The Wedding Dress

To my husband, Dave, who has helped rescue more puppies than I can count. Thank you for twenty-six years of catching frightened strays and breaking up dogfights for me. You are never more my hero than when you utter that long-suffering sigh I love so much and say, “I’ll do it. I’ll heal faster.”

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter One

Emma’s World Shatters

TWENTY-EIGHT-YEAR-OLD Emma McDaniel winced as she recognized the headline blazing across the tabloid a college-aged girl was devouring in the airport baggage claim. Unfortunately, neither huddling deeper into the enveloping folds of her raincoat nor tugging the brim of her Witness Protection ball cap lower to shadow her face could shield Emma from the pain. She knew the fine print on the glossy cover by heart.

Jade Star actress faces studio insiders’ doubts to attempt role of a lifetime…Her beaming ex-husband brings home the baby she refused to give him.

Images in living color flashed into Emma’s head: The picture of Drew Lawson, the only man she’d ever loved, leaving the hospital in Whitewater, Illinois, his face aglow as he cradled his new daughter in his arms while Emma’s onetime best friend, Jessie, leaned against him, her shy face luminous. The joyous new parents stood out in sharp counterpoint to the paparazzi shots of Emma back in L.A., thronged by reporters clamoring for her reaction to the news about Drew’s child. She could still hear them shouting…

“Emma, your fans are dying to know how you feel.”

How the hell do you think I feel? She’d wanted to fling back at them. Read your own damned press clippings and you should be able to figure it out.

Instead, she’d given an Oscar-worthy performance, forcing a brilliant smile. “I know Drew will be a wonderful father…”

She’d always known he would be. But if she had to pretend one more time it didn’t hurt that he’d fathered a child with a different woman…

She shoved her sunglasses farther up her nose, praying no one would recognize her before she retrieved her luggage, found her ride and dropped off the face of the earth. But then, there were times Emma barely recognized herself anymore.

A tight, panicky feeling cinched Emma’s lungs as she surreptitiously scanned the crowd of passengers just arrived at Glasgow’s airport. And she felt suddenly, horribly exposed.

Emma, traveling alone is a really bad idea, her mother’s voice warned in her head. It could even be dangerous. If someone recognizes you before you meet up with this historical consultant, anything could happen.

Emma could get mobbed for autographs, pounced on by photographers, stalked by an obsessed fan…God, how had life gotten so insane? And why hadn’t she noticed until Drew walked out the door?

I need to get out of here, Emma thought, searching for the man who was supposed to meet her. Dr. Jared Butler, experimental archaeologist—whatever that was. The brilliant scholar who had made Castle Craigmorrigan and its heroic fourteenth-century lady his life’s work.

Ever since she’d gotten the call telling her to hop on the next flight to Scotland, Emma had pictured Butler as a cross between Albert Einstein and her high school history teacher—a single eyebrow crawling across his forehead like a runaway caterpillar, pop-bottle-thick glasses, frizzy white hair and rumpled tweed suits bought sometime in the 1930s. But there wasn’t a genius in sight.

A surly dark-haired man in a cream sweater slouched in a plastic molded chair and scowled at a book that looked heavy enough to be used as a murder weapon. A cluster of exuberant American kids on tour crowded around a teacher who was taking a head count. Businessmen with briefcases eyed their wristwatches as the luggage started spilling onto the conveyor belt.

But no one held the sign Emma’s director had promised would be waiting for her when she stepped off the plane. Not a discreet card reading E. M. in sight. Nobody even seemed to be searching the crowd with that somewhat awed expression she’d come to know after six years of being swept from movie set to movie set.

“Where the hell is he?” she muttered, peering past families hugging each other and vacationing trekkers ready to wallow in Scotland’s wild beauty.

For an instant Emma wished she’d taken her mother up on her offer to accompany her, help her settle in. But Emma had spent enough time grieving for all the things that would never be. It was time she learned how to be alone.

She had to focus on the one thing that mattered now. The sign from God that her luck had changed. The part of a lifetime she’d thought beyond her reach was hers now.

By accident, a voice reminded her. If Angelica Robards hadn’t fallen off a horse and landed in traction, you’d still be trapped in L.A., being hammered by the studio to stick to what you do best. A fifth sequel of Jade Star.

Okay, so it was true what insiders said—that the screen-play for Lady Valiant had been written specifically for Angelica Robards. The Meryl Streep of Emma’s generation had told the world and Jay Leno the tale of how she had first heard of Lady Aislinn from locals during her honeymoon in Scotland. A pub owner had pointed her to an obscure book this genius Butler had written, and Angelica had fallen head-over-heels in love with the story. The actress had given her new husband, one of Hollywood’s most gifted directors, no peace until Barry presented the script to her as an anniversary gift the following year. But no matter what the Robards’ intentions had been, the part of Lady Aislinn was Emma’s now.

Emma’s opportunity to show the world that she was more than futuristic gizmos and special effects. Emma’s chance to break out of the role that had left her typecast and her career dead in the water.

Well, not her career, Emma had to admit to herself. The character of Jade Star was still box office gold. It was Emma’s creativity that was drowning, her love of her craft, her dreams of playing roles that tested not only her physical strength, but the depth of her heart.

And portraying the Scotswoman who’d defied Scotland’s most ruthless villain in 1305 would demand every shred of courage Emma could find within herself. She would have to dig deeper, reach further, strip her emotions so raw that the audience would be as devastated as Emma had been at the end of the script, when the brave lady of Castle Craigmorrigan plunged to her death off the rugged, sea-swept cliff.

And at the end of the ordeal, maybe, just maybe Emma would find herself.

She dove for her suitcase as it whizzed past, wrestling it off the conveyor, the simple black bag so heavy it almost dislocated her shoulder. The ball cap fell off, dislodging her sunglasses, her trademark black curls tumbling down from the elastic band she’d bundled them into an ocean ago. Cover blown, she thought miserably as a screech sounded from across the room.

“Ohmigod!”

Emma knew in her gut it was Tabloid Girl. She felt some of the other passengers glance her way, but fortunately most were still too engrossed in retrieving their own luggage to pay much attention.

Tabloid Girl clutched the magazine to her chest and rushed toward Emma, breathless. “It’s you, isn’t it? It really is you!” Her voice dropped to an awed whisper. “Emma McDaniel.”

Emma retrieved her cap, but there was no point in trying to stuff the genie back in the bottle. She shoved the hat in her giant black purse. “You must be thinking of the other Emma McDaniel,” she attempted to joke. The one who could have run through the middle of an airport half naked without anyone noticing. Well, maybe someone would.

“I adored your last movie,” the girl enthused. “The special effects were amazing.”

If the glossy tabloid cover hadn’t been right in Emma’s line of sight, she could have managed to be a lot more gracious. Instead, Emma cursed the man who was supposed to meet her. Where the hell was Butler? A few minutes more and this girl would be asking the pain-and-heartbreak questions everyone seemed to level at Emma these days.

“My name’s Sandy,” the girl supplied, thrusting out the hand that wasn’t clutching the tabloid.

“Sandy,” Emma repeated, briefly shaking the girl’s hand. “I’m glad you liked the movie, but I can hardly take credit for the special effects.”

“Can I ask you a question?”

Emma stared pointedly at the tabloid. “As a matter of fact, I’ve decided never to answer a question again.”

The girl flushed, glancing down at the lurid headline. “Oh, God. You must hate magazines like this. Articles about…well, your creep of an ex-husband. What pond scum!”

If only Emma could relegate Drew to slime level, her life would be so much easier. She gritted her teeth, determined to keep quiet. Sandy just rushed on.

“Running off with your best friend—what a jerk.”

“I knew Jessie a lifetime ago, in high school.” Damn, Emma cursed herself. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t rise to the bait. “Listen, Sandy, I appreciate your support, but I really don’t want to talk about this.”

“And why should you? I say good riddance to the asshole. I mean, who needs him when you get paid to kiss guys like Tom Cruise and Mel Gibson? And your last movie—wow! What was it like? Having Brad Pitt look you in the eyes like that, loving you, knowing he could never have you because he was turning into a werewolf? Women all through the theater were having spontaneous orgasms.”

“Actually, Brad wasn’t even in the room when we shot that scene. I was talking to a white stick that gave me a focal point so I knew where the computer-generated wolf-guy would be once they put him in.”

“Oh.” The girl sighed in disappointment.

Emma could just imagine Sandy’s reaction if she told the whole truth. That she’d barely noticed Brad, werewolf or otherwise, during the filming because she’d been sick to her stomach most of the time, knowing that with every Jade line she spoke she was digging herself deeper into the creative wasteland where typecast actors lived.

What an odd sensation, the whole world believing she was a roaring success when she could feel everything she treasured slipping through her fingers. If she’d known how much top billing Jade would cost her, would she have taken the part at all?

Emma’s heart squeezed, remembering how hungry she’d been to get on stage—fresh out of drama school, newly married, so full of dreams about how wonderful life would be.

Now here she was an ocean away from her life with Drew, her palms sweating with self-doubt as she prepared for her first new role in six years. Feeling so disillusioned that the Emma who’d spent her honeymoon gorging on the Broadway shows she was determined to star in seemed like a stranger.

Sandy grimaced. “I guess sometimes it’s better not to know about all that movie magic stuff, you know? It kind of ruins things.”

“Maybe you should try reading a book.”

The low burr of the sexiest Scottish accent Emma had ever heard sent a shiver of attraction through her. She turned to see who the voice belonged to and found herself face-to-face with the surly dark-haired man she’d noticed earlier. The Scot stared at the tabloid’s headline, every fiber of his being radiating scorn.

And there was a whole lot of being to radiate. From the time Emma had hit her growth spurt, she had been one of the tallest kids in class. Some of her leading men had to wear risers in their shoes. But this guy loomed over her by at least six inches, one of his big hands holding the “murder weapon” as negligently as if it were a postcard, his cable-knit sweater doing nothing to soften shoulders Brad Pitt would have envied. Wind-tousled mahogany hair curled in thick waves about a face hewn rugged as the Scottish crags she’d seen in books she’d used for research. Two days’ worth of stubble darkened a belligerent jut of jaw.

Fierce green eyes burned into Emma’s with such intensity she shifted her own a few inches down his face, instinctively trying to shield herself from a gaze designed to strip souls of their secrets.

She knew in a heartbeat she’d jumped straight into the fire. For an instant, she forgot to breathe as her gaze locked on one of God’s nastier practical jokes.

This arrogant bundle of raw testosterone had the most amazing mouth Emma had ever seen. Soul-blisteringly sensual, just a whisper sensitive, the left side of his full upper lip curling a fraction higher than the right.

A woman could get herself into big trouble if she spent much time around a mouth like that.

“Ms. McDaniel. You’ll have to excuse me,” he drawled. “I didn’t recognize you without your spandex suit.”

Ouch. Too bad the man’s personality wasn’t as gorgeous as his looks.

“I never wear spandex when I fly,” Emma countered breezily. “It seems to distract the pilots.” For once she wished she really was armed with the freeze blaster she’d carried in the last Jade Star—she’d point it at this jerk’s face and turn him into a giant snow cone.

He turned toward Sandy, then slid the tabloid out of the girl’s hand. “I’ll be doing you a favor by getting rid of this thing. Between movies like Jade Star and gossip rags like this, it’s amazing you have a single functioning brain cell left.”

Sandy looked as if the man had kicked her puppy. Okay, so the tabloid was trash, but Sandy was already embarrassed Emma had caught her with the thing—utter humiliation wasn’t necessary.

Emma pasted on her ice-queen face as she flashed him the glare that had made Robert de Niro back down in Jade III: Revenge of the Star Demon. “Actually, I was about to autograph the article for Sandy,” she said, digging a pen from her purse. “I wouldn’t be anywhere if it weren’t for the support of my fans.” Emma cringed as the words spilled out of her mouth. So much for keeping a low profile.

“By all means, sign your picture.” He held the tabloid out to Emma as if he were disposing of a dead rat. “I wouldn’t dream of coming between you and your work.”

“And I wouldn’t dream of coming between you and whatever it is you do when you’re not butting into conversations that are none of your business.”

She scooped the tabloid out of the man’s hand and made a huge deal out of choosing which of the pictures to sign as she waited for the jerk to go away. But he stayed put, as persistent as chewing gum in the tread of her little sister’s running shoes. Finally she scrawled her name in red ink across the picture of her brittle smile. Emma the actress, pretending not to care.

Pretending, just like she was pretending now. She handed the magazine to Sandy, who thanked her and fled into the crowd. Then Emma snapped up the handle on her suitcase and started to wheel it toward the exit.

A hard hand flashed out, grabbing her by the arm. She whirled around, heart hammering against her chest. Sexy Mouth was so close she could feel his breath hot on her cheek. Alarm prickled the hair at Emma’s nape.

“Take your hand off me,” she warned. Her right arm swept up hard. The man swore in surprise and pain as she broke his hold, the book he held in his other hand crashing onto the toe of his scuffed leather boot. If there was a God, Sexy Mouth should have a bruise the size of Manhattan come morning.

“Bloody hell!” Green eyes fired with fury. One second too late, she remembered her stepfather’s warning about the defense moves her ex-Army Ranger grandfather had taught her as a child. The old man’s tricks are great, but don’t ever pull them on somebody who really could kick your ass or you might get a nasty surprise.

The Scot glanced around, evidently aware people were starting to stare. His rugged cheeks darkened. Jake had been right. Making this stranger mad wasn’t the smartest thing she’d ever done. The Scotsman rubbed his arm, hard biceps outlined against the cream-colored yarn as he took a menacing step toward her.

“Do I have to call security?” Emma demanded, searching for a uniformed guard.

“Go ahead. Try it.” His gaze pierced her. “I’m the one who nearly got a broken arm here. I figure I’ve already got you on assault, hands down.” Too late Emma could hear warning bells that sounded a lot like lawsuit, lawsuit.

“Listen, Mr…” She didn’t know his name, but he sure as heck knew hers. Not good, Emma. Not good. “I’d like to say it’s been nice talking to you, but that would be a lie.”

“Isn’t that what actresses do for a living?” he asked cynically. “Lie?”

Emma’s breath hissed between her teeth. She couldn’t remember the last time anyone had made her this furious. Hadn’t felt any emotion this sharp since she’d plunged into the haze of regrets and grief, rejection and self-doubt that had plagued her for the past two years.

“Why, you pompous, arrogant…”

“Have you made enough of a scene?” he asked. “Or do you want me to have the PA system announce to the whole world you’re here?”

“I don’t want you to do a damned thing except leave me alone!”

“That makes two of us. But it looks like we’re stuck with each other.”

“No. We’re not. Because I’m leaving.”

The left corner of those wicked lips ticked up a notch. “You want to walk to the excavation site in those ridiculous shoes, it’s fine with me. I’ll see you sometime next month.”

“Excavation site?” Horror flooded through Emma. “Oh, God.” So much for rumpled suits bought sometime during the 1930s. The man standing before her hadn’t even been born then. And as for life’s work…how long could that amount to with this guy? All of ten years? “Please,” she said, knowing the axe was about to fall, “don’t tell me you’re—”

“Dr. Jared Butler at your service, milady.” He executed a bow dripping with sarcasm, ridiculous in the modern-day airport, and yet strangely suiting him better than a handshake ever would.

Emma’s stomach flip-flopped as his eyes narrowed on her.

“I own you for the next six weeks,” he growled, “or until you come to your senses and ‘cry hold, enough.’ Or did you skip MacBeth on the way to your spaceship?”

Emma couldn’t help but wince. Kids in high school drama class knew calling “The Scottish Play” by its name was bad luck. But then, could her luck get any worse?

“‘Lay on, MacDuff,’” Emma quoted the play, challenge in her eyes.

“The bottom line is this,” Butler said, ignoring her, “Barry Robards hired me to teach his lead actress how to live, how to move, how to breathe medieval Scotland. How to be Lady Aislinn. That’s right—it’s pronounced Ash-leen. You can start by saying her name correctly. You Yanks have been massacring it for two years now.”

“Well, this Yank looked it up in a Celtic baby-name book the first time she saw the script, so you can move on to more important things.”

“Fine. How about this, then? When Barry Robards asked me to take on the role of historical consultant, I figured I’d have a fair chance of success with Angelica Robards to work with. But you?” He snorted in derision.

Emma glared. “Why don’t you tell me how you really feel?”

“I might as well.” He crossed his arms over that impressive chest. “I told anybody at the studio who’d talk to me that you’ll never be a believable Lady Aislinn.”

This arrogant jerk who spent all his time digging up dead people had been complaining to the studio about her being cast? Who did Jared Butler think he was?

“So now you’re an expert on acting?”

His scruffy-looking chin tipped at an angle that made her want to smash it. “I know what it will take to portray Lady Aislinn. Courage, intelligence, tenacity,” he asserted, a sudden distance in his eyes, as if he saw a world beyond the Scottish mist. “She held Castle Craigmorrigan for eight months, besting Sir Brannoc with no weapon but her wits. There’s a subtlety about her, a…”

“And you know this how? Did you have a chat with her sarcophagus? Or did some psychic channel her for you?”

Butler’s eyes flashed and Emma realized she’d managed to strike a nerve, get back some of her own.

But the good doctor was quick, almost as accomplished as Emma at shuttering vulnerability away.

“Why don’t you save us both a lot of trouble and just head for some ritzy spa on the French Riviera,” he challenged. “Go back where you belong.”

“According to Barry Robards, I belong right here. Playing Lady Aislinn. And if that means I have to deal with you for six weeks, I guess we’ll both just have to suffer. I have to admit one thing though, Dr. Butler. You are a brilliant teacher. I’ve known you all of five minutes and you’ve already helped me get into character. I can’t wait to get a sword up to your throat.”

Butler rolled his eyes. “I told the bloody screenwriter that part of the legend is rubbish. There isn’t a woman alive who could beat a seasoned knight and get a blade to his throat.”

If Butler had smacked her cheek with a gauntlet the challenge couldn’t have been any clearer. Adrenaline rushed through Emma. She was going to make the man eat his words if it was the last thing she did.

“You’re quite sure it’s impossible?” she inquired with acid sweetness.

“I’d stake my life on it.”

“Hmm.” Emma laid one finger along her cheek, considering for a moment. Suddenly her gaze dropped to the bulge in his brown canvas cargo pants. “Maybe I’ll just aim a whole lot lower.”

Ten minutes in Scotland and she’d already declared war.

Chapter Two

“NOTHING LIKE HATE at first sight to make a lady feel welcome,” Emma muttered under her breath as Butler all but rolled his battered Mini Cooper on yet another hairpin corner. The right shoulder of the narrow road plunged down in a boulder-strewn cliff, while a dozen yards to the left, a mountain soared skyward. If it weren’t for the biting chill that had whipped her raincoat in the airport parking lot and the lowering thunderheads gathering on the horizon, she might have been tempted to get out and walk to Castle Craigmorrigan.

Her legs ached from bracing herself against the floorboards, her fingers clamped in the upholstery to keep her arm from touching his. For God’s sake, could the man take up any more room? It was like being wedged in a clown car with MacTavish the Pissed-Off Scot Giant. Not to mention the fact that Butler’s testosterone overload was sucking up all the oxygen in the cab of this ridiculously small vehicle.

“Getting us both killed isn’t going to do you any good,” Emma said.

“You’re right.” The corner of Butler’s sexy mouth twisted. “I’m already in hell.”

Before Emma could think of a comeback, a fuzzy brownish-red hill loomed in their path. Emma choked back a scream as Butler swerved with annoying expertise, the car bouncing over the road’s shoulder so hard the top of Emma’s head hit the roof in spite of her seat belt.

She whispered a Hail Mary, sandwiched for a heartbeat between mountain wall and the weirdest cow she’d ever seen. She glimpsed long horns and terrified bovine eyes all but buried under a shaggy red topknot as the car sped past. Butler wrestled the toy car back onto the road, spraying gravel in his wake.

No doubt about it, Emma thought. She was going to die. But damn if she was going to give Jared Butler the satisfaction of knowing he was rattling her nerves before they’d even reached the castle.