Excerpt of Just Married! by Shirley Jump, Cara Colter

"Ladies, if you would gather by the chocolate fountain,
Mrs. Charles Weston is about to throw her bouquet."
Colton St. John had been best man at the wedding of two of
his oldest friends, and now he was acting as the master of
ceremonies.

The town had been founded by his forefathers, and leadership
came easily to him. At twenty-eight, the dark-haired,
blue-eyed Colton would have been a more likely movie star
than a law school graduate and the youngest mayor St.
John's Cove had ever elected.

Not that Samantha Hall, bridesmaid, was admiring the
confidence and finesse of her dear friend, Colton, at the
moment.

It's nearly over, she told herself as she slid toward the exit of the St. John's Cove Yacht Club. It was hard to be unobtrusive in the bridesmaid's gown that Amanda—make that Mrs. Charles Weston—had chosen. Amanda had glowingly described the color as fuchsia, but it wasn't. The dress was the exact shade of pink Sam's current stray rescued dog, Waldo, had thrown up after eating the Jell-O salad Sam had made for Amanda's bridal shower earlier in the week. As if the color wasn't hideous enough, Sam considered the dress just a little too everything for a wedding. Between hitching up the hem so she wouldn't trip over it, pulling the tiny spaghetti straps back on her shoulders every time they slipped down, and tugging at the plunging V-line of the bodice, the dress had felt like a full-time job since she had first put it on nearly twelve hours ago.

Even her three older brothers, who usually teased
unmercifully when she put on "girl" clothes, had
gone silent when she had come out to the car and they'd
seen the dress for the first time.

"I thought you said it looked like dog puke," her
oldest brother, Mitch, had said, holding open the door of
his ancient station wagon for her. She was driving with her
brothers to the wedding because she couldn't manage the
clutch of her Land Rover in the three-inch heels, plus was
afraid of splitting the hind end out of the dress getting in
and out of her higher vehicle.

And then Mitch had done the oddest thing. He'd kissed
her cheek and said, almost sadly, "When did you go and
grow up, Sam?"

Since she'd been living in her own apartment above the
business she had founded here in St. John's Cove after
graduating from high school seven years ago, his comment had
been insulting rather than endearing.

Trust a man! Show a little too much cleavage, pile your hair
on top of your head and put on a bit of makeup, and you were
all grown-up.

Her brothers' reaction had foreshadowed an uncomfortable
evening. Guys she had spent her whole life in this small
Cape Cod hamlet with—boating and swimming and fishing—had
been sending her sidelong looks as if she'd gone and
grown a second head.

Thankfully most of them were too scared of her brothers to
do anything about it except gawk.

Though there was one man—he'd been introduced in the
reception line on the steps of St. Michael's Church as
Amanda's cousin, Ethan Ballard—who hadn't been able
to take his eyes off of her through the whole evening.

He was gorgeous, too. Tall, lean, broad-shouldered. Dark.
Dark eyes, dark hair.

Sam killed the intrigue he made her feel.

He'd asked her to dance four times, but she'd said
no. Even his voice gave her the shivers, deep and measured.

The truth was she didn't know how to dance, and
wasn't going to make a fool of herself by trying for the
first time in the heels. The truth was, Ethan was asking the
illusion to dance. If he'd seen her in her normal
duds—rolled-up jeans, sneakers, a faded shirt that
advertised her pet store and supply business, Groom to Grow,
he would have never looked that interested.

Of course, there was always the possibility one of the local
guys had dared him to show interest in her, or offered him
twenty bucks to dance with her.

Knowing that any man in St. John's Cove who went near
Samantha Hall was going to have to run the gauntlet of her
brothers.

Sam glanced over to where Ethan was standing, one shoulder braced against the wall, his tie undone, his crisp white shirt open against the end-of-June early-summer heat in the reception room. He was nursing a drink and still looking at her.

And he didn't look like a fool, either. Ethan Ballard
radiated the confidence, wealth and poise one would expect
from a businessman from Boston.

He raised his glass to her, took a long, slow sip without
taking his eyes from her. Now how could that possibly seem
suggestive, make her insides melt into hot liquid?

How about because she hadn't had a date in over a year? And that date had been with a sumpie—she and her friends' pet name for summer people—because the locals were afraid to ask her out. And with good reason. After one drink, her brother Mitch had shown up at the Clam Digger, glowering and flexing muscles earned from plying his strength and guts against the waters of the Atlantic to make his living as a lobsterman.

To the local male population, she was Sam, not Samantha. She
could outrun, outsail and outswim most of them—it was a
well-known fact no one had beaten her in a race to the buoys
since she was sixteen. But even if the local young men
weren't totally intimidated by that, nobody wanted to
deal with the Hall brothers, Mitch, Jake and Bryce, when it
came to their little sister.

Which was okay with her. Fairy tales had finished for her
family when her mom and dad had been killed in a boating
accident when she was twelve. Mitch, newly married, had
stepped up to the plate and taken in his siblings, but his
wife, Karina, had not bargained for a ready-made family of
two rowdy teenage brothers, and a twelve-year-old girl
swimming in pain. Karina, Sam's one chance for a bit of
feminine influence, had jumped ship.

Her brothers had raised her so she could fight but not put on makeup, handle a fishing rod but not wear heels, arm wrestle but not dance. They'd given her an earful about what men really wanted.

Plus, all three of her brothers had taken Karina's
abandonment personally and were commitment phobic, and so
was she.

Most of the time. Occasionally Sam felt this odd little tug
of wistfulness. She felt it when she watched couples walk
hand in hand along the beach at sunset, she felt it when old
Mr. and Mrs. Nelson came into her shop, their teasing
affection for one another reminding Sam of her mom and dad.

And Sam had felt it with surprising strength when Charlie
and Amanda had exchanged their vows earlier at St.
Michael's, Amanda glowing, and Charlie choking up on
emotion.

Sam's own eyes had teared up, and she was so
unaccustomed to that, she didn't have a tissue, and so
unaccustomed to mascara that she didn't know crying in
it would have unfortunate consequences.

And she had reacted like that even though she personally
felt that if there were ever two people who should not have
gotten married, it was Charlie and Amanda!

The pair were part of a tight-knit group of six friends,
Colton St. John, Vivian Reilly and Sam's brother Bryce,
who had been hanging out together since grade school. Sam
was the youngest of the group—she had started as a tagalong
with Bryce. Amanda and Charlie had been dating on and off
since they were fourteen, their relationship punctuated with
frequent drama, constant squabbling, and hundreds of
breakups and makeups.

Ah. Sam's hand connected with the steel bar of the exit door of the reception hall. She pushed, caught a whiff of the fresh June breeze coming in off the bay. Freedom. On an impulse, she turned and wagged her fingers at Ethan Ballard, goodbye.

"Oh, no, you don't," Vivian Reilly said. Vivian,
also a charter member of the Group of Six, was the other
bridesmaid, and she caught Sam's arm just as she was
halfway out the door.

"How come the dress doesn't look like dog puke on
you?" Sam asked, wishing she could take back that
impulsive wag of the fingers.

The color of the dress should have clashed with Vivian's
incredible red hair, but, of course, it didn't. Vivian
looked leggy and beautiful, but then Vivian could wear a
grain sack and make it look sexy. If anything, the dress was
slightly more demure than Vivian's usual style.

"It mustn't look all that bad on you, either,"
Vivian said with a laugh. "Check out that man staring at
you. I'm getting heat stroke from it. He's glorious.
Ethan something? Amanda's cousin?"

Ethan Ballard. Sam remembered his name perfectly, not to
mention the touch of his hand in that reception line.
Lingering. Sam slid Amanda's cousin another look, and
looked away, though not before her heart tumbled in her
chest, and she felt the tug of something a lot stronger than
the wistfulness she felt when she looked at old Mr. And Mrs.
Nelson picking out a new collar for their badly spoiled Pom,
Duffy.

Ethan Ballard was glorious. And no doubt just as superficial as every other guy in the world, including her brothers. She did not kid herself that the good-looking cousin would have given her a second look if her hair was pulled back into its usual no-nonsense ponytail, her eyes were not smudged with the plum shadow that Vivian and Amanda insisted made them look greener, and her chest wasn't falling out of the embarrassingly low-cut dress.

The door clicked shut again, and Sam, resigned, tugged at
the dress. She glanced up to see Ethan Ballard watching, an
amused smile playing at the handsome, firm line of his wide
mouth.

There was that hot rush again, so she stuck her nose in the
air so he wouldn't ever guess.

"Come on," Vivian said, steering Sam back toward the
gaggle of giggling single girls and women waiting for the
traditional throwing of the bouquet. "Be a sport."

Amanda was standing at the front of the room now, still
glowing, a queen looking benevolently at her subjects. No
doubt she was kidding herself that this was the best day of
her life, Sam thought cynically.

As soon as Vivian let go of her arm, Sam moved way up to the
front of the gathering of hopefuls. She'd played ball
with the bride, and Amanda had a strong throwing arm. As
long as she didn't do the I'm-cute-and-helpless
routine, that bouquet should sail right over Sam's head
and hit old Mable Saunders in the back row.

Sixty and never married.

Which will probably be me someday, Sam thought, and given that she was cynical about the institution of marriage she was not sure why the thought made her feel more wistful—and gloomy—than before.

The truth was the whole day had made her feel gloomy, not
just because she didn't hold out much hope for Amanda
and Charlie—why would they be the one out of two couples who
succeeded when they hadn't ever managed to go more than
three days in their whole relationship without a
squabble—but because Sam didn't like change.

Her five friends were the unchangeable anchor in her life.
Vivian, Amanda, Charles, Colton and Sam's brother Bryce
had all hung out together for as long as she could remember.
Oh, some of them moved, went to college, came back, but the
ties remained unbreakable. The constancy of family and
friendships were what made life in the small Cape Cod
community idyllic for its three thousand permanent residents.

This was the biggest change they had experienced. A wedding.
Sam didn't like it. She didn't like it one bit.

Though she had to admit Amanda did look beautiful in her
wedding dress, beaming at them all from the front of the room.

The dress, considering the sudden haste to get married, was
like something out of a fairy tale, a princess design of a
tight-fitting beaded bodice and full floor-length skirt with
about sixty-two crinolines underneath it.

Amanda's eyes met hers, full of mischief, so Sam was
relieved when someone suggested Amanda turn around with her
back to them all, so she couldn't choose who to toss the
bouquet to. As soon as Amanda did turn around, Sam shuffled
positions, moving closer to the burbling chocolate fountain,
still close to the front, gambling on Amanda's good arm.

What she couldn't have gambled on was this: Amanda threw
the bouquet over her shoulder with all her might. It arched
up and up and up toward the ceiling.

Those who really were eager to catch the thing moved back in
anticipation of where it would fall back to earth.

But the bouquet hit an exposed beam, and instead of
completing its arc, it fell straight down like a duck shot
out of the sky.

It was going to land right in the middle of the chocolate
fountain.

Unless someone intervened.

For an uncharitable moment, Sam swore it was not going to be
her.

But she caught a glimpse of the horrified look on
Amanda's face and wondered in that split second if it
wasn't some kind of bad luck for the bouquet not to be
caught, to land smack dab in the middle of a pool of
burbling chocolate.

Amanda and Charlie were going to need all the luck they
could get.

Reluctantly Sam reached out an arm, and the bouquet fell
into her hand as if it had been destined to find her.

A cheer went up, though she could hear the lusty challenge
of Mitch.

"Anyone who thinks they're going to marry my sister
is going to have to arm wrestle me first."

Sam smiled, with so many teeth she felt like a dog snarling,
waved the bouquet and headed for the exit.

So that's my future wife, Ethan Ballard thought, watching the bridesmaid head out the exit onto the stone veranda that faced the sea. He bet she was going to hurl that bouquet right off of there, too. He hadn't missed her thwarted attempt at escape earlier, or the way she had looked during the dinner and the toasts. Cynical. Uncomfortable. Bored.

The least romantic woman in the room. Perfect.

He'd been pretty sure she was the one from the moment
he'd laid eyes on her. Despite the sexy outfit, and the
abundance of rich chocolate upswept hair, he could tell by
the sunburn and freckles that she was the wholesome,
outdoorsy type that he imagined the Finkles would love.

She'd be perfect for the task he had in mind. When
he'd held her hand a little too long in the reception
line she'd yanked it away and given him a dirty look
with those sea-mist eyes of hers.

Ditto for his offers to dance with her. Though Ethan felt faintly stung—who didn't want to dance with him—it boded well for his plan.

Samantha Hall was the girl least likely to appreciate his
offer of marriage. Least likely to want anything else once
the assignment was over.