Dying To Marry Read online

  Okay, I’m Holly van Winkle, and I’ve been asleep for twenty years, and things in Troutville, New Jersey, have changed. Morrows aren’t dirt poor and looked down upon. Dunhills aren’t wealthy beyond belief and downright mean. Lizzie and Dylan have been dating for a couple of years and he proposed and she accepted and they’re getting married, in the wedding that Lizzie has always dreamed of.

  Only it wasn’t possible. Troutville would never change. Dunhills would never change. And Lizzie couldn’t have changed so much in the month since Holly had last seen her that she was suddenly a completely different person, a person who mingled with the Dunhill crowd and had fallen in love with one.

  The last time Holly had spoken to Lizzie, her cousin wasn’t even dating anyone. In fact, Lizzie, who usually dated a different guy every weekend, had said she’d taken herself off the market and that she was concentrating on her photography. And that was only two weeks ago! Granted, Lizzie was spontaneous and impulsive, but she wasn’t crazy. Nor was she one to take love lightly.

  Yet somehow, as evidenced by the wedding invitation in Holly’s hand, Lizzie and Dylan had fallen madly in love in a few weeks’ time, he’d proposed, she’d accepted, and she was now planning a wedding—three weeks from this Saturday.

  Three weeks. Who got married after dating someone for two weeks and then rushed into marrying him? Who got married after five weeks? Celebrities, maybe. Then again, Lizzie’s husband-to-be was something of a celebrity, in Troutville, New Jersey, at least.

  “Mrs. Lizbeth Dunhill,” Lizzie breathed into the phone on a sigh. “Oh, Holly, doesn’t that sound so fancy? Me, a Dunhill! Can you believe it?”

  No, I can’t. I really can’t. This makes no sense!

  Holly glanced down at the invitation, at the flowery gold type on the cream paper. You are cordially invited to witness the marriage ... She wasn’t surprised that the parents of the bride and groom were not mentioned on the invitation.

  As Lizzie continued on about the particular shade of dark blue of Dylan’s eyes, the cleft in his chin and his “adorable toes,” Holly shot up from the chair.

  “You’re pregnant,” Holly blurted out. “That’s what this is about.”

  There was silence on the other end for a few moments. “Holly, I expect that kind of talk from just about everyone,” Lizzie said quietly, “but not from you. Never from you.”

  Guilt hit Holly in the stomach. “I’m sorry, honey,” she said. “I’m just shocked, that’s all.” Are you pregnant? Holly wondered. And would Dylan really marry you because you were? Doubtful.

  I don’t get any of this! Holly thought crazily. The world was perfectly normal the second before I opened the invitation!

  “I am so happy!” Lizzie exclaimed with her characteristic inability to remain angry with anyone—especially her cousin—for longer than ten seconds. “So, so happy. I’ve never felt this way before, Holly. Like my heart could just burst with how in love I am, how happy I am.”

  Holly took a deep breath. Lizzie deserved to be happy; she’d never had it easy.

  But a marriage to Dylan Dunhill was absurd.

  “Holly, I’m sorry I didn’t mention that Dylan and I were dating, let alone that we’d gotten so serious about each other, but I guess I wanted to keep the relationship to myself since I knew how everyone would react.”

  “How long were you dating before he proposed?” Holly asked. “And how did everyone react? What did your mom say?”

  “Ooh, there’s the doorbell,” Lizzie said. “It’s the florist with samples.”

  Convenient, Holly thought. What does Aunt Louise think of the relationship? Of having Dylan Dunhill as a son-in-law? Of having Victoria Dunhill as an in-law? The very idea was preposterous!

  “Oh, and Hol, the bridal party is going to meet next weekend to shop for my gown and bridesmaids dresses,” Lizzie said. “Do you believe we have an appointment at Bettina’s Bridal salon? Only the most expensive dress shop in town! Dylan told me to spare no expense for our wedding. Holly, you can come dress shopping, can’t you? I especially made our appointment for next weekend because I know summer school will be over for you by then and maybe you could even stay with me until the wedding. Oh, Holly, that would mean the world to me. There’s so much to do and hardly any time! And you will be my maid of honor, won’t you? I didn’t even think to ask—I just assumed!”

  Holly took a deep breath. “Of course, I’ll be your maid on honor, Lizzie. I’d do anything for you. You know that.” But stay in Troutville for three weeks? Could I do that? Holly wasn’t sure she could stomach Troutville for a half hour, let alone three weeks.

  “I do know that,” Lizzie said. “And the most important thing you can do for me is be happy for me. I know the sudden marriage must be quite a surprise, but Dylan and I are so happy together and we want to be married. We want to spend the rest of our lives together. He is so wonderful, Holly! I can’t wait for you to get to know him.”

  I could, Holly thought, then chastised herself. She owed Lizzie respect.

  “Did you get an invitation to the class reunion the weekend after next?” Lizzie asked. “I was, um, thinking of maybe going.”

  O-kay, Holly thought. Now I know I’m hearing things. My cousin couldn’t have possibly said she was actually going to our ten-year high school reunion. Voluntarily.

  “And since you’ll be in town,” Lizzie continued, “we could all go. The whole gang—me, you, Gayle, Flea. And Dylan, too, of course.”

  Of course. Because Dylan Dunhill always accompanied our gang, Holly thought sarcastically.

  “Lizzie, I don’t know about the reunion ...”

  “Well, we’ll see, then,” Lizzie said. “I’m just so excited you’re coming! I can’t wait to see you, Holly-Molly. It’s been way too long and there’s so much I have to tell you.”

  Such as how you and Dylan ever got to talking, let alone dating or marrying.

  “Oh, Holly,” Lizzie said, “I know it all must sound so strange to you, but love is love. It’s about caring and sharing and happiness—it’s not about who your family is or where you grew up.”

  It was in Troutville.

  “I can’t wait to tell the gang you’re coming!” Lizzie exclaimed. “Flea asks after you all the time, Holly. She’s missed you so much. Gayle, too. They’re going to be so excited!”

  Holly smiled as the image of Gayle, with her long red hair and movie-star smile, and Flea, with her pretty blue eyes and trademark black silk scarf around her neck, came to mind. “It’ll be great to see them,” Holly said, and she meant it. She hadn’t seen her old friends in way too long. “And it’ll be great to see you, too, Lizzie. No one’s missed anyone as much as I’ve missed you.”

  After promises to arrive promptly on the ten A.M. train next Saturday, Holly and Lizzie said their good-byes, Holly clamping her mouth around the many questions she had. And with a shake of her head to clear her mind of Troutville and Dylan and Lizzie’s impending marriage, Holly headed into the kitchen to start baking a masterpiece for the one wedding in her future that did make perfect sense.

  “You have a safe trip now, Holly-girl.”

  Holly set down her suitcase on the train platform and gave Ellie and her new husband of one week a kiss each on the cheek. “Thanks for seeing me off, you two.”

  Herbert wrapped Holly in a hug. “There’s nothing like going home for a visit,” he said. “Nothing like it at all.”

  Unless you’re me and headed to Troutville, Holly thought. And Troutville isn’t home.

  “Then again, home for me for the past few years was the senior center, and I much prefer my new home at Miss Ellie’s,” Herbert added. “She’s a much better cook—and much better-looking—than those busybodies at the center.”

  Ellie playfully swatted at Herbert. “Look, dear, your train is coming.”

  The train rumbled into the station, and Holly took a deep breath. This was one time she wouldn’t have minded if the train had been late.

  “Well
, you two just behave yourselves while I’m away,” Holly told them with a smile.

  Herbert swept Ellie up in his arms and very slowly spun her around. “Oh, we will, Holly, dear,” he said. “Behave like twenty-one-year-old newlyweds!”

  Holly laughed, hugged and kissed the couple, then boarded the train. She settled herself into a window seat, then turned to wave good-bye to Ellie and Herbert, but the sweet, elderly duo were doing a little slow dance on the platform. As Holly watched Herbert dip Ellie—as he’d done at least twenty times at their reception last weekend, she wondered about Lizzie and Dylan Dunhill—as she’d done at least a hundred times since Lizzie’s bombshell. She could not imagine the two of them talking, let alone dancing. Kissing. Doing anything, for that matter. Lizzie and Dylan.

  She had so many questions, questions that had been bouncing in her mind all week long. She’d been tempted to call Lizzie for answers, but Lizzie did sound happy, very happy, and Holly could not and would not give her cousin the third degree. Lizzie had always been very open with Holly, and she’d chosen to keep her relationship and engagement to Dylan a secret for a reason.

  Because I reacted exactly the way she feared, Holly thought.

  She owed Lizzie better than that, but the idea of Lizzie and Dylan engaged, planning a wedding, planning a life, was simply unbelievable. When did they start dating? How did his parents feel about the relationship? About the marriage? And what did Lizzie’s mother think of all this? Louise Morrow couldn’t possibly be pleased.

  Then again, perhaps Holly was being silly. Perhaps no one blinked an eye over the romance, over the announcement of the engagement. Perhaps Holly had been away from Troutville for so long that things had changed. Perhaps “Down Hill” now simply referred to the area of Troutville behind the railroad tracks, down the enormous hill from “Troutville proper” as the residents liked to refer to it. The railroad station, two bars, including one that hid a strip club in a back room, a truck stop, and an all-night grocery, made up Down Hill, which was populated by the folks who either owned or operated the businesses (though the strip club was patronized by the folks who lived up the hill). When Holly was growing up, Down Hill had been synonymous with downtrodden. With seedy. With less than. Up Hill, as the residents of Down Hill called it, was full of bank presidents and Fortune 500 chairmen and PTA leaders and debutantes. The difference between Up Hill and Down Hill was night and day. Money and none.

  Here comes Holly the Whore and Lay Me Lizzie and Good Time Gayle and Filthy Flea, the other kids would whisper—or shout—when the girls ventured Up Hill. And venture Up Hill they had to, since school and church and the shopping district were there.

  Holly hadn’t stepped foot in Troutville in ten years, since she graduated from high school and earned enough money by the end of that summer to help her parents afford a condo in Florida, where they’d always dreamed of living. Their branch of the Morrow family had finally bid Troutville good-bye. But Lizzie and her mother, like Gayle and Flea, had inexplicably stayed. We won’t be chased out of our home, our town, by people we don’t care a hoot about, Lizzie’s mother and father would say.

  But they had to care. How could they not? How did stares and leers and jeers and rumors and stories ever roll off your back?

  Holly the Whore. The first time Holly had heard herself called that, by a boy in Dylan Dunhill’s crowd, it hadn’t registered. She hadn’t understood. But by the tenth time, she’d understood that she’d gone from ignored thirteen-year-old to infamous thirteen-year-old. At thirteen and never-been-kissed, Holly Morrow had been called a whore—for what she hadn’t done—and the label had stuck, despite the fact that she’d graduated from high school a virgin.

  Jake Boone’s sweet seventeen-year-old face came into mind. “It doesn’t matter what people say you are, Holly. It only matters who you know you are,” Jake would say over and over. “Screw them!” he’d add vehemently, slamming a fist down on the table or the ground. “One day, when I’m a cop, I’m going to catch one of them spitting on the sidewalk or tossing a gum wrapper into the street or jaywalking, and I’m going to arrest them and throw them in jail!”

  Jake Boone. It had been ten long years since she’d seen him, but not since she’d thought about him. What she’d said the last night she saw him, prom night, still shamed her, still caused her to suck in her breath at how misguided she’d been. She wondered where he was now, what he was doing. If he still had to constantly push his thick dark hair out of his eyes. He’d had aspirations of being a cop like his father and grandfather, and Holly wondered if that dream had come true.

  As the train began to pull away, Holly waved good-bye to Ellie and Herbert, who stood with one arm around each other and one arm waving at Holly. At times like this, crazy times, when the world didn’t seem to make sense, Holly would long for her own partner, a husband. But in the past ten years, since living on her own, Holly hadn’t really connected with anyone, even though she’d met much nicer men than the belcher. Once, she’d overheard a few teachers talking about her in the teachers’ lounge at school; they were surprised that “such a pretty woman” had no life to speak of or that the male teachers weren’t beating down her classroom door for a date. One of the women sitting at the table had said it was because Holly was prickly—that was the exact word she’d used—a little standoffish; not so much with women, but with men, as though she didn’t trust them. She must have gotten hurt real bad once, added the woman. More than once, probably, said another. And that’ll do it, the third woman had put in.

  Yes, that’ll do it, Holly thought. What she wouldn’t give to feel someone’s strong arm around her shoulder. Someone to share things with, be with. Someone who’d see through the prickly attitude, the false primness, the veneer of tailored, conservative clothes.

  The way Jake Boone used to, she thought, leaning back against the headrest. For a few minutes, Holly let herself think of Jake, those dark blue eyes framed by dark, dark lashes, his voice, deep for a boy of seventeen, his muscular arm slung over her shoulder in friendship.

  At least Jake Boone won’t be in Troutville this weekend, Holly thought. She had no doubt that he’d hightailed it out of town the moment he could, just as she’d had, and that he’d never looked back, just as she hadn’t.

  You are looking back, Holly, she realized.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The cloying scent of whatever awful perfumes Pru Dunhill and Arianna Miller wore hit Jake Boone full in the face as he stepped onto the outdoor platform at the Troutville train station. Stop. Turn back. Run! he warned himself, but it was no use. A client’s train was due in at nine-thirty, and Jake had promised to meet the man on the platform. Besides, it was too late; Pru and Arianna had spotted him.

  “Why, if it isn’t Jake Boone in the flesh,” Pru said, her thin, pink-glossed lips stretched into a smile.

  Why Pru Dunhill couldn’t speak like a normal person was beyond Jake. She was always saying things like, Why, Jake Boone, I do declare that you’re looking very handsome today. Her brother Dylan, who had become one of Jake’s best friends after graduation, had told Jake that their mother had encouraged Pru from birth to conduct all conversations as though she were being interviewed on stage for the Miss America pageant. Pru had clearly listened to her mother. And decided that she was representing a southern state rather than New Jersey.

  She smoothed her long, wavy blond hair. “Arianna and I are waiting for the train from New York City. We have a girlfriend coming in for the weekend.” She suddenly dropped the stack of magazines in her arms. “Oops. Arianna, didn’t I say I shouldn’t try to carry so many magazines? But that’s me, always striving to do more than I possibly can.”

  Jake had to restrain himself from bursting out laughing at the absurdity of that. Pru went from the beauty salon to the movies to a friend’s house to a restaurant, and that was about the extent of her daily achievements.

  Arianna nodded at Pru and toyed with one of her light brown ringlets. “Jake, I always tell Pru she
has way too much on her plate, but will she listen? No, no, no, she just keeps on, helping, helping, helping. She absolutely insisted on meeting the train this morning to collect our friends herself instead of sending her family’s driver. I tell you, Pru is going to make someone an incredible wife, Jake. Why, she’s willing to do absolutely anything to make the world a better place. Imagine what she’d do for her own husband!”

  Jake would really rather not. With a silent sigh, he bent down to pick up the magazines for Pru, as he always did. Whenever they ran into each other, Pru dropped whatever she was carrying, Arianna went on and on about her attributes, and both women waited for Jake to kneel before Pru and admire her legs, her body, her femininity.

  And granted, she had a body to admire. Slender, yet curvy, with long legs always enhanced by heels and a dress that whished around just above her knees, Pru Dunhill was considered a hot babe by most of the men Jake knew. A hot babe no one—especially he—could tolerate for longer than five seconds, but a hot babe nonetheless. That she had a crush on him wasn’t lost on anyone. You are one lucky dude—sort of, his friends said often, running an eye up and down her lovely form, and probably thinking about her trust fund bank account.

  He felt anything but lucky at the moment. Jake was a polite man, an adjective that hadn’t always described him, and escaping Pru wasn’t as easy as nodding a hello and continuing on his way. She wasn’t the nicest person in the world—far from it—but she did have strong romantic feelings for him, and that was something that Jake would never handle carelessly, despite his complete lack of interest in her as a woman and a person. Personally, he found her detestable. She’d been cruel to people he cared about, one person in particular. It might have been a long time ago, but Pru was still as disdainful as ever of people she considered beneath her. Back in high school, Jake had been one of those people, and her feelings for him had driven her crazy. She hadn’t been just physically attracted to him, the bad boy. She’d liked him, really liked him, and it had tormented her. Prudence Dunhill, one of the wealthiest girls in Troutville, with Jake Boone, Down Hiller and son of a police officer who’d been on disability for years?