RUNAWAY Read Online Free Page B

grimaced. “We’re complete strangers to each other, aren’t we?”
    A flush rose up her neck and she looked away again. “Eat your lunch.”
    He picked up half the sandwich with his good hand. “What about you?”
    “I’m not hungry.”
    She’d eaten like a bird those days in Las Vegas. And drank like a fish? But no, although they’d spenta fair amount of time in the bar at their hotel and also poolside with those froufrou, umbrella-topped drinks, he didn’t think alcohol had played a major role in the tipsy feeling he’d felt in her company—and in the spur-of-the-moment decision they’d made to say “I do” to the strains of “Blue Suede Shoes.”
    “I blame Will and Emily,” he muttered. “We were under the influence of their first-love vibes.”
    He heard a small, heartfelt sigh and shot Izzy a disgruntled look. That was the kind of thing that had gotten them into trouble five weeks ago. Those sweet little sighs, that soft look on her face, the dreamy expression in her eyes when she’d looked at her best friend, Emily, who had happened to run into Owen’s best friend, Will, at the hotel. The other two had been childhood summer sweethearts and then lost touch after Will’s parents had died, leaving him the sole support of his five brothers and sisters.
    Their chance meeting had ended in Will and Emily making a date for drinks later, and they’d each dragged along their best friend. So there it was, Will and Emily, Owen and Izzy. They’d been witness to hours of amusing reminiscing, which included the long-ago vow the other two had once made to each other. “If only,” Owen said now, “they’d not dreamed up that stupid promise to marry each other if they both weren’t wed by thirty.”
    “Not so stupid now,” Izzy said, perching on theend of the mattress, beyond where his feet were propped on pillows. “They’re moving in together.”
    Owen looked over. “Huh?” Last he remembered, right before they’d been called out to the fire, Will had been wondering how two such smart single guys like themselves had somehow got themselves hitched.
    “I talked to Emily last night. Apparently what Will went through during the fire gave them both a clearer perspective on the promise they made in Las Vegas to love and cherish. They’re a real couple now.”
    “Huh?” he said again. Will had come by his hospital room but had not a said a word about what he’d worked out with his wife. Maybe he hadn’t wanted to rub it in. “Really?”
    “She’s packing boxes as we speak, and his ring is back on her finger.”
    Owen’s gaze jumped from Izzy’s face to her left hand. She’d had a ring, too. A simple gold circle that had come as part of the “Blue Suede and Gold Band” wedding package at the Elvis Luvs U Wedding Chapel. He remembered how her hand had trembled in his as he’d slid it down the short length of her slim finger. He remembered the tremulous smile on her lips and the glow in her eyes and how that dizziness he felt now he’d felt then, too, because she was so damn pretty and so…
    His.
    He’d liked the thought of that. He’d believed that what they’d had was real and could really work.

    Before she’d left him and not bothered with a phone call or even an e-mail for thirty-seven days.
    What was real was that he’d been an idiot. They’d both been idiots in that wedding chapel. “What the hell were we thinking?” he ground out again.
    She shrugged, then studied the bedspread beside her. “I’d been having a pretty stressful time at the librarians’ convention. Not everyone is onboard with doing away with Dewey.”
    “Yeah. I remember having to pull you from a debate with a couple of crazies wearing T-shirts reading ‘Melvil Now and Forever.’”
    “Melvil Dewey.” Izzy nodded. “Outside of Emily, I’d been a pariah for the five days before I met you. It was refreshing to have someone who looked at me with such, um…um…”
    “Lust?” he provided