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“Limousines,” Zack said.

  “Limousines,” Julie repeated into the phone.

  When she hung up, Zack looked at her and all of his impatience turned to admiration. Despite the incredible pressure Julie was under, getting ready for their wedding at the end of the week, she never lost her cool. Rachel had spent months of time on their wedding and a quarter million dollars of Zack’s money to create a three-ring media circus that required the efforts of two publicists and an army of servants, consultants, and assistants to pull off, and Rachel had been used to dealing with the pressures of public life. Even so, by the day of the wedding, Rachel had been behaving like a frantic virago for weeks and popping tranquilizers like M&Ms.

  Julie had spent a week on their wedding with only the help of Katherine and the long-distance aid of Zack’s competent California staff. At the same time, she had continued with her regular job and arranged to sublease her house, and she had neither lost her temper nor slighted Zack. Because the entire citizenry of Keaton had gone so far out of their way to make Zack feel comfortable and welcome and because Julie was so much a part of their town, the decision had been made to limit the guests at the afternoon wedding ceremony to family and close friends, but to invite all of the Mathisons’ vast circle of friends and acquaintances to the evening reception, which was scheduled to take place in the park. The decision to invite 650 people instead of having a small, intimate reception had been made at Zack’s urging. In the days that he had been here, he’d enjoyed more honest companionship with decent, down-to-earth people than he’d ever known in his entire life. Despite his complaints, he’d thoroughly enjoyed the simple things they’d done together while he was here. He’d liked dancing with her in a restaurant where friends of theirs joined them without ever intruding; he’d loved going to the movie in town with her, eating stale popcorn, necking in the back row, and then walking her home, holding her hand in the balmy night air. Last night, he’d played pool at the senior Cahills’ house with Ted and his friends, while Julie, Katherine, and the other wives brought in food and cheered their men on, and then he’d watched in amazement as Julie took on the winner— and beat him.

  Somehow she’d managed to do all that as well as make arrangements with a dozen local women to handle the catering for the reception, hire musicians, go over the music selections, order flowers from the local florist, and arrange for white canopies to be sent down from Dallas to be used in the park by the caterers. Zack, who’d listened to the arrangements periodically, had the amused hope that this second wedding reception of his would make up for the decorum and beauty it was probably going to lack with warmth and a festive atmosphere. If not, it had all the earmarks of becoming a ludicrously corny disaster. In which case, he devoutly hoped it would rain.

  The only thing that had given Julie momentary pause was the question of a wedding gown and gowns for Katherine, Sara, and Meredith, who she’d decided should be her only three attendants. Meredith had volunteered the solution to that problem when Julie called to invite her to be in their wedding: She’d had pictures of all the wedding gowns and attendants gowns available from Bancroft & Company’s exclusive bridal salon sent down by overnight mail for Julie to peruse. Julie had settled on three possibilities, which were picked up the next day in Chicago by the Farrells’ pilot and flown to Keaton. Rachel had deliberated for weeks over the selection of a wedding gown; Julie, Katherine, and Sara deliberated for two hours, made their selection, and brought their gowns to the Eldridge twins to be altered to fit Meredith, who was back in Chicago with Matt, was being fitted for hers there.

  During all that time, the only disagreement Zack and Julie had took place the night of their engagement, and it was about Zack’s adamant insistence on paying for the wedding. He’d finally settled it in private with Julie’s father, who, thankfully, had absolutely no conception of the cost of a wedding gown from Bancroft & Company or jet fuel, which Zack was going to compensate Matt for, or much of anything else. Zack had “graciously relented” enough to let Reverend Mathison contribute $2,000 toward the cost of the wedding, then he volunteered—with equal graciousness and less honesty—to have his accountant in California handle the tedious business of paying all the bills and to refund Reverend Mathison any excess.

  Now, as Zack looked at Julie who was making notes on her tablet, he thought of all the pressure she was under and how gracefully she coped with everything. In comparison, his own days had been wonderfully peaceful and filled with accomplishment. Free from the constant interruptions he’d have had in California, he’d been able to read scripts, which was his most pressing current task, and consider what he wanted to do as his first film project. The studio heads and producers and bankers he needed to meet with would all wait until he got back home. His dramatic escape from prison, his recapture, his subsequent release, and now his marriage to the young teacher who’d been his hostage had combined to make him into an even bigger “legend” than he’d been before he went to prison. He didn’t need to read Variety to know he was now the hottest property in the film business. Beyond attending to his work, the only other problem he’d needed to handle personally in the last week had been the issue of Julie’s public image. Originally, when the tapes of his arrest in Mexico City had been shown, Julie had been regarded by the world as a heroine who’d trapped a deranged mass murderer. A few weeks later, when Zack had been proved innocent and released from prison, those same tapes had made him into a heroic martyr to police brutality and Julie into a treacherous bitch who’d betrayed him. Rather than let her continue to suffer from the taint of that, Zack had quietly sent a copy of the tape he’d gotten from Richardson to a friend at CNN without first consulting with Julie. Within twenty-four hours of the first broadcast of it, the world had reacted to Julie’s hysterical suffering just as Zack had done when he saw the tape.

  Now, as he remembered all that had transpired in her life in the last week, Zack felt guilty and ashamed for his irascibility over what was, after all, only two weeks of enforced celibacy in the presence of a woman he desired more than he’d have imagined possible. Walking over to her, he took the tablet out of her hands, kissed her forehead, and said softly, “You are an amazing woman, sweetheart. Unfortunately, you’re marrying an oversexed, badtempered jerk who happens to want you desperately.”

  She leaned forward and kissed him with enough ardor to make him groan and move her away again. “All you have to do,” she reminded him, “is either break your word or tell my father his deal with you is off.”

  “I’m not going to break my damned word.”

  She chuckled and shook her head, picked up the tablet again, and pulled the pencil out of her shiny hair as if she’d already forgotten the kiss that still had his blood running hot. “I know. I’d be disappointed if you did.”

  “It might help,” Zack said, irrationally irked by the same patience that he’d admired only moments before, “if I thought this sexless arrangement was driving you just half as crazy as it’s driving me.”

  Julie tossed the tablet aside and stood up, and he realized for the first time that either she wasn’t nearly as serene about the wedding plans and their enforced celibacy as he’d thought or else his own disposition was wearing her down. Or all three. “We’re supposed to be on the baseball field tonight, remember?” she said testily. “This is a very special game between the Little League team I’ve helped to coach all year and our rivals in Perseville. You agreed to umpire, and everybody’s all excited about that. Let’s not argue. Or if we’re going to disagree, then save it for the game.”

  Zack did, and they did.

  Three hours later, with two stunned Little League teams looking on and the bleachers filled with amazed parents, Zack Benedict reaped the unpleasant rewards of a week of unjust impatience he’d inflicted on his overstressed fiancée.

  Crouched behind home plate during the end of the seventh inning, with the bases loaded and the score tied, Zack watched from behind his obligatory umpire’s mask as Julie’s second star r