Wanted: One
Groom
Pat Ballard
Chapter 1
“Hanna, you know what your grandfather’s will stipulated.” Hanna
sensed the barely concealed agitation in her mother’s voice.
“But, just in case you’ve forgotten, let me
refresh your memory,” chimed in Hanna’s brother, Will, two years her
senior. “You have to be married, in order to receive the money that the
old codger left you. And if you aren’t married by the time you’re thirty
years old, everything goes to charity.” Will didn’t try to conceal the
contempt he felt for his grandfather, not only for leaving him totally out
of the will except for a substantial monthly allowance, which he blew on a
monthly basis, but for leaving the conditions as such that they might all
wind up on the streets with nowhere to live.
“Everything, Hanna,” interjected her mother.
“That means this house, all the land that goes with the estate, all the
furniture in the house, and all the money in the bank, including our
allowances. Are you going to let that happen to us? To your brother and
me, and to yourself?” Desperation was apparent on her face and in her
voice.
Suddenly, Hanna understood for the first time
why Grandfather Rockwell had held so much contempt for these two people
prostrating themselves before her. They were users. They depended on
someone else to make their lives okay. She loved her mother, but she had
lost all respect for her, years ago. And she loved her brother, simply
because he was her brother, and for no other reason. He was a spoiled
little rich boy, and he loved that image of himself.
Hanna was tired of the pressure the two of
them had been putting on her to get married. And even though she could
barely stand either of them at times, she knew she wouldn’t be the cause
of them losing the only home they had ever known.
Frankly, she’d always wondered how it would be
to live somewhere else. She had spent her life right here at Rockwell
Place, so at times, she thought she would welcome a change. But she knew
she wouldn’t make that stand against them, so she decided to go with the
plan that she had been quietly formulating for the right moment. That
moment seemed to be upon her, so taking a deep breath, she challenged
them.
“Okay, Mother, start planning the wedding.
Give it your best. We’ll have a wedding on my thirtieth birthday, June
17.” She heard both of them suck in their breath at the same time.
“Sis, have you been holding out on us? Who’s
the lucky guy?” Her brother’s sardonic facial expressions of just a few
minutes earlier had suddenly turned to complete joy.
“That’s where you come in, dear brother.”
Hanna’s emerald green eyes filled with contempt as they perused her
weakling of a brother. “You get to find the lucky guy! Find someone that
will marry me in three months, and we’ll have ourselves a wedding.” She
found great pleasure in the look of disbelief on his face. “Just do me one
favor,” she continued, “try to make sure he’s not a serial killer, or
rapist...if you get my drift.”
“How am I supposed to find you someone to
marry?” her astounded brother asked. “Do I run an ad in the paper that
says, ‘Wanted: One Groom’?”
“However you want to handle it is fine with
me. It’s not my problem,” Hanna answered him.
“Hanna?”
“Don’t start, Mother. This is what you want,
isn’t it? You and Will have driven me to distraction these past few
months, insisting that I find someone and get married. If you think it’s
as easy as all of that, then you two knock yourselves out. Just tell me
what time to show up, and I’ll be there.” And she headed for the door. But
just before she left the room, she turned back to them. “I’ve just
realized why Grandfather wanted me to be married before I could receive
what he left me. He wanted me to have someone to help protect me from you
two money-grabbers.”
Their gaping mouths almost made her sorry for
her outburst. She turned and fled the room before they could see the tears
flowing down her face.
The next morning, Hanna made her way down the spiral staircase and
headed toward the formal dining room for her usual bagel and cup of
coffee. Cook always prepared several breakfast items and had them
waiting for the family as they drifted down to start their day.
Hanna hoped against hope she would be able to
start her morning alone, but as soon as she came through the door she
spotted her mother sitting at the huge antique oak dining table,
dramatically grasping her head in her hands. Hanna knew she was in for a
long lecture.
“Good morning, Mother,” she said, and sat down
at the opposite end of the table, hoping to discourage any conversation.
All she wanted was to eat her breakfast in peace.
“Hanna, come down here and talk with me.” Hanna could tell by the whining
note in her mother’s voice that she might as well give in and get this
over with, so, reluctantly, she gathered up her bagel and coffee and moved
closer to her mother.
“Hanna, what you said yesterday really hurt
me. I’m your mother, and I love you. I’m just trying to look out for you
and your brother. I want what’s best for you. I want us all to be able to
continue living in the custom that we’ve always been used to. None of us
know how to go out into the world and make a living.”
Hanna knew when her mother used this tone of
voice that there was no use trying to reason with her, so she didn’t
volunteer any conversation, and her mother continued.
“Maybe if you would have listened to me all these years I’ve tried to
encourage you to lose that weight, we wouldn’t be in this situation. You
have such a beautiful face, and I know you would be able to find a fine
young man to marry if you looked more like those models in the magazines
and on TV.”
There had been a time when her mother’s
comments would have caused Hanna to run to her room and cry for hours,
then get up the next day and go on the latest fad diet. But not any more.
She had long since learned to ignore her mother and Will’s hard comments
about her size. She had learned how to tune them out, and think about
something that made her happy.
This morning, she gazed lovingly at the
life-size portrait of her grandparents that hung over the large mantle at
the end of the dining room, where on cold winter nights a roaring fire
blazed in the huge fireplace, turning the large formal room into a warm,
welcoming haven.
Even in death, it seemed her grandfather kept
watch over the family from his vantage point, as he looked down on
gatherings in the room he loved the most. Her grandfather stood tall and
handsome, and his piercing blue eyes seemed to look into the soul of
anyone looking up at the portrait. His eyes seemed to follow a person
around the room, and Hanna loved that about the portrait. It almost seemed
as if Grandfather was there with her.
The portrait of her grandmother could have
been of Hanna, it looked so much like her. She had inherited her
grandmother’s golden red hair, big emerald green eyes, peaches and cream
complexion, and her voluptuous body. That’s why Grandfather had loved
Hanna so much. She had reminded him of his beloved Victoria, whom he had
lost when she gave birth to their only son, Greg, Hanna’s father. And even
though Hanna had never seen her grandmother, she knew more about her than
most people know about their living grandmothers. Grandfather had spent
hours on end, telling her stories about her grandmother.
And as her mother droned on, Hanna again
memorized every detail of her grandmother’s image. She was glad she looked
like her, but Hanna knew she would never find a man like Grandfather, who
would love her and her own voluptuous body like he had loved her
grandmother. In her grandmother’s day, it was considered beautiful to be
well rounded. But it seemed that all the men these days were taken with
Hollywood’s typical size six female body, so she had given up on ever
finding the man of her dreams. The man who would love her for her mind as
well as her body.
“Hanna, are you listening to me?” Her mother’s
impatient voice interrupted her thoughts.
“Actually, I wasn’t, Mother. So if you’re
finished, I have things to do.”
“Hold on! Not so fast, I have great news!”
Will burst into the room just as Hanna was about to make her exit.
Sinking slowly back into her chair, she waited
to see what new scheme Will had come up with.
“Sis, I’ve found your future husband!” He
couldn’t hide the jubilation in his voice.
Hanna felt as if her insides were going to
shrivel up and die. She had hoped this plan wouldn’t work, but here he
was, the day after she had laid down her challenge, with a prospect for
her to marry. He had really spent a lot of time trying to find the man she
was supposed to spend her life with, she thought ruefully. Actually,
Grandfather’s will hadn’t specified how long she stayed married, just that
she got married. She planned to get a divorce as soon as the will was
settled. This farce of a marriage wouldn’t last long.
“Well, don’t you want to know who he is?” Will
asked impatiently.
Hanna had a sudden urge to reach over and slap
him in the mouth. But instead, she said, “Not really, but I can tell
you’re going to tell me anyway.”
“Matt Corbett!” Satisfaction sounded in every
word.
Laughter exploded from Hanna’s throat.
“The Matt Corbett?” Her mother asked in
awe.
“The one and the same!” Will practically
shouted.
“But how? Why?” Their mother was flushed with
excitement from the news.
“Oh, Mother, can’t you see he’s just playing
one of his childish tricks on us? Surely you don’t believe Matt Corbett
would agree to marry someone he’s never seen. With all he has going on for
him, he can choose anyone he wants.” Hanna’s sound reasoning brought her
mother back to earth.
“Well, Sis, ol’ Matt has run into a little
trouble with the Internal Revenue Service. It seems that his manager has
been skimming off the top, bottom, and middle of Matt’s finances, and
hasn’t been paying any of Matt’s bills, so he’s in big trouble. The IRS
came in last week and confiscated everything he owns that’s worth a dime,
and Matt’s about to declare bankruptcy. I just happened to find him
drowning his sorrows in his beer last night, and I gave him the proposal
of a lifetime. I told him I would pay off his debts if he would marry my
sister, sight unseen. He agreed.” Will slapped the polished oak table so
hard it made both women jump.
“Will, he was drunk! I’m sure when he wakes up
this morning and realizes what he’s done, he’ll change his mind.” Hanna
couldn’t believe her brother was naive enough to believe Matt Corbett
would marry her.
“It won’t matter if he does want to change his
mind,” Will stated with a smug look on his face. “He’s in the palm of our
hands!”
“And why is that?” Hanna wondered what Will
could have possibly done to be so sure of his “catch.”
“As soon as he agreed to my terms, I called
Carl Hardin, and took Matt to Carl’s office and we drew up the papers last
night. It’s legal. He can’t back out.”
“Will, one of these days that crooked lawyer
friend of yours is going to get the two of you into something he can’t
talk your way out of. This just may be it,” Hanna warned.
Matthew Corbett came slowly awake. His mouth felt like it had a
three-pound cotton ball stuck where his tongue was supposed to be. His
head felt as if it would explode if he moved it at all, and when he tried
to open his squinted eyes to the sun shining in through the dingy window,
he gave a cry of pain and fell back on the bed.
Moving very slowly, he made himself get off
the bed. He had to go to the bathroom or he was going to pee on himself.
Finally, after washing his face and combing his hair, he stumbled back
into the small dingy hotel room where he had spent the night.
Reality crept into his foggy brain. His house
was gone. His car was gone. Hell, he barely had the money to rent this
cheap hotel room for the night. And going out last night, spending money
getting drunk wasn’t the smartest thing he’d ever done, either. When he
got a chance to find that damn manager who had screwed him out of
everything, he wouldn’t have to worry about a place to stay. He was going
to kill that son of a bitch, and then he’d be in prison. At least he’d
have a place to sleep and food to eat.
He slumped into the uncomfortable chair beside
the wobbly table in the corner of the room and was about to hold his
throbbing head in his hands when he spotted the papers on the table. Not
remembering laying any papers on the table, he reached over and started to
read the contents.
The letterhead was from a lawyer’s office, and
the document stated that he had agreed to marry someone named Hanna
Rockwell, sight unseen, in exchange for enough money to pay off all his
debts plus settle the score that was left over with the IRS if what they
collected from his possessions didn’t cover what he owed them.
Sight unseen? What kind of woman was she that
he would have to agree to marry her “sight unseen”? Was she some kind of
monster? His hangover didn’t stop him from conjuring up all kinds of
horror images of some woman who didn’t want to be seen until after her
wedding. And why did she have to have an arranged wedding? Was she so
repulsive she couldn’t even find her own husband?
But the worst horror of all was finding his
own signature at the end of the three-page document. He had already agreed
to do this! He couldn’t deny his own signature scrawled in the spot marked
by an X. But how? When?
He vaguely remembered some guy having a couple
of drinks with him last night, but he had already been pretty far gone
when the guy joined him at his table, so he didn’t remember anything about
him. Was he the one who had gotten up this bogus contract? He picked up
the phone and called the number that was on the letterhead.
“Carl Hardin’s office,” a man’s voice
answered.
“Carl Hardin, please,” Matt requested.
“Speaking.”
“Carl, this is Matt Corbett. I need to talk to
you about a contract I supposedly signed last night.”
“Hello,” Hanna spoke into the phone receiver.
“Hanna? This is Carl Hardin. Is Will
there?” Hanna had never heard Carl sound so stressed before.
“Yes, he’s here. Do you want to speak with
him?”
“No, just tell him to get down here right now.
Matt Corbett is on his way to see us.”
Hanna hung up the phone and turned back to her
mother and Will, who were discussing the possibilities of having Matt
Corbett as part of their family.
“I do believe there’s already trouble with
your new business partner, Will. That was Carl. He wants you in his office
right now. Seems as if a certain Matt Corbett is on his way to see you
two.” Hanna couldn’t keep the note of victory from her voice.
Will’s face turned a little white as he
bounded for the door.
“Really, Hanna, I think you like making things
difficult. I believe you secretly want this whole thing to fall through,”
her mother said, and stormed from the room.
Carrying a fresh cup of steaming coffee, Hanna
opened the sliding glass doors that led from the dining room and stepped
onto the adjoining deck. A cool spring breeze danced through the treetops
to the music of singing birds. Leaning back in a chaise lounge, Hanna
closed her eyes and reveled in the peace of the moment.
Matt Corbett. What would life be like with
Matt Corbett, the rock star? Well, he used to be a rock star. She
remembered when she thought he was the most handsome man who ever lived.
And sexy! Her full understanding of the word “sexy” came as a result of
her teenage crush on Matt Corbett.
She used to have a full size poster of him in
her room. What happened to that poster? Did she still have it stored away
somewhere? She would look for it later. But she didn’t need a picture to
remember how he looked. He was medium height, not a big man, but that dark
hair and those smoky brown eyes, and that olive complexion, made him look
so masculine that women made fools of themselves constantly over him. And
when he was on stage, shaking his hips like he did—Hanna felt her body go
warm all over.
A smile played on her full lips as she let
herself fantasize briefly about being married to Matt Corbett. She sure
wouldn’t mind. She wouldn’t be in as big a hurry to divorce him as she had
planned on if he wound up being her husband.
What if it did happen? And wouldn’t it be a
hoot if he found her really attractive and fell in love with her, and —
“Hoooold it!” she admonished herself
out loud. She wouldn’t let herself get too carried away with a fantasy she
knew could never happen.
But she couldn’t get Matt Corbett off her
mind. After several attempts to relax and enjoy the morning, she gave up
and headed upstairs to see if she could find her teenage treasures. Soon
she found the box where she had stored some of her old memorabilia.
Standing in the far back corner of her closet was the cardboard poster of
Matt.
Pulling the poster out of the closet made
Hanna feel like a teenager again. Her heart pounded faster, just gazing at
Matt’s beautiful smile. He had been her idol. Her dream man.
In the poster he had on the tight jeans and
black leather jacket that was his trademark. His dark hair was slicked
back off his face, but hung to his shoulders. The guitar strap was drooped
loosely around his neck and the guitar hung seductively between his legs
as he stood with feet apart and hands in the air, as if he had just
finished a perfect performance.
And his performances had been perfect. But
then he started to quietly fade from the public’s eye, and gradually
disappeared as so many of the great performers do.
She had mourned his slow disappearance almost
as one would mourn a lost lover. She had acquired any and all information
about him that was available to the public. She knew his likes and
dislikes. His favorite colors. His favorite foods. She could have answered
any trivia question about him that anyone could have possibly asked.
She wondered if he’d changed much in the last
15 years. Did he still wear black jeans and a black leather jacket? Did he
still have that smooth, sexy voice?
She was so lost in her memories that she
didn’t hear Will calling her name until he was almost to her room.
Hurriedly, she stood the poster back inside her closet and barely had the
door closed when Will burst into her room.
“He’s going to do it! He’s curious as to why
he can’t see you until after the wedding, but Carl and I talked to him
until he agreed to go through with it!”
“Will, I’m curious about that, too,” Hanna
interrupted him.
“What?” He looked puzzled.
“Why can’t my prospective husband see me? Why
did you come up with that stipulation?”
“Well — uh — I just thought —”
Will’s stumbling over an excuse irritated
Hanna, because she knew full well the reason he’d come up with that
stipulation. He was afraid if Matt Corbett knew she was fat, he wouldn’t
agree to the wedding.
“Forget it, Will. Just go. I have things to
do.” She shooed him from her room.
After closing and locking the door behind
Will, Hanna went back to the closet. She found her favorite Matt Corbett
CD and stuck it into the CD player. Remembered schoolgirl emotions swept
over her as his voice started crooning her favorite love song. It was one
of his slower songs, which allowed the quality of his voice to come
through.
She took the poster out and stood it against
the wall. Suddenly Matt’s eyes seemed to lock with hers, and panic washed
over her. She was going to marry Matt Corbett! She was going to marry the
only man she had ever had a crush on! And she was scared!
She sank slowly to the floor in front of the
poster and gazed up at it. Her chest felt as if her heart would tear its
way through her ribcage. Her palms started to bead up with moisture.
What was she going to do? What if she went
through with this wedding and he found her repulsive? In her fantasies, he
had always been the one who had loved her unconditionally. He had loved
her just the way she was, and had never wanted her to starve herself and
lose weight. Now that fantasy was going to be blown.
She couldn’t let that happen. She would just
stick with her initial plan. She would go through with the wedding, and
then she would disappear until the will was settled. Then she would get a
divorce. She would arrange it to where Matt Corbett would never see her,
except on their wedding day. That way, she would never have to see the
disappointment in his eyes when he realized what she looked like.
With that decision made, Hanna could feel
herself start to calm down. She stood the poster in the closet, but left
it where she could see it when the door was open. She could dream, even if
nothing would ever come of those dreams.
Sunday morning when Hanna came down for breakfast, her mother already
had the Sunday paper spread out on the dining room table. Good, Hanna
thought. Maybe if her mother was reading, she wouldn’t start babbling
about Matt Corbett like she had done continually since Will had announced
that Matt had, indeed, agreed to the wedding contract.
Hanna had her usual cup of coffee and bagel,
and was contentedly nibbling the raisins off the bagel when she heard her
mother’s sharply in-drawn breath.
“Oh — my — word!” She screeched, half rising from
her chair.
“Mother, what is it?” Hanna asked, giving her
mother her complete attention for a change.
But all her mother could do was point at the
paper.
In exasperation, Hanna got up and went to read
what her mother was pointing at. There on the front of the “Living”
section of the paper was a large picture of Hanna, with a headline reading
Rockwell Heiress Finally Sets the Date.
Hanna stared open-mouthed at the photo.
It was a recent picture that had been taken one day when she had gone to
the park for a brief getaway from Rockwell Place. One of the local TV
crews was out filming “first signs of spring,” as they called it. She had
been standing beside a huge old oak tree, watching the squirrels, when a
young photographer had walked up to her and asked if he could take her
picture. She had agreed, but had asked him not to put it on TV.
She’d had on a cream-colored chiffon dress
that reached to her ankles, and the wind had it plastered against her
body. Her hair had been whipped into a mass of reddish golden curls that
seemed to be everywhere at once. Hanna smiled to herself. The young
photographer was really good. He’d made her look like a sex goddess from
some other century.
“I’ll sue that stupid paper. Look what they’ve
done to you! They’ve made you look like some wanton floozy! I’m calling
them right now!”
“No, Mother. You aren’t going to call or to
sue.” Determination sounded in Hanna’s every word. Seldom did she stand up
to her mother, but when she did, she usually got results.
“But why? We didn’t give them permission to
print this. They can’t print something like this without asking us first.”
Frustration sounded in every word.
“Who have you told about the wedding?”
“Well—I—uh—well—a lot of people,” her mother
stuttered.
“I know. I’ve heard you on the phone
constantly talking about it,” Hanna said, accusingly.
“But I have to make plans. I can’t plan a
wedding without talking about it.”
“Did you speak with Mrs. Tolbert?”
“Yes,” her mother said.
“I asked her to tell the bridge club I wouldn’t be there for a few weeks.
I would be busy with the wedding.”
“And did she ask about photos for the paper?”
Hanna persisted.
“Yes, she asked if I had any pictures of you.
I told her I didn’t have any good ones.” Her mother didn’t even consider
how her statement might make Hanna feel.
“And? What did she say?”
“Hmmmmm. Oh, she asked if I did have a good
picture, would I agree to let the paper run an article about the wedding.
I told her I would, and she asked a few more questions, and that was all
of the conversation.”
“Well, Mother, that was how the picture got
into the paper. Tom, the photographer who took the picture, is Mrs.
Tolbert’s son. He does freelance photography for the paper and TV
stations.”
“But still, I didn’t give them permission.”
“Forget it, Mother. It’s my picture. If anyone
has a right to have a problem it should be me, and I don’t have a problem
with it.”
“But it makes you look so — so —”
“Fat?” Hanna filled in the word she knew her
mother was trying so hard not to say.
“Well, I didn’t say that!”
“No, but you wanted to,” Hanna said, and,
taking her bagel and coffee, escaped to the balcony.
Matt Corbett perched on a stool in front of the counter at the little
coffee shop two blocks from the motel where Will Rockwell had paid his
expenses until the wedding. He ordered coffee and a sweet roll from
the waitress, who kept flirting with him every chance she got.
He wasn’t totally broke, but his assets were
frozen until he could get this IRS fiasco straightened out. So Will had
also given him a food allowance until the wedding. He didn’t like Will
Rockwell much. He couldn’t figure out the guy’s motives. Why was he in
such a hurry to get his sister married off, and why couldn’t Matt see his
future wife? He had an occasional nightmare of lifting the veil to kiss
his new bride and finding a snake’s head in place of a woman’s.
He couldn’t believe what a mess his life had
gotten into. How in the hell had he, Matt Corbett, come to the point in
his life that he was having to depend on a rich playboy to support him
until he could say “I do” to the playboy’s mysterious sister?
He probably could have gotten out of the
contract he’d signed when he was dog drunk, but the next day at the
lawyer’s office Will and the lawyer had been so persuasive, he’d decided
to give it a shot. After all, what did he have to lose? His career was
sure shot to hell. His band had long since broken up and each member had
found another gig to pull. And now that the government had confiscated all
his possessions, he had absolutely nothing. He should be thankful that
something like this Rockwell situation had come along when it did. Where
would he be without it? On the streets, probably. Of course, the IRS
didn’t give a damn about that as long as they got theirs.
But the mysterious bride-to-be bothered him a
lot. Would he be expected to perform sexually? Just like a real husband?
There had been nothing in the contract about that.
Weary from trying to figure it all out, Matt
reached for the Sunday paper someone had left lying on the counter. The
“Living” section was on top. As he pulled the paper toward him he was
captivated by a picture of a gorgeous woman that covered most of the page.
Whoever had taken the photograph was good. They’d captured the golden
highlights in her light red hair. They’d captured the creamy complexion
and those big green eyes.
Matt’s eyes traveled down her body. The wind
had pressed her dress against her, outlining her large breasts and full
hips. It even revealed the V between her legs. Now here was a woman! She
almost looked like a goddess from a long-lost island. One that he would
like to be stranded on, if she was there, he mused with a lopsided grin.
At 36, Matt had reached a place in his life
where he was secure enough in his manhood that he wasn’t afraid anymore to
admit he liked women with a little meat on their bones. He had spent years
trying to make himself feel attracted to the skinny women that were
splashed everywhere he looked, but he finally realized he just wasn’t
attracted to that type of woman. He knew a lot of men who were, or who
said they were, and to each his own, but he had “come out.”
He was no longer a closet lover of big
beautiful women. He loved them right out in the open, and it felt so good.
He had been amazed when some of his friends gladly agreed with him when he
stated his preference for larger women. It was almost like they had been
afraid to be the first to admit they felt the same way.
But why couldn’t he have met someone like this
gorgeous babe before he agreed to marry “the monster lady,” as he had
taken to calling her in his mind? Did the paper give her name? Maybe he’d
call her if she weren’t married. If this goddess was available, he might
have to call off this farce of a marriage.
Then his eyes fell on the headline,
Rockwell Heiress Finally Sets the Date. Realization didn’t sink in
when he first read the words. So what’s her name, he wondered, looking for
the article that went with the picture. Then it hit him.
“Rockwell?” He didn’t realize he’d spoken out
loud. Could this be?
Frantically, he searched for the article.
Hanna Rockwell, heiress to the Rockwell Place estate, has set her
wedding date.
According to sources, unless Hanna marries by her 30th
birthday, she and her
family lose the entire estate. The wedding will take
place on June 17.
So that’s it! Suddenly, the mystery cleared up. Brother Will had to find
his sister a husband or the family would lose their estate.
But why wasn’t Matt allowed to see her? That didn’t make any sense. And
why couldn’t a woman who looked like that picture find a husband on her
own? Why did her brother have to get a total stranger to sign a contract
to marry her sight unseen? Was there something else wrong with her?
Something that didn’t show up in this picture? Was she mentally unstable?
Solving the mystery of finding out how she looked just seemed to add more
questions for him.
But looking again at the picture in front of him, suddenly Matt didn’t
care. She was beautiful! He laughed out loud as he picked up the paper,
stuck it under his arm and left the coffee shop.
Life had suddenly taken on a whole new meaning.
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