‘Don’t get stupid, Alex. I mean it.” She grabbed handfuls of us crisp, dark hair in her fists. “I’m begging you. We’ve come too far for you to get stupid on me now; I’ve done enough of that for both of us. But a lot of it was your fault; you know it was. All that talk about how you couldn’t love. And then when you really did love me, I thought it was guilt. I should have known. I should have—”
“Let me up, Daisy.”
He could easily throw her off, but she knew he wouldn’t do it because of the baby. And because he loved her.
She plastered herself flat on top of him, wrapping her arms in a stranglehold around his neck, pressing her cheek to the side of his head. She flattened her torso and legs against his and let her toes curl on top of his ankles. “I don’t think so. You’re in a temper right now, but you’ll be all right in a couple of minutes, as soon as you have a chance to think everything over, and until then, I’m not letting you do anything you’re going to regret.”
She thought she could feel his body beginning to relax, but she didn’t shift her weight because he was tricky and this could be a ploy to catch her off guard.
“Get up now, Daisy.”
“No.”
“You’re going to be sorry.”
“You wouldn’t hurt me for anything.”
“Who said anything about hurting?”
“You’re mad.”
“I’ve been happier.”
“You’re really mad about what she made you do.”
“She didn’t make me do anything.”
“She sure did.” Daisy drew her head back far enough so she could grin down into his scowling face. “She got you good, Alex. She really did. If we have a girl, we may name her Sheba.”
“Over my dead body.”
She curled into his neck again and just waited like that, lying peacefully on top of him as if he were the world’s best orthopedic mattress.
His lips brushed her ear.
She snuggled closer and whispered, “I want to get married before the baby’s born.”
She felt his hand in her hair. “We are married.”
“I want to do it again.”
“Let’s just do it.”
“You’re going to be vulgar, aren’t you?”
“Will that get you off me?”
“Do you love me?”
“I love you.”
“You don’t sound loving. You sound like you’re gritting your teeth.”
“I am gritting my teeth, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love you with all my heart.”
“Really?” She drew back her head and beamed at him. “Then why are you so anxious to get me off you.”
His grin was sly. “So I can prove my love.”
“Now you’re making me nervous.”
“Are you afraid you’re not woman enough for me?”
“Oh, no. I’m definitely not afraid of that.” She dipped her head and nibbled at his bottom lip. That lasted for about half a second before he turned it into a deep, sensuous kiss. And then she started to cry because it was all so wonderful.
He began kissing her tears away, and she rubbed her fingers over his cheek. “You really love me, don’t you?”
“I really do,” he said huskily, “and this time I want you to believe me. I’m begging you, sweetheart.”
She smiled through her tears. “All right, then. Let’s go home.”
Epilogue
Daisy and Alex were married for the second time ten days later in a field northf Tampa. The ceremony took place at dawn because of the bride’s insistence on the presence of one guest the others would just as soon she’d forgotten.
Sinjun lay at Daisy’s feet, and the two of them were joined by a length of silver ribbon. At one end, it encircled his neck, while, at the other, it looped her wrist. As a result of his presence, the number of people attending the six o’clock ceremony that October morning was quite small. And understandably nervous.
“I don’t know why she couldn’t keep him in his cage,” Sheba snapped to her husband, the man she had married several days earlier in a center ring ceremony complete with a performance by the Flying Toleas.
“Don’t talk to me about stubborn women,” he replied. “I’m married to one.”
She regarded him with knowing eyes. “Lucky for you.”
“Yeah,” he smiled back. “Lucky for me.”
Heather stood off to the left and stroked Tater’s trunk while she gazed critically at Daisy. If this was her wedding, Heather decided, she’d wear something nicer than an old pair of jeans, especially since Heather knew very well Daisy couldn’t even get them snapped at the waist anymore. Just as bad, she had on one of Alex’s blue dress shirts to hide the evidence.
Still, she looked pretty cute. Her cheeks were rosy and her eyes all shiny, and she had this bridal wreath made up of daisies in her hair. Alex had given it to her as a surprise, along with a diamond ring so big it was a good thing the sun hadn’t come up the rest of the way or they’d all be blinded.
So many changes had happened in Heather’s life this summer that she still couldn’t quite take them in. Sheba wasn’t selling Quest Brothers, and Heather was pretty sure she and her dad were trying to make a baby. Sheba was the coolest stepmom. She’d said Heather could start dating this year even though her dad said over his dead body. And Sheba’d turning into as big a hugger as Daisy.
Daisy had told Heather she’d be taking classes at Alex’s college just as soon as the baby as born so she could learn how to be a kindergarten teacher, and the two of them were going to Russia in December on some kind of buying trip for this big museum Alex represented. Best of all, they were traveling for a month next summer with Quest Brothers, and Daisy even said she was going back into the ring with Alex. She’d told Heather that she wasn’t scared anymore because she’d already lived through the worst thing that could happened.
Alex started speaking his vows in a deep, mushy voice, and as he looked down at Daisy, his face was all soft so that everybody there could see how much he loved her. Daisy, naturally, started to cry, and Jill had to hand her a tissue.
Daisy sniffed and blew, then started in on her vows. “I, Daisy Devreaux Markov, take thee . . .” She paused.
Alex looked down at her and lifted his eyebrow. “Don’t tell me. You forgot my name again.” He looked exasperated, but Heather could tell that he wanted to laugh.
“Of course not. You didn’t say your middle name, and I just I realized I don’t know what it is.”
“Ah.” He leaned down and whispered it into her ear.
“Perfect.” She smiled through her tears, and once again gazed up into his eyes. “I Daisy Devreaux Markov take thee Alexander Romanov Markov . . .”
As she went on, Alex squeezed her hand real tight, and Heather would have sworn to God she saw tears in his eyes, too.
Sinjun rose and stretched until he was about thirty feet long. Sheba got all nervous-looking and started clinging to Heather’s dad’s arm, which had to be a first. Heather wasn’t too crazy about the tiger herself, but she wasn’t a wimp about him like Sheba.
Sheba’d surprised everybody by giving Sinjun to Daisy as a wedding present, and Alex already had somebody building this really cool tiger compound behind his house in Connecticut. It sure must be nice to be so rich. Although nobody’d said anything definite about it, Heather had the feeling Tater might end up spending the winter in Alex’s barn in Connecticut, too, instead of staying with the other elephants in Tampa.
“I now pronounce you husband and wife.”
Daisy and Alex looked at each other, and for a minute it was like they’d forgotten anybody else was around. Finally Alex remembered it was time for the kiss part, and he really laid one on her. Heather couldn’t tell for sure if he was frenching her, but she wouldn’t have been surprised. While they kissed, Tater dusted both of them with hay, just as if he thought the stuff was rice.
Everybody started to laugh, except for Sheba, who was still watching Si
njun.
Daisy let Sinjun’s ribbon leash drop from her wrist. Then she made this funny whooping sound and threw her arms around Alex’s neck. Alex picked her up and twirled her, but he held her real careful so he didn’t hurt the baby or anything.
When he was done spinning her, he kissed her again. “I’ve got the best Markov woman of them all.”
Daisy got this real saucy look on her face that even Heather thought was pretty cute. “And I’ve got the best Markov man.”
They were acting so silly that Heather started being embarrassed for both of them, except that she was kind of crying, too, because she liked happy endings.
Then she realized it wasn’t an ending at all. As she gazed around at all these people she loved, she knew that everybody here was just getting started.
Acknowledgments
A number of generous people helped with the research for Kiss An Angel. I am especially grateful to my mother, Lou Titus, who worked so hard on the initial background material. Also, the reference librarians at Nichols Library always manage to come through for me, as does Linda Barlow. Additional thanks to Kacy Frazier, the staff at Brookfield Zoo, David Morgan, and the World Circus Museum for answering my questions.
My special appreciation goes to Jill Barnett, whose thoughtful critique of this book rescued me from craziness. And my editor, Carrie Feron, who has given me the best gift a writer can receive: the peace of mind to write.
Susan Elizabeth Phillips
c/o Avon Books
1350 Avenue of the Americas
New York, New York 10019
About the Author
Susan Elizabeth Phillips is one of our biggest women’s fiction stars soaring onto the New York Times bestseller list with Dream a Little Dream. She’s the only four-time recipient of Romance Writer’s of America’s prestigious Favorite Book of the Year Award. Susan delights fans by touching hearts as well as funny bones with her wonderfully whimsical and modern fairy tales. A resident of the Chicago suburbs, she is also a wife and mother of two grown sons.
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Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.
KISS AN ANGEL. Copyright © 1996 by Susan Elizabeth Phillips. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition © OCTOBER 2002 ISBN: 9780061794797
First Avon Books printing: February 1996
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Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Kiss an Angel
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