No Time for Temptation: No Brides Club, Book 4 Read online

  No Time for Temptation

  No Brides Club, Book 4

  Monique McDonell

  © 2019, Monique McDonell

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  No part of this work may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher.

  Sweet Promise Press

  PO Box 72

  Brighton, MI 48116

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Epilogue

  Sneak Peek

  Acknowledgments

  More from this Series

  More from Sweet Promise Press

  More from Monique McDonell

  About the Author

  To all my brides who I have stood up with over the years – Jenny, Maddy, Kylie, and Jacqui.

  Prologue

  2005

  Liam Stone stood beside his neighbor and best friend Georgie Price. They were gathered next to the stage at the East Coast Mall. The place was teeming with teenagers and other wannabes all hoping to audition and win a place on the Teen Network’s next big show, Summer Times High. The crowd was seething with nervous energy, but Georgie was beyond nervous.

  Every minute they stood in line, the paler Georgie got. Liam knew she suffered from terrible stage fright, but he also knew she was insanely talented and that if she nailed this audition it would change her life forever. Georgie’s life wasn’t all that bad, but since her dad had gotten sick a year earlier, her life in the Dank Street Trailer Park had gone from pretty good to just not yet terrible. Her mother was trying, and their double-wide, unlike the one Liam lived in, was neat and clean and smelled like home cooking. That was fine for now, but Liam knew there was no money for her to go to college, and without college she’d be stuck here.

  This was her golden ticket.

  “Nearly there,” he said, elbowing her forward in the line.

  “I don’t think I can do this, Liam.” Her voice was soft and trembling. He pushed a lock of honey blonde hair behind her ear and whispered softly, “You’ve got this. Everyone within a hundred miles of here knows you’re amazingly talented, and these guys from Hollywood will soon know it too.”

  “What if I mess up?” She bit her lip, and her eyes were downcast. It was like this every time. She’d been the lead in three high school musicals, and every time the routine was the same.

  “You won’t, and I’m going to stand down the front and, just like always, just sing to me. Ignore everyone else and sing to me.” That’s how she got through all her auditions. Eyes on Liam until she found her rhythm.

  When they got to the front of the line, Liam handed her paperwork and head shot to a middle-aged guy in a Hawaiian shirt who looked Georgie up and down. She was a knockout in that all-American way that TV lapped up. Liam wasn’t worried about that at all. She’d make the cut on appearance alone. They’d watched the man put different symbols on the page, and Liam had worked out that it meant you weren’t making the cut even if you could sing, depending on the symbol. Smiley face meant you had the look, and tick meant you didn’t.

  Georgie was beautiful inside and out. That’s why she had to get out of here. And Hawaiian shirt guy agreed because she got the smiley face.

  It was going to break Liam’s heart to see her go. She was the one good thing in his entire stinking life, but he knew that if he loved her, and man, did he love her, silently and from the sidelines, but still, if he did, she had to go. He had to save her first, and then he’d save himself.

  “Wait over there, honey, there are two on before you.”

  They’d been listening to boy bands and pop princesses the hour they’d been in line, and while Georgie had gotten increasingly anxious, Liam felt even more confident she could do it. He moved to go with her, but Hawaiian shirt stopped him.

  “Not you, just her.”

  “You got this, Georgie.” He gave her a quick hug before she was whisked away by a young woman with a clipboard. She looked back over her shoulder, biting her lip, and he gave her the thumbs-up before pushing his way through the crowd to the perfect spot in her eyeline where she would look like she was singing to the crowd, but just like always, she’d never break eye contact with him.

  Liam watched her take the stage and find him in the crowd as the music for her chosen song started to play. He could tell she was nervous, her left knee was shaking just a little and the smile on her face looked more fake than genuine, but he smiled at her and gave her a nod when it was time to sing and she did just that.

  He didn’t break eye contact, but he could tell by the hush in the crowd that she had them in the palm of her hand. He smiled at her, happy for her that she was absolutely owning this audition, while inside his heart squeezed because he knew it would never be him in the audience again, he’d never be the one she looked at with such faith and adoration.

  All her dreams were going to come true, and he was going to lose the one person in his life that made it worthwhile.

  If this was what love was, Liam was going to harden his heart so that his name was his mantra. Stone, he’d be like stone from now on.

  Chapter 1

  Present Day

  Georgie Price pushed the door to her apartment open with one shoulder as she balanced her takeout coffee in one hand and pulled her suitcase along with the other. It was so good to be home. She was exhausted. All she wanted to do was peel off her clothes, have a long bath, and eat some home-cooked food for a change.

  Except straightaway she knew something wasn’t right. Over the sound of Tapioca, her West Highland White Terrier, barking and running up to meet her, she could hear a distinct dripping sound. She let go of the suitcase handle and swooped down to lift up the dog.

  “Hey, precious, did you miss me?” She kissed Tapioca’s head, and the dog licked her face in response. “And why, oh why, are you damp? There is no way Mrs. Knickerson left you with a wet coat.”

  The dog sitter was nothing if not meticulous. Something was definitely not right. Stepping out of the foyer and heading down the hall, Georgie followed the sound that got louder the closer she got to the kitchen. “Is that a faucet dripping, Tappy?”

  To her dismay when she walked into the kitchen, it was obvious that it was not a tap but something worse. Water was leaking through the ceiling from the apartment above. It wasn’t a slow drip either, oh no, there was an enormous damp patch on the roof and a large puddle on the floor. This was not a new problem. If she had to guess, she’d say this was trouble that had brewed for at least a couple of days.

  Georgie had been out of town for a week working on her TV
show American Food, American Life, and she knew Mrs. Knickerson would have dropped the dog inside the front door an hour or so earlier but not made it down the hall, so there was no real way of knowing how long water had been pooling on her ceiling.

  Without putting down the dog, or the coffee, Georgie hightailed it down the hall and took the elevator up one floor to see what was happening in the apartment above. In the upstairs corridor, she was greeted by damp carpet and a disheveled-looking airline pilot who was still in his uniform, except he was shoeless and with his pant legs rolled up to his calves. His own suitcase was sitting out in the hallway.

  “Hey, neighbor,” she called out as she approached. She vaguely knew Captain Zach Campbell from a Christmas drinks mixer she’d held the previous December. They’d tried and failed to connect since. “Trouble in paradise?”

  He looked over at her and sighed. “Seems like a tap was left running in my place.”

  “Seems like your apartment may be planning to come through my ceiling just like all the water has.”

  “Oh crap!” he said. “I was hoping it was, well, contained.”

  Considering she was squelching down the hall toward him, it was very much not contained. If denial was a river in Egypt, they were ankle deep in it right now.

  “Nope, sadly not. Did you just get back?” He gave her a nod. She peered past him to see the lake that had formed in his apartment.

  “Yes, my sister was here when I left for a week. Looks like she didn’t turn the kitchen tap off properly. It’s off now but . . . I fear it’s too late.”

  “You should call Neil the building manager and your insurance company.” He nodded but remained rooted to the spot. So she kept going because this problem was getting worse every minute he wasted. “Zach, I don’t want to be pushy, but may I suggest sooner rather than later?”

  He seemed to snap out of it, and within minutes, the hallway was filled with a tribe of people from the building manager to the doormen to the fire department who appeared out of nowhere. All of whom agreed that neither she nor Zach would be able to sleep at home that night, and probably not for a very long time.

  “I’m so sorry,” Zach said as he stood beside her, leaning against the wall trying to keep out of the way as people moved around them. He looked every bit as distraught as she felt. Unfortunately for Georgie, she’d learned from hard-won experience that former Hollywood starlets like herself didn’t get to have a public temper tantrum about their home being trashed, even if such a tantrum was justified. If she lost her cool, it would be all over the entertainment news and she’d be fodder for gossips for days. So she held it together as best she could even though she was tossing up whether she’d rather be screaming or crying if she were allowed to react.

  “It’s just extra hard for me because we film my cooking show in the apartment, so I’ve lost my home and my place of business. Oh yes, and I literally just finished my renovations.”

  She knew he knew this because all the residents were informed when filming took place, but under the circumstances, she could understand he might have forgotten that not-so-minor detail that was about to send her entire life into meltdown.

  “Okay, well, now that you’ve reminded me, I feel even worse.” He tilted his head, rubbing the back of his neck.

  Tapioca gave a yelp in Georgie’s arms. Her dog had had enough of this hallway too. It was time to go and find somewhere to stay for the night.

  “We’ll work it out.” She pulled a card from her pocket, maybe it was old school, but she never went anywhere without one and for that she was grateful. “Call me or have your insurance people call me tomorrow? I need to go find somewhere to stay.”

  She slid the card into his palm, and he closed his hand around hers, staring down at her, his very handsome face inches away. “I really am sorry, Georgie. I’ll make it up to you, somehow. We should meet for a drink and talk it through.”

  “Accidents happen.” She didn’t say yes to the drink, but she didn’t say no either.

  She withdrew her hand and headed for the elevator.

  “I’ll call you,” he said toward her back.

  She gave him a nod and waited until the door was closed before stamping her feet and letting out the scream she’d been holding in for the last hour. Tapioca yelped right along with her until the doors opened and she stepped out a picture of serenity and headed to her apartment to get her bag.

  * * *

  The Carlyle Hotel had three things going for it. It was dog friendly, which meant she and Tapioca could stay together, they had a suite available for her so she could work from the hotel, and it was just a block from the Briarwood Tavern where her friends, all members of the No Brides Club, met on Thursday nights.

  She hadn’t planned on going out tonight, but she couldn’t cook in her hotel room and she was certain after the day she’d had she deserved a drink. She was late, but she’d sent a text to the girls begging them to have a cocktail ready and waiting.

  The girls were in a corner booth when she arrived. Georgie quickly hugged Melody, Rachel, Kate, Kingsley, and Julie before slipping into the booth and grabbing the only untouched cocktail on the table.

  “Hey, stranger,” Rachel said. “We thought you might not make it.”

  “Well, truthfully, I was planning to put on my sweatpants, pile my hair on my head, put on a face mask, and test out a new recipe, but my upstairs neighbor flooded his condo and now mine is unsafe.”

  “What? When? How?” Julie asked.

  “Hang on.” She took a good long sip of her elderflower martini before she filled them in on the details.

  “But you just finished your renovations,” Melody said, her voice full of empathy.

  “I know.” She allowed herself a pity pout. She deserved one after all.

  “And it was so perfect.” Julie patted her arm, no doubt picturing the night they’d all come over and celebrated her renovations being done.

  “I know.”

  “And you’re only halfway through the season, won’t that be complicated?” Rachel asked, her brow furrowed with concern.

  “I know and this year everything that can go wrong has gone wrong. We should change the name from American Life to American Disaster. In fact, I should change my own name to that.”

  She’d been the star of the country’s most popular show, Summer Times High, for seven years, and even though she’d been off that show for just as long, that was how the country thought of her. The truth was her life felt like it had careened from one chaotic incident to another. She’d hoped the cooking show, now in its second season, would help break that cycle and maybe freshen her image up so people saw her as an adult and not an eternal teen, but right now it didn’t feel like that.

  “Hey, was this the hot neighbor from upstairs who did this? The pilot we met at your place?” Melody asked.

  “Yeah, that’s him. He was very sorry and maybe a little flirty. As much as a man whose house had just flooded can be, anyway.”

  “You should totally ask him out,” Julie suggested.

  “Julie, this is the No Brides Club. I’m not asking anyone out. I’m homeless, my TV show is rating well, but making it is making me crazy, so I do not have time for a hot pilot in my life.” She knew she was being short with her friend, but it was not as if she had time to date right now.

  “Well, at least you acknowledge he’s hot; that’s progress for you,” her friend teased. She was right, Georgie made it a habit not to look and not to comment about men.

  She drained the rest of the martini. “If I’m not going to touch, it’s easier not to look. I’ve sworn off men until my life is on track, and it’s anything but right now.”

  Kate reached over and squeezed her hand. “It’ll be fine. New York has millions of kitchens. You’ll find the perfect one to film the rest of the season. You might even get some good publicity out of this.”

  Kate was right, there were other kitchens, and the network PR team would lap this up, but she had just fini
shed her renovations and her place had been perfect as Julie had said earlier. It was the first place that had felt like home since she left Dank Street at age fifteen, and now it was ruined. She let out a sigh.

  “I’m going to need another drink and some wings if I’m going to talk myself out of this funk,” she said, and within minutes her friends had both arriving at the table, which made Georgie smile. Her life wasn’t a total disaster because she had amazing supportive friends to help her through. Still, as she sipped her drink and listened to them recap their own, far less disastrous week, she thought she might need more than her girlfriends to get her through this mess.

  When she got back to the hotel, she took Tapioca downstairs to do her business, and then she went straight up and flopped on the bed. She had the overwhelming urge to call Liam Stone, her childhood best friend, and talk through her misery, but it was late and his live-in girlfriend had made it abundantly clear that she didn’t want Georgie calling him, and certainly not late at night. She missed Liam, but she was trying to be a good friend and give his relationship some time to get settled. Still, on a night like this, she really could have used the comfort of a friend. Instead, she curled up on the bed, her little white dog beside her, and hoped things would look better in the morning.

  Chapter 2

  “They don’t call this the windy city for nothing,” Georgie said sweetly into the camera as her hair whipped across her face and she stood in the breeze, a slice of pizza in hand. “And there’s also a reason Chicago is famous for its pizza.”