Lisa Plumley | excerpt from The Honeymoon Hoax by Lisa Plumley

Especially alone.

Sucking in a deep breath, Stacey Ames paused beneath the neon-studded entrance of the Atmosphere Hotel. Like everything else in Las Vegas, the massive concrete piazza bordering the hotel's drive popped with thousands of flashing lights. Never mind that it was only four o'clock on a sweltering Friday afternoon in August. The illusion of glamour, Stacey supposed, had to be maintained at all hours.

Maybe all that mood lighting would perk up her sun-starved complexion and wilted hairstyle. Something sure had to. After more than five hours spent driving from her cousin Janie's wedding to the hotel, she felt about as glamorous as a wrung-out washcloth. Except maybe a little less colorful.

Behind her, tires squealed against the pavement. Stacey glanced backward long enough to glimpse her red rented Honda Accord skid around the corner toward the hotel's hundred-acre back parking lot. The poor car all but spun on two wheels, thanks to the valet's energetic driving.

She'd have to check her rental car agreement's insurance provisions, just in case Mario Andretti, Jr. got too carried away. Making a mental note to do that when she got safely to the honeymoon suite, Stacey picked up her two hastily-packed suitcases, shrugged her purse higher on her shoulder, and girded her courage. Time to get on with the honeymoon hoax.

It'll be fun, she told herself as she pushed through the hotel's heavy glass doors. A three-day weekend of sun, fun, and fulfilling family obligations. Every girl's dream getaway.

Good thing they had free drinks at these places.

Frigid air blasted her the instant she stepped into the hotel's lobby. So did a cacophony of jangling slot machines, murmured voices, and what sounded like a watered-down version of one of those Fifties' crooner's songs. Muzak. She hoped they weren't featuring a similarly-orchestrated One Hundred Greatest Romantic Hits For Lovers in the honeymoon suite. It just might be the thing to make her end this sham, promise or no.

Stacey glanced down at her clothes, suddenly feeling more self-conscious than she wanted to be about her cutoff jean shorts and plain white T-shirt. She'd dressed for a road trip, not a honeymoon masquerade. Why hadn't she thrown on something else before leaving Phoenix this morning?

Because she hadn't planned on being drafted as a bride for a weekend, that's why. Cheering herself with thoughts of soaking in a hot bubble bath until she turned pruney once she reached the sanctity of her room, Stacey crossed the lobby to the hotel desk and plunked her bags onto the slick marble floor.

The immaculately-coiffured woman behind the desk glanced up. "May I help you?"

"I have a reservation," Stacey said, trying to ignore the way the woman's curious gaze skimmed over her casual clothes. "It's, ahhh, registered under the name of Parker. Robert and Janie Parker."

The woman swiveled in her chair, frowning slightly as she typed in the names. Suddenly, she beamed up at Stacey. "Oh! The honeymoon suite. How exciting for you. Congratulations!"

"Thanks." Please just give me the key. Don't ask any questions, Stacey prayed. Please, please, please. How like Janie it was to ask her, possibly the world's worst liar, to take her place at the hotel.

It would be a miracle if she wasn't found out before sunset. Then the people at the hotel would tell Aunt Geraldine her niece had tried to pawn off her wedding gift on somebody else, and she would get mad at Janie. Janie, when she got back from the Bahamas with Richard, would get mad at Stacey for bungling the whole thing. Before long, none of the family would be speaking to each other. For the sake of the promise she'd made to her cousin, Stacey had to get through the weekend with her real identity undiscovered. She'd just have to find a way to pull it off.

"Married." The desk clerk sighed, and her eyes went dreamy, just like Janie's did when she spotted a shoe sale. "You must be thrilled," she chirped, going back to the terminal in front of her. "I got married just last June."

Pushing buttons, she described her bridesmaid's dresses, the flowers, and the wedding toast the best man had made.

Stacey nodded and smiled, doing her best to gush right along with her. It was just her luck, to be checked in by the hotel's talkiest, cheeriest employee. A woman like this was meant to work at Disneyland greeting little kids, not working at one of Las Vegas's newest hotels.

Still chattering, the woman rifled through a pile of room keycards, then selected one and started handing it to Stacey. With her hand midway there, she stopped.

"But where's the happy groom?" she asked, frowning toward the hotel's entrance, then at the conspicuously empty area surrounding the reservation desk.

"Oh, ahhh..." Think, dummy. Nothing came to mind. Why hadn't she planned for this question? Stacey gestured vaguely toward the bank of glass doors leading outside. "He's, ahhh-"

"Getting the rest of your luggage?" the woman finished. She waved her hand and smiled conspiratorially. "I always pack too much, too. Mark-that's my husband-well, he says you shouldn't bring more than you can carry yourself, but that's ridiculous, don't you think? How would I ever bring what I needed then?"

"Right," Stacey said, giving her what felt like a completely inane grin. She picked up her suitcases again and nodded toward the keycard. "I'd better just go on up without him, I guess."

"Oh!" The woman tittered. "Sorry. Here you go!"

She held out the magnetized card that allowed entry into the hotel's suites. Stacey reached up to take it, forgetting the suitcase in her hand. It swung forward and thunked into the front of the desk with an awful hollow clunk.

"Whoops!" Keeping her gaze fixed on that keycard, Stacey turned her suitcase sideways over the desktop, trying to pry her sweaty fingers loose. Between the awkward angle she held it at and the weight of her purse swinging from her shoulder, she couldn't manage it. An instant later her purse slipped, yanking her arm downward. Her fingers opened, her suitcase swung free...and shot straight at the bellboy behind the desk.

"Oh!"

"Ooof." He caught it with both hands, looking surprised.

The woman behind the desk stared.

"Sorry," Stacey murmured.

Not again. Despite her mother's frequent assurances she'd outgrow her tendency toward...awkwardness, somehow that hadn't ever happened. Even at twenty-eight, she was still bumping and dropping things as often as ever. The tendency seemed to get worse any time she was with an appealing man, and had already led to several rather hazardous dates.

Luckily, the bellboy wouldn't be putting the Calvin Klein guys out of business any time soon. He was safe.

She snatched the keycard, retrieved her suitcase with thanks to the bellboy, and made her getaway before it was too late. So much for starting off on the right foot.

~ ~ ~

"Quit worrying," Dylan Davis said, speaking into his cell phone with one hand and steering his jeep through the bumper-to-bumper Las Vegas traffic with the other. "I said I'll handle it."

On the other end of the line, his friend Richard sighed. "When I asked you to do this," he said, "I didn't know things had gone sour between you and Stacey. Janie told me all about it. You-"

"Everything will be fine," Dylan interrupted. Ducking his head, he frowned through the windshield at the highway exit sign flashing overhead. "The Atmosphere, you said?"

"Yeah. Janie's aunt booked us into the honeymoon suite for the weekend as a wedding surprise."

"Some surprise." Or it would have been, if the newlyweds hadn't already paid for a trip to the Bahamas themselves.

But their loss was his gain. Thanks to the generosity of Janie's Aunt Geraldine-and her yen for surprises-Dylan was about to have a second chance with Stacey. He'd blown it the last time. He didn't mean to make the same mistake twice.

He grinned and steered the jeep toward the next exit. At the rate cars crawled off the highway toward the Las Vegas Strip, he'd be lucky to get there in time to spring his own surprise much before sunset.

"Get on that plane with Janie and get going, you worrywart," he told Richard. "I'll handle everything here."

"That's what I'm afraid of," Richard said. A muffled thump sounded on his end of the phone line, then bumping. A second later, Dylan heard something scrape across the receiver, then Richard's voice saying, "Okay, okay."

If he knew Janie, she was giving her new husband an earful. Patiently, Dylan nestled the phone between his ear and shoulder and eased his jeep down the off-ramp. Heat shimmered from the asphalt, and cars whizzed past in the right-hand lane, streaming toward the turn that led to the surface streets.

Nothing like Vegas in the summertime to make a person appreciate air conditioning, Dylan thought, reaching over the stick shift to adjust the vents. The only thing hotter than the desert city in August was sex in the desert city in August. Ideally first thing in the morning. Ideally fresh from the pool. Ideally beneath a big, sweeping ceiling fan.

Who was he kidding? Ideally with Stacey-any way she wanted it. He'd hang naked from a trapeze at Circus Circus if that's what it took to get her to give him a second chance.

The phone crackled. "Listen," Richard said, loudly, as though he'd returned his full attention to their phone conversation. "I gotta go. But watch yourself out there," he went on. "If you screw up and break Stacey's heart again, you'll never sing bass in this town again."

Dylan grinned. "Janie's parting shot, I presume?"

"Mine, too. You know how-"

"Quit worrying," Dylan said, frowning at the brake lights shining at him all the way to the stoplight. "Stacey's a big girl. She can take care of herself."

"Like hell she can," Richard returned. "Especially when it comes to you."

"What am I, the Terminator of romance?"

"According to Stacey, yeah."

"She'll change her mind," Dylan said. God, he hoped she'd change her mind. He said his good-byes to Richard and Janie, then plopped his cell phone onto the jeep's passenger seat. Its occupant, Ginger, sprawled across the upholstery with about as much canine grace as usual. He gave her a pat.

"You know, for a girl dog, you don't have much feminine mystique," he said, scratching between her furry, perked-up ears. She sneezed, quivering with the joy of being the center of attention as she rolled over so he could rub her belly. Dylan rubbed absentmindedly, his thoughts turning to Stacey.

Now there was a female with feminine mystique to spare. He hardly ever knew what the hell she was thinking. He had to be insane to jump back into the three-ring-circus that was dating Stacey Ames.

On the other hand, he'd be even crazier not to.

Grinning, Dylan turned onto the next street, his gaze darting toward the bright red spire of the Atmosphere Hotel rising above the Las Vegas skyline. Stacey didn't know what she was in for. But he was going to love showing her.

~ ~ ~

In the honeymoon suite's pink marble bathroom, Stacey slipped deeper into the hot, lemon-scented bath water she'd drawn, feeling her muscles relax for the first time since she'd stepped into the church for Janie's wedding this morning.

What an adventure that had turned out to be. First Janie had burst into tears at her bachelorette party the night before, thanks to Stacey's brilliant idea to have a male stripper dressed as a police officer come to the door and pretend to arrest the bride. Then at the wedding, Janie had had the train of her wedding gown ripped off, thanks to Stacey's spotting a cute usher and accidentally stepping on it.

By the time Aunt Geraldine had presented the bride and groom with their surprise wedding gift-a whole month after they'd scrimped and saved for a nonrefundable trip to the Bahamas-Janie had had all she could take. She'd run from the room wailing, leaving Stacey to explain away her trauma as a case of newlywed nerves.

And to step in and solve the problem.

Now here she was, chest-deep in a bubble bath foamy enough to get lost in, in a hotel suite bigger than the whole closet-sized apartment she lived in back in Phoenix. You know, she thought, sculpting herself a new pair of forty-four double-d's with the suds, this might actually be fun. A little relaxation, a little honeymooner champagne, a little time spent pool side...yessir, she could get to like spending a weekend in Vegas.

It wasn't likely she'd be able to pay for a vacation like this on her modest pharmacist's salary. Not for a long time, maybe not ever. As long as she was there, she figured she might as well enjoy it.

Stacey raised her foot from the water and examined it. Yep, just about wrinkly enough. A few more minutes soaking, then maybe she'd get dressed and head down to the casino and try her hand at a slot machine or two.

The phone jangled. Luckily, hotel patrons in Las Vegas apparently felt it imperative to remain connected at all times. Beside the neatly lined-up toiletry bottles on the pink marble vanity stood a cordless receiver. Dripping, Stacey rose from the tub and leaned halfway out to answer it.

"Oh, Mrs. Parker!" yelped the woman from the front desk. "I hope everything's all right with your room. Is everything satisfactory? Do you need anything?"

"Everything's fine," Stacey replied. As soon as I hang up, I'm throwing the phone out the window. "Thank you for calling. If that's all, I'll just-"

A giggle came from the receiver. "I just wanted to give you a little advance warning, in case you wanted to, you know, change clothes or something. I mean, no offense or anything."

Stacey recalled her shorts-and-T-shirt getup earlier, and gritted her teeth. It wasn't as though people ran around in evening gowns here, for Pete's sake. She hadn't looked that bad. Listening with half an ear, she murmured, "Uh-huh."

Water puddled onto the plush pink rug beneath her left foot. Frowning at it, Stacey balanced on the foot that was still in the bath water so she could shake herself dry on the left side, at least.

"He's on his way up," the woman from the hotel desk said on the other end of the phone. She lowered her voice to a girlish whisper. "I just gave him his keycard a few seconds ago." She paused. "Whoops! There he goes into the elevator."

"What?" Stacey lowered her leg back to the rug, still poised between the tub and vanity but too confused to move. Goosebumps spread along her arms and speeded toward her toes. "You gave who a keycard?"

"Why, your husband, of course."

"My husband."

Silence. Then, tentatively, "Yes, your husband. Is there...a problem?"

Her husband? But Richard and Janie were already at the airport, waiting for their honeymoon flight. Who in the world...?

"Mrs. Parker?"

This had to be some kind of mistake. Had to be.

"Uh, I'm here." Her mind wasn't, though. It was someplace else entirely. Like Panicville. "Thanks for calling. I guess I ought to change clothes after all," Stacey said, hanging up the phone with a ridiculous, panic-induced titter.

Clothes. She needed clothes. She slammed the phone into its stand and twisted to pull her other foot from the bath water.

Knock-knock-knock.

Her heart revved into overdrive. So did her foot. It splashed from the water, sending an arc of lemon-scented foam across the bathroom-and sending Stacey flat onto the floor. She landed on her backside in a puddle, staring in the direction of the knock on the door.

Knock-knock-knock.

Ouch. Rubbing her bruised, soggy knee, she glared toward the sound. Maybe if she just ignored it, whoever it was would just go away. He'd obviously made a mistake. He needed the other honeymoon suite, the one with an actual bride in it.

Just in case, she pushed herself up and hobbled to the bathroom door. Her knee ached from cracking into the marble floor. Good thing there hadn't been a cute guy nearby; she might have wound up unable to walk at all.

Shivering, she yanked the white monogrammed hotel robe from its hook and slipped her arms inside the sleeves. The thick terry cloth stuck to her wet skin, but at least it was warm. She'd cranked up the air conditioning before stepping into the tub, a bad move if you were going to wind up creeping around dripping and injured a half hour later.

Knock-knock-knock.

Okay, this was ridiculous, Stacey decided, tying the robe closed at her waist. She was hardly going to skulk around in her honeymoon suite, dripping, while some poor libidinous bridegroom knocked around outside. For all she knew, that wasn't even his knuckles he was rapping against the door.

Now there's the kind of guy you want to invite in, Janie would've said with a wink. Unfortunately, Janie and her ribald sense of humor weren't there. Stacey was. With a quick swipe at the foggy bathroom mirror and a last pat at her scraggly brown ponytail, she headed toward the door.

Something scraped against it. The knob clicked.

The keycard. The woman at the desk said she'd given one to Stacey's 'husband.'

Panicked, Stacey scanned the room for a weapon. Her suitcase? Too bulky. Her purse? She carried hot pepper spray in a holster inside, but there wasn't time to grab it. Think, think.

Her gaze settled on her blow-dryer's cord, dangling from the bathroom vanity to the floor. She followed it upward from the plug to the two-thousand watt, gun-shaped business end.

The door swung inward.

If personal care appliances were all she had to defend herself with, that's what she'd use. Adrenaline pumping, Stacey lunged for the blow-dryer. The plug slapped her bare leg. The dryer's weight filled her hand.

"Mrs. Parker?" asked a rich-timbered masculine voice.

A familiar masculine voice.

The broad, polo-shirt clad shoulder that edged next into view around the door nudged her suspicions. The rest of the hard-muscled body that followed confirmed them.

Dylan Davis. Here. Dear Lord, she had to be imagining him. Maybe hallucinating. Stress could do that to a person, couldn't it?

But he sure looked real. Tall, dark-haired and grinning, he filled her doorway. His arms were laden with an overcoat-wrapped bundle of what she assumed constituted luggage for a Peter Pan type like him, and above it his eyes sparkled with good humor. The bastard.

"Aren't you missing a husband?" he asked.

He added another smile to the mix. This was the part, Stacey supposed, where she was supposed to fall at his feet in gratitude. Fat chance.

"I spent the whole wedding trying to avoid you," she said, aiming the blow-dryer nozzle at him.

His gaze went to it, and his eyebrows raised. His stupid smile widened, too, damn him. "What are you going to do?" he asked. "Style me to death?"

Stacey stretched her arm back, letting the blow-dryer cord spin through her fingers until she held a good hank of it. She twirled it in the air, working up momentum. Then she walloped him with it.

It was the least Dylan Davis deserved.

~ ~ ~

The hair dryer whacked him right in the temple.

"Ouch!"

The dryer rebounded off his forehead, bashed off the wall, and came at him again. Dylan ducked, his head stinging, and tried to keep from dropping the trench coat-wrapped bundle in his arms. Easing it into the crook of his arm, he grabbed the hair dryer with his other hand.

"Same old Stacey," he said, unable to keep a goofy-feeling grin from his face. "I knew I should've taken out accident insurance before I came here."

She crossed her arms over her chest, hair dryer swinging beneath her elbow, and glared at him. "That wasn't an accident."

"Uh-huh."

God, she looked great. Between the half-tied bathrobe she had on, the bunched-up, shiny brown ponytail she'd stuck her hair in, and the fire in her eyes, Dylan figured she'd never looked sexier. But maybe that was just his skewed perspective talking. Because actually, Stacey looked miffed. Adorably miffed.

Adorably miffed? part of his brain jeered. Hell-o. You're way far gone over this one. He had to get a hold of himself.

Okay, maybe miffed was understating it. Mad as hell was more like it.

On the other hand, he'd pretty much expected that. Now he just had to change her mind-about him, about them-and he didn't plan to leave until he'd done it.

Dylan let go of the hair dryer. "You always say that, right after you stomp, drop, smash or hurl something at somebody."

"I did that on purpose, you creep," Stacey said.

He stepped forward, glancing around the suite. Behind her, the room stretched into a pale-carpeted sitting area with a couch and chairs arranged around a table that featured a cellophane-wrapped basket of more fruit than Dylan ate in a whole month. Behind that, a bank of windows let the desert sunshine pour in, illuminating the room's central feature-a big double bed covered with a cushy black silk comforter.

He liked it.

"Nice place," Dylan said, looking back at her.

"You're not staying."

"Who's asking?"

"Not me."

Beneath his trench coat, Ginger wiggled. Stacey's gaze went straight to the lump of coat covering the dog, and her eyebrows lifted.

"But you were thinking about it," he said to distract her. "Admit it. You want me as much as I want you."

She swung the hair dryer back and forth in front of her like a lion tamer tossing a whip from hand to hand. Her eyes told him Stacey would've found the analogy wholly appropriate. Something inside him ached at the thought.

"I want you to leave," she said.

Dylan kicked the door closed with his foot.

Her eyes widened and she stepped backward. A flush rose beneath the gaping neckline of her robe, tinting the cleavage he remembered so well a nice shade of pink. The heck with looking over the room. He liked watching her more.

"Get out of here," she said, advancing toward him. Dylan wasn't sure if she realized exactly how menacingly she'd started whirling the hair dryer again. Probably not.

"Don't you understand? Take a walk," she went on. Ginger's tail popped from beneath his trench coat. It started wagging. "Scram. I don't wa-"

She snapped her mouth shut, staring at the fluffy, golden-colored tail beating against his hip. "What have you got under there?"

He lowered Ginger to the carpet and pulled off his coat. Free at last, the dog sneezed and trotted over to have a good sniff of their new companion. Her tail wagged so fast it made her whole hind end shake.

"You had to say the 'W' word, didn't you?" Dylan asked.

"'W' word?" Stacey's eyebrows dipped. Absently, she crouched beside his dog and patted her head. With a blissful closing of her doggie eyes, Ginger rolled onto her back. All four furry legs lolled in the air.

"Yeah, don't say it a-"

"What do you..." Her eyes brightened. "Oh, walk!"

Yip!

Ginger tried to scramble onto four paws. She thunked her muzzle on the carpet, looked vaguely confused, then made it upright. From tail to whiskers, her whole body quivered with undisguised canine glee. Walk-walk-walk.

Dylan shook his head. "Sorry, girl," he told her. "Not right now." Crossing his arms, he looked at Stacey. "I had enough trouble just smuggling her in here. What'd you have to go and do that for?"

"Sorry, I didn't know." She bent over the dog, crooning as she smoothed her hand over Ginger's fur and scratched beneath her muzzle. "Sorry to get you all worked up for nothing," she told the dog.

She glanced up at Dylan, her eyes clear, golden brown...and suspicious. "Whose is she?" she asked.

"What do you mean, 'whose is she?' She's mine." He crouched near the bathroom door and whistled. "Come here, Ginger."

The damned traitorous dog rolled her eyes and licked Stacey's hand. Not so much as a tail thump indicated she'd heard him.

"Ginger. Come."

She sprawled heavily atop Stacey's feet, nearly toppling her over. Grinning for the first time-presumably at his failure to make even a dog listen to him-Stacey went on petting her.

Dylan snapped his fingers. "Come."

The dog yawned, stretching her muzzle wide, then plunked her head onto the carpet and closed her eyes.

"Smart dog," Stacey observed. "More women ought to try resisting you like that."

"Ha, ha."

She grinned. With a final crooning pat, she left Ginger in a contented heap and crossed the room toward him. Dylan watched her, mentally gauging his chances of being as kindly treated as the dog.

Judging by his reception so far, they were pretty bleak.

"Really," Stacey said, "who'd you borrow her from?"

"What do you mean, who'd I borrow her from? She's mine."

"Yours." She snorted and looked back at Ginger. "Right."

"I'm hurt," Dylan said, doing his best to look it. "Why can't I have a dog?"

She tightened the belt on her robe and scrutinized him through narrowed eyes. The hair dryer still poked from beneath her elbow, but Stacey hardly needed it. Her icy composure was all the defense required. Dylan practically felt himself shrink a couple of inches just standing there.

"You're not the dog type," she said simply.

As though that actually explained anything, she rocked back on her heels and waited for him to answer. Bet you can't, her expression said.

Bet I can, he thought.

Dylan stepped nearer, close enough to sense the lemon-scented dampness on her skin. Close enough to touch her. God, how he wanted to touch her.

"I've changed," he said.

Her head came up, sending her ponytail swinging. "I don't believe you."

"I can convince you." He pried the hair dryer from beneath her elbow and shoved it safety onto the bathroom vanity where he could keep an eye on it. "Let me convince you, Stacey. I'm not leaving until the weekend's over. I promised Richard and Janie. So you might as well give me another try."