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didn’t dare turn around.
    â€œWhy are you hesitating? We can draft whatever legal documents you want to protect the Thunderbolt.”
    â€œIt’s not that.” Well, actually, it was that. At least, that was part of it. He didn’t know Sydney, and he’d be a fool to trust her.
    But there was more to it than the legal risks. It was amarriage, a marriage to a woman he didn’t love, didn’t even know. Maybe he was an old-fashioned guy, but he just couldn’t bring himself to do it.
    â€œThe Laurent is a very reputable institution,” she said.
    â€œI believe you.”
    â€œIs it lying to Katie, then?”
    Cole turned. And there was Sydney, mere inches away. A slight movement of his hand and he’d be touching her. A tip of his head and he’d be kissing her.
    â€œIt’s lying to Katie,” he said. “Lying to Grandma. Lying to God.”
    â€œWe could have a civil service.”
    â€œNot a possibility.”
    She tipped her head, looking perplexed.
    He moved in, just a little, pressing his point, hoping he could make her understand and give up on this ridiculous idea. “We’re talking about my family here, and they know me very well. They know that if I loved someone—if I truly loved someone—I sure wouldn’t say so in a civic office in front of a clerk and two impartial witnesses.”
    Sydney bit down on her bottom lip. Her cat-green eyes narrowed in concentration, but she didn’t respond.
    â€œYou ready to walk down the aisle in a white dress, promise to love me and honor me, then kiss me and throw a bouquet?”
    As he outlined the scenario, an unexpected vision bloomed in Cole’s mind. Sydney in a white dress. Sydney in a veil. Sydney with a spray of delicate roses trembling in her hands. He could feel her skin, smell her perfume, taste the sweetness of her lush lips.
    â€œWe’d both know it was fake,” she said.
    Cole startled out of the vision and gave a short nod. “Yeah. Right. We’d both know it was fake.”
    â€œAnd that’s what would matter. That’s what would count.” She squared her shoulders. “Knowing the benefits, I could do it.”
    Cole clenched his jaw. He’d hand the Thunderbolt over to her tomorrow if he could. But Olav the Third was specific, and Cole’s grandfather’s will was ironclad.
    He examined the idea from every angle. From his, from Kyle’s, from Katie’s, from Sydney’s.
    She could do it? Of course she could. It wasn’t as if it would be physically painful. And nobody would die. And nobody would ever be the wiser. Marriages failed all the time. After a decent interval, he and Sydney could simply divorce.
    â€œThen so can I,” said Cole, just as he’d known he would from the second his brother conceived the plan. His family needed him, and that was an unconditional trump card.
    A brilliant smile lit Sydney’s face. “Where do we start?”
    Â 
    â€œFirst thing we have to do,” said Cole two hours later while Sydney watched him saddle a horse outside his cabin, “is convince Katie I’m falling for you.”
    Sydney eyed up the big animal from the safety of his porch, having second and third and fourth thoughts. Oh, not about marrying Cole; she was completely convinced that was the right thing to do. She was having second thoughts about getting on the back of an animal that could crush her with one stomp of its foot.
    â€œTell me again why that has to involve horses?” she said.
    â€œDon’t you watch the movies?” Cole pressed his knee into the horse’s ribs and pulled snug on a leather strap. His strong, calloused hands worked with practiced ease, and she had a sudden vision of them against her pale skin.
    He released a stirrup and secured a buckle. “People who are falling in love gallop their horses along the beach all the time.”
    Maybe so. But there was no way in