Yield to Love

Yield to Love

Love Under Construction
Series: Book 3

By Chanta Jefferson
Rand

Copyright 2014 Chanta
Jefferson Rand

Smashwords Edition

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“
Gabriel Edward Hunt, do
you take Candace Jones to be your lawfully wedded wife?”

“
I do,” Gabe
answered.

“
Candace Denyse Jones, do
you take Gabe Hunt to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“
I do,” Candace
answered.

The chubby-cheeked minister of St. Andrews
Episcopal First Presbyterian Church paused in front of an audience
of nearly two hundred people before he addressed the second
couple.

“
Victor Miguel Romano, do
you take Veronica Jones as your lawfully wedded wife?”

“
I do,” Vic
answered.

“
Veronica Lynn Jones, do
you take Victor Romano as your lawfully wedded husband?”

“
I do,” Ronnie
replied.

The minister took a deep breath. “Then, by
the power vested in me by the state of Florida, I now pronounce you
husband and wife. Gentlemen, you may kiss your brides.”

Marlowe Jones smiled as her sisters
instantly lip-locked with their new husbands. Unbelievably, both
Candace and Ronnie had found their soul mates within a year of each
other. Marlowe had to admit, her brothers-in-law were all good
guys.

Alpha males that had fallen hard for the
Jones women.

We are pretty damn hard to resist.

The groomsmen all clapped each other on the
back, no doubt happy to have escaped the same fate as Gabe and Vic.
But these poor guys were about to be cornered by the battalion of
single women who were looking for a groom of their own. Sadly, the
women here were in no danger of hooking up with any of the men in
the wedding party.

Phil, Gabe’s best man, was a confirmed
bachelor for life. Bud, Vic’s best man, was Ronnie’s childhood
friend and her best friend, Quatara’s doting husband for over a
decade. Cordell, a handsome, young executive who worked for Gabe,
was blessed with smooth mahogany skin and a dazzling smile. But any
woman vying for a piece of that chocolate would have to fight his
boyfriend. Vic’s second cousin, Vinnie “Cro-Magnon” Esposito was
hideous. Marlowe would bet all the money in her Roth IRA that the
babies had been switched at birth, and Vic’s real cousin was a
runway model in Venice. And Jovan, Ronnie’s son, was only thirteen
years old—still too young for even the most desperate cougar in the
room.

When her sisters decided to marry in a
double ceremony, Marlowe was shocked. The two were as different as
night and day. Candace was flashy, sassy, and outspoken. She’d kept
her fiancé, Gabe waiting for over two years before she finally set
a date. Ronnie was classy, conservative, and always thought before
she spoke. She wasn’t prone to rash decisions, but when she met bad
boy Vic, she agreed to marry him after only five months of dating.
The one thing Marlowe’s sisters did have in common was they were
both strong, independent women who knew what they wanted.

But they weren’t the only women in the Jones
family who knew what they wanted. Right now, Marlowe’s attention
was being high jacked by a fine specimen sitting in the third row
of the church. Olive skin. Piercing blue eyes. Dark goatee. Thick
sable hair. To her surprise, he was staring back at her! When their
eyes met, he gave her an imperceptible nod of the head. No smile.
No wink. Just a nod of his head. He must be the strong, silent
type.

Humph! She had a way of making even the most
hardened introvert call out her name in the throes of pleasure.

She silently berated herself. She should be
paying attention to her Maid of Honor duties, which weren’t
complicated. All she had to do was stand here and be her gorgeous
self. Candace and Ronnie pretty much had everything else covered.
The ceremony was over anyway. The passionate kisses of both couples
sealed the deal. Now, it was on to the reception, and then in the
morning, her sisters would depart on their separate honeymoons,
leaving her in charge of Three Sisters Construction for a week.

Marlowe joined the four other bridesmaids as
they trailed after the brides, scooping up the long trains on their
wedding gowns. Marlowe and her cousin, Toye, held the train of
Candace’s elegant, white lace gown. Ronnie’s best friend, Quatara,
and Vic’s sister, Andrea, held Ronnie’s stunning, beaded pale pink
gown. This was Ronnie’s second marriage, and she felt weird getting
married in white. Vic was so in love with the woman, he wouldn’t
have cared if she’d worn red.

Thankfully, both sisters agreed to have
black and silver as their wedding colors. Both of their gowns
blended beautifully with the bridesmaids’ silver beaded dresses.
Stopping just above the knee, this was a dress Marlowe could get
years of mileage out of.

Ronnie’s personal assistant, Olivia, was the
remaining bridesmaid, who for once, followed demurely instead of
flossing like a strutting peacock.

Outside on the steps of the massive church,
the guests wished the couples well and threw birdseed instead of
rice, at Ronnie’s insistence. Ronnie was always thinking of others.
She argued no one should be throwing away food when millions of
people were going hungry every day. As the two couples got into
separate limos to be transported to the reception, one hundred
white balloons were released into the sky. The effect was
breathtaking.

Toye came up to Marlowe, tears misting her
gray eyes. “Wasn’t that a beautiful ceremony?”

“
Yes,” Marlowe answered.
“And even better was the fact that I only had to buy one
dress.”

Toye shot her a snide look. “You were wrong
for that.”

“
No, I was being honest.
If you’d have gotten married too, I could have tripled my money on
this dress.”

“
Yeah, well with no likely
prospects, it’s kind of hard to be engaged.”

Marlowe felt a pang of guilt. Toye was
married years ago, but her no-good husband ran off with some skank
hoe. Now, Toye had the pleasure of watching both of her cousins get
married.

“
I’ll be thirty-four in
less than six months,” Toye moaned. “And I still have no hopes of
getting married.”

Marlowe, at twenty-eight was nine years
younger than her oldest sister, Ronnie, and seven years younger
than Candace. Marlowe wanted to tell Toye that maybe if she stayed
out of folks’ business, she might find a man of her own. Her cousin
had a fucked up habit of budding in where she didn’t belong.
Instead, Marlowe said, “They say things happen in threes. So,
you’ll probably be next.”

Before Toye could respond, Olivia slithered
up to them. The blonde bombshell’s eyes were focused on something
in the distance. Her lips, painted with a brilliant red lipstick,
barely moved as she spoke. “Ten o’clock, to my left. Check out the
beefcake in the gray suit. Damn!”

Marlowe retrieved her small gold compact
from her bra and pretended to glimpse into the mirror, but in
reality, it allowed her to fully appreciate the man reflected in
the mirror. He was the Adonis she’d seen earlier in the third row.
The man was striking, by classic standards. In the bright sunlight,
she had a better view of his Indigo eyes and patrician features. He
stood with his hands in the pockets of his tailored gray suit. She
could tell even from this distance, it was quality. God, she loved
it when a man knew how to dress.

“
About time,” Toye huffed.
“I was beginning to think there were no interesting prospects at
this wedding.”

“
Yeah,” Olivia complained.
“You would think with one hundred and seventy-three RSVPs the odds
of at least one fine ass man would be pretty damn high.”

“
How do you know a hundred
and seventy-three people RSVP’d?” Toye asked.

“
Don’t forget who wrote
the invitations. The P.A. knows everything.”

Marlowe laughed. Poor Olivia. In the last
six months, she’d graduated from Ronnie’s secretary to her personal
assistant. She was already running Ronnie’s office as well as her
personal life. Ronnie just made it official.

“
I call dibs,” Toye
announced, a predatory grin settling across her full
lips.

“
I saw him first,” Olivia
argued back. “I was only advising you as a courtesy—stay out of my
way.”

“
I’m the oldest,” Toye
murmured, as her gaze swept over the man’s body. “Always listen to
your elders. Plus,” she licked her lips, “his suit matches my eyes.
It’s karma.”

Toye did have unusual gray eyes that seemed
to attract men like flies to shit. But neither she nor Olivia were
about to claim this prize.

Marlowe checked her image in the small
mirror.

Makeup. Perfect.

Hair. Flawless.

Teeth. No lipstick smears.

She was ready.

“
Who is he?” Marlowe
asked. She watched as the man checked his watch. An onyx and gold
cufflink peeped from the cuff of his crisp, white shirt. What a
nice surprise. Few men bothered with small details like
cufflinks.

“
I haven’t figured that
out yet,” Olivia admitted. “Apparently, he’s here solo.”

Toye was saying something, but Marlowe had
tuned her out. Olivia and Toye were attention whores, in the most
affectionate sense of the words. The two women talked a good game.
Marlowe wasn’t about talk. She was about action. She sashayed in
the direction of the mystery man.

He had an athletic build. Broad shoulders
that tapered to a slim waist. She pegged him at around thirty-five
or thirty-six. Just her speed. She liked older men who knew their
way around a woman’s anatomy. Up close, she could see the fine
detailing on his suit. It looked custom-made, the way it molded to
his muscular shoulders. The material had to be 300-thread count.
The dark goatee framing his lips was groomed to perfection. She
liked everything about this one. She hoped he didn’t go and mess it
up by being married or gay.

“
I’m Marlowe.” She stuck
her hand out in introduction.

“
Roque Coleman,” he
answered in a deep voice that wrapped around her like a mink fur
rubbing against nude skin.

Rock? Did he say Rock? What kind of name is
that?

His brief smile was all-business. His cobalt
eyes calmly appraised her. No flirting. No unspoken innuendoes.
That wasn’t the usual reaction she got from guys. Most of them
couldn’t keep from tripping over their tongues whenever she was
around.

The tantalizing smell of his cologne drew
her like a hypnotic nectar. A heady mix of sandalwood with citrus
undertones.

Mommy Like!

“
So, are you a friend of
Gabe’s or Vic’s?” she asked.

“
Neither.”

She knew he wasn’t a friend of either of her
sisters. She would know if Candace or Ronnie knew any guy this hot!
But she asked anyway. “You must know one of the bridesmaids,” she
prompted.

“
No, I can’t say I
do.”

Marlowe didn’t bother to hide her growing
irritation. “If you don’t know the brides or the grooms, then why
are you here? What are you? A wedding crasher or something?”

He begrudged her a half-smile that might
have made him even more devastatingly handsome if he’d bothered to
turn the wattage up. “Actually, I’m here for you,” he said.

“
Me?”

“
You are Marlowe Jones,
right?”

“
Yes.”

“
Then, you’re just the
woman I want.”

She smirked. “You and half of the other men
here.”

Roque stared at the
striking beauty in front of him. Some men might consider her
features exotic. Skin that reminded him of the café au lait he
drank this morning. Eyes the
amber hue of
fine cognac.
A flawless face graced with
high cheekbones and a wide, sensual mouth. His eyes roamed her
slender figure. She was top-heavy with a slender waist and narrow
hips. The draped neckline of her silver dress dipped low to allow
for ample admiration of her cleavage. And he was happy to
oblige.