Peaches & the Duke - Ginger Voight Page 0,144

had pretty much made all the rules since we first met. It wasn’t anything we weren’t already used to.

Auggie and I had just sort of decided to roll with it, saving it all for our wedding night.

Still, I had many reservations. Though I no longer shared my life on my socials, I still got alerts whenever someone went through my old posts, liking or commenting as John Q. Public was known to do. Christopher had made his presence known, even though he was legally barred from entering the country. He made damn sure I knew he was watching me like a hawk regardless.

It wasn’t that he wanted me or Jack, he wanted an exclusive to the scandal, or a lot of money, or both. I knew I couldn’t risk an early birth. At least, any earlier than the “early” date of Halloween when I was scheduled for a C-section.

Still, my Auggie was a hard man to resist. When he pulled me closer, there was no pulling away.

That was why I had spent the last couple of weeks at Greystone Castle, preparing for the wedding of the century. The world watched and waited for the next royal wedding, and I wasn’t about to let them down even if I had to continually pinch myself that the blushing bride that they were talking about was me.

By the end of the next day, I would no longer be known as Peaches McPhee. I would be Peaches, Duchess of Iver, an official member of the House of Quinn.

All I wanted was to be Auggie’s wife. These last two weeks were the longest we’d been apart since we met. I could tell by his texts that it was killing him every bit as much as me, though Queen Maeve made damn sure he stayed busy in the interim.

He had returned to Shimmering Falls, where he began his official grooming to become king. Fortunately, he had finished his education during his Duke of Mayhem days, which he had agreed to in exchange for his freedom to tour. Still, as the King of Aldayne he would be the leader of their armed forces. He required standard military training before he could take the throne. This would put off his coronation for another couple of years, after his 35th birthday.

Both of us were fine with this.

My job was public outreach. After our two-week honeymoon in a location Auggie had decided to keep secret, I would then begin making public appearances to represent the royal family.

Of course, all that would grind to a halt after Halloween when Jack made his “early” appearance, but we had to plan events into November to keep up the ruse.

A quick knock preceded Kelly poking her head around the slightly open door. “They’re almost ready for you, Mum.”

I smiled. The McPhee family had taken over Greystone to prepare for the big day. They had insisted on a bachelorette party the night before the wedding. I expected barbecue, disco and karaoke in true McPhee fashioned. I hoped the ghosts of Greystone would be able to keep up with us, because it promised to be a party unlike anything they’d ever seen. “I’m almost ready,” I told her.

“I’ll let them know,” she said, walking further into the room. “You had another delivery,” she grinned as she held up a small package.

I chuckled. I barely even expected to get married, much less have hundreds of gifts pouring in every day. They came from all over the world, but the Aldayneans would not be outdone. They wanted me to know that they approved of Auggie’s choice.

I think they just loved the idea of a wedding. Who didn’t?

“Put it on the pile with the rest,” I decided.

She shook her head as she handed it to me. “It says it’s to the bride.”

My brow furrowed. I had gotten tons of gifts, some to Peaches, some to Miss McPhee, some to Mrs. Auggie Agassi, but this one was just as cold as she said. I took it and examined the writing. It was bold black lettering. “There’s no return address,” I mentioned.

“It was hand delivered, mum.”

I walked to the window. Down in the circular drive below was a black Alda luxury sedan. I could see Cillian Byrne’s silhouette from where I stood. I shivered from that icy blue stare even from hundreds of feet away.

Only family could get this close to the castle. Regrettably, the House of Byrne was exactly that, so he had been allowed passage.

I gulped. “I’ve got it,” I said, dismissing her with a small nod. I waited until she disappeared before I opened the package with trembling fingers. There was a note on top of a black velvet jewelry box. I pulled open the note written on delicate stationary with CB embossed in gold in the corner.

I underestimated you, it read. I won’t be doing that again. If you are as smart as I think you are, then you won’t underestimate me, either. Especially come Halloween.

I gulped again as I withdrew the box and opened it. A gold locket was nestled on the black velvet. My fingers shook as I opened it, my belly filled with such dread it made Jack jump in the womb. I gasped as I focused on the picture placed inside the locket.

It was a picture of Christopher.

I gasped and tossed the box across the room with a clatter. When I turned back to the window, the black Alda was gone.

But he didn’t need to stick around, did he? He had thrown that stick of dynamite right in the middle of my fairy tale wedding, the damage was done.

He knew my secret.

Now I just had to wait to see how it all blew apart.

About the Authors

Ginger Voight is a screenwriter and bestselling author with more than thirty published titles in fiction and nonfiction. Her nonfiction works cover everything from travel to politics, while her works of fiction range from romance to the paranormal, as well as dark “ripped-from-the-headlines” topics, such as those featured in her book Dirty Little Secrets.

Ginger discovered her love for writing in the sixth grade, courtesy of a Halloween assignment. From then on, writing became a thing of solace, reflection, and security. When she found herself homeless in L.A. at the age of nineteen, she wrote her first novel in longhand on notebook paper while living out of her car.

In 1995, after she lost her nine-day-old son, she worked through her grief by writing the story that would eventually become The Fullerton Family Saga. In 2011, she embarked on a new journey: to publish romance novels starring heroines who look like the average American woman. These “Rubenesque romances” have developed a following thanks to her bestselling Groupie series. Other titles, such as the highly-rated Fierce series, tap into the American preoccupation with reality TV, giving her contemporary stories a current, pop-culture edge.

Ginger isn’t afraid to push the envelope with characters who are perfectly imperfect. Rich or poor, sweet or selfish, gay or straight, plus-size or svelte, her characters are beautifully flawed and three-dimensional. They populate her lavish fictional landscapes and teach us more about the real world in which we live, through their interactions with each other, and often through gut-wrenching angst. Ginger’s goal with every book is to give her readers a little bit more than they were expecting, with stories they’ll never forget.

For more, please visit gingervoight.com. Follow Ginger on Twitter (twitter.com/gingervoight) and “like” her author page on Facebook (facebook.com/gingervoight) for all the latest news on her public appearances and new releases.

In The Rocking Royals Trilogy, Ginger is joined by her best friend, Jeffrey L. Mayo. They began telling stories together in 1980, after a fortuitous meeting in the fifth grade. Jeff was already a voracious reader, having won an award for reading 80 books in the first grade. Jeff and Ginger instantly shared a love of books and of stories and storytelling. In fact, Jeff proved instrumental in introducing Ginger to many of the books and authors that crafted her into the storyteller she is today. Over the past four decades, he has helped her craft many of her novels, including her beloved GROUPIE trilogy. His insight brings a lot to this new installment to the GROUPIEVERSE.