by Megan Bryce
He followed and said, “You need to wear it every time you go outside.”
“It’s too big. I keep catching it on things.”
“Like what?”
“Like my jeans. I try to put something in my pocket and it gets caught. It’s irritating.”
“What you’re telling me is the ring is too big.”
She nodded.
He shook his head at her back. “How can a diamond engagement ring be too big? Too small, sure. Too big? Absurd.”
She walked into her closet, placing the stool right in the middle of the room.
He said, “What are you doing?”
“Getting the ring.”
She climbed up on the stool, unscrewed the frosty dome on the ceiling light, and took out a small white envelope.
He shook his head and took the envelope from her. “I have a safe.”
“Then you should keep it in there.”
He laughed silently, watching her screw the dome back on, then helped her down from the stool. “Seriously. In a light fixture?”
“I didn’t want the housekeeper to accidentally find it.”
He snorted. “You didn’t want me finding it while I was looking for your stash. Do you have valuables hidden all over your house?”
“Of course not. I have a safe deposit box.”
“I don’t know whether to believe you or not. You hid things in your office; you’re hiding things here.”
He opened up the envelope, dumping out the ring. He grabbed her hand and slid it on to her finger. “Wear it.”
She looked down at her hand, wiggling her finger and watching the ring sparkle, then took it back off and handed it to him. “You try it. Put it on your finger and put your hand in your pocket.”
“It can’t be so big of a deal that you have to hide it in a light to keep from wearing it.”
She crossed her arms and nodded towards his hand. “Just try it.”
He laughed, sliding the ring as far up his finger as it would go. He slid his hand into his pocket, the ring catching.
She nodded. “Now do it twenty more times and you’ll start to understand.”
“That’s. . .”
“Annoying.”
He tried it again, reluctant to agree with her. “A little. But this is the first complaint I’ve ever heard about it.”
“Do the women you date not have pockets?”
He shrugged, thinking back. Mackenzie was quite a bit more fond of jeans and pants than any of his previous girlfriends. He hadn’t seen a glimpse of her legs since the limo.
He said, “Maybe it’s like high heels. Worth the pain.”
“It’s not to me.”
He smiled at her. “Okay. We’ll go get something else.”
She shook her head. “We’ve only got a few weeks left. I don’t really need a ring.”
“An engagement’s not real unless there’s a ring on your finger.”
“Show me where that’s written.”
“I’ll have my grandma bring over a copy.”
She pouted. “I don’t want a ring.”
“Too bad. It shows the world that you’re taken.”
She gave him a look. “That’s just lovely. Where’s your ‘private property’ stamp?”
“A man doesn’t get one until he’s actually married.”
“I like where this conversation is going. I’m starting to smell a half million dollars.”
He laughed again, taking the ring off his finger. He held it up to the light. “You’re really not going to wear this?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“I guess it was just supposed to be a temporary one, anyway. Let’s go get you the real one.”
He took her hand in his and began pulling her out of the closet. She dug in her heels.
He said, “You really don’t want me picking it out, do you? I believe in the ‘bigger is better’ mantra.”
“I’ll just find somewhere else to hide it.”
“Or you could come with me and pick one you’ll actually wear.”
“I’m not sure we’re ever going to meet on this issue. I’ll pick small ones and you’ll pick big ones. This engagement will be over before we can agree.”
“What else are we going to do today?”
“You should really go back to work.”
“Hey, I haven’t taken a vacation in years either. And I get the feeling shopping with you is going to be a new and entertaining experience.” He tugged gently. “Didn’t we have fun going to the zoo?”
“I feel like I should say no.”
“You can say it as many times as you want, I’m not going to believe it.”
She shrugged. “It was fun imagining feeding you to the lions.”
“That’s why we spent so much time watching the polar bear cub.”
“She was pretty cute. And in a year or two, I could feed you to her.”
He nodded, finally understanding. “Oh, you were taking notes.”
She snickered.
He took a deep breath, inhaling her laugh. He took a step toward her. “Or we could stay in.”
She blew out a breath, looked around as if just realizing they were in her bedroom, and started pushing him out of the closet.
She said, “We’ll take the subway,” and he nodded. “Of course we will.”
The subway was crowded and they remained standing when they got in the car. Ethan wrapped his arm around her waist. She glared at him and he grinned at her. And kept his arm around her.
She leaned into him and said, “You’re just nervous about riding the subway.”
He nodded. “Absolutely. That guy over there is staring at me.”
She glanced where he was looking and saw three guys in suits. All of them reading.
She shook her head, but didn’t say anything else. They watched people getting on and off, and Ethan tried not to think about how he could feel her heat through her shirt and how she smelled like a mix of laundry soap and warm female. And really didn’t think about why the smell of laundry soap was messing with his libido.
He grabbed her hand when they exited and joined the mob climbing the stairs.
When they stepped into daylight, she tried to tug her hand free. He held tight and she looked down at their hands intertwined. “What are you doing?”
“Holding your hand.”
She looked back up, the alarm clear on her face. “Out here? Why?”
“Because you don’t have a ring wrapped around your finger and I’m feeling the need to lay my claim.”
She tried to pull her fingers away and he held on.
She said, “Lay your claim. You’re just trying to get me mad.”
“Actually, I’m just trying to distract you long enough to get you into a clothes store.”
She shook her head. “I will go shopping. But not with you.”
“Why not? I have fashion sense. And dressing you in short skirts and high heels sounds like fun.”
“That’s only one of the reasons why I’m not going shopping with you.”
“But we need to get rid of that muumuu. Maybe today.”
Honestly, a muumuu. She couldn’t broadcast any clearer that she was planning on getting through their six weeks together without getting naked. It would piss him off if he wasn’t enjoying the challenge so much.
He was enjoying the challenge, dammit.
She squinted her eyes at him. “Have you been talking to Cassandra?”
“I don’t need to. I’ve got eyes. And I don’t think that muumuu does what you want it to.”
“I want it to be comfortable.”
“I want to rip it off your body and throw it in the garbage.”
She jerked and he adjusted his hold on her hand. She said, “It makes me want to go to Hawaii.”
He cocked his head. “Where you will wear a bikini and high heels? Because I can take some time off.”
“I’m sensing a trend. Do you need to stock up on some late-night reading m
aterial?”
He looked at her out of the corner of his eye. “No.”
“‘Cause if you need to take care of something, you should do it.”
He grumbled under his breath and dragged her into a jewelry store.
It was quiet and cool inside, and a few well-dressed customers were already being helped.
Ethan bent his head in to Mackenzie and indicated a woman looking at earrings. He said softly, “She doesn’t seem to have a problem with large rings.”
Mackenzie murmured, “I notice she doesn’t have any pockets, either.”
He nodded. “I think we’ve figured out it’s a pocket problem, not a jewelry problem. We could skip this store and go buy you some new clothes instead.”
“Why don’t we just skip all the stores and call it a day?”
“Only if you slip back into that muumuu when we get home.”
She turned her head away from him and saw Ellen and Christine coming in the door. She yanked her hand out of Ethan’s. “What in the world?”
He looked up. “I invited Mother and Grandma.”
Mackenzie let out a low groan. “You have got to be kidding me.”
“They like shopping. And they know jewelry.”
“You don’t bring your mother along when you’re buying an engagement ring.”
“I didn’t do such a bang-up job of picking out your first ring. And I thought you were probably right that we would never come to an agreement. I needed reinforcements.”
“I think we could have handled it between the two of us.”
His mother ignored Mackenzie to kiss Ethan on the cheek. “I thought you already got her a ring.”
“She didn’t like it.”
His mother sniffed. “I thought it was lovely.”
Ethan said, “She thinks it’s too big,” and Ellen chuckled. She said, “You keep him guessing, girlie.”
Shards of ice shot out of his mother’s eyes and she wandered away, taking out her cell phone.
Mackenzie muttered, “Let’s get this over with.”
Thirty minutes later they were still arguing. Ellen had snorted at Mackenzie’s first choice, saying no O’Connor would buy a piece of wire for his bride. Christine had murmured, “Does it even matter?” while staring at Mackenzie with her icy eyes. Ethan kept pulling out rings too big, too expensive, too noticeable. Anything but what Mackenzie would be comfortable wearing.
He leaned in close. “Doesn’t it worry you that my mother is agreeing with every choice you make? I think you should take it as a sign.”
She’d take it as a sign that at least one other person wanted to get out of that store as bad as she did.
Christine smiled and waved when a tall, buxom red-head entered the store. The red-head kissed Christine’s cheek, leaned her boobs into Ethan’s face, and looked Mackenzie up and down.
The woman turned out to be a fashion consultant and she grabbed Mackenzie’s hands, turning her this way and that. The woman laughed and said, “A minimalist marrying into the O’Connor family?” She smiled at Christine. “Now I understand why you needed me to rush down here.”
Mackenzie glared at Ethan, then at Christine. And when the vixen/consultant brought over a selection of rings that no one objected to, Mackenzie glared at the rings. There was just something about having her ring chosen by a consultant chosen by Christine. A consultant who kept pressing herself against Ethan and giving him come-hither looks when she thought Mackenzie wasn’t looking. While they were shopping for an engagement ring.
Ethan’s grandma said, “You’re going to have to choose something. An engagement’s not–”
Mackenzie interrupted her. “I’ve heard the saying.” She pointed to the smallest of the lot. What did it matter, anyway. She was only going to be wearing it for a couple more weeks.
She wondered if they had return policy.
The consultant smiled and said, “Now. Clothes.”
Ethan quickly thanked her, eyeing Mackenzie’s mutinous expression, saying he was saving that pleasure for himself. The consultant giggled. Christine looked like she wanted to vomit. And Mackenzie couldn’t decide whether to laugh or vomit herself.
Ellen grabbed Christine in one hand and the consultant in the other. “Now that we’ve helped solve the ring emergency, we’ll leave these two lovebirds to shop alone.”
Mackenzie didn’t even argue with her. As soon as they left the store, Mackenzie dug a chocolate bar out of her purse.
Ethan eyed it, then her. “Thank you for not attacking the consultant. Or my mother.”
“I do have some tact. It’s just when you’re annoying me that I can’t seem to control it.”
He took her hand, looking at the ring. “Control is overrated, anyway. Are you going to wear this ring?”
She took her hand back, shoving it in and out of her pocket a few times. “It’s okay,” she said, and he laughed and laughed.
Mackenzie felt marginally better and put the chocolate back in her purse.
She said, “The consultant was pretty. Your type.” She didn’t know why she said that. Every woman was his type. “You could probably get her number from your mother. Take care of that problem you’re having.”
He glanced down at her lips.
“I am a one-woman man, Mackenzie. And right now, you’re my woman.”
She tried to feel offended by that but all she felt was a flop in her belly.
He grabbed her hand when they left the store and she said, “You can let go. I’m wearing a ring now.”
He shook his head. “Now I’m used to it. I don’t have to worry that I’m losing you in the crowd.”
They spent the day roaming. They ate, Ethan tried to get her inside a few clothing stores and failed, and they finally spent a couple of hours in a book store, comparing investing books.
She bought a few saying, “Now that I’m part of the idle rich,” and he snorted.
“And how much longer do you think you’re going to last having nothing to do?”
She held up a book. “I’ll have to invest my millions. That’s something to do.”
“Million. Singular. You’ll be surprised how quickly that goes.”
He took the bag of books in one hand and her hand in the other when they left the store.
He said, “Really. What are you going to do if you don’t go back to work?”
“When. And I don’t know. Move to some middling town.” She thought. “Or maybe travel.”
“And do what?”
“See the world?”
“Boring. You don’t want to see it, you want to conquer it.”
She couldn’t argue with that and she shrugged. She didn’t know what she was going to do when this was all over.
He said, “Don’t leave. You can move to the London office and I’ll stay away until it all blows over. Go see if you can win over a foreign market with your particular brand of ‘charm’.”
She could feel her blood start heating at the thought of a new challenge and she pushed it back down.
She said, “Doesn’t HGC have offices in Tokyo? Now there would be a real challenge.”
He groaned. “HGC! I forbid you to work for them. In any country.”
She laughed. “Good thing for you that I’m getting used to sleeping in.”
He muttered, “I should have forbid you from working for them in the pre-nup.”
“You’ve still got that half million to work with.”
“It would almost be worth it.”
She smiled at him and he shook his head. “I’m saving it for a real emergency. You’d work for HGC a week before you realized they were a bunch of sneaky, no-good thieves only out for themselves, and come crawling back to me.”
“You’re just pissed that Bob Givens got the cover of Forbes.”
He glowered at her and she patted his arm with her free hand. “Just remember you looked better on your cover. And probably sold more copies.”
“Did I? Look better?”
�
��Of course you did. And you actually said something instead of just hyping your company.”
He looked mollified, then said, “It’s because he went public.” He shook his head. “Now he’s focused on selling bits of his company instead of selling product.”
She shook her head. “It’s because he’s not making any money. He only has hype.”
“Revenue has tripled! What a fantastic year!”
“And he forgets to mention that costs have quintupled.”
He looked at her. “Would you buy stock in it?”
She shook her head, then paused. “I might trade it. HGC is flavor of the month right now. But when the buzz fades?” She shook her head. “I’ll be shorting it at the first hint of a turn-around.”
“Would you buy into O’Connor?”
She looked at him in surprise. “Are you thinking of going public?”
“Not while there is breath left in my body,” he said and she laughed.
“But if we did, would you buy it?”
She shrugged. “I’d have to see a few years of annual reports first.”
He smiled slightly and squeezed her hand. “Come on. Tell me you would.”
“The OC will be there to mop up HGC’s clients when they go bankrupt. So, probably I would buy stock.”
“Then why didn’t you take the shares when I offered?”
“Because I have a personal issue with the owner. He keeps stealing my chocolate.”
He nodded at the doorman, then leaned down to murmur, “I’ll have to think of a way to make that up to you.”
He held on to her hand on the elevator ride up to the apartment.
And all the while he stroked her hand with his thumb. Up, down, on the inside of her palm. Again and again.
Her breathing picked up and her skin became extremely sensitive. She tried to pull her hand out of his and he pulled her out of the elevator and down the hallway. He shut the door and crowded her back up against it.
She said, “You can stop now.”
He leaned down and whispered in her ear, “I’m just getting back at you for the reading material crack.”
“It wasn’t a crack. It was legitimate concern.”
He nuzzled her neck. “That’s nice. How concerned are you?”
He scraped her neck with his teeth and her hands curled into fists. She shook her head but couldn’t get any breath past her lips.
He paused, his mouth hovering over hers. “I’m going to kiss you.”