Hadn’t she?
He’d said them to her, but now that he really thought about it…his wife hadn’t reciprocated. Not one time. Why not? Was this past weekend a way to get him to open up before she leveled the killing blow to their marriage?
No. Libby wasn’t a cold, vindictive woman—even when the divorce petition clutched in hand suggested otherwise. So what in tarnation was going on with her?
Only one way to find out.
Quinn’s boots kicked up dust as he raced to his pickup.
Cam called out, “Hey! Where you going?”
“Cheyenne.” Within two seconds, his cousin jerked him around and got right in his face. Damn. Cam was scary fast and stealthy, even sporting a fake leg. “What?”
“I can’t let you go, Q, if you’re planning on doing something stupid.”
“Jesus, Cam, you think I’d ever hurt her? I love her. She’s everything in the damn world to me.”
His younger cousin gave him a hard cop stare.
“I’ve hurt her enough. Only stupid thing I’m doin’ is standin’ here, tellin’ you what I oughta be tellin’ her.”
Cam grinned. “That’s all I wanted to hear. Drive safe.”
***
Four hours later, Quinn hit the state capital. The parking lot of the Sheraton was jam-packed. He rolled the papers up and shoved them in his back pocket.
Inside the convention center, he checked the electronic display board listing class times and rooms. Librarians roamed the halls. Mostly females. Luckily in Wyoming no one paid attention to just another man in a cowboy hat.
He paused outside the door to Conference Room B and took a deep breath. Rounding the corner, he scanned the women congregated around the beverage station and scattered in groups of twos and threes. Bingo. There she was, looking pretty as a picture in a clingy purple pantsuit, chatting with a lady twice her age and half as tall.
Quinn strode toward her.
Libby glanced up when ten feet separated them. Her eyes widened. “Quinn? What on earth?”
“I’m happy to see you too, darlin’ wife.”
The older woman tittered.
Color rose in Libby’s cheeks. “Why are you here?”
“Because I got hold of some interestin’ papers today and I wanted to talk to you about them.” He slipped his arm around Libby’s stiff shoulders and smiled at her companion. “Ma’am. If you’ll excuse us.”
“Certainly.”
He sensed Libby fuming as he attempted to steer her out of the room. She dug in her heels. “I’m busy. This is not the place to discuss this.”
Quinn placed his lips near her temple. “Wrong. Unless you want me to hoist you into a fireman’s hold and drag you outta this room, you’d better keep movin’.”
She jerked back. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“Try me.” After a couple seconds of her indecision, Quinn flashed his teeth at her. “Fine. If that’s the way you wanna play this.” He bent down, intending to throw her over his shoulder.
“No! Wait.” Libby grabbed his hand and hustled him out the side door. She kept dragging him along at a good clip until they reached a deserted corridor. She whirled around, hands on hips. But he could tell she wasn’t really mad, just…worried.
“What happened between us last weekend?” Quinn asked. “Was it only about sex?”
She shook her head.
“It wasn’t one last tumble before you moved on?”
“Moved on? Why in the world would you say that? You were there, Quinn. You know how everything changed between us.”
“Yeah, but I thought it was a change for the better.”
“It was. It is.”
Quinn reached into his back pocket and held out the rolled-up papers. “Then how in the hell can you possibly explain this?”
Libby’s eyes darted away. “It was supposed to be a surprise.”
“A surprise?”
“We’ve never done anything like that. I thought it’d be fun.”
“Fun?” he repeated. “Since when is a surprise divorce fun?”
“What are you talking about?”
“This.” Quinn waved the papers. “A signed document from Ginger Paulson, Attorney-at-Law, starting the divorce proceedings at your request.”
“Gimme that.” Libby snatched the papers and unrolled them. All the blood drained from her face and she wilted against the wall as she flipped through the pages. “No. No. No! This wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“Then how did it?”
Silence.
“Libby?”
“Last Friday, I’d given up hope. I thought you didn’t care—”
“I remember that conversation. We’ve been through this.”
“You don’t know this part. Earlier that day I signed the Complaint paperwork. I put it in my outbox, intending to mail it…and then you were waiting for me in the parking lot. Since I was out of town this week, someone at the school must’ve thought they were doing me a favor and sent it off.”
“Some favor.”
“This wasn’t what I wanted.” Libby looked at him beseechingly. “You have to believe me. I forgot all about it. Especially after we spent the weekend trying to work things out.”
“Did we work things out, Libby?”
“Yes!”
Relief like he’d never felt swept through him. “So if you would’ve gone into the library on Monday?”
“I’d have ripped this into shreds.” Her chin wobbled. “God, Quinn, I’m so sorry. You probably were thinking all sorts of horrible thoughts about me.”
Quinn pulled her into his arms. “Never. I was just mighty confused and needed to get to the bottom of it straightaway, since we talked about not keepin’ things from each other.”
“So you…?”
“I hopped in my truck and headed for Cheyenne right after Cam dropped it off this mornin’.”
“Your cousin delivered this to you?” She cringed. “That oughta be fodder for the McKay gossipmongers.”
“Since it was official business, I doubt he’ll say anything.” He swallowed his pride. “But I wouldn’t mind reassurance from you that it ain’t gonna be grist for the mill.”
She tipped her face up to look at him. “Like?”
“Like…do you still love me?”
“Of course I still love you. I never stopped loving you.”
“Say it again.”
Libby stood on her tiptoes and peppered his face with kisses. “I love you. Love, love, love you, with my heart, my soul, my everything. Quinn McKay, you are my everything, and if you think for one moment I’m ever letting you go, after all we’ve been through—”
Quinn dipped his head and kissed her. For a good long time.
When they broke apart, she murmured, “My roommate is in a class right now. Wouldn’t it be fun to mess around? Especially when there’s a chance we’ll get caught?”
“Sounds like my kinda fun.” Fun. That reminded him. “What did you mean when you said you thought it’d be a fun surprise and we’d never done anything like it?”
Color tinged her cheeks. “Oh. When I saw those papers, I thought you’d found the tropical island ‘couples only’ getaway packages I’d printed out on Sunday. I wanted to tempt you into taking a real vacation, just you and me, the sand and the sea.”
Quinn brought her hand to his mouth and kissed her knuckles. “Is that another one of your untold fantasies? Jetting off to a tropical island?”
“Only if it’s jetting off with you.”
“Then the week after you get outta school for the summer, we’ll hop on a plane and be sippin’ drinks on the beach by sunset. You can call it a fantasy. I’ll call it our second honeymoon.”
“Really? You’d do that for me? Even though you hate to fly?”
Quinn touched her, the woman he’d loved most his life, the woman who was his everything, the woman who loved him enough to give him a second chance. “Libby, I love you. I’d do anything for you. I wanna make you ha
ppy. I want us both to be happy. Not just for a week, or for a weekend, but for the rest of our lives. Let’s go home.”
Libby stepped back and gave him a wicked grin. “Right after we test the bounce factor of the mattress in my room.”
Yep, he was really grateful for second chances.
Epilogue
Six months later
Libby barely made it to the toilet before she threw up.
Again.
Damn flu.
She managed a sip of water. The liquid stayed down for a change. Good. She wiped her mouth and let the sink cabinet hold her up, hoping she could climb back in bed before Quinn returned home from checking cattle.
Yeah, she’d pop to her feet and walk those twenty steps to their bedroom. In a second. She just needed to rest her eyes for a minute or two.
“Nappin’ in the bathroom again?”
Her eyes flew open, giving her an instant case of vertigo. Dammit. She’d dozed off. Worse, he’d caught her dozing off.
Quinn crouched down, his face lined with concern. “Libby—”
“I’m fine.”
“No, you ain’t. You need to go to the doctor.”
“It’s the flu, Quinn.” When he scowled, she added, “It’s flu season. I work with coughing, hacking, feverish kids every damn day. Do the math. I’m bound to get sick a lot.”
“I have done the math, which is why I know it ain’t the damn flu.” He stood and stalked out of the bathroom.
Libby yelled, “I am not going to the doctor.”
No answer.
Crap. She hated arguing with him. It’d been a rarity since their reconciliation, but not because they weren’t communicating. They talked all the time. In fact, her formerly strong, silent type of husband had become downright chatty. Libby wasn’t complaining. She’d never been happier and Quinn felt the same. Their life wasn’t perfect, but it was damn close.
Now, if she could just get over the flu that’d been hanging on for the last month.
Paper rustled and she looked up at Quinn leaning in the doorway. A white pharmacy bag dangled from his hand. She managed a wan smile. “You went to town and got me medicine? That’s so sweet.”
“No, I went to town and got you a pregnancy test.”
Her stomach lurched. She crawled to the toilet and threw up again.
Quinn held her hair back and wiped her face. After he situated her on the floor, he stretched out across from her. “Better?”
When the queasiness subsided, she said, “I’m not pregnant. I’m never pregnant.”
“This time is different.”
“How do you know?”
“Pregnant is pregnant. I recognize the signs.”
Indignantly, she snapped, “I am not a heifer! You cannot judge me by the way I twitch my backside or behave erratically whether or not I’m pregnant for the first time.” To Libby’s utter dismay, she began to cry.
“Ah hell. Take a deep breath or else you’ll be right back hangin’ over that toilet after gettin’ so worked up.”
“Shit. Shit. Shit. I hate to bawl. I hate to whine. I hate to throw up. I hate that I’m sitting on the damn bathroom floor again doing all three.”
“I know you do.” He ripped off a chunk of toilet paper and handed it to her. “Lib, what’s really goin’ on?”
She sniffled and blew her nose. “I’m scared.”
“Me too.” He paused, but his silences no longer made her nervous.
“It’s just…things are so good between us now. I don’t want anything to wreck it.”
“You think havin’ a baby could do that?”
“Me wanting one so badly did before.”
“Yeah, but it wasn’t the only thing that caused our problems. We’re different now. We’re probably better prepared to deal with all the issues involving a baby. So maybe there was a reason we didn’t get this gift until we were both ready to handle it.”
Libby stared at him. “You really think I could be pregnant?”
Quinn took her hand. “Come on. Indulge me. I believe in my gut and in my heart we’ll be fine no matter what the stick says.”
She did too. “All right.”
“Good.” Quinn cracked open the pregnancy test kit, read the directions a billion times and watched her like a hawk so she didn’t screw it up. In all the years she’d locked herself in the bathroom and conducted multitudes of pregnancy tests, this was the first time she’d involved Quinn in the process.
They left the urine-soaked stick on the back of the toilet and Quinn set his watch.
Holding her close, he gave her a reassuring kiss on the top of her head and murmured, “I love you. Nothin’ll ever change that. Baby. No baby. Don’t matter as long as I have you.”
“I feel the same. I love you. God, I love you so much.”
The watch beeped.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Ready,” she answered.
They held hands as they peered at the indicator.
Finally, Quinn said softly, “I’ll be damned.”
The results window read…a plus sign in big, bold type.
Not the flu after all.
Libby didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
“You okay?” he said.
“Uh-huh. I’ll probably freak out once it sinks in.”
“That’ll make two of us, darlin’.”
“Don’t you mean, three of us?”
“Three. Right. God. A baby. We’re havin’ a baby.” His body went ironing board rigid. “Now that we know, get your butt back in bed, pretty mama. I’m callin’ Doc Monroe and you’re goin’ to see her first thing tomorrow. But today you need to rest.”
“But—”
“No buts. I’m gonna make sure you don’t move, even if I hafta hogtie you to the headboard. ’Cept I know how much you love bein’ tied up.”
“Quinn—”
“No arguin’, Lib, I mean it.”
She sighed. “Are you gonna be one of those hovering, overbearing husbands who obsesses about every little thing during this pregnancy?”
A beat passed. “I reckon so.”
Libby leaned into him, grateful to have him standing behind her, holding her up, in every possible way. “I can live with that.”
About the Author
To learn more about Lorelei James please visit www.loreleijames.com. Send an email to [email protected] or join her Yahoo! group to join in the fun with other readers as well as Lorelei! http://groups.yahoo.com/group/LoreleiJamesgang
Look for these titles by Lorelei James
Now Available:
Rough Riders Series
Branded As Trouble
Rough, Raw, and Ready
Tied Up, Tied Down
Cowgirl Up and Ride
Rode Hard, Put Up Wet
Long Hard Ride
Wild West Boys Series
Mistress Christmas
Three’s Company Anthology
Wicked Garden
Running With the Devil
Dirty Deeds
Beginnings Anthology
Babe in the Woods
Coming Soon:
Rough Riders Series
Shoulda Been a Cowboy
Wild West Boys Series
Miss Firecracker
He held the reins to her heart once—and this time he won’t let go.
The Real Deal
© 2009 Niki Green
A Wild Ride story.
Willa Tate left Millbrook, Texas, years ago—along with her future, her fiancé and her heart. Now, as one of the headlining acts at a hot burlesque club, she looks into the crowd, sees a familiar face staring up at her—and her past comes crashing back.
Chase Kiel has some hard questions for the former love of his life. He spent forever looking for her, and now he wants answers—even if he has to throw her over his shoulder and drag her back to Millbrook to get them.
He’d find it a hell of a lot easier if the chemistry weren’t still there. If th
ey didn’t still fit together like keg of dynamite and fuse. If he didn’t want not only his answers…but her heart.
Chase is still certain he and Willa belong together—and convincing Willa of it will be his pleasure.
Warning: This title contains explicit, powder-keg-hot sex, language that ain’t fit for your mama’s ears, and a hot cowboy with a Texas-sized heart.
Enjoy the following excerpt for The Real Deal:
The music began roaring its way through the speakers filling the club. Nick recognized the song. It was popular and played on nearly every radio station numerous times a day. He couldn’t remember most of the words but he knew the overall theme, someone had kissed a girl and she had seemed to like it, or so he thought. He couldn’t remember. All he could think about was the pressure his zipper was putting on his increasing erection. Never in his life was he so grateful for a table cloth.
Hayden on the other hand didn’t seem to care if his arousal was evident to the rest of the patrons or not. There he sat an elbow’s length away laid back in the opposite chair, beer bottle lifted halfway to his mouth, eyes roving over the eye candy moving before the crowd. Nick shook his head at his captivated brother and returned his undivided attention to the stage and to the ones who occupied it.
After the first few beats introduced the song a throaty, ultra feminine voice rang out the lyrics that propelled the dancers along. Each movement from the two was synchronized. What one did, the other mimicked.
They moved with the beat of the music, at first only watching each other through the faux mirror in front of them. Black fishnet gloves traced an eyebrow and moved seductively to the sets of cherry-red lips. Material ran gracefully and without pause over the glistening pair. Their fingertips stroked the top first, then bottom and then back to the top before blowing a kiss to one another via the mirror.
Without faltering, breaking their timing or rhythm, the pair removed the gloves slowly and let them fly into the crowd. With bare hands placed on the vanity top, the dancers rose and inched closer to each other, inspecting the reflection that should have been there. Closer and closer the pair drew to each other until only a breath separated them from each other.
Strong, Silent Type_A Wild Ride story Page 10