Anna helped with Evie’s shyness, and the two girls seemed to be connected by some invisible tether of friendship.
Mara moved closer to the bounce house, squinting to see through the mesh webbing on the side. A half-dozen kids, most of whom appeared to be of kindergarten age, jumped on the inflated floor of the structure, launching themselves up with shrieks of laughter. There was one dad in the mix, using his weight to send the kids flying. The side of her mouth tipped into a true grin. Even she was unable to resist the pure joy and excitement that the children exuded.
All but one kid.
Mara gasped as she realized Evie stood in the corner of the bounce house, her arms out to either side, grasping at the sides as if to hold herself steady. Every few seconds the floor would undulate, taking Evie to her knees until she could manage to straighten to her feet again.
Sit down, Mara wanted to call as she hurried toward the front of the inflatable structure. Her daughter would do better if her center of gravity stayed low. Evie sometimes suffered from motion sickness, and Mara could imagine the girl’s potential embarrassment if the party ended with her tossing her cookies all over the birthday girl.
Anna was jumping with the rest of the kids, unaware of Evie’s distress. The dad didn’t seem to notice either. Mara pushed past the two moms supervising the entrance.
“No shoes,” the one told her as Mara began to climb into the structure.
“Right.” Mara kicked off her ballet flats and climbed into the bounce house, losing her balance as she tried to stand. She dropped then rolled against the side of the house, wondering how the hell a bunch of little kids could cause so much movement.
She started to shout at them to stop jumping but shut her mouth when her gaze caught on Evie’s. Her daughter gave a tiny shake of her head, letting Mara know she didn’t want the attention. Mara nodded and flashed what she hoped passed for a reassuring smile. How many times had she offered Evie that same false hope in the past year?
“Hold on, girl,” she muttered under her breath as she managed to scramble to her feet. The rest of the partygoers hadn’t noticed her, so she stuck close to the edge, taking slow steps and trailing her open palm against the side of the structure to keep her balance.
“I feel sick,” Evie said as Mara reached her.
“Let’s get you out of here and into the fresh air,” Mara said, smoothing away a wisp of hair that had come loose from Evie’s braids and now stuck to her damp forehead. “Want me to carry you?”
Evie shook her head. “I can walk.”
“That’s my brave girl.” Mara made her voice calm and soothing as she smoothed a hand over Evie’s dark hair. Although the temperature outside was perfect for an early September weekend, it felt at least ten degrees warmer inside the structure. The air smelled of a mix of sweat, feet and chemicals. No wonder Evie’s stomach was upset. Why were bounce houses so popular anyway?
“Evie, what’s wrong?” Anna called as they made their way toward the entrance.
“I just need her for a second.” Mara smiled and gave a thumbs up to the birthday girl. “She’ll be right outside.”
Anna nodded before returning to jumping, and Evie sent Mara a look of such gratitude it made tears prick the backs of her eyes.
A birthday party was supposed to be fun, not an event to make her daughter feel even more of an outsider.
Why couldn’t anything be easy these days?
As they got closer to the opening, Evie lost her balance and face-planted on the floor, sending her glasses flying.
Mara’s stomach pitched. “It’s okay, honey.” She bent and plucked up the frames before they got wedged in the side of the house. As she turned back, a pair of wide shoulders blocked her view of her daughter for a moment. Then the man who’d been jumping with the kids hauled Evie up, her poufy pink skirt flouncing around her, and helped her out of the structure.
Mara couldn’t decide whether to be grateful for the help or nervous Evie would freak out at the attention.
As long as she didn’t puke, Mara thought as she lost her balance again. She tumbled forward to the edge of the entrance, and the corner of the flap that covered the opening snagged on her shirt because that’s how the day was going. Why not flash half the party on her way out the door? Then a warm, slightly calloused hand touched her bare back before she could yank the fabric into place again.
Righting herself, she turned to thank whoever had rescued her daughter only to come face-to-face with the man who’d helped ruin her life.
“You,” she whispered, her throat going dry. Rage roared through her.
Her ex-husband’s pit bull of a divorce attorney offered a friendly smile, clearly not recognizing her. “It’s kind of crazy in here, right?”
Crazy pretty much summed up what Mara was feeling at the moment. Crazy angry. Crazy bitter. Crazy with the need for revenge.
The one thing that didn’t feel crazy was moving forward, crowding Parker Johnson and whispering, “I hate you,” before trying to elbow her way past him.
Confusion marred his movie-star handsome features as he reached for her. “Wait. I don’t even know you.”
She yanked her arm away, throwing him off-balance in the process. He stumbled a step and then he was gone, falling through the opening to the bounce house and landing with a thud on the hard ground.
* * *
“Your friend is crazy,” Parker Johnson muttered, hissing as his brother pressed a bag of frozen peas to the knot on the back of his head.
“She’s not,” Josh insisted tightly. “Hold the peas, Parker.”
His hand replaced Josh’s, and he tried not to wince. “You should have seen the look in her eyes when she said she hated me. If she’d had a dull knife in her hand, she probably would have gutted me.”
“You were her husband’s divorce attorney,” Josh said, as if that explained everything.
“I’ve been a lot of peoples’ divorce attorney.”
“And you’ve never been practically knocked unconscious? I’m shocked.”
Parker narrowed his eyes and ignored the truth of the statement. “Funny.”
Josh moved toward the window of the small laundry room that held the extra freezer where he’d found the peas, and pulled the curtain aside enough to see out. “We need to sing Happy Birthday and cut the cake. This party needs a distraction. I don’t want Anna’s celebration to be a total bust.”
“Go,” Parker told him. “I’m fine.”
Josh turned with a sigh. “Are you sure you don’t need a trip to the ER? It looked like you popped your head pretty hard. You might have a concussion.”
“I don’t have a concussion. I have a dull headache, but at this point my pride is what hurts the most. She caught me off guard.”
“Mara’s great, but the divorce was really tough on her. She lost everything. Starlight is a good place to start over, but she’s had trouble letting go of her anger.”
Parker swallowed down the lump of guilt that tried to lodge itself in his throat. He hadn’t become one of the top attorneys in Seattle by allowing himself to feel bad for the work he did. If he took someone on as a client, their marriage was already way off the rails. Yes, he was cutthroat. Of course his tactics bordered on ruthless. Those things made him the best.
There was no room in his life for entertaining another person’s bruised feelings. When a marriage went south, weakness only led to more heartache. He’d learned that lesson from his parents and he figured he knew way more about losing everything than Mara Reed ever would.
“Take care of Anna and the party,” he told Josh. “I’m sure you’ll love reliving the moment I was felled by a woman.”
“A woman who probably weighs fifty pounds less than you,” Josh clarified with a small smile. Josh and Parker shared the same build, big and broad, although that’s where their physical similarities ended. They had polar-oppo
site personalities, as well. Frankly, Parker was stunned at how natural the role of dad came to his little brother. “Mara is tiny.”
“That should make the story even better.” Parker had noticed Mara the moment she climbed into the bounce house, chiding himself for admiring the figure of one of the moms at his niece’s nauseatingly pink sixth birthday party. He’d registered her enthusiasm for getting into the structure but realized the venture wasn’t for fun as she’d awkwardly moved toward a kid cowering in the corner.
Parker had been happy for an excuse to stop bouncing with the kids. When the girl had fallen, he’d helped her out, just in the nick of time based on the unnatural shade of green coloring her face.
Next he’d placed a steadying hand on the woman when she’d stumbled. In his mind it had been an innocuous touch, so her reaction had shocked him. The woman hadn’t stuck around after he’d fallen, had climbed out, then lifted her daughter into her arms and disappeared amidst the crowd of partygoers that surrounded him, most of whom he’d known since childhood.
His wannabe mortal enemy had been a stranger, or so he’d thought until Josh explained that her ex-husband was Paul Reed. Parker hadn’t particularly liked the man he’d represented in divorce court three separate times, but friendship was by no means a requisite of his job. In fact, he tried to keep his professional and personal lives separate. Since he usually worked seven days a week, he had very little personal life to speak of.
The sound of a throat clearing several minutes after Josh returned to the party had him glancing toward the laundry room door.
“Come to finish me off?” he asked as Mara Reed walked into the room.
She sniffed. “How’s your head?”
He removed the bag of peas, tossing them to the top of the dryer. “I’ve taken harder hits.”
“Not that I meant for you to fall, but I can’t say you didn’t deserve it,” she told him, crossing her arms over her chest.
He raised a brow. “That’s an interesting way to apologize.”
She gave a humorless laugh. “I’m not here to say sorry.”
Parker felt his mouth drop open. “You practically pushed me out of the bounce house.”
“Not quite. You grabbed for me and I evaded you with my catlike reflexes. Is it my problem that you’re clumsy?”
He had to admire her moxie. The moment had happened so fast, but he was pretty sure she’d given him a tiny shove when he stumbled. Not that he’d throw her under the bus by telling anyone. “If you didn’t seek me out to apologize, why are you here?”
“You took everything from me,” she said instead of answering, her husky voice laced with bitterness.
“Your anger is misdirected,” Parker said, shifting under the weight of her stony glare. “I’m not your ex-husband.” He’d represented hundreds of clients over the years, but this was the first time he’d actually been confronted outside the courtroom. He didn’t like the way Mara Reed made him feel, as if he’d been the one to cause the destruction of her marriage.
“No,” she agreed, her hazel eyes giving him a slow once-over. Despite her obvious dislike of him and the obstinate set of her heart-shaped jaw, there was no denying Mara’s beauty. She had dark hair with a few hints of burnished gold highlighting it and pale, luminous skin that would have inspired the finest Renaissance painter.
She was taller than average, something he’d always appreciated in a woman given that he stood well over six feet. She’d fit perfectly with him, a thought that almost made him laugh for its absurdity. He couldn’t imagine any scenario which would make Mara want to be close to him.
“You made it possible for him to destroy me,” she said, her voice oddly devoid of emotion. He wanted to deny it, but the truth was he couldn’t remember the details of her case, especially since she’d been Paul Reed’s much younger third wife. He’d already been twice down that road with his client. It was a mental trick he employed, not allowing himself to see the opponent as a person. Mara Reed had been a name to him, an entity he’d set out to take down like he was a remote-control drone zeroing in on a target.
“It wasn’t personal.”
She flinched, and he wanted to take back the words. They were simple enough as part of his job, but he imagined they felt like salt dumped into an open wound to Mara. Despite his now pounding headache, he didn’t mean to hurt her. He understood what he did for a living and had come to terms with the man he’d become as a result, even if he didn’t always like himself because of it.
“It was to me,” she whispered and walked away.
Copyright © 2020 by Michelle Major
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ISBN-13: 9781488070013
The Maverick’s Baby Arrangement
Copyright © 2020 by Harlequin Books S.A.
Special thanks and acknowledgment are given to Kathy Douglass for her contribution to the Montana Mavericks: What Happened to Beatrix? miniseries.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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The Maverick's Baby Arrangement Page 21