The Ready-Made Family (Silhouette Special Edition)

by Laurie Paige

  When the deal was done, she’d turned to him, excited at getting near the top mark for the shipment of earrings she’d sold to a chain of mall jewelry kiosks. Mr. Parker had grunted and gone back to his office without a word.

  “If he ever smiled, his face would crack,” she’d complained to Harrison on the way home that night.

  “I felt the same when he was helping me come on board. He always told me what I was doing wrong, but he never mentioned it when I did right.”

  “Exactly,” Isa had said.

  She smiled as she and Harrison went together to greet the old man. “I’m so glad you could come,” she said after they’d said hello. “That’s a lovely shirt.”

  “Thank you.”

  Mr. Parker wore dress slacks, but he’d left off his tie and jacket in favor of a tropical dress shirt of white cotton with an embroidered vine motif along the front.

  “My wife was Filipino and quite skillful with the needle. She made me a dozen shirts before she passed on so I’d have enough to last my lifetime.”

  “How thoughtful,” Isa murmured, unable to think of another word to say. She realized her grumpy mentor had at least one soft spot in him.

  Harrison met her eyes. His gaze was lambent. For a second, she was filled with longing for things she couldn’t have. It made her angry with herself, and with him. Sexy or sardonic she could handle. She didn’t want anything else between them.

  After all their guests had arrived, Harrison went to help Rick with the ribs. Isa replenished the platters of snacks and checked with Maggie on the vegetables that went with the meat.

  “Everything is under control,” Maggie assured her. She hummed along with a country-western song coming from a portable radio on the kitchen counter while she peeked at the ears of corn roasting in the oven. “Go. Go on,” Maggie shooed her from the kitchen. “Have fun. It’s your party.”

  Like a bashful child, Isa drifted outside. Thirty people, half of them couples, milled around the area. Five guys, including her husband, were in the pool playing water polo. Several women sat on the side, dangling their legs in the water.

  Helen relaxed on a chaise longue under an umbrella, sipping a glass of champagne and chatting with Flo Murray and another woman. She’d removed her silk wraparound. Her body was lean and tanned, very fit.

  Isa was surprised the woman wasn’t in the pool with the men, showing off her Olympic swimming skills or some such.

  She put aside the catty thought when she noticed Mr. Parker sitting alone in the shade. After a second’s hes- itation, she walked across the patio. There were things she wanted to ask him about the past. She joined him.

  “Nice party,” he said with much more cordiality than he’d ever shown at the office.

  “Thank you.”

  “I was surprised when the boy married.”

  She grinned when he nodded toward Harrison. She’d thought of many descriptive terms for her husband, in- cluding stubborn and mulish, but she’d never thought of him as a boy.

  “But I was glad of it,” Mr. Parker continued, his tone serious. “A man needs a wife to add joy to his life.”

  Isa had a sudden sense of his loneliness. It touched her, bringing the tightening to her throat again. She’d never been prone to tears, but during the three months of her marriage, she’d often had to hold them in. Some- times when Harrison made exquisite love to her, she couldn’t. It was as if she mourned her marriage before it was over.

  “Hello, you two. What secrets are you telling, stuck away over here by yourselves?” Helen demanded.

  Isa tamped down her irritation.

  “We were agreeing that wives are the great civilizing influences in the world,” Mr. Parker said. He gave a sly grin that made him look like a devious cherub, albeit a bald one.

  Helen’s smile became brittle. “Yes. Several of us were wondering how anyone ever managed to get Har- rison to the altar. He’s been a determined bachelor for years.”

  “It was an impulse.” Isa felt her ears grow hot, and wished she didn’t blush when she lied.

  “I must confess to being fascinated by anyone who could catch him. You were an actress before you moved here, weren’t you? Back in Oregon? A bit player, I heard.”

  Ah, the woman had been doing some checking on her. “I did a few parts, yes, but. my degree is in busi- ness. I was an assistant manager.”

  “She’s got a head on her shoulders,” Mr. Parker said as if she were his personal protege.

  Helen ignored him. “What was your maiden name? I may have seen you in Ashland. I visited friends there last summer.”

  “Chavez. Isadora Chavez is my name.”

  Helen considered. “No, I don’t remember it.” She studied Isa with a doubtful expression.

  Isa wondered if the woman thought she was lying about her past. Why would she? Her life was an open book. Except for the deception involving her marriage. She’d had to do that. She’d had to have a home for Rick.

  She glanced around the patio and at the country sur- rounding the house. This home was a good place for a boy to grow to manhood. Harrison was wonderful and kind and…

  The longing hit her, harder this time. She swallowed hard to control it. A person couldn’t go around getting choked up all the time. She saw Mr. Parker studying her curiously and managed a smile, once more in con- trol.

  When the food was served, Helen left to join her cousin and his wife as they lined up for the lavish meal. Isa breathed a sigh of relief. She and Helen weren’t going to be bosom buddies.

  “Chavez,” Mr. Parker mused. “I once knew a fellow by that name. It was years ago, though.”

  Isa’s hands went cold and clammy. “It’s a common Hispanic name, like Smith or Jones in English. Was this man a friend?”

  He snorted in contempt. “Not mine. He was a partner to the boy’s father. They’d taken claim to an old silver mine that everyone assumed was played out. They found a new lode, though, and started it up again. It was a small operation, just the two of them trying to scrape together enough cash for equipment.”

  “What happened to them?”

  “Dan Stone was always having to bail Chavez out of trouble. The man was a drinker and a gambler, a loser in every way.”

  Isa’s face burned at this assessment of her father. It was true, but that didn’t make it any easier to hear.

  “He got in over his head in an illegal gambling op- eration,” Mr. Parker confided. “Dan scraped together enough money to pay off the debt, but he’d had it by then. He made Chavez put up his interest in the mine as collateral. Chavez lit out one day and left Dan with another pile of unpaid bills that had been charged to the mine. We never saw him again, but Dan heard the man had married some woman over near the coast and had a baby a few years later. He used to worry about them. I say it was a case of good riddance myself.”

  Isa swallowed hard. “Yes, I think you’re right.”

  “The food is ready. We’d better get in line before it’s gone.” He chuckled at his joke.

  “You go ahead. I need to help Maggie.” Isa retreated to the master bedroom and closed the door.

  She sat on the side of the luxurious tub, which she and Harrison hadn’t yet used, and watched the laughing people on the patio. Harrison was forking racks of the succulent ribs onto his guests’ plates. Rick, wearing an oven mitt, put a foil-wrapped baked potato beside the meat. Maggie set platters of corn and vegetables on the refreshment table.

  The scene blurred as Isa pondered the conversation with Mr. Parker. He had unknowingly given her the key to her past.

  That woman had been her mother. She had been that baby.

  Her father had lied. The mining claim she’d self- righteously staked her and Rick’s future on wasn’t worth a cent. She and Rick had no right to anything that belonged to Harrison Stone, no right at all.

  Chapter Twelve

  Isa stood at the window and watched the movement of trucks and workers along the street. The building, lo- cated in an area of s
mall manufacturing businesses and their related warehouses, housed a wholesale import business on the first floor, the jewelry-making business on the second floor and Harrison’s corporate offices on the third.

  She could see her brother sitting on the loading dock three stories down from her. He was eating his lunch, his back against the wall, one leg dangling over the edge of the dock.

  Worry ate at her like an invasion of locusts, nibbling constantly at the edges of her mind. God help her, she didn’t know what to do.

  Her conscience didn’t help at all. It merely yelled at her like an irate parent, reminding her she was living a lie, that she’d forced Harrison into marriage without just cause, that she and Rick weren’t entitled to one cent from the mine even if it had been turning a profit.

  The jewelry business was the only lucrative part of Stone Enterprises. Her family wasn’t entitled to any part of it, since it had been started by Daniel Stone long after her father had run off and left Stone with a mound of debts.

  She ran a hand through her hair and felt the tight, stressed muscles in her neck and back. She’d had a headache for most of the week after talking to Mr. Par- ker on the weekend.

  A bone-weary sigh escaped her.

  “Tired?” a voice asked from behind her.

  She jerked around. Harrison stood in the doorway. Her heart gave a hitch, then beat very fast. She forced a smile that felt more like a grimace.

  “Somewhat,” she said lightly. “This wheeling and dealing is hard work. I think I’d rather stick to updating the accounting department. Computers may have minds of their own, but they don’t talk back.”

  “Have you had lunch?”

  She looked at a empty soda can and the remains of a peanut-butter-and-cracker package from the candy machine on her desk. “Uh, I wasn’t very hungry.”

  “That wasn’t a proper meal. The gals go out to lunch one Friday a month. Today was the day. Did anyone invite you?” He walked around the desk and stopped- beside her.

  “Yes, but I declined. I thought I’d be a damper.”

  “Being the boss’s wife?”

  “Yes.” She was engulfed by all the things she’d come to associate with her virile husband—his warmth and strength, the scent of his aftershave and talc, his masculine presence that thrilled and excited her.

  She’d miss him when she was gone.

  Harrison turned her and began to massage her shoul- ders. He could feel the tension vibrating through her like electrical impulses through a wire. She lived on the edge. Whatever bothered her, she kept it to herself.

  However, there was one part of her he knew as well as he knew himself. Her passion. She couldn’t hide her body’s response to him. When they came together, she was as fervid in her hunger for him as he was for her. It was the one thing that dispelled his anger at being trapped.

  He rubbed the taut cords running up her neck to her skull. She bent her head forward to give him better ac- cess. He heard her sigh. Unable to resist, he lifted the heavy fall of hair and kissed her neck.

  Her fragrance filled his nostrils and made him wish they were home. Only in bed did they communicate without shadows and subterfuge between them. At least they had, until this week.

  After the party last weekend, Isa had withdrawn even further behind her composed smile. At night, when they made love, he could sense her holding part of herself aloof, even though she reacted with satisfying vigor.

  He rubbed most of the tension out, then slipped his arms around her narrow waist and hugged her to him.

  “You’ve been quiet this week,” he murmured against her temple. “Did Helen say something to hurt you last weekend?”

  The tension returned. “No, of course not.”

  He tightened his arms in regret. “I wish she weren’t part of my past. Getting mixed up with her, even for a short time, was a mistake. I realized it and got out be- fore I got stuck in her web, thank God.”

  “Instead, you got stuck in mine.”

  He could read nothing in her tone, other than the touch of irony she often injected into her discussions with him.

  “It hasn’t been all bad.” He realized that much was true. “Sometimes the reward is worth the risk.” He kissed her neck again, then lingered to trace his tongue over the smooth skin. His body reacted as usual.

  A shiver flowed through her.

  An answering tremor hit him. Everything about her excited him in a way no woman ever had. It angered him, but he couldn’t escape it. However, he had a piece of business to discuss with her at this moment. He sup- pressed the desire.

  “I talked to Harry this morning,” he murmured against her temple. “He’s researched the mining claim.”

  “What…what did he find out?”

  “Nothing directly. There was flooding in a basement where some of the early records were stored. Several boxes were destroyed. There’s no record of an earlier claim. My father filed again, but in his name alone the second time. I don’t know why.”

  I do. Isa gulped the words down before they could spring from her mouth. Guilt gnawed at her.

  “If your claim is valid, then…” Harrison sounded baffled, uncertain about his father’s actions.

  She bit her bottom lip until it hurt. She’d put the doubts in his mind. Her family’s claim, discharged long ago by Dan Stone, had forced the son to consider that his parent had acted less than honorably in the past. He’d hate her when he found out the truth.

  Staring out the window, Harrison’s breath soft on her skin, she wished she could vanish in a puff of smoke like a genie into a bottle and wipe all memory of her from his mind.

  Since she couldn’t simply disappear from his life, she knew she should tell him the truth before he found out from someone else who, like Mr. Parker, had known his father and hers.

  Tell him. Tell him now, her conscience urged.

  “Who’s that with Rick?” Harrison asked.

  Isa released the pressure on her lip and looked to where Harrison pointed. Another young man stood close to her brother. They were engrossed in conver- sation, an angry one if she was reading their body lan- guage accurately.

  “He looks familiar,” she said, “something about the way he moves, but I can’t see his face.”

  “A friend from school?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Rick had been happy lately. He walked with his head up and his shoulders back, a bounce in his step. She’d heard him whistling while he worked in the yard or cleaned the pool, two jobs that Harrison had assigned to the younger man.

  He also received a healthy allowance plus a list of extras he could do to earn money if the chores were warranted. Harrison didn’t believe in busywork or pay for nothing. Rick was becoming the responsible, de- pendable person she’d known he could be, given half a chance. They were growing close again..

  “Looks as if they’re in a disagreement over some- thing.”

  “Yes.” A frisson of worry swept over her. She brushed it aside. “It’s probably nothing. Teenagers are prone to take things to heart….” She trailed off, think- ing of the state of her own unstable organ.

  “Do you?” Harrison asked. He nuzzled on her ear.

  Heat formed inside her. Only when he touched her could she forget her troubles, but that wouldn’t work forever. She had to face things sooner or later.

  She stalled for time. “Sometimes.”

  “Like us? Like this?” he probed. His tongue circled the rim of her ear before he settled to nibbling on the lobe.

  She’d been aware of the need he didn’t bother to hide from the moment he’d cuddled her against him. It awak- ened the hunger in her. With it came the desires of the heart that she could no longer deny. She wished that Harrison would want to keep them, her and her brother. She wished he could learn to love them as they were learning to love and trust him. Oh, God, she wished…

  He released her and locked the door to her office. When he came back to her, she was watching him in wide-eyed surprise.

/>   “Surely it doesn’t come as a shock that a husband might want his beautiful wife other than when they’re at home in bed.” He fixed the blinds so that no one could see into the office.

  His smile was slow and lazy, his gaze intent when he began to undress. Her hand flew to her throat, which still had a tendency to clog up with emotion when she saw him unclothed.

  “You next,” he murmured. He reached for her suit jacket, then paused, a question in his eyes.

  “If someone should come,” she whispered, glancing anxiously at the door. A sexy grin spread over his face. A blush ran over hers.

  “Everyone is out to lunch,” he assured her.

  “But if they aren’t. I mean, what would they think…”

  “That we want to be alone,” he whispered. He slipped the jacket from her, then her blouse and skirt and shoes. He kissed the various parts of her as they were exposed.

  At last, he sat her on the desk, the smooth paper of the desk pad cool under her bare skin. He meandered around her neck, lingered at her breasts, then moved down to her thighs, leaving a trail of wet kisses in his path.

  She closed her eyes and moaned as need overrode good sense. She made one last attempt at sanity. “Har- rison, we shouldn’t.”

  “We should. It’s the only time we’re totally open with each other.” He nudged her legs farther apart.

  Heat engulfed her, spreading slowly from deep inside as he pleasured her until she went mindless from his touch. She stroked through his hair as endless waves of delight broke over her, making her whimper. He gave a low growl and continued his attentions to her.

  She called his name urgently. When she convulsed, he rose and entered her, thrusting to the very center. He absorbed her muted cries with his mouth as they both experienced the shattering bliss together. Afterward, she slumped against him, too weary to move.

  He held her for a long time, his hands gentle as he rubbed her back from shoulders to hips.

  “I didn’t mean to go this far. I didn’t have anything with me,” he said. “Do you think we started a baby?”

  “I…I don’t know.” She stirred and lifted her head, knowing it was time to rejoin reality. “Probably not.”