A TEMPTING ENGAGEMENT

by Bronwyn Jameson

  Mostly he needed to prevent her leaving.

  One solution grabbed ahold of his brain, strong and unshakable. A full afternoon of his son's exuberance, a plane trip back to Sydney and an hour on the road back to Plenty hadn't loosened its hold. A perfect, workable solution for a range of practical reasons that had nothing to do with Emily in his bed, again and again and again.

  A glance in the rearview mirror confirmed that Joshua had finally succumbed to exhaustion. Beside him Emily sat constrained by a seat belt and the confines of a vehicle speeding through the darkening landscape. No means of escape. He cleared his throat.

  "What you said back there, at the lodge…"

  Mitch sensed as much as saw her straighten, stiffen. "Which particular piece? I seem to recall saying rather a lot."

  "You mentioned leaving … if what you said freaked me out."

  The pause was only a heartbeat, but that beat reverberated through the car like a drum roll. "And did it? Freak you out?"

  "The thought of you leaving does." Hand over hand, he steadied the car around a tight right-hand bend before he could slant her a look. She sat staring straight ahead, her hands gripping the edges of her seat as if to anchor her there. Smart choice, he thought wryly, as his own stomach jumped with nerves. "I think we should get married."

  * * *

  Chapter 10

  «^»

  A car seat, it turned out, did not provide ample mooring when the world spun out from under oneself. Emily dug her fingers deeper into the upholstery but reality continued to whirl with the shock of Mitch's … did you call that out-of-nowhere statement a proposal?

  "Are you serious?" she asked. After the devastating end to his previous marriage… "You want to get married again?"

  "I want to do the right thing. For Joshua and for you."

  Of course he didn't want to get married. He wanted "to do the right thing," for everyone else but himself. Emily shook her head and, paradoxically, it stopped spinning. "Because you slept with me? Because of some misplaced sense of responsibility? That is so old-fashioned it's laughable."

  He didn't laugh.

  "I mean, it's not even as if you might have to marry me, seeing as we used protection."

  "So did my sisters," he said shortly. "And look at them."

  Both pregnant when they married. Emily's heart stuttered at the possibility that her one explosive, mind-blowing sexual experience could yield a similar result. No, she cautioned herself sharply. Not even a slim, next-to-nothing possibility – she had never been that lucky.

  "Even if the impossible happened," she said, faking a light tone as best she could. "I don't have any shotgun-toting relatives who are likely to track you down."

  "Exactly. You don't have any relatives who help you out at any turn. They didn't even know where you'd gone, how to find you, when you disappeared. I didn't know where you were, in what condition."

  "You thought that I might be…?" Lord. No wonder he'd been so incensed by her disappearance, so grim that first night on Gramps's verandah. So insistent about unearthing the truth.

  He huffed out a breath. "The thought did cross my mind. More than once."

  "I didn't know you thought we'd even…"

  Her vague, waving gesture from her to him and back again, wrung a dry humorless laugh from Mitch. "Done it? Hell, Emily, I couldn't even remember what we'd done or not done, so what was the chance I'd have thought to use protection?"

  "I didn't know." Any of that. Anything. Her voice trailed off as she slumped back in her seat, shell-shocked by the notion that he'd thought she may have been pregnant. With his baby. Her hand shifted, hovering over her belly as her heart and her stomach and her emotions jumped all over the place.

  "Why did you leave?" he asked, then before she could begin to think how to answer that pearler, he made an impatient sound low in his throat. "No, you didn't just leave, you dropped off the face of the earth. Obviously – since we didn't do anything – you had no concerns about an unwanted baby, so why, Emily?"

  Emily pressed a hand to her jittery stomach. What could she say? I ran because we didn't do it? Because, even with you falling-down drunk, I couldn't seduce you, so what chance I could ever win your love? Reflexively she pressed her hand against the ache low in her stomach. "If there had been any chance of a baby, I wouldn't have hidden it from you," she said honestly. "A child needs as many parents to love her as possible."

  For a second she felt his eyes on her – silent, watchful, measuring – and then he needed to concentrate on the road as it wound its way over the top of the Great Divide. Hopefully she'd diverted him from the why-did-you-leave issue, although her whole body tensed in expectation of the next twist and turn.

  "You haven't had much of that in your life," he observed, his voice low and unhurried.

  Emily frowned. "That's not what I meant. It was like a hypothetical – if I ever found myself in that position."

  "Based on your own childhood." Not a question, although he held up a hand in case she chose to object. "Home's important to you? And family?"

  The aching tension shifted higher, circling her chest in a steel-banded embrace. "I'm not exactly your expert on home and family."

  "Is that why you chose nannying as a career? Because that's what you wanted?"

  Wanted? Ah, Mitch, that word doesn't even begin to describe how much I have craved, yearned, wished-upon-a-candled-cake for those things. "I suppose you could say that," she prevaricated. "Except the home-slash-family isn't really yours when you're the nanny. It's only a loaner."

  "I'm giving you the chance to change that," he said. "All you have to do is marry me."

  Her heart was already starting to pound when she met his eyes. Only a brief clash before his returned to the road, but the steely purpose, the dark intensity … she dragged in a serrated breath and felt the tremor roll right through her – a tremor that whispered with insidious and seductive intent.

  Marry him, Emily, and you can have it all.

  "That sounds too easy." Like one of those unsolicited lottery letters: Congratulations! You are the one in ten-million winner! The kind you toss straight in the garbage, because you know there's a catch. "I get a home and a family, but what do you get, Mitch?"

  The look he slanted her – one brief second – sizzled with all they'd shared that afternoon. Her mouth may well have fallen open, her eyes definitely clouded with heat, and her thighs tingled from that one blazing glimpse of what marriage to Mitch would include. Hot and powerful and often. She closed her mouth before she said something ill-advised, such as, Yes, I'll marry you.

  "Don't underestimate the power of great sex," he said softly. Only a tiny hint of humor edged his deep velvet-cream drawl. "Especially when it's been a while."

  Emily swallowed, caught between powerful flattery and cynical reality. Sure, he may use the "great" adjective, but if it had been "a while" – and how long constituted a while for a man like Mitch? – then any sex might qualify. She looked at him now, with those darkly rugged good looks, his athlete's body, and that deceptive calm she knew could explode into heated passion at the drop of a … bathrobe … and she shook her head. "That's not something you would have to marry to get regularly, Mitch. I imagine you'd only have to crook a finger at certain parties or bars."

  Something hardened in his profile. "I'm not interested in picking up my next wife at a bar."

  Annabelle, the beautiful party girl. How could she have forgotten? All the shimmering heat of sexual flattery faded, leaving only hard reality. He's suggested they marry – what was the catch? "Do you think, honestly, that I qualify as your next wife?"

  "You're a good person, Emily, easy to be around. You're warm, practical, even-tempered … usually," he added with a quirk of his lips.

  "You left out plain." And vanilla, her own personal favorite descriptor.

  Strangely enough, Mitch's eyes sparked. "I've seen you naked, Emily. You're far from plain."

  Oh. Okay. She swallowed.

&n
bsp; "But that's not the point." His gaze switched back to the road. "I like your company. We could have a pretty decent marriage."

  Pretty decent, good, practical – what happened to great sex and her far-from-plain naked body? "Sounds like good grounds for a friendship," she said.

  "Maybe that's what I want this time, a relationship without all the emotional upheavals. Where I'm not walking around on eggshells struggling to understand what could have gone wrong and backpedaling like crazy to make up for whatever damn thing I messed up."

  And there it was, his first marriage summarized in one heated string of words. Not that Emily should have been surprised – she'd lived through two years of Annabelle's emotional dramas – but, oh, what she'd give to inspire that kind of high passion. And she knew, suddenly, that she didn't care for a "pretty decent" marriage, and she definitely couldn't guarantee a lack of emotional upheaval. Her emotions were heaving all over the place at this very moment.

  "I'm sorry," she said softly. And her mouth twisted a little with the irony of what she was doing, saying, turning down – her fantasy for most of the past three years. "But I don't think I can marry you."

  He huffed out a breath that sounded both bitter and disbelieving. "Sorry? Why are you sorry?"

  "For a lot of things." Mostly that he'd started this whole circular conversation with I think we should get married instead of I want to get married. That he wanted a clear conscience and a nanny who wouldn't leave rather than a wife who loved him. "I can't be the kind of wife you're looking for."

  "Don't you think I'm the best judge of that?" His quiet words wrapped her in a tempting cloak. "Promise me you'll think about it. Will you do that?"

  In all honesty… "Yes." Her answer was a thin whisper of sound, barely audible over the road noise. Of course she would think about it. Quite possibly for the rest of her life.

  * * *

  Amazingly, Emily slept. She didn't remember nodding off but she woke with a start that jerked her head upright. Where were they? She squinted through her side window toward a single light glowing in the darkness. A farmyard, she thought, although one she didn't recognize.

  "Are we home yet?" Joshua asked groggily from the back seat. When she turned to see him rubbing his eyes, several pieces of his hair standing on end and a just-woke-up pout on his little mouth, she felt the same winded punch as when she'd hit the ground hard that first day on skis.

  "Soon, honey."

  Through the back window she saw Mitch coming toward them, a dark silhouette whose size and presence blocked out much of that one bright spotlight. The ache in her chest intensified. Did she really think she could resist such a twosome? Couldn't she simply take what she could get, and hang the grand passion?

  "Where's Daddy?"

  "He's coming now," she told Joshua, a smile starting as she recognized the squirming bundle under his arm. "Looks as if we stopped to pick up a passenger."

  The back door opened and Joshua yelled "Digger!" and greeted his pal as if they'd been apart weeks instead of days. By the dog's clamorous response, the elation was mutual.

  Laughing, she turned back around to find Mitch sliding into the driver's seat and watching her with a strange expression on his face. Her laughter faded. Those new, shorter layers of hair were probably standing on end like Joshua's. Self-conscious, she finger combed them back into place. "Better?" she asked.

  He shook his head – no answer at all – then Joshua asked, "How come Digger was here? We left him with Uncle Quade."

  "It appears your uncle Quade got busy." Warmth and a subtle sense of contained excitement turned his lopsided grin into a thing of powerful beauty. For a moment it blinded Emily to everything, including the cell phone he brandished.

  "The baby?" she squeaked.

  "He texted to say we'd find Digger down here with the Andersons."

  Emily rocked forward impatiently, grabbing hold of his jacket sleeve. "Forget the dog. Have they gone to the hospital? Has Chantal had the baby?"

  His grin widened. "Seems like."

  * * *

  Charlotte Quade made her entrance into the world several hours before their return from the ski trip. Just like her cousin Bridie, she jumped the gun by almost a month, impatient to get out and start bossing everyone around, Mitch surmised.

  Emily smiled, remembering. How long since she'd seen him so … happy. Charlotte's safe arrival completely overshadowed the tension that still resonated between them, that would continue to resonate until she made a decision about her future.

  Would she change her mind? Could she marry him?

  Frankly, she didn't know. There had been times in the last two days when he could have taken her by the hand and led her to the nearest celebrant. Talk about your complete family joyfest! Emily caught the overflow and let it fill every hollow ache in her soul until she practically vibrated with longing. Her smile turned wry. So much for staying strong.

  "Good to see you smiling," Mitch said, steering the SUV she'd yet to drive into the hospital parking lot. "All the way in here, you looked tense enough to snap."

  Well, yes, but she had justification. For a start, this was her first visit with Chantal, and the prospect of seeing baby Charlotte filled her with a complicated mix of anticipation and excitement and dread. With Mitch alongside and, all that my-sisters-used-protection-and-look-at-them talk whispering away in the back of her consciousness – Lord help her if she got to actually hold this infant.

  Secondly, Mitch's parents had arrived home this morning and although she'd met them many times in the past, that was before she'd slept with their son and agreed to consider his marriage suggestion. Which kind of put a new spin on the meeting, her nerves had decided as she'd dithered over her wardrobe choice.

  In the end she'd gone with her nice, plain, practical and only skirt. With nervous hands she smoothed the woolen fabric over her knees and felt it prickle against her bare skin. She had managed to stick a finger right through her only pair of pantyhose while dressing. When she felt Mitch's gaze track her nervous smoothing, sensual warmth rippled through her blood. Just from that one, covert glance. Lord, she had it bad.

  "I've got your present, Em," Joshua crowed, unsnapping his seat belt and reaching for his car door the second they stopped. "Come on, I know where we go. I'll show you."

  Slowing him from a gallop to something resembling a walk, and responding to his excited chatter, kept her mind and her nerves occupied all the way to Chantal's room – except for that moment when she'd caught their reflection in the plate-glass entrance doors. Mitch looked so tall and broad and handsome; she looked not so bad in her off-white sweater and crimson skirt; Joshua strode, confident and happy, with his arms clutching the gift-wrapped parcel.

  A family, she'd thought with a sudden shock of discovery. They actually looked like a family.

  Then Joshua grabbed her hand and demanded an answer to some pressing problem, but she stored that image in the back of her mind for later … later, when she would pore over all the carefully filed information and make her decision. But now – she paused on the threshold and inhaled deeply – now she had other Goodwins to deal with.

  "Come on, Emmy." Joshua tugged on her hand, pulling her into a large, airy room that could not have contained any more flowers or balloons or pink stuffed animals without extensive remodeling. It was also surprisingly light on people. No Goodwins senior, just Chantal and Quade and Julia, the latter holding a tiny, swaddled pink bundle.

  "I got another present 'cept this one's from Emmy." Joshua plonked it down on the bed. "It's a bear for Charlie."

  "Charlotte," at least two voices corrected.

  "Told you so." Julia sounded very pleased with herself.

  "All Charlottes do not get called Charlie," Chantal said tartly, and, as always when Goodwins gathered, the room soon spun with teasing and laughter and it was so easy to relax and feel a part of it. Emily released her pent-up anxiety in a big smile and an even bigger hug for each of the new parents. When Joshua asked
for a turn holding the baby, she instinctively hunkered down to help.

  "Hold her so," she instructed softly, helping cradle the tiny bonneted head. She was so delicate and pink and sweet smelling and perfect. "Isn't she beautiful?"

  "For a girl," Joshua decided with a heavy sigh. "Can the next baby be a boy?"

  Julia patted him on the head and promised, "We'll do our best, sweetie," which drew a shudder from Chantal. "Do not even mention 'next baby' in my company." But Quade squeezed her hand, and the look that passed between them was so full of love it turned Emily to mush. She figured there would be more Quade babies, God willing.

  "I have to scoot," Julia said. "Or my little princess will be spoiled beyond redemption by the grands. You should see all the presents they bought in London."

  The P word captured Joshua's attention. "Is there any for me?"

  "What do you think?"

  His grin spread like spilled sunshine. "Nan and Da always bring me presents."

  Julia cocked a brow at Mitch. "Okay if I take him around to visit with them?"

  And in the ensuing organization of who-was-going-where-and-for-how-long, followed by the many kisses and hugs of departure, Emily ended up holding the baby. As she settled Charlotte's insubstantial weight in her arms, as she gazed into her sleeping face with its perfect cupid's-bow mouth and brow scrunched as if in concentrated thought, all the peripheral chatter faded away. Need, want, longing closed around her like a physical entity – a many-tentacled, living, breathing, writhing thing that threatened to squeeze everything else from her soul.

  You can have this, Emily, your own tiny piece of God's perfection.

  She looked up then, looked up to find Mitch watching her, seeing her most-secret craving written all over her face. Somewhere deep inside she felt a twang of alarm. You're handing him everything he needs, it warned her, every tool he needs to shape your decision. But she could not do a thing about it. In that moment, she could not even bring herself to care.

  * * *

  "I'm sorry I missed your parents."