How To Hook A Husband (And A Baby)

by Carolyn Zane

  “No!” He wiped his eyes. “I was trying to breathe.”

  “Oh.” Wendy began to laugh in earnest. “So, I wasn’t supposed to be blowing in his ear right off the bat?” she choked.

  “Oh, man,” Travis howled and, sitting up, clutched at his gut. “You thought I was telling you to…” He was rendered silent for a moment by the hilarious thought. “Blow in his ear? Right there at the table?” Slapping his thighs, he hung his head between his legs and gave in to the swells of laughter that crowded his throat. Oh, it was too much. The image of the prissy Cecil, and the strange look of shock and discomfort he wore all evening. It was all making perfect sense.

  He could feel Wendy’s slight body leaning against his arm, shaking along with him, seeing the humor in the situation. She was such a good sport. Most women he knew would be shooting him dead about now.

  Pulling his head up, he dared to take a peek at Wendy, and seeing her cheeks streaming with tears of laughter sent him over the edge once again.

  “I…I…” She gasped. “I thought you wanted me to force him to dance, the way you were shrugging your shoulders that way. I thought…you…ha!—knew what you were…doing!” she screamed and fell across his lap.

  “Well, that explains the yellow pallor in his cheeks,”

  Travis groaned, breathing deeply with Wendy as she struggled back to an upright position. “You know,” he told her, when he could finally speak again, “while you were out dancing…” He reached up and ran a hand across his mouth to stem the impending tidal wave of mirth. “BambiAnn wanted to know why you were interrogating poor Cecil that way. She said she thought you were…” He started to laugh again. “Scaring him half to death with all your questions and demands.”

  “My questions and demands?” Wendy shrieked, doubling over. “You were the one who suggested I draw him out. ‘People love that,’“ she mimicked, her face scrunched with glee.

  “You drew him out, all right. Right out of the room.”

  “I know.” Wendy hiccuped and sighed. “I saw them leave together. Travis…” Dabbing at her cheeks with her sleeve, she grew suddenly sober. “I’m so sorry. I hope you’re okay.” Her voice was gentle. Tender. Filled with compassion.

  “Oh, don’t worry about it,” he said, and smiled, inordinately pleased at concern. “I’ve been meaning to call it quits with BambiAnn for quite a while now, and I think she knew it. We were never all that serious.” Leaning back on one elbow, he reached up and playfully tugged a lock of her hair. “Actually, I think BambiAnn and Cecil make a pretty good couple. She was extremely impressed with his income figures, and he seemed to be pretty impressed with her…figure, too.” He grinned. “To tell you the truth, I’m relieved.”

  She drew her lower lip between her straight, white teeth, worrying it. “Really?”

  He nodded. “Really. When I decide to get married again, I want it to be to someone that Dusty loves as much as I do.” He studied her for her reaction.

  Sitting up straight, Wendy tugged her hem down over her knees and locked her arms at her shins. “That’s good,” she agreed with relief, nodding solemnly. “And it’s not like you don’t have a whole slew of women you can fall back on.”

  He nodded. “Yeah.” Right about now, he’d like to fall back on her, he thought, dropping his eyes to the lower lip she’d been so thoughtfully chewing a moment ago. A primal, sexual urge began to stir low in his gut. He was growing to need her. And want her. He hadn’t wanted anyone this way for a long time. Absently, he wondered why it didn’t scare the hell out of him. “And I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you with Cecil.” He dropped this platitude for her benefit, but knew it was a barefaced lie. Truthfully, he was glad the little weasel had taken off with BambiAnn. Killed two birds with one stone, in his opinion.

  “Oh, that’s okay.” Wendy shrugged and rested her chin on her knees. Smiling, she angled her cheek to face him. “I don’t think Cecil was exactly my soul mate. With or without the secret signals.”

  Travis felt a slow smile steal across his hardened heart. “No.”

  “That’s okay. I had a lot of fun tonight, in spite of all the mixed messages.” She giggled. “I just don’t know how I’m ever going to face Cecil again.” Slanting her head, her gaze collided with his. “I want to thank you for teaching me to dance, Travis. I had no idea how much fun dancing could be. Especially dancing with someone as good as Conway Brubaker. No wonder Sue Ellen calls him Conway Swayze. He’s wonderful. And,” she sighed, “handsome.”

  Travis was sure his heart stopped beating.

  Wendy lazily studied his face. Not as handsome as you, she wanted to say, but couldn’t. Travis would think she’d lost her mind if she confessed to her burgeoning crush on him. What a goon she was. Going and getting all hung up on him over one little kiss. She wasn’t supposed to be thinking about the soft caress of his lips. No. She should be concentrating on someone else’s lips. Someone like…Conway Brubaker. Taking a deep breath, she made a decision to confide her secret in Travis. “You know,” she began shyly, “when I was slow dancing with Conway, for a minute there, I thought he might kiss me.”

  This was it. Call the cardio unit, Travis thought, panic clutching at his chest. “Really.” The calm, steady sound of his voice surprised him.

  “Mmm-hmm,” she admitted, nodding. “I kind of wished he would.”

  Over my dead body, he thought, suddenly hating the handsome Conway with a passion. He tried to shake it off, but couldn’t. The volatile passion that exploded between him and Wendy when they kissed was his, dammit. Not Conway Brubaker’s. Jealously, unwanted and unaccustomed, tore him up inside. “Why is that?” he asked, a grim muscle throbbing in his jaw.

  “Mmm…” She hesitated, then, squeezing her eyes tightly shut, forged ahead. “I wanted to see if kissing another man would be as…exciting as kissing you.” She ducked her head, embarrassed. “I know that you’ve probably already forgotten that we kissed after our practice date, but for me, it was kind of a big deal.”

  Travis felt his heart resume beating again. In fact, it began to race.

  Toying with a lock of her hair, Wendy continued with her admission. “I haven’t had much experience kissing, and I know I need more practice before I kiss someone as handsome and experienced and worldly as Conway Brubaker—”

  His heart stopped again.

  “In fact,” she confessed, humiliation coloring her words, “you were my first really…um, passionate kiss.”

  His heart started again.

  Although he was bothered by her plans to hone her kissing expertise on Conway “The Playboy” Brubaker, he was relieved and thrilled to learn that he had been her first. Something poignant swelled in his throat as he watched her face. It was such a sweet face. Classically beautiful, yet filled with wonderful emotion that made her unique. Amazing how he’d never noticed how lovely she was before she’d started this husband hunt of hers. Any fool could see that she was a beauty, inside and out. Any fool, but him. He guessed he couldn’t see past BambiAnn’s voluptuous glamour girl act.

  Slowly, he reached out and cupped her soft, delicate cheek in his work-roughened palm. Their eyes tangled and danced, suddenly seeing things in each other that they had never noticed before. Drawing her inexorably closer, Travis lowered his mouth to hers for the slowest, sweetest, softest kiss he’d ever experienced.

  Like angel’s wings, he imagined as his lips moved lightly over hers, hovering, touching, lightly tasting. She parted her lips, ever so slightly, and he could feel her warm, sweet breath in his mouth. She tasted of sunshine and rainbows and bubbling waterfalls and—sighing, he deepened the kiss—yonder light. Man. The things she did to him. Never had he kissed a woman this way. The ecstasy was indescribable. Her lashes, whisper-soft, tickled his cheek, and Travis, if it hadn’t been for the paper boy’s misplaced aim, would have thought he’d ascended to an alternate planet again. The Technicolor passion planet.

  The dull thud of the paper, as it bounced off the back of h
is head and landed on the lawn, pulled Travis back to reality.

  Wendy lay curled in his lap, his shirt twisted into wads under her tightly clenched fists. How she’d ended up in this position, he’d never know. Pulling her forehead to his lips, he planted a proprietary kiss and murmured into her hair.

  “I don’t want you kissing Conway Brubaker.” His tone brooked no argument. He didn’t want her kissing anyone, but that wasn’t realistic. No. Realistically, she should probably kiss a bunch of guys before she got engaged. He just didn’t want to know about it. He didn’t want to have to listen to her accounts of her various good-night kisses. He was getting too involved as it was. This was not good for either of them. It was time to cut her loose. Resting his chin at the top of her head, he leaned back with her on the stairs. “I think you’re ready to solo,” he said flatly.

  “Really? You think I’m ready to go out with someone by myself?”

  He exhaled mightily. “Yeah.” Closing his eyes, he added, “Anyone but Conway Brubaker.”

  9

  Beads of perspiration broke out on Travis’s brow as he savagely attacked the offending hedge with swift, powerful strokes of his long-handled garden shears. Because of his procrastination, the paint job on his poor truck bore permanent scars. Well, enough was enough. He wasn’t going to put up with this irritating situation another minute. No way. Travis had been meaning to trim back the giant laurel hedge between his and Wendy’s driveways for a long time now.

  He just hadn’t meant to accomplish this task at midnight.

  But what better time to do it? he wondered, wrestling the heavy, tangled undergrowth into the middle of his driveway. Dusty was sound asleep and out of harm’s way, he thought logically as he kicked and punched the growing mountain of hedge clippings out from under his feet. It was cool outside, so he wouldn’t get overheated, he rationalized, huffing and puffing as he mopped his sweaty face with the sleeve of his raggedy old flannel shirt.

  And, he could keep an eye out for Wendy.

  Much to his chagrin, she had taken him up on his suggestion and was out on her first solo date, while he spent the evening acting like a worried father. No, that wasn’t quite true. A worried father wouldn’t feel the searing sense of jealousy that whirled through his gut like a twister on the rampage. No, he was acting more like a worried lunatic.

  Pushing the branches of the hedge aside for the umpteenth time that evening, he peered through the darkness across Wendy’s yard and checked to see if she had somehow magically appeared on her front porch. But no. She was still out, doing heaven only knew what with mystery date number two. Abner Perkins.

  Abner was one of Travis’s subcontractors. Seemed like a nice enough guy. Okay, admittedly, Abner had a few problems, but who didn’t? Wendy, the lady that she was, wasn’t one to hold a person’s little idiosyncrasies against them. At least he hoped not, since it was his idea in the first place that she call Abner and make a date.

  Good old Abner. About six feet. And that was just his belt measurement. Interesting thing about Abner, Travis mused. It seemed he always carried leftovers from his meal somewhere in his longish beard. Because Abner was such a sensitive soul, no one wanted to point this little problem out. So, Abner would go through the day with crumbs of this and that dangling from his face, bobbing distractingly as he spoke.

  With a rueful smile, Travis shook his head and pushed his sweat soaked hair out of his face. Wendy had been yapping for the last three days about how she felt the need to kiss another man. Said she needed to do some comparison shopping, so to speak.

  Why on earth she’d feel the need for that was beyond him. He knew she could search the world over and never find, with another living soul, what happened between them when their lips met. It just wasn’t possible that something so…incredible could happen for her with another man. He’d been able to tell from the instant their mouths melded that first time that they had something special. Magical. Explosive. The mere thought of that kiss made his blood run hot.

  Abner was a lucky son of a gun, getting a date with Wendy. In his opinion, good old Abner wasn’t anywhere near Wendy’s league, socially speaking. Funny, but if someone would have asked him last month, he’d have thought they were perfect for each other. Now though—he shook his head, tsk-tsking under his breath—now he had other ideas. When it came to Wendy, like his son before him, he’d seen the light. Sighing, he heaved a laurel branch as thick as his arm over his shoulder.

  He’d suggested the less than attractive Abner to Wendy, mainly because he hoped when the date ended, she wouldn’t feel like kissing him good-night. If, he thought peevishly, the damn date ever ended.

  Picking up his clippers, Travis viciously whacked off a short, stubby branch that protruded into the drive. For Pete’s sake, it had to be at least one in the morning. Travis angled his wrist to catch the glow of the overhead street lamp. One-seventeen. Where the hell was she? It was onethe-hell-seventeen in the morning. What was she doing? He closed his eyes. He couldn’t think about it. If she was kissing Abner.…The very thought made him want to lash out.

  Just as Travis was really getting into his frenzied assault on his monster foliage, a bright pair of headlights swung around the corner and into their cul-de-sac. Not wanting to be discovered for fear Wendy would get the wrong idea and think he was more concerned about her than he actually was, he dropped his clippers and dove headlong into the middle of the huge, overgrown hedge.

  Aw, geez. This was not a good idea, he thought, feeling like a human shish kebab as the hedge held him aloft in its midst with dozens of pointy branches. However, it was too late to do anything about it now. Pulling a particularly sharp branch out of the middle of his back, Travis angled his head among the leaves so that he could see Abner and Wendy as they stepped out of the car and strolled right past him up the front steps to the door.

  Even though he lay as still as humanly possible, the rustling leaves and snapping branches obscured their conversation. Shoot, he thought, holding his breath and strainingto hear their murmured words. What on earth was Abner saying to Wendy? Whatever it was, she was smiling brightly and looking up at him with what he could only guess was adoration.

  Travis felt suddenly nauseated. He might not be able to hear the words, but he could see Abner preparing for the move.

  The move.

  It was obvious. He was going to kiss her. Aw, criminy. And she was going to let him? Yeesh.

  To Travis’s eternal disgust, Abner pulled her into the meaty circle of his arms, much the way Travis had shown her one of her dates would, and planted a big, wet one somewhere in the vicinity of her lips. Travis blanched. He couldn’t look. As quietly as he could, he twisted away from the unnerving scene before him and settled in to wait for Abner to take a hike.

  At least he’d better be leaving, Travis fumed. If he thought he was coming in for a cup of coffee on the first date, he had another think coming. Travis knew how the male mind operated. Abner only wanted one thing, and he wasn’t going to get it. Not here, not tonight. Not after they were engaged, not even after they were married. Not ever, if Travis could help it. A large supporting bough suddenly broke and Travis felt himself fall further into the dank and crawly recesses of his hedge.

  Wendy pushed against Abner’s doughy chest, relieved to have a reason to distract him. “Did you hear that?”

  “Hear…what?” Abner’s eyes were glazed, much like the pile of donuts he’d consumed for dessert. He reached for her.

  Taking a step back, Wendy frowned. “That noise. It sounded like it was coming from the hedge.”

  Abner dropped his arms. “Probably just an animal.”

  “Yes, you’re most likely right. Anyway,” Wendy said brightly, smiling up at Abner, hoping she was effectively masking her revulsion, “thanks so much for a lovely evening.” She decided to skip Travis’s advice about saying how they ought to do it again sometime. Because there wouldn’t be a next time. Not if she had anything to say about it.

  “Y
ou bet,” Abner said, shuffling his feet back and forth, his eyes shifting about as he nervously stroked his sticky beard.

  Obviously, he was trying to find the words to ask her out again, and Wendy decided to head him off at the pass. “Gosh, Abner! Will you look at the time? It’s after one-thirty in the morning! I have to get up in just a few short hours if I’m going to make it to church by first service. Well, you drive careful, now, you hear? And—” The words tumbled out in a rush as she ushered Abner back toward his car and opened the door for him. “Thank you again for the lovely.uh, all that food. I had a full—uh, fun time…there, uh, eating with you. So, again…” She closed the door after the nervous Abner, and patted the roof of the car. “Thanks for everything. Bye-bye,” she chirped, and walked quickly back toward the sidewalk.

  As if not knowing exactly what had hit him, Abner started his engine and waved uncertainly at Wendy. “‘Bye, now,” he called, slowly pulling away from the curb. Tooting his horn against the silent night, he rounded the corner and beaded home.

  Sighing, Wendy returned his wave and watched as his taillights disappeared from view.

  “You can come out now, Travis,” she called over her shoulder and into the hedge. “Travis,” she repeated after a moment. “I know you’re in there. You can stop spying on me and go to bed now.”

  The snap, crackle and pop of the laurel hedge that separated their driveways finally gave birth to Travis as he thrashed his way out of his hiding place.

  “I wasn’t spying on you,” he protested testily as he staggered to his feet and dusted himself off. He gestured to his mountain of yard debris. “As you can see, I’ve been working on the hedge.”

  Wendy laughed. “From the inside out? At one-thirty in the morning, no less? Sure.” She snorted. “You were spying on me, and you know it. Why don’t you just admit it?”

  He glared at her through narrowed eyes. “Hey, I’m a busy man. I don’t have all day to work in my yard, like some people. I have to do it when I have the time.”