Wish Upon a Matchmaker

by Marie Ferrarella

  Danni held on to it as long as possible, aware of just how tightly Stone was holding her to him, as if, were he able to, he would have absorbed her completely into himself.

  A sense of loss nibbled away at the edges of her being when she felt the slight sag of his body against hers as Stone began the descent back down again.

  Maybe it was selfish of her, but Danni wasn’t quite ready to release the euphoria dancing through her. In a move more instinctive than anything else, she wrapped her legs around his torso, keeping him exactly where he was.

  He raised himself up on his elbows and for a moment, just looked at her as he brushed the hair out of her face. She couldn’t begin to gauge what he was thinking.

  Stone smiled when he spoke. “Is that your way of saying you want more?”

  “No,” she answered, even though she did want more. “That’s my way of saying I want to hold on to the sensation just a little bit longer.”

  About to roll off her and take his place right beside Danni, Stone remained where he was a while longer.

  There were far worse places to be in the world, he thought with suppressed amusement. “Anything else?” he asked her.

  She laughed then, a soft, gentle laugh that made him smile all the more. Things were going on inside of him that he didn’t feel up to exploring. For now it was enough that there were these skyrocketing sensations going on in his body as a direct result of their close contact.

  “You can relax,” she told him. When he didn’t move a muscle but continued looming over her, she added, “That means you can lie down next to me instead of staying where you are.”

  The next moment, he was rolling off her and gathering her to him. “Certainly didn’t see that coming,” he murmured under his breath.

  “What?” She wasn’t sure what he was referring to. “That I’d let you lie down?”

  “No.” He gently stroked her cheek, succeeding in arousing himself with the simple action. “That you’d let me—well, you know.”

  “There was no ‘letting’ going on,” she assured him. “Whatever went on was done by mutual consent,” she told him.

  “Regrets?” he couldn’t help asking her.

  “Yes,” she admitted. When she saw the sadness that entered his eyes, she was quick to add, “But not about this. Perhaps no one explained to you what the word mutual means?” she suggested.

  He laughed and pulled her closer, then kissed the top of her forehead. “I know what it means. I suppose you’ll want a friends-and-family discount on the work,” he teased.

  Danni raised herself up on one elbow, a part of her still rather stunned that she’d done what she had. Celibacy had become a way of life with her. “And just how does that work?” she teased back.

  Stone did his best to keep a somber expression on his face as he said, “The closer a friend or a family member you are, the better the discount.”

  “I see.” He was still flat on his back and she was looming over him on the limited space they were sharing. The ends of her hair were lightly flirting with his upper chest, tickling it. “And just how friendly am I allowed to get?”

  “As friendly as you want,” he told her solemnly—but his eyes were flirting with her the entire time.

  “What if I want to be very, very friendly?” she pressed. “Then what?”

  He pretended to think the matter over. And then he wove his fingers through her hair and said, “Then I just might wind up having to pay you for working on your house.”

  “Sounds tempting,” she said, her eyes dancing as she regarded him.

  “No, you’re tempting,” he corrected. Cupping the back of her head, he brought her face down closer to his. “So tempting that you’d probably be banned in at least seven Southern states,” he theorized.

  “How about you?” she asked. “Are you thinking about banning me?”

  He slowly moved his head from side to side, his eyes never leaving hers. “My mother didn’t raise any stupid children,” he told her.

  “Prove it,” she whispered, her words feathering along his lips.

  He laughed then, delighting in her, in the way she made him feel. It had been a very long time since a woman had made him glad just to be alive.

  “I thought you’d never ask,” he told her, bringing her closer to him again.

  It amazed Stone that he could want her again so soon, that he would be ready to make love with her all over again so quickly on the heels of what they had just done together.

  He thought he knew his limitations, thought he knew himself as well as any man could know himself. But being with Danni had created a whole new set of parameters for him, parameters that both surprised him and pleased him at the same time.

  He had no idea, at this moment, where any of this was going. All he knew right now was that he wanted her and that, for the first time in a very long time, he didn’t feel as if there was a part of him that was empty, a part that was conspicuously missing. Maybe he wasn’t exactly complete, but he wasn’t empty, either.

  And more than that, he realized as he began the journey back to paradise, he was happy.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Happy” was a dangerous state to be in, Stone thought the next afternoon as he attempted to finish what he’d scheduled to be done for today.

  He was hurrying. He wanted to be gone by the time Danni came home. The less temptation, the better.

  “Happy” made you blind to the inevitable and set a man up to take a fall. And if ever a man was getting set up for a fall, it was him.

  He knew there was no future for the two of them; he’d been here before. Granted, Danni was a far warmer person than Elizabeth had been, but they were both professional women, both smart and attractive—and Danni was a budding celebrity to boot. And he, he was a former aerospace engineer with a general contractor license who didn’t talk all that much.

  He just wasn’t on the same level, the same rung in society as Danni. Eventually that would hit her and become important enough to move to center stage even if it didn’t seem that way now. He had nothing to offer her and he knew it. She outearned him and while that wasn’t a problem for him, down the line it just might turn into one for her.

  Elizabeth, he knew, was acutely aware of the fact that she earned more money than he did. She’d even mentioned it a couple of times in passing. The most notable time was when she’d talked about sending Ginny off to a “proper” private school, to use her words. She’d quickly followed that up by saying she knew he probably didn’t have the money for that, given his job, but she did and she was quite willing to “lend” him the money so that Ginny could receive a decent education.

  Though he’d tried to deny it to himself at first, it became very apparent that this was less about Ginny and more about her and how it would reflect on her to have a stepdaughter who went to public school.

  After that incident, he was forced to acknowledge two things. One, Elizabeth apparently wanted to send his daughter away once they were married—something she’d obviously taken for granted despite his “station in life.” And two, she did consider herself and what she did superior to what he did and consequently, to him.

  After that, even if Danni hadn’t come along, their relationship was scheduled for termination.

  After measuring, he hung the last two tiles on the wall. He’d made a mistake last night. A glorious one, but a mistake nonetheless. To make certain that he wasn’t tempted again—because the very thought of Danni sent him headlong into the land of heated desire—Stone decided that it was best not to be around her any more than was absolutely necessary. He only had so much willpower and no more.

  Done! he congratulated himself as he rose to his feet.

  Brushing off his hands, Stone looked around the immediate area to see what he needed to take with him. A quick assessment told him that he was going to need everything there tomorrow so there was no point in packing up.

  Besides, it saved time.

  Grabbing only the basic
toolbox he brought with him to every job—a gift from Eva on their last Christmas together—he headed for the door.

  As he put his hand on the doorknob, he felt it suddenly turning. The next second, the door was opening and Danni, her arms laden with bags and one large, opened box, came hurrying in.

  The collision was inevitable. And jarring.

  In that split second, Stone became acutely aware of her body and his own instant response to it. As if he needed to have that reinforced.

  This would be a great deal more difficult than he’d foreseen, he thought with a suppressed sigh.

  Steadying her even as he took a step back, Stone said, “You’re home early.”

  Was that disappointment she heard in his voice, or just her imagination? Was she being insecure because she was still having trouble believing that something so perfect was happening to her at long last?

  Damn it, Danni, you’re overthinking things again. You plowed into him. He’s just reacting to that.

  “And you’re leaving early,” she noted, seeing the toolbox he’d dropped on the floor.

  Suddenly feeling awkward, he said, “I got done ahead of schedule.” It was only a partial lie; he’d gotten done early because he’d engineered it that way, but there was no way she could know about that. “So I thought I’d go home and spend some quality time with—um—with Ginny.”

  Great, forgetting your kid’s name. If Danni needed any proof that you’re less than brilliant, you just handed it to her.

  If she noticed that he’d stumbled, she didn’t show it. Instead, shifting the box and bags so she had a better grip, she told him, “Well, it looks like you can still get your wish.”

  Good, she wasn’t going to try to make him stay, he thought. Maybe he’d overreacted as to the situation between them. Maybe she didn’t feel the same way about him that he felt about her.

  That was supposed to make him feel better, not worse, he upbraided himself. Just what the hell was the matter with him? Stone silently and impatiently demanded. Either he wanted her to be into him, or he didn’t. He had to choose.

  It was while he was confronted with this little dilemma that he realized she was all but completely overloaded with several bags and a large carton opened at the top.

  And the most sensational aroma was wafting from it all. “I’ll just help you carry that in and then go,” he said as he relieved her of the large opened box.

  She looked up at him innocently. “I thought you said you wanted to spend some time with Ginny.”

  Confused, Stone followed her into the kitchen. The room now had a finished floor, so it could once more accommodate the table and chairs that had been there originally.

  “I did—I mean—I do,” he corrected.

  “Then you’d better stay here because that’s where they’re coming,” she told him matter-of-factly. Putting the bags down on the table she turned around to face him as she told him the rest of it. “I invited your sister and Ginny over for dinner.”

  “You’re going to cook dinner now?” he asked, surprised.

  She still didn’t have a functioning stove, although that was next on his list of installations. Her new stove was currently in a box in her garage. He was waiting on the granite to be delivered for the counter. He knew, of course, the miracles she could accomplish with her hot plate, but that took time and it would be late before she would be finished.

  “No, I’m going to heat dinner now, or at least keep it on a warming tray,” she amended. “I made this at work before I left.” She nodded toward the box and bags. “I’m kind of partial to the ovens we have on the set,” she confessed. Which was why when she began ordering appliances to replace the ones she’d had before the remodeling began, she’d ordered the same brand of range and cooktop that was featured on her set. “This way Ginny and Virginia won’t have to sit around, starving and waiting for me to make a three-course meal one piece at a time on my struggling hot plate.”

  “When are they coming?” Stone asked.

  He’d talked to Virginia earlier today and she hadn’t mentioned anything about coming over for dinner. Why would she deliberately neglect to tell him that? Unless, it suddenly hit him, this was a last-minute idea on Danni’s part.

  The doorbell rang just then, interrupting his thoughts.

  “Now,” Danni said brightly, answering his question before she left the room.

  She started to go to admit Virginia and Ginny. They were her buffer, because she really wanted to see Stone again, but at the same time, she didn’t want either one of them to be tempted to repeat last night.

  Not that she hadn’t absolutely loved and thrilled at what happened between them. But an event of that magnitude stole away her ability to think clearly, causing her to focus on one thing and one thing only. And this was ever so much more complicated than “just one thing.”

  She didn’t want him to feel pressured in the slightest while she needed to keep her intense, unvarnished reaction to him safely under wraps.

  “You don’t have to do this,” he said just as she crossed the threshold.

  She stopped and slowly turned around. Was he telling her, or actually ordering her not to do this?

  “I know,” she replied, flashing him a smile. “But I want to. From what you’ve told me, good, balanced meals aren’t exactly a priority at your house.”

  With that, she hurried off before he could protest anymore. She didn’t want to keep her two guests waiting any longer.

  The second she opened the door, Ginny was quick to give her an energetic hug.

  Virginia, on the other hand, hung back a little, which, Danni later discovered, that was rather foreign to her normal mode of behavior.

  “You didn’t have to invite me, too,” Virginia told her. It was obvious that Danni had decided to make a play for her brother. Maybe she felt that the way to Stone was through his family.

  Virginia smiled to herself. In that case, this woman was a very pleasant change from his last girlfriend. Elizabeth had made a point of looking down her perfectly shaped nose at her and the fact that she was self-employed, pulling in far less money than the other woman did.

  But all this was supposition on her part and Virginia didn’t want to seem as if she was presuming too much.

  Danni laughed. “Well, it’s certainly easy to see who you’re related to. I’ll tell you what I told your brother. ‘I know I don’t have to but I want to.’ Come into the dining room while I still have a dining room where I can seat people,” she said.

  Taking Ginny’s hand in hers, she led the way to the small room.

  The only element that saved the dining room from arousing very real feelings of claustrophobia was that both sides of the room were open, leading into either the kitchen on one end or the living room on the other. However the dining room itself was completely filled up by the scarred mahogany table with its six chairs. Of necessity, the table was placed at an angle so that people could pull out their chairs without slamming into walls on three of the table’s four sides.

  “Make yourselves comfortable,” Danni told them. “Dinner will be ready in a few minutes.”

  Because she knew that form dictated it, Virginia felt she had to volunteer her services even though she was less than domestic.

  “You need any help with dinner?” she asked Danni gamely.

  Danni shook her head. “None whatsoever,” she assured Virginia. “I prepared dinner at the studio. I just have to get all the covers off and make sure everything’s the right temperature to serve,” she told Stone’s sister. “Besides, I wouldn’t invite you to dinner and then put you to work cooking it. That wouldn’t be right.”

  Virginia didn’t bother hiding her relief. Turning toward her brother, she said, “I really like this woman, Stone,” she said with sincerity as well as a bright, broad smile. Turning her head, she winked at her niece, who had been, after all, the start of it all when she’d brought her case to that Realtor. She’d had her doubts at first, but it looked now as if
that woman was the genuine article. A matchmaker of the first caliber.

  And neither one of these two people knew it, she realized. Somehow, that made this match all the more special.

  “Me, too!” Ginny piped up, needlessly putting in her two cents.

  No more than I do, Ginny, no more than I do, Stone said silently. Out loud he said to his daughter, “We already know that, kiddo.”

  If he didn’t know better, he would have said that the female members of his family were actually trying to sell him on Danni.

  As if they had to.

  The real problem here was keeping his feelings under wraps—especially since he was so very tempted not to.

  Had he been someone else, someone with fewer principles and more of an inclination to have a good time, he might have been tempted to go another route, to enjoy himself with Danni and live only within the moment without giving any thought to the future.

  But that wasn’t him.

  He’d always done things with an eye to the future, ever mindful of the possible consequences of any action.

  Stone already felt as if he cared more than he should for Danni. And he knew he was going to wind up paying for that. Because when the time came, and it would whenever he was finished with her renovations, they would inevitably go their separate ways.

  He would move on to his next project and she would move on with the rest of her life. The life of a woman who had a bestselling cookbook to her name and a cable channel program that was swiftly growing in popularity. He’d heard somewhere that her audience was growing larger with each broadcast.

  The last time he, Danni and Ginny had gone to look for new carpeting for her living room and bedrooms, the sales clerk had recognized her. And just like that, the man’s clip, efficient manner transformed and he became a fawning fan who’d asked her for her autograph.

  How could he possibly hope to compete with that? Stone wondered.

  The simple truth of it was that he couldn’t. He was destined to get lost somewhere in the background.

  He was still mulling over this dark situation and its inevitable resolution when Danni returned with the main course and several side dishes. One that he was partial to, he noticed, while there were two others that would appeal to his daughter and his sister.