He shook his head, sending his wispy white hair flying. “You’re every bit as stubborn as he is.”
“I have to be,” she told him. “I can’t settle for half a life.” Then she gave him a hug. As his arms came around her, she whispered, “I’m really going to miss you.”
He patted her back and offered, “I’ll beat him up for you if you want.”
Margie smiled through her tears. “Thanks, Simon.”
As she pulled away, he said, “Still doesn’t seem like much of a birthday present for me. You leaving, I mean.”
“I wish I could stay. I really do.” She let her gaze slide around the room and out to the hall, as if looking all over the mansion she’d come to think of as home. It would be so hard to leave this place. But what choice did she have?
She couldn’t stay, loving Hunter and knowing he didn’t feel the same. That would be like a slow death. No. Better to go. To move on. Find a new place and try to forget what she’d had so briefly, here.
“It’s a shame you don’t love him enough to fight for him,” Simon mused.
Surprised, Margie only said, “I do love him enough. But Simon, you can’t fight a battle you can’t win.”
“Ah,” he said solemnly, “sometimes those are the only battles worth fighting.”
An hour later, there was a knock at the door, and when Margie opened it, a tall, elegantly dressed, absolutely breathtaking woman swept inside.
“Isn’t this lovely.” The blonde’s cool blue eyes swept the interior of the mansion as if she were taking an inventory. Then she glanced at Margie, giving her a quick, dismissive glance as if finding her less than interesting.
Margie’s spine stiffened a little in response. For the moment, this was her house and this blonde was the intruder, gorgeous though she might be.
“Can I help you?”
“Yes.” The blonde looked down from her towering height and gave a smile that barely creased her lean cheeks. “You can tell Hunter that Gretchen is here to see him.”
“Gretchen?” Margie could have sworn she felt a cold, hard piece of ice settle in the pit of her stomach. This was Hunter’s ex-girlfriend? Oh dear God. No wonder his friend Hula had called her a goddess and had been so surprised to find out that Margie was Hunter’s wife. In comparison with this-okay, goddess really was the only appropriately descriptive word-Margie felt like Cinderella. Before the big night with her fairy godmother.
“Yes. Is Hunter here?” The blonde walked farther down the hall, peeked into the living room, then turned back. “I was going to call him, but then I thought what fun it would be to surprise him.”
“You have,” Hunter said from the staircase.
Margie looked over her shoulder at him and tried to read his expression. His features were tight, his eyes shuttered and his jawline grim. Well, at least he didn’t look delighted to see the fabulous Gretchen.
“Hunter, honey!” The tall blond actually squealed as she raced to his side on incredibly long legs.
Margie stood open-mouthed and watched as Gretchen flung herself at Hunter’s chest. He caught her automatically, and for one brief moment the two of them were locked together. Margie’s stomach lurched again. This was the kind of woman Hunter belonged with, she told herself. No wonder he wasn’t interested in a ten-pound-overweight, curly-haired redhead with freckles in all the wrong places.
Hunter’s gaze locked with hers over Gretchen’s shoulder, and he looked frustrated. He tried to mouth something at her, but then the blonde pulled back, looked up at him and said, “I came to tell you I’ve decided I will marry you, after all!”
Margie’s jaw dropped and her eyes narrowed as the rest of her world dissolved out from under her.
“Damn it.” Hunter saw the look in Margie’s eyes as he pried Gretchen’s long fingers off his shoulders and set her onto her feet. His ex was babbling, but he wasn’t listening. Instead, he was focused on the short redhead glaring at him. There was fury and pain mingling in Margie’s green eyes, and Hunter wished Gretchen to the other side of the planet.
“Margie, I can explain,” he said, and did some mental sprints trying to figure out just what he could say. And in the next instant, he reminded himself that she hadn’t listened to him for the last few days, so why would she start now?
“Oh, there’s nothing to explain, Hunter,” she said from her position by the front door. “Really. Everything’s very clear.”
“Hunter, who is this person?” Gretchen’s voice had a spike in it as if she were less than amused.
“Don’t you worry about me,” Margie told her with a way-too-sweet smile. “I’m just his wife.”
“His wife?” she cried, with a gaping look at Margie. “Seriously?”
Hunter almost clapped one hand over Gretchen’s mouth, but it wouldn’t have helped anyway. Instead, he glared at her. “How the hell did you find me?”
“Well, you told me the name of your little town. Wasn’t hard to find the only Cabots here.”
“Right.” So this was his own damn fault. He looked past the blonde. “Margie-”
“Hunter,” Margie said as the toe of her tennis shoe tapped noisily against the floor, “don’t you want to invite your fiancée in for a drink?”
“No,” he shouted and tried to get past Gretchen, but the blonde latched onto his upper arm with strong fingers and deadly nails. “And she’s not my fiancée.”
“Yes, I am,” Gretchen argued. “That’s what I came here to tell you. And then I find you’re already married.”
“I never asked you to marry me,” Hunter countered with a triumphant look at Margie.
“You said you were thinking about getting married and asked me what I thought about the idea,” she reminded him.
“How very romantic,” Margie mused.
“It was an abstract idea,” Hunter shouted.
“Is there a problem?” the housekeeper asked as she came running down the long hallway.
“Yes, Sophie,” Margie told her, “would you bring Hunter and his fiancée some tea in the front parlor?”
“His what?” Sophie’s big eyes slitted and focused on the tall blonde.
“She’s not my fiancée,” Hunter argued.
“Yes, I am,” Gretchen said.
“Oh, how nice. Must be true love,” Margie said and clasped both hands under her chin. “Isn’t that special?”
“Damn it, Margie, you know this is all a mistake.”
“Mistake?” Gretchen echoed, giving him a glare that could have fried bacon.
“Yes, a mistake. I can’t be engaged, I’m already married,” Hunter said and felt like he was talking to an empty room. Not one of the three women glaring at him was listening to him. They were all talking to one another and around him, but it was as if he weren’t there.
“Not for long,” Margie told him flatly.
“There,” Gretchen said, looking very pleased, “problem solved.”
When he gave Gretchen an impatient look, she blinked at him and worked up a pout. He’d seen her do it before and knew she could manage to squeeze out a theatrical tear or two if she had to, just as easily. And he really didn’t have time for Gretchen’s drama.
“Hunter, make that woman go away so we can talk.”
“She’s not going anywhere, and we have nothing to talk about,” he ground out.
“But surely you want to make some wedding plans,” Margie taunted and folded her arms across her chest. “After all, the divorce will be final soon-no sense wasting time.”
“Divorce?” Gretchen smiled again.
“There’s not going to be a divorce,” Hunter said.
“Don’t count on it,” Margie muttered, then turned to Sophie. “Would you mind helping me out in the ballroom? I want to do another check on the party things.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Sophie said and gave Hunter a hard glare he hadn’t seen since he was thirteen years old.
Could this day go to hell any faster?
“Margie, wait.” Dam
n it. She’d hardly spoken to him in the last few days, and now with Gretchen showing up out of the blue things just got even more difficult. But Margie left, without so much as a glance over her shoulder, and he was faced with a tall blonde from his past giving him a cool, calculating stare.
“Just what is going on here, Hunter?” Gretchen smoothed her hair unnecessarily, then tapped the tip of her index finger against her chin. “I don’t appreciate being made to look like a fool.”
“I didn’t invite you here, Gretchen,” he reminded her, flicking a glance down the hall where Margie had gone.
She ignored that remark. “Strange that you never mentioned the fact that you were already married when we were together.”
“It’s a long story.” And he wouldn’t come out sounding too good in it, either. After all, he had been legally married while he was dating Gretchen. The fact that he hadn’t known about the marriage would really be a hard sell.
But he knew it for a fact, so why did he feel like a cheating husband caught sneaking out of a motel?
“I’m sure,” Gretchen said tightly. “Oddly enough, I’m not interested enough to hear it. I don’t date married men, Hunter.”
“Good for you,” he said, easing her down the stairs with a tight grip on her elbow. “Then you should be going, right?”
He just wanted her the hell out of the house so he could talk to Margie. Make her understand. Make her see that he didn’t want Gretchen. He wanted her.
Gretchen wouldn’t be hurried, though. She glanced around the great hall, noting the stained glass, the polished wood and the obvious signs of a great deal of money. “But if you’re in the process of a divorce, that changes things considerably. You know I’m happy to wait for you.”
“No,” he snapped, meeting her gaze with a hard look. “Don’t bother waiting, Gretchen. I told you, there’s not going to be a divorce.” At least, not if he could find a way around it.
“Well then, it seems I’ve made a mistake,” she said, her voice dropping to a low purr as she dragged the tips of her fingers down his chest. “Unless, of course, I can change your mind…”
Though Gretchen was planning a seduction, all Hunter felt was irritation. “You should go, Gretchen. Sorry you wasted the trip.”
Instantly, she straightened up, dropped the sultry, heavy-lidded gaze and snapped, “Fine. Go to your fat little redhead. May you be cursed with a dozen fat babies who look just like her.”
Babies? Instantly, an image of Margie carrying his child filled his mind, and Hunter realized he wanted that reality. He wanted Margie in his life more completely than he’d ever wanted anything. And he wanted kids. With her. Damned if he’d let her walk away from what they could have together.
Gretchen, meanwhile, huffed out a breath and swept out of the house as majestically as only a six-foot-tall, skinny model with delusions of grandeur could muster. Hunter shut the door behind her and took a long, deep breath. She never had taken rejection well.
How in the hell could he even briefly have considered a life with her? The drama. The pouting. The grasping nature. The viciousness. Margie wasn’t fat. She was curvy, deliciously curvy. And kind. And goodhearted. And she loved him.
So why the hell didn’t she want to stay married to him?
Eleven
The party was everything Margie had hoped it would be. As her big farewell to the town of Springville and Simon, it was perfect. The fact that the smile she’d plastered on her face was almost painful to maintain was no one else’s business.
Dance music soared through the air, and candles in glass bowls flickered on every table. Clusters of spring flowers made for bright splashes of color, and their scents mingled with the delicious aromas coming from the kitchen as the catering crew ran up and down the long hallway to the ballroom.
Balloons festooned every corner of the massive room, and there was a cheerful fire in the hearth at the far end of the room to combat the cool, nighttime breeze drifting in through the open French doors. The floors gleamed under the light thrown from the chandeliers, and in the backyard, fairy lights were strung in the trees ringing the garden. Everything was fabulous, and Simon’s guests were all clearly having a good time.
“Yay me,” Margie whispered as she rubbed her hands up and down her arms against the tiny chill snaking along her skin. But it didn’t help, because this cold went bonedeep. This was the cold she was far too familiar with.
The cold of alone. The cold of unwanted. Unchosen. Not really even a word, she told herself, but it was so true. No one in her whole damn life had ever chosen her. She’d never been first. She’d never been important enough to matter.
And God, she’d so wanted to matter to Hunter.
Against her will, her gaze scanned the crowd for one man in particular. He wasn’t hard to find. Wearing his dress whites uniform, Hunter Cabot looked impossibly handsome. Simply watching him made her heartbeat quicken and curls of heat spiral in the pit of her stomach. He was standing with his grandfather in a circle of friends, and Margie felt like the outsider she’d always been.
She had no place here. Not anymore. She shouldn’t have even stayed for the party, but she’d felt that she owed it to Simon. Now, she wished she were anywhere but here.
“This is great, Margie,” someone said from nearby, and she turned to foist her phony smile on Terry Gates. Terry was yet another friend she’d made here in Springville. Another person she’d miss. Another link lost in her own personal chain.
“Thanks, Terry,” she managed to say past the hard lump in her throat. “I’m so glad you could come.”
“Are you kidding? Wouldn’t have missed it.” Terry’s green eyes danced as she leaned in. “The whole town’s here.”
“Seems like,” she mused, her gaze once again going unerringly toward the man who was and wasn’t her husband.
“Hmm…” Terry gave her a little nudge. “Why are you standing here alone when you should be dancing with that gorgeous man of yours?”
Because to dance with him to this music would mean being in Hunter’s arms, and how could Margie ever force herself to leave that warm circle once she’d willingly gone into it? Better to keep her distance. Better to save whatever pride she had left and remember what Hunter had looked like with Gretchen. They’d actually made a gorgeous couple.
Blast it.
But Terry was watching her, waiting for an answer. “Oh, too busy to dance. Have to keep track of the caterers and-”
“Not a chance,” Terry said with a laugh and grabbed hold of Margie’s elbow. “You arranged it all, did all the work, and now you’re going to take a minute to dance with your husband.”
“No, really, I um-” Margie tried to pull away, but she couldn’t get any traction out of the needle-thin high heels she was wearing with the strapless black dress Hunter had picked out for her what seemed like a lifetime ago. “I really need to-”
“Dance,” Terry told her firmly and kept walking, threading their way through the crowd.
“Oh, for-” Margie stopped trying to argue, stopped trying to fight her way free of her friend’s good intentions. The more she struggled, the more attention she garnered from the watching crowd, and she was determined that no one here would know that her heart was breaking-or that her marriage was over as of tonight.
“Atta girl,” Terry said, sensing the difference in her friend’s attitude. Then she smiled and shrugged. “Look, I shouldn’t say anything, but I know.”
“Know?” Margie asked as they slowed down to get through a knot of people.
“About your argument with Hunter,” Terry said with a shrug.
Oh, God. How could she know? Who would have said anything? Not Simon or Sophie. Surely not Hunter.
“He told me,” Terry was saying. “Hunter said you were mad at him because he was going back to base before he was completely healed.”
“Oh.” Confused, Margie shifted her gaze from Terry to Hunter, who was watching their approach with a half smile on his face. �
�He told you that, did he?”
“Yeah, and between us, I so agree. But I feel bad for him that you’re not speaking to him, so that’s why I agreed to go and get you to dance with him.”
“Hunter put you up to this?”
“Who else, silly?”
Who else indeed, Margie thought as she came to a stop right in front of the very man she’d been ignoring for days. The very man who held every corner of her heart. The man she’d never forget and would miss every day of her life.
His blue eyes locked with her green ones and he gave her a small, intimate smile that just barely nudged his dimple into existence. Without looking at the other woman, he said quietly, “Thanks, Terry.”
“No problem,” the brunette said, then turned her head to look out over the crowd. “Now, think I’ll go find my own husband and force him to dance with me.”
Hunter stepped up close to Margie and her heart did a quick, hard thump. His eyes were so deep, so clear and so intent on her that she couldn’t have looked away if her life had depended on it.
“Dance with me, Margie,” he said and held out one hand to her.
The people around them were watching-she could feel it. To one side of Hunter, Simon stood looking like a benevolent elf with his flyaway white hair and smiling blue eyes. Could she really turn away? Did she want to make everyone talk about them, wonder what was wrong between them? Wouldn’t it be easier if no one knew a thing until she’d gone?
Besides all that, could she really pass up the chance to be held by him one last time?
Finally nodding, Margie slipped her hand into Hunter’s, and instant warmth slid through her bloodstream, temporarily easing the cold inside her. He led her onto the dance floor just as the band ended one song and started another.
Margie recognized the tune, since Simon was a huge Frank Sinatra fan. And though the band’s singer was no Ol’ Blue Eyes, the melody and words of the song about a summer wind wrapped themselves around her and Hunter and drew them into the magic of the moment.
“You look beautiful tonight,” he said, his voice a low rush of sensuality that seemed to slide right inside Margie.
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