“Thanks.” She looked up into his eyes, felt her heart break a little and then shifted her gaze to one side. She couldn’t look into his blue eyes. Couldn’t read the regrets and goodbyes written there.
“You’ve been avoiding me,” he said and moved her into a slow turn that made the lights at the edges of her vision swim.
“Yes.” God, would this dance never end? Margie tried to pull back from Hunter’s embrace, to put a little space between them, but he wouldn’t allow that. Instead, he pulled her closer, held her more tightly, pressed her body into the length of his until she felt his heartbeat pounding in tandem with her own.
“I don’t want you to go, Margie. Don’t leave.”
“Don’t do this,” she whispered brokenly. “Don’t make it harder.”
“It should be hard. You said you loved me.”
She looked up at him, and it seemed as though every light in the room was reflected in his gaze. Those blue depths sparkled and shone down at her, and it took all of her courage to not look away. “I do,” she said, forcing the words out. “I do love you, and that’s why I won’t stay.”
His arm tightened around her even further until it felt as though she could hardly draw a breath. “I wasn’t engaged to Gretchen.”
Margie closed her eyes briefly, gathered up her strength and made herself ask, “Did you propose to her?”
The music pumped around them, other dancers drifted past and Hunter looked only at her. “In a way I guess I did,” he said. “But-”
“No. You wanted Gretchen,” she said as the song slowly wound its way to the end. “You never wanted me. I wasn’t your choice for a wife. She was.”
“But she’s not my wife. You are.”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter, Hunter. Don’t you get it? It just doesn’t matter.”
The music ended, but Hunter wouldn’t let her go. He stood there, on the dance floor, his arms still holding her tight, his gaze locked with hers, refusing to say goodbye. To let her walk away. From him.
“Of course it matters,” he said, his voice low and dark, filled with a banked anger that nibbled at the edges of his self-control. Hell, he’d given her days to get past this hang-up of hers. Days to think about his offer. To reconsider. To stay the hell married to him. And this is what it was going to come down to? A quick goodbye on a dance floor, surrounded by too many damn people?
He didn’t think so.
As if she could read his mind, she whispered, “Please don’t do this, Hunter. Don’t make it harder.”
“It damn well should be hard,” he told her, his voice low and hot with a temper crouched inside him.
She was bound and determined to walk away from him, and Hunter simply wasn’t going to let that happen. Never once in his SEAL career had he given up on reaching his objective. He’d had guns misfire, plans go askew, ambushes fail, but he’d always won the day. Damned if he was going to ruin his record now.
His chest felt tight and his insides snapped to attention. Releasing her briefly, he then took her upper arm in a firm grip and turned her toward the French doors and the gardens beyond.
“Okay, that’s it. You’re coming with me.”
“Oh no, I’m not,” Margie countered and pulled free of his hold. Then she took two long steps in the opposite direction, obviously headed for the foyer.
“Like hell,” Hunter muttered and caught up to her in a flat second. Spinning her around to face him, he held on to her shoulders, met her now furious, embarrassed gaze and said, “You’re going to listen to me, Margie, even if I have to tie you to a chair.”
From somewhere to his right, he absentmindedly heard his grandfather’s chuckle. Well, Hunter was glad somebody was enjoying this.
“Hunter…” Her gaze shot from side to side, then up to him, as if to point out to him that they weren’t exactly alone.
Hunter couldn’t have cared less. Glaring at her, he said, “You think I give a good damn who’s watching?”
“Well, I do.”
“I don’t. I’ve got some things to say to you, and I’m going to say ’em. Here or somewhere else. Your choice.”
Margie glanced around again and apparently noticed the eager attention on the faces surrounding them. She finally looked up at him and said, “Fine. We can talk in the study.”
“Nope, too far away,” he told her and bent down. Tucking his shoulder into her abdomen, he straightened up with her head and shoulders now hanging down over his back.
“What are you doing?” she shrieked it, pushing herself up from his back and trying to shove herself free.
“What I should have done three days ago,” Hunter told her and threw one arm across her legs, pinning her to him.
“Simon!” Margie yelled as Hunter headed for the French doors, “help me!”
“Not a chance, honey,” the old man shouted on a laugh.
The whole room was laughing, Hunter realized as the crowd parted before him and let him pass through the ballroom and into the gardens. And he didn’t care. Didn’t care what they thought, what they had to say or the fact that they’d be talking about this night for the next twenty years.
Nothing mattered but the stubborn redhead in his arms. And no way was he going to lose her.
Jaw tight, body rigid, he marched across the patio, muttering, “Excuse me,” to those he passed.
“Let me down!” Margie shouted, then in a much lower voice adding, “You’re showing the whole world my behind, you know!”
Hunter grinned, gave that sweet rear end of hers a friendly smack and told her, “It’s a great behind. You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of.”
“For heaven’s sake, Hunter, put me down!”
“Soon.” He kept walking. Hell, he knew these paths better than Calvin. This was home, and he felt as though the fairy lights in the trees and the garden itself were welcoming him back.
“Where are we going?” she demanded.
“To the fountain.” It was the most secluded spot on the grounds. Surrounded by trees and flowering bushes, the old fountain was so far back, so near the edge of the cliff overlooking the ocean that almost no one went out there anymore. Much of the cliff’s edge had been eroded over the years, so it wasn’t the safest place on the estate. Therefore, Hunter told himself, none of the guests would be wandering out there.
He and Margie could be alone, and for what he wanted to say, he needed them to be alone.
When he set her onto her feet, she staggered a little, tossed her hair back out of her face and took a wild swing at him. He caught her fist in one hand, then bent and kissed her knuckles.
“Don’t do that.” She pulled her hand free and looked around wildly.
Hunter did too, just to check the area. There was no one there, and the only sound besides the wind in the trees was the soft hush of the ocean below and the cheerful splash of the fountain.
“Margie, Gretchen doesn’t mean a thing to me,” he started.
She blew out a breath, shook her head and said, “If you think that makes me feel better, you’re wrong.”
“I’m not finished,” he snapped, watching as moonlight shimmered in her eyes. “There’s something I need to say to you, and you’re going to listen.”
“There’s nothing you can say, Hunter.” Her voice broke, and something inside him twisted in response. She looked so lost, so lovely there in the moonlight. The ocean breeze twisted itself in her curls, and her eyes were wide, glimmering with the reflection of the moonlight. “Nothing’s going to change my mind. I’m leaving.”
He looked at her fiercely brave expression and felt an explosion of knowledge open up inside him. Couldn’t figure out why he hadn’t seen it before, because right now the truth was so crystal clear it was as if he’d been born knowing it. He didn’t just want her. Didn’t just need her. It was so much more than that.
“I love you,” he said and smiled at the wonder of saying those words and meaning them with everything he had.
She gaspe
d and looked up at him. Then she shook her head. “No, no, you don’t. You only want me to stay because I’m already your wife. I’m easy.”
Hunter laughed shortly, loudly. “Margie, you are many things, but you haven’t been easy since the day we met.”
She frowned at him.
“And I love you.”
“Stop saying that.”
“No,” he told her, coming closer. “I like saying it. I like feeling it.”
“No,” she argued, her voice hardly more than a murmur, “you don’t.”
“Yeah, I do. And I’m going to say it until you believe me. I’ll say it every damn day for the rest of our lives and find a way to say it after I’m dead, if that’s what it takes to convince you.”
“Hunter…” She bit down on her bottom lip, brushed a single tear from her cheek and turned away from him to stare out at the ocean and the moonlight striping its surface like a pathway to heaven.
“Why is that so hard to believe?”
She huffed out a breath, wrapped her arms around herself and whispered, “Because no one’s ever loved me.”
Her pain whipped through him with a hell of a lot more force than that bullet had. He felt her broken heart and wanted to kick his own ass for ever bringing her to tears. “What do you mean?”
She shook her head, and her hair moved with the wind sighing past them. “I didn’t grow up like you did, Hunter. I grew up in a series of foster homes that were never really mine.”
Moving softly, quietly, Hunter laid his hands on her shoulders and stroked his palms down her arms. “I’m sorry for that, Margie. I am. But you have to believe, I do love you.”
She sniffed, breathed fast and shook her head. “You have to stop saying it, Hunter. Please. Stop.”
He turned her in his arms, never taking his hands from her, needing to feel her, needing her to feel his touch. To somehow understand just what she was to him.
“Margie, why can’t you believe me? Why can’t you see that I want you to be with me? Forever.”
Crying now, in big gulping sobs, she turned her gaze up to his and said, “Because no one ever has. Never once, Hunter. In my whole life I’ve never been chosen. I’ve never been important to somebody. Until I came here. And Simon loved me. And I loved this place and convinced myself that I loved you.”
He took a harsh breath and held it, wanting to hear her out, wanting her to get it all said so they could start again. Start fresh.
“But Hunter, you didn’t choose me to be your wife.” She sniffed again and waved one hand at the mansion behind them. “You picked a Swedish goddess. You didn’t want me. You just got stuck with me. And now you’re trying to do the right thing. But you’re only making it harder-can’t you see that?”
Shaken to his soul, Hunter wondered how he’d ever gotten lucky enough to have this woman tossed into his life. What had he done that had merited this warm, loving, gentle heart? And how could he keep her?
“You’re wrong,” he said and smiled in spite of the fresh bout of tears his words started. “I’m choosing you now, Margie. I know you. I love you. And I’m choosing you.”
She still didn’t believe him, and her tears were falling fast and furiously. Cupping her face in his palms, Hunter tipped her face up to his. Then he bent, kissed her cheeks and tasted the salt of her tears.
“Listen to me, babe,” he said, using that word deliberately to make her roll her eyes and smile.
It worked, though that fragile curve of her lips was tremulous.
“You said no one ever wanted you to stay, Margie. Well, I do. I need you to stay here with me.”
“Oh, God…” She shook her head as if she were tempted to believe but still too afraid of losing everything to take the chance.
Hunter looked deeply into her eyes, willing her to see all that he was feeling. “Margie, I’ve been in combat. I’ve been in situations so dark and terrifying I never thought I’d survive. I’ve faced gunfire, bombs and explosions with more ease than I can face the thought of living a life without you.”
She blew out a breath that ruffled the curls on her forehead. Then her mouth worked as she tried to stem the tears that continued to rain down her face. “Hunter…”
“I’ve got seven more months in the Navy, Margie. Then I’m coming home. To a place that you made me see I belonged. I’m coming home to you, Margie. And if you’re not here, it won’t be home.”
“Hunter, you’re not being fair,” she murmured, shaking her head again and taking a shuddering breath. “I was going to leave and let you have your life back.”
He laughed because he finally sensed that he was convincing her, and, God, he felt better than he had in years.
“My life? What kind of life would it be without you ordering me around? Without you organizing everything? Without you to hold in the night? Without you to wake up to? If you leave me, Margie,” he added, and waited until she was looking into his eyes, so she could read just how serious he really was. “If you leave me, I’ll follow you. I’ll turn into some weirdo stalker, and then Simon’ll be alone and the town will fall apart because you’re not here to be the heart of it…” He paused and smiled gently. “Do you really want to be responsible for all of that?”
She sniffed again and smiled a little. “Well, if you put it like that…”
He gathered her in close, folding his arms around her, resting his chin on top of her head, and when she wrapped her arms around his middle, Hunter took his first easy breath in days. “You’re right where you belong, Margie. With me.”
“Oh, God,” she said, leaning back and brushing at the front of his uniform, “I’m getting mascara all over your whites!”
Hunter laughed, delighted. “You can cry on me anytime you want to,” he said, “but I swear, I’ll try to make sure none of your tears are because of me.”
“I do love you,” she said.
“I love you, Margie.” Then to make sure she heard his next words, he held her face in his hands again and looked directly into her eyes. “You are the most important thing in my life. I choose you to love forever. I choose you to make me complete and to make a family with. Please choose me back.”
“Oh God, I’m gonna cry again,” she said with a half laugh.
“Well, then, let’s make sure it’s worth it,” he said, giving her a fast, hard kiss. “Here’s something else for you to organize.”
“What?”
“When I come home, you and I are going to have a real wedding. Right here in town,” he told her, bending down to lift her into the curve of his arms.
“We are?” Margie grinned up at him and wrapped her arms around his neck.
“We damn sure are,” he told her with a wink. “And then, we’re going to Bali. I think we can improve on that ‘honeymoon’ we already had, don’t you?”
“I don’t know,” Margie teased, “in my fantasies, you were pretty good…”
“Babe,” he said, grinning down at her with a wink, “I’m a SEAL. I love a challenge.”
Laughing, her heart lighter than it had ever been, Margie laid her cheek against her own personal hero’s shoulder and let him carry her back into the light.
Back to the house where love waited.
MAUREEN CHILD
is a California native who loves to travel. Every chance they get, she and her husband are taking off on another research trip. An author of more than sixty books, Maureen loves a happy ending and still swears that she has the best job in the world. She lives in Southern California with her husband, two children and a golden retriever with delusions of grandeur.
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An Officer And A Millionaire Page 14