Four-Karat Fiancee

by Sharon Swan

For once, Amanda was also grateful for Dev’s potent brand of coffee. Her first sip had her system zinging toward full alertness. Now, she thought, if she could just ignore the man seated beside her—too close beside her—maybe she could get through breakfast with her composure intact.

  “The children seem to have as good an appetite this morning as they did at dinner,” Louise remarked with an assessing look around the table.

  “Yes,” Amanda was delighted to reply. She hadn’t had to worry about any of them in that respect.

  “They take after their big sister,” Dev said. “Of course, Amanda’s appetite’s not as big as mine, but it’s getting there.” He turned his head toward his wife. “Isn’t it, sweetheart?”

  His last remarks had nothing to do with food, and it was plain to her that he recognized she recognized it. Now she knew without a doubt why the man she’d married had once been called “Devil Devlin.”

  “That’s right, dear,” she told him calmly. She waited a deliberate beat. “But who knows, I may decide to go on a diet.” She was pleased to see a fleeting frown replace his far-too-satisfied expression. It was clear he knew she wasn’t talking about food, either.

  Louise spoke up with typically frank directness. “Exercise is always good, but you don’t need to diet.”

  “You can say that again,” Dev agreed in no uncertain terms.

  Amanda carefully lifted one shoulder in an offhand gesture and raised her coffee cup for another sip. “We’ll see.”

  “Yeah, we certainly will,” Dev muttered, and then said little else for the rest of the meal.

  Louise stood up to leave shortly after they’d finished. The Devlins saw her off at the front door. “I’m sure you’ll be glad to know that my report will be favorable,” she told them. “And thank you again for your hospitality.” With that, she left them to beat a brisk path toward her car.

  “Thank goodness,” Amanda said in pure relief when the door was safely closed.

  “Uh-huh.” Dev braced a hand on the doorjamb. His frown was back. “What did you mean by we’ll see?”

  One corner of her mouth quirked up. “Nothing much.”

  That’s all it took for him to look every bit as relieved as she felt—for an entirely different reason, of course. “I’m guessing you’ve decided that you’re not going to be able to keep your hands off me.” He reached out and tugged her close, fitting her firmly to him. “Am I on target here?”

  “Yes,” she replied softly. She set aside her usual independence and laid her head on his shoulder, knowing how true it was. She wouldn’t be able to deny him what he so obviously wanted. She wanted it too much herself.

  No physical or emotional commitment. That had been foremost in her mind when she’d first considered a marriage in name only. And now, during the course of one night, a physical bond had been formed. Things had changed, as she’d more than suspected when she’d agreed just hours ago to make love with her husband. Her only question then had been how much.

  A lot, she’d since come to believe. And now other questions were rising to take its place.

  With a physical bond formed, would emotional ties follow? And what if she let that happen and found herself caring too much for a man who’d once chosen to walk on the wild side and might never truly be ready to settle down—not for a lifetime?

  Logic said it could only be wise to guard against that happening. Which meant guarding her emotions…if she could.

  SHE WAS HOLDING something back. Dev came to that conclusion several days after he and his wife had spent their first night together. It wasn’t that Amanda denied either of them the pleasure of sharing the master bedroom—and its sprawling bed—on a regular basis. In fact, his suitcases had never made it back down the hall to what had now become a real guest room. And it wasn’t that she didn’t welcome him home every evening with a smile as wide as the Western sky and a kiss that could triple his pulse in a heartbeat. She did.

  It was just that something seemed to be missing.

  Not that he had a clue as to what it might be, he had to admit as he walked out through the Heartbreaker’s swinging doors on a stormy late afternoon. It could be anything.

  Or maybe it’s nothing and you’re all wet, Devlin.

  Well, that could be true, too, he allowed. And in more ways than one.

  Everything in Jester and who knew how many miles surrounding it was wet. It had been raining for forty-eight hours straight—not a drizzle, but a real downpour. Main Street, all two blocks of it, was downright waterlogged. A few customers at the saloon had joked about building an ark. Others had taken to playing mournful tunes on the jukebox. The dips and turns in the weather just had that effect on some people—maybe the majority of people when dark clouds hid even a glimmer of the sun for days on end.

  But not him, Dev reflected, jamming his hands into the pockets of his long rain slicker as he started to slosh his way home. With a good dinner waiting for him and the prospect of spending another night enjoying the comforts of Amanda’s silky-skinned, sweet-scented, all-female body wrapped around his, he was feeling too damn good.

  It wasn’t long before he found, much to his satisfaction, that his wife seemed to feel the same way. As usual these days, a generous smile curved her mouth when she caught sight of him closing the door to the entryway closet as she came down the center staircase. He crossed the living room in his stocking feet, having just dealt with his soaked boots, and met her at the bottom of the steps. There, he kissed her—and did a damn good job of it, if he did say so himself.

  “I see the weather hasn’t dampened any of your enthusiasm,” she told him.

  “Not hardly.” He slid a hand down her spine and gave her soft behind a brief pat, something he’d grown fond of doing. He’d often spied other men patting their wives’ backsides, but had never realized how enjoyable that simple touch could be. Until now.

  Dev gave his wife another once-over, noting that she’d already changed out of what he’d come to think of as her “business clothes.” Someday, he promised himself, he was going to stop in at the Ex-Libris and rumple her up good and proper when she was dressed for success. If he managed to catch her alone, he might even lock the door, herd her into the back of the store and use one of those fancy leather love seats to maximum advantage. Afterward, he could let her serve him tea in a little cup while she wore nothing but the rings he’d given her.

  Oh, yeah.

  Amanda studied him with an arched brow as they walked arm-in-arm down the hall toward the rear of the house. “Something tells me you’re getting hungry.”

  He swallowed a chuckle. “I am.” In more ways than one. “What’s for dinner?”

  “Beef stew. I thought something hearty was in order with all the gloom and doom outside. I have to admit that I hope the sun puts in an appearance soon. This constant rain seems to be getting the children down.”

  Dev discovered how true that was after Amanda headed off to the kitchen and he stepped into the family room. As usual for this time of day, the kids were stretched out on the rug, watching TV before dinner. The laugh track of an old sitcom provided a cheery background to what was happening on the screen, but none of its viewers looked all that happy.

  “Hi, guys,” he said in a deliberately upbeat voice.

  He got three quiet greetings in return as he settled himself on the sofa. Betsy merely stood and teetered over to him. He waited for a familiar demand to pick her up, but she just laid her curly blond head on his denim-clad knees. Reaching down, he gently placed her in his lap. He was so used to seeing a sunny grin that he immediately noticed its lack as she sighed and settled back against his chest. For a second he wondered if she might be sick and felt helpless at the thought. He had zip experience in dealing with a sick child.

  But Amanda was a lot more likely to know if anything was seriously wrong, he assured himself in the next breath. If she wasn’t worried, he shouldn’t be, either.

  Right from the first, she’d taken to the role of mother
to her sisters and brothers, and she was still doing a bang-up job. He, on the other hand, was still mostly a bystander when it came to taking care of the kids on a day-to-day basis. Which, of course, was the way she’d planned it. She didn’t expect him to take care of the kids. She didn’t expect him to be involved much at all with them beyond the fact that he was their big sister’s husband. She probably didn’t even expect him to try to cheer them up.

  Trouble was, he flat-out hated to see them so glum.

  “I know you probably all miss going out in the backyard and running around,” he told them, “but it can’t rain forever.”

  Caleb turned away from the television. “I think it’s been forever already.”

  “Hmm.” Deciding to take another tack, Dev asked, “How was kindergarten today?”

  Caleb gave his head a disgusted shake. “One girl kept hangin’ on to me every time it thundered—” he made a face “—and we all had to stay inside at recess.”

  “That’s too bad,” Dev agreed. He didn’t think it was the time to tell Caleb that someday girls hanging on to him would be good.

  “Me and Betsy hadda stay inside all day,” Patrick muttered, deserting the sitcom to air his own grievances. “We can’t even go to school.”

  “But I’ll bet Mabel baked something,” Dev countered.

  “Yeah. She called it a pound cake. It was pretty good.”

  Obviously not good enough, though, Dev thought, to make up for another round of dark skies. “How about you, Liza? How was your day?”

  The oldest Bradley child picked up the remote and flicked off the television. “It was all right,” she said in her typically quiet fashion.

  Dev ran his tongue over his teeth. “Just all right, huh?” At Liza’s small shrug, he added, “Well, I’m beginning to suspect that Betsy’s not her usual happy self because the rest of you are on the glum side. Maybe it’s time to start feeling better.”

  “I guess so,” Liza allowed after a second. She gave her brothers a sober look. “We don’t want to make Betsy sad.”

  Caleb offered a solemn nod. “Okay.”

  Patrick ducked his head. “Yeah.”

  “So smile,” Dev told them in a hearty tone.

  They did. And none of the three looked all that much cheerier. Betsy merely issued another sigh, evidently agreeing.

  By the time everyone sat down to dinner, Dev had almost given up on changing the situation. Maybe he should just join Amanda in hoping that the skies would clear soon, he told himself. After all, he’d had his glum moments as a kid and he’d gotten over them.

  For a while, as he recalled, his big grievance had been rules. There’d always seemed to be so many rules made up by people a lot bigger than you were. Once upon a time, his dream had been a world with no rul—

  Dev stopped with his fork poised halfway to his mouth as an idea hit. After a second’s consideration, he decided it was worth a shot. With any luck at all, it just might produce some badly lacking cheer.

  He looked across the table at Amanda. “I’ve got a notion on how to perk the kids up.” Just go along with me, he did his best to convey with a meaningful lift of a brow.

  Amanda pursed her lips. She’d gotten the gist of his silent message. He was seeking her cooperation in whatever notion he’d come up with.

  “What I’m suggesting,” he added, aiming a glance around the table, “is a no-rules evening.”

  Everyone except the littlest Bradley, who was busy making mincemeat out of her dinner roll, stared back at him. Finally, Amanda spoke. “A no-rules evening?” she repeated carefully.

  “Uh-huh.” Dev set his fork down. “For one evening, everybody’s allowed to break some rules.” He switched his gaze to Caleb. “For instance, if Caleb wants to push all the carrots aside before he eats the rest of his stew, he can—just for tonight.”

  “I can?” The boy’s brown eyes went as round as one of Mabel’s chocolate cookies.

  “If your big sister agrees with the plan,” Dev told him.

  Caleb looked at Amanda. “Do you, Mandy?”

  His young face held so much hope. Amanda didn’t even ask herself if she could turn him down and watch it fade. She knew she couldn’t. Not this time.

  “Just for tonight,” she said, “I suppose we can all break a few rules.” Seeing the blinding smile her agreement produced, she simply couldn’t regret it.

  “Holy cow!” Still smiling to beat the band, Caleb wasted no time in starting to shove his carrots to the far side of his plate.

  After that, things moved along quickly. Liza, with only a little coaxing, asked to be allowed to give Rufus his own plate of stew, and the cat, who seemed to have a sixth sense for timing his appearances to coincide with food on the table, relished every bite. Dev, with a devilish look his wife’s way, chose not to deal with the dirty dishes once dinner was over, and Amanda, getting into the spirit of the thing, absolved herself of any responsibility for serving dessert, leaving that task to her husband. Then Patrick elected not to take a bath—or wash behind his ears—and both boys had forbidden slides down the banister supervised by Amanda at the top of the long pine staircase and Dev at the bottom.

  At last it was Betsy’s turn, but no one could come up with anything against the rules that she’d been pining to do. “Well, she likes to go up,” Dev said at length. “Let’s put her way up.” And with that, he settled the little girl on his shoulders, which turned out to be much to her delight. Now she wasn’t only cheerfully babbling, her good humor long since restored, but giggling nonstop as he made a tour of the home’s lower level with the rest of the group following behind.

  “It’s getting late,” Amanda said when they finally climbed the steps to the second floor. “I think this concludes our no-rules evening.”

  Dev halted at the top of the stairs with Betsy still perched high. “Maybe not quite.” His gaze settled on Liza. “When you made your choice earlier, you did it for Rufus, and I hope that cat knows how lucky he is to get a whole plate of stew for himself. But don’t you have something you’d like to do for you?”

  Amanda laid a gentle hand on the girl’s narrow shoulder and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “That’s right. You still get to choose, if you want to.”

  Liza peeked up at her. A few quiet seconds passed before she spoke. “Could I…jump on the bed—just once?”

  “That’s a super idea,” Caleb said. “Can we all jump on the bed?”

  Amanda released a soft sigh. “I suppose you can.”

  “Whoopee!” Patrick cried.

  “I guess,” Dev slid in, his tone wry, “we’ll have to find a big bed.”

  “Mmm-hmm.” Amanda turned and started for the master bedroom. “I’ll lead the way this time.”

  Before long all four children were jumping up and down on the large bed in their stocking-clad feet. The boys hooted and hollered. Betsy giggled up a storm.

  And Liza, bouncing even higher than the rest of her siblings, gradually smiled, then eventually grinned, and then finally laughed out loud.

  It was music to Amanda’s ears. Thank goodness, she thought as the last of her lingering worries about the eldest of the Bradley bunch faded. Liza might always be on the serious side, but she could let herself go and laugh, too. She hadn’t lost the ability to enjoy just being a child.

  Things were going to be all right. Thank goodness.

  Amanda turned toward the man who stood beside her, prepared to share her conclusions, but the expression on his face had her voice dying in her throat. Although she couldn’t make out what he might be thinking, he looked so caught up in watching the children. It wasn’t long before she found herself caught up in watching him.

  He was the one who’d worked wonders tonight, she thought. Leave it to a former bad boy to come up with an evening dedicated to breaking rules. Not that he bore much resemblance to a bad boy at the moment, she had to concede. Instead, he looked like a full-grown male who was…Captivated might be the word. Not by the action in progress,
surely. She more than suspected that the young Dev Devlin had been no stranger to the forbidden joys of bed-jumping.

  But if it wasn’t what the children were doing that had such a lock on his attention, the only alternative seemed to be the children themselves. One thing for certain, she had never seen that look on his face before. She’d seen him angry at times, amused at others and, just lately, thoroughly aroused in a way that could steal her breath. But the expression he wore now was brand-new.

  Amanda couldn’t help but wonder what it meant.

  Chapter Ten

  He’d tumbled for them like a ton of stacked hay bowled over by a strong wind. One minute he’d simply been enjoying the sight of the kids having a rip-roaring good time bouncing on that bed, and the next something gut deep in him had seemed to shift gears. The upshot was that he’d found himself no longer only determined to keep those four towheads safe. Sure, he’d still do his best to protect them, no matter what. But by the end of their no-rules evening more than protective instincts had kicked in.

  Unless he missed his guess, the Bradley kids had got through what he’d always figured was some pretty thick skin and burrowed straight inside him. Maybe, something told him, they made it far enough to wiggle their way into your heart.

  Whatever the case, for the first time he’d begun to think that stepping into a parent’s shoes might not be beyond him, despite the fact that his own parents had never provided even a passable example of how to go about it. Maybe he could get a handle on it. The kids seemed to like him well enough, so they just might give him the chance.

  But would Amanda?

  That question rumbled through Dev’s mind as he lounged back on an old wooden bench in Jester Community Park on a Saturday morning that had thankfully dawned at least clear enough to hold little threat of more rain. It had occurred to him more and more over the course of the past few days that he was far from sure how Amanda felt about him, even though they’d become as physically close as two people could probably get. She still wanted him, that was plain enough, but anything beyond that was by and large a mystery.