It didn’t matter, for the moment, that she’d deceived him and used him for her own ends. All that mattered was that she was excellent mother material. And therefore excellent wife material.
He felt as though he’d been given a noogie by the hand of providence. Marriage could be the answer. Marriage to Libby.
“Can you stay for dinner, John?” Jared asked, reaching to the table for his coffee. “I think I have a plan if you have the time to help us work it out.”
Miller looked first surprised, then pleased. “Of course. Just let me call my wife and tell her not to expect me.”
“MARRIED TO YOU?” Libby glanced up at Jared in haughty disbelief as she sprinkled uncooked rice over chicken breasts in an oblong pan. “No.”
Jared leaned against the counter and folded his arms, refusing to be rattled by what he was sure was a calculated attempt to make him sweat.
“I’ll make it worth your while,” he bargained, watching her walk to the microwave. She reached into it with hotpads to extricate a plastic container filled with a fragrant murky brown substance.
She gave him a bland smile as she passed him on her way back to the pan. “Bill Gates doesn’t have enough money to make marrying you worth my while.”
He nodded with grim acceptance. “Go ahead. Take your shots. I can stand up to it.”
She poured the brown stuff over the chicken and the rice. “That’s it. Would you either move or hand me the foil, please?”
He studied the concoction in the pan with concern. “What are you making?”
“Chicken mushroom rice bake, okay?” she said with impatience, physically pushing him aside and reaching into a drawer for the roll of foil. “I’m the cooking-withsoups queen at home because I’m just not brilliant in the kitchen, but fortunately we’re dealing with Darren’s gourmet soup here and not the contents of a can, so it should be palatable. If you’re going to spring guests on me at the last minute, that’s what you have to expect.”
He grinned. “That sounded very wifely.”
She ripped off a piece of foil with a fervent yank that made him suspect she wasn’t as disassociated from his dilemma as she would have him believe. She covered the pan with it, pressed down the corners.
He opened the oven door for her and she placed the pan inside, ignoring his remark. “You’re sure Mr. Miller is all right out there with the children?”
“I’m sure.” He moved to place himself directly in her path. “Zachary fell asleep, and John’s a lawyer. He ought to be able to handle a discussion with Savannah.”
She set the oven timer and turned away from the stove, to find herself hemmed into a corner by the oven, the counter and Jared’s formidable body. Her nerve endings jangled, heat filled her cheeks and energy churned inside her like heated molecules. She didn’t know how long she could keep up this pretended resistance. Her intention had been to make him suffer, but the reverse seemed to be happening.
It would have been such a relief to throw herself at him, tell him she’d do whatever was necessary to help him keep the children. But this was a golden opportunity. It was probably even the very fate that had flung her back in time stepping in to see that she accomplished what she’d been sent back to do. She didn’t want to blow it by giving Jared all the advantages.
He was so close that she felt heat emanating from his body; that she could see shards of gold in the depths of his brown eyes; that her fingers itched to touch the subtle shadow of beard along his jaw, to trace the line of his lip with a fingertip.
To hold herself together, she baited him. “Jared, why would noble you want to marry tricky me?”
He knew precisely what she was doing; she could see that in his eyes. But he rested his hands on his hips and replied patiently, “I explained all that. It’ll give me an edge against Mandy’s sister in court. She’s a blood relative and I’m just a friend of the family. And even though it was Frank and Mandy’s wish that I take the children, their instructions were never made legal. They’re going to court a week from Friday.”
“And you’d get more points for having a wife.”
“Yes. Particularly one with a degree in education.”
So. He wasn’t even going to pretend that she held any personal appeal apart from the child-rearing nature of her sex and the status-raising nature of her degree. All right. It was time to move in.
“You’re telling me you’re willing to use me to get the children?” she asked quite civilly.
He saw that he was giving her a weapon. He had no other choice. “Yes. That’s what I’m telling you.”
“I see. Yet when I used you to stay near the children, you found that reprehensible.”
He stayed with it. “Yes.”
She folded her arms. Her elbow grazed his chest through his flannel shirt. Sensation shot around inside him like a ricochet.
“Is there a double standard at work here?” she asked.
“What’s at work here,” he replied evenly, “is a determination to keep the children. Without you on my side, I’m not sure I have a prayer. And if I lose them, so do you.”
He saw that truth register in her eyes. She turned to look at the window, a pleat between her eyebrows. Then she turned back to him. “What kind of a marriage are you talking about?”
He knew that was a loaded question. He put it back on her. “What kind of a marriage do you want?”
She looked up into his eyes. He squared his stance, ready to take a hit.
“I want a real one,” she said, “and if you’re keeping John Miller around to have him draw up a contract, I want that spelled out in it.”
This was both as bad as things could get and better than he’d hoped. He lifted her onto the counter so that they could face each other evenly. “Define ‘real.’”
Her hands lingered on his forearms where she’d taken hold for balance. Then she pulled them away and joined them in her lap. She put on a firm expression. “For me, it means that I want to be treated by you like the children’s mother rather than the nanny, and if custody is decided in your favor, I want to remain your wife until both children are grown and on their own.”
He couldn’t even crystallize a thought that expressed what he felt when he heard that. He couldn’t even decide if what he felt was happiness or pain. Or if a state of painful happiness could exist.
“And if I lose?”
“We won’t need each other any more,” she said gravely. “I’ll give you a divorce.”
Talk about a win-lose situation. If he got the children, he kept them and her. If he lost them, he lost everything. Well. He’d already been through that once. He supposed he could survive it again.
“All right,” he said. He planted his hands on the countertop on either side of her. He needed a little leverage here, something to make her feel as vulnerable as he’d made himself. “But before we sign on the dotted line, I have a point I’d like included.”
Her eyes went over his face a little warily, but she nodded. “That seems fair.”
“I want us to share my bed,” he said directly, “and I don’t want to have to wait until we know the judge’s decision. There’ll be a caseworker coming Tuesday, and her recommendations will count. I want you to look like a loved woman.”
Libby lost all wariness in the face of such audacity. She stared at him for a moment. He stared back. “You really think you’re capable,” she asked in astonishment, “of making such expert love to me that it’ll show in my eyes?”
He ran both hands gently up her thighs and grinned. “Absolutely.”
She felt the feminine heart of her grow warm and liquid. Unconsciously she tightened one ankle around the other. But this was a war of wills and hers was as strong as his.
“You have my word,” she promised, putting her hands to his face, delighting in the flash of surprise she saw in his eyes when she combed her fingertips into his hair and leaned closer. “Just please don’t do anything tacky like be specific about frequency.” She nipped at his
bottom lip. “If you’re that good, we don’t need it spelled out in the contract.”
Then she kissed him mercilessly, her upper body stretched against him, her tongue dipping into his mouth. She put into it all the hopes and dreams she’d entertained for the four of them before he’d found her out. This was her second chance, and it wasn’t going to fail through any fault of hers.
She felt herself lifted against him and off the counter and wrapped her legs around his hips instinctively. His hands supported her bottom and she felt their strength and warmth through the soft wool of her pants. The erotic thrill was instant and shockingly total.
She’d thought she had him, that she’d managed to wrest control with this kiss, but he’d taken it back. She was dependent upon his body for support now that he’d stepped back from the counter.
She couldn’t quite draw out of the cocoon in which his kiss enveloped her to censure him for it. It occurred to her that—for however long it lasted—this was going to be some marriage.
“Don’t you dare drop me,” she whispered against his mouth, tightening her arms and her legs around him.
He firmed his grip on her backside, a movement that raised a conflagration in her.
“Not a chance,” he said, and opened his mouth over hers.
Chapter Ten
“I now pronounce you man and wife,” the short, bespectacled priest announced with a beaming smile. “What God has joined together, let no man put asunder.”
The little rustic white clapboard church that had graced the far side of the peninsula since the end of the nineteenth century rocked with a thunderous, joyful recessional played on the old organ by one of the local ladies.
Darren, Jared’s best man, and Justine, serving as Libby’s maid of honor, preceded the bridal couple down the aisle.
Carlie blew kisses from the front pew, where she held Zachary, who was wearing a tiny suit and tie for the occasion. Savannah clung to the hand of Julio Ruiz, Carlie’s Puerto Rican fiancé. The dogs, mercifully, had been boarded in Seattle.
I like Julio, Libby thought, ensnared in a kind of beaded web somewhere between dream and reality. It was so much easier to think of anything else but what she’d done, and what could ultimately result. If Jared lost the children, she would be alone again, but it would be harder this go-around now that she’d spent time with him and the children, now that she knew his family.
She dismissed that thought by concentrating on Julio as they passed the family pew on their way to the door. He was just a few inches taller than Carlie, romantically swarthy and winningly charming, with a wide smile, a warm and lively sense of humor and a tenderness when dealing with Jared’s mother that had won Libby over the night before when they’d arrived for the wedding. He’d sung the children to sleep in the husky, romantic baritone that had once spread his fame far beyond the island of his boyhood.
They’d had a long evening of eating and talking, and it would have been obvious to someone blindfolded that Julio adored Carlie and that he would make her happy.
“I like Julio,” she whispered to Jared as they stopped at the door, confronted by a sheet of rain outside.
“You’re supposed to be thinking about liking me,” Jared returned, pulling her back from the opening. “Hold on. I think Darren’s prepared for this.”
“Never fear! The best man is here!” Darren thrust a closed umbrella between them from behind, then flipped the power opening with his thumb. It unfolded before them like a protective shield. “To the rectory. We have to sign the book and your certificate.”
Jared took the umbrella, wrapped an arm around Libby and ran with her to the side door of the rectory. He tried it and found it locked.
He held Libby to him as rain fell thunderously against the thin dome that protected them.
They could see Darren and Justy in the church doorway in earnest conversation with the priest.
“Warm enough?” Jared asked her, gently rubbing her upper arm.
She could think of nowhere she would rather be at that moment. Since the decision had been made to marry just four days ago, it was as though each of them had abandoned all suspicions and grudges in the interest of their alliance. And miraculously, an ease had developed between them that made her believe she’d finally found what she’d been sent back for. Not just the children, but Jared and the children—the four of them a family.
“Yes, I’m fine,” she replied, her voice a little thready. Her mind was running ahead to what the night would be like.
She saw his gaze read that thought in her eyes, and he smiled, the gesture a paradoxical combination of arrogance and tenderness that was uniquely male.
Darren and Justy ran toward them under another umbrella, Carlie and Julio and the baby under another and the priest and Savannah under still another, Savannah talking a mile a minute.
Jared groaned as they watched them approach. “I wonder what she’s telling him,” he murmured.
Libby grinned ruefully. “She’s probably asking him if she can curl his hair.”
“I HAVE A SURPRISE for you,” Carlie said. They were partying at the King’s Ransom in the early afternoon. Darren had brought in his chef and a skeletal crew to serve them.
Libby had to tear herself away from the magnificent view of the storm over Willapa Bay. Darren’s restaurant stood in wild grass on the banks of the bay, a wall of windows looking out on turbulent gray waters. The decor was a cut above nautical, the furnishings and appointments reminiscent of those on a yacht. Everything was mahogany, leather and brass, and white linen stretched everywhere she looked.
“Mom, you make me nervous when you say that.” Jared put an arm around her and squeezed her to him.
She sent him a reproving look from under the narrow brim of her flat-crowned red hat. “I meant that Julio and I have booked you a room for tonight at a little B-and-B at the end of the peninsula. We’ll stay with Zachary and Savannah. I know, I know.” She raised a hand to stem any protest. “You explained very calmly that the move is a strategic one so you can keep the children, but even a convenient marriage can benefit from good sex.”
Darren, who’d been about to approach them, heard his mother’s last remark and did an about-face. Or tried to. Jared grabbed him by the coat sleeve. “If I have to be lectured,” he said, “so do you. Did you know that even a convenient marriage can benefit from good sex?”
Darren cleared his throat and seemed to think about it. “Well, you know, it’s hard to think of anything that wouldn’t benefit from good sex. Or anyone.”
His mother punched his arm. “It’s best for married people, because the intimacy it produces when your lives are already promised is a magic that works for you your whole life.”
Libby saw Darren’s glance slant to Justy, who’d come up beside him—Justy, who wanted his baby but didn’t want to marry him. She pretended interest in the bouquet of Stargazer lilies she carried.
Jared and Libby were shooed away early in the afternoon. News of their overnight absence was greeted by Savannah with a pout. Her eyes brimmed with tears.
Jared held her on his hip under the umbrella. “We’re going to be home tomorrow in time for dinner. And tonight, Grandma and Julio are going to rent movies and make popcorn and you can stay up as late as you want.”
“I want to come with you,” she said plaintively. Just when Libby was about to cave in and plead with Jared that they take her with them, the child added with a soulful sigh, “But I know I can’t ‘cause it’s your honeymoon.”
Jared and Libby exchanged a smiling glance. “You know what a honeymoon is?” Jared asked her.
“It’s a trip mommies and daddies take. Grandma told me.”
“We’ll bring you back a present,” Libby promised, desperate to get a smile. She didn’t get it, but did see a gleam of avarice followed by a nod of resignation.
Jared and Libby took turns holding Zachary, then handed him back to Carlie, hugged everyone and ran together under the umbrella to the car.
Jared put their two small bags in the bottom of the open closet and looked around the room. He’d taken in at a glance that it was an odd but somehow comfortable confusion of federal furnishings, country linens and used-brick fireplace. But his brain had quickly accepted and dismissed the room and focused instead on the sudden, roiling tension in it—and in his companion. Or rather, his wife. That was a sobering thought.
“No back problems,” he assured her. “You?”
“No.”
He went to the bed and gazed down on her, thinking that she looked about to run. “Any…other problems?”
She sat up briskly. She’d kicked off her shoes and wore brown woolen pants and a soft gold sweater.
“Yes, actually. Well, they’re not problems for me, but they present some for you. In all the rush to get married, I never did get a chance to tell you that I have a few habits you might not like.”
He went to sit on the foot of the bed. “I already knew that. You’re meddlesome, sneaky and distracting.”
She opened her mouth to object to his brutal assessment of her, then hesitated over the last adjective. “Distracting?”
“Yes.” He stretched out to lean on an elbow. “I’d be furious at you for something, then I’d remember how your hair looks under the kitchen light, how dark your eyes get when you’re angry.”
Her nervousness seemed to slip a little.
“You did?” she asked softly.
Before the expression in her eyes could distract him again, he smiled. “But I didn’t mean to interrupt your confession. Go ahead. What kind of problems are you going to cause me?”
Libby needed a minute to think. So he’d longed for her just as she’d longed for him. That was comforting.
“I love garlic,” she admitted, trying to resume that air of nonchalance, but not quite succeeding. “I like to watch TV in the middle of the night, and I have a passion for Alabama. So there you have it.”
The Comeback Mom Page 17