by Judi Fennell
Bryan kissed the third finger on her left hand. “I love you.”
Her breath hitched and she managed to say the same thing back to him. “I love you, Bryan.”
“And I love Bryan, too,” said Maggie who’d somehow managed to sneak up on them. “Does this mean you’re gonna get married, Mommy?”
Jason came running over, shooting a look at Bryan. A very grown-up, manly look as he scooped up his baby sister again. “Of course it does, runt. That’s what people do when they love each other.”
“Good, then I’m gonna marry Bryan, ’cause I love him, too.”
“Silly girl,” said Mark, shaking his head.
“Yeah, you can’t marry him if he’s gonna marry Mom.”
“I can, too.”
“Cannot.”
“Can too.”
“Cannot.”
For the first time, Bryan didn’t step in and shut down the argument. No, this time, he stepped in and kissed her. Right there, in front of her kids and everyone in the parking lot and whatever cameras people had on them. This would be all over the internet in seconds.
But Beth didn’t care. This was what she wanted.
And it was what they all needed.
Epilogue
THREE fours beat two aces, Maggie.”
“They do not.”
“Do too.”
“Do not.”
“Do too.”
“I’m going to go ask Daddy.” Maggie huffed herself to her feet and stomped off in the direction of the backyard where Bryan was reinforcing the fencing yet again. Sherman was turning into quite the little tunnel digger, and Bryan was seriously considering having a cement wall put in, three feet into the ground.
Beth wasn’t sure that’d be deep enough for Sherman. Especially since the Chihuahua had moved in next door.
“Mom, Maggie’s wrong, right?” asked Tommy. “Bryan said fours beat aces if you have more of them.”
“And when was Bryan teaching you to play poker?” Hmmm . . . Bryan was an awesome stepdad, but she was going to have to go over some of the finer points of parenting. Like no gambling under the age of twenty-one.
“He didn’t teach us. We were watching when he played with Uncle Sean and Uncle Liam. Maggie listened in.”
Ah, yes, the monthly poker game. She was going to have to rethink bringing the kids if all they were doing was spying on the guys. But it was nice getting together with her sisters-in-law and Gran.
Beth smiled and patted her belly. She couldn’t wait to share her news with all of them. Especially Bryan. Seven months from now, he’d finally have his own child to love.
Not that he’d love hers any less. And, really, they weren’t just hers any longer. They were Manleys even if they didn’t have that name.
Though Bryan had said something the other night . . .
She looked at Mike’s picture on the mantel and felt that familiar pain wash over her that he wasn’t here to see his kids grow up.
She walked over to his picture and pressed a kiss to her fingers that she then pressed to his lips. She still missed him but was moving forward. It’s what he would have wanted. She just couldn’t believe she’d been blessed twice in one lifetime to love and be loved by two such wonderful men.
The sliding door opened in the kitchen. Beth spun around. Bryan wouldn’t mind seeing her at Mike’s picture—after all, he’d insisted that the mantel stay just as it was for the kids’ sake. “I don’t want them to forget their father. If it were me, I’d be devastated. I’m fine having him there. The kids should know their dad.”
She’d loved him more for saying that and she had a feeling that’d been the night this little one had been conceived.
She hurried back into the kitchen.
Bryan put his hands in the air. “I swear. I didn’t teach them to play poker. I know better.”
“I know you do, honey.” She wrapped her arms around him, not caring that he was all hot and sweaty. “They were spying on you and your brothers.”
Bryan chuckled and linked his arms low on her back. “Of course they were. I’d expect nothing less of Mark and Tommy.”
“Actually, it was Maggie. She taught them.”
Now he went to full-on laughing. “God, that kid’s a riot. It’s a good thing there’s only one of her. I don’t know what we’d do if there were more.”
“Um . . .” Beth nibbled her bottom lip and looked up at him.
“Um, what?” His gorgeous green eyes narrowed.
“Um, this.” She took his hand and slid it to her belly.
Those gorgeous green eyes got very wide. “Beth . . . Are you saying . . . Do you mean . . . ?”
She nodded, feeling the tears fill her eyes. She’d always been an emotional hormonal wreck with the other pregnancies. “I do.”
“Oh God, baby. I love you.”
The sweetest two- and three-word phrases in the world.
TURN THE PAGE FOR A SNEAK PEEK AT THE NEXT MANLEY MAIDS NOVEL
What a Woman Gets
COMING IN NOVEMBER 2014 FROM BERKLEY SENSATION
Guys’ Night . . . Plus One
I BELIEVE, dear brothers, you all need to be fitted for Manley Maids uniforms.”
Liam Manley bit his tongue at his sister Mac’s announcement as she laid her winning hand on the green felt poker table. She’d played him—him and his brothers, and she’d played them good.
She’d played poker good. Who knew she even played poker?
And that bet . . . Four weeks’ worth of free cleaning service for her company against their vacation homes and expensive sports cars. Why did Liam feel like a sucker?
“I am not wearing an apron.” Bryan, the youngest Manley brother, sounded so offended it made Liam bite his tongue even harder—this time so he wouldn’t laugh. You’d think Mac had asked them to wear . . . well . . . an apron.
Sean, his middle brother and fellow loser, kept stacking the poker chips, avoiding Mac’s jack-high straight flush like the plague while keeping his mouth shut.
Bryan’s mouth was hanging open. His movie-star brother was gaping like a fish. Where was a camera when he needed one? Bry would pay anything to keep that unflattering picture out of the press, and Liam could use a new hot tub for the house he was renovating—make that, had just finished renovating, which meant he had some time on his hands.
No time like the present to get started paying off the ridiculous bet. “When do you want us to start, Mac?”
“I have extra uniforms, so whenever you have the time.”
Extra uniforms? Since when did she have extra anything when it came to the business?
Something was going on.
He never would have thought Mary-Alice Catherine would resort to dirty tricks to get her older brothers to do what she wanted. Hell, when they’d gone to live with Gran after their parents had been killed in a car accident, they’d practically tripped over each other to take care of their baby sister. Now he was going to be tripping over brooms and mops and vacuum cleaners. Ugh.
“Hey, can I do my own house?” That was Bryan, working whatever angle he could to come out on top.
“You’d put Monica out of a job to weasel out of the bet? Really?” It was Mac’s turn for mouth-gaping.
“I’m not weaseling out of anything.” But Bry didn’t look happy. “You can count on me for Monday, too. I’ve got a month between projects and was looking for something to do anyhow.”
Liam highly doubted Bryan’s choice would be to play maid. It wasn’t Liam’s, either. Still, he’d made the bet . . .
And so had she.
He finished off his beer then gathered the cards, dragging Mac’s winning hand across the felt last. Bryan’s gaze was on those cards the entire way. Sean kept his on the chips. They were probably the most anal-retentively stacked chips in the history of the game.
“I didn’t know you had guys working for you, Mac.” Liam kept his voice even. Controlled. And if there was the slightest hint of something else in it, w
ell, he’d be fine with Mac assuming it was anger at losing. But why would Mac A) want to play poker so badly with them when she couldn’t afford the cash if she lost, and B) make that bet and win? Something was rotten in the state of Manley.
“Wha . . . what?”
Yeah, that startled look in her eyes confirmed exactly what he’d thought. There were no guys employed by Manley Maids, so those uniforms weren’t “extra.” She’d had them made in advance. For them.
Mac had planned this. Her winning was no fluke. He’d call her on it if he had any proof other than his gut, but he didn’t. And God knew, he couldn’t always trust his gut. It’d let him down before.
“Never mind.” He shuffled the offending cards in with the other forty-seven, then tapped the long edge of the deck on the table. “I’ll be there Monday.”
And he’d use the mindless monotony of cleaning to come up with some way to pay his sister back.
In spades.
Chapter One
IF there was one thing Cassidy Davenport hated, it was to be kept waiting. And if there was one thing her father did best, it was keep her waiting.
“But Deborah, I just spoke to him.” God, she had to go through her father’s executive secretary for every little scrap, but that’s the way Dad’s empire worked. No one got to him without going through Deborah. The woman seriously ought to demand the title of CEO because Cassidy doubted her father ever made a business decision he didn’t run through Deborah Capshaw first. The woman had been with him for nearly thirty years and kept the business running while Dad went running.
Running around, that is.
“I’m sorry, Cassidy, but he’s in a meeting he can’t be pulled out of. I’m sure you understand.”
Oh Cassidy understood all right. She wondered how old this one was. Probably blonde—most of her father’s “meetings” were—and probably with an impressive degree. That was the weird thing. Somehow Dad always managed to snag the Harvards and Yales of the world. You’d think those women would know better, but there was something about Mitchell Davenport that made women lose their minds.
Cassidy was about to join their ranks.
She ran a hand over her Maltese Titania’s soft fur. “All right, Deborah. I understand.” They both knew what that meant—actually, no, Cassidy didn’t understand. “Have him call me when he’s free.” And showered, she wanted to add, but Deborah didn’t deserve crass. Poor thing had to deal with it on a daily basis.
Or hourly.
Cassidy ended the call then stroked her cheek over the little dog’s soft head. When was she going to accept the fact that her father only came through for her when it garnered him something? And the “meeting” in his office was garnering him a lot more than she ever would.
Lunch and, more importantly, the conversation she wanted to have with him were obviously out.
She set Titania down on the floor and picked her iPad off the table in front of the glass wall that looked out over the mirror-like lake twelve stories below her condo, the riot of wildflowers reflecting off all surfaces.
She’d love to spend the day painting, trying to capture this scene. Oils would bring out just the right shimmer of the flowers’ reflection on the gray-blue water. Her fingers itched to get to her brushes.
Cassidy tapped the calendar app to make sure she had enough time today. There was nothing worse than getting herself all psyched up to lose herself in her art only to find out she had other commitments.
Which she did. MANLEY MAIDS was written in for ten a.m.
Ah, yes. Today was the day Sharon, her housekeeper, was supposed to train the new girl the service was sending over, but Sharon had gone on maternity leave early over the weekend.
Cassidy checked the time. Nine fifty-five.
She tapped the calendar and set the iPad back on the table. Nothing like having to introduce someone to the Davenport world she inhabited. At first they were awestruck—Dad did like to do showy in grand style, with a side helping of decadent just to make himself look good, and he’d had the designer outdo herself with this place.
It usually took less than a week for a newcomer to see beneath the veneer and start with the pitying looks—the ones she had to pretend she didn’t see because it made no sense for anyone to pity someone who lived a life as fabulous as hers.
Wasn’t that what Dad always said?
Actually, Cassidy didn’t know what Dad said anymore. If it weren’t for email, she’d rarely hear from him.
Right at ten, the doorbell rang. Cassidy shooed Titania into her enclosure, brushed her waves of chestnut hair over her shoulder, straightened the lapels on her beige silk blouse, then smoothed the braided belt at the waistline of her matching linen pants. She’d test the one-week theory with this one.
She opened the door to the condo’s vestibule. It took the hunk in the Manley Maids uniform less than one second to start with the looks.
Only his weren’t the pitying kind. They also weren’t leering, which was another reaction she’d come to expect.
No, if she had to guess, she’d call his look angry.
• • •
CASSIDY Davenport stood before him in the flesh.
Flesh-colored pants, flesh-colored top, and enough buttons unbuttoned to reveal a lot more flesh.
Liam worked hard to keep from groaning. Mac had assured him she wouldn’t be here. Not on Mondays. It’d been his stipulation. Yet here she was.
Cassidy Davenport. Pampered socialite whose daily clothing bill was probably more than a blue-collar worker earned in a week—and he doubted she’d know a blue-collar worker if he came up and bit off her ridiculously priced manicure. The woman was frivolous with a capital F.
He was done with frivolous. Been there, done that, spent a fortune on designer clothes and rhinestone-studded T-shirts for Rachel that matched the diamond studs she’d insisted on having.
He was really going to have to work for this job. And not to keep it.
“You’re the maid?”
Liam winced. Surely there had to be a better term, but domestic goddess didn’t exactly fit, while housekeeper brought up an image of the Brady Bunch.
He gripped the vacuum cleaner and straightened his shoulders. His pecs flexed—purely involuntarily of course. “Um, yeah. I am.”
He didn’t have to be a college graduate—though he was—to read what she was thinking when her gaze ran over him from head to toe. Mac didn’t run that kind of a business.
“They didn’t tell me they were sending a guy.”
“Is that a problem?” God, let her say “Yes” so he could get the hell out of here, because he felt a sudden need to clean something—himself. Women like her got under his skin and not in a good way.
Or they used to.
What was the saying about repeating history’s mistakes? Liam had zero intention of doing that.
“Well, no. I guess it’s not a problem.” She tapped one of those ridiculously priced nails on her surprisingly non-collagen-enhanced lips. “Won’t you come in?”
“Uh, yeah. Sure.” Mac would kill him if he said no. This had been his baby sister’s first account. That’s why she’d selected it for him, she’d said; she knew he wouldn’t lose it for her.
He was going to lose something. His breakfast for starters. Then maybe his cool. Definitely his mind.
Thank God the bet had only been for four weeks. Any longer and he wouldn’t be the brother Mac thought he was.
Cassidy stepped back to let him in, and Liam stumbled up the step into the foyer. Damn. Where’d that come from?
He caught himself before he fell on top of her. She was much smaller when they were on the same level.
Then he got a look around the place. No way would they ever be on the same level.
Rich dripped from the chandelier with the pear-sized crystals. It wove through the gold-threaded rug, vined through the marble floor, and scented the air with the hint of millions.
Liam had money, but this . . . Even the frou-fro
u little dog had a gilded cage. This was on the level of the Donald Trumps and Conrad Hiltons of the world.
And Mitchell Davenports. It was important to remember that none of this was Cassidy’s. She lived off Daddy’s money.
“Sorry,” she said, her voice huskier than he’d expected. “I should have warned you about that first step. It’s a doozy.”
Literally and figuratively.
Liam checked his grip on the vacuum and made sure none of the cleaning products had fallen out of the bucket—so not his M.O. around beautiful women. But then, Cassidy Davenport was more Bryan’s type than his these days, especially because Liam had known her kind before—when they’d looked down their noses at him . . . unless they wanted something from him.
He glanced at Cassidy’s nose. Perfectly pert in that rhinoplastic way of the rich, but she’d never get the chance to look down it at him. He’d learned his lesson, and women like her, while not a dime a dozen—they upped the ante to about a hundred thou a dozen—were so far below women who knew how to make their own way in the world that all he felt for her kind was anger at such uselessness.
But he wasn’t here to judge; he was here to clean. For four frickin’ weeks.
He should have folded that last hand. Taken his losses and lived with them. But Manleys didn’t go down without a fight. It was how he’d made his own fortune, inconsequential though it was when compared to this place. The one he was supposed to be cleaning.
He gripped the vacuum wand and planted it in front of him. “Where would you like me to start?”
Cassidy took a step back. Probably so he wouldn’t land on her; Liam was sure she was used to men falling at her feet, but he wasn’t the kind to do that.
Well, not again.
“I guess you can start in the bedroom.”
Seriously? Did she really think he’d fall for that? Was she slumming today? Pissed off at the boyfriend or something? Wanting a little spice?
“Sharon always started in the bedroom, then worked her way out. She said it kept what she’d already cleaned from getting messed up again before she finished. Makes sense to me, but if you’ve got another routine, I’m okay with that. Whatever you want to do is fine.”