“And as for me, well we both know, I only have one real love,” Joe continued arrogantly. “Hockey.”
The sport that had turned into the bane of her existence. “And no woman is getting in the way of that,” Emma ascertained sarcastically.
“Right.” An edge of belligerence crept into his voice.
Emma smiled, glad she wasn’t the only one in the room prone to emotions she couldn’t quite control. Maybe this wasn’t as dangerous as she’d thought. If Joe wasn’t at all interested in having emotional feelings for her, she would not have to worry about falling in love with him all over again. She’d be too darn ticked off at the complete lack of romance in his professional sports-oriented soul.
Sensing a crack in her emotional armor, Joe straightened and continued persuasively as he slowly, patiently closed the distance between them. “All I’m talking about, Emma, is a year,” he told her softly, taking both her hands in his. “Maybe two. All we have to do is stay married long enough for the scandal to die down and people to think we gave it our best effort—and for me to establish myself with the Storm, to the point that no matter what happens with us your father won’t want to do his level best to destroy my career again.”
Emma let out a shuddering breath as she tilted her face up to his. “My father would expect a lot of you if you were my husband.” She couldn’t believe they were really talking about this!
“I know that,” Joe replied, just as seriously. His grip tightened protectively. “And I wouldn’t let him—or you—down. I’d treat you right, from day one. Come on, Emma. We were friends once. More than friends.”
They had loved each other. Or a least she thought they had.
“We can do this,” Joe promised.
Emma swallowed as her thoughts turned unexpectedly amorous and erotic. “Live together?” she croaked. As husband and wife?
“I admit we were awfully young back then, but the physical side of our relationship never seemed to be the problem. You know that.”
His kisses had the power to turn her world upside down.
“Besides, it’s not as if you’re still a virgin,” Joe said, continuing his argument sagely.
Actually, although she would prefer he not know it, she was.
“We’re seven years older now. A lot more sophisticated.”
Emma knew Joe was. And so, she admitted reluctantly, was she. Albeit not in the bedroom. In the bedroom, she was still as innocent as she had ever been.
“We could have a friendship and an affair. And if we were married at the same time, well, so much the better. It’s not as if we were never likely to do this. We tried to do it once. We just…failed.”
And Joe, Emma knew, did not like to fail. Not on the ice, not in life. Had their abruptly ended marriage haunted him as much as it had her? Was their unexplored love at the root of his crazy problem-solving proposal to her? Was it possible? Would doing this ultimately help her to move on, too? Put her misguided love for Joe behind her once and for all? After all, they were both adults. And adults had sex for all sorts of reasons….
“Look, I’m not saying we’ll ever have sex.” Or even ever sleep together again, Emma amended silently. “But if we do,” Emma continued stubbornly, looking him right in the eye, “I want it to be on my terms.”
Behaving as if they were in the midst of very serious business negotiations, Joe considered her demand thoughtfully, then countered with one of his own. “I’ll agree to that—if you agree that while we are married we’re exclusive. Physically involved only with each other, no one else.”
The thought of Joe being hers—all hers—gave her a thrill. Resolutely, Emma pushed it away. Thoughts like that would get her heart broken, all over again.
SIX HOURS LATER, EMMA AND JOE were in her Raleigh apartment, waiting for their guests to arrive. She was in a tailored cream-colored silk sheath with matching jacket. He was in a charcoal-gray suit and tie. He looked fabulous except for one thing. He still hadn’t shaved, and his jaw was lined with a good two-and-a-half-days’ growth of beard. Catching her glance, he smiled at her mischievously and said, “This bothering you?”
Emma watched as he stroked the golden-brown stubble lining his handsome jaw. “Not at all,” she fibbed.
She knew their mothers weren’t going to be too happy about him neglecting to use his razor.
But she figured it was his one act of rebellion.
She had hers, too. Though it was her wedding day, she had nothing borrowed, nothing blue, nothing old and nothing new on her person.
If that wasn’t enough to jinx their nuptials and prevent any real emotional involvement on either side, she didn’t know what was.
Not that she was all that superstitious in any case.
The doorbell rang and she went to let the guests in. Her father and mother were first. Joe’s mother, Helen, was second. Attorney Ross Dempsey and Storm Coach Thad Lantz brought up the rear. All were dressed as they had been directed, in semiformal clothing.
Saul Donovan gazed at the flowers around the room, the stands of candles on either side of her hearth. He arched his brow in disapproval at both of them. “What’s going on here, Emma?” he asked gruffly.
Show time! Emma linked hands with Joe in solidarity. “Joe and I are saying our vows again.”
Everyone blinked in stunned amazement. The room fell silent.
Joe squeezed her hand encouragingly and Emma continued, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, “We know you weren’t present the last time, but we wanted you all to witness our vows. The photographer and minister will be here in about—” she consulted her watch “—fifteen minutes.” Which gave them, in her and Joe’s estimation, enough time to let their parents in on their game plans, and not enough time to argue the validity of their proposed solution. As Joe’s siblings surely would have, had they been invited.
Saul’s eyebrows slammed together as he glared at Joe. “This is your solution?” he demanded, his gaze roving Joe’s stubbly chin.
Relief flowed through Emma as Joe stubbornly held his ground, instead of running off to shave.
“Sir, with all due respect,” Joe told her father, as he wrapped an arm reassuringly around Emma’s waist, “your daughter’s reputation, personally and professionally, has been tarnished by her association with me. Marrying her is the only honorable thing to do, and it’s the fastest and surest way the two of us can think to get the gossip to die down, so people just forget what has happened the last few days.”
Helen Hart looked at them both a long, assessing moment before she interjected quietly, “But you two don’t love each other, Joe.”
My thoughts exactly, Emma thought, even as she espoused the argument she and Joe had carefully laid out to justify their actions. “We did once, years ago. And had I not lied to Joe about who I was we might still be married today.” Seeing those gathered around them were still highly skeptical, Emma continued persuasively, “We’re hoping those feelings will come back to us if we spend any time together.”
“And if they don’t?” Margaret Donovan asked, acting less like a public relations exec and more like a fiercely protective mom.
Emma shrugged off her mother’s emotional concern. She and Joe had promised each other they wouldn’t let feelings—theirs or anyone else’s—get in the way of what they both knew they had to do. “Then we’ll know for sure it never would have worked out and we’ll both be free to move on.”
No one could argue that.
It didn’t mean Saul approved, or was simply going to let it happen.
“Emma, a word with you, please.” Her father took her by the arm and led her into the adjacent bedroom. He guided her to sit down on the romantic white eyelet comforter on her antique four-poster bed.
“I know what you’re going to say—” Emma held up a staying palm.
Saul plowed on, anyway, “You don’t have what it takes to be a hockey player’s wife.”
Braced for an attack on Joe’s character—not her o
wn— Emma blinked. Her lower lip slid out in a dissenting pout. “Really.”
Her father gripped the poster nearest him and leaned into it. “I’m not trying to be cruel here, honey—just honest. You’ve had a very pampered and sheltered upbringing. You’re used to having everything and anything your heart desires. Having the attention totally on you.”
Emma knew that. But she had never asked for any of that. And in fact, had often wished her parents hadn’t become multimillionaires while she was growing up. She would have much rather had their attention, than all the money they’d provided her. Like fancy boarding schools and an even more prestigious university. “And whose fault is that?” Emma prodded dryly.
Her father ignored her attempt to draw their attention to his actions. “Being married to a hockey player is anything but glamorous.”
It didn’t look that way to Emma.
“First of all, you’re stuck in the limelight, while your star husband’s life revolves around one thing and one thing only—his sport. He’s gone all the time, tempted by groupies at every turn, and obsessed by whatever happened or didn’t happen that day on the ice. Not to mention prone to injury and career fortunes that can turn on a dime and turn your lives upside down.”
“That’s a pretty bleak picture you’re painting,” Joe said from the doorway. The look on his face said he had heard—and openly resented—everything Saul had just said.
“Albeit a true one,” Saul replied grimly as Emma sighed.
JOE KNEW HE COULD SIDE WITH Emma’s overbearing father, and possibly win some points with Saul, bettering his current position with the team, but he was less concerned with that than giving Emma the moral support she so badly needed.
“And furthermore, when I told you to fix this situation with Emma this wasn’t what I meant,” Saul continued angrily.
“Oh, I know what you had in mind, sir.” Joe moved to Emma’s side. He stood next to her, positioning himself so close their knees were touching. “You were hoping I’d just throw in the towel, quit hockey and go away for good,” Joe continued sternly, aware that beside him, Emma was trembling, upset, as he continued to square off with her father, who was ruining what should have been at the very least, a scolding-free occasion. “Barring that, ask to be put on waivers and be traded again to another team before the season started, maybe even at a reduced salary. The damage from this debacle to be borne solely by me and my career.” Thereby bringing back the “nothing but trouble rep” Saul had branded Joe with early in his career.
“Obviously, you’re not as dense as I thought,” Saul remarked, something akin to respect coming into his penetrating gaze. “Although you could do a lot more in the grateful category.”
“Why should Joe be grateful to you?” Emma demanded, leaping to her feet and moving deliberately away from both men.
Saul turned to face her. “Because,” Saul explained with grating patience, “I was good enough to overlook what happened before—with you—and give Joe a second chance to make it with the Storm. Because I thought—erroneously, it now seems—that Joe was mature enough to handle being around you without getting himself and you into trouble.”
“Oh, baloney!” Emma said. “You wanted Joe because he’s the best up-and-coming right winger in the NHL. You don’t give a hoot about Joe personally or his future and his prospects as a player. You knew from the get-go that you’d just get rid of him if he stepped over the line, toward me.”
Joe marveled at Emma’s passionate defense of him.
Saul frowned. “I made no secret of that when I talked to Joe Friday night. His deal with our team was predicated on his steering clear of you, Emma.”
“Only it didn’t happen, Dad. We did run into each other that night, and stuff happens, and now we are where we are! End of story!”
“You can either stay and be part of it, or not,” Joe told Saul, speaking for both of them. “It’s your choice. But if you’re leaving, Emma and I would prefer you do it before the press and the minister arrives.”
TO EMMA’S RELIEF, HER FATHER made no effort to leave nor did anyone else, and two minutes later, the doorbell rang again.
Joe had convinced Emma it would be a good idea if they asked the W-MOL news team to carry exclusive video of their vows. They both hoped the scoop would get the tenacious local organization out of their hair. The local Raleigh, Durham and Holly Springs newspapers were also represented.
Although they’d had none of the accoutrements the first time they had said their vows to each other, Emma thought it had still been wildly romantic.
This time they had all the trappings, and it was only nerve-racking. At least that was what Emma told herself as they repeated their individual promises to love, honor and cherish each other, and slipped exquisite platinum rings on each other’s fingers.
“What God has joined together, let no man put asunder. Joe, you may kiss your bride.”
Emma expected Joe to give her a sweet, chaste kiss.
She should have known better.
A reckless hellion on ice, he was no less daring in the first few seconds as her “husband.” The amorous glint in his eyes letting her know he planned to make it as realistic and convincing as possible for the audience of doubting Thomases around them, he took her in his arms, bent her backward from the waist and planted one on her.
Shifted off balance that way, Emma had no choice but to wreathe her arms around his neck and hold on for dear life as his lips moved surely, sensually over hers. She swore to herself she wasn’t going to play his game, wasn’t going to kiss him back, but instead let the hotly possessive kiss be all one-sided and strictly for show.
It was a good plan. A very safe, intelligent way of resisting him. And to her chagrin, it didn’t work. Before even a second had gone by, her lips parted under the pressure of his. Her knees weakened. Her heart sped up. And, breasts pearling beneath the fabric of her dress, she melted against him. By the time, the possessive kiss came to a halt, she was tingling from head to toe, and so dizzy with barely contained desire that she barely heard the obligatory laughter and clapping and cheers around them.
Emma’s father had a smile plastered on his lips and poker eyes. Emma wasn’t fooled. She knew Saul Donovan was furious, with her and with Joe.
Their mothers, however, had a completely different view of the impetuous display of passion.
Margaret and Helen were regarding them with awe and pleasure, the smiles on their faces seeming to speculate that maybe…just maybe…this crazy relationship of Joe and Emma’s could work after all.
IT WAS ANOTHER TWO HOURS before Joe and Emma were able to get the apartment cleared of their guests. First, there was champagne, and then the cake—which the reporters were invited to eat—and more pictures. A few brief statements, words for the camera. Acceptances of well-wishes and a subtly worded message from her father that only Joe and Emma could hear, telling Joe that he had better make Saul Donovan’s only daughter happy—or else. A message Joe seemed to take in stride. As if said task were going to be the easiest thing in the world.
Until finally…finally, they were done. And they were alone again.
Joe shut the door behind him, unfastened the first two buttons on his shirt and removed his tie.
Suddenly nervous, not sure why, since their marriage vows had more or less been a way out of trouble and nothing more, Emma began to clean up. “Sorry about the warning from my father.”
Joe helped her collect empty glasses and plates and take them to the kitchen sink. “Nothing I wouldn’t have done for my own daughter,” he told her confidently as he shrugged out of his suit coat.
“Besides,” he continued lazily over his shoulder as he made another foray into the living room, “I intend to make you happy. I plan to make us both happy. Otherwise,” he finished, coming back to her side, “the next two years or so would be miserable, and there’s no point in that.”
No kidding, Emma commiserated as she quickly slid the dishes into her dishwasher.
Joe shut the refrigerator door and turned to give her his full attention. “What about it?”
Emma smiled at him efficiently. “We need to decide where we’re going to sleep.”
Joe shrugged his broad shoulders amiably. Amusement twinkled in his golden brown eyes. “The bedroom?”
There was a slight problem with that. “There’s only one bed.”
He grinned wolfishly. No doubt about what was on his mind! “I think we’ll both fit,” he said.
Emma flushed, despite herself. Time to get serious here. “We can’t sleep together,” she warned.
Some of the laughter left his eyes, but none of the desire. “Those rings on our left hands say differently.”
“Can’t you just sneak off somewhere else to sleep?” she asked plaintively. Wouldn’t that be so much easier? For both of them? Apparently not, in Joe’s view.
He quirked his brow in a way that seemed to indicate she had lost her mind. “On what everyone thinks is our wedding night?”
“No one would have to know but you and me,” Emma persisted.
He regarded her skeptically. “What if someone found out? What then?” Joe returned, just as practically. Like he didn’t really care, either. Except for the impact on his career and his standing with Saul and the team.
But Emma did care. For reasons that were a lot more personal than professional. “Well, what are we going to do?” she demanded, her senses swirling as he closed the distance between them to mere inches, once again. “We can’t share a bed!”
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