“You don’t have to go downstairs with me.”
“Oh,” she said, leading the way out to the landing and then down the stairs. “’Tisn’t just for you. I’m off to brew some tea and then get to work myself.”
His eyebrows rose. So much for the fond farewell. His leaving was no more than a by-product here. She was picking up the threads of her everyday life and so was he, he reminded himself. So again, why the flicker of irritation?
She opened the front door and held it wide for him. She smiled, reached up and cupped his cheek briefly. “Fly safe, Jefferson.”
“Right.” He stepped onto the porch and the Irish wind howled around him. “Take care of yourself, Maura.”
“Oh, I always do,” she told him. “And you, as well. Not to worry about your film crew, either. All will be here when they arrive.”
“Fine.”
“All right then.” She gave him one last smile, then shut the door, leaving him no choice now but to walk to his car and leave.
With her back to the closed door, Maura wrapped her arms around her middle and held on. After a few steadying breaths, she heard his car engine fire up and she leaned toward the nearest window to catch one last glimpse of him.
He steered his car out onto the road and in a moment, he was gone, as if he’d never been. Even the echo of his car was nothing more than a hush on the wind.
“Well, now,” she murmured, swiping away the tears running down her cheeks. “It’s best this way and you know it, my girl. No point in laying out your heart for him to stumble over on his way out of the country.”
She wasn’t the first foolish woman to fall for the wrong man entirely. No doubt, she wouldn’t be the last, either.
“Doesn’t matter now anyway as he’s gone.” She headed through the quiet house toward the kitchen and a morning pot of tea. Best to get back to her life. The life she knew. The animals and the land and the world that was hers. “You’ll get over him,” she promised herself firmly. “Won’t take long at all.”
Four
S he wasn’t over him.
It had been two months and she still thought of Jefferson King nearly every day. Her only hope was that he was being haunted by memories, as well. That would make this whole thing more fair.
The problem was, she had too much alone time, she told herself. Too much empty time to spend in thoughts she shouldn’t be indulging in anyway. But with Cara off making a film in Dublin, Maura was alone at the farmhouse with nothing more to talk to than the dog she’d recently acquired.
Unfortunately, King, named for a certain man she was still feeling fondness for when she purchased the dog, was not much of a conversationalist.
Now, along with her wild thoughts, her misery at missing the man she never should have let into her heart, the work building up to lambing season and her new dog, she was also feeling a bit off physically. Her stomach was queasy most of the time and she’d been so dizzy only that morning in the barn, she’d had to sit down before she fell down.
“I was right, wasn’t I? It’s the flu, I know it,” Maura told the village doctor as he walked into the examination room. “I haven’t been getting enough sleep and there’s so much work to be done. I’m run down is all. I thought you could give me a little something to help me sleep.”
Doc Rafferty had been in the village for forty years. He’d treated everyone for miles around and he had delivered both Maura and Cara himself. So he knew them far too intimately to pull any punches, so to speak. And as he was a forthright man in any case, he met her gaze and told her the truth of the matter.
“I’ve got the results of your test,” he said, checking the papers he held in his hand as if to be sure of what he was about to say. “If this is the flu, it’s the nine-month variety, Maura. You’re pregnant.”
A beat of silence fell between them as those last two words of the doctor’s repeated over and over again in her head. Sure she’d misheard him, Maura laughed shortly.
“No, I’m not.” She shook her head. “That’s impossible.”
“Is it now?” The older man sat down on a rolling stool and shifted his pale green eyes up to hers. “You’re telling me you’ve done nothing to produce such a condition?”
“Well I—” He’d examined her from head to toe too often for her to try to persuade him she was a virgin, and why would she care to? But this? No. It couldn’t be.
Maura stopped, frowned and started thinking. Odd, but she’d been paying no attention at all to her period and hadn’t even noticed until now that it hadn’t shown up in quite some time. Quickly, she did a little math in her head and as she reached the only conclusion she could under the circumstances, she let out a breath and whispered, “Oh my God.”
“There you are, then.” Doc Rafferty reached out, patted her knee. “You’ll be feeling fine again soon. The first couple of months are always the hardest, after all. In the meantime though, I want you to take better care of yourself.” He scribbled a few things down on a pad and then tore off the top sheet and handed it to her.
Maura couldn’t read it through the fog blocking her vision.
“Eat regular meals, cut back on the caffeine and I’ll have Nurse Doherty give you a sample bottle of vitamins.” He stood up, looked down at her through kind eyes and said, “Maura, love. You should tell the baby’s father right away.”
The baby’s father.
The man she’d sworn to put firmly in her past.
So much for that fine notion. He would surely be a part of her future now, wouldn’t he?
“Yes, I will.” Tell Jefferson that he was going to be a father. Well, wouldn’t that make for a lovely long-distance conversation?
“Will you be all right with this, Maura?”
“Of course. I’ll be fine.” And she would. Already, the first shock of the news was passing and a small curl of excitement was fluttering to life inside her.
She was going to have a baby.
“Do you need to talk about anything?”
“What?” Maura’s gaze lifted to meet his. Kindness was stamped on his familiar features and she knew he was worried for her. And though she appreciated it, he needn’t be.
“No, Doctor,” she told him, scooting off the examination table. “I’m fine, really. It was a bit of a shock, but…” She stopped and smiled. “It’s happy news after all, isn’t it?”
“You’re a good girl, Maura, as I’ve always said.” He gave her a nod of approval and added, “I’d like to see you once a month now, just to keep a check on you and the baby. Make the appointment on your way out. And, Maura, no more heavy lifting, understand?”
When he left the room, she was alone with her news. Although…
“Not as alone as I was when I arrived, am I?” she whispered and dropped one hand to her flat belly.
Awe rose up inside her.
There was a child growing within her. A new life. A precious, innocent life that would be counting on her. But Maura was a woman used to responsibility, so that didn’t worry her. The fact that her child would grow up without a father was a bit of a hitch. When she’d imagined the day she would become a mother, she’d had hazy, blurry images of a faceless man standing at her side, rejoicing with her at the birth.
Never once had she considered being a single mother.
Heaven knew she hadn’t planned on this. Had, in fact been taking precautions—well, the over-the-counter precautions. It wasn’t as though she had sex often enough to warrant anything permanent.
Of course, she should have insisted Jefferson wear a condom, that would have been the intelligent thing to do. But neither of them had been thinking straight that night, she admitted silently. For herself, she’d been in such a hunger to have Jefferson over, under and in her, she hadn’t wanted to wait for anything.
Now, it seemed, there would be consequences.
But such wonderful consequences. All penances should be this happily paid.
A child.
She’d always wanted to
be a mother.
Maura turned, looked out the window and watched as thick, pewter clouds raced across the sky. A storm was brewing, she thought, and wondered if it was a metaphor for what was about to happen to her life.
“We’ll be just fine, you and I,” she told her child, still keeping one hand tight to the womb where her baby slept. She would see to it that her child was safe and well and happy.
As soon as she got home, she’d call Jefferson. She’d keep the conversation brisk and as impersonal as she could, considering the situation. She’d tell him because it was right. But she’d also tell him she had no need for him to come rushing back. She wasn’t over him just yet and had no wish to see him again, stirring up things that had yet to settle down.
One phone call.
Then they’d be done.
Two months later…
“Mr. King said there would be no problems.”
Maura glared at the little man standing on her porch. He was short, bald and looked as though a stiff wind off the lake might blow him into Galway city. She showed him no mercy. “Aye, your Mr. King says a lot of things, doesn’t he?”
He took a deep breath as if trying for patience. She understood that feeling very well as she’d been trying for weeks and still hadn’t found any.
“We do have a contract,” the man reminded her.
She looked past him out to the film crew setting up tents and trailers and cameras with banks of lights surrounding them. Somehow she hadn’t expected the whole mess to be quite so…intimidating. As it was, she had dozens of people trampling the grass in her front yard and the complaining bleats from the sheep were as sharp as nails against a chalkboard. Swallowing her irritation as best she could, she said, “We do indeed and I’ll stay to the very letter of the contract.”
“Meaning?” the little man asked, his small tight mouth flattening into a grim slash across his narrow face.
“Meaning, I said you could be on my property, but nowhere near the lambing sheds.”
“But Mr. King said…”
“If you’ve a problem with me,” Maura told him, “I suggest you phone your I’m-so-busy-I-can’t-bother-to-return-a-message King and deliver your complaints to him.” Just before she slammed the front door, she added, “And I wish you good luck getting him on the bleeding phone as I haven’t been able to manage that no-doubt miraculous feat in the last two months.”
Jefferson King was juggling what felt like thirty different projects at once. It helped to stay busy. Thankfully, his position at King Studios ensured that he remained that way.
There were currently three films under production and each of them presented different headaches. Dealing with producers, directors and, worst of all to his mind, the actors, was enough to make a man wonder what he’d first enjoyed about this business. He had deals rolling with agents, a couple of smaller studios he was looking to absorb and he was in the middle of buying the rights to a bestselling romance novel to turn it into what would be, he firmly believed, a blockbuster summer hit.
So yeah. Busy. But he preferred it that way. Busy meant his thoughts were too distracted to drift toward memories of Ireland that came only a dozen times a day now. Images of deep green fields, smoky, music-filled pubs and, mostly, thoughts of Maura Donohue.
Which was just as well because every time a picture of that blue-eyed woman rose up in his mind, he was filled with a wild mixture of emotions that were so tangled and twisted into knots inside him it was impossible to figure out which had prominence.
He tossed his pen onto the desktop and scowled at the wall opposite him. Of course he remembered the passion. The chemistry between them that had built slowly and inexorably until it had finally exploded on their last night together.
Yet he also recalled clearly the calm, cool look in her eye as she walked him to the door that last morning. He gritted his teeth as he saw her face in his mind. Clear blue eyes, luscious mouth curved in a half smile. She hadn’t cried. Hadn’t asked him to stay. Had, in fact, acted as if he were nothing more than an annoying guest keeping her from her work.
Fresh aggravation rose inside him at the memory, so he pushed it away and grabbed his pen again. Thumb flicking madly at the pen top, he told himself it wasn’t that he really cared, it was the principle of the thing. Women didn’t walk away from Jefferson King. No matter the situation, it was he who did the walking. Always. But she’d thrown him off. Caught him off balance and kept him that way and a part of him wondered if that hadn’t been her plan all along.
Had she been teasing him, leading him along sexually until she got the offer just the way she wanted it, and then took him to bed to seal the deal? Was she that manipulative and he simply hadn’t seen it? He’d hate to think that. Went against the grain to consider it, but why else had she been so casual about a night that had damn well hit him harder than he had expected it to?
What kind of woman spent the night with a man and then turned him loose the next morning so easily?
And why the hell was he still thinking about her? The deal was done; it was time to move on. “Well past time,” he muttered, since there was no one else in his office to overhear him.
“That’s perfect,” he added under his breath, “now she’s got me talking to myself and the woman probably hasn’t given me a single thought.”
Which really fried his ass if truth be told. Damn it, Jefferson King was not forgettable. Women usually crowded around him, clamoring for his attention. Not just the wannabe actresses who littered Hollywood’s streets every few feet, either. But women with wit and intelligence. Women who looked at him and saw a successful man, sure of himself and his own place in the world.
Women who weren’t Maura.
Still grumbling, Jefferson flipped through the stack of papers on his desk, and made a few scattered notes. He was buying up an independent film company, thinking of branching King Studios out into documentaries. But it was a stretch to say his mind was focused on that particular task at the moment.
No, like it or not, he was still thinking about her.
But why? After all, it wasn’t as if either of them had wanted or counted on a relationship. They’d had some good times together, capped by one amazing night of mind-blowing sex. So why was he so disgusted at her casual goodbye the next morning? It wasn’t as if he’d been planning to stay anyway.
It had to be ego, pure and simple.
His had taken a slap and that was something he wasn’t used to. How had Maura slipped under his well-honed defenses to leave such an indelible image on his mind?
“Doesn’t matter,” he said aloud, hearing the determination in not only the words but his tone. The memories would fade, eventually. But that wasn’t much comfort in the middle of the night when he woke up with dreams of her raging through his mind.
But a man couldn’t be held responsible for what his unconscious mind dredged up, could he? He pushed away from his desk and walked to the window overlooking Beverly Hills and Hollywood. The streets were jammed with cars and in the distance he could see the stalled traffic on the freeway. Smog hung low over the scene, a hazy brown blanket covering a city with millions of people all hurrying through their lives. And for just a moment, he let himself imagine the cool green fields of Ireland. The warm welcome of the pub.
The narrow road to Maura’s farmhouse.
Irritated with himself and the memories that were still far too vivid, he scrubbed both hands over his face and turned away from the window. He didn’t have time to waste indulging in thoughts of a woman who’d no doubt already moved on.
His phone rang and he grabbed at it with the eagerness of a drowning man reaching for a life preserver. “What is it, Joan?”
His assistant said, “Mr. King, Harry Robinson’s on line three for you. He says they’re having problems on location.”
Harry was directing the Irish epic shooting at Maura’s farmhouse. Frowning, Jefferson said, “Thanks, Joan. Put him through.”
The line clicked over and he
asked, “What seems to be the problem, Harry?”
The other man’s voice was sharp and filled with both static and disgust. “The problem is, nothing’s going right over here. It’s a nightmare.”
“What? What happened?”
“What hasn’t?” Harry countered. “That inn you told me about? Suddenly it has no vacancies. The local caterer’s prices have gone up three times in the last week and the coffee’s always cold. The guy at the pub even insists he’s run out of beer whenever we walk in.”
Jefferson turned around and stared blankly out at the city view again. His own reflection stared back at him from the sun-drenched glass. He looked just as confused as he felt. “Run out of beer? How is it possible for a pub to run out of beer?”
“Tell me about it.”
That mild swell of irritation he’d felt earlier began to bubble and churn inside him. “That doesn’t sound like Craic to me.”
“Yeah, well, it doesn’t exactly match the description you gave me of the place, either.” In an aside to someone else, Harry said, “Well, move the trough out of the shot. No? Fine. I’ll be there in a minute.” Then he refocused. “That’s an example of what we’re dealing with. There’s a feed trough I want to move and Ms. Donohue refuses to cooperate.”
Jefferson tugged at the tie that felt as if it was strangling him. “Go on.”
“Yesterday,” Harry told him, “the owner of the market told us he wouldn’t be selling to us at all and we could just go into the city for whatever we needed.”
“He can’t do that.”
“Seems he can. I don’t have to tell you that Westport’s a much longer drive and it’s eating up time we don’t have.”
“I know.” What the hell was going on?
“Oh, and the market guy said that if I spoke to you I should tell you, and I quote, ‘There’ll be no peace for you here until someone does his duty,’ end quote. Do you have any idea what he was talking about?”
Wedding at King's Convenience Page 5