Zane had felt it, too. He took her mouth hungrily and she threaded her fingers through his hair. He drew his lips down over her chin, lower to the pulse of her throat.
“Ah, Ellie,” He groaned.
“Zane,” she panted. She’d always been so careful with men in the past. She kissed, of course, enjoyed the physical pleasure of it. But she never gave of herself, not of her heart. Not like this.
“Ah, sweetie.” Zane exhaled, pressing his cheek to her chest.
They were on dangerous ground now. They both knew it.
“I want to make love to you,” he murmured as he lifted his head to look into her eyes.
“I want that, too,” she breathed.
He swallowed. “But I think we should wait. I think it’s worth waiting for, don’t you?”
She nodded, unsure if his words disappointed her or made her love him all the more. Both. She did want to make love with Zane, but a long time ago she had decided that perhaps her father sleeping with so many women was part of why marriage meant so little to him. And if she married, it would be forever. She wanted to be married to Zane forever.
“You’re right,” she whispered, smoothing his hair where she had tousled it with her fingers. “But we don’t have to wait long, do we?”
He laughed. “How’s this sound? My cousin Carter is getting married in South Carolina in a month. I was going to invite you anyway. How about if we announce our engagement then? All my family will be there. It will be the perfect time, and it will give me time to get you a ring.”
Still sitting on his lap, she smoothed his cheek. She could feel the slightest bit of beard stubble on his chin, and she liked the sensation. “Sounds perfect.”
“Now, it’s a Saturday,” he warned. “So we have to go down on Friday.”
“It’s not a problem.”
“You’re sure you can miss a couple of days at work? I don’t want to tell everyone you’re coming and then show up like bachelor number three.”
She laughed. “I wouldn’t miss Carter and Amy’s wedding for the world.”
“Then it’s settled. What kind of ring would you like?”
“Whatever you pick out will be perfect. I think you know me better than I know myself,” she confessed. “Just make it a surprise!”
“Surprise it is. Now come on, let me take you home.” He slid her off his lap onto the swing, setting it in motion.
“I don’t have to go yet.” She looked at her watch. “It’s still early.”
“You do have to go.” He got up off the swing and adjusted his shorts. “Because if you don’t go, I’m going to pick you up in my arms and carry you up to my bed and ravish you. Now come on.” He offered his hand.
Laughing, touched, she accepted his hand and followed him across the porch and down the steps. At this moment, she’d follow Zane anywhere.
The phone was ringing when Elise walked in the door. After taking her to her car and then following her to be sure she got home safely, Zane hadn’t even walked her to the door. He said she was still too tempting, that he needed to stay away from beds tonight as long as she was near. They had kissed through his open car window. It was an innocent enough kiss but there was an exhilarating hint of anticipation in it.
“How do you feel about autumn weddings?” he had called after her as she went up the sidewalk to her door.
“I love them,” she called to him not caring if anyone heard her. “And I love you! Just make it early autumn.”
He was still laughing when she slipped in her door and closed it behind her.
Elise picked up her phone, kicking her sandals that were still damp and now beginning to rub at her heel. “Hello.”
“Oh, thank heaven!” Liz exclaimed. “Where have you been? I was afraid you’d been kidnapped or something.”
“What?” Elise dropped both sandals on the living room carpet and left them there. She flipped on a lamp.
“I’ve been trying to reach you for hours. You car was still in the parking lot. We thought maybe you’d gone out to show some property and ridden in the client’s car, but then you didn’t even answer your cell.”
As she padded down the hall toward her office, Elise thought about how she had tossed her purse in the back seat of Zane’s car when he picked her up at the office. She’d never thought about it again until they returned to the office a short time ago to get her car. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you.” She was actually touched that Liz had noticed she was gone and had worried about her. Maybe things weren’t as bad as she thought between them.
“Gallagher was pretty bent out of shape when he couldn’t get a hold of you. I think he left a hundred messages on your home and cell phones.”
Feeling guilty, Elise glanced at her answering machine blinking in the dark on her desk. She flipped on the light switch, illuminating the room. “What did he need?”
“Some guy called from Lindsborg Associates.” Liz sounded like she was reading the name off something.
“Lindsborg?” Elise had been so busy fighting for Zane’s land, between that and her usual showings, she hadn’t thought twice about Lindsborg Associates and their golf course since she talked to some guy in their acquisitions department almost two weeks ago. He’d said he would get back to her. She couldn’t even remember his name—Stroudsburg, Stromsburg. She assumed she’d never hear from them again.
“That’s what it says. Lindsborg Associates. A Robert Stroudsburg called twice for you.”
“I’ll call him first thing in the morning,” Elise said, reaching for her Husband Finder checklist on her desk. She knew she had to come clean with Zane on it eventually, but she thought he might like to see it. She’d written all over it in different colors of ink and crossed out much of what the author had printed.
“Thanks for calling me, Liz. I’m sorry I made you worry.”
“So exactly where the heck were you? Mark said he saw you at the copy machine at three and then no one saw you again the rest of the day.”
“I made the Jacobs’ sale. Zane is buying the land.”
“Wow, that’s great. Congratulations. I told Joe you knew what you were doing there. I knew you were handling Zane Keaton just fine.”
“I wasn’t handling him, Liz.” She took breath. If she didn’t tell someone, she was just going to burst. “He asked me tonight to marry him,” she blurted out.
There was pause on the other end of the line. Brief, but definitely a pause. “What did you say?”
Elise was disappointed that her friend didn’t sound happier for her. “I said yes, of course. This is what I’ve been waiting for my whole adult life. This is what we talked about, Liz.” She looked down at checklist in her hand. “The book worked. The list worked.”
“Zane isn’t anything like what you set out looking for.”
Elise tossed the paper on her desk. “I thought you would be happy for me.”
“I am. I am if you’re happy,” Liz backpedaled. “I just hope you know what you’re doing.”
“So do I,” Elise confessed thoughtfully, dropping into her chair. “So do I.”
Chapter Nine
Serious lifestyle differences can spell disaster in a marriage. Opposites may attract, but they don’t stick. If you’re looking for a forever marriage, choose a mate with your own background and ambitions.
Joe Gallagher walked into the conference room of Waterfront Realty and offered his hand to Zane who was just rising from his chair. “You must be Mr. Keaton,” he said, taking Zane’s hand and pumping it enthusiastically. “Joe Gallagher, one of the partners of this fine firm.”
Zane looked to Elise who was sorting through the papers on the mahogany table, taking care to be sure each party received the properly signed forms. Zane wouldn’t even have to go to settlement tomorrow as his lawyer was handling it for him.
“Nice to meet you,” Zane said. “Elise has spoken of you.”
“Well, we’re very proud of Elise.” Gallagher drew himself up to his full
five-foot-nine frame. “She did a hell of a job on this deal.”
Zane smirked, looking back at her again. “That she did.”
“A smart woman,” Gallagher went on. “Nice woman.”
“I like to think so.” Zane winked at her.
Elise eyed him. She hadn’t told anyone in the office yet, but Liz, that she was engaged. She hadn’t told her father yet, either. After all it wasn’t official yet. It wouldn’t be until next weekend when they announced it at the rehearsal dinner party, Friday night. Zane was giving her the ring, then.
It wouldn’t be real until then, although they’d already picked a November first wedding date. Nothing fancy. They would be wed at the little country church that Zane had attended his entire life. Elise liked it there; she liked the people. And then, they planned a reception at the local country club that she hadn’t even known Zane belonged to. He’d told her that he kept his membership just in case he needed a wedding reception. A cancellation had allowed them to make the arrangements on such short notice.
Elise shook her head ever so slightly at Zane, hoping he’d get the message. She knew he wanted to say something about their plans to marry to her boss, but she wasn’t ready. Gallagher was still on the fence about her becoming a partner and he might not take the news well. Truthfully, she was on the fence, too. It was what she had wanted since the day she became an agent here, but now, she just didn’t know. Owning a share of the company would be costly in money and time. She didn’t want to work seven days a week anymore, ten, twelve hours a day. She wanted time to be with Zane. It was crazy, but after getting to know little Alyssa, she even thought she wanted a baby.
“You know, Elise and I are engaged,” Zane said.
As the words came out of Zane’s mouth, Elise wanted to leap across the conference table in her best pair of heels and cover that sexy mouth of his with her hand. She wanted to stuff the cat back in the bag. Instead, she just stood there, smiling pleasantly and stuffing the paperwork into the appropriate folder.
“Is that right?” Gallagher asked stiffly, seeming to puff up. “Well, congratulations.” He looked to Elise and nodded. “I’m certain you’ll be very happy together.”
“Thank you.” Zane grinned. “I know we will because I love Ellie very much.”
Gallagher raised his bushy eyebrows. “Well, good to meet you. Elise, when you get a moment, could I see you in my office?”
“Sure.”
Zane waited until Gallagher was gone and shut the door, leaving him and Elise alone in the boardroom. “You haven’t told anyone?”
She closed her eyes and groaned. “You said we’d make the announcement at Carter’s wedding. I just assumed—”
“How about your father?” Zane made no pretense of hiding his irritation. “You call Edwin?”
“We haven’t been able to catch up with each other.”
Zane made a sound in his throat.
“Zane, I’ve been really busy with this Lindsborg thing, and your paperwork, and those new spec houses off Route Thirteen.”
He slipped off his gray suit jacket that looked so good on him that he could have stood in any boardroom in the world, even her father’s. “Ellie, do you still want to marry me?”
“Of course!” She came around the table. “Zane, of course I want to marry you. I love you.”
He looked down at her, his jacket draped over his arm, his mouth taut. “And I love you and I don’t want to hide that fact. I want to tell everyone. I’ve told everyone.” He threw out his hand. “I love Elise Anne Montgomery,” he shouted.
She closed her eyes, pressing her fingertips to one throbbing temple. “Zane, I work here.”
“So what? Real estate agents don’t fall in love? Don’t marry?” He was raising his voice again.
“Of course they do.” She grabbed his hand, turning him to face her. “But men look at women in their jobs differently, and you know it. I have to be careful of my professional image here.”
“Ah, so we’re talking about your career?”
She looked up at him, searching his blue eyes. “I don’t understand why you’re angry with me. You said we would announce our engagement next Friday. That’s less than two weeks from now. I was going to tell everyone when I got back, including my father.”
Softening, he reached out to rest his hand on her hip. “I don’t want you ducking out on me.”
She shook her head. “I won’t,” she said softly, realizing that she wasn’t the only one anxious about their wedding plans. It hadn’t occurred to her that Zane might be worried, too. It was a big step. What person in their right mind wouldn’t be? “No one is offering me a job in Singapore,” she told him. “And even if they were, I wouldn’t take it.”
He grinned. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.” She lifted on her toes and kissed him. “Now get out of here because I have to go talk to Gallagher, and then I have a lot of work to do before I cut out of here at five.”
He blew her a kiss from the door. “See you for dinner at Pops’?” It had become their weekly ritual. Every Monday, they had dinner—meat loaf—in the lounge with his grandfather and then took him for a walk on the grounds.
“See you at Pops’ and I won’t be late,” she said.
Elise watched Zane go, then gathered up her folders and walked down the hall. She knocked on Gallagher’s door.
“Come in.”
“You wanted to see me, Joe?”
“Close the door.”
She pushed it with the heel of her shoe. As she looked at her boss and his bushy eyebrows, the thought occurred to her that she could quit this job. She didn’t have to listen to what she knew he was going to say. She could just hand him the completed paperwork for the sale and walk out.
What would she do then? Anything she wanted. When she was in high school, she had wanted to be a teacher. Her father had insisted business was the only profession a Montgomery could succeed at. She was beginning to realize that he had been wrong about many things. He was probably wrong about that, too.
“So you’re getting married?”
She nodded.
“Nice catch.”
She eyed Joe. The comment wasn’t worthy of a response.
He teepeed his hands, fingertips to fingertips. “I just want to be sure that you and I are on the same page, is all, Elise.”
“I can do my job and be married.”
He studied her over the rims of his bifocals. “Of course you can,” he placated.
“Every man in this office is married, including you,” she said, “and I resent the insinuation that marriage might prevent me from doing my job.”
“It’s just that as a partner, Elise…” He opened his arms. “It takes a great deal of dedication.” He pulled off his glasses. “Frankly, dear, if you’ll excuse my crudeness, it takes balls.”
Her irritation had turned to anger. How dare he suggest she didn’t have what it took to make it in this business? She was a better salesman than anyone in this building. Hands down. She gritted her teeth. “I’ve got them, Joe. You know I have.”
“It’s just that I have to go back to the partners—”
“I think I’m going to swing this Lindsborg deal,” she blurted out. She hadn’t intended to say anything until she was sure, but he just made her so angry with his platitudes and bushy eyebrows that she hadn’t been able to stop herself.
“Are you now?” The brows went up with renewed interest.
“The vice president of the company may fly in as early as next week to see the Johnston property. It’s perfect for a golf course at the beach. The land’s a steal, even at that exorbitant price,” she told him proudly. And she was proud. It would be a good deal for both parties, and she and Waterfront would make a killing. Not that she really cared about the money, but her face would be back on the sales page of the Web site and even her father, who knew the Lindsborg courses, would be impressed.
Joe leaned over his desk, pressing his hands to his blo
tter. “You make this sale, Elise, and I think that partnership is as good as yours.”
“Fine,” she said. She didn’t even say thank you. She just walked out the door.
Two days later, the telephone on Elise’s nightstand rang. She was already in bed, just drifting off to sleep. She glanced at the clock as she reached for the phone beside her bed. It was eleven-forty.
“Hello?”
“Ellie?”
It was Zane, but it didn’t sound like him. There was something wrong. She sat up in bed and reached for the light. “Zane, what’s wrong, hon?”
“Pops.”
She heard his voice catch in his throat.
“Pops died, Ellie.”
“Oh, Zane, I’m so sorry.” Tears welled in her eyes, not just for Zane’s loss, but her own. She really had loved the old man, which was pretty amazing considering the fact that they had never once shared a verbal conversation.
“I left him about eight, tucked into bed with that stuffed dog you gave him.” Zane’s words were halting. “The nurses called me a few minutes ago. They went in to turn off his TV. You know how he fiddles with the timer. And, he…he was dead. Died in his sleep.”
Elise scrambled out of bed and grabbed a pair of gym shorts she’d left on the floor. “Where are you? Are you at home?”
“I’m going over to the nursing home for just a minute, meeting Meagan there.”
“I can come.”
“No, Ellie, it’s okay. Go back to sleep. I just…I just wanted to tell you…because I knew you loved him, too.” He took a deep breath, and she knew he was fighting not to cry. “I have to go. I’ll talk to you in the morning. I love you, babe.”
“I love you, too.”
Barefoot and Pregnant? Page 11