The Marriage Maker

by Christie Ridgway

  The wine still in her mouth, Cleo blinked. He was just shrugging off the idea of making love with her—until! he’d said, unless!—when she was wearing the most sophisticated, most sexy dress she’d ever worn in her life.

  He must have taken her silence as a prompt to go on, because he now looked her full in the face. “And, Cleo, second, and best of all…” He paused a moment, deal-making charisma oozing off him. “If you marry me, I’ll buy the Beansprouts’s building and list the deed in your name.”

  That’s when Cleo finally tried to swallow, quickly, so she could get right to telling him what she thought of such a businesslike…bribe. Yes. That’s what it was, all right, a bribe. But either the wine went down the wrong way or her throat was as angry as the rest of her and forgot to actually accept the liquid.

  In any case, instead of telling Ethan off, Cleo found herself fighting for breath. She choked and coughed, thinking she might die from lack of oxygen, instead of at the hands of the state, a much more predictable fate considering what she felt like doing to Ethan.

  “Cleo! Are you all right?”

  Her napkin to her mouth, she looked up, into the concerned face of John Riker. His wife, Rosemary, bustled over and started patting Cleo briskly on the back.

  Thanks to Rosemary and a couple of sips of water, Cleo managed to catch her breath and then smile at her longtime friends. “I haven’t seen you two in ages,” she said, her voice only a little hoarse from all the coughing.

  She stood to hug Rosemary, and then turned to John. A sweet smile transformed his craggy face to something just this side of beautiful. He took her hands in his huge ones. “Cleo, my love.” His arms came around her and he swept her up for a bearlike squeeze.

  Cleo giggled. Embracing John was like embracing one of the ageless pines surrounding Blue Mirror Lake. He was as dear as he was sturdy. With an appreciative smack, he kissed her on the lips.

  From the other side of the table came the sound of an ominously cleared throat. Cleo ignored it. Ignored him. Ethan. She still couldn’t believe he would so cold-bloodedly frame his second proposal of marriage, and she needed a little time to decide exactly how she was going to tell him no, no way, no how.

  But he cleared his throat again, and John set her on her feet. “Won’t you introduce us?” John asked in his booming voice.

  Cleo sighed, but turned toward Ethan. His eyes looked kind of glittery and he was staring at John. “Rosemary and John Riker, this is an…acquaintance of mine, Ethan Redford.”

  He stood as she spoke and came around the table to shake first Rosemary’s, then John’s hand. “I’m a friend of Cleo’s,” he corrected. “A close friend.” His palm came to rest on her shoulder.

  Cleo ignored the heat running down her arm. “I’ve known John since we were kids.”

  John teasingly tugged one of the tendrils of hair around her face. “But you sure look all grown up tonight.”

  As if Ethan even noticed it, darn him. Cleo pushed lightly against John’s shoulder. “Flatterer,” she said fondly.

  Ethan’s fingers squeezed her shoulder. “Don’t let us hold you up.”

  Cleo turned her head to look at him. His face was a perfect mask of politeness, but she could feel the tension in his body. Of course, he’d just asked her to marry him and she’d yet to give him her answer. She liked the idea he might be a little anxious about it.

  She smiled gaily at Rosemary and John. “Please say you can join us. It would be so much more fun as a foursome.” Cleo ignored a second squeeze from Ethan’s hand.

  Rosemary cocked an eyebrow and darted a look at Ethan. “Oh, I don’t know…”

  But John didn’t need to be asked twice. “For a drink, Rosie. Then we’ll get our own table. I want to know what Cleo’s been up to.” He chuckled. “And who she’s been up to it with.”

  Rosemary rolled her eyes. “John.”

  Cleo just whacked him with another light punch and grinned. She didn’t mind John’s teasing if it meant Ethan would have to squirm for a while.

  Once they were all seated at the table and the other couple’s drinks served, John leaned back and gave Cleo another once-over. “Have I mentioned you look like a million bucks? You’re going to break my heart a second time, I swear.”

  Cleo grinned. “I may take you back just for the compliments.”

  Ethan’s chair made a loud crrrck as he scraped it closer to the table.

  Rosemary smiled and put her hand on her husband’s massive forearm. “You’re making Cleo’s date nervous, John, with all this talk.” She turned toward Ethan. “Cleo and John were an item once upon a time. She was the best thing that ever happened to him.”

  John grinned. “Until she tore my heart out of my chest and stomped all over it.”

  It was Cleo’s turn to roll her eyes. “We were in college, John. You loved beer more than you ever loved me, admit it.”

  John’s grin died. “Nah, Cleo, honey, I really loved you.” But the light in his eyes was for his wife when he turned his gaze to her. “But then I met Rosemary.”

  Cleo smiled, remembering, and sent a significant look Ethan’s way. “Whom I introduced him to, by the way.”

  “How…fortunate for all three of you,” he said. He wore that deal-maker’s poker face of his. “How long ago did you say this was?” he addressed this last to Rosemary.

  She sipped at her glass of red wine. “Hmm. Five years ago? We’ve been married for two.”

  “That’s right,” Cleo said. “You were married the same week I opened Bean sprouts.”

  “A business that certainly deserves to remain open,” Ethan murmured. Beneath the table, he touched her hand. He linked his fingers with hers and held on tight when she instantly tried to pull away.

  Rosemary smiled, unaware of the under tones beneath Ethan’s compliment. “Cleo does wonders with the business and the children.”

  “Always knew she’d make a success of it,” John added. “Cleo is a detail person.”

  “Hey, come on, you guys.” Cleo squirmed in her seat, embarrassed.

  “Now you shush,” Rosemary answered. “There’s no reason we can’t tell Ethan about you.”

  Cleo groaned, feeling pretty certain that for some reason her friends had decided to foster the romance they supposed—oh, so wrongly—was going on between her and Ethan.

  “I’d like to know everything about Cleo,” Ethan said smoothly. “Please go on.”

  Cleo groaned again. The only thing he needed to know was how quickly she could spit out the letters n-o. “Really, guys—”

  “She’s the most sensible woman I know.”

  Rosemary’s obviously heart felt words penetrated Cleo like a blade. Sensible? She stared at her friend. Is that how Rosemary saw her, too?

  “Why I remember a time in college when the rest of us were gung-ho for a road trip to San Francisco. While we were throwing stuff in back packs and arguing about how to divvy up the driving, it was Cleo who checked the road conditions, called the weather service, and determined that not only was our car without a first-aid kit, it didn’t have a spare tire, either.” Rosemary smiled. “And you were right, Cleo. We should have listened to you. We ran into a storm two hours out and had a flat six hours after that.”

  “And I bet Cleo was the only one who knew how to change a tire,” Ethan said.

  A chill ran down Cleo’s back. “I didn’t go,” she said slowly. “I had an early class on the day they were planning to get back and I was worried about missing it.”

  Rosemary beamed. “What did I tell you? Always sensible.”

  Cleo swallowed. “But, remember? You had a terrific time. You brought me back one of those little cable cars from a souvenir shop. I keep it at Beansprouts.” Now that she thought about it, she didn’t know what made her give it that place of honor on her desk. To remind her of what? That she’d never seen San Francisco because she’d made the wise, sensible choice?

  “Don’t pout, honey,” John said teasingly. “If we all follo
wed our bliss who would be around to mop up the mess we left behind? We need you practical, capable types.”

  Cleo hid behind her glass of wine. If we all followed our bliss…John did that. He’d taken the same business courses she had and ended up with his own successful enterprise—he made a fortune in woodworking, crafting unique custom cabinetry and such with his own two hands. His bliss.

  Conversation continued around the table and Cleo let it go on without her. John said they needed the practical, capable types. Like her.

  Was she this sturdy old stick that everyone saw her as? Sure she loved Bean sprouts and was happy working at her business, but when she thought of following her bliss…

  She slid her gaze toward Ethan. And like that, she remembered his kiss, the sensation of his palms cupping her face, the catch in his voice when he peeled her dress from her shoulders….

  Her fingers tightened on the stem of her wine-glass and she tugged on her other fingers, the ones Ethan still claimed. Without a pause in what he was saying to John and Rosemary, he held on.

  Cleo swallowed, her gaze following his handsome profile. Bliss.

  “Are you okay?” Rosemary’s voice snuck under the louder conversation of the men.

  Cleo swallowed again. “I’m…not sure.” Which even to her own ears sounded odd. She was always sure about things. Sensible, safe choices. Practical decisions.

  “He’s to die for,” Rosemary whispered, her gaze flicking toward Ethan. “And when I saw the way he looks at you and the way you look at him…whoa!”

  Cleo raised her eyebrows and thought maybe her friend should consider another line of work. Rosemary was an artist, which should have made her an excellent observer, but though Cleo might be guilty of going moony over Ethan, the reverse was definitely not true. He saw her as a sensible-practical-capable person.

  Not as a to-drool-for woman.

  Anyway, people shouldn’t marry someone they think of as practical and capable any more than someone should marry over a little lust.

  “He has a child,” she told Rosemary suddenly. “A baby. His sister died and he has custody of his nephew.” The thought of Jonah’s blond chubbiness made her stomach clench. And then clench harder, when she thought of the hard, golden man who cared enough about his dead sister and her child to do anything to keep him close.

  “Like your mother and Summer,” Rosemary said softly.

  Cleo nodded. Like her mother and Summer… When Cleo’s aunt Blanche died, before Cleo was even born, Yvette and Celeste had raised Blanche’s daughter Summer. Yvette looked after her while Celeste was in Louisiana, but when Celeste returned and Yvette married and moved to the house behind the B and B, Summer had continued to live with Celeste. Summer, Cleo and Jasmine, and their cousin Frannie had been raised as sisters, loved each other as sisters.

  That was what Ethan wanted for Jonah. Love and family.

  “I—” she broke off and looked desperately at Rosemary as a scary, life-altering realization crystallized in her mind. “Marriage is forever, isn’t it?”

  Rosemary smiled softly. “It doesn’t seem that long when you’re in love with the person you’re married to.”

  In love.

  Cleo gripped her wine glass again. “Rosemary, talk me out of something. Tell me to think sensibly. Tell me to be practical.”

  Rosemary’s smile widened. “Are you talking to me? I went to San Francisco, remember? I’m an artist.”

  “You follow your bliss.”

  Rosemary nodded. “Always, Cleo. And if I take a wrong path or two, well the bliss more than makes up for it.”

  Oh, God. Cleo wished Rosemary hadn’t said that. But though she could wish the whole conversation away, could wish they’d never run into Rosemary and John, none of the wishing would change the truth.

  Cleo met her bliss the day she met Ethan Redford. She’d fallen in love with him that instant, as improbable and impractical as it sounded.

  And sensible, capable Cleo just couldn’t deny it any longer. Maybe she didn’t want to. Maybe at twenty-seven years old it was time to damn the consequences and embrace her bliss.

  Embrace Ethan.

  A delighted, thrilled shiver wiggled down her spine. She squeezed Ethan’s hand and he stopped talking to John and gave her a questioning look.

  Cleo took a deep breath. There would be time to make him drool later. “Why don’t we go ahead and tell them?” she said.

  Ethan stilled and his eyes widened. Oh, they were so heartbreakingly blue. “You mean…?”

  She nodded and then tried smiling, but she wasn’t sure how it came off when she knew there was more than a hint of tears in her eyes. “John, Rosemary. Ethan and I are going to be married.”

  Around the table, she noted varied reactions. Rosemary wore an expression of gentle delight. John was out-and-out grinning, which told Cleo that somehow Ethan had worked his deal-maker magic and already made a buddy.

  As for Ethan himself…he didn’t look at all surprised that the sensible woman he’d asked to marry him had made such a practical decision as to commit to a man who offered brick-and-mortar buildings instead of tender emotion.

  She sighed, letting the reality of what she’d just done wash over her. She, practical, sensible Cleo Monroe, loved Ethan Redford. There was no question about that.

  But would she ever be capable of getting Ethan to love her back?

  Four

  The next evening the doorbell rang at Ethan’s rented house. Seated in the deep, comfortable couch, he threw down the report he’d been reading.

  “That’s her,” he told his nephew. Jonah sat in a hammock-like baby chair on the coffee table in front of the couch. “It’s Cleo.”

  The baby blinked, and then rolled his eyes in the direction of the striking view of Blue Mirror Lake from the room’s huge picture window. Ethan followed his gaze, then stared at the French doors leading to the spacious deck—the last possible escape route before he made what could be the biggest mistake of his life.

  “I wanted a mother figure, bud,” he whispered to the baby. But instead, the certainly attractive, yet maternal Cleo of his memory had turned into a tantalizing siren last night. Oh, he’d known she had that side to her, too—it wasn’t as if he’d forgotten the time he’d kissed her mouth and touched her luscious skin—but he’d thought he could focus on her mothering qualities.

  Well, hell, not in that piece of shrink-wrap she’d called a dress last night. He’d barely kept his hands to himself and then his irritation under control when another man’s hands—those of her old boy friend John—had so naturally touched her.

  The doorbell rang again. With a sigh, Ethan stood. It wasn’t as if he had any choice. He’d proposed, she’d accepted, and then they’d calmly discussed their future plans. Plans that included getting Jonah accustomed to her as soon as possible. Hence tonight’s dinner.

  He pulled open the door just as Cleo rang the bell once more. He hoped the echoing sound would account for the stupid expression he figured took over his face, because even in a casual pair of jeans and a lightweight apricot-colored turtleneck, she made his blood chug hotly through his veins, just as she had the night before in the slinky dress.

  “Hi.” Cleo held out a bottle of wine and smiled.

  Chug-a-chug-chug went his blood, pulsing a slow burn through his body. Hell. Ethan set his jaw. How terrible would it be if he grabbed the wine but then shut the door on her pretty, tempting face?

  Cleo stepped closer and lifted the bottle she held higher. “Jasmine said this would go well with the meal you conned her into making us.”

  Ethan found his voice. “I wanted the meal to be something special.” That was before he’d been having these doubts. Really, it wasn’t too late to call the whole thing off. Some other woman, some woman who looked less like something he wanted to savor for dessert and more like a Mrs. Cleaver mother-type who would make desserts, would be better. Safer.

  If this marriage—if Ethan himself—took the sparkle out of Cle
o’s wide violet eyes, he’d never be able to look himself in the face again. “Cleo—”

  But her gaze drifted past him and her face changed, her mouth softening. “Oh,” she said softly. “There he is.” The wine was thrust against his chest and he caught it as she brushed by him and headed for Jonah.

  Something contracted pain fully inside the emptiness in Ethan’s chest. There had been tears in Cleo’s eyes. He closed his, damn grateful. No matter what risks, Jonah deserved a woman who cried the first time she saw him after agreeing to be his mother.

  Ethan shut the door and turned to see Cleo pluck the baby from his chair. She held him up, so they were nearly nose to nose, and Jonah gave her that hopeful don’t-I-know-you smile of his that never failed to stab Ethan. It seemed to be the smile of a baby who was desperately looking for his place in the world.

  Cleo fussed over Jonah, praising his intelligence, size and beauty. The baby listened avidly to each soft word and his hands reached out for Cleo’s face. She cuddled him against her chest.

  Ethan swallowed. “Can I get you something? A drink?”

  Cleo didn’t take her gaze off the baby. “How about a glass of the wine I brought and some directions?”

  “Directions?”

  She flicked a glance Ethan’s way. The sparkle was there, bright as Christmas lights. “To the diaper changing area. I think this guy could use my services.”

  Ethan pointed her down the hallway to the baby’s bedroom, then poured a glass of wine for each of them. He trailed her to Jonah’s room, following the sound of more feminine nonsense talk. Her diaper-changing skills were a lot more professional than his first efforts had been.

  “You’re good,” he said admiringly. “When I first started changing Jonah I had pangs of guilt over my contribution to the landfill problem. About one in four diapers actually stayed on him.”