Austin's Revenge (The Townsends Book 4)

by Angie Campbell

  When she realized where he was staring, her eyes narrowed to slits. She seriously considered kicking him in the shins. Why is it he can find my boobs so interesting, but not the rest of me?

  She sighed to herself and snapped her fingers in front of his face. “Mr. Silverman, are you in there?”

  He looked up, blushing when they made eye contact. “Stop calling me Mr. Silverman,” he said, moving on, trying to escape the awkward feeling from getting caught so obviously staring at her chest. “We went to school together. Even if you were three grades behind me.”

  “You still deserve the respect,” she said, rolling her eyes, not sure right now, he really did.

  “Then show me respect. Call me Brock, please.”

  “Mr. Silverman…”

  “I’m not going to stop until you start calling me Brock,” he said with a deep frown. He felt certain she continued to call him by the formal title to keep a distance between them at work, and quite frankly, he was getting tired of it.

  “Fine, Brock,” she said with a much too serious look. “What do you need me to do?”

  He braced himself for her reaction, then uttered the very words that could bring about his early demise. “Find me a wife.”

  “What?” she asked, barely able to remain on her feet.

  “Find me…”

  “I heard you,” she snapped. “What I want to know is why you think I can find you a wife.”

  “Well, you do know which of the ladies in my age range are still single. I’d hate to make some jealous husband angry,” he stated with a shrug of his incredibly wide shoulders. “You know I don’t date. I don’t have time.”

  “So, I know who’s single,” she snarled. “You want me to give you a list?”

  He just ignored her obvious sarcasm and shook his head. “No,” he said, turning his back on her.

  She breathed a sigh of relief, thinking he had been playing a bad joke, and the gig was now up. He tended to be a bit of a jokester. Granted, none of his previous jokes had ever been this bad. Her relief proved, however, to be premature. “I don’t have time to date. You need to find me someone to marry. I need a wife. This is the best way to do this quickly.”

  He needs a brain transplant. A wife, indeed. “If you don’t have time to date, what makes you think you’ll have time for a wife?” she growled out, struggling not to throw something at his head.

  “I’m thirty-one-years-old. I’m tired of waiting for the right woman to fall in my lap. I want children.” Maybe if I tripped her as she was walking past me, I could get her to fall in my lap. It took him a serious struggle not to chuckle out-loud at that thought.

  She barely suppressed a growl as she ran a hand over the little lion statue on his desk. He used it as a paperweight just like his father did before he gave it to him when he took over the running of the paper. “Children need time with their father. Are you going to take the time once they’re here?”

  “Why are you so worried about my future wife and children? Are you volunteering to be the one, and bare me the other?” he asked, then held his breath.

  “No,” she squeaked, taking a step back.

  “Then I need your help,” he grumbled, hoping this game would eventually play out to his advantage.

  “How exactly do you think this is going to work?” she asked, slowly regaining her composure.

  “Well, you know. Something like they did in the early eighteen-hundreds, or whenever it was. Like a mail-order bride service,” he said, snapping his fingers as he turned back to face her.

  “I am not a matchmaking service. Or a mail-order bride service,” she snarled, her beautiful blue eyes snapping. “Whatever fancy name you give it, it’s still not my job. I’m not doing this.”

  “Hey, look at it this way, you’ll only have to do this once,” he grinned, sounding like he was enjoying himself.

  “I’m not even doing it once. You can find your own wife,” she snapped again, finding it increasingly more difficult to hold back the tears. “I’m sure all you’ll have to do is announce you want to get married. You’ll have more than enough volunteers to pick from.”

  “No, you’ll have to do this,” he continued, once again pacing in front of his desk, and brushing her knees every time he passed her. “I don’t have time. You’ll have to vet all the possibilities beforehand, then I can pick from your suggestions.”

  “Suggestions? You’re not picking out a suit and tie here. You’re going to be living with this woman for the rest of your life.”

  “I’ll need at least three choices to choose from,” he went on like she hadn’t spoken.

  “Seriously?” she asked, for the first time in her life, wanting to snap someone’s head off their shoulders. She’d been angry with the man before, but not like this. “Have you taken a fall and hit your head?”

  He held one hand up in the air to stop her from continuing with what could promise to be a seriously long rant. “Oh, one more thing.”

  “Yes?” she asked, still holding out hope that this was all some horrible joke.

  “She can only be as young as twenty-two. I’m afraid if she’s any younger than that, then we won’t have anything in common. I don’t know. Do you think that’s too young?”

  “Grr,” was all he got when he turned to look at her.

  “Okay, twenty-two it is, and no older than thirty. She needs to have plenty of childbearing years left.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want me to just get you a broodmare?” she snarled.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t understand your question. I’m not starting a horse ranch. I have enough horses already.”

  She knew he had caught the sarcasm but was choosing to ignore it. He wasn’t one half of the zany twins for nothing. “Whatever. When do I need to have these glowing recommendations ready?”

  “This time next week.”

  “Next Monday?” she nearly yelled before getting herself back under control. “Are you out of your crazy little mind?”

  “No. I’ve really put a lot of thought into this. I’m ready to get married.” And I’m doing my best to push you in the right direction.

  “Whatever,” she snarled, turning to storm out of the office door. Next time I catch him staring at my boobs, I am going to kick him in the shins. She was going to have to take the rest of the day off. There was no way she wanted to deal with him anymore today. She picked her cell phone up off her desk and hit redial.

  “Hello. Something wrong?”

  Of course, one of her best friends since grade school, Jenney Townsend Harris, would know when she had a problem. “How did you guess?”

  “You usually don’t call this time of the day. You’re usually too busy making goo-goo eyes at your sexy boss.”

  “Jenny, please.”

  “Oh no,” the other woman breathed in the phone on her end. “What’s going on? What did that idiot do now?”

  “Can you meet me for lunch? I’m taking the rest of the day off. Whether he likes it or not.”

  “Sapphire Café?”

  “Yeah, sounds great.”