The Marriage Prescription

by Debra Webb

  Here he was berating himself for even thinking about taking advantage of Beth in that way and just maybe she was the one who wanted to take advantage of him…in a manner of speaking. This could be about nothing more than revenge. She knew he was only in town for a couple of weeks. Maybe she wanted to find out what it would be like…

  …what they would be like. Together.

  He had to remember that Beth wasn’t a kid anymore. She was a woman. The image of her soft curves and voluptuous mouth filled his head. A fully grown, very beautiful woman. One who was no longer a virgin…no longer a naive schoolgirl who lived next door and tempted him beyond all reason.

  But she’d married someone else. The niggling of anger that always accompanied that thought poked him now. She hadn’t wanted him. What the hell made him think she wanted him now…for anything other than recreational sex?

  “You’re a mess, pal.” Zach shoved away from the sink and walked into his dimly lit room. He flipped on the overhead light and contemplated what the hell he was going to do now. It would be dark in an hour or so. His mother was going out with a friend for the evening. He had to do something to get his mind off Beth or sex…or both. A strange restless feeling nagged at him relentlessly. A near constant state of arousal was driving him insane. He needed relief.

  He considered for about two seconds going into town to check out the nightlife, but quickly nixed that possibility. There wouldn’t be that much nightlife to check out and, besides, anyone he ran into would know his mother if not him. The fact that he was still a bachelor had not escaped the local single ladies. The last thing he wanted was a steady stream of husband-prospectors dropping by. And they would. He wasn’t blind. He was a pretty good-looking guy and he’d stayed in shape. He had a prestigious job. But it would be the Ashton name that attracted the ladies hereabouts. And he was no glutton for punishment, nor was he the kind of guy who would take advantage of a woman who hoped to negotiate herself a marriage proposal.

  That left one choice as far as alleviating his physical condition. He would just have to work it off. He hadn’t worked out, other than the painting, since he arrived. A nice, long run would take care of his problem. At least temporarily.

  “Why didn’t you think of this before, Ashton?” he muttered as he prowled through drawers in search of suitable running attire. He’d do a few miles hard and fast, then a few more a little slower. By the time he stumbled back to his room he’d be way too exhausted to think about sex.

  Or Beth.

  BETH TIED her running shoes and stood. She glanced around her room and almost sighed at all she had to do. Her laundry was knee-deep. She’d brought home a half-dozen reports she needed to review. The files and the palm-size recorder she used for dictating lay waiting on her bed. And she still didn’t have the darned theme for Mrs. Ashton’s birthday celebration ironed out. The mayor would be hounding her about that in a day or two. But right now, she had to get out of here. Had to run off some of this adrenaline.

  Promising herself she would take care of the reports and the laundry before she went to bed, she started her warm-up routine. She stretched her upper body first, then spent twice as long stretching out her leg muscles. Two or three miles would do her good in more ways than one.

  She had to gather her perspective on the Ellroy case. She was a professional; she couldn’t allow this case or any other to become so personal. But it hurt to watch the young woman’s life hang so precariously in the balance. If a donor wasn’t found, she would certainly die.

  The fact was Laurie Ellroy was no longer Beth’s concern, medically speaking. An oncologist had taken over the case, an excellent doctor who Beth respected. But Mrs. Ellroy remained adamant that Beth was to stay involved. Truth be told, she wanted to be involved. This case—the people involved in this case—meant a great deal to her.

  Beth banished those thoughts, took a deep breath and bent at the waist. She wrapped her fingers around her left ankle and extended in that direction as far as she could and held, stretching out her hamstrings. She would not think of work for the next hour. She would run until she was spent, then she would take a long, leisurely soak in the tub.

  And think about Zach.

  She straightened and shook off that last thought. She would not think about Zach. She’d behaved rashly this afternoon. She’d fully intended to set her plan into motion but at a more appropriate time and place. Zach had been shocked by her actions. He’d talked incessantly the entire drive home, about everything from the weather to the price of gasoline. It had been painful to listen to. He clearly did not want to pursue the issue or her.

  Nothing had changed.

  Tamping down the urge to throw something, she caught her hair in one hand and tucked it quickly into a serviceable ponytail. Maybe nothing had changed, but that didn’t mean change wasn’t possible. On a mental level he might not want to be seduced by Beth. He might even still see her as the kid next door, but on a physical level he’d been more than ready. She’d felt every hard inch of the evidence he could not deny.

  But did she want it to be that way?

  Was she really ready to chase Zach Ashton again?

  She glared out her bedroom window and in the direction of his, the way she’d done a thousand times as an infatuated adolescent. As if she’d somehow summoned him he stepped into view. Without thought she moved to the window, leaned against the bureau there and reluctantly took in the whole picture. She wanted to ignore the rows of lush roses and still-flowering shrubs that made up the east garden that stood between them, and scented the air with their enticing fragrance. Wanted to tune out the sexy melody emanating from the radio playing softly from its perch on her bedside table. The same music she’d barely noticed only moments ago. The sun was setting, spreading pink and purple hues across the landscape, adding another layer of sensuality to her private fantasy as she imagined what it would be like to be in that room with him as she watched him move about.

  When she could bear the tension no longer she jerked open the top drawer of the bureau and snagged her binoculars.

  “You are truly pathetic,” she muttered. She hadn’t done anything this juvenile since she was seventeen. Even the knowledge that her current actions were more rash than her earlier display as a sex-starved nympho couldn’t stop the compulsion now driving her. She had to see. She brought the binoculars her father had given her for bird watching on her twelfth birthday to her eyes and peered into Zach’s bedroom window.

  Suddenly she was a teenager again and her heart skittered in her chest. Her breath hitched when her gaze flowed over the wide planes of his shoulders, down his strong, bare back and to a lean waist. A towel hung loosely on his narrow hips. He was searching for something in his bureau. With every bend and reach, every twist, muscles flexed and contracted beneath tanned skin. He fished a pair of shorts from a drawer and grinned as if he’d hit pay dirt. That funny little flip-flop in her chest that always occurred whenever he smiled, did so even now with so much distance between them…with her peeping at him through ancient binoculars.

  She’d seen Zach in swimming trunks dozens of times. She remembered what a great body he’d had, but it was even better now. Time and maturity had sculpted him a magnificent torso. Her respiration increased, keeping time with the impatient pounding in her chest. He dragged a T-shirt from another drawer and tossed it toward the bed to join the shorts he’d selected. Her gaze jerked back to that awesome chest where a sprinkling of silken hair adorned amazing pecs, then narrowed and plunged toward his naval. The outline of his lean hips was clear above the contrasting white towel.

  “Mercy,” she breathed. The man was gorgeous. The lightning quick combustion of heat deep inside her and the racing of her heart made it difficult to breathe. She had to stop this. She shouldn’t be—

  The towel dropped to the floor.

  She gasped. Then stopped breathing altogether.

  He moved toward the bed, his long legs all hard muscle…and, oh my dear, he was magnificent. He c
ertainly hadn’t been shorted in any department—not brains, not looks, not…she never imagined…

  What was she doing?

  Beth lowered the binoculars and spun away from the window. Belatedly, her mouth gaped. She’d been gawking at a stark naked Zach who had no idea he was being watched.

  She was sick. Dragging in a ragged gulp of air, Beth shoved the damning binoculars back into the drawer and slammed it shut. Twenty-four hours in Zach’s presence and already she’d regressed to those hormone-crazed, dreaded days when she’d thought of nothing else but him.

  She had to get a grip. If he ever found out…

  She shuddered. She didn’t even want to think about that. After her little show this afternoon, he probably already thought she was a prime candidate for the psych ward. And maybe she was, because in spite of it all, she still wanted to go through with her decision to seduce him. The image of him standing there, completely, unabashedly naked, a semiarousal clearly delineating his well-endowed manhood formed in her head. Her pulse leapt as desire zinged through her. She wanted him all right. And, somehow, she intended to have him if just once. Then the mystery of him would be solved—mentally speaking. Lord knew she’d now seen all there was to see physically. They could be together…just once. Then she’d know he was just like any other man, admittedly an incredibly handsome and intelligent one who was seriously hung, a mere man nonetheless.

  Her plan could prove once and for all that he wasn’t the god she’d made him out to be all those years ago.

  With that theory seen to fruition, maybe she could get over him once and for all.

  Determined to plot a slightly more subtle but effective course, Beth headed out for a badly needed, stress-relieving run. She was going to do this her way, on her own terms. She grinned as she bounded through the kitchen door and down the steps. The charming, moderately arrogant Zach Ashton would be at her mercy.

  Before he ever figured out what she was up to she would have proven her theory.

  This time he would be the one left behind.

  “FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE, you’re not dressed,” Colleen Ashton exclaimed, aghast, as Zach descended the staircase.

  He glanced down at himself, then raised a skeptical eyebrow. “Of course, I am,” he countered. “Just not for going out out.”

  His mother waved a hand and huffed a breath. “I thought you might accompany us to dinner.”

  He stopped on the bottom tread and leaned against the polished mahogany newel post. “I don’t think Harold would appreciate my presence,” Zach teased. Harold Winthrop had courted his mother for seven years to no avail. Though Colleen enjoyed his attention and the perception of desirability cast for her peers to see, she had never once looked at any man seriously. Even after all these years she was still in love with Zach’s father. He knew it and so did she. Now there was what a relationship was supposed to be, he reminded himself. And he had no clue how to make one like that happen. More proof that he wasn’t worthy as husband material.

  “You go right back up those stairs and get dressed,” she ordered in her firmest don’t-you-dare-argue-with-me tone. “Harold should simply consider himself lucky that I agree to have dinner with him at all.”

  Zach couldn’t help a smile. “I’m quite sure he does.”

  Colleen assumed an expression of impatient tolerance. “Are you certain you won’t join us, Zach. I hate to think of you here all alone.”

  He took the final step down, closed the distance between them and deposited a heartfelt kiss on his mother’s cheek. “Don’t worry about me, I’m going for a run.”

  A frown furrowed her forehead. “You young people,” she fussed. “You’re always running from something.”

  If she only knew, Zach mused.

  “I’ll have dinner later. I’m sure I can rustle up something. You—” using one finger he tilted her chin upward and looked directly into her worried gray eyes “—have a good time.” His smile widened to a grin. “And you tell Harold I’m quickly growing suspect of his intentions. Seven years is a long time.”

  She harrumphed. “This coming from a man who’s yet to marry for the first time.” She lifted one elegant eyebrow. “And who is rapidly nearing forty.”

  “I’m thirty-eight, so what?” Was everyone determined to remind him of his age? Zach crossed his arms over his chest and studied his mother with mounting suspicion. “If I didn’t know you better I’d think you were teasing, but I know that look. Since when did you decide I need to get married?”

  She daintily cleared her throat, a slight blush rising to her cheeks. “It is what most people do,” she suggested from beneath lowered lashes. “I can’t say that I don’t have the occasional yearning for a grandchild.”

  The statement startled him, but he recovered swiftly. He rubbed his chin nonchalantly, somewhere in the back of his mind noting the five-o’clock shadow rasping against his palm. “A grandchild?” He considered that concept, carefully restraining the rush of emotions the sincere yearning in her eyes evoked. “I suppose I could work on that,” he offered awkwardly. “But I can’t promise you anything. You know I’m too busy for that kind of relationship.”

  She shook a manicured finger at him. “That attitude is a mistake Zacharius Ashton. You’ll wake up one of these days and find yourself old and alone.”

  Zach held up both hands in surrender. “Okay, okay.” He almost frowned at the vehemence in her tone. He’d never heard his mother speak so adamantly regarding the subject. Maybe it was the heart attack that had started her thinking of life’s briefness. “I’ll work on it,” he promised with no idea how he would accomplish such a proposal.

  She sighed, her shoulders sagged and she looked suddenly frail to him. “Helen had hoped Beth would…” she began, then seemed to realize what she was about to say and thought better of it.

  He cocked his head. “What? That Beth would have a child? I suppose if that had happened the two of you might be on speaking terms now, for the child’s sake,” he suggested, the ire he instantly felt at the notion completely irrational.

  Colleen squared her shoulders in defiance. “This has nothing to do with my relationship with Helen.” She shrugged, an obvious attempt at appearing disinterested. “I just meant that Beth would probably remarry and produce a grandchild for Helen. I can only hope that you don’t intend to leave me in the lurch.”

  The irritation he had no business feeling inched toward anger. “You’re saying that Beth is involved?”

  His mother looked taken aback, but not enough so to prevent her bloodhound instincts from kicking in. “I’m not sure involved is the right word,” she hedged.

  “So she’s dating,” he countered, determined to have the meaning of her statement.

  “Well, of course she is. She’s a beautiful young woman. Smart, too. A doctor,” she said with clear awe. “What man in his right mind wouldn’t want her?”

  Zach clenched his jaw. That shot had been aimed directly at him. He knew it. Was his mother on some sort of mission to throw him and Beth together? He stilled. Had she somehow talked Beth into some sort of crazy grandchild scheme? That would explain Beth’s sudden about-face. At first she’d acted as if she didn’t even want to be around him, then, the next thing he knew, she was kissing him.

  “Mother, you haven’t—” The doorbell sounded, cutting off his intended accusation.

  “That’s Harold. Have a pleasant run, Zach.” She gifted him with a quick pat on the arm and hurried away in a rush of perfectly coifed gray hair and pink silk designer suit.

  Zach shook his head and started for the back door. He had to be reading too much into his mother’s comment. She would never attempt to interfere with his social life, not on that level anyway. And no way would Beth go along with such a ludicrous idea. The whole notion was outrageous. Apparently his little vacation was wreaking havoc with his ability to reason.

  His mother indicated that Beth had a full social life. Did that mean that she was dating someone special right now? Then
why had she kissed him like that today? He could still taste her lips. He licked his own. Could feel her body pressed against his. He’d wanted her in the worst way.

  Enough, Ashton, he ordered, silently cursing himself for the fool he was. He wasn’t supposed to be thinking about Beth or sex, he reminded himself. It took every ounce of determination he possessed to push aside that line of thinking, but he managed.

  ZACH JOGGED at a steady pace for about twenty minutes, his focus trained on work and what he might be missing. He’d given Victoria a call that morning and she had assured him that all was well. But still, he missed being there. He missed the exhilarating adrenaline rush of a major legal coup. He missed it all—getting up at the crack of dawn to run, reviewing cases with Victoria and Ian, working until seven or eight and having dinner and an occasional evening of physical pleasure with a lady friend. What else could a man ask for?

  Beth’s deep brown eyes zoomed into vivid focus, fracturing all other thought. Everything about her—the sound of her voice, her sweet smell, the feel of her skin—tumbled into his head, wrecking any hope of keeping thoughts of her away. How would he ever survive the next two weeks? As much as he loved his mother, coming back home was proving one huge mistake.

  There were far too many memories here. Instantly, Beth’s taste sprang to mind. He clenched his jaw and tried to ignore the hunger gnawing at him. How was it he could still want her so badly? She was beautiful and he had loved her for as long as he could remember, but that love was supposed to be the brother-sister kind now. After all, she’d married someone else. He should have moved on…thought he had.

  He called himself every kind of idiot as he lunged forward, increasing his pace, trying to outrun his thoughts. His mother’s words, you’re always running from something, echoed in his ears. Was she that perceptive, or was he simply that easy to read? He was running, all right. Running from what Beth made him feel…from the past he couldn’t change.