House Calls: Callaghan Brothers, Book 3

by Zanders, Abbie

  “We contract with you for organic produce and ask you to oversee the harvesting and canning processes. It would be a term type thing, so if after a year or two you feel it’s not in your best interests you can opt out. Aidan is extremely flexible and fair-minded about that kind of thing.”

  “My land?” Maggie asked warily.

  “Stays yours. There will be occasional inspections and whatnot, required by federal regulations, of course. Although I’m sure that Aidan will ask that you provide exclusively for the Celtic Goddess and not any other restaurants.”

  Maggie was stunned. “But I couldn’t possibly do all that.”

  “You will have a staff, equipment, whatever you need. Delegate as much or as little as you want.”

  Maggie sank into a chair. It was too good to be true.

  “The added benefit of all this is that you will be required to have meetings with Aidan and myself. Quite a few of them initially. Some of those will undoubtedly be at our corporate offices down in Benton, Georgia.” Lexi paused. “I know some great, really discreet specialists down there, Maggie. No one else would ever have to know, not unless you wanted them to.”

  Maggie couldn’t help it. She started to cry. “Why would you do all this for me?” she asked tearfully.

  “Because, Maggie, like it or not, you’re one of us now,” Taryn said with a smile. “And we take care of our own.”

  “Explain to me again why you think I shouldn’t go with you,” Michael pouted as Maggie packed a small overnight bag. If she hadn’t been so nervous, it might have been funny. But she was nervous, afraid that she would give something away. So far she hadn’t had to lie to him. Everything she’d told him was one hundred percent true, even if it wasn’t one hundred percent complete.

  “You’re supposed to be recovering, remember? It’s only for a day or two,” Maggie said, keeping her voice light. “And Ian’s not going either.”

  “I’m not sure I like this, Maggie.”

  “I know, Michael, and I’m sorry about that. I am going to miss you terribly, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to a little girl time with Lexi. I haven’t done anything like that in a long time.”

  Michael shifted uncomfortably, his eyes watching her every move.

  “You trust Lexi, don’t you?” She refrained from asking him if he trusted her, because either way she didn’t want to hear the answer. An affirmative would rack her with guilt, a negative would crush her.

  * * *

  “Of course I do.” To a point, that was. Lexi would never do anything to intentionally cause harm to anyone, ever. She was quite possibly the gentlest soul he’d ever met. Yet there was nothing Lexi would not do to help someone else she cared about, either. If she believed she was helping Maggie in some way, even if it was something she knew he would not agree with, she would not hesitate.

  And he was pleased by the fact that Maggie was growing so close to Taryn and Lexi. The more she became of part of his family the better as far as he was concerned. And he certainly wouldn’t begrudge her a little ‘girl time’ as she called it. But there was something else there, something unspoken, something vague and undefined, that was making him uneasy.

  “Lexi told me about this great spa down there – said she would take me if we have enough time.” Maggie let the genuine excitement creep into her voice. “I’ve never been to a real spa before.”

  Yeah, Michael had heard about that place from Ian. Lexi hit it every time she travelled down that way. Said she came back smoother and softer than silk. Just thinking about Maggie returning to him all buffed and waxed had him hardening painfully.

  Maybe he was being paranoid. Maybe this trip really was only about meeting with the board of the Celtic Goddess Corporation with some feminine pampering on the side. He took one look at those big, pleading green eyes and shook his head.

  “Come here,” he commanded, using that deep, low voice that she said made her tingle in all the right places. She obeyed him without hesitation. His suspicion immediately rose up again.

  “That was too easy,” he said when she straddled his lap, locking his arms around her. “What are you up to?”

  “I’m going to be gone for almost two days,” she said, licking beneath his jaw, burying her hands in his hair. “I need a little extra to hold me over.”

  Oh. Well, that made perfect sense. Michael gave her a warning growl as his hands found their way beneath her shirt, skimming along her waist. He kept his hands there, gently needing the soft flesh. She sucked in a breath, her hands freezing momentarily.

  “I love how you’re filling out again,” he breathed against her ear, before all thoughts but one fled his mind.

  “They’re up to something, Ian,” Michael said for the tenth time. “I’m sure of it.”

  Now that Maggie was physically gone, it all seemed much clearer to him. Whether it was a sixth sense or subtle changes in her behavior – or possibly both, Michael was convinced that Maggie wasn’t telling him everything about her trip down to Benton with Lexi. The more he thought about it, the more certain he was. It was the same kind of feeling he’d had when she’d been experiencing all of those warning signs after her fall and hadn’t wanted him to know. After that experience, Michael swore he would never ignore that feeling again.

  She’d seemed preoccupied and distracted that morning. Maggie had tried to pass it off as a fear of flying. Since her first experience in a plane had been with his adrenalin-junkie brother Sean, that seemed believable enough, but Michael had been with her on the much gentler trip back and she hadn’t seemed bothered in the least. Maybe she was just too worried about him at the time to give it much thought, but he wasn’t entirely convinced.

  And she’d picked at her breakfast. No big surprise there if she was truly nervous about the meeting, but he kept catching her absently placing her hand over her stomach while she appeared to be a million miles away. It was her reaction when he asked her about it that had the warning bells sounding in his head. She’d looked almost afraid, like she’d been caught doing something wrong, and from that point on had made an obvious effort to keep both hands on the table.

  At the time he’d thought she was self-conscious about gaining a few pounds. It was why he’d made sure he told her how much that pleased him. But now, he wasn’t so sure that was it at all.

  And then there was the packing issue. Luckily, he’d double-checked her overnight bag; otherwise she would have found herself with four shirts, two bras, and no pants or underwear when she went to change that night. She tried to laugh it off, saying that with Michael around she was so used to going without clothes the thought of having to wear them all day was rather foreign to her. To prove her point, she’d lifted her skirt to show him that she wasn’t wearing anything underneath. That distracted him for a little while, as he’d had the sudden urge to bend her over the bed and investigate her claim thoroughly. But again, the moment Aidan’s limo had arrived, the unease began to resurface.

  In the back of the limo, the atmosphere had been tense. It was subtle, really, but it was there. Several times Michael caught the furtive little glances between the two women when they thought he wasn’t looking. The rest of the time, Lexi had gone out of her way not to look at him directly. When she spoke with him, he had the distinct impression her focus was on the top of his head rather than his eyes.

  Kind of like Taryn was doing right now.

  Michael mentioned this to Ian, but his brother didn’t seem quite as concerned at the time. As the day progressed, Taryn retreated into the shadows several times for texting. And while behind the bar, Taryn seemed distracted enough that he’d had to repeat himself on several occasions about the simplest of things. By mid-afternoon, even Ian began to suspect something as well.

  “You know something, don’t you?” Michael blatantly accused, blocking Taryn’s exit to the quieter back room when her phone sounded out the tolling strains from “Hells Bells” announcing yet another incoming message. The look she gave hi
m was too perfect, too innocent to be believable, because Taryn didn’t do innocent.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Taryn...”

  “I’d love to stay here and chat, really, but ... I’m not going to.” A moment later, she ducked under his arm and was gone.

  “Okay,” Ian said, watching her retreating form. “Now I believe you. Jake, watch the bar, man. Mick and I have some research to do.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “Okay,” Ian said, lacing his fingers together and stretching them wide. “Let’s see what we can find, shall we?”

  He began by pulling up the travel itinerary. “Looks like Aidan’s private jet landed outside Benton, just as they said it would. This log shows them being picked up in the company limo and taken right to Lexi’s penthouse.”

  Next, he brought up a custom search engine, typing in several pieces of information, including Maggie and Lexi’s first and last names, cell numbers, social security numbers, a location code, and a range of dates covering their planned time down there.

  “This will search every online database in the Benton area and give us a listing of anything that references their information – appointments, reservations, etc.”

  Michael was impressed. “When did you set all this up?”

  “When Lexi was hiding out in Benton,” he said without apology. At the time Michael had thought Ian was a bit paranoid, too intrusive of Lexi’s obvious desire for privacy. Now, he wanted to buy him a beer for having the foresight to create such an intricate – and thorough – system.

  Within a few minutes a list began appearing. The flight schedule. The limo log. The big corporate meeting. The day spa.

  “Wait,” Michael said when an unexpected entry popped up. “There – Elena McKenzie, four p.m. What the hell is that?”

  Ian frowned. Elena McKenzie was one of the specialists Lexi had seen when she was pregnant with Patrick. She was also the one who worked with Michael to discover the most effective combination of organics to treat her. Since Lexi’s dramatic improvement on the organic program Michael had developed, they’d been trying for a second child. Ian’s face lit up with hope and fear. “You don’t think she’s pregnant again already, do you?”

  But as Ian’s fingers flew across the keyboard, as new information flashed upon the screen, it became increasingly clear that it was not Lexi who had been subjected to a battery of tests.

  “Oh, man,” Ian said softly as he pulled up the series of ultrasound images, and Michael looked upon his son for the first time. And he finally knew with certainty what his subconscious had been trying to tell him all along.

  Michael couldn’t take his eyes off of Maggie as he sat across from her at the corner table. She was more beautiful than he’d ever seen her. Radiant, really.

  “What?” she asked self-consciously, nervously lifting her hand to her face. “Do I have lipstick on my teeth or something?”

  “No, Maggie,” he said patiently. “I just can’t seem to stop looking at you. You’re glowing. It must have been a good trip.”

  “It was,” Maggie agreed with a smile. “But I think this ‘glow’ is more from my homecoming than it is a result of my travels.”

  A grin slowly curved across Michael’s features. The moment she had the front door unlocked he carried her up the stairs and spent the next several hours making love to her. Thoroughly. Passionately. Possessively.

  “What can I say? I missed you.”

  * * *

  “I missed you, too, Michael.” It was an understatement. From the moment she left his arms to board the plane all she could think about was getting back into them again. To have his strength, his support, as she underwent test after test, terrified beyond belief. His calm, soothing voice, explaining everything, soothing away the fear. As it was, poor Lexi was probably being fitted for a hand splint. She’d stayed with Maggie through everything, holding her hand and offering support whenever she could.

  Throughout the entire trip – thirty-six hours that felt more like hundreds – Maggie had gone back and forth in her mind. One minute she was convinced she had done the right thing by not telling him about their baby just yet. He would have been beside himself with worry, and she didn’t want to do that to him, not with him just recovering from a near-fatal chest wound. No, it was better that she find out first. If there was a problem, then they would face it together. If not, then she would not have worried him unnecessarily.

  In the next minute, her heart would ache so badly she could barely breathe, and she’d be just as certain that keeping the truth from Michael was exactly the worst thing she could possibly do. There were already some trust issues between them - all her fault of course - even though at the time she’d thought she was doing the right thing. He wouldn’t be happy to learn that she’d kept this from him, no matter what the outcome.

  And she was feeling so close to the edge right now – Lexi said it was hormones – that she simply could not bear it if he was angry with her. What if he decided that he’d had enough? That he didn’t want to have to worry about whether or not she was keeping something from him?

  The waiter came by with a bottle of wine. Maggie politely placed her hand over the top of her glass as he poured some for Michael. “No, thank you,” she said with a little smile.

  “Are you sure, Maggie? Perhaps a little wine will help you relax.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Would you like a mixed drink instead?” He lifted his hand as if to call the waiter back.

  “No, no, I’m good, thanks.”

  “Iced tea, then?”

  “Um, no. Maybe just some water.”

  “With lemon?”

  “Yes, please.”

  * * *

  He wondered again why he had not seen it before, when now everything seemed to jump out at him. No alcohol. No caffeine. Maggie had even refused the coffee she loved so much, saying that she was too jittery, even though most of the time she looked as if she could fall asleep right where she stood. Only dry toast for breakfast – she blamed it on the lingering headaches that still plagued her but were easing. He hadn’t hounded her about it because she was eating heartily later in the day.

  “You’re awfully quiet tonight,” Michael said as the remains of their meal were cleared away. For the entire evening Maggie had been distracted, her mind a million miles away. Several times he’d caught her staring at him, looking like she was about to say something, then her lashes would drop down and he knew that once again, she’d been unable to speak the words.

  Maggie had yet to tell him he was going to be a father. He could sense the undercurrent of anticipation, though, and knew she wanted to tell him. He was giving her every opportunity, but so far, no admission. Her eyes were doing that swirling thing again, almost constantly now. There was so much going on in that stubborn, proud mind of hers. When would she learn to open up to him? To believe that she did not have to handle everything on her own?

  She loved him, he had no doubts about that. He saw it in her eyes every time she looked at him, felt it in her touch. His brothers told him of how fiercely she had guarded him in the hospital, how she had threatened anyone – without regard to size or gender - who dared approach him. The thought made him smile.

  Yes, she was strong and capable and smart and funny. She loved him more than he ever thought possible. It was what scared him most, because he knew she would protect him, and their child, without a thought to herself. It made his own protective instincts all that much stronger, because he knew that he would do the same.

  Even as he worried for Maggie, though, he could barely contain the primal elation at the knowledge he now had. It was hard to keep the joy he was feeling concealed, even if he was unhappy that she had gone through all of those tests without him. He should have been there, damn it. Nothing could have kept him from her side every moment, had he known.

  But the irritation he’d felt at her silence drained away rapidly as he mentally scanne
d the myriad of tests she’d gone through. Some relatively innocuous, others brutally invasive. He hated the thought of her having to face that fear on her own, of having to face those tests. It would have been bad enough for any woman under any circumstances, but this was his woman – a woman terrified of medical procedures in general. God, he thought once again, she must have been beside herself.

  As it was, he’d had to use every last bit of self-restraint he had not to say something, to admit that he knew of the pregnancy. All but one or two of the tests had come back negative for any indications of a problem, a hopeful sign that all was well. He thought she might have said something upon her return, dropped some hint at least, but she hadn’t. Was she waiting until the last results were in to tell him?

  During those several intimate hours they had spent together upon her return he found it nearly impossible to keep his hands from her abdomen and that slight natural curve that cradled his son. To break his mouth away from the fuller, more rounded breasts that had already begun preparing for their child. Just knowing his child was growing inside of her had him nearly insane with the visceral need to protect and possess with everything he had, no matter what the tests revealed. But how could he make her see that? He thought he might have an idea.

  “Maggie, I’ve been thinking,” he said slowly. She hadn’t responded to his previous comment, once again lost in her own thoughts. This time, however, his quiet, serious tone captured her attention immediately.

  * * *

  “Yes?” she prompted when he failed to expound. She hoped the single word didn’t sound as trembly as she thought it did.

  Michael pulled a small velvet box from his jacket and knelt beside her chair. “Maggie, I love you, and I don’t ever want to make the mistake of losing you again. Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”

  Maggie gasped. Her eyes grew wide as she gazed upon the most stunning diamond she’d ever seen. At least a full carat, it glimmered as if it held its own source of light deep within. The setting was just as stunning, done in intricate white gold.