by Miranda Lee
‘Lover!’ he spluttered, sitting bolt upright. ‘I’ll have you know that—’
The front doorbell rang. Loudly and insistently.
‘It’ll be Lisa,’ Samantha told a frowning Guy. ‘She’s a good friend. Lives upstairs. I’ll go and give her Tom and send her on her way. Why don’t you get up and get into the shower, then I’ll make you breakfast?’
His eyes lit up. ‘Bacon and eggs?’
‘Muesli and wholemeal toast,’ she returned. ‘You don’t want to have a heart attack, do you? I’m going to need you in the peak of condition for a few years yet.’ She threw him a very sexy smile as she closed the bedroom door and walked off, one large ginger cat slung over her shoulder.
Still smiling, she opened the door to find not Lisa, but her Aunt Vonnie and Martin Haywood standing there. Their ready smiles faded as both their gazes simultaneously fastened on Samantha’s rounded stomach, the slender silk robe not hiding a scrap of her advancing pregnancy. Tom chose that inopportune moment to leap for freedom and race up the stairs, probably to Lisa’s. Which left Samantha without even a cat between herself and her shocked aunt.
‘Oh, Samantha,’ Aunt Vonnie said, clearly aghast. ‘Why didn’t you tell me? Martin...’ She turned to her companion. ‘I think perhaps I’d better go in and talk to my niece alone. She...’
It perhaps wasn’t the ideal moment for Guy to stride into the living-room, a towel slung low around his hips, looking like a man who hadn’t slept much the night before. ‘Sam, honey, I need a razor. Where...?’ His voice trailed away when his eyes clamped on their visitors.
Aunt Vonnie gave an audible gasp of shock. ‘I knew it!’ she said accusingly. ‘I just knew it!’
‘I wish I had,’ Martin muttered darkly.
Guy, thank the lord, was the only one who was not nonplussed by the situation. ‘Look, why don’t you two come on in instead of standing there looking like stunned mullets? I presume you’re the inimitable Aunt Vonnie?’ he said, coming forward to take the flustered woman’s hand and draw her inside. ‘You too, Dad. And there’s no need to look so appalled. Yes, it’s my baby, and yes, we love each other, and yes, we’re going to be married as soon as possible.’
Now it was Samantha’s turn to look like a stunned mullet. Her rounded eyes blinked at Guy, who gave her a wry smile and a shrug. ‘It was going to be a breakfast proposal. I just brought it forward a little. Do you mind?’
She gathered herself to come forward, eyes shining. ‘No, I don’t mind.’ She slid an arm around his waist and hugged him, her heart filled with emotion. The man she loved...the father of her baby...her lover... And now her husband.
‘What is all this?’ a female voice chirped up from outside in the hallway. ‘Someone die or something?’
Martin and Aunt Vonnie turned to stare with the older generation’s shock at Lisa in her skin-tight jeans and outrageous purple jumper.
‘It’s all right, Lisa,’ Samantha laughed, waving at her friend. ‘Come on in. We’re about to have an engagement party brunch.’
‘No!’ Lisa gaped at Guy from the doorway. ‘Good heavens, you hooked him at last! Look, I’ll just run back upstairs and get some of the champagne we had left over from our last orgy.’
At this even Guy looked taken aback.
‘It’s just her way of talking,’ Samantha defended as Lisa scuttled off. ‘She’s going to be my chief bridesmaid, so you’d better get used to her.’
‘Yes, well,’ Guy said drily, ‘with Frankie as my best man, and you God knows how pregnant by then, this could be the wedding of the year!’
‘Maybe we should go the whole hog,’ Martin rejoined, ‘and make it a double wedding.’
Samantha’s and Guy’s heads snapped round to stare at him.
He took Aunt Vonnie’s hand, his expression smug. ‘Veronica has finally agreed to be my bride.’
‘No!’ came their chorused exclamation.
‘Oh, yes! And, believe me, it’s taken some doing. She kept telling me that I didn’t have a very good track record in the marriage stakes, didn’t you, dear? She said we Haywood men were rakes! And I suppose there is some truth in that, but—’
‘Speak for yourself, Dad,’ Guy interrupted firmly. ‘From this moment on there’s only one woman for me and she’s standing right beside me.’ His arm enclosed Samantha with loving reassurance, and her heart turned over.
‘You lot still standing gas-bagging in the doorway?’ Lisa scolded, reappearing with a champagne bottle in each hand. ‘Good grief, I can see you need someone to organise things around here. If it weren’t for me, you know, there wouldn’t even be an engagement at all!’
They all stared at her with puzzled eyes.
Her grin was mischievous. ‘Well, it was my red dress, wasn’t it?’
Guy looked down at Samantha, eyes reproving. But she merely smiled back at him. ‘I love you,’ she whispered and, when a slow smile tugged at his mouth, she kissed him.
ISBN: 978-1-4592-8410-4
A Daring Proposition
Copyright © 1992 by Miranda Lee
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Table of Contents
TITLE PAGE
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
COPYRIGHT
