Her heart faltered with the insight, not knowing if it meant there was room for hope or if it meant there was no hope, at all. All of a sudden, her resolve to nab her brothers and leave the ranch worked itself into a tug-of-war. She shouldn’t stay, couldn’t stay, but as Rose held up tiny little sleepers and passed around blankets as soft as a cloud, Abbie realized she had waited too late, already. Whatever Mac had meant to accomplish, whether he’d seen his announcement this morning as a stopgap solution or a slow and painful way to exact revenge, he had only added a new and deeper wrinkle.
Because now Abbie understood what she wanted.
And what she could never have.
Chapter Ten
Dinner that night was a big, boisterous gathering. The Jones brothers were far from antisocial. They enjoyed the food, the amiable company, the novelty of being houseguests, and were at their entertaining best to return the hospitality. And their best was very good. Abbie didn’t know about other families, but her brothers could be wonderfully charming when they weren’t trying to run her life. Despite being frustrated and out of patience with all four of them, she found herself laughing with everyone else at their “keeping up with the Joneses” stories. There had been hundreds of times over the years when she was genuinely proud to call them her big brothers and this was one of those times. Or rather, it would have been, if only the circumstances surrounding their visit hadn’t been so embarrassing.
Across the table and down from her, Mac sat solemn and somber, with Cade on one side of him and Hannah on the other. Abbie was flanked by Brad and Jaz. No one else seemed to find it odd that talk of the wedding floated back and forth and up and down, exciting enthusiastic conversation all along the way, while the prospective bride and bridegroom sat a table-width apart, mostly silent, and heavily chaperoned. Mac didn’t look at Abbie and the few smiles he handed out never came near her, but no one else appeared to notice that, either. She and Mac might as well have been invisible for all the attention they received. It was as if the planning had taken on a life of its own, and the wedding had become a thing apart from its two main participants or any basis in reality.
While she and Rose had been shopping, her brothers had enlisted the aid of Vi, Jessica, Ella, Hannah and Serena in finding a church, a minister, an organist, a florist, a caterer, and someone who—according to Ella and Vi—made absolutely gorgeous wedding cakes. The brothers had talked Randy around until he believed the idea for a combination wedding reception and Texas-style barbeque was all his own. The food was decided. The time, the place already set in stone. There were a few details, it seemed, still under debate. What Abbie would wear, for one. Whether Hannah, Serena, and Jessica—the chosen bridesmaids—would wear pink or blue. Music for the reception was still up in the air, although Stanley Fox knew someone who was a deejay on the side and would find out if he was available a week from Saturday. Abbie alternated between wanting to scream out her frustration and shaking her head in awe at her brothers’ supreme arrogance and efficiency in doing it all without once asking her opinion.
Still, other than climbing up on the table and yelling out that she wasn’t getting married no matter who was making the wedding cake, Abbie didn’t see a lot she could do about it. Well, there was one thing. She could talk to Mac, find out what kind of cat-and-mouse game he was playing with her.
On second thought, she didn’t want to know. What difference did it make in the long run, anyway? This whole unsettling wedding business was growing like Jack’s beanstalk and, unless someone put a stop to it, she and Mac were going to wake up a week from Sunday and find themselves married. Wouldn’t that just serve him right, too? But unfortunately, it would mean a loveless marriage, a marriage for all the wrong reasons and none of the right ones. Abbie didn’t want that; neither, she was certain, did Mac. So they had to talk, had to decide the best way to stop this wedding nonsense. Whether he wanted to believe it or not, Mac had helped set this runaway train in motion and he was just going to have to give her a hand in putting on the brakes.
Getting a few minutes alone could prove tricky, though. Her brothers hadn’t even begun to stretch their big-brotherly muscles yet. They had done a bit of pairing off, were showing signs that they wouldn’t take lightly the task of watching out for their baby sister’s interests. And her interests were whatever they decided they were and the course of action they had deemed best. The memory of her first high school prom date flitted like flypaper through her thoughts and stuck fast. She’d been sixteen. Her date had already turned eighteen. They’d had plenty of chaperons at the dance. But that hadn’t stopped her brothers from showing up like clockwork every half hour, just to insure she was okay.
She was older now. So were they. But she knew from experience that very little had changed. At least from their perspective. They’d already moved her out to the guest house, and she felt certain that one or another of them would have a ready excuse to be on their way to anywhere she needed or wanted to go. They’d be nice. They’d be congenial. But they’d be with her twenty-four seven until after the wedding. Maybe even for days or weeks afterward. In their minds, Mac had had the pleasure of her company and now he would do the right thing by her and her baby, whether he wanted to or not.
Which only meant she and Mac would have to pull off some fancy footwork if they were to get more than five minutes of uninterrupted privacy. Abbie didn’t know right off how it could be managed. Tonight was probably a bit soon to slip free of her brothers’ surveillance. But it would happen. It had to happen. Because, one way or another, she and Mac had to talk.
MAC WAS AWARE of Abbie’s surreptitious glances during dinner. He figured she was plotting something behind the unreadable expression in her blue eyes. Not that he let himself get caught watching her. He didn’t want her to know he’d noticed the presumably new, particularly pretty, outfit she was wearing. Probably bought with his mother’s approval and checkbook. He didn’t want her to know he’d noticed how pale she looked, or how weary her smile. He didn’t want to feel a pang of remorse for being less than kind to her both this morning and this afternoon. Hell, he didn’t even want to be in the same room with her and all this jolly, jarring talk about weddings.
A wedding.
His wedding.
But it was too late now to reconsider. He’d laid claim to Abbie and her baby. He couldn’t very well stand up in the midst of all the excitement and say he’d changed his mind, had decided Abbie was a liar and a cheat and probably wouldn’t be able to pick her baby’s real father out of a lineup.
Cade said something and Mac responded with a vague nod, pretending to be present in this moment he wouldn’t remember a moment from now. He was weary, too. Seeing Abbie’s brothers march into the bedroom this morning, like Sherman’s troops into Atlanta, had crushed something inside him, left him too angry with himself to think clearly, made him wonder why he’d allowed himself to trust another woman with his heart. After Gillian, he’d sworn never to do it again. But then along came Abbie, with her soft smiles, laughing eyes and fiery passions to test his resolve. Like a complete idiot, he’d fallen for her. Not once, but twice. It was the height of foolishness he knew, but last night, he’d thought that…
Never mind what he’d thought, what he’d allowed himself to hope. Her strategy was too good, her outrage at her brothers’ sudden appearance a little too convincing to be anything less than a part of a master plan. She had played an ace, but instead of calling her bluff, he’d topped her bid by playing the joker.
Well, so be it. In the next few days, he expected she’d try to convince him she was against the marriage, didn’t want it, wouldn’t bow to her brothers’ wishes, even though he was convinced a wedding had been and was her aim all along. If she held true to form, he figured Abbie would do her best to persuade him she was angry at her brother’s interference but helpless to do anything about it. Maybe he’d listen to her, if only to see how far she’d go to insure he was waiting for her at the end of the church aisle on Saturd
ay.
Maybe he’d be there waiting. Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he was an idiot to harbor even the faint hope that she’d call off the wedding before it got to that point. He didn’t want to be the one to do it, to humiliate her—and himself—in front of his family and hers. He wasn’t sure in his heart of hearts that he would, or could, do it when the moment arrived.
What he did know was that he was the biggest fool in Texas to want to offer her even that one chance to redeem herself.
ABBIE COULDN’T BELIEVE it was so difficult to get five minutes alone with the man she was supposed to marry in five days.
No, four days.
No, three.
The hours slipped away in a round of planning and shopping and getting things ready and, whenever she dug in her heels in an effort to get off the merry-go-round, someone was there to pick her up by the elbows and propel her right back into the saddle. The baby stretched and kicked and added his or her protests to the seemingly endless stream of activities, the must-do-this and the have-to-do-thats. Who could have guessed a wedding that wasn’t going to happen could take such a lot of energy? Or be accomplished with so little interaction of the prospective bride and groom?
But either by accident or design, and Abbie was inclined to believe it was all part of a master plan by her brothers, she couldn’t get a moment alone with Mac to tell him they needed to talk. Whenever she was entering a room, he seemed to be on his way out. When she went looking for him, one or more of her brothers fell into step beside her. When she did find him, he was with one or more of his brothers and didn’t appear to be in any hurry to leave their company for hers. He seemed to have nearly as much protection as she did.
There. She’d given the strange feeling a name. It was as if he needed protection from her, didn’t want to be alone with her, didn’t feel the need to talk about what to do next. That was crazy, of course. She knew he didn’t want to marry her. And she definitely did not want to marry him. Not like this. Not for all the wrong reasons. Not because someone else felt it was the right thing to do. Not because neither one of them had a choice.
Somehow, some way, she had to talk to him. Alone. And it had to be soon, because time was running out.
MAC WAS BEGINNING TO THINK Abbie’s brothers had missed their calling. The CIA could have used them as a crackerjack surveillance team. If it had been only the four Jones brothers, though, he probably could have escaped their net. He did have the home court advantage, after all. But it seemed everyone on the ranch was eager to offer felicitations and advice on his approaching nuptials.
He couldn’t walk from the stallion barn to the outdoor arena without being accosted by someone or another who wanted to talk about the wedding. He couldn’t get from the house to his truck without running into someone eager to wish him happy. Congratulations were poured over him like confetti and he was slapped on the back so many times he began to wonder if Somebody Up There wasn’t trying to knock some sense into him. The worst part of the whole business, though, was discovering that while he really wanted to dislike Abbie’s brothers, they made it next to impossible. They were big, brawny, boisterous men who believed him to have enjoyed the pleasure of their sister’s company and now simply expected him to take responsibility for it.
In a strange way, Mac understood their perspective and respected them for it. If Abbie were his to protect, he would take it as a matter of pride to see that she got what she wanted or needed. The Jones brothers were no different. They wanted him to do right by their sister, and as long as he was willing to do that, they were eager to know more about him.
At the house, at the barn, on their way to or from the guest house, one or another of them seemed always to be on their way to wherever he was going. They didn’t talk much about the wedding to him, certainly never mentioned the baby, but he found it somehow reassuring, not to mention interesting, that they did want to talk about Abbie. He heard stories about her at age five, stories about her as a toddler, stories about her awkward stages, and stories about her first date. He learned about her desire to be a teacher and the tremendous debate within the family when she declared she was going to the University of Texas to complete work for her graduate degree.
Mac found it downright amazing that she’d managed to turn out all right under the kind of supervision her family obviously considered normal. It would have been perfectly understandable if she were afraid of her own shadow, much less of making an independent decision. It was clear her brothers didn’t think she was capable of making a right choice without their collective assistance.
Slowly, without even wanting to, Mac began to see Abbie in a new light. While he was still pretty well convinced that she was behind the wedding plans, he was feeling a bit resentful that her brothers took so many decisions away from her. They decided, Abbie protested, and they acted as if she’d agreed. Or would, once she’d had a chance to think it over. It wasn’t fair she’d had to deal with their control issues all her life. It wasn’t fair her preferences couldn’t be heard over what they absolutely believed was best for her. It wasn’t fair that within days of their arrival, he’d gone from resenting Abbie’s deceit to understanding a little of why she was so desperate to escape from her brothers. Marriage must seem preferable to continuing as she was, with her brothers hovering over her every move like overgrown mother hens. And marriage to him would guarantee that she no longer needed their consistent and persistent presence. Financially, Mac could provide for her and the baby in a manner that even her choosy brothers couldn’t fault. How could they object if she married the man she claimed was the father of her baby, who also just happened to be rich and newly discovered royalty to boot? It would solve everything. At least, she undoubtedly thought it would.
And so, finally, it was her brothers’ tireless vigilance over Abbie’s every move that persuaded Mac to plot to kidnap her out from under their separate noses. He told himself she needed a respite from their watchful eyes. He told himself it was only right that he allow her the opportunity to do the right thing and call off her bloodhounds. He told himself the two of them needed to talk.
What he didn’t say, what he barely allowed himself to acknowledge, was that he missed her and wanted to be alone with her. Regardless of the reason.
MAC HANDED JESSICA A NOTE. “Give this to Abbie.”
She glanced at the folded piece of paper and handed it back. “Give it to her yourself. She’s right over there,” she said, indicating Abbie sitting not ten feet away on the sofa, squarely between brother Quinn and brother Brad. “In fact, you could actually talk to her. This is a free country, you know.”
“It’s not that easy to talk to her, in case you haven’t noticed. She has bodyguards around the clock.”
Jessie laughed. “And you expect me to believe you’re afraid of them?”
“No,” he said testily. “I just can’t get them to leave us alone for five minutes. It’s getting a little frustrating.”
“So you’re writing notes to your fiancée like you were both still in junior high?” She reached for the note again. “What does it say? Meet me after school, but don’t tell anyone?”
Mac jammed the note into his pocket and out of her reach. “It says, Don’t tell Jessie our secret!”
She teased him with a broad smile. “Very mature, cousin. But I’m not falling for that one. If you and Abbie had a secret, I’d have ferreted it out of her long before now. So what is it you’re really trying to do? Plan your honeymoon? I think they’ve already got something in mind for that, too. Very thorough, those Jones brothers.”
Mac wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that Abbie’s brothers had plotted out the first fifty years of his married life. But he wasn’t interested in their longterm goals. Only those that kept him away from Abbie. “I just want a few minutes alone with Abbie away from everybody. And that includes you, too, Miss Nosy Britches.”
“It’s not nice to insult people when you’re asking for their help, Mac.”
“Je
ssie,” he tried again, extending the note toward her. “Will you please give this note to Abbie?”
“Sure,” she said with a wicked grin. “Be glad to.” Then she took the note, walked across the room and handed it to Abbie.
ABBIE CLUTCHED THE PAPER in her fist and looked guilty. She could feel the tinge of guilt creeping into her cheeks. She could see the hint of it in Mac’s instant frown. She could hear the inflection of it in Brad’s “Woo-hoo, a love letter.”
She wanted to read the note, wanted to tear it into pieces to demonstrate her disgust with men in general and her fiancé in particular, wanted to tell everyone she was walking out the door and no one—repeat no one—was ever to come looking for her again. Period. End of difficulty. Case dismissed. Over and out.
Of course, she wouldn’t even be off the sofa—an action that wasn’t quite as easy as it once had been—before some male or other would be offering to help her escape, drawing out maps, telling her how to pack more efficiently, thinking up places she might want to go and those she’d be better off to avoid.
Then, in a hush between her taking the note from Jessie and after her brother’s gibe, Abbie realized Mac was moving toward her. He stopped right in front of her, held out his hand, and his expression said he wasn’t taking no for an answer. “Will you go for a walk with me, Abbie? Right now? Just the two of us?”
There was a light stress on the “two of us,” and don’t-mess-with-me note of warning in his voice that was somehow directed at her brothers even though his gaze never flickered from hers. “Thank you,” she said tightly. “A walk is just what I need.”
Brad was on his feet, hand on her elbow, ready to help her up or knock Mac down, whichever seemed necessary. “You mustn’t get overtired, Abbie. Remember, you need to rest up for the weekend.”
His Shotgun Proposal Page 17
