A Wedding for Maggie

by ALLISON LEIGH,

  He closed his eyes. But the tick of the clock on his bedside table sounded too loud. He rolled over and thumped his pillows. But he couldn’t get comfortable.

  “Oh, for Chrissakes.” He finally got out of bed, hitching a clean pair of jeans up over his hips. Barefoot, he went upstairs and silently closed himself in Matthew’s office. Then, calling himself the fool of all fools, he flipped through Matthew’s Rolodex, and dialed.

  Her voice, when she answered, was filled with sleep. Had him picturing her, pale blond hair rumpled and eyes soft as the sea. “It’s Dan. What’d you want?”

  He heard her indrawn breath. Imagined her sitting up, drawing her knees close and cradling the phone with her shoulder.

  “I didn’t expect...um...how, uh, how are you?”

  He leaned back against the desk, crossing his bare feet. “It’s the middle of the night, Maggie. What’s wrong?”

  “What makes you think something’s wrong?”

  “Why else would you call?” Dead silence weighted down the phone line.

  “Actually you’re the one calling me in the middle of the night,” she returned unevenly. Then he heard her soft sigh. “I don’t know why you’re so angry, Daniel. I didn’t know why when I was there in August. I still don’t. I don’t know why you were gone that next morning. Or why I haven’t heard one word from you since.”

  “I don’t like competing with a dead man.” The words dropped baldly from his lips. One thing about late-night phone calls. A person said all sorts of things he shouldn’t.

  “God...it...Daniel, I was married. What did you want from me?”

  I wanted you to take what I could offer you. To break free of a marriage that was killing you. But they weren’t talking about three years ago. They were talking about nine weeks ago. And he needed to be ruling with his head, not his heart “I got what I wanted the night of the picnic,” he said evenly. “You agreed. We would finish it. We’re two adults. Free to do whatever the hell we wanted to do. And we did it. So put your conscience in a box for once, and forget about it.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why? Because you weren’t faithful to your dear Joe’s memory?”

  “No.” Her voice shook and he had to strain to hear her. “Because I became pregnant that night. I was foolish enough to think you’d want to know.” The slam of the phone crashed in his ear.

  He stared stupidly at the receiver clenched in his fist. Then he swore and redialed. Again and again. But all he got was a busy signal.

  Maggie shoved the phone receiver in the kitchen drawer and stumbled back to her sofa bed. She huddled in one corner of it, burying her face in a pillow.

  She would have cried if she could have. But she was numb. Numb.

  So if she was so numb, why did her chest ache like it had been cracked in two?

  Chilled to the bone, she wrapped herself in her blanket and rocked back and forth, her eyes painfully dry. She sat there, the rest of the night. Until the pearly light of dawn filled her apartment.

  She shut off her alarm before it had a chance to sound and went into the bathroom to take her shower. Pregnant or not, J.D. needed to be awakened. She’d need breakfast. Maggie had a job to get to.

  She had a life that she’d formed for herself. It had kept her going since Joe’s desertion. It would keep her going still.

  It took more makeup than usual to hide the dark circles under her eyes. Even her shoulder-length hair wouldn’t cooperate, so she finally yanked it back into a tight bun at her nape. Her working wardrobe, though adequate, was far from expansive, and she pulled the bright red coat-dress off the hanger with a sense of bleak irony. She’d forgotten to pick up her dry cleaning this week.

  Perhaps it was a sign. She was her mother’s daughter, after all. Might as well dress in scarlet.

  Working on autopilot, she dressed and fed J.D., gathered up her daughter’s stuffed horse and favorite blanket, then dropped her off two floors down with the young mother, who provided child care for several of the children in the budding. Monica Miniver would also take J.D. and her own two children to preschool, pick them up five hours later and keep J.D. until Maggie returned from work.

  She stepped off the elevator in her building’s lobby and looked out at the wet morning. Well, wasn’t that just perfect, too?

  Fortunately she lived close enough to Ryker Interiors to walk to work. But she’d left her umbrella upstairs. She went back up to her apartment to get it.

  Now she’d be late.

  Late.

  She felt a wave of hysteria rush over her. Being late for work was the least of her worries.

  In the lobby again, she stepped outside, tightening the belt of her raincoat and shoving open the umbrella.

  She didn’t get two steps before she stopped short. Stared in disbelief at the man climbing out of the taxicab parked crookedly near the curb He settled his cowboy hat, seemingly oblivious in his faded blue jeans and white button-down shirt to the steady fall of rain. His long legs brought him across the sidewalk to her, and she watched the rain wet the shoulders of his shirt. “What are you doing here?”

  Daniel’s shadowed jaw tightened. “Do you really want to discuss it here on the sidewalk?”

  She didn’t want him in her apartment. It was the one place where memories of him didn’t assault her at every turn. “I don’t think there is much to discuss.”

  He shook his head, his eyes molten silver. “I disagree.”

  Maggie stepped aside as a trio of people scurried along, their umbrellas bobbing. Her hands tightened around the handle of her own umbrella, and she shivered with a cold that had nothing to do with the rainy October morning. “You got what you wanted, Daniel. You said so yourself.”

  “No.”

  She shivered again. “I have to go to work. It’s too bad you’ve wasted a trip here.”

  “Call them and tell them you won’t be there.”

  “No.”

  “Were you always this stubborn?”

  She huffed. Scooted again out of the way of more pedestrians. Saw that his shoulders were soaking, the fabric of his shirt heavy with rain. He had to be freezing. “Fine.” She wheeled around, collapsing her umbrella as she shouldered her way inside again.

  She knew it would be futile trying to conduct their discussion in the small lobby. Trembling inside, she led the way to the ancient, groaning elevator. Seemingly unperturbed by the thick silence in the elevator car, he drew off his hat, slicking water from it, then looked up at the floor number display, his big, knuckles-scraped hand idly tapping the hat against his thigh.

  She fiddled with her umbrella and mentally urged the elevator to move faster.

  Finally it creaked to a stop and she walked down the hall to her apartment. Her fingers shook, and she barely managed to insert the key in the triple set of locks. The door swung open with a squeak, displaying her minuscule home. At least she’d picked up J.D.’s toys.

  Sliding a look his way from beneath her lashes, she went inside and dumped her purse and folded umbrella on the round Formica-topped table that sat in the tiny dining alcove. Shoved her raincoat down her arms and left it lying over the back of one of the chrome-and-vinyl chairs where water dripped heedlessly onto the floor.

  She knew that his gray gaze was studying her home—finding it wanting, no doubt—and went into the narrow galley-style kitchen where she quickly called her office.

  “Okay.” She turned to face him after she’d hung up the phone, fixing her gaze somewhere around his left ear. “You satisfied? You’ve now messed up my day. So discuss away.”

  “Messed up your—” He bit off the words and placed his hat on the table with inordinate care. “Where is J.D.?”

  “With her child care provider.” Thank goodness. It had taken J.D. days and days to stop chattering about “Dannl” when they’d returned from Wyoming. Maggie didn’t think she could stand more of the same just now.

  When his eyes, those smoky eyes, continued studying her with not a word comin
g from his lips, she turned away, picking up a small block of cedar that she’d forgotten on the kitchen counter. Molding her shaking hands about the silky surface, she moved over to the couch and perched on the arm.

  “Why did you leave the Double-C?”

  She started. Not sure what she’d expected, but that certainly wasn’t it, She looked at the block of wood that she planned to fashion into three Christmas ornaments. A sleigh, an angel and a snowflake, she thought fuzzily.

  “Maggie?”

  Her shoulders stiffened when he took a single step toward her. “I only had those days of emergency leave,” she said evenly. “You know, to tell Jaimie about—”

  “I’m talking about three years ago.”

  Her fingers stilled. “I don’t—”

  “Didn’t you want to stay at the Double-C? You told me once that it was the only place you’d ever felt you belonged.”

  “That was before Joe—”

  “Leave Joe out of this and answer me.”

  She tossed the block onto the couch, incredulous that he actually thought she’d be able to leave Joe out of anything that had concerned her and the Double-C. “I can’t leave him out of this. For pity’s sake, Daniel. He embezzled money from you and your family. From the Double-C! What was I supposed to do?”

  “He did it,” Daniel reminded, his voice hard. “Did we ever blame you?”

  “No.” She swallowed against the growing knot in her throat. “No, of course not.” Matthew and Squire had been unfailingly kind. And Daniel—

  “So why did you leave?”

  She straightened, too agitated to sit...even on the arm of the couch. “Daniel, this is old news. It has nothing—”

  His hand closed over her arm, pulling her around to face him once again. “Why?”

  Her pulse skittered. “Because I thought if I did, then maybe you’d come back home!” She yanked her arm away. She lifted her chin and smoothed her skirt with damp palms. “Only you didn’t,” she finished unevenly. “And I needed to find Joe.”

  “Because you loved him.”

  Her jaw locked and she looked down at her hands. She really didn’t want to discuss Joe. Didn’t want to acknowledge the bitterness that swelled within her whenever she thought of what he’d done. “He was my husband.”

  “He lied and cheated and abandoned you.”

  She didn’t flinch from the facts, even if she did feel the blood drain from her face. “I married him. For better or worse.”

  Daniel’s lips twisted. “More worse than not.”

  Anger curled through her. “I’d made a commitment. But perhaps you don’t know what that really means, anyway!”

  His eyes narrowed. “Meaning?”

  She crossed her arms, squaring her shoulders. “What have you ever been committed to, Daniel? The ranch? Your family? Maybe you used me as an excuse to leave, but you could have gone back earlier than you did. If you’d wanted to. Why did Matthew hire Joe as a foreman in the first place, when between you and your brother and the regular hands you could have handled the ranch without hiring anyone at all?” She drew in a calming breath but it didn’t calm. “Don’t you dare stand there all high-and-mighty and preach about commitment to me. You left your family. The same as Joe left me. End—of—story.”

  “You’d compare me to that thieving liar.” Something came and went in his gray gaze. Something brief. Writhing.

  She felt sick. Did she really think Daniel was at all like Joe?

  Daniel. Devilish grins and fast motorcycles. Grease on his knuckles from some engine he’d magically coaxed back to life, and rips in his faded blue jeans. Pool games at the bar in town, impromptu bronc busting and buxom women following him around. Daniel, who’d worked hard during the days and played harder during the nights.

  And Joe. Charming, quiet, green-eyed Joe. Who had told her nearly every morning of their life together that he loved her. Who had taken lovers. Embezzled money. And still claimed to love her, right up until the day he walked out of her life and proceeded to erase their existence from his life.

  Her shoulders sagged. Her eyes burned. “Why were you gone that next morning in August?”

  His expression tightened. “It doesn’t matter.”

  She wanted to scream at him that it mattered far too much. But she didn’t. She had too much pride to beg for explanations he clearly didn’t want to give.

  His fingers clawed through his hair, leaving it standing in rumpled butterscotch waves. “For the record, I didn’t abandon my family. I left you on the ranch because I couldn’t stick around and not make you mine. Maybe I wasn’t the most clean-living guy in the county, but even I drew the line at taking another man’s wife.”

  She flushed at that. “I wouldn’t have—”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Oh, really?” Then he stepped closer. “Despite that conscience you drag around with you so diligently, we’d have done just exactly what we did at the swimming hole. It was only a matter of time, Maggie, and you know it.”

  Maggie shook her head sharply. “No.”

  He smiled grimly. Thoroughly male. Thoroughly assured. “Lie to me if you want, Maggie. But don’t lie to yourself.” A muscle ticked in his jaw and he lifted his arm, touching his finger to her chin. “I left the ranch. You left the ranch. We just put off for three years what would’ve happened if we hadn’t.”

  “Fine, then. Like you said, you got what you wanted.” Her breath shuddered in her chest. “It’s over and done with.”

  “Not by half, Maggie. Not by half. You see, I did learn something while I was gone.” His lips twisted. His finger, warm and dry, outlined her lips.

  Shivers crept along her spine. She lifted her chin, trying to escape that finger. But he caught her chin, holding her still. And her breath jammed in her chest as his eyes locked hers into a silvery gray web.

  “I want what’s mine,” he continued softly

  “I’m not yours,” she said, hoarse.

  “Ah, but that baby you carry is.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “You will marry me.”

  Chapter Five

  She stared at him like he’d lost his mind.

  Perhaps he had. But this woman who’d haunted his dreams for more years than he cared to remember, who’d turned down anything and everything to do with him, who twisted his guts into knots still, carried his child.

  His.

  He wouldn’t ever walk away from what was his. Not again.

  “I don’t love you,” she finally gasped.

  He shrugged. “I don’t love you, either. But our marriage bed won’t be cold.”

  She scrambled away from him. “You’re crazy. I’m not going to marry you. I’m not going to marry anyone!” Her eyes darted to him and away again like droplets of water skittering around in hot grease. “Been there. Done that.”

  “Don’t,” he warned, his voice hardening. “Don’t ever compare me with him.”

  She pushed at her hair, unknowingly dislodging the tight knot she’d made of it. “Let’s be...sensible. Reasonable. I wouldn’t try to keep you from...the baby, Daniel. I told you about it, after all. But marriage is...”

  “Nonnegotiable.”

  “...out of the question. I’m sure if we...”

  “Got married.”

  “...discussed this calmly, we could come to some type of—of arrangement.”

  “You’re not hearing me, Maggie. You’re carrying my child. We will be married.”

  Her finely arched eyebrows drew together. “What if I said it wasn’t yours!”

  He snorted. “Honey, you are desperate, aren’t you.”

  Her eyes glinted like wet shards of turquoise. “I’m being sensible! You can’t force me to marry you.”

  “No, I can’t,” he agreed smoothly, his eyes drifting about the small, tidy interior of her apartment. “But I’m sure you’ll want to be involved in your child’s life.”

  Her palm pressed against her stomach, her expression turning wary.
“What do you mean?”

  “My child will be raised on the Double-C, not in some apartment in the middle of a city. You can either be a part of that or not.”

  She blinked. “Are you threatening me?”

  “Not at all.” He picked up the block of wood she’d been playing with earlier and studied the fine grain. It reminded him of the paperweight on his nightstand. “You know this child will be better off with two parents. On the Double-C, where she—”

  “Or he.”

  He nodded once. “Or he can be part of his or her rightful heritage. Use that practicality you’re tossing around. You never wanted a city life. You told me so yourself once.” He waved his hand at her. “But look at you. You’re working in an office. J.D. is at a sitter. You’re pale and too thin, and you’re living in an apartment the size of a postage stamp. For God’s sake, Maggie Mae, you can’t even see the damned sky for all the buildings hemming you in. Is this the way you wanted to raise your kids? Why make things harder than they have to be?”

  Despite her conviction that his suggestion...demand wasn’t the answer, she felt herself wavering. Lord, it would be so easy. She rubbed the knot in her forehead and stepped into the kitchen. Away from his gaze.

  He followed. “Come home to Wyoming, Maggie. You and J.D. don’t belong here.”

  And she stiffened all over again. It wasn’t the life she’d have chosen if she’d had a choice. But she’d worked hard for what she’d achieved, whether in the city or not. A life for her and J.D. A home. Stability that she’d never had. Not during her childhood and certainly not during her marriage She made her own way now and that was that.

  He’d reached one long arm over her head and had pulled open a white cupboard door. She knew what he’d see. A few dozen cans of soup. Some dried pasta.

  Things that, before, she’d always prepared from scratch with her own hands Things that, now, she didn’t have time for.

  He shut the cupboard with a snap. “You’re thinner than I’ve ever seen you. You look like a stiff wind would knock you over, and you’ve got circles under your eyes the size of dinner plates. This life isn’t for you, Maggie. Admit it.”