Daddy By Design? & Her Perfect Wife

by Cheryl Anne Porter

Until she twisted out from under him, rolled him onto his back. “Please,” she whispered as she rose above him. Her green eyes glowed like burning emeralds. “I can’t…wait…any longer.”

  The hot, hard tip of his arousal touched her hot, wet entrance. “Please.”

  With a groan, Jack put his hands on her hips and guided her down.

  She took them to paradise in less time than it would take even someone as succinct as Madonna to say it.

  Not that Jack minded the speed of the trip, but the next time, he stayed in charge—and made it last.

  And last. And last. Until they both begged for release and found it together.

  Afterward was almost as good as during. Sated, languid, warm. Their bodies still entangled, they drifted to sleep.

  Sometime later, Jack awoke. They’d left the lights on; the sky visible through the window was dark. Propping his elbow on one of the pillows and his head on his hand, he watched Mel doze on.

  And wondered how anything so right could feel so…wrong.

  Damn. He sure as hell wasn’t ready to give up the best sex he’d experienced in his life, but…

  Jack sighed and let his free hand play with Mel’s silky chocolate hair.

  He wanted more. Sex without love seemed wonderful but, for the first time ever, incomplete. And all Hallorans knew that love without commitment was just talk.

  Was that what had him squirming inside? Some antiquated sensibility that a woman as special as Mel deserved more than casual, uncomplicated sex?

  She hadn’t asked for anything more! And maybe she didn’t want more.

  Or maybe, with her life devoted to medicine, she didn’t know there was more to want.

  Should he keep his mouth shut, take what she offered and slowly try to show her what more they could have together?

  Or should he refuse to get back in the sack with her until she agreed to a long-term commitment?

  Oh, right, like he’d hold out for more than an instant if she so much as bared a toenail or fluttered her eyelashes suggestively!

  Momentarily conclusionless, he stole out of bed, tucked Mel in carefully and dressed in the hallway. Then he went downstairs to whip up some energy-boosting dinner. Chicken with raspberry-balsamic sauce, steamed broccoli and jasmine rice.

  “Take that, Red Chef!” he muttered as he finished the low-fat but flavorful sauce.

  He served Mel dinner in bed. When she shivered from the air-conditioning, he gave her one of his shirts to put on; it sure looked better on her than it ever had on him.

  And he wanted to take it right back off her.

  THIS IS, Mel decided as she accepted another bite of saucy chicken, the height of decadence.

  And she was savoring every minute of it.

  Jack had to be the reigning lovemaking champion. Not that she had enough experience to judge that for herself, but she couldn’t imagine anyone needing to be any better than he’d been. Than they’d been.

  Twice!

  Then he’d brought her this delicious meal and practically fed it to her, bite by bite. And now…was that just a gratuitous bulge in his jeans or was Jack’s interest in applied erotica reviving?

  Hers was. Rapidly.

  “Do you—?”

  “I want to—” Jack cleared his throat. “Sorry. Go ahead.”

  Mel signaled him to go first. She didn’t mind a bit sharing the aggressor role. “No, you.”

  Before Jack could speak, something buzzed. Mel looked around, her heart suddenly pounding. Was there a rattlesnake loose in the room?

  The buzzing came again.

  With a disgusted expression, Jack got up, dug through the clothes on the floor, removed something and handed it to her.

  “You’re being paged, Dr. Burke,” he said heavily, then muttered something that sounded like an offer to disembowel Bowen while she checked the readout.

  “Sorry about that,” Mel said as she scooted to the edge of his bed. “It’s not the hospital,” she added, reaching for the phone. “Probably a wrong number—I don’t recognize it. Let me check. Otherwise, we might get paged every ten minutes.”

  She smiled across the rumpled sheets. “And I’d rather not be disturbed again tonight. How about you?”

  His dark blue eyes blazing, Jack corralled the tray. “I’ll remove the breakables while you take the page. And no,” he added as he crossed the room, “I don’t want to be disturbed by anyone tonight. Except you, Melinda. But you disturb me all the time.”

  “Good or bad?” Mel asked.

  “In a bad, very bad way,” he said with a deep chuckle that set her insides tingling. “And, believe me, that’s way good.”

  As Jack departed and Mel punched in the phone number showing on her pager display, she admitted she felt a smidge of relief at the interruption.

  All she needed was a little bit of breathing room. A fingersnap’s worth of time to make sure her head was still on straight. And that her heart wasn’t wandering down any blind, dead-end, no-win alleys.

  Jack made her body sing. He made her laugh. He gave her attention, consideration and care.

  None of which meant she’d give up her career for him. Not that he’d asked, of course, but…

  Medicine was her life. Trading pediatric surgery for the role of Jack Halloran’s wife would make her brother’s death meaningless.

  She couldn’t do that to Harry. To her parents. To herself.

  “Or to Jack,” she whispered as the phone rang again.

  So she’d just have to make sure he never asked.

  The ringing stopped as someone picked up. “Hello?” The voice sounded vaguely familiar.

  “Hello. This is Melinda Burke.”

  Before she could say anything more, the voice on the other end gave a heartfelt “Thank God,” then added, “It’s Bobby. Noreen’s husband.”

  Mel listened as he went on—the words spilling out, full of panic and terror and pleading.

  JACK PRACTICALLY TELEPORTED back upstairs. Good to go didn’t even begin to cover his condition! Well, he was married to an insatiable goddess. How lucky could a guy get?

  He started to race down the hall then screeched to a halt.

  “Mel? What are you doing?” She’d relocated to her room, which was okay, but she didn’t appear to be prepping for a long night of love. She looked to be—

  “Packing.”

  Jack thought about clamping his arms around her ankles and refusing to let go. Instead, he asked, “Why?”

  She ceased wadding up clothing and looked at him, clearly distressed. “The page…my cousin’s been in an accident. She’s in surgery at Presbyterian. It sounds pretty bad.”

  “But why are you taking clothes?”

  “Because I’m meeting Bobby at the hospital and taking the baby home. He wants me to keep her until Noreen’s out of—” Mel plunged her hands into her hair and pulled outward. “I don’t know what to do with a baby!” she wailed.

  “Of course you do,” Jack said. Was she nuts? “You’re a—”

  “If you say ‘woman,”’ Mel warned him conversationally, “I’ll relocate your cowlick.”

  “—pediatrician. That was my call all along,” he insisted firmly. “You’re a pediatrician.”

  “That doesn’t mean I like kids enough to get along with them,” Mel informed him.

  It doesn’t?

  “I went into pediatric surgery so Harry’s life wouldn’t be wasted.”

  Jack stared at her. This was so not right. “Why build a career around kids if you don’t like them? That seems like a waste of your life.”

  Mel’s soft green eyes turned to serpentine. “I didn’t say I don’t like them.”

  “What?!” She’d drive him crazy if he wasn’t already so close he could walk.

  “I don’t know how I feel about kids! I’ve only been around sick ones—and I’m too busy getting them well to worry about feelings.” She wadded up another cotton T-shirt and slam-dunked it into the soft-sided bag she was packing. “And making
my brother’s death count is not a waste of my life.”

  She didn’t add “you jerk,” but Jack could hear it. Okay, an issue for another time.

  “This’ll be a good experience then,” he said with the hard-edged cheerfulness of an elementary school phys ed teacher. “Nothing like a day or two with a baby to find out whether you—” Oops. He almost said “want one.” And that would be putting the layette before the trousseau. Or whatever.

  “—like them,” he finished quickly before changing, sort of, the subject. “Let me grab a few things, then we’ll go. You drive, I’ll call Bowen so he can’t tell you no.”

  “We’ll go? Y-you’re coming with me?”

  “Of course. We’re in this together, Mel.”

  She didn’t say anything, but he’d bet big that lowering her shoulders like that spelled relief.

  Was that sweet or what? The woman could transplant a liver, but baby-sitting a normal, healthy infant scared her to death.

  SOMEWHERE NEARBY, a baby whimpered. Reflexively Mel got to her feet and looked around. Huh. She’d slept in her clothes again. In a chair in Noreen’s minuscule living room.

  They’d been baby-sitting less than three days, but she felt as exhausted as she had after her first week of internship.

  The parallel was exact. Overwhelming demands meeting inexperienced uncertainty. It took everything out of you—faster than the latest annoying behavior became a syndrome with a Web site.

  Another whimper. Proof that babies were tougher than they looked. Swiping her hair off her face, Mel went in search of her niece.

  So far, she’d managed to diaper, feed and burp the five-month-old without harm. This, though, was her downfall: the soothing stuff. She just didn’t have the patience for it.

  Luckily for them all, Jack did. His magic touch extended to babies, too. He’d hoist the kid up against his shoulder and walk her to sleep.

  And while Amber slept…Mmm.

  Not that they made love in Bobby and Noreen’s bed.

  Just everywhere else they could think of—and what an imaginative partner Jack was! Athletic, too. Great flexibility, strength, endurance. And a very well developed, ah, circulatory system.

  “What time is it?” Mel asked as she entered the bedroom and intersected Jack’s path.

  “Morning.” He stopped patting the baby he held long enough to tuck a strand of Mel’s hair behind her ear and smooth his thumb over her eyebrow, cheekbone, and lip. “Thursday morning,” he clarified, twinkling his blue eyes at her and smiling.

  As if he didn’t care that she wasn’t very good with babies. Or cooking. Or anything domestic, when it came down to it.

  But the question haunted her. Stopped her from bringing up the topic of making their arrangement permanent.

  What if—when it came to the long haul—Jack wanted a wifely wife? After her French toast disaster, he’d said something about not expecting her to be Donna Reed on her first day off.

  Did that mean he’d expect Donna-like behavior from her later?

  Later, like now?

  “Bobby called,” Jack said over the baby’s continuing whimpers. “Noreen’s still in SICU, but he thinks she’ll be moved to a regular bed this afternoon”

  “Good.” Mel breathed a sigh of relief. Bobby could take the baby with him then. And they could go home.

  “Waaa!”

  “Here.” Mel made herself hold out her arms. “Let me have her. You’ve done your tour.”

  Jack didn’t bother disguising his relief as he handed Amber over. “We’ve been awake and fussing since three.”

  Mel couldn’t blame his eagerness. Amber was her niece and adorable when she slept, but…

  “Are you sure she isn’t sick?” Jack asked. “’Cuz she’s leaking.”

  “What do you mean?” Mel’s hand went to Amber’s diaper.

  “Not there,” Jack answered, as crankily as she’d ever heard him. Which, compared to Bowen, sounded like Emily Post on her best behavior. “Her nose is running. She’s drooling like a fountain. Maybe she’s got rabies.”

  After putting the infant down for a quick visual examination, Mel absently chewed on her lip as she considered symptoms and diagnoses.

  Aha. A possible explanation occurred to her. Gently she rubbed a fingertip over Amber’s gums. Yep. Score one for the doc.

  “What’s wrong?” Jack demanded.

  Smiling now, Mel said, “Noreen’s really going to be chapped about this.” She bent to kiss the baby’s soft, fat cheek, then picked her up. As she turned her smile on Jack, she said, “I just hope Bobby’s home before—”

  “Before what?” Jack shouted, ramming fingers through his hair. He knew they taught doctors to remain calm in crises, but this was ridiculous! Shouldn’t they be calling 911 or rushing to the nearest doc in the box or something!

  “Before Amber’s first tooth comes in. I know they’ll want to see it right away.”

  Jack sank into a chair, cradling his head in his hands. My God. He’d just gone to hell on a high-speed train and now…

  He looked up at Mel holding the baby in one arm, letting the kid gum her other forefinger and resting her puckered-up lips against Amber’s temple.

  Now I understand what Tess means. About life and love and pain.

  He also understood what Melinda meant to him. What he wanted—no, needed—for his life and hers.

  “Would you see if we’ve got any ice?” Mel asked him, still getting chewed on and drool-soaked. “I’ve heard that numbing the gums makes babies less uncomfortable when they’re teething.”

  He wanted to say, “I’ll remember that for our babies,” but he cautioned himself not to get too far ahead of himself. Not yet.

  Right now, he just drank in the sight of his woman—his dear, sweet, smart, sexy woman cradling the tiny, quiet, cuddly baby.

  Without thinking, he blurted, “I gotta tell you, Mel—I don’t intend to be your house spouse much longer.”

  Meaning, of course, that he wanted to be her adoring husband. The father of her undoubtedly adorable children. Her co-mortgage holder. The guy who brought home at least half the bacon and saved for the kids’ college and took Mel on romantic getaways whenever possible.

  Before he could get it all said—hell, before he could get any of it said, Mel whirled close to him. Close enough to poke his chest with her drool-covered finger.

  “Too bad, buster,” she grated, glaring at him between rapid eye blinks. “We made a deal and you’re going to honor it. Either you continue to be the house spouse for the rest of the six months or you arrange for a substitute housekeeping service to take over before you bail.”

  Mel whirled away. Then whirled back to plop Amber in his arms. “Here. Try the ice, but don’t give her frostbite. I’m going to check on Noreen, then I’m going to work. I’ll be back…later.”

  Congratulations, moron, Jack saluted himself as he watched Mel gather her doctor paraphernalia and almost run from the apartment. You certainly handled that well.

  Gingerly he let Amber grab his finger and stick it in her mouth. Now what, brainiac?

  10

  “IS THAT CLEAR, Dr. Burke?”

  Bowen referred to…something. Mel nodded anyway. Everything was clear now. All it took was seeing her with Amber for Jack to realize just how little he wanted to do with her. And why.

  “I don’t intend to be your house spouse much longer.”

  “Damned hypocrite,” Mel muttered, which had Bowen turning back, ready to rumble again. She fended him off with a not-applicable, ignore-me gesture.

  Jack Halloran could talk a good equal-rights line, but when push came to shove, when real life happened along, he turned into just another damned chauvinist. Wanting a wife who stayed home cooking, cleaning and child rearing, while he went out and managed other people’s money.

  Big deal. She’d devoted her whole life to medicine. To saving lives.

  That’s what she’d studied and worked and sacrificed for. That’s why she’d s
urvived when Harry had developed the heart problem that cut his life short.

  She refused to give up her career to serve Jack’s fantasies—or his beer.

  Very righteous, Burke. Except he hadn’t asked her to do anything.

  Mel’s fingers squeezed her pager. She didn’t want him to ask. She knew her answer if he did. Saving lives was more important than having one.

  Or making love. Or—

  She started over. Lecturing herself again on the wisdom of concentrating on her surgical career instead of wallowing in a diaper-induced and Jack Halloran– enhanced sea of female inadequacy.

  “SOUNDS GREAT.”

  “Count me in!”

  Jack breathed a short sigh of relief as the men filling the den verbally jumped on his bandwagon.

  “Bet the wife’d like ta sign up, too,” Bob said. “Think there’d be any call for handy women?”

  “I don’t see why not,” Jack replied while other seniors volunteered their wives. “I can’t mend hems or wrap presents worth spit. And I’m sure there are packs of executives with busy families, working couples strapped for time and—”

  He looked at Chester, a recent widower newly recruited by Preston. They’d keep him too busy to get lonely. Chester was a retired carpenter.

  “—ah, suddenly single home owners who’ve never cleaned a gutter, planted flowers or caulked a window in their lives,” Jack finished. “Rent-a-Spouse is practically a success already.”

  Leave it to Preston to locate the black cloud in the silver lining. “What about the Social Security earnings limits?” he asked.

  “He’s all over it, Pres.” Bob came to Jack’s rescue. They’d discussed the plan in exhaustive detail before presenting it to the larger group. “Jack’s brother is writing some software to track each Spouse’s earnings, tax bracket, preferred work area—everything.

  “This is gonna be the sweetest deal since the GI Bill. For us, for our neighbors, for Halloran. Everybody wins.”

  Jack nodded agreement. He had no doubts about Rent-a-Spouse’s appeal. Where else could one find reasonably priced, dependable, skilled workers to do all those little tasks that piled up around the house? The oldsters would have more work than they could handle in no time.

  And Jack, who’d agreed to set up and run the business, foresaw a decent income stream while he built his financial consulting business, giving him the freedom to take only clients he really wanted to work with.