Once Upon a Matchmaker

by Marie Ferrarella

  “I talked to the doctor this morning,” Tracy explained to her semiskeptical audience. “And he said that your daddy’s healing really well so there’s no reason not to let him come home. So he’ll be there before you know it,” Tracy promised.

  “I’ll take the boys outside,” Sheila offered amid their cheering, then added, “Let the two of you have a few minutes alone.”

  Not waiting for a response, the older woman took each little boy by the hand and ushered her grand-nephews out of the room.

  “Thanks for bringing them,” he said to Tracy when the boys’ echoing goodbyes faded, and his sons had left the hospital room.

  She shrugged carelessly, as if she couldn’t take credit for a matter that had been really out of her hands. “It was either that, or risk having them hike out here on their own. They wanted to see that you were doing all right with their own eyes. I’m afraid that you seem to have raised a couple of skeptics,” Tracy concluded with a soft laugh.

  His sons weren’t the only ones who were skeptical. He’d gotten very restless in the past few hours. “Am I really going home tomorrow?” he asked her, adding, “I haven’t been able to see the doctor yet today.”

  It wasn’t for lack of trying. He’d asked the nurse on duty several times if his doctor was coming in to make his hospital rounds and if not, could he get a call put through to the man’s office. The nurse had told him that as far as she knew, the doctor was due in sometime before six. To Micah, that was code for “before the end of the world.” So far, the man hadn’t been by to see him.

  “I cornered him early this morning, just as he was coming into his office,” Tracy told him.

  She had plenty of practice, ambushing witnesses who were reluctant to testify at one trial or another. Because of that, she’d learned how to be both resourceful and persuasive. The former often required being several steps ahead of her quarry.

  Micah looked at his attorney with more than a little admiration in his eyes. The woman knew how to get things done. Rather than off-putting, he found her take-charge attitude both compelling and stirring. A few more pieces of his dream came back to him.

  He smiled broadly. “Remind me to fire you when I get a little stronger.”

  She knew exactly what he was referring to. Trying to look serious, she still couldn’t help smiling. “Don’t bite off more than you can chew,” she warned him.

  “I wasn’t planning on chewing,” he told her, humor highlighted in his eyes. “Unless, of course, you want me to.”

  She laughed then and shook her head. This is just temporary. Enjoy it but don’t get used to it. He’s just vulnerable right now. Like you are.

  “One step at a time, Micah,” she advised. “Let’s get you home and healed first.”

  He caught her hand. Lacing his fingers through hers, he looked at her. Didn’t she realize that she was good for what ailed him?

  “Haven’t you heard?’ he asked her. “Making love with a beautiful, intelligent woman is all part of the new healing plan.”

  “No, I haven’t heard. Sounds intriguing,” she admitted. “But right now, I have to get your tribe back home and then duck into my office for a few hours.” She didn’t even want to think about what had to be piling up on her desk. The past three days, because of the boys—and Micah—she’d been out more than she’d been in. “My contact at the police department said that they think they might be getting closer to breaking this identity theft case.” She looked at him pointedly. “I don’t have to tell you that once they do, once the whole story comes out, you’ll be exonerated.”

  Other than his sons’ welfare, clearing his name had become the most important thing in the world to him. But right now, while still very important, it wasn’t in quite the same life-or-death category as it had been only a month ago. Things had happened. Things that placed his life in a different focus than it had been before.

  He’d begun to feel again, feel in a way he had been so very certain he would never feel again. He’d been convinced that those particular emotions had been numbed, disconnected. Severed.

  But he’d been proven wrong.

  He thought of all that this woman he hadn’t even known a short while ago had done for him. For his family. “Saying thank-you doesn’t seem like nearly enough,” he told her.

  Tracy shook her head. “I’m superstitious about things like that,” she admitted. “Don’t thank me yet. Save your thanks for when we put this whole thing to rest,” she cautioned.

  “All right.” His eyes smiled into hers. “But I can practice saying thank-you.”

  The man was wonderfully incorrigible. With so little encouragement, she could become entirely used to this, to his family…

  Stop. What the hell are you doing? You don’t want to go there. You don’t want to get hurt again. Good things don’t last, remember?

  Drawing in a breath, she took a moment to pull herself together. “After you’ve got your strength back,” she told him. “Remember?”

  “I remember,” he echoed, then told her with a wicked, if a little weak, grin. “But I’m working on it.”

  Brushing her lips quickly against his—it was all she would allow herself and besides, he didn’t need to be tempted in his condition—Tracy said, “Don’t get too ambitious. Slow and steady is what usually gets a person there.”

  The last thing she wanted was for the man to jeopardize himself. After all, he’d just had an operation. His stitches were still fresh. Any undue acrobatics and he might break them before his incision was healed.

  But there was another part of her, a part that needed to feel loved, if only fleetingly and superficially. Something was better than nothing, and that part urged her on, whispering, You don’t know how much longer this is going to go on, take advantage of the situation while you can.

  Tracy wasn’t about to try to deceive herself by pretending this could continue indefinitely. There was a finite timetable out there with the name of this affair on it. She was a big girl now and she knew that. She accepted it because she knew that life was harsh with no happily ever after.

  But there was happiness, if only for a very little while, and why shouldn’t she allow herself to revel in it? As long as she accepted the fact that it would fade away like the morning fog, leaving no trace, she would be all right. She’d survive. Just like she always had.

  “Thanks, again,” Micah said to her as he let go of her hand.

  She placed her index finger lightly against his lips. “Like I said, don’t thank me yet.” Her eyes held his for a moment. “Later,” she said in a whisper that sounded more like a promise.

  To both of them.

  * * *

  “You know, that young woman is just an absolute godsend,” Sheila told her nephew the next afternoon as she fluffed up his pillow for him.

  The doctor had signed him out of the hospital earlier that morning, just as Tracy had said. And she, bringing along his sons and his aunt, had arrived to pick him up and bring him back home. But once he was back in his familiar surroundings, Tracy had begged off his aunt’s invitation to lunch, saying she would do Micah more good back at the office.

  He didn’t know about that, but he kept his protest to himself, afraid that perhaps, like his sons, he was becoming too attached to her.

  Rather than retreat to the bed in his room, Micah had opted to camp out on the sofa in the family room. At least there he could be around his sons and also near the kitchen where his aunt could usually be found when she was at his house, puttering around.

  “Lean forward,” Sheila instructed as she tucked the pillow back in behind his head. “She came right in and took charge of everything. Never saw anything like it,” his aunt marveled. “After she brought you to the hospital and waited around to make sure that you were all right, she didn’t just call to tell me, she came by after she left you to reassure the boys in person. She stayed talking to them until they were all out of questions. Came back the next day and got them involved in things so that they w
ouldn’t worry about you.”

  Taking a breath, Sheila debated going on, then decided that it was best to be honest.

  “To tell you the truth, I thought I was going to resent her take-charge attitude—you know how I like to have the upper hand when it comes to you and the boys—but she did it in a way that made me feel relieved, not resentful.” Sheila laughed softly, shaking her head in wonder. “I’d say that was a pretty unique quality to have. Looks to me like she’s the whole package,” she told her nephew.

  “I mean, I knew Tracy was a very good lawyer. Maizie wouldn’t have recommended her if she wasn’t, but I didn’t know she was going to be so capable and yet so nice.” Sheila looked quite happy as she looked at him meaningfully. “She should be able to put that company of yours in their place.”

  Satisfaction echoed in every word Sheila uttered. She had been both horrified and angrily indignant when she’d first learned about the accusation leveled against her nephew. Micah was as honest and upstanding as anyone could be.

  “The very idea, treating you like a criminal after all that time you put in with them, especially these last couple of years. You practically worked around the clock for those people.”

  That, he thought, was less about dedication on his part than it was about trying to bury himself in his work so that he wouldn’t think about losing Ella and how devastated that had made him.

  Defending Donovan Defense came automatically for him. You didn’t become the top in this field by being lax and laid-back. He’d known all about that when he’d signed on to the black programs.

  “They have to be careful, Aunt Sheila. Donovan Defense is responsible for a good part of the country’s defense missiles.”

  That carried no weight with Sheila. She fisted her hands against her hips, her very stance a challenge. “And you’re what, the enemy?”

  “No, but my laptop was compromised and they’re geared to think the worst and be suspicious until they’re shown otherwise.” There was no other way to proceed and he knew that. Unfortunately, this time around they were proceeding against him.

  Sheila took his face in her hand the way she’d done countless times when he’d been a small boy. Since he was a man now, with a man’s face, all she managed to be able to hold was his chin. She gave it a quick, affectionate squeeze before releasing it.

  “Anyone can see that this is not a face that belongs to an enemy conspirator. This is the face of a good, decent, honest man who loves both his country and his family.”

  “Be that as it may,” Micah allowed, “it’s still something that they want to verify themselves.”

  Until just a little while ago, he’d been afraid of getting railroaded. But now that fear had abated. He wasn’t sure if it was because he’d faced death and beaten it, or because he had such supreme faith in the woman who had been thrust into his life. But for whatever reason, he was now confident that it might take a while, but things would be sorted out. And in the end, he would be cleared.

  The only questions that remained were how long it would take and what would he use for income until that happened. He had a thirty-day grace period, after which action against him would be taken or he might be let go pending further investigation. In either case he wouldn’t have a salary or health coverage.

  Some catch he was. How could he possibly entertain thoughts of getting serious with Tracy? What did he have to offer her? An instant family with accumulated bills? Not exactly appealing to a woman who had looks, brains and was most obviously going somewhere. He, in thirty days, had gone from being a man with a future to a man whose future had turned into a huge question mark.

  He didn’t want her remaining with him, even for a little while, out of some sense of obligation or, worse yet, out of pity.

  Yet what else could keep her with him, he silently challenged.

  “You’re awfully quiet,” Sheila observed. “Has my talking tired you out?” she asked with an amused smile.

  No, but realizing I have nothing to offer Tracy does make me tired.

  “I think I am a little tired,” he admitted. “If you don’t mind, maybe I’ll just take a nap before dinner.”

  “I don’t mind,” she assured him, then confided, “I’m just happy you’re around to do anything. I know you well enough to know that if that woman hadn’t forcibly taken you to the hospital—well, I don’t want to think about that,” she said, emotion welling up within her. “By all means, take a nap,” she said, then promised, “I’ll be very quiet.”

  He closed his eyes, pretending to take a nap. But rather than fall asleep, Micah couldn’t help thinking about how lonely life would be once Tracy was no longer in it.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Micah discovered that as his strength slowly returned, so did, to a lesser degree, his confidence. Specifically, that his feelings for Tracy were not futile.

  Rather than simply continuing to believe that he had nothing to offer this woman, he felt a surge of determination to prove himself.

  Granted, he currently faced having no salary, no job and the possibility, if things went horribly wrong, of incarceration for quite a long time.

  But all that could be turned around with a little bit of luck. Luck that hinged on what that joined task force comprised of the local police department and the FBI could uncover. While he hated having the outcome of his fate in the hands of complete strangers, he now felt that at least there was a chance that things might work out.

  With growing impatience that he was nonetheless trying to keep under wraps, Micah glanced at his watch. It was almost six o’clock. Anticipation hummed through the veins of his healing body.

  She’d be here soon.

  Not that there was any actual arrangement to that effect, at least not in so many words. But in the past two weeks, ever since he’d come home from the hospital, Tracy had stopped by around this time every day after work. And on the weekend, she’d found one excuse after another to come over even earlier in the day.

  He knew that technically they were working on and building up his case, but he’d like to think that even if they weren’t, she’d still find a reason to stop over.

  But even if his case was the only reason she came, he wouldn’t allow that to bother him. The way he felt about Tracy, he would work with whatever he could get—and build the foundation of his relationship on that.

  The doorbell rang.

  Pushing himself up from the easy chair where he’d been sitting, Micah rose to his feet and began to make his way to the door. In the background he heard his sons scrambling, obviously with the same goal in mind. They were arguing about who could get to the front door first.

  He barely made it there before they did. Opening the door, he smiled broadly at the person standing on the other side.

  Tracy.

  She wore a light aqua jacket with a matching pencil skirt. Four-inch tan heels turned the business suit into something impossibly sexy in his eyes. He could feel the very air around him brightened instantly.

  “Hi,” he said, stepping back to allow her in.

  Crossing the threshold, Tracy frowned. “What are you doing out of bed?” she asked. Usually, it was Sheila who let her in. Micah had been camped out on the family room sofa. A quick glance around told her that Sheila wasn’t around.

  “Just what a man wants to hear from a beautiful woman,” Micah said warmly, shutting the door again.

  She gave him a full appraisal. If the case against Micah came down to an actual hearing, she needed him to be strong. That meant no setbacks due to the operation. “That man better get back into bed if he knows what’s good for him.”

  His eyes washed over her. She found herself growing rather warm. He dropped his voice several levels as Gary and Greg all but tumbled into the room.

  “I know exactly what’s good for me.”

  Tracy stood perfectly still in order to keep the shiver from giving her away. It wasn’t easy. If she wasn’t careful, she would start believing him.

  �
��At least lie down on the sofa,” she said just before she turned and threw her arms open to his sons. The little boys all but plowed into her, small arms reaching as far as they could in an attempted embrace around her waist. Grinning at her fan club, Tracy hugged them close and asked, “How are my two favorite men?”

  “We missed you, Tracy,” Greg told her solemnly.

  She’d been here for more than three hours yesterday, but she never grew tired of hearing the boys express their feelings for her. “And I missed you, but we each have things we have to do, right?”

  The boys bobbed their heads up and down in vigorous agreement. She had a feeling that they would have easily agreed to anything. Too bad that quality would fade away by the time they reached manhood, she thought.

  Straightening, Tracy’s attention was drawn back to their father, the man who invaded her dreams lately. It was a bad sign and she knew it. She had become used to having him in her life. That would make it twice as hard on her when they went their separate ways, as they inevitably would.

  What made it even worse was that she would miss his little boys like crazy.

  “Oh, before I forget. Here.” Digging into her purse, Tracy pulled out an envelope and held it out to him.

  For a moment, he just stared at it, puzzled. The logo in the corner had a broad, bold embossed double D, one capitalized letter within the other. That was Donovan Defense’s logo.

  What was Tracy doing with an envelope from Donovan? he wondered.

  “Trying out your X-ray vision?” she asked, mildly amused when he made no effort to take the envelope from her hand, but went on staring at it.

  Micah blinked and looked at her. He knew she’d said something, but the words had gone right by him without registering.

  “What?”

  Tracy kept a straight face for at least part of her answer. “Well, you’re staring at the envelope as if you were trying to see inside it. Most people open envelopes to accomplish that, so I was just wondering if you’d been blessed with X-ray vision recently and were trying it out just now.”