Contract Bride

by Kat Cantrell

  Wasn’t it? Something unnamable gripped her shoulders, tightening them as she contemplated the gorgeous face of the man she’d married, who didn’t seem all that boss-like as he nodded his agreement.

  “Yes. And no. It strikes me as ironic that we’re so similar. Here we are, married, and we can barely have dinner together without resorting to work. Maybe it’s an opportunity to practice relaxing. For both of us. I like that we’re on the same wavelength about nearly everything. It facilitates a good working relationship. I don’t want the fact that we now live together to interfere with how we work together, and it feels like there’s a potential for that if we can’t eliminate the weirdness.”

  Oh, God, she was going to botch this whole thing up. He could feel her hesitancy, the way she tensed up the moment he looked at her with the slightest bit of warmth. And he was calling her on it. How was she supposed to stop being a freak about a man getting personal with her? “Seems to me like the best way to eliminate the weirdness is to talk about work.”

  Yes. Work. The one place she felt one hundred percent safe.

  He flashed her a smile. “Which is what I’d rather do. I’m asking you to humor me, as this is a difficulty of mine as well.”

  How could she say no to that? He was asking her for help with his own social clumsiness, which she’d never have called a failing in a million years. “I like that you’re so business focused. There’s a certain confidence required to be the CEO and you carry it well.”

  It was far sexier than it should be. She’d never admit it out loud, but she could certainly visualize how those skills might extend to the bedroom. She could pretend she might drop a few hints about the nature of her undergarments, just to see where that led.

  Now that she was thinking about them, the tiny scraps chafed the intimate places they covered, teasing up a fair amount of unexpected heat. She couldn’t seem to ignore the fact that she was wearing the most daring lingerie she owned while having dinner with her husband.

  What would he say if he knew?

  The bubble of awareness grew until she could hardly stand it.

  His gaze caught hers, burning with a strange intensity, as if he’d guessed the direction of her thoughts. “I like that you think that.”

  What was this conversation they were having? Normally, Warren had the concept of distance down to a science. That was why they worked so well together.

  This had nothing to do with feeling pressured and everything to do with the sudden chemistry between her and Warren that she had no idea how to handle. Okay, she had ideas. So many ideas...

  “But,” he continued. “I was being serious about the interviews. No time like the present to get more comfortable about being a couple. Soon enough, we’ll have to do it for real in front of government officials.”

  That popped her bubble in a hurry. She’d been lulled into a false sense of security where she could ignore the marriage part of this marriage and still get her green card. He was right. It simply wasn’t going to be that easy. And utilitarian tasks she could handle.

  “I like books,” she offered warily. “Cozy mysteries.”

  “I don’t think I know what that means.” Finally, he picked up his fork, starting to eat as if this really was a casual dinner between a married couple with no expectations. “Tell me.”

  She launched into a rundown of the difference between cozy mysteries and detective stories. This was an innocuous enough subject that she didn’t feel uncomfortable. But she was going to have to figure out how to be a little more open with him or they could be in trouble with her green card. How much trouble, she didn’t want to find out.

  He asked her a few questions, guiding the conversation well enough that she’d taken the last bite of her green beans without realizing she’d cleaned her plate. Huh. Somewhere along the way, he’d gotten her to relax. Good. She could do this. Being married to Warren wasn’t any different than being his employee, and they’d navigated dinner without a lot of hoopla.

  “Have a glass of wine with me,” he said without preamble as the housekeeper picked up their dishes. Her gaze flew to his and he shrugged with a solid smile. “I have a beautiful terrace overlooking the garden and I never use it. Sit with me and let’s continue the conversation.”

  She shouldn’t say no. Not when a lot rode on playing the part of a wife. And maybe, in the grand scheme of things, it was okay to stop being such a sook and admit she didn’t want to say no.

  And not all of her reasons had to do with green cards.

  Four

  The terrace was one of Warren’s favorite parts of the house. He’d bought this historic home in an exclusive Raleigh neighborhood for many reasons, mostly having to do with boring concepts like asset management, resale value and tax write-offs, but he’d made the decision to sign on the dotted line the moment he’d stepped through the double French doors.

  Wrought iron curlicued through the railing like an endless black vine, affording an unobstructed view of the half-acre garden that the groundskeeper kept thriving through some alchemy that baffled Warren. Dollar signs, he understood. Living things, not so much.

  Tilda would be one such example. She had turned into a quiet mouse the moment she crossed the threshold of the terrace. She’d been off-kilter all night. He’d been trying to change the dynamic, move them past boss and employee for God knew what reason. She clearly wasn’t on board. Gingerly, she took a seat on one of the wicker chairs with bright orange cushions. The thing swallowed her; it was big enough to seat an elephant or two cozy lovers, which they definitely were not.

  Which didn’t necessarily mean he couldn’t slide into the chair next to her and see if he could coax a little more cheer out of the woman he’d married. Funny, he’d never even noticed the size of that chair. Perhaps because he seldom came out here. A shame.

  And now that was all he could think about. Giant chair. Pretty woman. Beautiful view. Lots to enjoy.

  He cleared his throat and extended the wine bottle dangling from his fingers. “Red okay?”

  She nodded, relaxing not an iota as she shifted in the chair. He had the distinct impression she would have agreed in exactly the same manner if he’d casually suggested paint thinner as their after-dinner drink.

  It was nearly painful how thick the tension had grown, and that was not going to work come Monday morning when they’d spend hours in each other’s company doing the job she’d married him for. That was his excuse and he was sticking to it. Though the miniscule bit of intel he’d gleaned during dinner had only whetted his appetite to draw out this puzzle of a woman from her workaholic shell and see what made her tick.

  There was a part of him that wondered if he’d figure out what made him tick in the process. The point wasn’t lost on him that there were two uncomfortable people on the terrace, neither of whom had a lot of practice at putting work aside. Why couldn’t they practice with each other? The fact that they needed to get comfortable—for more than one reason—was just a bonus.

  He uncorked the wine that his housekeeper had already opened and then poured it, handing Tilda the glass of deep red wine by the stem—deliberately. Their fingers brushed and he wasn’t a bit ashamed to enjoy the blush that worked across her cheeks. The setting sun threw all kinds of interesting shadows across the terrace and the atmosphere was far more romantic than he’d fully anticipated. Seriously, he’d just hoped to spend a little more time with Tilda before it was back to all business, but this had turned out better than he could have dreamed.

  And he’d done a lot of that. Fantasies were harmless. The problems cropped up when he couldn’t figure out how to engage the real woman, especially since he didn’t have the possibility of dropping them both into one of his sensually charged imaginary scenes.

  Bad thing to be thinking about. And still be thinking about. His lower half had gotten uncomfortably tight in half a second, and she was going to
clue in that his groin was stirring if he didn’t reel it back.

  Not that there was anything wrong with a healthy attraction between two people. They just happened to be the two worst people on the planet to indulge in any kind of attraction, healthy or otherwise. They needed to be relaxed around each other, not hot and heavy. Though he was markedly better at the kind of conversations that he had with her in his head, the imaginary ones where all the words were sexy and led to both of them getting naked very fast.

  Get a grip with a capital G right now.

  Instead of taking one of the smaller chairs near the railing, he pulled over the footstool that went with Tilda’s chair and perched on it, sipping his wine as he contemplated her.

  “Tell me more about your life in Melbourne.”

  Her eyes widened. “Why?”

  Yeah, practice definitely needed, stat. Along with an icebreaker, more wine and maybe a nice fire at the Flying Squirrel warehouse that would allow him to escape, because of course it would take hours to untangle.

  He bit back a sigh. “Tilda, we’re married. We work together. The green-card people will think it’s weird that I know nothing about you, your childhood, your hopes, dreams. That’s what people who get married talk about as they’re falling in love.”

  Didn’t they? He’d never talked about stuff like this with women. Hence the reason he was failing at it. Quite handily, too.

  “Right-o.” She shut her eyes for a blink and then glugged about a third of her wine in one shot. “I’m not very good at this, either. I don’t date.”

  That was an interesting admission. “Really? Not at all? It seems unlikely that you don’t get asked out. You’re an attractive woman.”

  Something bright flared in her eyes and then vanished. “It might not have escaped your notice that I work a lot. Means I don’t have much time for dating.”

  “You might have noticed that’s something we have in common.” The smile he flashed her was immediately returned and that was so encouraging that his widened involuntarily. “This is good for both of us. Indulge me in something. Relax,” he told her as she raised her brows in question. “It’s just me, and I solemnly swear not to tattle to the boss that we didn’t spend the evening talking about spreadsheets.”

  That actually got a laugh out of her and it warmed something inside to hear. Because it meant she was taking his point seriously. That he might not be so bad at this, after all. Emboldened, he sipped his own wine and nudged her knee with his. “Melbourne?”

  To her credit, she didn’t edge away from the physical contact, and he gladly took it as a small victory.

  “I lived there with my parents, attended Victoria University on a full academic scholarship.”

  “That’s impressive.”

  She shrugged that off. “We weren’t wealthy by any stretch. If I wanted a degree, that was the only way.”

  “You went to work for Craig right out of college?”

  Nodding, she sipped more wine and the conversation ground to a halt. Okay. They were stuck together and he owed it to her to keep her eyes from glazing over.

  “Come on.” He stood and held out his hand without thinking better of it.

  But then he didn’t pull it back to his side. They could touch each other. It wasn’t a rule that they couldn’t. In fact, he’d say it was expected that a husband and wife touch each other, both in public and at home. How else would they get comfortable with it?

  She eyed his hand. “Are we going somewhere?”

  “Yes, to the railing so I can show you the garden. The personal conversation was too forced and people can get to know each other by means outside of the third degree.”

  That got her vote of confidence. She slipped her hand into his and let him help her from the gargantuan chair. Now that she’d done so, he couldn’t help but notice that her hand was small and feminine in his. She was so capable and focused. He forgot occasionally that she couldn’t, in fact, walk on water, and if she had vulnerabilities, she didn’t advertise them.

  He liked the reminder that she had softness hidden away, so he didn’t release her hand. Instead, he guided her to the edge of the terrace and stood with her at the railing, as promised, wedging in close.

  She didn’t comment on his proximity, just stared over the circular rows of flowers that radiated outward from the center of the garden like a pinwheel. The sun was in the last throes of setting and the landscape lighting had clicked on sometime back, illuminating the grounds. The brightness was a security measure, but he pretended it was an extension of the romantic atmosphere. Everything in his life felt utilitarian all at once, and he wasn’t in the mood to continue in the same vein with his wife.

  “This is a very unusual garden,” she remarked, pointedly not looking at their joined hands. But she didn’t pull away. “Do you spend a lot of time in it?”

  He couldn’t help but smile, both at the hilariousness of the question and the fact that she’d fallen into personal conversation in a snap, exactly as he’d hoped. “My groundskeeper occasionally consults me on things like whether I’d like to change out the annuals, but no. For the most part, it’s just magic that I enjoy occasionally when I remember that it’s here.”

  “If this was my house, I’d be out on this terrace all the time.”

  And that was as telling a comment as any. “You are aware of the fact that you live here, yes?”

  She smiled. “Not permanently. And, yes, I don’t seem capable of forgetting the fact that I now live here. With you.”

  The landscape lighting did her no favors when it came to hiding the blush that sprang up, spreading across her cheeks and into her hairline. It was as becoming as it was intriguing. She clearly didn’t like to discuss personal matters, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on whether it was because she didn’t like to give up details or because she worried that she’d say the wrong thing.

  “Yes, that’s an important part of the equation. We live here together. Have you not ever lived with a man before?”

  She shook her head and, lo and behold, one rebel strand of hair escaped her severe hairstyle, floating down to graze her cheek. And of course that made him wonder why she always shellacked her hair into place when there was at least part of it that didn’t want to conform to its mistress’s will.

  The hank of hair caught his gaze and he couldn’t stop thinking about what her hair might look like down. Better yet, what it might look like with his fingers shoved through it.

  And that was the tipping point. He wanted to touch.

  He reached out to sweep the strand from her cheek. But she jerked backward before his fingers connected, moving out of reach. Her hand slipped from his and the softening vibe between them shattered.

  “I’m sorry,” he muttered, though he wasn’t quite sure what he was apologizing for. “You had this piece of hair—”

  “No, I’m sorry,” she cut in, more color rushing into her face. “That was uncalled for.”

  “It’s fine. We’re not at the place where we can act like a couple yet. We only got married yesterday.”

  “But we are married.”

  She looked so miserable that he almost reached out again, but he caught himself this time. She didn’t want him touching her. That much was obvious. “Yes. Are you regretting that?”

  “No!” A horrified expression replaced the embarrassment of a moment ago. “I’m just... I told you I don’t date, and you surprised me. Not that you can’t—I mean, I’m not that much of a... Sorry. I’m rambling.”

  Shutting her eyes, she waited about four beats, as if collecting herself, and then opened them. He gave her that time because he was busy reading her nonverbal signals. Her arms had stolen around her midsection defensively, though he couldn’t imagine a scenario in which she’d have to be defensive. Was she afraid of him? Or did she object to him personally in some way?

 
His first instinct was to blaze through this problem, the way he would any challenge that came across his desk.

  But this was not a thorny personnel problem with Flying Squirrel or an accounting discrepancy that someone needed to explain. It was Tilda. He respected her. He’d married her. Warren forced his shoulders to relax and bit back the first phrase that had sprung to his lips, which sounded a lot like what he’d said to Marcus. Get over it.

  Whatever had been going on with Marcus prior to his suicide was not something he could just get over, no matter how logical a solution that had seemed to Warren at the time. What he’d really meant was move on. Forget about it. Focus on something else. Whatever worked.

  Marcus had needed compassion, not directives. Warren had missed that. He couldn’t make that mistake again, which was why he limited his personal interactions as much as possible. Distance was his friend for a lot of reasons. But he needed Tilda for his project. And maybe to assuage the sudden protective instinct that had sprung up out of nowhere. Tilda was his wife and it was not okay that she was so skittish around him. He had to figure out how to change things between them—without his CEO hat on—or his project would go down in flames.

  * * *

  The terrace had been a bad idea.

  Or rather, the terrace was fine. It was Tilda who was the problem. What had she been thinking when she’d agreed to a glass of wine and getting cozy with Warren? Well, that was no mystery. She’d assumed he’d never breach that physical distance between them, that the natural reserve he’d always exhibited would be her saving grace. Big mistake.

  The hand-holding had been one thing. That, he’d allowed her to ease into, which was precisely what she hadn’t known she’d need. Though it had been entirely unwitting on his part, she suspected. But then he’d lifted his hand toward her face. She hadn’t been fully prepared for it and now he was looking at her with a mixture of hesitancy and concern. Because he thought she was slightly crazy, no doubt.