Фиона Бранд – His Not-So-Blushing Bride: Marriage with Benefits / Improperly Wed / A Breathless Bride (страница 19)
Her phone beeped. She pulled it from her back pocket. Incoming text from Lucas: What’s wrong? What do you need to talk about?
She texted him back: It’s an in-person conversation. BTW, how did you find the maid?
In thirty seconds, the message alert beeped again. Lucas: She just started working for my mother and came highly recommended by your grandfather. Why?
Well, if anything, she’d underreacted. The maid was her grandfather’s spy, commissioned to spill her guts about Cia’s activities at the shelter, no doubt. Abuelo probably didn’t even anticipate the coup of information coming his way about the living arrangements.
It was too late to dismiss her. Imagine the conversation where she said a maid who was good enough for Lucas’s mother wasn’t good enough for Cia. And was she really going to fire a maid who probably sent at least fifty percent of her take-home pay back to extended family in Mexico?
Not only did she and Lucas need to be roommates by tomorrow, she’d have to come up with a plausible reason why they hadn’t been thus far and a way to tell the maid casually.
With a grimace, she weaved to her feet and started yanking tank tops out of the drawer, studiously avoiding thoughts about bedrooms, Lucas, beds and later.
Beep. Lucas: Still there? What’s up?
Quickly, she tapped out a response: Yeah. No prob with the maid. Late for work. Talk 2U tonight. Have a good day.
She cringed. Wait until he found out his wife telling him to have a good day was the least of the surprises in store.
Lucas rescheduled three showings he could not afford to put off and pulled into the garage at home by five, thanks to no small effort and a white-knuckle drive at ten over the speed limit. Suspense gnawed at his gut. Something was wrong, and Cia being so closemouthed about it made it ten times worse. Most women considered it worthy of a hysterical phone call if the toilet overflowed or if they backed the car into the fence. With his wife, the problem could range from serious, like the shelter closing down, to dire, like her grandfather dying.
Cia’s car wasn’t in the garage or the driveway, so he waited in the kitchen. And waited. After forty-five minutes, it was clear she must be working late. More than a little irritated, he went upstairs to change. As he yanked a T-shirt over his head, he caught sight of the vanity through the open bathroom door.
The counter had been empty when he left this morning. Now it wasn’t.
A mirrored tray sat between the twin sinks, loaded with lotion and other feminine stuff. He picked up the lotion and opened it to inhale the contents. Yep. Coconut and lime.
In four seconds, he put the cryptic text messages from Cia together with the addition of this tray, a pink razor, shaving cream and at least six bottles of who knew what lining the stone shelf in the shower.
The maid had spooked Cia into moving into the master bedroom. Rightly so, if the maid had come recommended by Cia’s grandfather, a detail he hadn’t even considered a problem at the time.
Man, he should have thought of that angle long ago. In a few hours, Cia might very well be sleeping in his bed.
He whistled a nameless tune as he meandered back to the kitchen. No wonder Cia was avoiding home as long as possible, because she guessed—correctly—he’d be all over this new development like white on rice. Her resistance to the true benefit of marriage was weakening. Slowly. Tonight might be the push over the edge she needed.
At seven o’clock, he sent her a text message to find out what time she’d be home. And got no answer.
At eight o’clock he called, but she didn’t pick up. In one of her texts, she’d mentioned being late for work. Maybe she’d stayed late to make up for it. He ate a roast beef sandwich and drank a dark beer. Every few bites, he coaxed Fergie to say his name.
But every time he said, “Lucas. Looo-kaaaas,” she squawked and ruffled her feathers. Sometimes she imitated Cia’s ringtone. But mostly the parrot waited for him to shove a piece of fruit through the bars, then took it immediately in her sharp claws.
At nine-thirty, Lucas realized he didn’t know the names of Cia’s friends and, therefore, couldn’t start calling to see if they’d heard from her. There was avoidance, and then there was late.
Besides, Cia met everything head-on, especially him. Radio silence wasn’t like her.
At eleven o’clock, as he stared at the TV while contemplating a call to the police to ask about accidents involving a red Porsche, the automatic garage door opener whirred.
A beat later, Cia trudged into the kitchen, shoulders hunched and messy hair falling in her face.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hey,” she repeated, her voice thinner than tissue paper. “Sorry. I got your messages.”
“I was kind of worried.”
“I know.” The shadows were back in full force, and there was a deep furrow between her eyes he immediately wanted to soothe away.
“I’m sorry,” she repeated. “It was unavoidable. I’m sure you saw my stuff in your room.”
None of this seemed like the right lead-up to a night of blistering passion. “I did. So we’re sharing a bedroom now?”
She squeezed her temples between a thumb and her middle finger, so hard the nail beds turned white. “Only because it’s necessary. Give me fifteen minutes, and then you can come in.”
Necessary. Like it was some big imposition to sleep in his bed. He knew a woman or two who’d be there in a heartbeat to take her place. Why couldn’t he be interested in one of them instead of his no-show wife, who did everything in her power to avoid the best benefit of marriage?
Fearful of what he might say if he tried to argue, he let her go without another word and gave her twenty minutes, exactly long enough for his temper to flare.
He was married, mad and celibate, and the woman responsible for all three lay in his bed.
When he strode into the bedroom, it was dark, so he felt his way into the bathroom, got ready for bed and opted to sleep naked, like normal. This was his room and since she’d moved into it without asking, she could deal with all that entailed.
He hit the button on the TV remote. She better be a heavy sleeper, because he always watched TV in bed, and he wasn’t changing his habits to suit anyone, least of all a prickly wife who couldn’t follow her own mandate to be home by eight.
The soft light of the flat screen mounted on the wall spilled over the empty bed. He glanced over at it. Yep, empty. Where was she?
A pile of sheets on the floor by the bay windows answered that question. “Cia, what are you doing over there?”
“Sleeping,” came the muffled reply from the mass of dark hair half-buried under the pile.
Since she still faced the wall, he turned the volume down on the TV. “You can’t sleep on the floor.”
“Yes, I can.”
“This bed is a California king. Two people could easily sleep in it without touching the entire night.” Could. But that didn’t necessarily mean he’d guarantee it. Although, given his mood, he was pretty sure he’d have no problem ignoring the unwilling woman in his bed.
After a lengthy pause, she mumbled, “It’s your bed. I’m imposing on you. The floor is fine.”
The martyr card. Great. A strangled sigh pushed out through his clamped teeth. “Get in the bed. I’ll sleep on the floor.”
“No. That’s not fair. Besides, I like the floor. This carpet is very soft.”
“Well, then.” Two could play that game. “Since it’s so comfortable, I’ll sleep on the floor, too.”
With a hard yank, he pulled the top sheet out from under the comforter, wrapped it around his waist and threw a pillow on the floor a foot from hers. As he reclined on the scratchy carpet, she rolled over and glared at him.
“Stop being so stubborn, Wheeler. The bed is yours. Sleep in it.”
Coconut and lime hit his nose, and the resulting pang to the abdomen put a spike in his temper. “Darlin’, you go right ahead and blow every gasket in that pretty little head of yours. I’m not sleeping in the bed when you’re on the floor. It’s not right.”
She made a frustrated noise in her throat. “Why do you always have to be such a gentleman about
“’Cause I like to irritate you,” he said easily.
She flipped back to face the wall. As he was about to snap out more witticisms, her shoulders started shaking.
“Hey,” he called. “Are you crying?”
“No,” she hissed, followed by a wrenching sob.
“Aw, honey, please don’t cry. If it’ll make you feel better, you can call my mother and yell at her for teaching me manners. Either way, I’m not sleeping in the bed unless you do.”
This pronouncement was greeted with a flurry of sobbing. Every ounce of temper drained away.
Obviously, his manners weren’t as well practiced as he’d bragged, and he’d been too worked up to remember arguing and prickliness were Cia’s way of deflecting the comfort she sorely needed but refused to ask for.
He scuttled forward and cursed the binding sheet and sandpaper carpet impeding his progress, but finally he wormed close enough to gather her in his arms. “Shh. It’s okay.”