Сандра Мартон – Pleasure: The Sheikh's Defiant Bride (страница 9)
Monday morning, none of that happened.
The coffee hadn’t brewed. Her hair dryer died when she plugged it in. There were no clean panty hose in the drawer. Even her mascara failed her, depositing a smear of black on the lashes of one eye and nothing at all on the other.
Her fault. All of it.
The coffeepot made a carafe of boiled water, not coffee. The dryer had been at death’s door last time she’d used it. Her panty hose were all in the hamper, the mascara had produced a pathetic dab of color because it was empty. Most unbelievable of all, she’d overslept because she’d forgotten—forgotten, for the first time in her life!—to set the alarm.
She’d intended to deal with all that Saturday and Sunday. Go to Zabar’s for coffee, to Macy’s for a new hair dryer, to Saks for mascara, wash her lingerie.
Instead she’d spent both days feverishly doing stuff that didn’t need doing.
She’d cleaned cupboards and closets, floors and furniture until someone from the Department of Health could have done a white-glove inspection and come away smiling and at night, she’d watched reruns of
“And for what reason?” she demanded of her reflection in the bathroom mirror Monday morning.
Because she couldn’t get the SOB, the stranger who’d almost seduced her, out of her head. Because even the memory of what had happened was humiliating.
Because she knew, deep down, that blaming him for everything was the worst kind of lie.
He hadn’t tossed her over his shoulder and carried her away.
He hadn’t lured her into that summerhouse.
He’d kissed her, was what he’d done, and her libido had done the rest, turning her into a creature she didn’t know, a woman who had let a stranger do things to her that still made her blush.
That still made her bones melt, just remembering.
Damn it.
What was the sense in rehashing it all? She’d done what she’d done. It was over.
A deep breath. Another look in the mirror. A lift of the chin.
“Stop whining,” Madison told herself briskly.
Who cared about Friday night? Today was Monday.
It was the truth.
Madison’s expression softened.
Her baby. A child to love. To nurture. That was all that mattered. Friday night, the man—not worth another second. What mattered was her appointment this afternoon and the sweet, bright promise of pregnancy. She turned her back on her reflection, went to the closet and flung the door open.
It was just that it was crazy that she, of all people, could have been swept off her feet not by a prince, as Barb had teasingly promised, but by the kind of sleazy Don Juans who’d tromped in and out of her mother’s life.
He’d been good-looking but Don Juans always were. Tall. Dark. Drop-dead gorgeous. And with an aura, a hint of something in his bearing, in his speech that hinted at the exotic.
Madison snorted.
He’d probably been born in Brooklyn—and why was she wasting time on him again?
Forget the panty hose. The smooth, tamed hair. Coffee? There was a Starbucks on the corner. Concentrate on the present, not the past.
She dressed quickly. Comfortably. A white blouse. A pale pink skirt. White sling-backs with a comfortable heel, no mascara because she didn’t have any, just some lip gloss, then some gel to tame her hair.
Monday might not have started well but it was going to end brilliantly. And when this was all over and her pregnancy was confirmed, she’d tell Barb Friday night’s Big Lesson.
If you had to weigh the benefits of a man against a test tube, the test tube would win, every time.
No one at FutureBorn knew this was not going to be an ordinary day.
Madison, of course, was the sole exception.
How could she keep her mind on work when something so important was going to happen at two o’clock?
She watched the hands of her watch creep from nine to ten, from ten to eleven, then—was it possible?—slow from a creep to a crawl.
At noon, she opened a container of yogurt, shut her office door, took the file folder that held the data about the donor she’d selected from her locked desk drawer.
She read as she spooned up yogurt.
Yes, absolutely, she’d chosen the right man.
Educated. Healthy. Nice-looking. Polite, soft-spoken and modest. The file didn’t mention anything but education and health but she knew the rest would be true.
Excellent traits for fatherhood.
The stranger had been none of those things. He’d been a walking, talking ad for self-centered arrogance, passionate intensity and macho attitude.
In other words, he’d been sexy as hell.
Madison rolled her eyes, dumped the yogurt in the trash and put away the file.
“Are you crazy?” she muttered.
She had to be.
So what if being in his arms had been like nothing she’d ever experienced in her life?
His touch. His kisses. His hunger … and, oh, the hunger that had blazed inside her. She’d wanted him. Needed him. Another few seconds, she’d have let him take her right there, in the garden where anyone might have stumbled across them.
Let him tear aside her panties. Her thong—and what had made her wear a thong, anyway? A thong and no panty hose. A good thing, because panty hose would have gotten in his way, delayed that incredible minute when he’d put his hand between her thighs.
Madison shot to her feet.
It was barely one o’clock. Her OB-GYN’s office was only a short cab ride away but there was no harm in getting there early. She was nervous and edgy. No wonder she was thinking crazy thoughts.
“Get moving, kid,” she said.
And she did.
It was amazing, how something a man had dreaded could turn out to be the very thing that restored his equilibrium.
At seven that evening, Tariq stepped into the foyer of his penthouse, tossed his keys on the marquetry-topped table near the door and shrugged off his suit jacket.
He’d been so hung up in disliking what he’d had to do this morning that he’d almost forgotten the reason for doing it.
Yes, he still had to find a wife but now he could give the project the time it deserved. Choosing a woman to wed was not like choosing a date for a party. It would require planning, something he had not initially considered.
Tariq undid his tie as he climbed the stairs to his bedroom.
He would draw up a list of qualities he demanded in a wife and a list of women he already knew. Cross-reference the two. He had not considered doing that until now, either.
To solve a problem, any problem, one needed to develop a method that would lead to a solution. It was the way he conducted business; why had he not also realized it was the way to search out a suitable wife?
But not tonight.
Tariq smiled as he stripped off his clothes.
Tonight, he would take a break from his wife-search. A shower. A drink. A meal.
And a woman.
He stepped into the glass shower stall, turned his face up to the spray, turned again and let the water beat down on his neck and shoulders.
Definitely, a woman.
He’d check the names in his BlackBerry, make a call …