The Groom's Revenge (4 page)
He returned to bed, jammed pillows behind his back and turned the stick over and over in his hands. He could barely remember snatching it out of her trash can when he’d tossed the empty wine bottle away. He’d acted on a whim, as she had when she’d kissed him.
That memory drifted in. Red and cold. And cherry sweet. Her cheeks had flushed afterward.
In his experience, kissing led to sex. Given their potential partnership, he couldn’t sleep with Mollie, therefore he couldn’t kiss her. It was that simple—unlike the woman herself, who was becoming more and more complicated.
He tapped the stick to his mouth, then tossed it on the nightstand, annoyed. Obsession was beyond his experience. It had been a long time since he’d wanted something he couldn’t have.
But she made him laugh. And she comforted without knowing it. Even better, she was as fiery as her red hair. In bed, too? he wondered.
And what would she say if she knew he was wondering about that?
Four
“N
ever?” Mollie gaped at the back of Gray’s head as she stood behind him the next evening. She’d closed her sho promptly at 6:00 p.m., then hurried upstairs. He’d spent the afternoon entering her previous year’s wholesale orders into “tracking program,” as he called it. “Gray McGuire, you have never in your life been on a picnic?”
ever?” Mollie gaped at the back of Gray’s head as she stood behind him the next evening. She’d closed her sho promptly at 6:00 p.m., then hurried upstairs. He’d spent the afternoon entering her previous year’s wholesale orders into “tracking program,” as he called it. “Gray McGuire, you have never in your life been on a picnic?”
“Not that I can recall.”
He was seated at the computer, watching the printer as cranked out sheet after sheet of graphs and charts. She looke over his shoulder at the monitor, where a colorful pie chart fille the screen.
“Maybe when I was too young to remember,” he added.
“That is un- American. Not even on the Fourth of July?”
“Not even.”
“We are filling that gap in your life experience tonight.”
“Okay.” He snagged the stack of papers from the printe “Take a look at these. As soon as I feed in the actual sale information, you’ll know exactly where your potential for los is. See here—”
Leaning around him, she reached for the papers just as he tipped his head back to say something. His head bumped against her sternum, right between her breasts. She didn’t move. Neither did he.
She matched her breathing to his, a rhythm that teased her with awareness of him as a man, a partner, a mate. She loved the weight of his head resting, almost nestling, between her breasts, making them swell and ache. Her nipples pressed into her bra. Down low, she felt her pulse pound.
Gray turned his head slightly, enough to feel the softness of her breast against his ear.
She stepped back, but the spell wasn’t broken for him. Need froze him in place.
“We won’t talk business until after dinner, okay? I’m going to change clothes, then fix our picnic. We’ll walk down to the park” Her voice faded as she moved away.
Her scent lingered. He wished he could pin it down, but it changed with her mood, her body temperature.
“I went to the grocery store before I opened up the shop,” she called out, jarring him out of his musings. “My refrigerator is overflowing with choices.”
“I brought wine,” he said. He typed a few keystrokes, sending the chart off the screen and bringing up a graph in its place. He waited until he heard her bedroom door shut before he took his hands off the keyboard. The back of his head still burned from the feel of her. Bells and whistles rang in his head, warning him of an impending crash of his logic system.
He checked his e-mail one last time. Another message from his stepfather, wondering when Gray would be resuming his responsibilities in California. The censure stung. He’d assumed his responsibilities early and well, had rarely taken a day off since he’d developed the computer operating system that had helped to revolutionize the fledgling home-computer industry.
Since then—a never-ending cycle of software to create, upgrades to design and the company to run since his stepfather had relinquished control to Gray years ago. The single-source business had mushroomed into a conglomerate under Gray’s risky push for growth. Some might even call it an empire He was grateful his stepfather had never figured out that Gray had taken such huge risks because he hadn’t created the company, therefore had nothing to lose.
He looked away from the screen, seeing nothing. He’d referred to James McGuire as his father since his mother’s marriage to the man almost twenty-five years ago. Had been ordered to, as if his real father had never walked the earth. His mother would not be pleased that Gray was thinking of James McGuire as his
step
father.
step
father.
His mother, however, would not be pleased about a lot of things, particularly not Gray’s plans for justice. The past wasn’t only dead and buried to her, it didn’t exist. Life hadn’t begun for her until the day she’d become Mrs. James McGuire.
Life had yet to begin for Gray.
He shut down the computer without replying to the e-mail. It was Friday night. Date night. And Gray intended to enjoy it.
“Just because I haven’t been on a picnic doesn’t mean I don’t know how it works,” Gray said as he helped Mollie spread out a blanket that had probably been dragged along on a hundred picnics, given the tattered softness of the fabric. The evening was perfect, warm enough that Mollie wore shorts, and breezy enough to mold her blouse to her breasts.
“You eat fried chicken,” he continued, “potato salad and pickles, then watermelon for dessert. And you spit the seeds on the ground. Then you lie back on the blanket and groan about how much food you ate while you watch the fireworks.”
“You helped me pack the basket, so you know you got the food all wrong. And if you spit watermelon seeds on the ground, they sprout. It’s annoying.”
“But fireworks,” he said. “There have to be fireworks”
“If you want ’em, you’ll have to provide ’em.”
She bent to straighten a corner of the blanket, her legs pale and smooth, her rear an appealing focal point. Fireworks, indeed, but in the form of one Mollie Shaw, human sparkler.
They created sandwiches of fresh bakery bread, smoked turkey, two kinds of cheeses and a dark, tangy mustard. Other containers yielded pasta salad, fresh and marinated vegetables, and watermelon, already cut into bite-size pieces Then rich, chocolaty brownies, so moist and gooey they had to lick the chocolate off their fingers. And the California white zinfandel wine they drank managed to complement all the different flavors.
Mollie lay flat on her back. “I’m so full,” she groaned She’d nursed one glass of wine throughout the meal, having no intention of being tipsy again. He probably already thought she was too young for him, if his indulgent smile was any indication. Of some consolation was the fact he seemed to be losing some of his seriousness. Neither of them spoke of their e-mail exchange the night before, when they’d written things to each other that they never would have said aloud. She wished she’d known how to print them off and save them.
She glanced toward Gray as he rested his back against a tree and watched some children play nearby, hollering and laughing, bringing a smile to his face. She wondered how rare it was for him to relax. He took a sip of wine, then stretched his arm across his upraised knee, letting the half-full wineglass dangle from his fingers. His eyes closed.
Mollie closed hers, as well, feeling the warm evening drift over her.
“You’re easy to be with,” he said after a while.
She stirred, rolling to her side and propping her head on her hand. His words answered a question she’d been pondering—why did a man with his many responsibilities have so much time to spend with her? Answer? Because she didn’t demand anything from him.
“I suppose people always want something from you.”
“Pretty much.”
“Ever thought about changing your life?”
It took him a few seconds to answer. “Now and then.”
“What brings you to the Twin Cities?”
“I’m considering acquiring a company here.”
“Acquiring, as in buying it? Or taking over?” She regretted asking the questions, because he lost his contented look.
“Whatever works.”
“Yet you have time to teach me computers.”
“Not a hardship, I assure you,” he said He slid down to stretch out beside her, facing her. “You’re the best kind of student”
“What kind is that?”
“Balky.”
“Me? Why, Mr. McGuire, I’m the easiest-going woman you’d ever hope to meet.”
“Balky,” he repeated, matter of fact
“Well, you’re pushy.”
“Only when I know I’m right” He refilled her wineglass, then looked at her. “I’m going home tomorrow.”
Her heart skipped. “Will you be back?”
He nodded. “In the meantime—”
“I know. We’ll e-mail.” She wondered if he had hair on his chest. She wondered what he would do if she pressed her mouth to that tempting vee of tanned flesh revealed by his open collar.
“I may even call you,” he said.
“Be still my heart.” She thumped her fist between her breasts, watching his gaze drop, then linger, even after she let her arm rest on the blanket again. Her body tingled as much as it had in her apartment. And all he’d done was look.
A tiny leaf swirled down, landing on his head. She resisted the temptation to brush it away, because she liked how it looked against his hair—and because he didn’t seem comfortable being touched. Touch was one of the things she missed most these days. She and her mother had hugged every day. Every single day.
“We should probably get back to your place and start working,” he said, sitting up.
Gray had just put the first container into the cooler when he sensed her inching toward him. She lifted her hand. He went still. Her fingers brushed his hair, then she held a small leaf for him to see.
“It landed on you a while ago.”
His reaction was ridiculous—getting aroused by a touch so faint it was hardly worth calling it that A whisper of contact, no more.
“Thanks,” he murmured, tossing the rest of their stuff into the cooler, then jamming it shut.
“My mom and I used to picnic here a lot,” she said, a catch in her voice. “I’ve been back since, but this is the first real picnic.”
He looked at her. She gazed into the distance.
“At times like this, I miss her so much I can hardly breathe.”
He clenched his teeth until his jaw hurt. “I thought I’d never get over my father’s death,” he said, the memories slamming into him. He hadn’t talked about his father in so long. So very long. “Nothing ever replaced him.”
“No. Nothing could. But maybe having a family of your own would help?”
He hesitated. That was her dream, not his. Family life hadn’t amounted to much. But he appeased Mollie, anyway. “Maybe,” he said.
“I want a family of my own so much I can taste it.”
Her words didn’t surprise him, but brought anger instead. She had a family, one that had ignored her all these years. She should have had their support, their love.
The list of crimes against Stuart Fortune grew longer.
“One last thing to show you,” Gray said three hours later. He closed the screen, then opened another. “Here’s your dictionary.”
“I think it would be easier to use the real thing,” she said. “It’s two feet away.”
“Not if you’re already on-line. Here. Let’s look up something.” He typed the word
leprechaun
. “ ‘One of a race of elves in Irish folklore who can reveal hidden treasure to someone who catches him,’ ” he read. “One who screeches,” he added with a smile at Mollie.
leprechaun
. “ ‘One of a race of elves in Irish folklore who can reveal hidden treasure to someone who catches him,’ ” he read. “One who screeches,” he added with a smile at Mollie.
“Yarg doesn’t screech, he shrieks. There’s a difference, you know.”
“Yarg. What kind of name is that, anyway?”
She didn’t answer right away. He took his gaze off the screen and saw her face pinken.
“Celtic,” she said, her voice strange.
“Do you want to look it up?”
“No!” She laughed a little. “I mean, I’ve had about as many lessons as I can take in one night.” She straightened the papers beside the computer. “Do you still think I’m the best kind of student?”
“Sure. Why?”
“You have more patience than anyone I’ve ever known.”
“Did you expect to be an expert after only a few hours?”
“I hate the learning process,” she grumbled. “I feel stupid.”
“Which you aren’t. And it’s been valuable for me, teaching you. I can see where we need to clarify the instructions in the manual for the novice user. The jargon slows you down, yet ours is supposed to be the most user-friendly system on the market.” He stood and stretched. He had to leave now, before sitting so close to her made him do something he would regret—like kiss her. It was bad enough he’d spent the past few hours adrift in her fragrance and distracted by the appealing frown of concentration on her face, the memory of her touch washing over him like gentle waves.
“Be fearless, Mollie. I’ve saved everything to floppy disks, so even if you mess something up, you won’t lose it entirely. The problem is that until you get a second phone line, I can’t talk you through anything.”
Her gaze was leveled directly at his mouth.
“Did you hear me?” he asked.
Visibly startled, she raised her eyes to his, then she stood. “I’ll be fearless. And I’ll master this by the time you come back. When do you think that might be?”
“It depends on how much has piled up at home and how quickly things transpire with the business here.” He extended his hand to her. “Goodbye for now.”
She hesitated, slipped her hand into his, then didn’t let go. “This is a lot to ask,” she said quietly, “but I would really like to hug you goodbye. I know we have a business relationship, but I feel so close to you tonight Our talk about my mother and your father and—”
He pulled her against him, wrapping his arms around her, feeling her arms come around his back and hold tight. She burrowed closer, pressing her face into his neck so that he could feel her breath, warm and unsteady against his skin.
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