Wendy Etherington - Suiteheart Of A Deal - Suiteheart Of A Deal / My Place Or Yours?

“Rainey, I just want to talk to you for a few minutes—” he pleaded. “After you ran out like that—”

“I didn’t run out, Trevor. I moved west. There’s a difference. I have to go now.”

“We need to talk, Rainey. Clear the air…”

Sighing impatiently, she glanced over her shoulder at Beck. He was watching her with wide eyes and thinly veiled curiosity. To Trevor, she roared, “There’s two thousand miles of air between us, and it’s all very clear to me! Goodbye!” She slammed the receiver down and sat down again, hard enough to bruise her tailbone.

A moment later, Beck asked, very casually, “Ah, who’s Trevor?”

“Nobody. Just an old boyfriend.” Oooh! How dare Trevor call her after what he had done! The nerve.

Beck’s eyebrows shot up. “Your old boyfriends call you long-distance?” From his tone and body language, it was clear to Rainey that he was trying not to seem too interested, but failing miserably. An alarm bell sounded in her head. Her past was none of his business. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

He nodded and waited. When it finally became clear that she really wasn’t going to say more, he cleared his throat. “Okay, then, back to us. Let’s look at our options.” He raised his right index finger in the air. “Option Number One. We do nothing. We continue running the Haven as is, until we go under.”

“That’s not an option. That’s a disaster!” The kettle whistled. Rainey jumped up, moved it to a cold burner, and sat down again, forgetting to make the tea.

“Okay, then. Option Number Two. We sell the inn, split the profits, if there are any, and go our separate ways.”

She gasped. “No way! I’ve worked my whole life for this opportunity.”

Beck nodded. “Right. And for me this is a terrific business deal. So what does that leave us with?”

Rainey chewed on her lower lip and stared into space. Oh, darn. What did it leave them with? Nothing, that’s what. Good grief, what a mess! How could she marry a total stranger she had vowed just yesterday to avoid at any cost? It was utterly insane. Every instinct she had told her to grab her still unpacked bags and get out of there as quickly as possible. Forget she’d ever heard of the Honeymoon Haven and Bragg Creek and Beck Mahoney. But where would she go? Back to “Tronna” and Trevor?

After a long silence, she sighed wearily and muttered, “Okay, tell me what you have in mind.”

Excited, Beck leaned forward and gave her his thoughts. They would have Nate Frome draw up a prenuptial agreement. They would marry quietly and stay married only as long as necessary—six months, a year at the most. Then they would start to make noise about trouble in the marriage…

“Well, at least that part will be true!”

He ignored her sarcasm and continued. They would live in his cottage….

“In separate bedrooms, of course.”

“Of course,” he agreed a little too quickly.

Rainey eyed him suspiciously. She smelled a rat.

In the meantime, Beck concluded, they would renovate the Haven from top to bottom, step up their marketing efforts and reel in the profits. Simple.

Energized by the sheer absurdity of the situation, Rainey rose and began to pace back and forth in the confined space. She felt like a wild animal caught in a trap. Something told her it just wasn’t going to be that simple. There would be all kinds of problems. Rules would have to be established. Scores of issues would have to be resolved. She struggled to mentally list them and consider each one separately.

Okay, for one thing…Whirling around like a prosecutor about to pounce on a hostile witness, she demanded, “What if you meet somebody three months from now, who you really would like to marry? What then?”

“I don’t think that will happen.” Beck’s eyes slid over her from head to toe and back again. Rainey involuntarily blushed. Darn it all, why did he have to do that? Why did he have to stir up so many mixed feelings in her? Like, dislike, amusement, exasperation, rage, sympathy, lust.

Startled, she realized for the first time that she was, maybe, just maybe, a little attracted to the guy. Oh, what a dreadful thought! She pushed it away and tried to concentrate on the situation at hand.

“Besides,” he added with a wry smile, “there’s nobody in this town I can trust with my heart, Rainey. With you, at least I would know that you only married me for my money.”

Her jaw dropped. “Beck Mahoney, that is the craziest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

He shrugged. “It’s a crazy situation.”

Sighing, Rainey glanced out the window at the Haven’s half-full parking lot. It was a hazy day and the majestic blue spruce trees surrounding the lot had taken on a bluish-green hue. Something on the far side of the lot caught her eye. What the…? It was a man and a woman, scrambling into the back seat of a car. They looked suspiciously like Freda Norman and Hollis Harriman, but from this distance it was hard to tell. Why on earth would those two be jumping into a parked car together?

A sense of defeat suddenly overwhelmed her and her shoulders slumped. All my life I’ve worked for this, she thought sadly. To run this inn, to live in this beautiful place, to be happy. Aren’t I entitled to a little happiness?

Oh, well, maybe the Rainey-gets-a-new-life program would just have to wait another year. Beck was right. They had no options.

She fixed a stern eye on him. “Okay, I’m not agreeing to anything just yet, but if we do get married—and I’m only saying if—everyone will have to be told that it’s strictly a business arrangement.”

Beck bared his dazzling white teeth in a grimace. “Ah, well, there might be a little problem with that.”

Yup. She was right. Problems already. “Really? Why?”

“Well, it’s my grandmother, see. She’d be horrified if she thought the marriage wasn’t real. From her standpoint it would violate the spirit of the trust. I think my grandfather meant for me to be happily married.”

Good grief. Rainey dropped her chin and looked at him the way she might look at a teenager who’d just tried teenage logic on her. “Call me crazy, Beck, but wouldn’t you be violating the spirit of the trust anyway? I mean, we’re not exactly smitten here, you know.”

The question caught him off guard and he hesitated. Alarm surged through Rainey like an electric jolt. Oh, no.

Surely he wasn’t attracted to her in a serious way. How could he be? They had just met yesterday.

A playful smile played across his luscious lips. “I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not.”

“What are you really saying? That we have to pretend to be smitten, for your grandmother’s sake?”

“Yup, for hers and everybody else’s. This is a small town, Rainey. People talk.”

“That’s ludicrous. How are we supposed to keep that up?”

He helped himself to another full-length appraisal of her. “I don’t know about you, but I won’t have any trouble playing my part.” He glanced at her breasts. Licked his lips. Grinned like a monkey.

“Look, Beck,” she warned him with narrowed eyes, “you mustn’t get any ideas about me. I’m here to run an inn, nothing more. Understand?”

“Perfectly,” he agreed with all the sincerity of a snake oil salesman.

Ooh, he was maddening! How on earth was a woman supposed to know when this guy was being real?

“Besides,” Rainey added, regretting it almost immediately, “I’m…I’ve just been through…I’m a little vulnerable right now. You have to respect that.” Darn, now why did she go and say that? It was way more than he needed to know.

Beck’s eyes widened, but he had the sense not to press for an explanation. “Okay, I will,” he agreed solemnly.