Christine Rimmer - The Millionaire She Married

“A disappointment.” His tone was knowing.

“That’s what it sounded like to me. So if she seems a little down, that’s probably why.”

“She’ll get over it.”

“Of course she will.”

“What she ought to do is get a real job. She’s twenty-five years old, after all. Time to make a few realistic decisions. There’s no reason she couldn’t move back to Meadow Valley permanently. That house of your mother’s is half hers now. As soon as you and I get married, she could have it to herself. Plenty of room to set up a studio and paint in her spare time. She ought to—”

“Logan,” Jenna cut in gently.

He was silent, then he chuckled. “I know, I know. None of my business. But she is your sister. And I worry about her.”

“I know you do. And it’s very sweet of you.”

“Tell me again how much you miss me.” She could picture the loving smile on his handsome face. The image made her feel about two inches tall.

“Jenna? Are you there?”

“I miss you,” she said. “A lot. And I…” Her throat closed up. She had to swallow before she could get the words out. “I love you. Very much.”

“And I love you, Jenna Bravo. Did you get those papers in the mail from Florida yet?”

“Uh. No. No, I’m afraid that I didn’t.”

“Well. It’s only been a few days. We have to exercise a little patience, I suppose.”

“That’s right. Logan, I…” But no, she told herself again. Not now. It’s not right to tell him something like this over the phone.

“What is it?” Concern threaded his voice. “Is something wrong?”

“No. Nothing. Nothing at all. I just…I’ll be glad when you’re home.”

Softly he agreed, “So will I.”

Jenna hung up feeling like a two-timer, a woman of questionable moral character, dishonest and bad. She could have killed Mack McGarrity. She muttered a few choice expletives under her breath.

And then, before reason could reassert itself, she got out the phone book and looked up the number of the Northern Empire Inn.

She dialed it quickly, and when the operator answered, she growled, “Mack McGarrity’s room, please.”

He picked up after the first ring. “McGarrity here.” His voice, so deep and firm and resonant, vibrated along her nerves, sent a shiver moving just beneath the surface of the skin.

She could hear a television in the background, a man talking, then audience laughter. “Hello?” he said, impatient now, sounding like the old Mack, the oh-so-busy Mack, the Mack who’d dragged her to New York City without bothering to get her input on the move—and then hardly had a spare moment for her once he got her there.

She opened her mouth, then shut it without making a sound. What was there to say that she hadn’t already said?

She heard him draw in a breath. And then, in tender reproach, he whispered her name.

“Jenna…”

She lowered the handset and laid it oh so carefully back in its cradle.

Jenna didn’t sleep well that night. She couldn’t get comfortable in her own bed. And then, when she finally did drop off, she had a dream about Mack.

About making love with Mack.

In the dream, their lovemaking was every bit as beautiful, as sensual and sweet and soul shattering, as it had been in real life.

They lay on a white bed—the bed in the window of her shop, as a matter of fact. In the dream, though, the bed drifted in some warm and safe and hazy place. It floated, with Jenna and Mack naked upon it, in a kind of misty void.

Mack touched her, the way he used to touch her—in the beginning, when it was all so new and magical. When what he’d found with her was still enough to make him put aside temporarily the demons of ambition that drove him.

His eyes were the sky, blue turning cloudy. His hands, so warm and strong, moved over her body in a lazy, arousing dance. She moaned, and he kissed her, the deepest, longest, most sensual kiss she had ever known. It went on and on. She pressed herself closer to him and realized that he was already within her. There was that perfect, full sensation of joining.

Her eyes drooped closed. His kiss deepened even more. Impossible, that a kiss already so deep could continue to intensify. But it did. And they were moving together, sighing together, on the wide white bed in the middle of a warm and lovely nowhere.

Then all at once she was standing in the waiting room of a doctor’s office, looking through the receptionist’s window.

And it was Logan, not a receptionist, who stared back at her. “There’s no cure for you, Jenna.” His voice was icy cold. “I’m afraid your case is terminal.”

She woke with a cry, sitting straight up in bed.

The next day Jenna looked in the phone book for the number of the attorney who had handled her divorce from Mack. It wasn’t there. She remembered the address, so she drove by the attorney’s office that evening, on the way home from Linen and Lace. But her lawyer had moved. The building was now occupied by a florist’s shop.

Logan didn’t call that night. Jenna felt guiltily grateful for that. As long as she didn’t talk to him, she didn’t have to keep asking herself if it was better to tell him the truth right now—or to wait until she could tell him to his face.

Sunday, Linen and Lace opened at one in the afternoon. Jenna went out at a little after ten o’clock and bought bagels and cream cheese. Then she woke Lacey and the two of them sat in the breakfast nook, warm September sunlight pouring in the windows, drinking coffee and sharing an impromptu brunch.

Lacey talked a little about her stalled career dreams. She’d been living in L.A. for five years now. She shared a downtown loft—in a rather rough neighborhood that made Jenna nervous—with a friend, a fellow artist. Lacey painted every chance she got, and she was making connections, building a network of people who knew and liked her work. Every now and then she’d sell a painting. But as yet, her long string of jobs waiting tables and serving at private catered events were what paid the rent.

Jenna really did believe her sister had talent. And Lacey had come a long way from the troubled, rebellious teenager who’d once been known by her teachers as the Scourge of Meadow Valley High. Now Lacey really cared about something.

“You work hard,” Jenna told her. “And you love what you do. You just keep working. Someday you’ll get the recognition you deserve.”

Lacey had what Jenna always thought of as a naughty angel’s face—wide blue eyes, a lush, full mouth, a delicate nose and beautiful pale skin. She liked to wear tight-fitting tops and flowing, semitransparent skirts. To Jenna, she always seemed a cross between a rock star and a fairy princess.

Now the full mouth was stretched to a grin. “It’s obvious why I come home—to hear you tell me that I’m bound to succeed.”

“And you are. I know you are. Do you need money?”

“No, I do not. I’m managing just fine.”

They shared a second bagel and Jenna poured them each more coffee.

Then Lacey asked, “So what’s gone wrong in your life lately?”

Jenna tensed, but tried her best not to let Lacey see it. “What do you mean?” She hoped she sounded breezy. “Everything’s fine.”

Lacey leaned closer. “Come on. It’s me. Your bad baby sister. I grew up spying on you, remember? I saw you get your first kiss.”

This was news to Jenna. “You did not.”

“I did. You kissed that redheaded boy, the one with all the freckles, whose ears stuck out. Chuckie…”

Jenna felt her cheeks coloring. “Oh, God. Chuckie Blevins.”

“You were thirteen. And that Chuckie. He was some kisser. He slobbered all over you—and you wiped your mouth after. But in a very Jenna-like way, so considerately, waiting until Chuckie wasn’t looking.”