Prelude to a Wedding Read online

  "Dad found me around midnight."

  His father's arms had hugged him so tightly it hurt a little, but it had been a good hurt. Even as he spoke now he could feel again his father's jacket shoulder under his cheek, smell the scent of his after-shave. His father's hands had been shaking slightly as they tightened a blanket around Paul's damp shoulders.

  "I thought he would skin me alive. Instead, he talked."

  Then and now he'd have preferred being skinned alive. He could still hear the words.

  Paul, what in the world got into you to run away?

  I'm not going to do what that old man tells me, even if he is my grandfather.

  Your grandfather is providing you opportunities most boys never have, never even dream of. An education, a profession, a position in life.

  I don't want them. I don't want anything he'd give me.

  You can't say that, yet. You're only a boy. You can't know what you'll want when you grow—.

  He made us move. Mom didn't want to move. I heard her.

  He thought it best. Your mother's always had these things, so she doesn't know what it means to be without—

  And he made you take that big job.

  No. No, he didn't make me. I wanted that, Paul.

  "He said that when I grew up, I'd understand. That being an adult meant making choices, and that meant leaving some things behind."

  Someday, when you're grown-up, when you're married and have children of your own, you'll understand, Paul.

  He didn't have to grow up to understand. He'd understood then. His father had made a choice to follow Walter Mulholland's rules, and what he'd left behind were twilight games of catch with his son.

  He couldn't blame his father; he'd been poor a long time and now he had a chance for money and position, not only for himself but for his family. But he could blame Walter Mulholland.

  He blinked away the memories and looked at Bette. Her eyes were wide and solemn, with another emotion deep in them that he couldn't read. The flicker of the candles' flames added a mysterious light. He felt his heartbeat accelerate as if in delayed reaction to some tremendous danger.

  He picked up his glass and tilted the cool, clear liquid into his mouth. It didn't completely ease the dryness. "That's when I realized I didn't want to be a grown-up. I preferred to stay a kid."

  When she blinked, he felt as if he'd been cut off from a source of warmth and light. Her left hand rested on the table between them, the fingers long and pale against the forest-green cloth. He wanted to cover it with his own, to give the connection that he thought had grown between them a physical expression.

  She lowered her eyelashes a second time, and he sensed withdrawal. Maybe his own.

  He quirked a grin at her, manufacturing the mischief. "Especially those next few weeks. Mom was terrific. I even got her to let me play hooky from school the first week and go to a Cubs' game."

  "What a fiend. Scare them to death, then weasel special treatment out of them." Bette made a tsking sound with her tongue. "It sounds as if you have a wonderful family."

  He met her deep blue eyes again, and saw recognition there. He considered his family ties—Mom, Dad, Judi, Tris, other cousins, aunts and uncles. Not perfect, and sometimes the ties chafed, but . . . "I do."

  "Although your younger sister . . ." Bette gave an exaggerated shudder. "That poor soul."

  He knew what she was doing, skirting away from the serious turn their conversation had taken, and he gladly cooperated. What had gotten into him to spill all this? Not his style, not his style at all.

  He snorted in disbelief. 'Judi, a poor soul? Not on your life." Then suspicion narrowed his eyes. "Why would you say that?"

  "To have you as an older brother," she said promptly. "I have an older brother myself, and I know what instruments of teasing torture they can be, but you—" She shivered again. "It must have been a nightmare for the poor girl."

  "Hey!"

  She laughed, and he let the sound, low and rippling, wash over him. The pleasure of that sound could become addictive. That, and the look in her eyes, as if she were surprised he'd drawn the amusement out of her, and perhaps secretly rather pleased, too.

  "So, tell me about your family," he invited, sliding his right hand over her left. He did it on impulse, a casual gesture that somehow didn't feel casual. Her skin was soft and warm against his. "I bet you're the oldest of twelve, responsible for all the little 'uns since you were barely able to toddle yourself. No, wait. That's right, you said you have an older brother. So you must be the oldest girl. And you grew up in the country, and spent summers at the local swimming hole."

  She shook her head with another laugh. "Not even close. I grew up in the decidedly un-country atmosphere of the near western suburbs—mostly Oak Park. I'm the younger of two, and mildly coddled. My parents worked hard enough to take early retirement a couple years ago and move permanently to Arizona where they'd had a house for years. And they still worry about their little girl being 'all alone.' "

  Paul looked at her, and felt a twinge of protectiveness deep within him. He could sympathize with her parents. For all her self-reliance, he didn't like the idea of Bette Wharton being without a strong shoulder to rely on—a friend, a partner.

  Then it occurred to him that she might already have that, and the possibility brought a twist to his stomach that came too fast and too strong to pretend it was anything but jealousy. God. That wasn't a reasonable reaction. What did he care whether she had someone or not? He certainly wasn't auditioning for the role of strong shoulder in anyone's life.

  He sat back, sliding his fingers away from hers under the pretext of placing his napkin on the table.

  Bette, too, straightened and moved away. Although the warmth of his touch still lingered on her skin, it didn't take a body language. expert to read good-night.

  She made a show of checking her watch. "This has been lovely, Paul. Thank you. I hope you have an opportunity to check those files, and give me a call in the morning." She gathered her purse, flashed him a smile and prepared to slide out of the booth.

  "Where do you think you're going?"

  If he hadn't said it with such blank astonishment, she would have been irked by the Neanderthal implication.

  "Home. It's late."

  "Fine. I'm driving you."

  "That isn't necessary. I can catch a cab to the train station and the line goes right near my house.' That was true; the commuter railroad line ran no more than five blocks from her home in a western suburb, though the nearest station was a couple miles from the house she rented. She'd have to try to rouse a cab, not always an easy task at night in the suburbs.

  "I bet roads go right near your house, too. I'm driving you."

  Protests did no good. Not even when she logically pointed out that since he'd said he lived north of the city, along the lake in Evanston, and she lived west, it would be a long drive home for him. By the time he'd wrangled with Ardith over whether or not he would pay for their meal, then they'd said their good-nights, found a cab and reached the lot where he'd parked his car, she'd about given up.

  He held open the car door for her, then went around to the driver's side. Clicking home the seat belt and starting the car with smooth efficiency, he remained silent. She knew little about cars, but this one struck her as sleekly unpretentious. It seemed old enough to be well broken in and new enough to boast all the amenities.

  "Paul—"

  He slanted her a quick, quelling look. "I'm driving you home."

  A flicker of irritation made her grimace at him. "I intended to ask if you wanted to know where I live."

  The car rolled up to a red light at a deserted intersection, and he turned to her. She could see the amusement back in his eyes. "Sorry. Maybe I jumped to a conclusion. It was just that the previous twenty-three sentences you'd started all ended with junk about taking a train. Obviously, a totally unwarranted assumption on my part this time."

  "Totally unwarranted," she agreed. As the ligh
t turned green and he eased the car forward, she saw his smile in profile and tried to ignore an answering twitch of her lips.

  "So now that I've apologized, are you going to tell me where you live, or do you want me to start picking spots at random?"

  "That could be an interesting experiment."

  He nodded. "Although I do know it's west, so that trims out a third of the Chicago suburbs. And with the hint that it's near a commuter railroad, that eliminates about a third of that third. So, I figure it shouldn't take more than a month or so to find the right one."

  She gave in to the laughter bubbling up in her. "All right! I live in Elmhurst. Take the Eisenhower Expressway. A month's too long on the road for me!"

  "It would be a long time between showers, but it would give me a chance to get to know you."

  Meeting his look for a moment, she thought his eyes held a glint not entirely deviltry or reflected streetlights. She looked away, and they drove in silence until they reached the expressway and headed west.

  "Tell me more about your family." be said. "How about your older brother? Where is he?"

  "Married, two children, living in Minneapolis."

  "So you're an aunt!"

  "Two times an aunt. Ron and Claire have a two-year-old son, Ron, Jr., and they just had a little girl, Abby, last month."

  He sighed. "I wish my sister was old enough to have kids. Or maybe I should say old enough to have kids without making Mom and Dad crazy. I've always wanted to be an uncle."

  "An uncle? Why?"

  "It seems like the perfect setup. Uncles—and aunts— have all the fun without the responsibilities. You don't have to live up to anyone's expectations of the perfect parent. No diaper changing, no worrying about childhood diseases, no sweating out death-defying escapades, no grounding them because they stayed out too late, no wondering if the roads'll ever be safe again with a sixteen-year-old maniac on the streets, no birds-and-bees talks, no college tuition."

  "Sounds to me as if you're speaking from first-hand experience."

  He quirked an eyebrow at her—questioning, but already primed to share her amusement.

  "As if you're remembering your own youth," she explained.

  The expectant look became a full-blown laugh. "I hadn't realized it, but you're right. The idea of having a kid like me would scare anybody off! Lord, when I think of the things Grady and I got into, it's amazing we made it to twenty—and without being the death of our parents."

  "Just you and Grady? Was Michael the responsible one?"

  "Probably. I didn't meet Michael until college. But, yeah, I'd guess he was the responsible type even as a kid. Steady. Not like Grady and me."

  As she gave him directions off the expressway, a twinge drew Bette's eyebrows into a frown, but she didn't have time to consider it, because he had another question.

  "How about your friends?"

  She hesitated, uneasy. "I, uh, I haven't been very good about keeping up with my friends. There's one girl from high school, Melody, who always checks in when she comes through the area. And my assistant, Darla, has been a wonderful friend to me."

  She broke off to give him further instructions on where to turn. She could have let the topic drop there, but she felt the need to explain further. She refused to use the word justify even in her own mind.

  "You know how it is when you get into college and get immersed in your classes and studying." She thought back to some of his stories tonight; maybe he didn't know. "Setting up a business is like that. It doesn't leave time for anything else. It takes twenty-five hours a day just to get it off the ground. To make it really fly, you have to be totally dedicated to that, and that alone."

  He glanced at her as he made the turn into her street and she knew he didn't agree.

  "What's the use of having your own. business if you let it run you? The whole idea is to not have a boss looking over your shoulder, telling you what to do and when to do it. Work's fine, but there are other things in life. Ambition can take over."

  She bristled a little at the implied criticism at the same time she wondered if anyone could really be that offhand and still make a go of a business. Experience had taught her the demands of a successful business. And she had done sufficient homework on Paul Monroe to know his business was successful . . . even if her research had left out exactly what he did.

  "This is it," she said coolly, "the one in the middle of the block with the light on."

  He pulled into the driveway. "A house? You own it?"

  "No. I'm renting this one, but I'm starting to look for a place to buy." The next step in her plan. With the business apparently on its feet, it was time to stop wasting money on rent and start building equity.

  "It's nice, but you could use a jack-o'-lantern."

  "Jack o'-lantern?"

  "You know, a pumpkin, carved to look like a face, with a candle inside,"

  "I know what a jack-o'-lantern is."

  "Good. Because that front doorstep of yours could definitely use one. You know Halloween's getting close."

  "Yes, I know, but a pumpkin has not been at the top of my list of priorities. I've been busy at—"

  "At work," lie finished for her.

  She glanced over, but saw no sign of the humor she might have expected. His gaze was fixed with great concentration on her bare front step.

  She prepared to say her thank-yous, but he turned the engine off. For a blood-thundering instant she thought he was going to turn to her, reach across the bucket seats, take her in his arms and . . .

  Before her imagination could get too carried away, he'd gotten out and come around to open her door. She thanked him, but ignored his hand.

  She'd known him less than eight hours, but sometimes that was all it took to see the flaws. He'd made no effort to hide them. From his own words she'd learned he hated schedules and put fun ahead ahead of responsibility. He hadn't learned that achievement followed a plan.

  It all added up to one message: he was a man to stay away from.

  Too bad her hormones didn't agree.

  "A hatchback, huh?"

  She followed the direction of his gaze to the garage door windows. Hatchback. Car.

  "That's right. A total suburbanite, that's me. It comes in handy for hauling things from the hardware store."

  "But you don't drive in to the city?"

  "Not if I can help it. It's more efficient to take the train. That way I can work during the commute and don't have to worry about parking. You always drive?"

  "I like the freedom."

  Stepping within the pool of light at the front door, she took a slow, steadying breath as she unlocked the door then turned to him, holding out her hand.

  "Thank you, Paul. I enjoyed the evening. Dinner was wonderful, and Mama Artemis's is a real find. I—"

  He ignored the hand and the speech. Grasping her upper arms, he turned her to face him, startling her into silence. He bent his head, so slowly she thought she might explode from the waiting before he ever reached her lips.

  And then, when the waiting had finally ended, all he did was brush his mouth against hers—top lip, bottom, top lip again. Softly, quickly.

  "Good night, Bette."

  He turned her around and headed her inside. Automatically, she closed the storm door and wooden door behind her. But she couldn't move any farther. She heard his car door shut, heard the engine start, heard his car back up and pull away, and still she stood, leaning against the door's wooden panels, staring into the hallway's familiar shadows.

  One thought; filled the yawning emptiness his touch had made of her mind.

  Uh-oh.

  Chapter Three

  Paul turned the corner and caught one last glimpse of the neat neighborhood. A neighborhood where all the corners were squared, all the houses in a straight line, all the lawns trimmed and the trees big. Someone with a ruler had probably plotted out the whole thing, including the flower beds filled with yellow mums.

  It suited Bette Wharton rig
ht down to the ground.

  A vague vision of his apartment rose in his mind as he accelerated onto the tollway and headed north. Although he'd lived there several years he couldn't form a clear picture of it. The walls were light, maybe white, and the windows good-sized so a good bit of tree-dappled sunlight made it into the rooms. He had an old couch his mother gave him when she redecorated the room over the garage. But he could envision it better in that hideaway of his teen years than in his own living room. Books, a TV and stereo equipment rested on shelves of boards and bricks, smacking a bit of college days. But he'd been reluctant to put up shelves. That seemed too permanent, too attached.

  He rolled into the exact-change lane for the tollbooth, flipping coins in left-handed with practiced ease. Merging into the traffic, which couldn't be considered light even at this hour, he found his mind repeated his earlier thought:

  That seemed too permanent, too attached.

  Maybe that was what bothered him about the museum deal.

  Jobs he'd done for several museums around the country as one-shot deals had worked out fine. In fact, he'd enjoyed them. The people sure weren't in the business for money, and he liked that about them. Plus, he appreciated that museums these days were acknowledging the lighter side of everyday life, the toys, the games, the hobbies. And he enjoyed visits to Washington, especially since they gave him a chance to visit Tris.

  But now, with the Smithsonian talking about a regular arrangement . . . He just didn't know.

  Someone like Bette Wharton would probably jump at this kind of opportunity. He suspected that, to her, it would be a building block in some great life plan.

  He checked the rearview mirror as he steered toward the exit, caught sight of his half smile and turned it into a grimace. All right, so he was attracted to Bette, despite the suspicion she actually had one of those god-awful five-year plans the yuppie magazines always wrote about. Why? What was so great about Bette Wharton?