A Conflict of Interest (17 page)

“I love you. Love isn’t always safe with you, or wise.” She smiled against his cheek. “But it’s real between us, and I’m grabbing it.” She took his face between her hands. With her lips barely over his, she asked, “Will you marry me?”

He kissed her, claiming her, offering and taking with his mouth and his hands, and making his answer clear.

“I need to hear you say yes,” she said, leaning back.

“Yes.” He took her mouth again, and she forgot her mother and sister and the hard floor beneath her knees.

“Wait.” He slid his hands over her with restless hunger. “We have to tell Leila.”

“Will she see you?”

“She stayed at my house last night. She browbeat me into coming here.”

“Let’s go tell her together. I think she and my sister may be the smarter therapists. Maybe we can start a family practice.” She grabbed her coat and gloves from the hall closet. “Can we tell Mom and Bryony first?”

“Mom?” Jake said. “Your mother’s here? Are you all right?”

“You said something, dear?”

Maria turned just in time to see her mother inspect Jake with her best up-and-down, “what a big boy you are” glance. Clearly, knitting wasn’t doing its job.

Again, the doorbell rang. Maria answered it instead of lecturing her mother on inappropriate come-ons.
Gail usually accused her of being envious because she hadn’t mastered the art of flirting.

Leila, hopping from one booted foot to the other, hurried inside. “I couldn’t wait.” She stared from her father to Maria. “You look happy.”

Maria hugged her, as tight as she could, and then turned her around. “Leila, you’d better meet my mother. You’ll be family when your dad and I decide on the right month and day.”

“Will we?”

The celebratory group hug was more like a football scrum, and no one came out untouched. Gail finally staggered to freedom, tidying her hair.

“We need wine,” she said. “I don’t suppose my own dear temperance-minded daughter has a bottle stashed for the holidays?”

“Funny, Mom. Bryony and I drank the tiny bottle we could afford last night.”

“I have champagne,” Jake said. “Come with me to get it, Maria.”

“Leila?” Maria said.

“I’ll stay here and get to know your mother.” They turned as one toward the kitchen. “What are you all cooking? Dad didn’t even buy a turkey.”

“Just champagne?” Gail asked. “I like that guy.”

“There must have been a sale,” Leila said. “My dad’s kind of cheap.”

Maria laughed until Jake stopped her with a kiss. He slid his hands inside her coat. Before long, she wanted to throw it aside.

“No.” He pulled his hands away and urged her toward the door.

She wreaked her revenge as he drove. A chaste kiss on the corner of his mouth turned into insistence that led her fingers to the buttons on his shirt and down to his waistband.

Fortunately, he owned one of the few houses in his neighborhood with an attached garage. A trail of clothes followed them into his kitchen.

The coldness of the granite counter made Maria hiss in shock. Pausing only to undo her bra, Jake slid his palm between her and the stone.

“Come upstairs,” he said, lowering his mouth to her breast. “No more floors.”

“This isn’t a floor. It’s a counter.” She arched into him, begging for now instead of upstairs.

He sighed, holding her head, only to echo her gasp as she found his taut nipple.

“They won’t expect us back for a while,” he said, catching her in his arms.

She wrapped her legs around his waist. “I still don’t need a bed.”

“For everything I want to do to you, a bed will be more comfortable.”

He was a strong man. He carried her up a set of back stairs, to a small room where they saw Christmas morning in with love almost too perfect to believe.

At last they sprawled, Maria on her stomach, Jake lying half across her back, with one leg between hers.

“What will next Christmas bring?” Maria asked.

Jake pushed her hair across her face, and kissed the pulse beating at the side of her throat. “All I need to know is that I’ll wake up with you.”

A
TINY FIST WAVED
in the air, welcoming the next Christmas morning with the sweetest of all greetings. Maria’s infant daughter snuffled a little. “You’re fine.” Maria nuzzled her baby’s nose, wondering if she’d ever look at her without awe. “Daddy’s paying the bill, and then we’ll go home and lock the world out and just be us together.”

Her hospital door burst open, and Leila followed it into her room.

“Where’s your dad?” Maria asked, making room for one more on the bed.

“With your mother. She’s—”

“Doing one of her slow strolls, gathering an audience,” Bryony said, coming into the room but going straight to the baby. “Isn’t she beautiful? What did you name her?”

“Maria, I wouldn’t leave Dad alone with your mother too often.” Leila pitched her voice low. “Don’t take this personally, but I think Gail’s putting the moves on him.”

“There’s a question that’s been on my mind for some time,” Gail said, sweeping into the room, her hand wrapped like a python around Jake’s forearm. Maybe like a cobra. He couldn’t seem to look away.

“What’s the question, Mom?” Bryony asked.

“Just get it over with,” Maria said, grinning, as she held out her daughter to Leila.

“Are there any more at home like you?” Gail asked Jake.

Maria and Leila and Bryony burst into laughter that startled their sleepy baby. Jake extricated himself from Gail’s clutches as she looked stunned at their mockery.

“What did you name our girl?” Bryony asked again.

“Bryony Leila Gail,” Jake said, standing close enough for Maria to touch him.

Leila turned. Gail grabbed for the bed rail. Bryony burst into tears.

“Now, B.” Jake hugged his sister-in-law, cradling her head on his shoulder.

Maria touched Leila’s cheek. She couldn’t read the younger woman’s wide stare. “You don’t mind that she shares your name? We haven’t signed anything yet.”

“Mind?” Her whisper broke. “She’s my family, my baby sister.” Leila leaned her head against Maria’s. “And I’m proud.”

“You named her after me, too?” Gail sat on the bed. “You named her after me, Maria.”

“I had a hand in it.” Jake held one daughter while leaning down to nuzzle the other.

“Yeah, but you don’t know me,” Gail said.

“I’d do anything to please your daughter.” He kissed his wife. “I trust her judgment.”

“He had the names on the form before I knew we’d agreed. I wanted Christmas.” Maria grinned as every eyebrow in the room cocked. “Carol.”

“Uh-huh.” Leila ignored her completely to nudge her father in the ribs. “I knew you couldn’t change. You still know best.”

“You’re wrong.” His eyes promised Maria everything. Everything she’d ever dreamed of, and all she hoped for in the future. “And it’s lucky for your sister that Maria trusts me, or little Bryony would be stuck with a hokey name.”

“I knew I could trust him after he agreed to my new home office,” Maria said.

Leila nodded sagely. “I don’t know how many times he told my mom and me that work stayed in the office downtown.” She turned to her father. “You’re balancing work and home right now, Dad.”

Maria reached for Jake because Leila’s observation seemed to pinch a little.

“I didn’t mean to complain, and I’m over the mommy-and-daddy-back-together fixation. You weren’t right for each other,” Leila said quickly.

“But am I doing right by you and all these other women, Leila?” Jake asked, and she hugged him, laughing. Father and daughter laughed together a lot these days.

There was no better music to Maria’s ears.

“I have to ask again.” Gail eased daintily into Maria’s waiting wheelchair, giving Jake all her attention, ignoring the orderly trying to shoo her out. “Are there any more at home like you?”

“Mom, leave him alone.” Maria stood. Everyone came at her, but then Jake handed little Bry back to Leila and wrapped his arm around Maria. She looped
her arm around his waist, perfectly well, but content to start the future in her husband’s embrace. “This family belongs to all of us.” She grinned, blissful. “But this man? He’s all mine.”

ISBN: 978-1-4268-4332-7

A CONFLICT OF INTEREST

Copyright © 2009 by Anna Adams.

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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