The Newlyweds. Elizabeth Bevarly

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СКАЧАТЬ the information got out. So when we go to Children’s Connection tomorrow, it’s as Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Jones, wealthy, upscale newlyweds who have recently relocated to Portland and who are anxious to start a family, but can’t, so they want to adopt.”

      Bridget nodded. “Mrs. Samuel Jones,” she repeated. She lifted her left hand and surveyed the heavy golden ring on the third finger. It matched the larger one Sam wore, both of them, Pennington had joked, a wedding present from the Bureau. “I never, ever, thought I’d give up my name for anyone,” she said.

      And Sam had never, ever, planned on asking anyone else to take his name again. But he had asked someone to do that once upon a time. And the woman he’d asked had agreed to do it. Then she’d made a mockery of his name. And him. He wasn’t likely to let something like that happen again.

      “It’s only for show,” he reminded her. “I doubt it’s even real gold.” He lifted his own left hand and wiggled his fingers against the strange weight. It had been a while since he’d worn one of these. And the one he’d owned before had only been a cheap bit of gold-plated metal that had turned his finger green. Appropriate, really, all things considered.

      “Oh, it’s real gold,” Bridget said, turning the ring first one way, then another. Even in the dim illumination from the lamp, it caught the light and threw it back in a bright twinkle.

      And, of course, she’d know real gold, Sam thought. She was, after all, a Logan. Well, for now, she was a Jones. Somehow, the realization made a funny knot form in his belly.

      “But I know the marriage is only for show,” she replied quite pointedly, dropping her hand back down to her side. “There’s no way I’ll ever get married for real,” she hastened to add.

      Not that Sam disagreed—he didn’t plan on marrying again, either. But he knew his reasons for that, and he’d made his decision based on personal experience. Bridget Logan, he knew for a fact, had never been married. From what he’d heard, she’d never even been that seriously involved with anyone. And she was still young. For all her insistence that she was a seasoned agent and a mature adult, she was only twenty-five, an age when many people were still trying to figure out exactly who they were and what the hell they wanted to do with the rest of their lives. Not that Sam was an ancient sage, by any stretch of the imagination. But he wondered how she could make such a certain, sweeping statement at her age.

      That was her business, he immediately answered himself. Not his. All he had to know about Special Agent Bridget Logan was that she was as dedicated to wrapping up this case as he was. He looked at her again, at the way the soft light filmed her hair in amber and made her skin glow and her eyes luminous. He noted the soft curves of her breasts and hips that even her baggy clothing couldn’t hide. In her sleep-deprived state—and hell, probably out of it, too, Sam thought—she looked soft and tempting and vulnerable.

      Yeah, he thought. They both needed to dedicate themselves to wrapping up this case.

      The sooner the better.

       Three

       T he meeting with Laurel Reiss, the social worker at Children’s Connection with whom Bridget’s mother had made their appointments, went as well as could be expected, all things considered. Those things being that Bridget and Sam barely knew each other, never mind even liked each other, so playing the part of loving newlyweds whose fondest wish was to start a family together hadn’t exactly been easy. All Bridget could hope at this point was that it had been convincing. Unfortunately, though, she couldn’t even be certain of that.

      It was strange, because she had never felt uncomfortable or unconvincing playing a role in the field before. She’d worked undercover as everything from a call girl to a drug dealer to a Mafia princess, and she had always been able to play the parts persuasively, often in situations where her very life depended on her performance. Yet today, she had been performing in an environment that was completely safe, and had been trying to pass herself off as something that required very little effort on her part. Yet she’d felt as nervous and jittery as a preteen at a dance.

      It didn’t bode well for the rest of the assignment.

      The social worker had been friendly and outgoing, and had walked Bridget and Sam through the adoption process. It sounded like a long and arduous procedure to Bridget, one for which there seemed a million opportunities for disappointment. But Children’s Connection, Laurel had assured them, was by far the best organization for them to use, something Bridget didn’t doubt for a moment, having witnessed for herself the success of her parents’ pet project. Still, she was glad she wasn’t going through this for real. Between the ninety-day waiting period, and the notices to—and appearances in—the court, and the home study, not to mention the sheer cost of adoption, a person would have to want a family awfully badly to be so patient, so understanding and so generous.

      But then, Bridget thought, that was probably what parenting was all about anyway. Still, she was happy she’d made the decision long ago to remain single. She didn’t ever want to be responsible for anyone but herself.

      In the end, Laurel had told them that their names would be added to a waiting list that included other couples waiting to adopt. That, alas, just because Bridget was a Logan, Children’s Connection couldn’t make any special allowances for her, but that she was hopeful it wouldn’t be more than a year or two before an infant became available for her and Sam to adopt. Bridget had assured the social worker that she didn’t expect any preferential treatment because of her family ties, and that that was one of the reasons she and Sam had sought to start the adoption procedure so soon after marrying, because they had realized it might be a while before they actually brought their new baby home.

      And, indeed, being put on the waiting list was in keeping with what Bridget and Sam wanted for this investigation. It would give them both time and opportunity to snoop around and fish for information. Though Bridget would doubtless be doing most of that herself, using the excuse of her mother’s and sister’s presence at Children’s Connection to drop in for impromptu visits…and impromptu snooping.

      Still, Bridget was beginning to understand that there was going to be a lot more to this case than she had originally anticipated. If she and Sam were going to play the part of wanna-be parents convincingly, they were going to have to go through all the proper steps, and that realistically the investigation could span months.

      They might have to fool a lot more people than just the bad guy. And she might just be here in Portland for a lot longer than the few weeks she’d originally anticipated. After the nervousness and discomfort she had felt simply speaking with the social worker today—nervousness and discomfort she’d sensed from Sam, too—she just hoped they’d be able to pull it off.

      And she hoped it wouldn’t take months to do it.

      After the meeting concluded, Sam cited a need to go into the Portland field office to catch up on some work, so Bridget sought out her mother, whom she knew would be spending much of the day at Children’s Connection, and offered to treat her to a late lunch. Leslie suggested inviting Jillian along, too. So, feeling celebratory in the face of Bridget’s return home, the three Logan women bypassed the hospital cafeteria and headed off to a nearby bistro instead.

      As always, Leslie Logan looked wonderful. Bridget was close to her mother and secretly delighted that she resembled her so much. She’d gotten her auburn hair from her mother, whose own reddish-gold tresses were swept back today with a gray velvet headband, in contrast to Bridget’s loosely plaited locks. She’d also inherited her mother’s mouth and the shape of her eyes, but Leslie Logan’s were brown instead of green, like Bridget’s. Their clothing preferences, too, were similar—both СКАЧАТЬ