In The Tycoon's Bed: One Night, Two Heirs. Maureen Child

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      He picked up the bag and asked, “I’ll see you later, then?”

      “We’ll be here for the fireworks show.” Knowing how the girls would be excited to see him, she pointed off to the gigantic black oak that stood in the town square. “Hannah and the girls are over there if you want to say hello.”

      A wide smile creased his face. “Thanks. Think I will.” His gaze shifted to Abby. “Nice to see you.”

      “Thanks, you, too.”

      When he walked off, Sadie watched him until he was swallowed up by the slowly moving crowd. Then she sighed and Abby nudged her in the ribs.

      “What?”

      “He’s still gorgeous.”

      “Yeah?”

      “He looks at you like you’re the last steak at a barbecue.”

      “I know.” That’s just how she felt when he was around.

      “So what’s the problem?”

      “He’s not here to stay, Abby,” Sadie said, resting one hip against the counter.

      “You don’t know that. Word is he’s thinking about retiring.”

      “Maybe,” she said, looking back over the crowd in the direction Rick went. “But even if he did stay in town, it isn’t me he wants. It’s his girls.”

      Abby laughed and dropped one arm around her shoulders. “Not what it looks like to me, Sadie. He’s really into you. It’s in his eyes.”

      “He just desires me. That’s different.”

      “And could be fun.”

      She shook her head even though she was smiling. “Fun isn’t on my schedule,” she said sadly. “I’m a mom now. I have to do what’s best for my daughters.”

      “And what exactly is that?”

      “Wish I knew,” Sadie whispered as Abby moved off to wait on another customer.

      The rest of the day passed in a flurry of activity. There were rides for the twins, a small petting zoo and a country-fair-like atmosphere at the booths filled with pies and handmade crafts.

      Sadie had as good a time as a woman could who was twisted into knots. Rick was there. All day. He carried the girls when they got tired, indulged them in ice cream and candy and Sadie could only hope their tummies were tough enough to handle all the sugar. Sadie should probably have drawn a few lines in the sand. Put a lid on sugar consumption at least. But Rick was so excited with his daughters and the girls were simply nuts about their daddy. She simply couldn’t force herself to be the disciplinarian at the party when everyone was having so much fun.

      They settled on the blanket beneath the tree for a late lunch. It was just the four of them since Hannah had found a group of friends among the crowd. While the girls ate bananas and mac and cheese, Sadie unwrapped the sandwiches Hannah had packed for her. She handed one to Rick.

      When he took it, his fingers brushed hers and she gasped a little. He heard it and smiled. “Thanks.”

      “Don’t thank me,” she protested. “Hannah packed the lunch.”

      “I wasn’t talking about the sandwich.”

      “Oh?” She looked at him as she reached over to hand Gail a cup of milk.

      “I meant,” he said, smoothing one hand over Wendy’s dark brown curls, “thanks for sharing our girls with me today.”

      “You don’t have to thank me for that, Rick,” she said softly. Yes, he was confusing the hell out of her personally, but his obvious love for the twins warmed her heart. “They’re your daughters, too. I want you to know them. I want them to know you.”

      He glanced from each of his daughters’ tiny faces back to Sadie. Dappled shade danced across his face as the leaves of the black oak dipped and swayed in the sultry breeze.

      “I appreciate that. I do.” He took a bite of the sandwich, chewed and swallowed. “But I want more than the occasional day with them, Sadie.”

      “I know that.” She picked up the sippy cup of milk Wendy toppled over and set it upright again. “But—”

      “No buts about it, Sadie. They’re my family. My blood.”

      “And mine,” she reminded him.

      “Yeah, which brings me back to my point.”

      She cut him off. Sadie wasn’t going to give him the chance to talk marriage again. Sharing the twins wasn’t enough of a reason to get married. She wouldn’t take that step again unless she was in love. “I know what your point is, Rick, but I haven’t changed my mind.”

      “Why the he—” he broke off, looked at the girls and gave a rueful smile. “Why the heck not? We were good together.”

      “Yes, for one night.”

      “Could be every night.”

      “Marriages aren’t only lived in bed.”

      “Doesn’t hurt.”

      She sighed. “Rick, we’ve been over this already.”

      “And will be again,” he told her, his brown eyes locked with hers.

      “What’s the point?”

      “We have kids.”

      “And we can both love them without being married to each other.”

      “We could be a family,” he said softly.

      And for one brief moment, that word seemed to reverberate inside her. She had always wanted a family of her own. It was the main reason she had agreed to go along with her father’s plan when he married her off to Taylor. She had believed back then that even if a marriage hadn’t started out for the right reasons that two people who wanted to badly enough could build something good.

      But she’d found out soon enough that a marriage without love wasn’t a marriage at all.

      “It’s a bad idea, Rick,” she said finally and met his eyes.

      “You don’t know that.”

      She actually laughed and Gail looked up at her with a grin. “Oh, yes,” she said, “believe me when I say I do.”

      “You can’t use your marriage as a measure of what we could have.”

      “It’s exactly what I should do,” she told him firmly. “My marriage was a misery because there was no love there. I married him for all the wrong reasons and СКАЧАТЬ