Montana Mail-Order Wife. Charlotte Douglas

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СКАЧАТЬ flooded through her, leaving disappointment in its wake. “So that’s why you need a wife. To take care of Jordan.”

      He nodded and relaxed. “I knew you’d understand. You did before when we discussed this in our letters.”

      Letters. He’d already told her they’d never met. “Why did you choose me to write to?”

      He leaned forward and rested his strong chin with its charming cleft on his forearms, crossed on the back of the chair. His tanned face beamed with enthusiasm. “Your letter was hands down the best answer to my ad.”

      “I answered an ad?” She failed to keep the horror from her voice. What kind of woman was she to have answered a personal ad from a stranger?

      Desperate?

      Lonely?

      Crazy?

      All of the above?

      “I saved your letters,” he said. “If you want, I’ll bring them next time I visit.”

      She struggled to dredge up lost memories, but the vast hole where her recollections should have been yielded nothing. “What did I say in my letters?”

      “You described how much you’d enjoyed growing up on a farm.”

      “I lived on a farm?” The concept seemed so alien, she shuddered. Whatever trauma she had suffered had erased her memories so completely that she couldn’t imagine farm life, much less remember it.

      “Until four years ago.”

      Without evidence to contradict him, she’d have to take his word. “Anything else?”

      “Your experience with country life is important, considering the way I live.”

      What kind of life had she agreed to? “You’re a farmer?”

      He frowned at the label. “No.”

      “Then why is my farm experience important?”

      “I’m a rancher. I raise cattle and timber.”

      Nothing he said rang any bells, and her head swam with efforts to remember. A single mystery looming in her mind distressed her most. “Did I explain in my letters why I was willing to marry a perfect stranger and care for his child without—”

      She floundered, searching for the right word.

      Wade was no help. He just sat there, staring at her with amusement sparkling in his eyes. Again he reminded her of the Marlboro Man. A tall, rugged, sexy outdoorsman about as anxious to commit to love as a tumbleweed.

      “Without…” She groped for a suitable phrase, bewailing silently that she’d lost not only her memories but her vocabulary, too.

      “Without sex?” he suggested.

      “That’s not what I meant.” Embarrassment scorched her face, and with relief, she latched on to the words she’d been searching for. “Without all the advantages of marriage. That’s what I was trying to say.”

      He lifted his right brow and considered her with a grin. “You don’t think sex is an advantage of marriage?”

      “No.” Memories, hovering at the edge of her consciousness, contradicted her.

      “No?” Wade’s raised brows registered his surprise.

      The memory faded. “I mean yes, but I was talking about love, affection, mutual respect….” She widened her eyes as a possibility hit her. “Sex wasn’t part of our agreement, was it?”

      He straightened in his chair, and his teasing expression sobered. “Our agreement is purely business. You take care of Jordan and help run the house and ranch. In return, you have your own room, all expenses paid, and you receive a percentage of the yearly profits. When Jordan reaches adulthood, you can have a divorce, no questions asked.”

      She collapsed against her pillows, shocked to learn she’d agreed to such a sad, barren life. As for Wade, his cold, unsentimental terms clashed with his warm personality, and she wondered what had driven him to demand such an impersonal arrangement.

      “Why go through the motions of getting married?” she said. “Why not just hire another housekeeper?”

      He tunneled his fingers through his thick hair, a gesture she’d come to associate with him, and clasped his hands behind his head. The movement stretched his denim shirt across well-developed chest muscles. Wade Garrett was a good-looking, agreeable man who probably had hordes of local single women beating down his door. Why hadn’t he married one of them?

      “Longhorn Lake is a small community,” he said. “A young housekeeper couldn’t live at the ranch without causing a scandal.”

      “Then hire an older woman.”

      He dropped his hands to his knees and shook his head. “Jordan needs a mother, a real mother—”

      “A real mother is the woman his father loves, not a business partner.”

      Wade avoided her gaze. “I don’t intend to fall in love. And I can’t marry anyone from the community.”

      “Why not?”

      “Maggie’s memory,” he said cryptically.

      She rubbed her throbbing temples with her fingertips to try to ease her pain and confusion. “I don’t understand.”

      He scooted from his chair to the bed, pulled her back against his chest and began massaging her forehead. “I’d rather not talk about Maggie,” he said in a flat tone.

      She would have pushed him further, but the lazy circles of his fingers against her temples, the comforting pressure of his chest against her back and the warmth of his breath against her neck distracted her and caused the discontent constantly hovering inside to dwindle for the first time since she’d regained consciousness.

      She had never felt so safe in a man’s arms.

      Wade’s fingers stalled in their circling, and he dropped his hands to her shoulders. “Jordan needs a woman who’ll be a permanent fixture in his life, someone he can be proud of. Someone he can introduce at school and church as his mom, so he’ll be like the other kids and maybe stop—” He halted abruptly, as if he’d said too much.

      So Jordan had some kind of problem, and Wade wanted a ready-made mother to deal with him. “How can you be sure Jordan will like me?”

      His fingers, toying with a curl of her hair, brushed the sensitive skin of her ear, transmitting dangerous flutters down her spine.

      “You love children,” he explained, as if that fact transcended all difficulties. “You said so in your letters.”

      What had she gotten herself into? She had problems enough already. No memory. No family. No money. And no idea how long she’d be confined to this hospital bed.

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