The Bride and the Bargain. Allison Leigh

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СКАЧАТЬ he would simply have made one call to Loretta and let her deal with the details.

      Task accomplished, he joined her at the front of his car. He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back against the hood. “How old is your niece?”

      “Ten.” She peered at her scraped palms, slowly picking out small pieces of gravel. “Do you have kids?”

      “No.” He’d made sure of that. Now it was just one more complication.

      Her eyebrows rose, but she said nothing.

      “You look surprised.”

      She shrugged and pressed her palms carefully together. “No. Just most men your age—” She broke off, flushing, when he couldn’t contain a snort of laughter.

      “You’re hell on my ego, Amelia. I don’t quite have one foot in the grave yet.”

      Her cheeks went even pinker, which just made him wonder how long it had been since he’d encountered a female who could still blush. Nobody that he’d dated in the last twenty years, that was for damn sure.

      “I didn’t mean that,” she said, patently lying.

      “That I’m old enough to have kids as grown as you?”

      She shook her head. “Hardly. Not unless you were very precocious.”

      “How old are you?”

      “Old enough.” She shot him a look from the corner of her eyes as if realizing how her comment might—just might—come across to a man.

      “What’s it going to take before you decide I’m not such a stranger?”

      She turned her head when they heard a car.

      It was the cab, inconveniently and firmly disproving the theory that they took forever to arrive.

      “I don’t know. I’ll have to let you know.” She straightened from the car and limped toward the distinctive, yellow taxi.

      Gray easily beat her to the cab’s door, opening the rear one for her. While she settled herself inside, he leaned in the driver’s open window and settled enough cash on the driver to take Amelia to the nearest drugstore and then home—wherever that might be. Then he begged a business card off the guy and wrote his personal cell phone number on the back of it. The only people who had the number were his family, his attorney and Loretta.

      He went around to Amelia’s side again and handed her the card. “Call me if you need anything. Anything.”

      She took the card from him, being careful not to brush his fingers.

      More stranger-danger, or was it caution of a different nature?

      “The driver said he’ll stop at the drugstore for you.” He handed her the smallest bills he’d had left in his money clip—two fifties. “If this doesn’t cover what you need, you call me.”

      She waved away the cash, looking annoyed. “This isn’t necessary.”

      He folded the bills in half and leaned in over her.

      She clamped her lips shut, pressing herself solidly back against the seat.

      He smiled faintly and deliberately tucked the bills at her hip, right beneath that rolled-over waistband. He ignored the way her skin felt—cool and warm all at once.

      And silky.

      Definitely silky.

      “Believe me, Amelia,” he told her softly. “It’s very necessary.”

      Then he straightened and closed the cab door, taking her wide-eyed expression with him as he headed toward his own car.

      Find. Wife. Find. Wife.

      “Maybe,” he murmured under his breath and watched the cab slowly turn out of the lot, carrying the blushing Amelia White away.

      Of course in his case, finding a wife was only part of his problem. He also needed a child.

      Chapter Two

      The moment the parking lot was out of sight through the cab’s windows, Amelia’s shoulders collapsed with relief.

      Dumb, dumb, dumb, Amelia, she thought silently. You had your chance to confront the man in person!

      And what had she done?

      Gotten into the cab, alone.

      Matthew. She shook her head at the name he’d given her, looking blindly out at the park where she’d been running now for the past several weeks.

      What a liar.

      Not that she’d expected anything else of the man given his treatment of Daphne.

      “Miss, I don’t mind driving around until the meter hits the roll your fella gave me—” the gray-haired cabbie shot her a grin over his shoulder “—but it might be easier if you’d just give me your address.”

      “He’s not my fella,” she assured, suppressing a shiver. It appalled her that it was a shiver, though, and not a shudder.

      In the flesh, Grayson Hunt, aka, Matthew Gray, hadn’t been quite what she’d expected.

      He was supposed to be the devil incarnate. He’d toyed with her sister, only to toss Daphne aside when she’d needed him. To this day he continued to deny the child he and Daphne had created together. Amelia had expected to feel nothing but revulsion for the man who wielded his power like some despot over the lesser beings he used as playthings.

      But what she had felt was not so easily defined.

      She pressed her hands to her hot cheeks, but winced at even that mild contact against her abraded palms. She lowered them to her lap only to snatch at the money he’d slid beneath her waistband.

      How easily he’d dropped the cash on her, even when she’d tried to avoid it.

      Too bad he didn’t take his other, far more important responsibilities so seriously.

      She rolled the bills into a tight cylinder. If she’d ever hoped to make an impression on the great Grayson Hunt that she was a serious adversary, she’d definitely shot that right down into the dust.

      Typical, typical Amelia.

      She never had been any good at confrontations. Why should she be, when it was ever so much easier to be the world’s doormat?

      “Miss?” the driver prompted.

      She jerked, feeling foolish for letting Grayson Hunt distract her so deeply, and gave the driver the address of Daphne’s apartment. She’d moved into it to be with the children when it had become apparent that Daphne would not be returning to her home anytime soon.

      “There a pharmacy close by?”

      “I’m СКАЧАТЬ