Bride For A Year

She shook her head. ‘So why me?’

‘Why not you? You’re attractive. You know the score up front. We can draw up a business agreement and know where we stand.’ He shrugged. ‘I’m not really the marrying kind. I like my freedom. However, twelve months doesn’t sound like such a bad idea.’

It was such a preposterous idea that she just stared at him. ‘A marriage of convenience...a business deal,’ she muttered finally. ‘You get a partner to stand next to you on platforms and say the right things at civic functions, I get the vineyard back in a year?’

He nodded. ‘We’d be sleeping partners for a year.’ The gleam of humour in his eyes made her hands curl into tight fists at her sides.

‘You mean a marriage in name only?’

He didn’t answer her immediately. His eyes moved over her, looking at the curves of her figure, the luxuriant fall of her hair around the young face.

‘No, I know my limitations. You do have a fabulous body and I have a very healthy appetite. I’d want you in my bed, Paige.’

For just a moment she was so shocked that she couldn’t speak.

‘It’s not such a repulsive idea...is it, Paige?’ he enquired genuinely. ‘I know you are a good deal younger than I, but when we kissed a few moments ago it was very pleasurable; you can’t deny that. In fact I’m sure I tasted desire on your lips. It made me wonder why I had never kissed you before.’

Her skin burned with furious fires of humiliation and anger. The fact that he was right just served to infuriate her further. Her pride would never admit to the fact that she found him attractive...never. She shook her head. ‘That’s in your imagination. You tasted surprise, shock, nothing else.’

One dark eyebrow lifted. ‘Are you sure? There was a time when I wondered if you might have a crush on me.’

The arrogance of that remark really stung. ‘How far back are you going?’ She kept her equilibrium with difficulty. ‘You’re not going to remind me of the time I invited you to be my date for my high-school prom, are you?’ She forced herself to laugh. She knew very well that this was one of the few times she had braved showing her feelings to Brad, had allowed herself to flirt. ‘Heavens! If I remember rightly you laughed, told me that people would accuse you of robbing the cradle, and you were right, it was absurd.’ She added flippantly, ‘I must just have been into older men at the time.’

He shrugged. ‘You were very young.’

‘The same fifteen years are still between us,’ she said, quietly now.

‘I haven’t forgotten.’ His voice was heavy, very serious for a moment. Then his eyes moved over the slender lines of her figure. ‘But you are twenty-two now and it’s different.’

For just a second Paige gained the impression that he was trying to convince himself of this fact more than her.

‘I’m fair game to be exploited for a year, you mean?’ she snapped, her nerves stretching beyond endurance. ‘I’d rather sell my soul to the devil.’ Her voice trembled.

‘I wouldn’t call being pulled from the brink of bankruptcy exploitation.’ He laughed at that. ‘And I think you will agree to my proposal... because it will be the most profitable move of your life.’ He turned and walked towards the door. ‘Think it over.’

CHAPTER TWO

‘I CAN’T believe that you are faced with the prospect of selling this place,’ Rosie said with heartfelt sympathy in her voice.

‘It’s just unfortunate.’ Paige tried to play down her emotion on the subject as she poured her friend another cup of coffee.

They were in Paige’s kitchen at the vineyard. It was getting up towards midday and Paige had a million jobs waiting to be done. She had shelved them all very gratefully when Rosie arrived, glad of a chance to talk and relax for a while.

‘But what will you do? Where will you go?’

Paige shrugged. At the back of her mind Brad’s offer lay...too scary to think deeply about, too intriguing to forget. ‘I might go to Seattle. One of my friends has got a flat up there and apparently some contacts if I want to start looking for a job.’

‘Seattle!’ Rosie sounded shocked. ‘That’s a hell of a long way away... Who lives up there? Not that guy you were friendly with...Josh Summers?’

Paige smiled. ‘No, not Josh. He was just a friend, you know, Rosie... There was nothing romantic between us.’

‘No, but he would have liked there to be. I saw the way he looked at you when he came up here for that long weekend.’

‘He was just a fellow student. I had a card of sympathy from him when he heard about my father’s death...but I certainly have no plans to move in with him, I can assure you.’ She leaned back against the windowsill and sighed. ‘Strange, but Brad jumped to exactly the same conclusion when I told him I might share a flat with a friend. He asked if it was a male friend.’

‘Did he, now?’ Rosie looked extremely interested in this. ‘When did you see Brad?’

‘He came over here last night.’ For a moment there was silence as Paige grappled with her conscience over whether or not to tell Rosie about Brad’s outrageous proposal.

Paige had been friends with Rosie Jefferson for years. They used to sit together in school, and had shared many secrets and dreams over the years. Even though they had been separated while Paige was away at college, and Rosie got married, they were still as close as ever.

But now, for the first time, Paige found she didn’t want to confide in her friend. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Rosie, it was more that she didn’t want to voice the extremely personal nature of Brad’s proposal—the fact that he had suggested a relationship based purely on business reasons hurt in some strange way. She tried to tell herself that it was her pride that was hurting, but deep down she wasn’t too sure.

‘Have you forgiven him over the money?’ Rosie asked, her eyes moving over the pallor of Paige’s skin.

She shrugged. ‘I suppose if, I’m honest, I can’t really blame him totally... What is it they say? Never a lender or a borrower be?’

‘I’m sure if he could have afforded to let your father’s loan ride he would have,’ Rosie said with a nod. ‘He’s a decent guy.’

‘Yes...’ Deep down Paige wanted to believe that. But the fact that Brad had openly told her he could afford to let the loan ride and had chosen not to did still grate rawly. Her father had been so broken up just before he had died... The memory was pitiful and it tore at Paige.

‘I’m glad that you two are friends again,’ Rosie continued briskly. ‘Brad must be pretty upset at the moment, anyway. I believe he and Carolyn Murphy have split up.’

‘He mentioned something,’ Paige said noncommittally.

‘Apparently she has ditched him for Robert Hicks.’

‘Really?’ There was complete amazement in Paige’s voice now. Strangely she hadn’t for one moment considered the fact that Carolyn might have been the one to finish with Brad.

Rosie grinned. ‘I knew that would surprise you. You’ve always had a soft spot for Brad, haven’t you?’

‘That’s in the past.’ Paige tried to sound firmly convinced and ignore the little whispering voice inside her that wanted to argue with that.

‘Sure.’ Rosie wasn’t at all taken in by Paige’s reply. ‘But you’re right, Carolyn must have been crazy to finish with Brad; he is gorgeous. If I weren’t a married woman, and didn’t adore my Mike, I’d be interested myself.’

‘How do you know that Carolyn finished with him? Did Brad tell you that?’

‘No, of course not. Mike sees a lot of Brad these days as he’s going to be managing Brad’s campaign for mayor. But I don’t think they discuss things like that... Well, if they do, my husband certainly hasn’t repeated it to me. No, I met Carolyn in town a while ago and she told me herself.’ Rose wrinkled her nose. ‘She’s extremely confident, you know, and I must say she looked fabulous. Made me wish I’d stuck to my diet last year.’

‘You don’t need to diet, Rosie,’ Paige said quickly. Rosie Jefferson was an extremely attractive blonde. She wasn’t fat, she just had a curvaceous figure.

Rosie shrugged as if she didn’t agree but wasn’t going to argue about it today.

‘So what did Carolyn say?’ Paige reached to pick up her coffee from the table.

‘Get this.’ Rosie’s eyes twinkled with good humour. ‘She said, and I quote, “I’ve finished with Brad. He was getting rather tiresome. Robert has asked me to marry him and I’ve accepted.”’

‘Marry him!’ Paige’s eyes widened. ‘She’s marrying Robert Hicks!’