The Mckennas: Finn, Riley and Brody: One Day to Find a Husband

CHAPTER SEVEN

AN HOUR on the treadmill. A half hour with the weight machines. And a hell of a sweat.

But it wasn’t enough. No matter how much time Finn spent in the gym, tension still knotted his shoulders, frustration still held tight to his chest. He’d been unable to forget Ellie—or bring himself to go home to her.

Home. To his wife.

Already he was getting far too wrapped up in her, he’d realized. They’d had that conversation at lunch about marriage, and he had found himself wanting to tell her that he felt the same way. That he had never imagined himself getting married, either.

Then he had come to his senses before he laid his heart bare again, and made the same mistakes he’d made before. He’d watched his parents locked in an emotional roller coaster of love and hate, then repeated those mistakes at the end of his relationship with Lucy. No way was he going to risk that again with Ellie. She saw him as a means to an end—a father on paper for her child—and nothing more.

He pulled on the lat bar, leaning back slightly on the padded bench, hauling the weights down. His shoulders protested, his biceps screamed, but Finn did another rep. Another. Over and over, he tugged the heavy weight down.

It wasn’t just the distraction of getting close to Ellie that had him sweating it out in the gym. It was the growing reality of the child she was about to adopt.

No, that they were about to adopt. He’d promised Ellie that he would go along with her plan, but now he was wondering if that was the right thing to do.

How could he be a temporary husband, temporary dad, and then, at the end of the hospital project, just pack up his things and go? If anyone knew firsthand what losing a parent suddenly could do to a child, it was Finn. He’d gone through it himself, and watched the impact on his younger brothers. They’d been cast adrift, emotional wrecks who took years to heal, even with the loving arms of their grandparents. How could he knowingly do that to a child?

He gave the lat bar another pull, his muscles groaning in protest, then lowered the weight back to the base. He was finished with his workout, but no closer to any of the answers he needed.

He showered, got dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, then hailed a cab and headed across town toward Ellie’s townhouse. Night had begun to fall, draping purple light over the city of Boston. It was beautiful, the kind of clear, slightly warm night that would be perfect for a walk. Except Finn never took time to do that. He wondered for a moment what his life would be like if he was the kind of man who did.

If he was the kind of man who had a real marriage, and spent his life with someone who wanted to stroll down the city streets as dusk was falling and appreciate the twinkling magic. But he wasn’t. And he was foolish to believe in a fantasy life. His mother had been like that—full of romantic notions that burned out when she saw the reality of her unhappy marriage. Finn was going to be clearheaded about his relationships. No banking on superfluous things like starry skies and red roses.

He paid the cabbie, then headed up the stairs to Ellie’s building. He paused at the door and caught her name on the intercom box. Ellie Winston.

His wife.

Already, he knew they had a connection. It wasn’t friendship, but something more, something indefinable. A hundred times during the meeting today, he found his mind wandering, his gaze drifting to her. He wondered a hundred things about her—what her favorite color was, if she preferred spring or fall, if she slept on the left side of the bed or the right. Even as he told himself to pull back, to not get any deeper connected to this woman than he already was. This was a business arrangement.

Nothing more.

As he headed inside, he marveled again at the building she had chosen—the complete opposite to the modern glass high-rise that housed his apartment. Ellie lived in one of Boston’s many converted brownstones. Ellie’s building sported a neat brick facade and window boxes filled with pansies doing a tentative wave to spring adorned every window. The building’s lobby featured a white tile floor and thick, dark woodwork. The staircase was flanked by a curved banister on one side, a white plaster wall on the other. A bank of mailboxes were stationed against one wall, lit from above by a black wrought-iron light fixture that looked older than Finn’s grandmother, but had a certain Old World charm.

He liked this place. A lot. It had a … homey feeling. At the same time, he cautioned himself not to get too comfortable. They weren’t making this a permanent thing, and letting himself feel at home would be a mistake. He’d get used to it, and begin to believe this was something that it wasn’t. He’d fooled himself like that once before.

Never again.

He found Ellie in the kitchen again, rinsing some dishes and loading them into the dishwasher. “Hi.”

Kind of a lame opening but what did one say to a wife who wasn’t a real wife?

She turned around. “Hi yourself. I’m sorry, I ate without you. I wasn’t sure what your plan …” She put up her hands. “Well, you certainly don’t have to answer to me. It’s not like we’re really married or anything.”

There. The truth of it.

“I grabbed a bite to eat after the gym.” He dropped his gym bag on the floor, then hung his dry cleaning over the chair. “Did you find out when the interview would be?”

“In a couple days. Linda’s trying to coordinate all the schedules.”

“Okay. Good.” The sooner the interview was over, the sooner they could go their separate ways. And that was what he wanted, wasn’t it?

“After this morning, I think we should work on our story,” she said. “You know, in case they ask us a lot of questions. I don’t want it to seem like …”

“We barely know each other.”

She nodded. “Yes.” She gestured toward a door at the back. “We can sit on the balcony out back if you want. It’s not a rooftop terrace, but we’ll be able to enjoy the evening a little.”

They got drinks—red wine for him, iced tea for her—and Ellie assembled a little platter of cheese and crackers. Finn would have never thought of a snack, or if he had, it probably would have been something salty, served straight from the bag. But Ellie laid everything out on a long red platter, and even included napkins. The night air drifted over them, lazy and warm. “You thought of everything,”

She shrugged. “Nothing special. And it’s not quite the evening you planned.”

“No, it’s not.” He picked up a cracker and a piece of cheese, and devoured them in one bite. “It’s better.”

She laughed. “How is that? There’s no musicians, no twinkling lights, no five-course meal. It’s just crackers and cheese on the balcony.”

“Done by you. Not by others. I don’t have that homemaking touch. At all.”

“I’m not exactly Betty Crocker myself. But I can assemble a hell of a crudités platter.” She laughed again. “So I take it you can’t cook?”

“Not so much as a scrambled egg. But I can order takeout like a pro. My grandmother is the real chef in the family. She doesn’t cook much now, but when I was a kid, she did everything from scratch.”

Ellie picked up her glass and took a sip of tea. “Where are you parents? Do they live in Boston?”

The question was an easy one, the kind people asked each other all the time. But for some reason, this time, it hit Finn hard and he had to take a minute to compose the answer.

“No. They don’t. Not anymore.” Finn was quiet for a moment. “My parents … died in a car accident, when I was eleven. Brody was eight, Riley was just six.”

“Oh, Finn, I’m so sorry.” She reached for him, and laid a soft hand on top of his arm. It was a simple, comforting touch, but it seemed to warm Finn to his core. He wanted to lean into that touch, to let it warm the icy spots in his heart.

But he didn’t.

“We went and lived with my grandparents,” he continued. “I think us three boys drove my grandmother nuts with all our noise and fighting.”

“I bet you three were a handful.”

He chuckled. “She called us a basketful of trouble, but she loved us. My grandmother was a stern, strict parent, but one who would surprise us at the oddest times with a new toy or a bunch of cookies.”

Ellie smiled. “She sounds wonderful.”

“She is. I think every kid needs a grandmother like that. One time, Brody and I were arguing over a toy. I can’t remember what toy it was or why. So my grandmother made us rake two ends of the yard, working toward each other. By the time we met in the middle, we had this massive pile of leaves. So we jumped in them. And the fight was forgotten.”

Ellie laughed. “Sounds like you learned some of your art of compromise from her.”

“Yeah, I guess I did. She taught me a lot.” He hadn’t shared that much of his personal life with anyone in a long, long time. Even Lucy hadn’t known much about him. They’d mainly talked about work when they were together.

Was that because she didn’t care, or because it was easier? Or was it because Finn had always reserved a corner of himself from Lucy, with some instinctual self-preservation because he knew there was something amiss in their relationship?

Was Ellie’s interest real, or was she just gathering facts for the interview? And why did he care? On his way here from the gym, he had vowed to keep this impersonal, business only. Why did he keep treading into personal waters? He knew better, damn it.

“I think every person needs someone like your grandmother in their lives,” Ellie said softly.

“Yeah,” he said. “They do.”

Damn, it was getting warm out here. He glanced over at Ellie to find her watching him. She opened her mouth, as if she was going to ask another question, to get him to open up more, but he cut her off by reaching into his pocket for a sheet of paper. He handed it to her. “I, uh, thought you’d want to know some things about me for the interview. So I wrote them down.”

She read over the sheet. “Shoe size. Suit jacket size. Car model.” Then she looked up at him. “This doesn’t tell me anything about you, except maybe what to get you for Christmas.”

“That’s all the particulars you would need right there.”

She dropped the sheet of paper onto a nearby table, then drew her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs. She’d changed into sweatpants and a soft pink T-shirt after work, and she looked as comfortable as a pile of pillows. “What a wife should know about a husband isn’t on that list, Finn.”

“Well, of course it is. A wife would know my shoe size and my car—”

“No, no. A wife would know your heart. She’d know what made you who you are. What your dreams are, your fears, your pet peeves. She’d be able to answer any question about you because she knows you as well as she knows herself.”

He shifted in his chair. The cracker felt heavy in his stomach. “No one knows me like that.”

“Why?”

It was such a simple question, just one word, but that didn’t mean Finn had an answer. “I don’t know.”

“Well, surely the woman you were engaged to got to know you like that. Like the story about your grandmother. That’s what I want to hear more of. Or tell me about your fiancée. Why did you two not work out?”

“I don’t want to talk about Lucy.”

Ellie let out a gust. “Finn, you have to talk about something. We’re supposed to know each other inside and out.”

“That’s why I gave you the list—”

“The list doesn’t tell me anything more about you than I already knew from reading the magazine article.” She let out a gust and got to her feet. For a while she stood at the railing, looking out over the darkened homes. Then she turned back to face him. “Why won’t you get close to me?” Her voice was soft and hesitant. It was the kind of sound that Finn wished he could curl into. “You take two steps forward, then three back. Why?”

“I don’t do that.” He rose and turned to the other end of the balcony, watching a neighbor taking his trash to the curb. It was all so mundane, so much of what a home should be like. Between the crackers and the cheese and the sweatpants—

Damn, it was like a real marriage.

“What are we doing here, Finn?” Ellie asked, coming around to stand beside him.

When she did, he caught the scent of her perfume. The same dark jasmine, with vanilla tones dancing just beneath the floral fragrance. It was a scent he’d already memorized, and every time he caught a whiff of those tantalizing notes, he remembered the first time he’d been close enough to smell her perfume.

He’d been kissing her. Sealing their marriage vows in Charlie’s office. And right now, all he could think about was kissing her again. And more, much more.

Damn.

“We’re pretending to be married,” he said.

“Are we?” He didn’t respond. She lifted her gaze to his. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

She let a beat pass. Another. Still her emerald gaze held his. “Why did you agree to marry me?”

“Because you said that’s what it would take. To get on board with the hospital project.”

“You are ‘the Hawk,’ Finn McKenna,” she said, putting air quotes around his nickname. “You could negotiate your way out of an underground prison. But when I proposed this … marriage, you didn’t try to negotiate at all. You agreed. What I want to know is why.”

The night air seemed to still. Even the whoosh-whoosh of traffic seemed to stop. Nothing seemed to move or breathe in the space of time that Ellie waited for his answer. He inhaled, and that damned jasmine perfume teased at his senses, reawakened his desire.

Why had he married her? She was right—he could have offered something else in return for her cooperation on the hospital project. Or he could have just said no. “I guess I just really needed that project to help my business get back on track.”

She took a step closer, and lifted her chin. “I don’t believe you.”

“Truly, it was all about business for me.”

“And that was all?”

She was mere inches away from him. A half step, no more, and she’d be against him. Desire pulsed in his veins, thundered in his head. His gaze dropped from her eyes to her lips, to her curves. “No,” he said, with a ragged breath, cursing the truth that slipped through his lips. “It’s not.”

Then he closed that gap, and reached up to capture one of those tendrils of her hair. All day, he’d wanted to do this, to let one silky strand slip through his grasp. “Is it for you?” he asked.

She swallowed, then shook her head. “No. It’s not.” She bit her lip, let it go. “It’s becoming more for me. A lot more.”

Finn watched her lips form the words, felt the whisper of her breath against his mouth. And he stopped listening to his common sense.

He leaned in, and kissed Ellie. She seemed to melt into him, her body curving against his, fitting perfectly against his chest, in his arms. She was soft where he was hard, sweet where he was sour, and the opposite of him in every way. Finn kissed her slow at first, then harder, faster, letting the raging need sweep over him and guide his mouth, his hands. She pressed into him, and he groaned, in agony for more of her, of this.

His cell phone began to ring, its insistent trill ripping through the fog in Finn’s brain. He jerked away from Ellie, then stepped away. “I’m sorry.” He flipped out the phone, but the call had already gone to voice mail. The interruption had served its purpose.

Finn had regained his senses.

Ellie stepped toward him, a smile on her lips, and everything in Finn wanted to take her in his arms and pick up where they left off. But doing so would only do the one thing he was trying to avoid—

Plunge him headlong down that path of wild and crazy. The kind of roller-coaster romance that led to bad decisions, bad matches, and in the end, unhappiness and broken hearts.

“We can’t do this.” He put some distance between them and picked up his glass, just to have something to do with his hands—something other than touch Ellie again.

“Can’t do what?” A smile curved across her face. “Let this lead to something more than a contract?”

“Especially not that. We can’t treat this like … like a real marriage. It’s a business partnership. And that’s all.” He shook his head and put the glass back on the tray. The remains of their snack sat there, mocking him. Tempting him to go back to pretending this was something that it wasn’t.

But Ellie wasn’t so easily dissuaded. She stood before him, hands on her hips. “What are you so afraid of?”

“I’m not afraid of anything. I just think it’s best if we keep this business only.”

“So that’s what that kiss was, business only?”

“No, that was a mistake. One I won’t make again.”

“And the rooftop dinner? The kiss in the courthouse? Also mistakes?”

He sighed. This was why he hadn’t wanted to go down this path. He could already see hurt brimming in Ellie’s eyes. He’d done this—he’d made her believe their fake marriage might be leading to something more—and he’d been wrong.

Was any project worth hurting Ellie? Seeing her crying, just like he had seen his mother crying so many times?

He exhaled, then pushed the words out. The words he should have said long ago. “After the interview, I don’t think we should wait to annul this marriage.” There. He’d said it. Fast, like ripping off a bandage.

Didn’t stop it from hurting, though.

Her green eyes filled with disbelief. A ripple of shock filled her features. “What?”

“The business deal can be maintained if you want,” he said. He kept his voice neutral, his stance professional. If he treated this like business as usual, perhaps she would, too. But the notes of her perfume kept teasing at his senses while the tears in her green eyes begged him to reconsider. Finn struggled to stick to his resolve. This was the best thing, all around. “Uh, if you like, I’ll keep my team in place at WW, and help you through the project. It seems like they’re working well together. No reason to break that up.”

“That wasn’t the deal. You were supposed to help me adopt Jiao.”

“I’ll do my part. When the interview is set up, just let me know and I’ll be here for that.”

“Pretending to be my husband.”

“Wasn’t that the arrangement?”

She didn’t say anything for a while. Outside her building, a car honked, and a dog barked. Night birds twittered at each other, and the breeze whispered over them all.

“Was that all you were doing a minute ago? Sealing a business deal?”

She made him sound so cold, calculated. So like the Hawk nickname he hated. “You think that’s the only reason I kissed you?”

“Isn’t it? You wanted an alliance that would help your company. I wanted a child. We each get what we want out of this marriage. It’s as simple as that. That’s all this marriage is about. A simple business transaction.” She took a step closer, her gaze locked on his. “Isn’t it? Or did it start to become something more for you, too?”

She was asking him for the truth. Why had he married her if it wasn’t about the business?

He couldn’t tell her it was because he was tired of sleeping on that sofa bed. That he was tired of hearing nothing other than his own breath in his apartment. Tired of spending his days working and his nights wondering why he was working so hard. And that when he had met Ellie he had started to wonder what it would be like to have more.

But he didn’t.

Because doing that would open a window into his heart, and if he did that, he’d never be able to walk away from Ellie Winston. He’d get tangled up in the kind of heated love story that he had always done his best to avoid. No, better to keep this cold, impersonal. Let her think the worst of him.

He let out a gust. “This is anything but simple.”

“Why? What is so bad about getting involved with someone, Finn? What makes you so afraid of doing that?”

“I’m not afraid of getting involved. We got married, remember?”

“In name only. That’s not a relationship. It’s a contract. And I know that’s what I said I wanted when we started this thing, but …” She let out a long breath and shook her head. “You know, a few times, I’ve thought I’ve seen a different side of you, a side that is downright human. And that made me wonder what it would be like to take a chance with you. I’m not a woman who takes chances easily, especially with my heart. But in the end, you keep coming back to being the Hawk.”

He scowled. “That’s not true.”

“You’re a coward, Finn.” She turned away. “I don’t know why I thought … why I thought anything at all.”

Why couldn’t she understand that he was trying to be smart, to put reality ahead of a fantasy they would never have? Acting without thinking and living in a dream bubble got people hurt. Ellie needed to understand that.

“You think we can turn this fantasy into a real marriage?” he asked. “Tell me the truth, Ellie. Was a part of you hoping that maybe, just maybe, we’d work out and make a happy little family with two-point-five kids and a dog?”