“Do you really believe I’m the sort of person who would plunk down a small fortune and move in next door to you a week before your wedding just to drive you nuts?”

Maddy stood up slowly, looked Joe full in the face. Pronounced every word carefully. “I loved you, Joe,” she said quietly. “But you didn’t trust me. Not enough to tell me the truth.”

Now Joe felt his temper rising, the temper he had thought had cooled long ago, to be replaced by the damning knowledge that, if he were to become rich beyond his dreams—and he had—he would never be happy, complete, without Maddy by his side. He had to love her. If he didn’t, he was just plain nuts to be putting himself back into a position where she could cut his knees, and heart, right out from underneath him.

And still, he couldn’t help himself….

Marrying Maddy (SR#1469)

Jessie’s Expecting (SR#1475)

Raffling Ryan (SR#1481)

Dear Reader,

Silhouette’s 20th anniversary celebration continues this month in Romance, with more not-to-be-missed novels that take you on the romantic journey from courtship to commitment.

First we revisit STORKVILLE, USA, where a jaded Native American rancher seems interested in His Expectant Neighbor. Don’t miss this second book in the series by Susan Meier! Next, New York Times bestselling author Kasey Michaels returns to the lineup, launching her new miniseries, THE CHANDLERS REQUEST…. One bride, two grooms—who will end up Marrying Maddy? In Daddy in Dress Blues by Cathie Linz, a Marine embarks on his most terrifying mission—fatherhood!—with the help of a pretty preschool teacher.

Then Valerie Parv whisks us to a faraway kingdom as THE CARRAMER CROWN continues. The Princess’s Proposal puts the lovely Adrienne and her American nemesis on a collision course with…love. The ever-delightful Terry Essig tells the tale of a bachelor, his orphaned brood and the woman who sparks A Gleam in His Eye. Shhh…. We can’t give anything away, but you must learn The Librarian’s Secret Wish. Carol Grace knows…and she’s anxious to tell you!

Next month, look for another installment of STORKVILLE, USA, and THE CHANDLERS REQUEST…from New York Times bestselling author Kasey Michaels. Plus, Donna Clayton launches her newest miniseries, SINGLE DOCTOR DADS!

Happy Reading!

Mary-Theresa Hussey

Senior Editor

Marrying Maddy
Kasey Michaels

MILLS & BOON

Before you start reading, why not sign up?

Thank you for downloading this Mills & Boon book. If you want to hear about exclusive discounts, special offers and competitions, sign up to our email newsletter today!

SIGN ME UP!

Or simply visit

signup.millsandboon.co.uk

Mills & Boon emails are completely free to receive and you can unsubscribe at any time via the link in any email we send you.

For Maryanne Colas,

for being there

KASEY MICHAELS,

a New York Times bestselling author of more than two dozen books, divides her creative time between writing contemporary romance and Regency novels. Married and the mother of four, Kasey’s writing has garnered the Romance Writers of America’s Golden Medallion Award and the Romantic Times Magazine’s the Best Regency Trophy.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter One

T he midafternoon sun filtered through sheer white draperies that hung at a half-dozen nearly floor-to-ceiling windows in the corner bedroom on the third floor of the Chandler mansion.

The June heat barely registered in the electronically filtered, air-conditioned atmosphere that was busily sucking dust motes out of the air as quickly as the sun could highlight them.

Dark cherry furniture, all genuine antiques, was scattered around the room; a grouping of chairs and a small, overstuffed ivory couch placed in front of the marble fireplace. A high, four-poster bed was angled into one corner and backed by a living forest of potted plants, a tall, Oriental screen tucked into the greenery.

Three crystal chandeliers hung from the high, stuccoed ceiling. There was a vanity table that definitely lived up to its name, displaying enough mirrors and pretty cut-glass bottles with expensive labels to keep Snow White’s stepmama too busy to look for poison apples.

There were original oil paintings on the walls of the bedroom, even on the walls of the huge bathroom that held a marble tub that had been brought over from France forty years earlier, so enormous it probably could have been floated across the Atlantic with a three-man crew aboard.

There was a separate dressing room, a separate showering room, both a built-in sauna and a mini beauty salon. The four-in-one walk-in closet—one large section for each season—was larger than most living rooms.

The remainder of the apartment, for this was only a small part of it, took up half of the third floor: a living room, formal dining room, full kitchen, a large guest bedroom and maid’s quarters.

It comprised only one half of one floor of a three-million-dollar mansion. But, hey, be it ever so humble, it was home.

Back to the bedroom…dragging the eye from the huge poster bed, the fireplace mantel that had once resided in the Earl of Coventry’s summer house on the isle of Jersey, the massive chandeliers…and to the trio of women gathered near the tall, three-sided mirror Madame Pompadour herself had once preened in front of before the ball.

One woman was seated on a straight-back Chippendale chair that had been moved across the carpet solely for the purpose of holding her body as she held sway over the situation. In other words, it would take no more than two seconds to play and win the game of “who’s the boss?” if anyone were to ask.

The woman was a deceptive seventy; the sort that looks fifty, laughs like forty and can’t believe she isn’t still thirty. A tiny woman, no more than three inches over five feet, she probably didn’t outweigh the chair she sat on as if it were a throne. Her perfectly coiffed light brown hair was piled high on her head above a long neck and a chin that was only slightly soft—three face-lifts, one eye job and a forehead lift just last year.

The manicured fingers of her right hand clasped a crystal sherry glass, half full. Her day dress was a soft blue silk paisley and she wore her skirt to the knee, because her legs were still slim, without a single telltale vein showing beneath her nude panty hose.

This woman, the clear matriarch of the Chandler family, spent a half hour each day with her legs inelegantly raised above her head in a yoga position in order to “reverse the damages of blood flow and gravity.” That, however, was a family secret revealed only to her two granddaughters, who had caught her in this ignoble position and threatened to tell their grandfather on her.

But enough of Almira Chandler, and on to the other two women.

The second, Mrs. Ballantine—and always Mrs. Ballantine, even after twelve years as the Chandler housekeeper—stood to one side of the trio, a part of the scene, but really not a part of the small group.

Nearly six feet tall, all of it straight as a poker, and with an air of command about her that would have made her the terror of the second grade if she hadn’t decided the classroom wasn’t for her, Mrs. Ballantine wore bright red lipstick, and was secretly proud of her coal-black hair. She had the pale complexion of a person who hadn’t been out in the sun since the Eisenhower administration.

At the moment, the formidable Mrs. Ballantine had a mouthful of straight pins.

And now to the last occupant of the room. This could only be Ms. Madeline Chandler, whose rooms these were, and who stood uncomfortably in front of the mirror, inspecting her reflection as the other two women watched.

The wedding gown she wore was nothing short of spectacular. It had rich, luxurious peau de soie. It had costly Alencon lace. It had cleverly positioned ribbons and silk flowers worked into the full, dropped-waist skirt, tucked into small “pockets” of material in the huge, off-the-shoulder “poof” sleeves. It had a long, flowing train both the flower girl and ring bearer could picnic on as the bride walked down the aisle.

Right now, the gown also had her, and Madeline Chandler was feeling rather trapped and smothered inside all of this beauty, inside all that it meant.

She thought about this for a moment, thought that her feelings were somehow wrong, and then worried that, for as trapped and smothered as she felt, she couldn’t seem to do anything about it. Couldn’t really even care all that much about it.

And she should. Shouldn’t she?

“You look like a fairy princess. Except for the frown. Surely you aren’t practicing to be the Wicked Witch of the West. I mean, remember, Maddy, dear, she wore black. Not white. More like Mrs. Ballantine.” Almira Chandler, known as Allie to her grandchildren, looked to the housekeeper, shivered. “Yes, much more like our own dear Mrs. Ballantine, who is looking remarkably like a porcupine at the moment.”

“It’s not white, Allie. It’s ivory. With a hint of blush. Very ‘in’ this year, and all of that,” Maddy explained. She looked into the full-length mirror again, drawing in her breath on a deep sigh that lifted her shoulders, then let both her mouth and her shoulders sag on the exhale. “I don’t know, Allie,” she said, shaking her head. “What do you think? Is this really me?”

“Is it you standing there, or is the gown really you? Clarify, Maddy darling. Always clarify. Mrs. Ballantine? More sherry, if you please? Being an observer seems to be thirsty work.”

As Mrs. Ballantine plucked the glass from Almira’s hand and walked toward a table bearing several crystal decanters, Maddy plucked at the skirt of the gown that had cost as much as her grandmother’s first house, forty-five years earlier.

“The gown, I suppose,” Maddy corrected. “I mean, I like it. Really. But do I really need three petticoats? I look like a mushroom. I wish I was taller, like Jessie. And less round. Maybe once the alterations are complete…”

“And you have the headpiece on, and your makeup, and your hair out of that rather inappropriate ponytail, and Matthew is on your arm…”

Maddy inspected her reflection—the heavy, blue-black hair pulled back from her full, yet slightly sharp-chinned face, the huge green eyes that looked so shadowed, so sad—not bridelike at all.

She bit her lips between her teeth, trying to bring some color into them, tipped her head to one side as she gripped both sides of her rather surprising twenty-three-inch waist. The gown really was beautiful. She wasn’t so bad herself, except for that frown line between her eyes. She smiled, knowing it looked more like a grimace.

“Yes,” she said at last, turning in a half circle, to look at the back of the gown as it was reflected in the mirror. “That’s probably it. I’m missing the accessories.”

“How wonderful. I’ll be sure to tell Matthew,” Almira said, winking at the unsmiling Mrs. Ballantine. “I’m sure he’ll be delighted to have been reduced to a bridal accessory. Not that he isn’t, of course. Other than to answer the minister at the correct times, he’s nothing more than a convenient prop to hang the bride on the whole day. Poor boy.”

Mrs. Ballantine stepped forward, and motioned for Maddy to step up onto the stool she had earlier placed on the carpet. “Hemmm, hemm,” she mumbled, still making small shooing motions to Maddy.

Almira chuckled. “What was that, Mrs. Ballantine? Him? Them? Oh, oh. Hem. You want to pin the hem? Goodness, woman, why didn’t you just say so? You could have hurt yourself, you know.”

The pins were removed from the wide red mouth. “Ha,” Mrs. Ballantine barked out, showing her lack of amusement. Then she knelt on the carpet, put the pins back between her lips once more and got to work.

“I think Mrs. Ballantine is just so sweet, insisting on doing the alterations herself, not trusting the bridal salon to do them properly. Don’t you, dear?”

Maddy turned to answer her grandmother, which earned her a sharp tug on the skirt of her gown, which nearly toppled her off the stool. “Sorry, Mrs. Ballantine. I shouldn’t move, should I? And I am very grateful for all your help. We all are.”

The pins transferred from mouth to hem, Mrs. Ballantine crowed, “Fall apart without me, the whole bunch of you,” even as Almira now exchanged winks with Maddy’s reflection in the mirror. “Told the old man I’d watch over you, and watch over you I will, even if it kills me outright.” She glared at Almira for a moment, then added, “And it just might,” then stuck more pins between her lips.

“You know, Mrs. Ballantine,” Almira said, pausing to take another sip of sherry, “with all the long, fairly involved conversations my late husband and I had during his last illness five years ago, I truthfully cannot remember him mentioning your name a single time. How odd that he didn’t bother to tell me that he’d appointed you guardian of us all, helpless creatures that we are. Even odder, don’t you think, was that he made sure to include a thank you and have a happy retirement gift of money for you in his will.”

Mrs. Ballantine pulled the pins from her mouth. “Wedding’s in a week. Are we going to talk, or are we going to pin up this hem?” she asked, her tone clearly indicating that she didn’t have time for idle chitchat.

“Oh, we’ll pin the hem, Mrs. Ballantine. Definitely. Maddy? Stand still, darling. After all, the woman’s armed.”

Maddy bit her lips again, this time to keep from giggling. The running feud between her grandmother and Mrs. Ballantine was probably what kept the old lady so young, so spry. Between the two women, they had loved Edward Chandler with all their hearts, in different ways, for different reasons.

That Edward Chandler had believed Mrs. Ballantine the reincarnation of his old, hated Army sergeant was a secret he’d shared only with his family. Through guilt at the woman’s obvious grief at Edward’s death, or because they were all afraid of her, the family had gone along with Mrs. Ballantine’s declaration that she had promised her late employer she would never leave, never desert the Chandler family.

After all, as Almira always said, who else would have the woman anyway? Mrs. Ballantine was about as appealing as prune whip on a stick.

“Mrs. Chandler? Please excuse the intrusion. The florist is on the telephone in my office. Something about trying to explain to you, one more time, why he can’t dye six dozen pots of mums blue.”

“How ridiculous. They can put a man on the moon, can’t they? So why can’t they do a simple little thing like—oh, never mind.” Almira sighed, slapped at her knees and rose to her feet. “Thank you, Sarah,” she said to her social secretary. “I suppose I can now safely leave you two to your own devices?” she asked Maddy and Mrs. Ballantine. Then, before either could answer, she swept out of the room, her stride smooth and graceful, even in three-inch heels.

“Fhought she’d neber lede.”

“Pardon me, Mrs. Ballantine?” Maddy asked, turning to look down at the housekeeper, earning herself another sharp tug on her skirts for the effort.

Mrs. Ballantine pulled the pins from her mouth. “I said, I thought she’d never leave. Now, what’s the matter, Miss Maddy? And don’t go telling me everything’s fine, because it isn’t. Never saw such an unhappy bride, or a grandmother so blind to what’s smack in front of her face. Dratted woman. Probably had her head pulled too tight last year, and her brains have all shrunk.”

“Mrs. Ballantine!” Maddy scolded, then laughed with real enjoyment—right up until she realized it was the first time she’d laughed in real enjoyment in quite a while. No, she wasn’t being very bridelike, was she?

“I’m fine, Mrs. Ballantine. Honestly. Just some prewedding nerves. I imagine all brides get them. Now, I promise to stand very still while you finish pinning this huge hem.”

“Going to take some time, you know.”

“Yes, I know. I should have gone with the sheath, I suppose, but Allie did like this one so much.”

“And you listened to her? Woman’s an idiot.”

“Yes, Mrs. Ballantine, I know,” Maddy replied calmly, as the running feud between housekeeper and matriarch was as superficial as the women’s regard for each other was deep. “She likes you, too.”

Mrs. Ballantine lifted another half-dozen pins to her mouth, pausing only to say, “Now, think happy thoughts, Miss Maddy, as a bride should, and we’ll be done here in about ten minutes. Then you can do something with that hair. At least the old lady was right about that. Ponytails are for children. Why, I remember…”

Maddy stared at her reflection as she allowed Mrs. Ballantine’s words to glide over her head. And she remembered the last time she’d worn her hair in a ponytail. Where she had been, who had been there with her…

“You look gorgeous, Maddy. I think every bride should wear shorts, her hair pulled up like that. I mean, that veil and gown thing is definitely overdone. Now, what do you think of my groom gear?”

Maddy could see Joe O’Malley standing in front of her, just as he had stood in front of her eighteen months earlier. His smile was wide in his tanned, handsome face. His arms were out at his sides as he playfully turned himself in a half circle, inviting her to admire his cutoffs and bright red Phillies jersey, the number 32 stamped on the back in huge white characters.

He stopped moving, with his back to her, and smiled at her over his shoulder. Sandy hair much too long, but just right for him, slid down onto his forehead. His blue eyes sparkled with mischief. Physically the man was a near god, even in cutoffs. Maybe especially in cutoffs. He had great legs for a man. “Well, come on, Mad. Don’t leave me hanging here. Am I a groom’s groom, or what?”

“You’re a nut,” Maddy said, and he completed his fashionable “turn” before grabbing her close, kissing her senseless.

Joe O’Malley was very good at kissing Madeline Chandler senseless. Very good. It was one of his most adorable attributes.

It was also, most probably, what had led to the two of them standing outside the small white chapel on the Strip in Las Vegas, ready to recite their vows to each other in front of God and an Elvis impersonator.

Possibly not the best reason to marry someone, but not that bad a reason, not when you got right down to it. At least that was what Maddy had convinced herself. Was still trying to convince herself, even as the sane, rational part of her—admittedly having been considerably downsized since meeting Joe—fought to maintain some sort of control.

Because, although a smiling Joe, a joking Joe, and a loving Joe were all wonderful, they’d had their share of disagreements. Even arguments. And those arguments most often concerned not the present, but the future. Her place in that future, his function in that future.

Even in the heat of Las Vegas, the heady excitement of an impromptu elopement, Maddy still had that small nagging sane part of her trying to throw a last-minute monkey wrench into her happiness.

Which probably meant something. Something like, hey, maybe postponing this wedding until they’d worked out a few things. Like, where they would live. How they would live. Small stuff like that…

She put her hands on Joe’s forearms, pushed him slightly away from her. And asked a question she didn’t want to ask. “I heard the phone ring early this morning, while I was in the shower. Was it Larry?”

Joe nibbled at her left ear. “Um-hmm.”

Maddy’s knees were crumbling, but she wouldn’t let them. She might be the youngest Chandler. She might have been hiding behind the door when the Chandler common sense had been handed out. But she did know when it became time to trust her instincts. And her instincts were telling her that Larry Barry and his lamebrained ideas showed all the signs of becoming the “other woman” in her marriage. “And Larry wanted what?”

Joe backed off a little, kissed the tip of her nose. But did not look into her eyes. “You know. Typical Larry stuff. We’re brilliant, megatalented, and we’re soon going to be rich, rich, rich. Right after we’re done being poor, poor, poor, not that we talk about that part much.” He took Maddy’s hand, gave it a tug. “Come on, sweetheart, let’s get married.”

Maddy’s feet stayed firmly planted on the sidewalk. “How poor, poor, poor? You did something, didn’t you, Joe? I can tell, because you’re not looking at me. It’s our wedding day, and you’ve barely looked at me, talked to me. What did you and Larry do?”

Joe sighed, stabbed his long, straight fingers through his hair. “Never could fool you, could I? Sometimes it’s hard to believe we’ve only known each other for three months. Okay, Maddy. Larry and I both quit our jobs last week—”

“You did what? Last week!”

“Yeah, last week. That’s why I could fly here to Vegas. We quit our jobs, cashed in our IRAs and any stocks and CDs we had, and we’re going to risk it all on this one roll. You’re now looking at one half of Barry and O’Malley Software. Incorporated, no less. It was going to be a surprise, a wedding present. Now, aren’t you sorry you made me give away the surprise?”

“Oh God.” Maddy walked away from him, turned in a full circle, glared at him, then walked back, not sure if she should give in to impulse and hit him, or just brush past him, keep on going. How could he do this to her? And today of all days!

Joe put his hands on her shoulders, gave her a small, encouraging shake. “Come on, Mad, don’t look like the world is coming to an end. You know this new idea of mine is going to fly. Bill Gates isn’t the only guy who can get an idea, you know. And Steve Jobs. Those guys started out working out of their own garages, and now look at them.”

Maddy ignored the sales pitch, as she’d heard it all before. They’d argued about all of it before, again and again. Joe was the computer genius, Larry the businessman. Together, they were going to conquer the world.

“Let me get this straight, Joe. You quit your job, liquidated all your holdings and went into business with Larry Barry the Loser? A week before you knew we were going to come here and maybe be married? When were you going to tell me all of this? Oh, yes, it was to be a surprise. You were going to tell me while we were on our honeymoon. Which will be in a cardboard box under a bridge, by the sound of it.”

Joe’s full, sensuous mouth flattened into a thin, white line. “If this is another way of saying, yet again, that we could live very comfortably on your trust fund, Mad, I’m not buying it, okay?”

“Okay, and I’m not Mad. Makes me sound like a wild animal that should be put down.” She broke free of him, turned her back on him once more. “I must be out of my tiny little mind. Allie said so, said I should bring you home, let her meet you before I did anything impetuous. Said I should take my time, not rush into anything. Why do I never listen to her?”

She felt Joe’s hand on her shoulder. “Do you want to listen to her, Maddy? Or is it just that you don’t believe in me? I love you, Maddy. I’ve loved you since the moment I first saw you. You know that, and you love me, too. I’d never do anything to hurt you.”

Maddy wanted to raise her own hand, place it on top of his. She wanted to lean back, lean against his hard strength. Fall back into the fantasy.

But she didn’t. She stepped out from under his hand, turned to face him, tears stinging her eyes.

“No, Joe. You’d never do anything to hurt me. Not on purpose. You’d only make plans for both our lives, without telling me. This isn’t going to work, Joe. I’m not a gambler, not in Las Vegas, certainly not with my life. And I’m not used to poverty. I don’t even know how to boil water, let alone how to keep a house. Or a cardboard box. We’d hate each other within a month.”

She watched through tears as Joe’s eyelids lowered, as the glitter of—could it be tears?—entered his own eyes. “So that’s it? One small stumbling block and it’s so long, Joe, been nice to know you? Five minutes away from getting married, and you’re going to run away, run back to your cushy life and all that old-money security? Is that love, Maddy? Is that trust?”

The tears spilled down Maddy’s cheeks now as she stood in front of the mirror, watching them drip off her chin, fall onto her wedding gown. All as she stood smack in the middle of the life she had always known, the one Joe had asked her to give up in order to figuratively jump off a bridge with him, into Lord only knew what sort of future.

She wasn’t a snob, damn it all! She wasn’t a rich brat, spoiled and selfish. At least that was what she’d been telling herself for the past eighteen months, ever since leaving Joe standing outside the wedding chapel and flying home to Pennsylvania.

She was a sane, semi-levelheaded human being, one who knew that only disaster awaited a marriage entered so hastily, with a man who acted without consulting her, a man who would “risk it all on this one roll.”

Was what she had felt for Joe love? Did that love have anything to do with trust? “No, Joe,” she whispered, “it wasn’t either of those things. It couldn’t have been. What we had was a dream, only a dream. A dream and a passion for each other that we mistook for love. It’s too late for us now, for so many, many reasons. But this time—this time, Joe—I’m going to get it right.”

“Did you say something, Miss Maddy?” Mrs. Ballantine asked as she stood behind her, fluffing out the long train.

“Yes. I was talking to myself, Mrs. Ballantine,” Maddy said, trying to smile. “Must be another part of prewedding jitters.”

“I don’t know. Living with your grandmother is enough to have anyone talking to herself,” Mrs. Ballantine said. “Now, stand still while I figure out how to bustle this thing. We want everything just right, don’t we?”

“Yes, Mrs. Ballantine,” Maddy agreed, quickly wiping the tears from her face. “We certainly do want everything to be just right….”

Chapter Two

T he fitting finely completed, Maddy gratefully allowed Mrs. Ballantine to help her out of the heavy gown and then went wandering off to take her second shower of the day. The underslips itched, and she’d actually broken out in a few hives along her waistline.

Mrs. Ballantine promised to cover the waistbands with some soft cotton, but Maddy still itched, so a cool shower sounded pretty good to her.

Hives. She never broke out in hives. It was pretty pitiful, being allergic to your own wedding gown. Not prophetic, she was sure. Just pitiful.

Her hair still in the ponytail, and only slightly damp around the edges from the shower, Maddy dressed in a short denim skirt and a pink-and-red flowered denim vest with metal snap closings she’d picked up on sale the previous week.

She loved sales, couldn’t get enough of them, especially considering that she hadn’t looked at a price tag until eighteen months ago. Now paying retail was an anathema to her, buying on credit felt like something akin to mortal sin and, as she’d discovered the delights of the local malls, she’d also developed a healthy appetite for fast food and huge pretzels slathered with mustard.

She knew her family thought she had probably gone a little overboard in her zealousness for economy, her pursuit of cooking and other household skills, even her recently discovered passion for gardening.

Matt was going to get himself one very accomplished wife, the lucky dog. Not that millionaires probably cared all that much about cents-off coupons and buying in bulk.

But, small as her accomplishments must look when compared to those of her older, quite successful siblings, Maddy was happy with her life.

Well, with most of her life.

She sure wished she didn’t have hives. They weren’t a good sign, definitely. The first and last time she’d had hives was on the airplane, flying home from Nevada. They’d started on her face, and hadn’t quit until she was all but covered in the itchy things.

Nerves, the Chandler family doctor had declared when he’d met her in the local emergency room an hour after her flight touched down. He then treated her with antihistamines and the recommendation that she look inside herself and discover what could be troubling her, as her body was merely reacting to her stress in its own particular way. That was Dr. Neally, full of holistic ideas and the patient having the power to cure herself. The man even had a lava lamp in his waiting room.

Maddy had taken the antihistamines, and switched doctors. Her new physician, Dr. Linda Garvey, Matt’s sister, told her pretty much the same thing, but then said she should sit down, examine her life and decide what she wanted from it. For some reason, what Maddy decided she wanted was to learn how to cook. And she ran with it, straight to classes at the local community college.

She hadn’t had a hive since, thanks to her soon-to-be sister-in-law.

Until today, damn it. And she’d rather stick one of Mrs. Ballantine’s straight pins in her eye than call the way-too-insightful Linda for help. Not when she was supposed to be the happy bride, only a week shy of her wedding to her doctor’s brother.

Maddy found some antihistamine capsules in her kitchen and downed two, even knowing that they’d make her sleepy in the middle of the day. She slipped her bare feet into a pair of cherry-red sneakers gotten for twenty percent off at JCPenney’s, and headed down the front stairs to see what the rest of the family was doing.

Ten minutes later she was sitting on the carpet in the second drawing room, surrounded by boxes, ribbons and tissue paper, once more playing Happy Bride. And trying to ignore the itch that seemed to be crawling up her back.

Jessica Chandler, Maddy’s older sister, sat cross-legged on the Oriental carpet with her, the two of them in the center of the room surrounded by white linen covered tables displaying many of the wedding gifts as they opened today’s deliveries.

At least one of the gifts was always good for a laugh.

“Ah, just what you need most, Maddy,” Jessica said, holding up the unwrapped gift. “Another silver tray. What does that make now—ten of them? You’d think somebody would have some imagination, wouldn’t you?”

“Great-Aunt Harriet has some,” Maddy replied, warily eyeing the object in her hands. “What is this?”

Jessie laughed out loud. “And we have today’s winner. What is it, Maddy? I don’t know, wait—it’s Great-Uncle Albert!” she suggested, still giggling. “I wouldn’t lift the lid if I were you. Especially if you feel a sneeze coming on.”

“Funny, Jessie, very funny.” Maddy looked at the vase, or ornamental urn, or whatever the devil she held in her hands, then carefully placed it on the carpet, still unable to believe what she was seeing. Her chin began to itch, but she ignored that, too.

The “Thing” Great-Aunt Harriet had sent by messenger—Maddy already had decided to think of it as the “Thing”—stood at least two feet high, and was fashioned out of some sort of porcelain. And it had to be old as dirt, something Great-Aunt Harriet had pulled from her collection and forwarded to her great-niece instead of just sending her another silver tray, like any normal person.

The Thing had a lid, and the lid had a handle—two close-to-naked cherubs cavorting. The Thing also had side handles, both of them similarly un-clothed cherubs bent forward at the waist, and looking as if they were about to do swan dives onto the floor.

She and Joe would have laughed and laughed—no! She would not think of Joe O’Malley again.

She scratched at an annoying itch behind her knee, and went back to inspecting her latest gift.

The Thing was so ugly, so overdone with intricate scrollwork and rosy-cheeked cherubs, and even bits of faux greenery, that Maddy was sure it had to be worth a small fortune. Ugly things almost always were. Worst of all, it seemed familiar; like something she’d at least seen a variation of during her college studies.

Carefully removing the dome lid and placing it back in the box, Maddy lifted the remaining piece and inspected the bottom of the base. “Nove, with an asterisk under it. Good Lord, Jessie, it’s a Le Nove. I should have known. I remember one from my classes—covered in shells and painted with mythological figures. Look, there are shells on this one, too, along the base. Well, at least now I know what to say in my thank-you note to Great-Aunt Harriet.”

“You sure do, Maddy. ‘Dear Aunt Harriet, thank you so much for the exquisite Nove. It will look so lovely in the basement storage area.’”

Maddy rolled her eyes, even as she scratched at her chin. “Jessie, this is a Nove. Straight from the late 1700s. A true, if revolting, work of art. I wouldn’t put it in the basement. Great-Aunt Harriet meant well, and always does.” She replaced the lid, tucked the vase back into its box. Then she smiled evilly. “I’ll give it to Allie.”

“Only if you want to be cut out of my will, young lady,” Almira Chandler said as she walked into the room, looked down into the tissue-filled box. “Did I hear someone say Great-Aunt Harriet? For our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, she sent back the silver compote your grandfather and I had given her one Christmas. That’s Harriet, the idiot. Some people give gifts that keep on giving, or whatever. Harriet just keeps recycling the same old stuff. I imagine it makes some sort of sense—to her.”

“But you love her, Allie,” Maddy said. “You love her because she’s three years younger than you and looks ten years older. Like you’ve said, you just can’t turn your back on a woman who makes you look so good at family parties.”

“Twenty years older than me, Maddy, not ten.” Almira laughed as she peered down into the box. “Now, what did the idiot send over now? The woman’s been cleaning house and stuffing up all her relatives’ houses for the last decade, saying she’s going to die any day and wants her treasures in loving hands first. Which,” she ended, straightening, “explains that hideous Chelsea tea caddy Mrs. Ballantine keeps insisting on putting on the breakfast table. Just what I want to wake up to, certainly. A grinning idiot figure of a man with a round, bare belly and a lotus leaf for a hat. He even has teeth, for crying out loud. And Harriet will linger on another twenty years, until she’s buried us all under her junk.”

“Very valuable junk, Allie, according to Maddy, our very own Art History major, although we probably should remember she graduated with only a C average,” Jessie interjected, opening yet another box, pulling out yet another silver tray. “My, Maddy, this is your lucky day, isn’t it?”

Maddy looked at her sister, slimmer than her, taller by four inches, older by three years. Jessie had dark honey-brown hair as opposed to Maddy’s own deepest black, pale blue eyes to her vibrant green. She was a bright, talented, successful young woman with a lifelong air of dignity and composure about her that Maddy had always envied, even as she had tagged after her, worshiping her.

Jessica was so confident, so sure of herself, and always had been. So successful, working side by side with their brother, Ryan, in the family business.

Maddy wished she could be more like her sister, rather than being the “baby” of the family, the one without a job, without a career, without, it seemed, much ambition or direction at all. And not expected to have any of those attributes, either, come to think of it.

If they’d had a Chandler family pet, they’d expect it to learn more tricks than they had ever expected from Maddy. No one in the family had batted a single eye or made a single comment when she’d withdrawn from her graduate courses, come home and learned how to cook pot roast. She sometimes wondered if she’d accepted Matt’s proposal because she loved him, or because he, at least, seemed to think she had some sort of potential.

Not that Joe O’Malley hadn’t thought she’d had potential. As a lover, that is. The asking her to be his wife part had only been an afterthought, she was sure. Something he thought he should do. Especially when he was about to lower the boom of his grand get-rich scheme. Having her safely married to him before she found out probably had seemed like a good idea at the time. The rat.

And now the rat was rich. Filthy rich. He didn’t need a little wife cutting coupons and sewing on buttons. Not that she had taken those courses just to make herself better equipped to be Joe’s wife, if the man were to come to his senses and figure out he simply could not live without her. Not at all.

Maddy stuck out her tongue, swiped it over her top lip, which had begun to tingle ominously.

And not that she needed grad school or cooking classes to strike out on her own. She could be on her own if she wanted to. Sure, she could. She could be working in some small museum, or in an art gallery somewhere. She could be independent. But, no. She had to leave the classroom, go running off to elope with a man whose kiss was enough to make her forget everything but the man, the kiss.

Which had gotten her—where? Almost to the altar, that’s where. With another man.

Maddy shook her head, banishing these pointless thoughts, knowing she had to stop using Joe as an excuse for her own failings. She hadn’t wanted a career, and she knew it now just as she had known it then. Only she hadn’t known what she wanted back then, and as Chandlers all went to college, she had gone to college. And gotten straight C’s, as Jessie had just pointed out.

She’d gotten straight A’s in all her classes at the community college. She loved her classes. That had to mean something. Had to mean more than that she had started taking the classes because Joe might come back and need a wife who knew how to cook. She enjoyed being domestic. Why, she’d even begun taking parenting classes last semester. Wasn’t that how she and Matt had gotten together? Because of their shared interest in having a family?

What Maddy wanted, had always wanted, she could now acknowledge, was a husband to love, a man who loved her above and beyond anything else in his world. And babies—lots of them. A home of her own. Let Jessie and Ryan run the business, heap more millions into her trust fund. She’d always be grateful to them for it. But she would be more than content to stay home and bake brownies, which she did now, from scratch, after taking a bakery class at the community college.

Cooking classes, classes on handling a family budget, gardening classes, even one on flower arranging—she’d taken them all, excelled at them all. Enjoyed them all.

Her degree in Art History meant less than nothing to her, but she truly treasured the First Place blue ribbon she had won last fall at the Great Allentown Fair for her chocolate cheesecake.

Eighteen months after admitting to Joe that she couldn’t boil water, Maddy had transformed herself into an accomplished cook, an enthusiastic gardener and a woman who actually knew how to hang wallpaper.

All so she could marry Matthew Garvey and have a house nearly as huge as this one, a staff to handle any emergency and enough free time to take every class the community college offered.

If there was something wrong with this, and Maddy was sure there was, she refused to recognize that she now had what it took to be a stay-at-home wife to a struggling young businessman, but she no longer had that struggling young businessman.

She unconsciously began to scratch at a spot behind her left ear.

“Maddy? Maddy. Allie’s talking to you,” Jessie said, giving her sister a playful shove in the ribs.

Maddy looked up at her grandmother, blinked a few times to clear her head and said rather dreamily, “Hmm?”

“Articulate as ever, darling,” Almira said, shaking her head. “I said, there’s a moving van next door. Mrs. Ballantine was nice enough to find your grandfather’s binoculars for me, and I wondered if you two wanted to go into the morning room, which has such lovely spying windows?”

Maddy shook her head. “Allie! Don’t tell me you actually want to spy on the new neighbors, see their furniture, probably make insulting cracks about every second piece that comes out of the truck.”

“And there’s something wrong with this?” Allie’s smile faded even as her green eyes twinkled. “Don’t let this miracle of plastic surgery fool you. I’m old now, Maddy, and just have to get my kicks wherever I can find them. So humor me, okay?”

Jessie was already on her feet. “Come on, Maddy, it’ll be fun.”

“For you, maybe,” Maddy said, also getting to her feet. “But Matt and I wanted to buy that house, remember? If I’m going to scope out the new neighbors, I’d much rather do it with Grandad’s old hunting rifle. Buying the place right out from under us like that, topping our bid with a one-time offer the Realtor couldn’t refuse.”

“I’m going to make you an offer you can’t refuse,” Jessie said, her voice rather muffled, as if she were speaking with marshmallows in her cheeks. “So, are you saying we’ve got nefarious characters moving into the old Harris house?”

“No, Jessie. What I’m saying is that I have next to no interest in our new neighbors. You and Allie go spy on them if you want. I’ll be out back, checking on my roses.” And taking a peek in the first mirror she saw on her way out, because her upper lip suddenly felt rather fat.

“Speaking of roses, I heard that the new owner is going to cut down all of Miriam Harris’s rose gardens and replace them with a second tennis court, or something like that,” Allie said as she walked away.

“What! How—how could they do that? Miriam’s roses have been there for fifty years, at least.” Maddy followed after Almira, nearly jogging to keep up with her grandmother’s brisk steps, all thoughts of mirrors and her possibly fat lip banished. “I mean, are these people absolute idiots? Who needs two tennis courts?”

Mrs. Ballantine stood at attention in the hallway, conveniently armed with a huge pair of vintage World War II field glasses, which she wordlessly passed to Almira before stepping back to let the three women pass. To an observant person, the two women performed like a well-trained tag-team wrestling duo. But Almira’s grandchildren weren’t being all that observant right now. At least one of them wasn’t, anyway.

“Who needs two tennis courts? I don’t know, dear, why don’t you look and see?” Almira answered, already in the mostly glass-sided morning room, the door closed behind them. Besides being the best vantage point to the driveway next door, the large, wicker-filled atrium was a family favorite for resting, and curling up with a good book.

Almira’s husband had added the room as an anniversary present years ago, and the only solid wall in the room was taken up with floor-to-ceiling bookcases stuffed three deep with romance novels. Sarah had them all cross-indexed and alphabetized, and a small card catalog stood in the far corner. Almira Chandler was very serious about her cherished books. Very serious.

Almira shoved the binoculars into Maddy’s hands—it was either take the things or have them jammed into her gut. “Why don’t you take a peek, and then maybe you can tell me what an idiot looks like. Or didn’t I mention that the owner is already on the property, overseeing the unloading of what looks to be a small mountain of boxes?”

Jessie, who had been watching all of this with a rather confused smile on her face—as she knew their grandmother never did anything without a reason—helpfully drew back the sheer curtains to give her sister a better view.

Maddy lifted the binoculars to her eyes, knowing that somehow she had been roped into doing what her grandmother wanted, again. She blinked as she saw nothing but fuzzy greenery through the lenses, then adjusted both the knob on the binoculars and her direction, slowly moving her sight along the sweep of lawn, past the white-painted split-rail fence covered in trailing red roses that divided the two properties.

Now more grass, trees and the start of the sweep of brick driveway that made a huge semicircle in front of the Harris house. She’d planned to plant white petunias and blue alyssum along both sides of that long driveway, as a complement to the blue-gray stone and creamy white wood trim of the house. With a couple of red geraniums mixed in, to pick up the dull red in the bricked driveway.

So many plans. So many things she was going to do with that house. Holding on to the heavy binoculars with only one hand, she used the other to run her fingernails over the wedge of bared flesh above her vest.

Feet. She saw feet. Male feet. Bare feet, standing on the brick driveway. Giving the powerful binoculars another small adjustment, she moved them slightly upward. Past remarkably straight legs, to a pair of khaki cutoffs and a white shirt with some sort of logo on it.

Too tiny to make out, even with the field glasses.

Maddy took a breath, moved the binoculars another fraction. Forgot about the itch on her chin.

“Joe.”

She said his name calmly, as if she had been expecting to see what she now saw. Why, she didn’t know. It had to be something about the knees, or something like that. Joe had great knees, not knobby at all. Her mind must have recognized them even before she saw his face. And now that mind had gone on Stun.

She didn’t itch anymore. She could safely say that. Because she was suddenly numb, all over.

“Who, Maddy?”

“I think that’s whom, Jessie, dear,” Almira said, moving closer to Maddy. “Did you say Joe? I thought you said Joe. But you couldn’t have said Joe, could you? I mean, what would that mean?”

Maddy was still staring through the binoculars, watching as Joe moved, pointed to a stack of boxes, said something to one of the workers. Smiled. Showed that single dimple in his left cheek. Made her heart flip over, land again with a sickening thud.

“I’m going to kill him,” she announced quietly, matter-of-factly.

By now, Jessie understood what was happening. Not all of it, of course. But enough to know that trouble was coming—with a capital T. She grabbed the binoculars from her sister. “Joe? Joe O’Malley? Your Joe O’Malley? Ohmigod, Maddy! Where? Which one?”

“It doesn’t matter, Jessie. He’ll be dead before you can meet him.”

Jessie squinted as she ran the binoculars over the figure of Joe O’Malley, at last getting a glimpse of the guy who had broken her sister’s heart. “Wow, cute. No wonder you—well, never mind.” Sorry she’d said what she said, she quickly passed the binoculars to Allie as she took hold of her sister’s arm. “Now, Maddy…”

“I’m having a nightmare, aren’t I?” Maddy said, shaking off Jessie’s hand. “First Great-Aunt Harriet, and now Joe O’Malley. It has to be a nightmare. But, if I shoot him, I’ll wake up. Why, the bang alone would wake me, right? That should work.”

Almira hadn’t used the binoculars, just placed them on a small table and walked toward the closed door leading to the hallway. She stood there, silently, her expression blank, and laid a hand on the doorknob.

“This way, darling,” she said, opening the door as Maddy stomped around the room in circles, her fists clenched, her mind going in sixteen directions at once. “May I suggest the front door? It’s the fastest way.”

“Allie, for God’s sake, don’t help her,” Jessie said in mingled exasperation and…could it be relief? No, that couldn’t be it. She felt sorry for her baby sister. Truly she did.

“Why not, Jessie?” Maddy said as, at last, everything fell into place. Every little bit of what was happening to her at this moment. “She brought him here, didn’t she?”

Almira Chandler put one fluttering, newly manicured hand to her chest. “I brought him here? Why, Madeline Chandler, shame on you. What are you saying?”

Maddy growled low in her throat, like an animal about to pounce, then straightened her shoulders and headed past her grandmother. “No, I don’t have time for this. You I can kill any time. Joe first!”

Mrs. Ballantine slipped into the room, her head turned to watch as Maddy stomped down the hallway on the way to the front door. She waited until she could hear the door slam, wincing only slightly as the chandelier in the foyer tinkled a bit in the passing breeze.

“Shame on you, Mrs. Chandler,” she said, shaking her head. “Bringing an old heartache into Miss Maddy’s life just a week before her wedding to that nice Mr. Garvey. How could you have done such a thing to that poor little girl?”

“I don’t know, Mrs. Ballantine, I really don’t,” Almira replied, sighing. “It must be this old age of mine. I just seem to do the most outlandish things.”

Jessie looked from one woman to the other. Neither smiled. Neither allowed a single emotion to show on her face.

“Why, you two sneaks! You’ve been planning this together, haven’t you?”

“Darling,” Almira said reasonably, “Mrs. Ballantine and I can’t even plan menus together, not without nearly coming to blows.”

Jessie thought about this for a moment, then pointed her finger at her grandmother, then at Mrs. Ballantine. She opened her mouth, wagged her finger a time or two as she searched her brain for something to say, anything to say. And then she let her arm drop to her side and said simply, “Thank you.”

“Whatever for?” Mrs. Ballantine said, looking as innocent as a drill sergeant could, which wasn’t very much.

Jessie rubbed at her forehead, trying to tell herself that nothing had changed, nothing would change. Then her blue eyes widened as another thought struck her. “Allie? Mrs. Ballantine? You aren’t going to say anything to Matt, are you? I mean, Maddy needs your help. Lord knows she’s been a mess, especially since Joe O’Malley’s company went public and his picture was on the cover of Newsweek— but you aren’t going to meddle in my life, right? Right?”

Almira put a hand on Jessie’s arm. “I don’t meddle, Jessica. I never meddle. Why, I’m as surprised as you are that Joseph O’Malley bought the Harris house.”

“Yeah. Right. Sure.” Jessie kissed her grandmother’s cheek. “You just keep on believing that Maddy and I believe that. And then keep your meddling out of my life.”

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.