Scenes of Passion
Author: Suzanne Brockmann
Date: 2009-12-01 06:05:35+00:00
Keywords: Contemporary Romance; General; Contemporary; Romance; harlequin; Romantic Suspense; Adult; Fiction; M F Romance; Silhouette
Description: Safe, steady...and unsatisfying--that pretty much summed up Maggie Stanton's life. Until a stranger stirred her imagination until she blushed, a stranger who made Maggie do the unimaginable: take a risk....Shockingly, the man who'd compelled her to forsake predictability for passion was the full-grown version of her childhood best friend. Only, this Matthew Stone wanted marriage, not a walk down memory lane. For a while, Maggie almost believed that their whirlwind wedding was the union of soul mates. Almost. Then she learned the secret Matthew was keeping.
Publisher: Harlequin
Rights: Copyright 2003 by Suzanne Brockmann

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

*Tall, Dark and Dangerous

“If We Made Love,” She Said To Him, “Would You Be Bored With Me After Only One Hour?”

Matthew choked on the air he was breathing, exhaling sharply. “What?”

Maggie felt her cheeks grow hot. She couldn’t believe she’d actually said that!

“Never mind,” she mumbled.

“Not ‘Never mind,’” Matthew insisted. “You just asked me if I thought you’d be boring in bed.”

Maggie avoided his eyes.

He pulled her chin so she was looking up at him. “I do not think making love to you would be dull. I would not be bored after one hour or even one hundred hours. And this is something that would not be difficult to prove.”

The look in his eyes was unmistakable. Fire. But was it passion for her or passion for a challenge?

“What would you do if I said, ‘Okay, prove it’?”

SUZANNE BROCKMANN

Scenes of Passion

Books by Suzanne Brockmann

Silhouette Desire

Scenes of Passion #1519

Silhouette Intimate Moments

Hero under Cover #575

Not without Risk #647

A Man To Die For #681

*Prince Joe #720

*Forever Blue #742

*Frisco’s Kid #759

Love with the Proper Stranger #831

*Everyday, Average Jones #872

*Harvard’s Education #884

*It Came Upon a Midnight Clear #896

*The Admiral’s Bride #962

Undercover Princess #968

*Identity: Unknown #974

*Get Lucky #991

*Taylor’s Temptation #1087

Letters to Kelly #1213

SUZANNE BROCKMANN
lives just west of Boston in a house always filled with her friends—actors and musicians and storytellers and artists and teachers. When not writing award-winning romances about U.S. Navy SEALs, among others, she sings in an a capella group called Serious Fun, manages the professional acting careers of her two children, volunteers at the Appalachian Benefit Coffeehouse and always answers letters from readers. Send her a SASE along with your letter to P.O. Box 5092, Wayland, MA 01778.

For Melanie and Jason.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

One

Traffic on Route 95 was in a snarl again.

Maggie Stanton sat in her car, too tired even to flip radio stations to find a song that annoyed her less than the one that was playing. She was too tired to do much of anything besides breathe.

Or maybe tired wasn’t the right word. Maybe discouraged was more accurate. Or downtrodden.

No, downtrodden implied a certain resistance to being trod upon.

Maggie was just plain pathetic. She was a doormat. A wimp without a life of her own.

She was twenty-nine years old and she was living at home. Yes, she’d moved back in with her parents because of the fire in her apartment.

But that was three years ago.

First her mother had asked her to stay to help with Vanessa’s wedding.

When 9/11 happened, her father had asked her to keep living at home a little longer, and somehow another year had passed.

Then right after Maggie had found a terrific new place in the city, her grandmother had died, and she couldn’t leave while her mother was feeling so blue.

It was now way past time to leave—a quarter past ridiculous—and her mother was making noise about how silly it would be for Maggie to get a place of her own when she was on the verge of getting married.

Uh, Mom? Don’t get the invitations engraved just yet. The bride kind of needs to be in love with the groom before that happens, doesn’t she?

Although, like most of the major decisions in Maggie’s life, it was possible that this one would be made by her parents, too. And she would just stand there, the way she always did, and nod and smile.

God, she was such a loser.

Maggie’s cell phone rang, saving her from the additional tedium of self-loathing. “Hello?”

“Hey, pumpkin.”

Someone kill her now. She was dating a man who called her pumpkin. No, she wasn’t just dating him, she was—as her mother called it—preengaged.

Yes, Brock “Hey, Pumpkin” Donovan had actually asked her to marry him. Maggie had managed to stall for the past few weeks—which turned out to be an enormous mistake. She should have said no immediately, right before she ran screaming from the room. Instead, because she was a wimp and rarely screamed about anything, she’d put it off. Her wimp thinking was that she’d find the right time and place to let him down without hurting his feelings. Instead, he’d gone and told Maggie’s older sister Vanessa, who was married to Brock’s former college roommate, that he’d popped the question. And Van had told their parents, and…

Segue to Mom buying Bride magazine and starting negotiations with the Hammonassett Inn.

Maggie’s parents had been so excited, they’d wanted to throw a preengagement party, for crying out loud. Fortunately, the only date Mom had had available was this Saturday—the day that Eastfield Community Theater was holding auditions for their summer show.

And they knew not to schedule something on that day.

Maggie’s involvement in theater was the only thing she had ever put her foot down about. Her parents had wanted her to go to Yale, so she’d gone to Yale instead of Emerson’s performing arts school. Yale had a terrific drama department, but her parents had made so much noise about starving artists needing a career to fall back on, she’d majored instead in business. After college, the noise had continued, so she’d gone to law school instead of moving to New York City and auditioning for a part on a soap opera. Her father had wanted her to work for his lawyer buddies at Andersen and Brenden here in New Haven, and here she was.

Stuck in traffic after putting in a twenty-seven-hour day at A&B. Preengaged, heaven help her, to a man who called her pumpkin.

Living her life vicariously through the roles she played on stage at ECT.

Because God forbid she ever say no and disappoint anyone.

Wimp.

“I’m still at work,” Brock told her now, over the phone. “It’s crazy here. I’m going to have to cancel, sweetheart. You don’t mind, do you?”

Maggie had actually taken her gym bag with her to work despite the fact that she and Brock were supposed to have dinner. More often than not, Brock canceled or arrived at the restaurant very late.

Of course, tonight was the night she’d planned to let him down. Gently, with no screaming and relatively little pain.

And yes, that was relief flooding through her, chicken that she was. There was also annoyance, she realized. This man allegedly loved her. He said he wanted to marry her, for crying out loud.

And yet his idea of wooing her was to repeatedly break dinner dates at the last minute.

She could imagine their wedding day—Brock calling her as she sat dressed in her wedding gown in a sleek white limo being driven to the church.

“Pumpkin!” he’d boom over the cell phone’s little speaker. “Something’s come up. Compu-dime’s systems have gone haywire! They need me in Dallas, pronto. We’re going to have to reschedule—you don’t mind, do you?”

And there it was—one of the reasons Brock wanted to marry her. She was so completely, idiotically compliant.

Of course she didn’t mind. She never minded. She always did what was asked or expected of her, with a smile on her idiotic face.

She was such a loser.

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” Brock said now. “I’ve got to run.”

And he was gone before she could say anything at all.

With his curly hair and Hollywood-star cleft in his chin, Brock was a good-looking man. And, as Maggie’s mother kept pointing out, he got six weeks of vacation each year.

Yeah, there was a reason to get married—for a man’s extensive vacation time.

Be careful, Angie had said the last time they’d talked on the phone. Maggie’s best friend from high school was convinced that if Mags didn’t stay alert, she’d wake up one morning married to the Brockster. Kind of the same way she’d woken up one morning with a law degree, a job at A&B and living at home again at age twenty-nine.

But Angie was Angie. Her goal in life was to make waves. She’d just gotten married herself to a man from England, and was living now in London, working as a stage manager in the theater district. She had a dream job and a dream husband. Freddy Chambers, a seemingly straitlaced Brit, was the perfect match for Angie Caratelli’s rather violently passionate nature.

Kind of for the same reasons quiet Maggie had gotten along so well with Angie.

It had been more than ten years, but Maggie still missed high school. She and Angie and Angie’s boyfriend, Matt Stone—all part of the theater crowd—had been inseparable and life had been one endless, laughter-filled party. Well, except when Angie and Matt were fighting. Which was every other day, because Matt had been as volatile as Angie.

Life had been jammed with anticipation and excitement and possibilities. There was always a new show to put on, a new dance to learn, a new song to sing. The future hung before them, glowing and bright.

Matt would have been as horrified as Angie if he knew Maggie was a corporate lawyer now, and that her office didn’t even have a window. But he’d disappeared over ten years ago, after graduation. His and Angie’s friendship hadn’t survived that one last devastating breakup, and when he’d left town, he hadn’t come back.

Not even a few years ago, when his father had died.

No, Maggie was the only one of them still living here in town. Wimp that she was, she liked living in the town she’d lived in most of her life. She just wished she weren’t living at home.

“Help,” she said to the woman in the car in the next lane over who looked nearly as tired as Maggie felt. But with the windows up and the air-conditioning running, they might as well have been in different rockets in outer space.

Angie repeatedly suggested that Maggie quit her job, dump Brock and run off to live in a recreational vehicle with that really gorgeous, long-haired, muscular Tarzan lookalike Maggie had caught glimpses of while at the health club. The jungle man, she and Angie had taken to calling him since he first appeared a week or so ago. She’d first noticed him hanging from his knees from the chin-up bar, doing midair sit-ups.

He had long, straight, honey-brown hair, and as he effortlessly pulled himself up again and again, it came free from the rubberband and whipped in a shimmering curtain around him.

Maggie had never gotten a clear look at his face, but the glimpses she’d seen were filled with angles and cheekbones and a clean-shaven and very strong chin.

She could picture him now, walking toward her, across the tops of the cars that were practically parked on Route 95.

He would move in slow motion—men who looked like that always did, at least in the movies. Muscles rippling, T-shirt hugging his chest, blue jeans tight across his thighs, hair down around his shoulders, a small smile playing about his sensuous mouth, a dangerous light in his golden-green eyes.

Well, Maggie hadn’t gotten close enough to him to see the color of his eyes, but she’d always had a special weakness for eyes that were that exotic, jungle cat color.

Oh, yeah.

He’d effortlessly swing himself down from the hood of her car, and open the driver’s side door.

“I’ll drive,” he’d say in a smoky, husky, sexy half whisper.

Maggie would scramble over the parking brake. No. No scrambling allowed in this fantasy. She’d gracefully and somewhat magically find her way into the passenger’s side as she surrendered the steering wheel to the jungle man.

“Where are we going?”

He’d shoot her another of those smiles. “Does it matter?”

She wouldn’t hesitate. “No.”

Heat and satisfaction would flare in his beautiful eyes, and she’d know he was going to take her someplace she’d never been before. “Good.”

The car behind her hit its horn.

Whoopsie. The traffic was finally moving.

Maggie stepped on the gas, signaling to move right, heading for the exit that would take her to the health club.

Maybe, if she were really lucky, she’d get another glimpse of the jungle man and her evening wouldn’t be a total waste.

God, she was such a loser.

Two

Matt Stone needed help.

He’d been back in Eastfield—he wasn’t quite ready to call it “home”—for less than two weeks, and he could no longer pretend that he was capable of pulling this off on his own.

His father had been determined to continue messing with Matt’s head even after he was dead. He’d left Matt a fortune—and the fate of two hundred and twenty employees of the Yankee Potato Chip Company—provided he was willing to jump through all the right hoops.

As far as Matt was concerned, his father could take his money straight to hell with him.

But for two hundred and twenty good people to lose their jobs in this economy…?

For that, Matt would learn to jump.

Still, he needed a lawyer who was on his side. He needed someone with a head for business. And he needed that person to be someone he trusted.

He needed Maggie Stanton.

He’d seen her a time or two at the health club. But she was always in a hurry, rushing into the locker room. Rushing to an aerobic dance class. Rushing back home.

He’d seen her last night—checking him out. She was very subtle. Maggie would never leer or ogle, but she was definitely watching him in the mirrors as he did curls.

She didn’t recognize him. Matt didn’t know whether to be insulted or glad. God knows he had changed quite a bit.

She, however, looked exactly the same. Blue eyes, brown hair, sweet girl-next-door face with that slightly elfin pointy chin, freckles across her adorable nose…

It was a crime to humanity that she’d gotten a law degree instead of going to New York and working toward a career on Broadway. She had a voice that always blew him away, and an ability to act. And, oh yeah, she could dance like a dream.

She’d won all the leads in the high school musicals starting when she was a freshman. She was Eliza Doolittle to his Henry Higgins when he was a junior and she was a sophomore.

The following year, they were Tony and Maria in West Side Story. It was the spring of Matt’s senior year, and the beginning of the end of his friendship with both Angie and Maggie.

Because Angie knew.

As Tony and Maria, he and Maggie had had to kiss on stage. It was different from the polite buss they’d shared as Eliza and Henry the year before. These were soul-sucking, heart-stopping, full power, no-holds-barred passionate kisses. The first time they went over the first of them, Matt had followed the director’s blocking with his usual easy confidence, pulling Maggie into his arms and kissing her with all of his character’s pent-up frustration and desire.

Maggie had become Maria, kissing him back so hotly, pressing herself against him and…

And Matt had to stop pretending to himself that he hadn’t fallen for his girlfriend’s best friend.

And of course, Angie knew. The only person who didn’t know was Maggie.

It was entirely possible she never knew.

Or maybe she did know, and she had been as angry with him as Angie.

In which case she probably wouldn’t return his phone call.

Which meant that he’d just have to keep calling.

Because he needed Maggie Stanton and this time he wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

Laden with files, Maggie staggered back into her office at five o’clock the next afternoon after a six-hour meeting with a client.

She pulled the wad of phone messages off her spiked message holder with a sigh, taking them with her into the former closet that was her office. She closed the door, dumped the files in the only other chair in the room, and, sitting at her desk, spread the message slips on the desk in front of her.

Brock had already called twice. Seven of the messages were from clients she knew, three were names she didn’t recognize.

There was a brand-new pile of files on her desk, with a casually scrawled note atop saying, “Deal with these before tomorrow, will you?”

Oh, yeah, sure. No problem—if she stayed here at the office until midnight.

Maggie let her head fall forward onto the desk. “I hate this job,” she whispered, wishing she were brave enough to say it loudly enough for either Andersen or Brenden to hear.

There was a knock on her office door.

Maggie lifted her head. This was where he’d make the scene. Her jungle man. She’d say, “Come in,” and the door would open and he’d be standing there, just looking at her with those golden-green eyes.

He’d step inside and close the door behind him and say, “Ready to go?”

And she wouldn’t hesitate. She’d say, “Yes.”

And he’d smile and hold out his hand and she’d stand up and slip her fingers into his and…

The door opened a crack and Janice Greene, the firm’s receptionist, peeked in. “You are still here.”

“Oh, yeah,” Maggie said. “I’m still here.”

“You missed one,” Janice told her, handing her the phone message slip.

“Thanks,” Maggie said as Janice went back out the door. She glanced down at the slip and…“Whoa, wait a minute, please—didn’t he leave a number?”

Matthew Stone, read the slip in Janice’s neat handwriting.

“He said you would know it,” Janice said. “I’m sorry, I should have—”

“No,” Maggie said. “It’s all right.” The only number she knew for Matt was the one for the big old house he’d once shared with his father, down by the water.

As Janice shut her door, she picked up her phone and started to dial.

But then hung it back up.

She’d always felt a little funny about the fact that she’d taken Angie’s side during her and Matt’s last big fight—the one that broke them up for good and even managed to disrupt Maggie’s own friendship with him.

Angie had never gone into detail about what it was that Matt had supposedly done.

All Maggie knew was that Matt and Angie had had the mother of all fights shortly after rehearsals for West Side Story had started. And that was saying something because theirs was a very stormy relationship, filled with conflict.

Angie had come running to Maggie’s house for comfort. And soon after, Matt had shown up, too.

Maggie could tell he’d been drinking from the aroma of alcohol that surrounded him. It had been whiskey she could smell, which alarmed her. Usually he only drank beer.

“Are you okay?” she’d asked him, coming out onto the front stoop.

He sat down heavily on the steps, and she knew as she sat next to him that something was really wrong. In addition to having too much to drink, he looked anxious and ill at ease.

He couldn’t quite meet her eyes. “Mags, there’s something I have to tell you,” he said

“Get the hell out of here, you creep!”

Maggie turned to see Angie inside the front door. Her eyes were blazing and her arms were crossed as she glared down at Matt.

He swore softly. “I should have figured you’d be here.”

Maggie had looked from Angie to Matt, feeling hopelessly caught in the middle. She stood up. “Look, you guys, why don’t I go inside? This doesn’t have anything to do with me.”

Matt started to laugh, and Angie kicked him, hard, in the back. He fell off the steps, landed in the shrubbery and came up mad.

“Damn it!”

“Stay away from me,” Angie shouted back at him. “And stay away from Maggie. I’m warning you, Matt!”

Maggie had never seen such venom in her friend’s eyes.

Matt turned deliberately away from her and looked at Maggie. “I would like to talk to you. Alone. Will you come for a ride with me? Please?”

“I wouldn’t let her go for a ride with you even if you were sober,” Angie shouted. “Get lost, you son of a bitch!”

“I wasn’t asking you,” Matt shouted back. “Just shut the hell up!” He turned back to Maggie. “Come on, Mags. If you don’t want me to drive, we could take a walk.”

“I’m sorry,” Maggie said as Angie pulled her back into the house.

After that, she’d only seen Matt at rehearsals.

She’d urged him to patch things up with Angie, but he simply smiled. “You still don’t get it, do you?” he asked.

Finally, she did get it. Matt and Angie were through, and their three-way friendship was over.

The next year, Matt went off to college. Angie found a new boyfriend and life went on. Maggie had kept track of Matt for a while.

The last address Maggie had had for him was from nearly seven years ago, when he was living in Los Angeles. Since then, she’d heard nothing of him, as if he’d dropped off the face of the earth.

But now he was back.

Maggie picked up the phone and dialed.

It rang four times before a breathless voice answered it. “Hello?”

“Hey, Matt.”

“Mags!” he said, genuine pleasure ringing in his voice. “Thanks for calling back so quickly. How are you?”

Awful. “I’m fine. Welcome back to the East Coast.”

“Yeah, well,” his voice sounded subdued for a moment. “I, uh, actually, I’m back in Eastfield on business and, um, that’s partly why I called. I mean, aside from just wanting to see you. God, it’s been forever.”

“You sound exactly the same,” she said.

“Yikes,” he said. “Really? That’s kind of scary.”

Maggie laughed. “So what kind of business are you in these days?”

“The inheritance business,” he told her. “Can you meet me tonight for dinner? I’m going to ask you to do me a giant favor and I’d rather not do it over the phone. I need the opportunity to use visuals—you know, so I can properly grovel.”

He did sound exactly the same. “How giant is this favor?”

“It’s about twenty-five million dollars giant.”

Maggie choked. “What?”

“I really want to wait and talk to you about this in person,” Matt said. “How about if I pick you up at six-thirty?”

Maggie looked at that new stack of files on her desk. “Let’s make it later. I’m going to be here for a while, and I was hoping to hit the health club tonight. I want to go to a class that ends at eight. Is that too late?”

“That’s right. Tonight’s that dance class you like to take. I’ve seen you over there, you know.”

“You’re kidding. You saw me at the club and you didn’t bother to say hello?” Maggie couldn’t believe it. “Thanks a million.”

“You didn’t see me?” he asked.

“If I had, I would’ve said hi. Jeez, Matt.”

He laughed. “It makes sense that you wouldn’t recognize me. I’ve put on some weight.”

“Really?” Maggie tried to picture Matt carrying an extra fifty pounds around his waist. Oh, dear. He was probably balding, too. No doubt it was his cosmic punishment for being too gleamingly handsome as a seventeen-year-old.

“Look, why don’t we meet at the club?” he asked. “We can get something healthy to eat in the café.”

Maggie snorted. “Yeah—since when do you eat anything healthy, Mr. Cheese Fries?”

Matt laughed. “I’ll see you a little after eight.”

Thanks to the files on her desk, Maggie missed the dance class. It was eight-fifteen before she pulled into the health club parking lot.

And there he was. Her jungle man. Hanging out right by the door, leaning against the wall. Dressed in jeans and that white T-shirt, just like in her fantasy.

Only this was real.

He was just standing there, as if he were waiting for her. And she was going to have to rush right past him, because she’d already kept Matt waiting.

Boy, she hated being late.

But as she moved toward him, the jungle man pushed himself up and off the wall. His hair was down around his shoulders, shiny and clean. His shoulders and chest were unbelievably broad, and the muscles in his arms actually strained against the sleeves of his T-shirt.

His face was twice as handsome as she’d imagined—although the twilight still made it hard to see him clearly.

He smiled as she drew closer, and she realized that his cheekbones were indeed a work of art. And his chin and his smile with those gracefully shaped lips, and those golden brown eyes that were—oh my God!—Matthew’s eyes…

Maggie couldn’t remember the last time she’d been completely speechless. But she sure as hell was speechless now.

Matthew.

Her fantasy jungle man was actually her old buddy Matthew.

He’d put on some weight, all right, but it was all solid muscle.

“Hey, Mags,” he said—Matt’s voice coming out of this stranger’s mouth. He was laughing at her. He knew damn well that she’d noticed him in the club but hadn’t recognized him.

Come on, Maggie. You’re an actor. Act.

“Hey, Matt,” she said, her voice coming out perfectly matter of fact. “I’m sorry I’m running late.”

“That’s all right,” he said. “I’m just glad you’re here. You look great, by the way.”

“I still look fourteen,” she told him. “You look great. God, Matt, I’ve seen you around here for days, but I didn’t know it was you.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve changed a lot,” he said, his eyes suddenly serious.

Maggie had to look away, suddenly uncomfortable with this new man-sized Matthew Stone. Somehow, she’d been expecting the kid she’d known in high school. This man was not only taller and broader, but he’d also lost the nervous energy that had ruled the teen. Young Matt had never sat still for longer than a few minutes, hopping from chair to chair around the room, smoking one cigarette after another.

This man exuded a quiet strength, a steadfast calmness. And that was really why she hadn’t recognized him—never mind the long hair and muscular body.

Matt smiled at her, not one of his old devil-may-care grins, but a gentle smile of genuine pleasure.

“I really missed you,” he said.

“I missed you, too,” she told him. “But right now I have to visit the ladies’ room. It’s a long drive from New Haven at this time of night.”

“No problem. I’ll go up to the café. Want me to order you something?”’

“Yeah, thanks,” she said as he held the door open for her. That was a new one, too. Matt—holding a door? “Will you get me a salad?”

“Italian dressing on the side,” they both said at the same time.

Matt grinned. “Some things never change.”

Three

When Maggie walked into the café, Matthew was standing at the juice bar, talking to three healthy, young college girls. What was it that he’d said? Some things never change.

He turned, as if he’d felt her eyes on him and quickly excused himself. Coming toward her, a smile lit his handsome face. “Hey.”

Their food had already come out, and he pulled her by the hand to a table. And held her chair for her.

She looked up at him as she sat, half expecting him to pull it out from underneath her, so he could laugh as she hit the floor.

But he just smiled at her, and sat down. Behind a huge salad and a plate of steamed vegetables. The hamburger kid was eating vegetables.

“Before we get down to talking about twenty-five-million-dollar favors,” Maggie said, “I’m dying to hear what you’ve been up to this past decade.”

And where was the beer? Even at seventeen, Matthew Stone never sat down to eat dinner without a cigarette and a bottle of beer.

“It would take a full ten years to tell you the whole story,” he said with a smile, digging into his salad.

Maggie looked around the open, airy café. The ceiling was high, the colors were muted grays and maroons. A sign on the wall proclaimed that there was absolutely No Smoking.

“Do you still smoke?” she asked.

“Nope. I quit three years ago,” he told her. “I also stopped drinking and started eating vegan. See, I, um…Well, I got sick, and I needed to take some kind of action—feel like I was doing something to help myself get better. I don’t know if it really helped, but it certainly helped my head, you know?”

“How long were you sick?”

He shook his head. “A long time. Do you mind if we don’t talk about that? It’s not…I have these superstitions about…Well, I’d rather not—”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Of course, you don’t have to…I had an address for you in California.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah. I was, uh, all over the southwest for a while. Right after dear old dad gave me the boot. He kicked me out—did you know about that?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Yeah, there was trouble at one of the colleges and he wouldn’t even hear my side of it. I mean, sure, it was the fourth college I was…” he cleared his throat. “Politely asked to leave, but…That time it really wasn’t my fault. Still, I got the ‘never darken my door again’ speech.”

“That’s terrible,” she said.

“It was good actually. I finally learned to take care of myself. I kind of floated for a while. I actually did some acting—and got paid for it. My most legit job was at this dinner theater in Phoenix. I did two shows with them—Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and Guys and Dolls.”

“That’s great—getting paid for acting?” Maggie smiled at him, and he smiled back.

“I guess. It was…It really wasn’t that great. They didn’t pay very much. I had to wash dishes, and…” He shrugged. “Their leading lady had nothing on you.”

Yeah, right. “Thanks.”

When he looked at her, something sparked. Maggie felt it deep in the pit of her stomach, and she had to look away. She’d trained herself for so long to feel nothing more than friendship for Matt that this kind of physical attraction seemed odd and unnatural.

His eyes gleamed with humor. “Oh, here’s a story you’ll really like. When I was in L.A., I managed to get this agent. What a sleazeball. He told me he could get me some work in the movies. Nothing big, you know—bit parts. But still, it was the movies…. Anyway, he sent me on an audition, right?”

Maggie nodded, watching Matt’s face as he talked, the corners of his mouth quivering with restrained laughter. It was hard to believe that it had been ten years since she’d seen him. It just seemed so natural, sitting here together.

“So I go into this place,” he said, “and I realize that it’s not a cattle call. You know, there’re not four hundred other guys that look sort of like me lining up to audition for the part of the store owner who says ‘A dollar fifty,’ to Keifer Sutherland when he comes into the convenience store to buy a pack of cigarettes. The director actually comes out and shakes my hand—if you can believe that—and he takes me into the studio. I was so jazzed. They had cameras set up on a soundstage, along with this living room set. It looked like a stock American home set—something out of a sitcom, you know?”

He paused, taking a sip of water. “Well, imagine my surprise when the director told me to go ahead and take off my clothes.”

“What?”

“Yeah.” Matt grinned. “It didn’t take me long to figure it out. I asked to see the script and it was called—I’ll never forget this—Sleazy Does It. It was a porno flick, Mags. It wasn’t an audition—they were just going to shoot the film that same day. Is that too scary or what?”

Maggie had to laugh. Poor Matt. Thinking he was going to get a part in a major motion picture…“Did you do it?”

He choked on his water and glared at her, mock outrage on his face. “Thanks a lot. No, I did not do it.”

She was still laughing. “Your past ten years have been much more exciting than mine.”

“You graduated from Yale, went to law school and managed to get an M.B.A. at the same time. You had a fire, moved back in with your folks. You dated someone named Tom for four years, now you’re seeing a guy named Brock Donovan. You’ve had the lead in Oklahoma, Carousel, Paint Your Wagon, Showboat, The Boyfriend, Superman, Anything Goes, Guys and Dolls, Lil’ Abner and one more…. What was it?”

“Annie, Get Your Gun.” Maggie couldn’t believe it. “How do you know all that?”

He closed his eyes, placing his fingertips on his forehead. “Matthieu senses all,” he said with a heavy Eastern European accent. “I also know that Angie’s married now,” he added in his regular voice.

There was something in his face, in his tone, that Maggie couldn’t read.

“Yeah,” she said. “Freddy’s great. You’d like him. But it’s kind of a drag—they live in London.”

“That must be tough,” he sympathized. “You and Angie stayed close, didn’t you?”

Maggie nodded. “I miss her.”

“Did she ever tell you…”

“What?”

He shook his head. “Why we broke up. I don’t know. It all seems so silly now.”

He was looking at her, and she felt herself blush under his scrutiny.

“Why did you break up?” she asked.

“Maybe I’ll tell you some other time,” he said. His eyes were warm. Hot, almost…

Where are we going?

Does it matter?

No.

Maggie cleared her throat. “Are you going to audition for the summer musical? I mean, are you going to be in town for a while?”

“Yeah, I’ll be here at least three months,” he said. “I don’t know about the show, though. I saw the audition notice in the paper. It’s tomorrow, right? But the show was one I didn’t recognize.”

“It’s called Day Dreamer. It was written by this local team of writers. It’s not…It’s really funny. And the music’s good, too….” Maggie felt herself babbling in an effort to keep the conversation pointed securely away from the physical attraction that seemed to simmer between them.

But she lapsed into silence as he sat back in his chair, his eyes still glued to her face. As he moved, the muscles in his arms and chest moved, too. It was hypnotizing. With a motion that was clearly well-practiced, he tossed his hair out of his face, back behind his shoulders.

“I guess I’ll audition,” he said. “If you’re going to…”

“Matt, why do you wear your hair like that?” she asked. “I mean, it’s beautiful, but you always had short hair. In school, you used to make fun of the boys who wore their hair long….”

“It’s a complicated story,” he said evasively. He sat forward, pointing at her salad. “Are you going to eat that?”

She wasn’t very hungry. “Do you want it?”

“No, I want to get out of here,” he told her. “I want to take you to see something.”

He stood up, tugging down on the thighs of his jeans in a movement that was all Matthew. How many thousands of times had she seem him do that?

But going vegan and quitting drinking and smoking, and the new super healthy body…

As they left the café and walked down the stairs to the lobby, he caught her puzzled look and said, “What?”

It was remarkable, really. With his dazzling white T-shirt tucked into the top of his blue jeans, his long hair cascading halfway down his broad back, he was an odd mixture of her friend Matt and her fantasy jungle man. He looked sort of like Matt and he moved and talked sort of like Matt, but there was so much more that was different about him now. She could see so many changes in him, the most startling being his confidence, his solid, quiet strength.

Again, she found herself attracted to him, and that felt strange.

“I’m trying to figure out exactly who you are,” she said bluntly, “just who it is you’ve become.”

He looked startled for a moment, and then he laughed. “You know, Mags,” he said, “I really did miss you. You and your honesty.”

He opened the door leading out of the club. With a grand gesture, he motioned for her to go through.

Outside, the night air was cool, and Maggie shivered slightly. Matt casually draped an arm around her shoulders.

His touch was warm, and Maggie felt the urge to lean against him, to rest her head on his shoulder, wrap her own arm around his waist.

But he was just being friendly old Matt. Wasn’t he?

She pulled away. “Your car or mine?”

Matt turned around and gave her such a look that she had to laugh. “I assume that means you still have to be the driver, right?” she said.

He grinned. “I’ve got the old man’s Maserati. He never drove it anywhere. What’s the point in having a car like that if you never use it?”

“Do you remember when you stole it and used it to drive Angie to the junior prom?” That was one of the best times they’d had together and one of the worst.

He unlocked the front passenger side door of the gleaming black sports car and opened it for Maggie. “How could I ever forget? I spent four days in jail for that one. God, my father was such a bastard.”

Matt got into the driver’s seat and closed the door. He looked over at Maggie, real sadness in his eyes. “I was such a disappointment to him. Right up to the end.”

She didn’t know what to say, and then there was no reason to say anything because he put the key into the ignition and started the engine with a roar. “Oh, yeah,” he said, flashing her a smile. “This is a very nice car.”

Maggie wanted to ask about his father, but she held her tongue. Mr. Stone had died over a year ago, and even though he and Matt had never gotten along, she’d been surprised when Matt didn’t show up for the funeral.

She shook free of the thought, fastened her seat belt, and got ready to hang on for dear life as he pulled out of the parking lot. But he drove almost slowly.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

Does it matter?

She loosened her fingers from her grip on the handstrap as she realized he was going to stay under the speed limit.

“Out to my father’s office,” Matt told her. “My office,” he corrected himself with a laugh. He shot her a look. “Can you believe I have an office?”

Maggie was confused. “You mean, over at the factory?”

“No,” he said. “The main office was in our house.”

Matt glanced at her.

Maggie’s face was lit in regular intervals by the street lights. The pale yellow glow made her seem unearthly.

She was prettier than ever. She still had the biggest, bluest eyes he’d ever seen. They were surrounded by thick, dark lashes. Her complexion was fair—a fascinating contrast to the dark brown of her soft, wavy hair. Her nose was small and almost impossibly perfect, her lips soft and full, and always quick to curve into a smile.

For the first time since he’d hit town, he was honestly glad to be back.

Very glad.

“I want to offer you a job,” he told her as they neared the house. “I’d like to hire you as my corporate attorney and business advisor—for three hundred thousand dollars a year.”

She stared at him.

She didn’t say a word as he pulled into the driveway of his father’s huge white Victorian house. All the outside lights were on, spotlighting it against the darkness of the night.

He’d grown up in this house, playing on the vast lawns that overlooked the Long Island Sound, scrambling on the rocks at the edge of the shore. It was a wonderful old place, full of nooks and crannies. It had rooms that weren’t perfectly square, windows that opened oddly, and closets that turned out to be secret staircases.

“What’s the catch?” Maggie finally found her voice.

After Matt’s mother died, his father had had the house renovated and restored. And although he knew his father hadn’t intended for it to happen, the renovations removed every last trace of her, every homey, motherly touch, leaving the house as impersonal and empty as a museum.

Matt pulled around to the back, where the office was, and parked the Maserati under another bright spotlight.

“The catch,” he said, turning toward her in the sudden silence after the car’s powerful engine had been shut off. “Yeah, there’s definitely a catch. You know my father had money. Big money.”

Maggie nodded. The Yankee Potato Chip Company, the mansion, the twelve-car garage with the twelve cars to go in it.

“Dear old dad decided to leave it all to me—all twenty-five million, if—” Matt took a deep breath “—I can show that I can run the business within a three-month time period—which started last week. If I can’t—adios to everything. The executor of the estate will shut down the business, auction off the factory, and all the money will go to charity. If that happens, I’ll get nothing. And if I get nothing, your job—and everyone else who works for YPCC—will be terminated.” He looked at her. “How’s that for a catch?”

Maggie nodded again, her eyes serious. “That’s some catch. What exactly does the will stipulate?”

Matt opened the car door. “I’ve got a copy inside. I’ll let you take a look at it.”

She got out of the car, too, staring up at the house. “You know, Matt, all those years we were friends, I never went inside your house.”

“That’s because my father hated Angie,” Matt told her. Angie had taken Mr. Stone’s crap and handed it straight back to him. “He would’ve really liked you, though.”

“Is that a compliment or an insult?” she asked with a laugh.

“Oh, it’s a compliment,” he told her. And wasn’t that strange? He and the old man would’ve finally agreed on something.

Maggie followed him up the path to the office door and into the house.

The outer office was large and spacious, with rows of file cabinets along one wall. There was a huge oak conference table in front of enormous bay windows that looked out over the water. The hardwood floors glistened, as did the intricate wood molding that surrounded the windows and door. It was a modern office with computers, copy machine and fax, but the feel of the room was Victorian. It was gorgeous. And in the daytime, with the view of the sun sparkling on the water, it would be even more beautiful.

Matt led the way to a dark wooden door and, pushing it open, he turned on the light.

Maggie had to laugh, looking around at the late Mr. Stone’s private office—Matt’s office now. “Oh, Matt,” she said. “It’s you.”

He grinned.

Thick red carpeting was underfoot. The walls were paneled with the same dark wood as the built-in bookcases. Row upon row of books lined the wall, and Maggie glanced at the varying titles and subjects. Mr. Stone had a few books on astronomy, several on geology, an entire shelf of medical books on cancer, many titles on the Second World War, but the vast majority of the books in the room were fiction—mysteries.

Matt’s father had been into whodunits. He had always seemed so practical and down-to-earth, with no time for nonsense of any kind. She just couldn’t picture him biting his fingernails in suspense as he read faster and faster to find out who was the killer.

The inner office had big windows but they were shuttered with elaborately carved wood. The centerpiece of the room was a massive cherry desk and what looked like a black leather Barcalounger behind it.

Maggie slowly circled the desk. It was quite possibly as large as a queen-sized bed, its rich dark wood buffed to a lustrous shine. She picked up the single item that rested on its clean surface—a photo of Matt at about age six, clinging possessively to his smiling young mother’s neck.

“Why didn’t you come to his funeral?” she wondered.

He turned away.

“I’m sorry,” she said swiftly, putting the picture down. “I shouldn’t have asked—”

“I saw him about two weeks before he died. I was in the hospital—it was back when I was sick. Somehow he’d managed to track me down and he came to see me.”

He was leaning against the door frame now, arms crossed. His pose was relaxed, but Maggie could see tension in his jaw. And she could hear it in his voice.

He laughed, but it didn’t have anything to do with humor. “I don’t know how he did it, but he managed to pick a fight. I mean, I’m lying there, dying for all he knows, and he’s telling me I never did anything worthwhile with my life.”

Maggie didn’t hesitate. She crossed toward him and put her arms around him. “I’m so sorry.”

“I told him to go to hell.” Matt rested his cheek on the top of her head. “I told him to stay out of my life, because no matter how short it was going to be, it was my life. So he got up to leave, and I thought he was just going to walk out, but he turned and he told me that he loved me, and that he didn’t want me to die. I told him—”

His voice broke, and Maggie held him even more tightly. She felt him take a deep breath, then exhale loud and hard. “I told him that I hated him,” Matt said, “and that I couldn’t wait for him to die.” He made another noise that wasn’t quite laughter. “God. Why did I say that? Of course, two weeks later the son of a bitch went and had a massive coronary. It was his ultimate revenge—he couldn’t have planned it better if he’d tried.”

She looked up at him. “Matt, he loved you. He knew you didn’t mean what you said.”

He sighed. “I hope so.”

In this light, from this angle, flecks of color made his eyes look more green than gold. Green, and very warm. As he looked down at her, his face held something—a sadness, a sweetness, and also a tenderness—that she hadn’t ever seen there in all the years she’d known him. At least not when he wasn’t acting.

It was entirely possible that back then, he simply hadn’t let it show.

His arms were still around her, and she was still holding him. They’d stood like this, leaning against each other, so many times—Matt had always been very casual with affectionate embraces. But everything felt different now, and as she looked into his eyes, she knew he felt it, too.

Attraction. Desire.

It seemed inappropriate. It had been years, but it was still hard not to think of Matt as Angie’s boyfriend.

Except Angie was married now to someone else. And this new, fantasy jungle man version of Matt was here, looking at Maggie as if he were thinking about kissing her. Not just a Matt kiss—he’d always been generous with friendly kisses on the cheek, too—but a real, on the mouth, tongues in action kind of kiss.

Like the way Tony had kissed Maria. Maggie’s stomach did a flip as she remembered kissing Matt on stage. Except that hadn’t been them—it was the characters they were playing who had kissed so passionately.

Still…

She pulled away from him and went to stare once again at the books on the shelf. This was just too weird.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “I shouldn’t have laid all that on you.”

Maggie shook her head. “Oh, no, I’m glad you told me,” she said as she turned to face him. “That’s what friends are for, right?”

Their eyes met. And Maggie felt it again, that spark of sexual energy that seemed to flow between them. Friends.

“You were going to give me a copy of that will,” she reminded him breathlessly, reminded herself, as well.

He took a step toward her, and another, and she knew he was going to kiss her.

But the kiss he gave her was only a Matt kiss, on the cheek. He stepped past her, going into the outer office. She followed, feeling oddly disappointed—was she insane?—as she watched him switch on the copy machine.

“You can take this home and look it over,” he told her as he opened one of the file cabinets and took out a manila folder. “Let me know what you think by Monday. I know it’s short notice, but I need you to decide by then because if you aren’t interested in the job, I’ll have to start looking for someone else to help me right away.”

Maggie watched as he copied the document.

A three-hundred-thousand-dollars-per-year job, guaranteed to blow up in three months if she didn’t help Matt become a businessman.

Was it exciting? Absolutely. Was it crazy? More than absolutely. What would her mother, her father, God, even Brock think?

They’d think she was irresponsible, silly, reckless, wild.

But what did she think? How about answering that question for once?

Sure, there was a chance this decision would backfire, leaving her without a job and laughed at by her friends and family. But there was a chance that something special was going on here—that she finally had an opportunity to take control of her life, to get out of her cell and make a difference in some way, even if only in her life and Matt’s and the people who supported their families from the Yankee Potato Chip Company.

To do something she wanted to do, something she would be proud of…

But the risk…

There were butterflies in her stomach—just like when she was little and in line for the Ferris wheel at the firemen’s carnival. As the line got shorter and the moment of truth approached, she would nearly sweat with anxiety. Would she do it or would she chicken out?

She would look up at the seemingly shaky structure that would take her on a ride fraught with danger, up to terrifying heights. Then she’d remember the exhilaration of the wind in her hair as she looked way, way down at the little people below and out at the horizon that seemed to stretch on forever.

It had been worth it. It always had been worth it.

She looked at Matt as he shut off the copy machine, as he stapled together the copies he’d made, as he put the original back in the folder, back in the file cabinet.

Where are we going?

Does it matter?

No.

“I’ll take the job,” she told him.

He turned and stared at her. “But you haven’t even read the—”

“I don’t care,” she said. “You offered, I’m taking it.”

Matt laughed. “Since when do you make a decision without forty-eight hours of soul searching?”

“Since right now,” she said.

“Are you sure?” He looked worried.

She felt a twinge of uncertainty. “Are you sure you want me?”

“Absolutely!”

“Then I’m sure.”

Matt just looked at her. With that same, disconcerting heat in his eyes. She had to turn away, look out the window at the night.

“I’ve been thinking for some time now about making some changes,” she confessed. “It occurred to me that if I took your offer I wouldn’t have to go back to that horrible office without a window.”

“You don’t have a window?”

She glanced at him. “You’ve got to earn a window at Andersen and Brenden.”

“God.”

“I wouldn’t have to make that awful commute, I wouldn’t have to wear uncomfortable shoes—would I?”

“No way.” He was grinning at her. “If you work for me, you don’t have to wear shoes at all. Of course in three months you won’t be able to afford to buy shoes….”

“Not if I can help it,” she said. “This is a beautiful office. It’s ten minutes from home, inches from the ocean….” She made a face. “Although, telling my dad that I’m leaving A&B isn’t going to be fun….”

His smile had faded. “Maggie,” he said, seriously. “I don’t want to pressure you.” He paused. “Don’t get me wrong. I want you to say yes. I really want you to say yes. But this isn’t going to be easy. Your job will be to help me figure out how to run this business. At this point, I can barely remember how to add or subtract. It’ll mean really long hours. I’ve only got three months, and right now, quite frankly, I couldn’t run a business if my life depended on it. So if you aren’t absolutely sure or if you’re doing this just to help me out of a tough spot or if you’re going to regret this tomorrow…” He looked searchingly into her eyes. “I want you to be really sure.”

She looked back at this man who was half Matt, half her fantasy man and didn’t hesitate. “I’m sure.”

A flood of emotions crossed his face. “Well, all right,” he said and handed her the copy of the will. “Let’s have dinner tomorrow after the auditions. We can start work then.”

Maggie glanced through the will—it was fourteen pages long. “We should forget about the auditions. If we only have three months—”

“No,” Matt said. “I’m not giving up a chance to be in another show with you. And rehearsals are only, what? A couple evenings a week?”

“Except for the last week before it opens,” she chided him. “Then it’s every week. We really can’t—”

“Yes, we can,” he said. “The show won’t open until the end of my fiscal quarter. If we haven’t succeeded by then…” He shrugged. “It’ll be too late.”

“I just don’t think we should take on too much at once,” Maggie told him.

The smile he gave her was beautiful. “You worry too much.”

“You don’t worry enough,” she countered.

“This is going to work out just perfectly.”

Four

The air in the community theater auditorium was cool compared to the outside warmth of the sunny spring morning. It smelled like sawdust and paint, musty curtains, a little bit of sweat, and a whole lot of excitement.

It smelled like a show.

Maggie smiled and waved to friends from past productions as she put her gym bag down on one of the seats in the first row.

There was an audition sign-up sheet posted on the apron of the stage, and she signed in.

“Sign me in, too.”

She looked up to see Matt leaning over her shoulder to look at the list. His hands were on the stage, on either side of her, effectively pinning her in.

His teeth flashed white and perfect as he grinned at her. He was standing so close, Maggie caught a whiff of the spearmint toothpaste he’d used, probably right before leaving his house. He was wearing all black—a snugly-fitting T-shirt, sweats, and a pair of jazz shoes that had clearly seen a lot of use. Howard Osford, the slightly balding, slightly overweight tenor who usually won the romantic leads out of lack of competition didn’t stand a chance today.

“What are you singing?” she asked as he watched her add his name to the list.

Matt shrugged, straightening up and freeing her. He followed her back to her gym bag, throwing himself casually into the seat next to it. “Want to do a duet?” He stretched his long legs out in front of him, and looked up at her, a glint in his eyes.

Maggie stopped taking off her street shoes to glare at him. “That always really pissed me off.”

“What?” He grinned, knowing darn well what she was talking about.

“The way you could come into an audition totally unprepared and walk away with the lead.”

Matt tried not to be obvious about watching her as she pulled off her T-shirt and adjusted her sports bra. She was wearing tight black pants that flared and a colorful dance top that left her midriff bare.

“You should get a belly button ring,” he said.

She rolled her eyes. “Ouch. No thanks.”

“You know, it’s been more than three years since I’ve gone on an audition,” he said. The room was filled with dozens of hopeful singers and dancers. It didn’t matter the town or the state—the hope that hung in the air at an audition was always the same.

“Are you scared?” she asked.

Matt tried to look frightened. “I won’t be if you sing a duet with me.”

She just laughed. “Not a chance. I, for one, worked hard to prepare a song.”

“Then let me use you as a prop.”

Maggie crossed her arms. “Come again?”

Ooh, he loved it when she put on a little attitude. Sweet Maggie had a backbone beneath that soft outer layer. “A prop,” he repeated, working hard not to smile. “You know, a warm body to sing to. I always do much better when I’m not up on stage all alone.”

She laughed in his face. “Tough luck. That’s what an audition is all about—being on stage all by your little old self. You can sing to me all you want, but I’m going to be right down here.” She shook her head in disgust. “Prop.”

“Okay,” Matt said.

“That’s it? No fussing? No begging? No whining? Just, okay?”

He tipped his head back and smiled up at her. “It’s only an audition.”

“I hate you,” she said, and walked away.

Ten minutes later, the first trembling victim stepped onto the stage, and Matt joined Maggie at the back of the room.

“I’m up twentieth,” she whispered. “You’re twenty-first. Have you decided what to sing?”

He nodded yes. “I’m doing something from my favorite show.”

“What is your favorite show?”

“West Side Story. It was the most fun I’ve had on stage in my entire life.”

Maggie looked at him, perplexed. “You mean, back in high school?”

“Yup.”

He looked up at the stage, watching as the director cut the singer off midsong. Maggie studied his profile, remembering the turmoil of his senior year.

Another singer mounted the stage and made it through about sixteen bars before being stopped and thanked for coming.

“Sheesh.” Matt glanced at her. “This director is brutal. They’re dropping like flies. He doesn’t give anyone time to warm up. At this rate, you’re going to be up there in less than a minute.”

“He is pretty harsh,” Maggie agreed, then asked, “How could West Side Story be your favorite show? You were miserable the entire time. You had that big fight with Angie….”

“As Matthew I was miserable,” he told her. “But I sure loved being Tony.”

He had a funny little half smile on his face, and a look in his eyes that made her heart beat faster.

He looked back at the stage, and Maggie watched him watch the auditions.

“Maria was a great part,” she told him softly. “But it was very hard each night to watch you die.”

He glanced at her, and the look on his face was one she absolutely couldn’t read.

“Maggie Stanton,” a stout woman with cat-eyed glasses and a clipboard finally called. “You’re next.”

Yikes.

Matt caught her arm as she started for the stage, pulling her into his arms for a hug. “Break a leg, Mags.”

She looked up at him, and the realization hit her hard, leaving her feeling weak. She wanted him to kiss her.

He was handsome and vibrant and so very alive and she wanted him to kiss her.

He wasn’t Angie’s boyfriend anymore and she wanted him to kiss her.

And he did.

On the cheek.

She swallowed her disappointment as she walked down the theater aisle toward the stage. Those sparks she’d thought were flying all over the place must’ve been only in her mind.

Or else he would have really kissed her, wouldn’t he?

He saw her as a friend, a buddy to hang with.

Which was a good thing. Matt had never been cut out for anything but short-term, intensely passionate flings. True, they wouldn’t leave his bedroom for a week, but after that week, it would probably be over. Any kind of romance with him would definitely be a mistake—particularly since she was going to be working with him.

She was going to work with him.

She’d called her boss at A&B this morning, and he’d accepted her resignation gracefully. In fact, he’d told her he didn’t even need the usual two weeks notice. Times were tough all over, Maggie knew, and business had been off lately, even at the big law firms.

She just had to go in some time next week, clean out her desk and drop off the company cell phone.

She handed her music to the accompanist with a smile, moved center stage and nodded to the director. He was someone she’d never worked with before, someone who didn’t know her from Eve. She could see him glancing through her resume, and she turned back to the piano player and nodded.

As the first strains of music surrounded her, Maggie closed her eyes and took a deep breath, letting herself become the character—a thirtysomething dancer pleading for a second chance on the stage.

As Maggie started to sing, Matt looked up from his search through the piles of sheet music that had been tossed on a table in the back of the auditorium. God, she was good. He’d forgotten how good. He’d never understood why she hadn’t studied acting, gone professional.

He had to laugh. Yeah, he’d met her parents many times. He did understand. And it was a shame.

She sang the first part of the song standing absolutely still, but with tension in every part of her body. When she reached the refrain, she exploded, both in volume and movement. She was fantastic, her voice clear and true, her body graceful.

Matt moved closer to the stage and sat on the arm of a chair. He could see the back of the director’s head, and the man hadn’t moved once since Maggie started singing. He grinned as the director let her sing the entire song, right down to the very last note.

The entire room burst into applause, and Maggie—typical—actually looked surprised. She blushed—also typical—and bowed.

“Very nice,” the director called, his usually bored voice actually showing interest. “Don’t go anywhere. I want you to read for me.”

She collected her music from the piano player and went down the stairs as Matt went up. He gave her a high-five.

“Your turn to break a leg,” she said.

“You’re a hard act to follow.”

Maggie sat down in the front row, feeling the last surges of adrenaline leaving her system. Matt came center and looked down at her and smiled, and somehow the adrenaline was back, making her heart flip-flop.

The music started and Maggie recognized the song instantly. “Something’s Coming.” Of course. Matt had always loved that song. It was all about hope and excitement and limitless possibilities. She had to smile. It was practically his theme song.

“Hold it,” the director called, and the accompanist stopped. “Matthew Stone?”

“That’s me,” Matt said.

“From Los Angeles?”

“Yeah, I lived there for a while.” Matt squinted slightly, looking past the bright lights at the director. “Dan Fowler? Is that you?”

“Yes. Thank you. Next,” the director said in a bored voice.

Matt’s eyes flashed. “What, you’re not even going to hear me sing?”

“I don’t want you on my stage,” Fowler said.

The room was dead silent. No one so much as moved.

Maggie stared up at Matt, holding her breath, waiting for him to explode. But he merely crossed his arms.

“Mind telling me why not?” he asked, his voice almost too calm.

“Because the last time I cast you in a show, you disappeared off the face of the earth halfway through rehearsals. That screwed me up pretty badly.”

“I called,” Matt countered. “I apologized. But I had to go into the hospital.”

“A detox center, wasn’t it?” Fowler countered.

“Detox?” Matt laughed. “Yeah, I guess it kind of was.” He looked out at the director. “That was three years ago, Dan.”

Detox. God. Maggie had always known that in the past Matt had lived recklessly, always pushing the edge. It wasn’t hard to believe that somewhere down the line he’d become addicted to either alcohol or drugs.

“It’s still fresh in my memory, Stone.”

“I’m not leaving this stage until you let me audition.” Matt said the words easily, evenly, but in such a way that left no doubt in anyone’s mind that he would not give in.

Fowler scowled. “You can audition until your face is blue. I’m not going to cast you. You’re wasting everyone’s time.”

Maggie stood up, grabbing her gym bag. “Matt, let’s go. There’ll be other shows—”

“Hold it,” Fowler said. “Maggie Stanton?”

There were a few moments of whispering as Fowler leaned over and spoke with his producers and assistants.

“Come here for a sec,” he finally called.

Maggie looked uncertainly at Matt, who nodded to her, telling her to go ahead. He then sat as if unconcerned, on the apron of the stage.

She left her bag on the seat and made her way to the director. She was outraged at the way he was handling this situation. To publicly humiliate someone like this was unprofessional. It was rude, inexcusable….

Dan Fowler was about thirty-five years old, but he had streaks of gray in his full, thick beard that made him seem at least fifteen years older. His eyebrows were large and bushy, making him look as if he had a permanent scowl. He didn’t speak until Maggie stood directly in front of him.

“You with him?” he asked quietly, motioning up to the stage and Matt.

“Yes,” she said tightly. “I don’t know what happened three years ago, but right now he’s clean.”

Fowler tapped his fingers on the table in front of him, looking from Maggie to Matt and back again. “Will he agree to urine testing?”

“For drugs?” Maggie asked in amazement.

Fowler nodded.

“You can ask him,” she said, “but I doubt he’ll go for that.”

“Hey, Stone,” the director called. “I’m willing to audition you if you consent to drug testing.”

“I meant, ask him privately,” Maggie hissed, throwing up her hands in despair. She risked a look at the stage, fearful of Matt’s reaction.

But he pushed himself to his feet and looked out at them serenely.

Only Matt knew how difficult it was to appear that calm. Inside, his blood boiled. He may have played hard and fast at one time with drugs and alcohol, but that had nothing to do with his admission into the hospital. But he wasn’t about to go into those details here. Not in front of a crowd, and especially not in front of Maggie.

He looked out at her. He could tell from the tightness of her shoulders that she was mad as hell. But he knew that she really wanted this part—she deserved this part—and he didn’t want her to lose it on account of him. And if he walked out of there, she’d go with him. He knew that. On top of that was the fact that he desperately wanted to play opposite her again….

“Okay,” he said, keeping his voice light.

“Good,” Fowler said. “Sing your damn song and get your ass off my stage.”

Matt snapped out a count and the accompanist played the introduction. He started to sing, his eyes following Maggie as she moved down the aisle, back to her seat. He could see the shine of unshed tears in her eyes, and he knew she’d realized that he’d let Dan Fowler push him around because of her. And she would, no doubt, chalk it all up to friendship. He was just her good old pal Matt, doing something nice for his buddy Maggie.

And yet there was attraction simmering between them. Although if it scared her even a third as much as it terrified him, was it any wonder she kept trying to ignore it, to push it aside?

But, God, imagine if she could let herself love him….

She looked up at him, and he channeled everything he was feeling into the music. Like most actors, he could be super critical of his own performance, but this time…well, even he would have cast himself.

He stopped the song halfway through, looking out at the director. “That’s enough, don’t you think, Dan?”

“Thank you,” came the standard reply. Then, “Stick around to read.”

Victory. He was going to get a chance to read lines. Whoopee.

Matt swung himself gracefully off the stage to find Maggie waiting for him. She silently took his hand and pulled him down the aisle to the back of the auditorium, ignoring all the curious eyes that were on them. She led him out the closed double doors into the lobby and started for the door to the street.

“Whoa,” he said. “Where are we going?”

“We’re leaving.”

He planted himself. “No way.”

“Yes way. That man is a creep.” She was seriously angry.

“He’s a good director, though. Wait and see.”

Now she was angry with him. “You’re only doing this for me, aren’t you?”

Yes. And he’d do far more for her, too, if she’d only let him. “Nope,” Matt told her. “I’m doing it for myself.”

Maggie didn’t buy it. “Matthew, you’ve had enough crap dumped on you from your father—with the will and everything. You don’t need to deal with this, too.”

“Hey!” He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her gently. “It’s okay. Really. It’s just my lurid past catching up with me. It happens. I don’t mind drug testing—”

“Liar.”

Matt laughed at the look of intense indignation on her face. God, she was wonderful.

“Well, okay,” he admitted. “It sucks. But life’s not always fair, and it’s no big deal.” She started to react, and he put one finger on her lips. “Really. If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the past few years, it’s to know the difference between big problems and little problems. And Dan Fowler is definitely a little problem.”

The woman with the clipboard and the cat glasses poked her head out of the door. “Stone and Stanton?” she said. “He’s looking for you. On stage, to read.”

“I want to do this,” Matt said, looking into Maggie’s eyes. “Let’s do this, okay?”

Maggie nodded, letting him drag her back into the auditorium. He took the bag from her shoulder, put it onto a seat and pushed her up the stairs to the stage.

“Take a few minutes to read it over,” Fowler called out from his throne behind the bright lights, a benevolent monarch lazily granting the peasants some crumbs from his table.

Maggie quickly skimmed the scene. And oh, God. She could feel herself start to blush. Of course. It had to be this scene. She glanced up to meet Matt’s eyes. He raised an eyebrow at her, then looked back at his script.

Oh, God.

“Whenever you’re ready, boys and girls,” Fowler’s indolent voice commanded.

“I read the entire play last week,” Maggie quickly told Matt. “This scene is part of a fantasy that my character is having. She’s just imagining that you’re there in her bedroom, okay?”

“Got it,” Matt said. He looked out toward the director. “We’re ready, Dan.”

“Quiet,” Fowler roared, and suddenly the room was still.

Sieg heil. Maggie couldn’t believe they were still here, auditioning for this tyrant. But then Matt read his first line, and she thought of nothing but the script.

“Lucy, are you still awake?” he read.

“Go away,” Maggie read, with weariness and annoyance in her voice.

“Hey,” Matt read, throwing up his free hand. “I don’t really want to be here. I’m just part of your overactive imagination. You want me to leave, you have to imagine me gone.”

“All right. I will.” As the script directed, she squeezed her eyes shut, concentrating for a moment. When she opened her eyes, he was still standing there, of course. “Oh, damn,” Maggie read.

“Cody Brown, at your service,” Matt read.

“What kind of name is Cody, anyway? It’s a ridiculous name for a man born in Manhattan. You sound like a cowboy or a rodeo rider. What were your parents thinking?”

“Aha,” Matt read. “So that’s why I’m here. You want to insult both me and my parents. Well, go for it, Luce.”

“I’m much too tired to be properly insulting,” Maggie sulked.

“Why else would you have imagined me here in your bedroom at one o’clock in the morning?”

Maggie looked up at Matt, her alarm not entirely feigned. He smiled, a smile that started very small and grew across his handsome face. “I know why I’m here,” he said as he advanced across the stage toward her.

Maggie stared at him, frozen in place. Was he really going to…? “No…”

“You’re wondering what it would be like to kiss me,” he read, moving closer to her. “Aren’t you?”

“No!”

As Maggie stared up at him, he came closer, until they were less than an inch apart. But he still wasn’t touching her.

Matt had the next line, but he waited a moment before reading it. The look in his eyes was remarkable as he gazed down at her, the perfect mix of nervousness and desire on his face. Oh, he was such a good actor. “You’re wondering what it would be like if I put my arms around you, like this,” he read, then tossed the script onto the floor as he did just that.

“And you’re wondering what it would be like to put your arms up around my neck.” Matt was going on memory now, but the lines were easy from here on in.

Maggie let her own script slide to the floor as she, as if almost in a trance, put the palms of both hands on Matt’s chest and slowly slid them upwards. She felt him inhale, as if he found her touch exciting. It was a nice addition to what was already fabulous acting.

Her hands met behind Matt’s neck and she could feel his long, soft hair against her bare arms. She was Lucy. And this was make-believe. They were acting. Acting.

“And you’re wondering what it would feel like,” Matt said slowly, “if you brought your lips up, like this—” and he gently pulled her chin up, then tenderly pushed the hair back from her face “—and if I brought my lips down, like this…”

Maggie was expecting a gentle kiss, but the moment his mouth found hers, something exploded. She felt his arms tighten around hers as he kissed her, and she kissed him, as she opened her mouth to him and…

Oh, God. She was lost.

But just as suddenly as that kiss began, it ended. Matt pushed her away from him and took several large steps to the other side of the stage.

“Well, forget it,” Matt said, his voice perfectly hoarse with emotion as he turned to look at her. “Because I’m not going to kiss you.”

They stared at each other, both breathing hard.

“Very nice,” Dan Fowler’s voice cut in. “Stick around for the dance audition.”

Maggie’s hands were shaking as she bent down to pick up her script. Matt took it from her.

“You okay?” he asked, concern in his eyes.

“Sure,” she lied, looking up at the man who seemed intent on turning her world inside out. “I’m…just fine.”

Five

Maggie dragged herself up the stairs to her bedroom. The dance audition had been grueling. A sane person would take a hot shower and curl up in bed with a good book. But somehow she’d let Matt talk her into having dinner with him, as they’d planned the day before.

“Nothing fancy,” he’d insisted, with that little smile that could turn her to jelly.

Did he know? Could he tell that she’d finally succumbed to Matthew Fever? That’s what Angie had scornfully called it back in high school when one after another pretty young girl had fallen prey to Matt’s charms and followed him around adoringly, sighing soulfully.

“Everyone gets it,” Angie had insisted.

“Not me,” Maggie had said.

Now she wondered if it were like other childhood diseases—much more dangerous if contracted when an adult.

She closed the door to her room and undressed quickly, slipping into her bathrobe.

There was a soft knock on her door, and she opened it cautiously, not wanting to get into another discussion with her mother about the pros and cons of an October wedding.

But it was her little brother, Stevie, who stood there, yawning, as if he had just gotten out of bed.

“Morning,” he said, scratching his head, making his short dark hair stand up straight.

“It’s five in the evening. Don’t tell me you slept all day.”

“I cannot tell a lie,” Stevie said, a weak smile on his still-boyish face. “Your evening is my morning.”

“That’s pathetic.” She softened her words with a smile.

“I didn’t get home last night until noon,” he told her. “That is noon, as in this morning.”

“Are you kidding? Are you grounded for the rest of your life?”

“It was prom night.” Her brother grinned. “It was very wholesome. I went to two different after-prom parties, and there was absolutely no alcohol served at either one. I felt like one of My Three Sons. Believe it or not, it was fun. And I’m not hung over. What a bonus.”

“How’d it go with Danielle?”

Stevie rolled his eyes. “Great—if my goal was for her to still not realize that I’m alive.”

“It must run in the family,” Maggie said. “I know what you mean.”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “You can’t accuse the Brockster of not knowing you’re alive. He wants to marry you. What’s doing, Mag-oid? You got a boy toy on the side?”

Maggie smacked him on the rear with her towel. “None of your business, Dr. Love. Outa my way. I need to take a shower.”

“Be nice to me,” Stevie said. “I came here to warn you. I overheard the ’rents talking, and it sounds like Her Royal Highness, Queen Vanessa, is coming over for dinner tonight.”

“Oh, thank God,” Maggie said. “I’ve already got an excuse. I’m having dinner out with a friend.”

“Lucky you, you’ll miss that magic. Give a shout when you’re out of the shower.”

As Maggie was putting the finishing touches on her makeup, the doorbell rang. It was only 6:18. She’d never known Matt to be early, but he was doing an awful lot of things differently these days.

She stood back and looked at herself one last time in the mirror. Jeans and a red tank top, sandals on her feet. Who’d’ve thought she’d ever wear something this casual to a dinner meeting with her new boss?

A boss she happened to have the screaming hots for. And that was something she couldn’t let happen. Talk about ways to destroy a friendship. And what would Angie say?

The doorbell rang again, and she clattered down the stairs, throwing the door open.

“Hi.” She smiled, expecting Matt.

Brock looked back at her, his arms filled with suitcases. Vanessa stood behind him, also laden with luggage.

Uh-oh.

Maggie’s sister never traveled light, but seven suitcases for a two hour dinner…?

“My arms are breaking here,” Vanessa said, and Maggie stepped back, holding the door open for them.

Brock piled the suitcases near the stairs, smiling at Maggie. “Hey, kiddo.” His deep voice boomed in the small foyer. “Bet you didn’t expect to see me tonight.”

“No,” Maggie said faintly. “I didn’t.”

Stevie came down the stairs, his hair still wet from his shower. He stared from Van to Brock to the large pile of suitcases to Maggie. Uh-oh. He was thinking the same thing she was.

Maggie’s dad came out of the den and shook hands warmly with Brock. “Glad you could join us,” he said, then turned to Maggie. “Van told us Brock was giving her a ride over tonight, so we invited him to stay for dinner.”

“Oh.” Maggie looked back at Stevie.

He shrugged. “I didn’t overhear that part,” he mouthed to her. “Yo, Van,” he said out loud. “You planning to change your clothes between every bite of your roast beef?”

“I’m staying for a while.” Van’s voice sounded brittle.

“Oh, wow.” Stevie looked at Maggie again. They both loved their sister, but it was much easier to love her when she lived under a different roof. “What, is Mitch away on business or something?”

“Or something.”

Uh-oh.

The phone rang.

“I’ll get it!” Maggie and Stevie said in unison.

But their mother picked it up in the kitchen. “It’s for you, hon,” she called to their father.

“I’ll take it in the den.” He disappeared down the hall.

“Help me get this stuff upstairs,” Vanessa commanded.

“Yes, sir!” Stevie fired off a salute as Vanessa and Brock led the way. “She’s staying for a while,” he muttered out of the side of his mouth to Maggie.

“Matt’s going to be here any minute,” Maggie muttered back.

“Matt?” Stevie was delighted. “The friend you’re having dinner with is a Matt. Oh, boy.”

“Dinner’s almost ready,” their mother called from the kitchen.

“I’m going out. I’ve got a business dinner,” Maggie called back, loudly enough for Brock to hear. Except he was leaning close to Vanessa, listening intently to whatever she was saying.

“I can’t hear you with the water running!” her mother called back.

“What are you going to do?” Stevie whispered to Maggie. “I know—you could invite him to stay for dinner, too.”

“Bite your tongue!”

Stevie was laughing. “It’s the only solution. You know, this evening is turning out to be much more interesting than I thought.”

Maggie rammed Vanessa’s suitcase into the back of his leg.

“Ouch!” he yelped.

“Margaret!” their father shouted from the bottom of the stairs. “I want to talk to you. Now.”

Maggie froze, looking at Stevie. Uh-oh.

“God, what’dya do?” he asked, sotto voce.

“I’m almost thirty years old,” she whispered back. “Why do I feel as if I’m thirteen and I’ve left the basketball out in the driveway?”

The doorbell rang.

Uh-oh. “I’ll get it,” Maggie called, desperately trying to sound normal as she hurried down the stairs.

“I’ll help!” Stevie dropped Van’s suitcase and scrambled after her.

They both nearly crashed headlong into their father, who seemed to materialize out of thin air. He had on his fighting face.

“Maggie, that was just Bob Andersen on the phone,” he said. “He just happened to mention that you quit your job this morning!”

“Yo, Mags! Finally makin’ that rockin’ career move?” Stevie said approvingly.

“You did what?” Vanessa came down the stairs, followed closely by Brock.

The doorbell rang again.

“She quit her job at Andersen and Brenden.” Her father shook his head in disbelief.

“Will someone please answer the door?” Maggie’s mom came out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on a dishtowel.

“I’ll get it,” Maggie said again, hurrying to reach the door before her mother got there. She took a deep breath and pulled it open.

Matt was standing there, wearing his usual jeans and white T-shirt, his hair loose, looking like a dream date from a music video. “Hey,” he said with that smile that lit his entire face.

She reached for his hand and pulled him into the foyer. His smile turned to surprise as he saw her entire family staring at him.

“Everyone,” Maggie said in her best stage voice. “I’d like you to meet my new boss, Matthew Stone.”

“Oh, my God,” Vanessa said.

“Your new what?” Brock asked as he sized Matt up.

“Intense.” Stevie was impressed.

“Close the door, dear,” Maggie’s mother said, her voice faint with shock, “or bugs will come inside.”

Maggie sat at the dinner table, buzzing with nervous energy. How did this happen? She’d thought she’d been in control. She’d intended to stick to her plans and go out with Matt. After all, it was business, right? Instead, they’d ended up here, in one great big, hostile room.

She looked across the table and met Matt’s tranquil gaze.

Well, the entire room wasn’t hostile.

“You have how long to do what?” her father was saying as her mother passed Matt a plate heaped with mashed potatoes, vegetables…and a large slice of roast beef.

And he was a vegetarian. She opened her mouth to protest, but Matt caught her eye and shook his head very slightly, taking the plate with a graciously murmured thanks.

“We have a fiscal quarter,” he told her father. He seemed entirely at ease with the fact that everyone was staring at him. “And I’m not really sure what I have to do in order to inherit the business.” He smiled at Maggie. “That’s one of the things we’re meeting to discuss later this evening.”

“Let me get this straight,” Vanessa said. “You’ve actually hired Maggie to do…what?”

“She’s going to be both my lawyer and my business partner,” he said.

Maggie glanced down the table at Stevie, who was looking at Matt in something akin to shock. Her brother looked at her, realization in his eyes and a rapidly growing grin on his lips.

Oh damn. Stevie had figured out that Matt was the man who had come up in their earlier conversation. What was that phrase Stevie had used? Boy toy.

She looked down the table at her brother, promising him with her eyes that the wrath of Satan and the winds of hell would be nothing compared to her if he let this one slip. He smiled at her and made a zipping motion across his mouth.

Yeah, you better keep it zipped, junior….

“Maggie, aren’t you hungry? You haven’t touched your plate,” her mother said.

She stared down at her dinner, her appetite gone. Her stomach churned nervously at the sight of roast beef congealing in a puddle of gravy. “Um,” she said.

Brock slipped his arm around her shoulders and he gave her a squeeze. “You know how girls are,” he said. “Always dieting.”

Matt send Maggie a disbelieving, amused look. She knew what he was thinking. Girls. Brock’s feminist awareness quotient was a shade lower than a Neanderthal’s.

And she really wished he wouldn’t touch her.

“I’m curious as to why you didn’t discuss Matt’s job offer with Brock before you took it,” Vanessa asked. “I mean, you are planning to get married, aren’t you?”

And now everyone was looking at Maggie.

But oh, my God, she was not going to turn Brock down in front of her entire family.

“Um,” she said.

Steve had his glass of milk in his hand, and Matt, who was sitting right next to him, elbowed him.

No one else saw it. Just Maggie.

But the milk went everywhere. “Whoops,” Stevie said as Vanessa jumped up to avoid getting drenched.

“Clumsy me,” Stevie said as Maggie’s mom ran for the kitchen towel.

Matt threw his napkin down to start soaking up the spill. He looked up at Maggie and smiled as Stevie kept on making noise. “Wow, how did that happen?”

No one was looking at her anymore. “Thank you,” she said silently to Matt.

He blew her a kiss.

Which Vanessa, unfortunately, saw.

“Didn’t you date Maggie back in high school?” she asked Matt after the worst of the spill was cleaned up and they were all sitting back down.

He shook his head. “No. I went out with Angie. You know, Caratelli, off and on for a couple of years.”

“But you wanted to date Maggie,” Vanessa persisted. She laughed. “Date being the euphemism that it is in high school.” She looked at her brother. “Right, Steven?”

“Has anyone seen the new James Bond movie?” Stevie asked brightly.

“Am I right or am I right?” Van asked Matt.

“Van,” Maggie said. What was her sister doing? As if Brock weren’t already prickly enough just at the sight of Matt. “Don’t.”

“Matthew’s not denying it,” she pointed out. She’d had far too much to drink tonight and Maggie’s heart broke for her. Her mother had pulled her aside to report that Van was home because Mitch had made it official. He was filing for divorce.

Maggie met Matt’s eyes again, across the table, and the look on his face was…

God, was it actually true? Matt had wanted to go out with…

But…

“I was seventeen,” Matt said to Vanessa. “I wanted to date everyone.”

Maggie stood up. Enough already. “We have to get to work.”

“For the record,” her father said. “I’m not happy about this job change.”

“For the record,” Maggie said, “I am.”

Matt leaned against the Maserati, watching Maggie say good-night to Brock, who was going to stay and keep Vanessa company for a little while longer.

He clenched his teeth as he watched the other man kiss Maggie. True, she turned her face away so that first kiss landed on her cheek. But Brock was a persistent bastard, and…Matt had to look away.

He jumped slightly, surprised to see Stevie leaning next to him. He hadn’t heard the kid approach.

“So. You’re a millionaire.”

“Not quite.” Matt glanced at Maggie. She’d pulled away from Brock, but he still held her hand.

“Answer me honestly,” Stevie said. “Are your intentions toward my sister honorable?”

Matt looked at Stevie in surprise. The kid was already as tall as he was, but he was lanky with that big-boned pony look that teenage boys so often had. He wore his dark hair buzzed at the back and sides, with a long lock of curls in the front that flopped down over his eyes. His face was just starting to lose its boyish prettiness as he began to fill out.

“I guess that’s not really my business, is it?” Stevie continued with a shrug. “You know, she’s as much as told me that she’s not going to marry the Blockhead.”

“She did?”

Stevie smiled. “Yeah, well,” he imitated Brock’s deep voice. “You never know with girls. They’re always changing their minds.”

Matt laughed. “God, he’s a jerk.”

“Who’s a jerk?” Maggie said, joining them.

“No one,” Matt and Stevie said in unison.

“Oh, great,” Maggie said, looking at their matching Cheshire cat grins. “That’s all I need. You two as cohorts. As if I didn’t know who you were talking about. Come on, Matt. Let me grab my briefcase from my car, then we can go.”

“Have fun,” Stevie said. With his back carefully to Matt, he dropped her a wink that was loaded with meaning.

Maggie let her own smile drip saccharine. “You have fun, too, Stevie-poo. Maybe if you’re lucky you can get Vanessa and Brock to play Monopoly with you.”

“Sounds real neat, but no,” Stevie said. “I’ve got plans. I’m going to go drive past Danielle’s house, oh, twenty-eight, twenty-nine times.” He glanced at Matt. “Unrequited love.”

Maggie got into Matt’s car as Stevie leaned over to look in the window. “Maybe you can offer me some advice,” he said to Matt, “you know, with the wisdom of your great age and all. There’s this girl, see?”

“Danielle,” Matt clarified, looking up at Stevie.

“Check. She’s the most fabulous, beautiful, wonderful…well, you know. But she doesn’t think of me as a guy. We’re friends, that’s all.”

Maggie leaned forward to look out Matt’s window at her brother. “Just go knock on her front door and tell her that you love her, for crying out loud!”

“Oh, no way,” Matt said.

“God!” Stevie reeled back in shock. “That’s very un-cool.”

“Yeah, and potentially humiliating,” Matt said. “If I were you, I’d take my time. Go slowly. You know, don’t scare her away.”

“Meanwhile the captain of the football team takes the more direct approach and ends up taking her to the prom,” Maggie said.

“Oh, no.” Matt cringed.

“Oh, yes.” Stevie nodded. “Pathetic, but true. And on that cheerful note, I’ll bid you good night.” He vanished into the shadows.

Matt glanced at Maggie. “Your little brother isn’t so little anymore.”

“Scary, huh?”

He started the car, shaking his head. “Sometimes I wish I could be eighteen again. Man, what I’d give to be able to go back and do it over.”

Maggie groaned. “Not me. Once was enough, thanks.”

He pulled out of the driveway. “There are definitely some things I’d do differently.”

“Like what?”

“Like, I wouldn’t start smoking. I wouldn’t drink or do drugs. I would’ve taken better care of myself.” He glanced at her. “I would’ve asked you out.”

Maggie looked back at him, but now his eyes were firmly on the road. Vanessa had been right. Matt had wanted to date her in high school. Date. Right. Wow, she’d never known. “Why didn’t you?” she asked.

He glanced at her with a smile. “Would you have gone out with me if I had?”

“No.” Her loyalty to Angie had been too strong. She never would have risked that friendship. Even for…“Matt, to be honest, I never thought of you as anything but a friend.”

Ten years ago. Now she was aware of him to the point of distraction.

He smiled at her again. “That’s why I never asked you out. I wasn’t a big fan of rejection.”

They rode in silence for a few miles, then Maggie said, “I’m sorry about dinner. Are you sure you still want me to work for you? It’s obvious that insanity runs rampant in my family.”

He just laughed. “And it doesn’t in mine?”

He was pulling into the parking lot of Sparky’s, the town watering hole. “What are you doing? Why are we…? You don’t drink anymore. Do you?” she asked.

“No, I don’t,” he said. “But you do. And after that dinner you definitely need something with a kick.”

“Roast beef,” Maggie shook her head. “I can’t believe my mother served roast beef to a vegetarian. Why didn’t you let me say something?”

He pulled her out of the car. “Because people tend to feel embarrassed and rejected when you don’t take what they offer for dinner. I took the plate and didn’t hurt your mom’s feelings.” Still holding her hand, he led her across the parking lot and into the dimly lit bar. “But I didn’t eat the meat. It’s an old trick I learned in California. Cut it up and move it around the plate and no one notices that you didn’t eat it. Everyone’s happy.”

Maggie hadn’t been inside Sparky’s in close to seven years, but the place hadn’t changed. It was dark and it smelled like a frat house basement.

Matt pulled two stools out from the bar, then stepped back so Maggie could climb up. He sat next to her, pulling his stool so close that his thigh brushed hers. He caught the bartender’s eye. “Coupla drafts.”

The touch of his leg against hers was making her crazy. Matt had never been careful with her personal space, constantly draping an arm around her, often coming up behind her to massage her shoulders or braid her hair.

His casual, friendly touch had always been part of the package. True, Maggie had heard tell that a friendly backrub had at times led to far more friendly activities, but she had never been subject to his amorous advances.

Or had she? Maybe she’d been too naive to realize….

He leaned against the bar and his shoulder grazed hers and she nearly jumped off the stool.

The bartender slid two foaming mugs of beer in front of them, and she gratefully took a long swallow. And risked a look at Matt.

His elbows rested on the bar and his T-shirt was pulled tight across his strong back. He was watching her, his face shadowy in the weak light, his eyes reflecting the yellow of a neon sign. It made him look otherworldly and alien, reminding her that he was in some ways a stranger, after all that time away.

Ten years ago, she never would’ve dreamed of kissing Matthew Stone. Tonight, she was having trouble thinking about anything else.

Maggie remembered her own words, spoken only minutes before to Stevie, realizing how impossible her advice had been. There was simply no way on earth she’d ever be able to turn to Matt and tell him that she was falling in love with him.

But she was.

But she couldn’t. What would Angie say if she knew? What would Matt say?

She stared morosely into her beer, taking another sip and feeling its coolness and accompanying warmth course through her.

Matt drew lines in the frost on the outside of his glass of beer. His glass of beer? What was a guy who’d been in a detox center three years ago doing with a glass of beer?

“You’re not going to drink that, are you?” she asked.

“No.” Matt laughed. “I’m not an alcoholic, despite what you heard from Dan Fowler today. I don’t drink because I choose not to, not because I can’t.”

He met her gaze steadily, and she felt herself blush. “I’m sorry.”

What had happened to him three years ago? She wished he would talk about it, but he didn’t. And she was afraid to push.

He reached over and pushed her empty glass toward the bartender, then slid the full glass in front of her. “I ordered this for you. Let’s go play pool.”

“I thought we were going to talk business.”

“I’d rather play pool. We can talk business tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow’s Sunday,” she said. “I’m having dinner with Brock.”

Matt let his opinion of Brock show on his face. “Why do you waste your time with him?”

“I’m not,” she said. “I mean, I won’t be anymore.”

There was a flare of something in his eyes. Satisfaction. And something else. “Good. Because he’s…” Matt laughed. “Don’t get me started. I can’t believe you’ve been dating him for, what is it? Six months?”

“Five months,” she corrected him. “And we’ve never actually…dated.” At least not according to Van’s definition.

Matt knew what she was saying. “Wow,” he said. “That’s…Wow.” He laughed. “So okay. If his being fabulous in bed wasn’t the reason you were with him…Why the hell did you go out with him more than once?”

Maggie closed her eyes. “Because he wanted to be with me,” she told him. “Because nice men don’t exactly fall out of the sky. Because I hoped he’d grow on me. Because I want a family. I want babies. Did I tell you that Angie is pregnant?”

She looked at him, expecting to see disbelief on Matt’s face. Angie. Pregnant. Instead, he was looking at the floor, real sadness in his eyes.

Was it possible he still loved her?

Maggie touched his arm. “Are you okay? I mean I know it must be a shock. Angie always swore that she’d never have kids, but…”

Now he looked perplexed. “What did you say about Angie? I think I missed something.”

“She and Freddy are going to have a baby,” Maggie repeated.

“No kidding? That’s great.”

Okay, now she was the one who was confused. If it hadn’t been the news about Angie, what had made him look so unhappy?

“Angie’s going to be a really cool mom,” Matt said. “Although I can’t picture her changing a diaper.”

She finished her second beer and, almost magically, another appeared. She narrowed her eyes at Matt. “Are you trying to get me too drunk to talk business? Another beer and we’ll have to play pool. I won’t be coherent.”

“I’m trying to get you relaxed,” he admitted. “You’re wound pretty tight.”

He slid off his seat and, standing behind her, he slipped his hands under her hair and began massaging the muscles in her neck and shoulders.

God, it felt good. Too good. Maggie felt herself get even more tense.

“Man, you have to loosen up. Is this what being a high-powered attorney does to you?”

No, it was what he did to her. She closed her eyes, letting his fingers work their magic, letting herself pretend that they were in an alternate time line—one where Matt was more than just a friend.

Matt could see Maggie’s face in the bar mirror. Under his hands, her shoulders were starting to relax. Her eyes were closed, her lips parted slightly.

Oh, brother. That was just too inviting. He was dying to kiss her the way he’d kissed her that morning at the audition. She’d actually commended him on his fine acting job, unaware that he hadn’t been acting at all.

He was praying that they’d both get the leads so that he’d be able to kiss her that way again and again. And again.

It was an odd blend of torment and delight. Delight that she could kiss him and make his heart pound and his blood rush. Torment that she could seem so unaffected by it herself.

And, oh my God, she’d never slept with Brock.

“We should talk about work. What time do you want to start tomorrow?” Maggie murmured, her eyes still closed.

“What time is your dinner with Brock?” he countered.

“We made plans to meet at six,” she said.

“Then let’s start early,” he leaned close to her ear to say. “Eight o’clock. Let’s have breakfast together, okay?”

It was an innocent enough suggestion, but somehow with his hands on her shoulders, his fingers caressing the bare skin of her neck, it seemed like a different sort of invitation. Maggie’s heart nearly stopped when she felt him lean forward and kiss her just below her ear.

He spun her bar stool so that she faced him.

He was going to kiss her. Wasn’t he? As Maggie looked up into his eyes, she only saw uncertainty. Oh, boy, she was probably looking at him as if she wanted to gobble him up, which would freak him out if he’d only intended that kiss on the neck—as sensual as it had felt—to be friendly.

“As your lawyer,” she said, half to fill in the sudden odd silence, “I recommend that we gain access to any other papers that might be in the court’s files.”

Matt backed off. “Other papers?” He was puzzled.

“Your father’s will states only that you must, and I quote, ‘improve the business,’ within a three-month time period. It’s much too vague. What exactly did your father mean by ‘improve the business’?”

“Make more money,” Matt said. “That was always the bottom line for him.”

Maggie frowned. “I’m going to need to look at the company’s yearly financial statement, as well as the last few years’ quarterly reports. As far as we both know, Yankee Potato Chip is thriving despite the recession. I’d bet that gross profits aren’t going to vary from quarter to quarter.”

And it wouldn’t be easy to improve a healthy business in only three months. Any action made by an increased, aggressive advertising campaign wouldn’t bring about increased sales within three months. Maggie put her chin in her hand and stared into space.

“What are you thinking?” Matt asked.

She looked at him. “I was just wondering what could possibly be in that codicil.”

“What’s a codicil?”

“It’s an addendum to a document. There was a note at the bottom of your father’s will, with your father’s signature, saying that his will has a codicil. It was dated only a few weeks before he died, but it wasn’t included in the other pages you gave me. The court has a copy. We’ll need to see it,” Maggie told him.

“You think it’s going to be any help?” Matt asked.

“I don’t know. There’s probably a copy of it somewhere in your office. We should go back and start looking for it.” She slid off the stool and nearly landed on the floor.

“I’ll look for it later,” Matt told her as he caught her. “I think you’re ready for a game of pool. You want to break or should I?”

Six

Maggie unlocked the kitchen door and went into the house without turning on the light. She was feeling wobbly from all that beer she’d had. She normally didn’t have a single beer, let alone four. Or was it five?

It was after midnight, and her parents had gone to bed. The house was dark, so she locked the door behind her and crept into the living room and…

And there, on the stairs, in the glow from the streetlight, was Vanessa.

Kissing Brock.

She was in her nightgown.

His jacket was off and his shirt was unbuttoned.

And it was pretty damn obvious that he’d been with her, up in her bedroom.

“Wow,” Maggie said. “That was fast.”

Her sister and the man who’d asked her to marry him just a few weeks ago—never mind the fact that she was intending to tell him no tomorrow—leapt apart.

“God,” Vanessa said. “Maggie, you scared me to death.”

Maggie turned on the light. Brock, at least, had the decency to look embarrassed.

Vanessa, from the looks of things, was even more drunk than she was.

Maggie sat down on the couch. “Your car’s not out front,” she said to Brock.

“I, uh, parked it down the street,” he admitted. “Look, Maggie, I’m sorry—”

“I thought you were Mitch’s friend,” she said.

“I am.”

“Some friend.”

Vanessa took offense at her tone. “Mitch is a son of a bitch who should rot in hell,” she said, sitting down on the step between the entryway and the living room.

“Who filed for divorce because you were cheating on him,” Maggie said. She looked at Brock. “Did you know that?”

“Because he was cheating on me!” Vanessa started to cry. “You’re so self-righteous.”

“Hey,” Maggie said. “I think I’m allowed a little self-righteousness when I come home to find out that you slept with my boyfriend.”

“I didn’t think you’d be coming home,” Vanessa countered. “Out with Matthew Stone? No woman in her right mind would make him drive her home. Except you. You’re so perfect, Margaret. So perfect and proper and cold.”

“This probably isn’t a good time to be having this conversation,” Brock said.

“Shut up,” Vanessa said, just as Maggie said, “Zip it, Brockster.”

“Maybe I should go…”

“How could you sleep with her?” Maggie asked him. The answer was right there on his face. All along, he’d wanted Vanessa. Even drunk, with her makeup faded and her hair a mess, Maggie’s sister was hot. All along, Brock had just wanted to get close to Maggie’s hotter sister. She looked up at him in amazement. “Maybe the question I should ask is how could you ask me to marry you, when you’re in love with her?”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought…” He shook his head. “I’m sorry.”

This was why he didn’t push when she’d said she wanted to wait before they spent the night together. She’d thought he was just nice. But oh, my God…“Have you been sleeping with her all this time?”

“No,” Brock said. “Absolutely not.”

“No,” Maggie echoed. “You just wanted to sleep with her.” God, she’d almost spent her life married to a man who really wanted her sister. She stood up and looked at Vanessa. “And you knew it. You bitch.”

“Fine,” Vanessa said. “I’m a bitch. I’d rather be a bitch than little miss no-no-no we’ve only been going out for four months, we can’t possible have sex yet.”

“Oh, my God,” Maggie looked at Brock. “You discussed our sex life with my sister?”

“What sex life?” Vanessa laughed. “You don’t have a sex life.”

“Not like yours,” Maggie said hotly. “No. I don’t have sex with strangers in the parking lot of a bar.”

“Yeah,” Vanessa shot back. “Miss Goody-Goody. You just don’t have sex, period. I can’t imagine why Matthew Stone even bothers to look at you. Sure, he’ll sleep with anything female, but the way you dress it’s hard to tell you’re actually a woman. If you did sleep with him, I’d give it one week. Although I’d bet big money that Matt would be bored to tears after only one hour in bed with you.”

Maggie gasped. “That’s an awful thing to say!”

“Van,” Brock said.

“It’s true.” Van started to cry. “You’re so perfect. I hate you.”

“And I won’t live in this house with you,” Maggie told her sister. “I know you say things like that because you’re the one who’s messed up, and because you can’t deal with Mitch’s leaving you, but I am so out of here. Tell Mom and Dad I’ve moved out. For good,” she added, the words making her feel remarkably light, despite her anger and hurt, despite the growing nausea from her churning stomach.

“Maybe this conversation should wait for the morning,” Brock said again.

“Maybe you should go to hell,” Maggie told him, and, grabbing her briefcase, she went into the kitchen and out the door.

She got into her car, but her head was spinning and her stomach definitely felt sick.

She was going to throw up.

She stared down at her car keys. How many mugs of beer did she drink?

Too many to drive.

Savagely, she opened the car door and got out.

As if on cue, the skies opened and it started to rain.

Maggie squared her shoulders, and still carrying her briefcase, started the long walk into town.

Stevie cranked up the volume of the radio and switched on the windshield wipers as the rain came down harder. He flipped his bright lights lower as he saw someone walking along Route One.

Poor wet son of a bitch. Didn’t need to be blinded, too.

But then Stevie hit the brakes and did a one-eighty, tires squealing. That was no ordinary son of a bitch. That was his sister! He pulled up alongside her and rolled down the window.

She didn’t stop walking.

“Yo, Mags.” He slipped the car into first to keep up with her.

She didn’t look at him.

She was soaked to the skin and dripping wet, hair plastered to her head. And she was carrying her briefcase, like some deranged zombie commuter.

“So where you going?” Steve dared to ask.

“Into town,” she said, as if it were a perfectly normal answer.

“You, uh, want a ride?”

“No, thank you.”

Stevie pulled his car to the side of the road and got out, trotting to catch up to his sister. “Maggie, are you okay?” He stood in front of her.

She stopped. “Stevie, if you don’t move, I’m going to throw up on you.”

He moved, fast, and Maggie kept walking.

“Maggie, come on,” he called, but she didn’t look back.

Maggie was walking to the Sachem’s Inn Motel, one step at a time. She didn’t feel good, but she felt a whole lot better since she’d stopped at the corner of Lily Pond Road to throw up behind the O’Connor’s shrubs.

It was another few miles into town, another mile after that past the harbor to where the motel overlooked the water…. She couldn’t handle the thought of walking three more miles. But she could walk one step. One step and one step and one step. Eventually, they’d all add up to three miles.

She stopped short.

Matthew.

Steam rose from the cooling hood of his car, creating a wall of mist behind him. He was wearing only a very small khaki-colored pair of running shorts. Light from a street lamp glinted off the moisture on his bare skin. It was cold enough so that his breath hung in the air, but he stood still, just watching her.

“Hey jungle man,” Maggie said. “I’ve run away from home.”

“So I’ve heard,” Matt said. “Steve called me. It’s about time you moved out of there. Can I give you a lift?”

Maggie looked at him, at his bare feet and athletic legs. Bare skin started again on the other side of his shorts. His stomach was a six-pack and his chest was…Fantasy material, indeed.

Vanessa was right. This was not a man who would ever want to be anything more than friends with Maggie. “Will you take me where I want to go?” she finally asked.

“Depends.”

“Then forget it,” she said. “I’ll walk.”

She stepped around him, but he caught her arm. “If you’re walking, Mags, I’m walking with you.” It was not an idle threat.

It was freezing. “You’re not exactly dressed for a stroll in the rain.”

“Neither are you. Come on, get into the car.”

Maggie looked at him for several long moments.

“Please,” he said.

“I look like I’ve really lost it, don’t I?” she asked.

He smiled. “Kind of. But I figure you must have a good explanation. Why don’t we get into the car and you can give it to me.”

“Will you take me where I want to go?” she asked again.

“Yes,” he said this time.

Maggie got into the car.

Matt turned the key and cranked up the heat.

“I’m ruining your leather seats,” she realized with dismay, reaching for the door handle.

He hit the lock button and slipped the car into gear. “That’s okay. In a few months I’m going to be a millionaire. I’ll buy new ones.”

“I want to go to the Sachem’s Inn Motel,” she said.

“Really?” He gave her a sidelong glance. “With me?”

“Very funny. Just take me there.”

Matt sighed. “I’m not going to take you there and simply drop you off.”

“You promised.”

“Did not.”

“You said you’d take me where I wanted to go.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t promise. I’m taking you home with me.”

“You jerk.” Maggie started to cry. She’d finally left home, and damn it, she’d left it under her own power, despite the fact that she’d had too much to drink to drive safely.

But now she’d gone and gotten rescued. Well, she didn’t want to be rescued, not even by Matthew Stone, jungle man.

Matt stopped at a red light and turned to look at her.

“I want to do it my way, Matt.” Her blue eyes were swimming in tears. “Let me. Please?”

The traffic light turned green, but he ignored it. He took a deep breath, hardening himself against her tears. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be alone tonight,” he told her. “If you insist on going to the motel, I am coming with you.”

“I insist,” Maggie said, wiping her eyes and sticking out her chin. “And I don’t need a baby-sitter.”

“Too bad, because I’ve made up my mind.”

“Well, I’ve made up my mind, too, and I’m staying there alone.”

Their eyes locked and held. And the traffic light turned red again.

“Let’s compromise,” Matt told her. “First come home with me. We can get warmed up, maybe get something to eat, and talk—”

“I don’t want to talk.” She crossed her arms, staring straight ahead.

“Fine,” he said. “We can sit in silence in the hot tub. After that, I’ll take you over to the motel. If you still want to go there.”

Maggie looked at him. “Hot tub?” she said.

“You already turned it on,” Maggie said, wonder in her voice. “It’s already hot.”

She stood shivering in the bathroom in Matt’s house, staring at the steam rising from the hot tub.

“I was sitting in it when Steve called.” Matt tugged impatiently at the zipper on her jacket. It stuck slightly, but he finally got it down, and peeled the wet sleeves off her arms. Her skin was icy.

He reached for the button on her jeans, but she pushed his hands away. “I can do that.”

Yeah, but it had always been one of his fantasies. Not a good time to tell her that. “Then do it,” he countered. “Come on, let’s get you in there before you die of hypothermia.”

She hesitated. “I don’t have a bathing suit.”

Matt laughed. “You don’t need a bathing suit for a hot tub. For God’s sake, Maggie, I’ll turn around. Just get in, will you?”

He pointedly did just that and she peeled off her clothes. Yeah, she was definitely tanked—otherwise she surely would have noticed that the room was filled with mirrors and his turning his back was useless. He could see her from all angles, and, oh, mighty God…A more chivalrous man might’ve closed his eyes but life was just too short.

Matt watched as she slipped into the water, and…Wasn’t that just perfect? Now it was his turn to get naked. But maybe that was good. Let her see what she did to him.

But, “Eek,” she said, as he started to pull off his shorts right in front of her. She closed her eyes until he was sitting across the tub from her. “Doesn’t this strike you as weird?”

Matt stretched out his legs to get more comfortable, and brushed against her. All right. Don’t do that. He was purposely sitting over here so there’d be no contact. “What’s weird about it?”

Her eyes were so blue and her face was pale and she was still shivering slightly. The last thing he should do was go over there and put his arm around her. He drew an imaginary line around her. Whatever happened, he was not going to cross that line. Not tonight, anyway.

“Well, to start with, we don’t have any clothes on,” she told him.

He shrugged as the water bubbled around them. “Personally, I’d find it much weirder if we did.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “It’s weird and you know it.”

Matt nodded. “Yeah, it’s weird. That doesn’t mean it’s not nice, though.”

“I have this fantasy,” she told him, “where this perfect stranger just kind of holds out his hand to me, and takes me away from my life.”

Oh, man. “That’s, uh…That’s probably one a lot of people have.”

“It’s pretty wimpy,” she said. “Like, I just want to lie back and be rescued.”

“Nothing wrong with that,” Matt said.

“No,” she said. “Because who’s to say that his choices would be any better for me? My fantasy should be that I go up to the jungle man and say come with me—let’s escape, but let’s do it my way.”

Jungle man. That wasn’t the first time she’d mentioned this jungle man. “That’s a good fantasy, too.” He laughed. “Mags, I get the feeling that you’re telling me something, but I’m not sure if I understand exactly what it is. Can we stop talking in code? I really want to talk about what happened tonight after I dropped you off.”

She sank down so that the water covered her mouth. Okay.

“Steve said he thought you and Vanessa got into a fight or something?”

Her eyes filled with tears.

“Talk to me,” he said.

She lifted her mouth above the water line. “If we made love, would you be bored with me after only an hour?”

Matt choked on the air he was breathing. “What?”

Great, now he’d embarrassed her. She closed her eyes. “Nothing. Never mind.”

“No,” he said, moving across the tub to her. Mistake, mistake, mistake. He moved back, just not as far as he had been, but still safely on the other side of his line. “Not never mind. You just asked me if I thought you’d be boring in bed, didn’t you?” Damn. “Did Vanessa say that to you? Mags, she already had too much wine at dinner. And she’s nuts on top of that…”

But Maggie was just sitting there, eyes closed, looking like she actually thought…

“To answer your question,” he told her, “no. No, I certainly don’t.”

She opened her eyes and looked at him, looked away. “It was stupid to ask. I mean, what are you really going to say? ‘Yes, sorry, I think making love to you would be dull?’”

Okay. Game over. Matt crossed his line, moving so that he was sitting right next to her. “For the record,” he said, pulling her chin up so that she was forced to meet his gaze, “I don’t think making love to you would be even remotely dull. I would not be bored after even a hundred hours. And this is something that would not be difficult to prove.”

“What would you do if I said, okay, prove it?” She was looking into his eyes, no longer needing his hand under her chin to meet his gaze, but he didn’t move. Her skin was so soft, and she was finally warm. Her lips were slightly parted, her cheeks charmingly flushed, her eyes bright.

Too bright.

No, no, no. No. He wanted to cry. Instead, he shook his head. “I can’t,” he said. “Not tonight, anyway. You’re drunk. It wouldn’t be fair.”

“I’m not drunk,” she said with the kind of indignation that only someone who’d had too much to drink could pull off.

“I think you are,” Matt countered. “But okay. Let’s take that off the table. Even if you’re not drunk, you’re upset. I don’t want to sleep with you because you’re mad at your sister.”

“There.” Maggie pulled away from him. “You don’t want to sleep with me. You just said it.”

“No way! Misquote! Sound bite attack! Take it back, or you’re going to get dunked!”

She’d moved all the way to the other side of the hot tub, but as he advanced on her, she actually came toward him.

“Matt, kiss me.”

That he could do.

He leaned forward, moving slowly now, until his mouth met hers in the sweetest of caresses. Her lips were soft and warm, and oh, Lord, so willing.

Matt carefully kept himself from touching her, aware once again that they were both naked, knowing that if he felt the softness of her body against his, he’d be lost.

And oh, although it was careful and gentle, it was the kiss he’d been waiting for, for a lifetime.

Maggie was kissing him. She wasn’t pretending to be someone else who was kissing the person he was pretending to be.

It took his breath away.

It was hard as hell to pull back, to stop kissing her, and he had to turn away to keep her from seeing the tears that had jumped into his eyes.

He forced a smile.

Maggie didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Matt was treating her the way everyone always treated her—as if she might break. And if she were going to feel embarrassed about this in the morning—and she knew she was—then, damn it, she wanted the kind of kiss Matt had been legendary for in high school, the kind of kiss that would knock her socks off.

Provided she had socks on.

“I think we should try that again,” she said.

“I think I need to get out of this tub,” he countered.

“I think there’s suddenly some doubt as to who would bore whom in bed,” she told him, amazed at the words coming out of her mouth.

“Oh really?” he said. There was an odd light in his eyes as he looked at her. He didn’t move, he just sat there, very, very still.

She shifted slightly, so that the water barely covered her breasts. Matt’s gaze flickered down and then back to her face.

“I’m not going to take advantage of you,” he said, but he still didn’t move.

“It’s not taking advantage if it’s what I want,” she countered. She stood up, water sheeting off her.

Matt stood, too, and scrambled out of the tub, grabbing a towel and wrapping it around his waist. “You’re too angry and drunk to know what you want.”

“I am not!”

“Please, just—”

“For the first time in ages, I’m actually making my own decisions—”

“This is no decision. It’s a knee-jerk reaction.” He raised his voice to interrupt her. “If we make love tonight, everything changes between us. Maybe it would be great. Maybe you’d wake up in the morning and still want me. Maybe we’d be lovers until the day I die. But maybe not.”

He handed her a towel. “Maybe it wouldn’t be anything more than a one-night stand,” he continued, the lateness of the hour suddenly evident in his voice. “I really don’t mind if you use me, Mags, but I’m not going to let you use me up. I value your friendship too much to throw it away for just one night.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

He headed for the door. “Dry off. I’ll go find you some clothes. Then we can duke it out over whether or not I’m going to drive you to the motel.”

Matt came back into the bathroom with his smallest pair of shorts, a T-shirt and a sweatshirt.

Maggie was gone.

He’d walked right past her—she was curled up in the middle of the bed. It wasn’t his bed, but she probably didn’t know that.

He sighed, moving closer, but then realized she was fast asleep.

She clutched the sheet to her chest, and her dark hair fanned out against the white pillow. He stood looking down at her, at her long, dark eyelashes that lay against her fair skin, at the smattering of freckles that ran across her cheeks and nose. She looked like the teenage girl he’d first met so many years ago.

As a seventeen-year-old boy, he wouldn’t have been able to resist shedding his own clothes and climbing into that big bed with her.

As a thirty-year-old man, he swore softly, then picked up the towel she’d dropped on the floor. He carried it into the bathroom and hung it up to dry, tossing the clothes he’d brought with him on the back of a chair. He covered the tub and turned off the light.

Okay. Leave. Walk away. Go upstairs.

Instead, he came back to look at her in the light from the hallway.

Instead, he sat on the edge of the bed. He’d leave in a minute.

God, he was a fool. He could have had her, made love to her. He could have been lying next to her right now, basking in the afterglow.

But tomorrow was coming with a vengeance. And tomorrow they both would’ve had to live with the consequences.

Maybe he could make her fall in love with him. Maybe. And wouldn’t that be nice. Then she’d be in love with someone who could make her no promises. Maggie wanted a family—babies and a husband who was going to stick around. Matt could give her no guarantees.

But he knew what he wanted. For the first time in years, he was certain. He wanted her. After all this time, he still wanted her.

He remembered the day more than a decade ago that he’d realized he was in love with Maggie Stanton. He’d been shocked, horrified, disbelieving. The great Matt Stone, slayer of hearts, did not fall in love. Then, as time passed and he realized that he had, indeed, succumbed, he’d had to face the fact that she didn’t see him as anything more than a friend.

When he’d left for college, he’d partied hard, sure that now that he was away, he’d forget about Maggie. It was only a high school crush, right?

He’d dated a long line of long-legged blondes, he’d drunk hard and had been horribly unhappy.

Somewhere down the line, he’d stopped missing her.

At least he thought he had.

Matt reached out to touch her. Her skin was so smooth, so soft. He wanted to kiss her, taste her, inhale her….

He’d leave in a minute. Really.

But he swung his legs up onto the bed, leaning back, resting his head on his hand, propped up by his elbow. He leaned forward to kiss her shoulder, and she smiled in her sleep and snuggled against him.

He knew then that he wasn’t going anywhere, and he put his arms around her.

Tomorrow Maggie would wake up and find him there. And if she still wanted him in the light of morning, there’d be no holding him back, regardless of the consequences.

Seven

Maggie awoke to the sound of the window shade rubbing against the sill in the gentle ocean breeze.

The room was dim, but bright sunlight seeped in around the edges of the shade. She could tell from the brightness that it was late morning, possibly even past noon.

She stretched and her leg bumped something very solid and memories from the night before came roaring back to her.

It was indeed Matt, lying beside her, fast asleep. His long hair was tangled around his face. He was on his side, one arm tucked under his head, his legs kicked free from the sheet. He was wearing a pair of shorts—what a relief. Maggie was hyperaware of her own lack of clothing.

She’d tried to seduce him last night, but he’d refused.

Her face heated. She’d thrown herself at him, but he’d made it clear he didn’t want to be anything more than friends.

So what was he doing in bed with her?

The phone rang, suddenly, shrilly, and Matt stirred. His eyes opened and focused on her for one brief moment before he turned and picked it up from the bedside table. “Hello?” His voice was husky from sleep. He sat up, pushing his hair out of his face, swearing softly. He listened for a moment longer, than handed the phone to Maggie. “It’s your brother.”

“Stevie?” she said, clutching the sheet to her. Her own voice was rusty sounding, and God, her head was throbbing.

“Yo, Mags,” he said, wonder in his voice. “Are you guys still in bed?”

“Well, sort of,” she told him. “But it’s not what—”

“I’m very impressed. I’m also very glad I called. Mom and Dad are on their way over.”

“Oh, God!” Her eyes met Matt’s and from the look on his face, she knew he’d heard what Stevie had said.

“I’m going to shower,” Matt told her. “I left some clothes for you in the bathroom.”

“They’re coming out to have a little chat, if you know what I mean,” her brother said. “Hang tough. And don’t let ’em get close enough to throw the straitjacket around you.”

“Very funny,” Maggie said. “Stevie, thanks for calling.”

“Anytime. Good luck. And don’t forget to practice safe sex.”

She and Matt had had the safest kind of sex there was—none. But if he wanted to keep their relationship limited to friendship as he’d claimed last night, why was he sleeping in her bed?

Maggie hung up the phone and went into the bathroom. She drank directly from the sink faucet, trying to rehydrate and make her head feel a little less like it was about to explode.

She dressed quickly—her underwear was mostly dry, but everything else was still damp. She put on Matt’s clothes—which made her look like a kid playing dress-up. And her hair…

Nothing like falling asleep with a wet head to create a noteworthy style. Her only chance at looking seminormal was to put it into a ponytail.

She went in search of Matt who surely had a vast collection of ponytail holders.

Following the sound of running water, she went up a huge curved staircase to the third and then the fourth floor.

The fourth story of this old house wasn’t a full floor. There was a very small landing at the top of the stairs and a single door. Maggie knocked, but there was no answer. She tried the knob and the door swung open.

Another door was off to the immediate right. The bathroom—she could hear the sound of the shower. More stairs led up, and she climbed them.

This was Matt’s room—Maggie knew it without a doubt.

It was the tower room, large and airy. Its octagonal walls were all windows. There were no curtains, only miniblinds and they’d all been pulled up.

Sunlight streamed in from all angles, and the hardwood floor gleamed. The woodwork around the windows was white, as was the ceiling and all the furniture and the spread on Matt’s double bed. There wasn’t much color in the entire room. There didn’t need to be. Nature provided all the color anyone could possibly want.

The view was breathtaking. The sky—and there was so much of it—was a brilliant blue. She could see the deep blue-green water if she looked in one direction. When she turned she could see the gentle hills that led into town, covered with the new green leaves of early summer. The white steeple of the Congregational Church peeked up over the treetops.

A wind chime of fragile white shells hung in front of an open window, and it moved in the breeze, creating a delicate and soothing cascade of music.

The bathroom door opened, and Matt came into the room. Maggie blushed—he was wearing only a white pair of briefs.

“Nice room, huh?” he said, unfazed at the sight of her, as he rubbed his hair with a towel. He made no attempt to cover himself, as if it were entirely normal for her to be there in his room while he was in his underwear.

“It’s beautiful,” she said. “I’m actually looking for a ponytail holder.”

“In the bathroom drawer,” he told her.

She went down the stairs. The bathroom air was still heavy with moisture, the mirror steamed up despite the fresh air from an open window. It was a modest little room, nothing like the bathroom with the hot tub, downstairs.

She fished through a drawer jammed with combs and razors.

“I think you should tell your parents that you’re going to live here for a while,” Matt told her, coming to stand in the doorway.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” She used his brush to attempt to tame her hair. “And I don’t think my parents will, either.”

“I’ve got eight empty bedrooms,” he pointed out. “They don’t have to fear for your virtue.”

And neither did she, obviously. Maggie put his brush back on the edge of the sink.

“Mags, we have to talk about what happened last night,” he said as if he could read her mind.

“What’s to say?” She pushed past him and headed down the stairs to the main part of the house. “Except I guess I should probably apologize. And thank you. I would have been really embarrassed this morning if we’d actually, you know…”

She would have been beyond embarrassed and well into mortified. If he’d made love to her, it would’ve been as a favor.

Matt followed her down the stairs.

She turned to face him. “You are a good friend,” she said. “And you were right. Our friendship is too valuable to risk losing.”

His expression was unreadable.

The doorbell rang.

“We should talk more about this later,” he said. “Right now it’s showtime.”

He brushed past her as he went down the stairs, and Maggie had to cling to the thick oak banister, shocked at the way her body responded to even such casual contact. It was a symptom of Matthew Fever.

Could she really live in a house with him? Without embarrassing herself further? On the other hand, could she pass up the opportunity to be near him?

And she wanted to be near him—desperately. Maybe it would pass. Maybe this illness would leave as quickly as it had struck.

Her parents were dressed in their church clothes. They peered at Matt and Maggie through the screen.

“Mr. and Mrs. Stanton,” Matt said graciously. “Please come in.”

“Maggie, are you all right?” her father asked.

Her mother came and hugged her. “My poor baby. Get your things. We’ll take you home.”

“I don’t want to go home,” Maggie told her.

Her father glanced at Matt. “Honey, we want to talk to you, and it’ll be much easier at home.”

“Anyone thirsty?” Matt asked. “I’ll go get some lemonade.”

“No,” Maggie said sharply. “I’m not thirsty and neither are my parents.”

“Mags, I was trying to be polite—give you some privacy.”

“We don’t need privacy.” She turned back to her parents. “I’m going to stay here for a while.”

Her parents both started talking at once.

“Margaret, I understand how unhappy you must feel about Brock and Vanessa—”

“Vanessa’s gone to Brock’s,” her father told her. “What’s she’s done is inexcusable. It’s not fair that you should be the one to leave. And moving here seems rather sudden and—”

“Wait a minute,” Maggie said. “Don’t get the wrong idea. Matt has lots of room here, and he offered me a place to stay. We’re friends, Dad. It’s like me moving in with Angie.”

Her father glanced at Matt again, this time sizing him up. “You don’t really expect us to believe that, do you?” He turned to Matt. “Maybe you should get that lemonade, son.”

But Matt, thank God, knew that she desperately didn’t want to be alone with her parents. “Sure,” he said easily, but then turned to Maggie. “Want to give me a hand?”

She nearly bolted toward the kitchen.

“Go on into the living room,” she heard Matt say, before he followed her and shut the kitchen door behind him.

“What’s this with Vanessa and Brock?” he asked, as he crossed to the cabinets and took out four tall glasses.

“I got home last night just in time to see Brock kissing Vanessa good night,” she told him, sitting at the kitchen table and putting her head in her hands. “She actually slept with him.”

Matt swore. And then he put a couple of aspirin on the table in front of her, along with a glass of water.

“Thank you. Apparently Brock’s been interested in Van all along,” Maggie told him. “She and I had a little confrontation.”

“What a jackass,” he said. “So that’s what last night was about, huh?”

Maggie nodded, unable to meet his eyes. “I can’t believe I was too stupid to notice that I wasn’t the one he really wanted.”

Matt took a pitcher of lemonade out of the refrigerator and stirred it with a long spoon. “Maggie, the man wanted to marry you.”

“Until Vanessa became available. Then it was no contest.”

“But you didn’t want to marry him—”

“That’s not the point,” she nearly shouted at him. “God, how many times back in high school did boys ask me out because they wanted to get closer to Van?”

“Too often,” Matt said quietly. “It sucked. I remember how hurt you used to be.”

“I thought that was over with,” she admitted. “I thought people were finally interested in me, for who I am, not for whose sister I am. But I was wrong. I feel…insignificant and…worthless and stupid.”

And when she’d come to him, he’d rejected her, too. Matt’s heart sank. Damn, he’d thought he was doing the right thing last night, and it had been exactly, perfectly wrong.

“Maggie—” he started, but she cut him off.

“I’ll get over it,” she said. “I always did before. But I’ve got to confess, I’m seriously considering moving someplace where no one’s ever heard of Vanessa Stanton.”

“Maybe that’s not a bad idea,” Matt said. “I’ll make a deal with you. In three months, if I don’t win my inheritance, we’ll get one of those big camper things and cruise the United States.”

Maggie looked up at him with the most peculiar expression. “You mean a…recreational vehicle?”

“Yeah.” He grinned at her. “It’ll be a blast. What do you say?” It was always good to have a plan B. Especially since he really didn’t expect plan A to work.

She put her face in her hands. It was hard to tell whether she was laughing or groaning.

“As for right now, I know what to tell your parents.” He handed her the pitcher of lemonade. “Carry this out, will you?”

“What?” asked Maggie. “What are you going to tell them?”

Matt picked up the tray with the glasses. “They’re not going to believe that there’s nothing going on between us. We can deny it until the end of time, but they’re going to think you’re living here with me. You know, with me.”

“But it’s not true.”

“I know that and you know that, but I’m telling you that denying it will only make them crazy. Just follow my lead,” he said with a smile. “Think of this as an improvisational skit.”

“I hate improv,” Maggie muttered, following him out of the kitchen.

The Stantons looked up as Maggie and Matt came into the living room. They were sitting stiffly on those chairs his father had bought—the uncomfortable ones with wooden legs that were curved into bird’s claws. Matt put the tray down on top of the coffee table.

“Just set the lemonade over here, then come sit next to me, babe,” he said to Maggie.

Babe? She didn’t say it, but the look she was giving him nearly made him laugh out loud.

He poured the lemonade, handed glasses to Mr. and Mrs. Stanton, and then patted the couch next to him.

Slowly, she approached. Slowly, she sat down. And he draped an arm around her shoulders. “Mags and I discussed it in the kitchen,” he told her parents, “and we decided that you should know the truth.”

Mr. Stanton nodded. “That would be appreciated.”

“Last night I asked Maggie to marry me,” Matt told them. He could feel disbelief radiating out of Maggie, and it was all he could do not to laugh.

“What?” said Mrs. Stanton.

“What?” said Mr. Stanton.

“Matt!” said Maggie.

He shut her up with a quick kiss. “It’s no secret that I’ve been crazy about her for years,” he told them, then looked at Maggie. “Right, babe?”

The Stantons—all three of them—wore identical looks of shock. Matt knew not to kiss Maggie again. If he did, they’d all fall out of their chairs.

Mrs. Stanton looked at Maggie. “But…”

“She said yes,” Matt said, squeezing her shoulder.

“I said no,” she countered, elbowing him in the ribs.

“Obviously, we’re still working it out,” he said quickly, putting his hand on her knee, and sliding it up her smooth, bare thigh. His shorts looked good on her. “You can understand her hesitation. She’s not sure if this is the real thing or if she’s just on the rebound.”

“I see.” Mr. Stanton was staring at Matt’s hand, still moving north on Maggie’s thigh.

Out of desperation, Maggie grabbed Matt’s hand and held it tightly. But that was, of course, exactly what he’d wanted her to do, since it looked as if she’d taken his hand intentionally, instead of in self-defense.

“We’ve decided the best thing to do is to live together, see how it goes,” Matt said.

Her parents, of course, were appalled.

“You must know that we don’t approve.”

“I realize that, sir,” Matt said solemnly. “But I want Maggie and I’m afraid if she goes back home with you, she’ll never make up her mind.”

Hey. Maggie shot him a look, but he refused to look at her. The muscle in the side of his jaw was jumping, though. Matt was clenching his teeth to keep from laughing. He actually thought this was funny! She squeezed his fingers, wishing she actually had nails to dig into him.

Her father shook his head. “Well, decision making’s never been her strong suit,” he said ruefully.

They were talking about her as if she were a horse being sold or a child or a…a…houseplant.

“I can make up my mind quite easily,” she said hotly. “In fact, there’s absolutely no decision here. This is ridiculous and…”

And she stopped, suddenly realizing that if she said no, she’d end up going back home with her parents.

They were all watching her, her parents with anticipation, Matt with one eyebrow lazily lifted, his expression carefully bland. But his eyes were sharp and he was watching her as if he were trying to read her mind.

What would he do if she said yes? Wouldn’t that scare him to death? She smiled, imagining his frantic backpedaling as he tried to keep her mother from pulling out her Polaroid camera to snap an engagement photo to send to the society page of the Shore Line Times.

Matt watched Maggie smile and realized that she was actually considering saying yes. The shock value would be tremendous—it would blow her parents right out of the water. Come on, Mags, say it.

Except, God, he’d have to tell her the truth about where he’d been, what he’d been doing these past three years. If they were going to get married, he’d have to tell her all that, and more—Whoa, Stone, slow it down. This was fiction. This was acting. This was not real life.

Still, he leaned toward her. “Say it,” he whispered.

She stared at him.

“Say it,” he repeated. “Come on, Maggie. Marry me.” He slid off the couch onto his knees on the floor in front of her and brought her hand to his lips as the audience—her parents—watched in undisguised shock. “Please?”

Maggie couldn’t believe him. Oh, overacting! she wanted to shout. God, she hated improv because she was never really sure how the other actors wanted her to respond. Now, did Matt really want her to say yes, or did he want her to say no? Or was he too caught up in the drama of the scene even to think rationally?

Didn’t it occur to him what would happen if she actually said yes?

She looked down at Matt, still waiting on bended knee like some kind of fantasy husband-to-be. Damn him for making her wish this wasn’t just a game. She almost smacked him.

“This is silly,” she said. “Matt, get up off the floor. We have to tell them the real truth.”

Whatever he was expecting her to say, it wasn’t that. Matt covered a laugh with a cough. “The real truth.” He pulled himself back onto the couch. “Oh, you mean the real truth.”

She looked at him expectantly, innocently, waiting for him to take the lead. Which of course he couldn’t take since he had no idea what she had in mind.

She threw him a bone. “The Internet thing,” she said, “www.VegasWedding.com?”

He almost completely lost it, and he covered by kissing her. In front of her parents.

“God, I love you,” he said, with so much emotion in his voice, she almost believed him, too.

Her father cleared his throat. “What Internet thing?”

“You don’t have to go to Las Vegas anymore for a quickie wedding,” Matt explained to her parents, taking her cue and running with it. Were they actually going to believe this? “You just go online and visit the Web site, and you can actually get married in a virtual ceremony.” He kissed Maggie’s hand. “We did that last night.”

“Is it legal?” her mother asked.

“Absolutely,” Matt said. “They send the marriage certificate in the mail. It takes a couple weeks, though, because they, you know, laminate it first.”

Her father looked as if he were going to protest, and Maggie cut him off. “Dad, I’m twenty-nine years old.”

He nodded. “You are. I think your living here is a mistake, and I think rushing into marriage with someone you haven’t seen in ten years is also a mistake. We would like it if you came home. That’s what we came here to say. That and we love you.” He looked at Matt. “And if you hurt her, I’ll make you wish you were never born.”

He stood up, and held out his hand for Matt to shake, then gave Maggie a hug. “This is the biggest barrel of crap I’ve ever heard,” he whispered to her. “But your mother believes you. You just decide whether or not you’re going to marry this guy, and you do it fast, you hear me?”

Maggie nodded, and he kissed her cheek. Her mother hugged her, too, and then they were out the door.

Matt put his arm around her as they watched her parents drive away. “How about another kiss for show?” he asked, nuzzling her neck.

She elbowed him hard in the ribs. “You had your chance last night, babe,” she said. “Matt, how could you tell my parents that we were going to live together? Didn’t it occur to you that my mother might have a heart attack right there on the living-room rug?”

“And I’m telling you they weren’t going to believe that we could live here in platonic harmony,” Matt said, rubbing his side. “I can’t believe you came up with www.VegasWedding.com. It was beautiful—I wish I’d thought of that. You know, this was the best improv I’ve been in in a long time. Did you see their faces?”

Maggie glared at him. “That was no improv, Matt, that was my life. Now my mother thinks we’re married!”

“But it worked,” he pointed out. “You didn’t get pressured to go back home.”

“She’s going to want a look at our laminated wedding certificate,” she said. “Jeez! Laminated. Very classy, Matt!”

“I was thinking on my feet,” he said as she pushed past him into the house. “Give me a break!”

She turned back to him. “Give me the keys to your car.”

He went into the kitchen and came back with the keys to the Maserati. “Where are you going?” he asked as he handed them over. “Can I come along? After all, it is our honeymoon.”

“Shopping,” she said. “No. And stuff it.”

Eight

The sun was sinking in the sky by the time Maggie returned from the mall.

Matt was out on the front-porch swing. He watched as she unloaded one huge shopping bag after another from the car.

“Honey, I’m home,” she singsonged.

“Well, if it isn’t the little wife,” he said, coming to help her. “Thank God you’ve got your sense of humor back.”

“Nothing like a little shopping to ease the soul.”

“A little?” His arms were piled high with packages. “You’re going to be paying off your credit cards until you’re eighty years old.”

“Your credit cards,” she said smoothly. “We’re married now, remember?”

“Oh, good, I’ll keep that in mind, later, when it’s time to go to bed,” Matt said in his best Groucho Marx imitation.

“I was kidding,” Maggie said darkly.

Matt wasn’t.

“I paid cash for this stuff,” Maggie told him. “I worked at A&B for three years. Remember me? I used to live at home. I saved all my money all that time. I can afford to splurge. I wanted to splurge. So I bought myself clothes that I like.” She hadn’t bought one single corporate clone suit.

Matt pulled a sundress out of one of the bags. “Put this on,” he said, draping it over her shoulder. “I’m taking you out to dinner. We’re celebrating.”

She shot him a look. “Celebrating what? And if you say ‘Our recent marriage,’ I’m going to smack you.”

“How about celebrating our getting the leads in the summer musical?”

“No kidding?” Maggie’s face completely lit up.

“Nope.” He smiled back at her. “Dan Fowler called while you were out. You got Lucy. And I’m ‘Cody Brown, at your service.’ First rehearsal’s tomorrow night.”

“This is great!” Maggie did a victory dance around the entry hall. “I’m so jazzed—I really, really wanted this part.”

Matt grinned, watching her. But then she stopped and stared at him accusingly. “Why didn’t you tell me right when I got home?” she asked.

“I did. I mean, I am. I mean, this is right when you got home. So you want to go out and celebrate?” Dinner—and then maybe another, less public celebration…

“Definitely.” She beamed at him.

“Get dressed,” he ordered her. “I’ll meet you on the porch in twenty minutes.”

Maggie pushed open the screen door and stepped out onto the porch. The last traces of the sunset were facing from the sky. Matt had lit a citronella candle and was sitting back in one of the rocking chairs, his cowboy boots up on the rail.

“You look great,” he said simply, getting to his feet.

“You do, too.” Maggie laughed. “I thought you only wore T-shirts and jeans.”

He had on a pair of brown pants and a soft, white poet’s shirt with full, billowy sleeves. With his hair down, he looked like a time traveler from the past.

“This is about as dressed up as I get,” he said. “I mean, aside from a tux.”

It was plenty. Matthew Stone in a tux would create riots. Women would faint in the street.

In fact, more than one female head turned as they walked into the little harborside restaurant that was only a few miles from Matt’s house.

Maggie was much too aware of his fingers on her back as the hostess brought them to a table overlooking the water. He’s just a friend. He’s just a friend. He’s just a friend. Maybe if she chanted it silently, she wouldn’t do anything stupid.

Dinner was lovely, and Matt carefully kept the conversation on safe topics—movies they’d seen, books they’d read, and since they had ten years of catching up to do, they never ran out of things to say.

As they were finishing dessert, the waitress brought over a florist’s box and handed it to Maggie with a smile—and an appreciative glance at Matt.

Maggie gave him a quizzical look, but he just smiled.

She untied the ribbon and lifted the lid.

A dozen roses—deep red and gorgeous. “They’re beautiful.”

“Only eleven,” he said quietly. “You make it a dozen.”

There was a card among the flowers, and she opened the tiny envelope.

Make Love To Me Tonight was printed in plain block letters on the card.

She looked up at Matt. His face looked mysterious in the candlelight. Shadows accentuated his cheekbones, giving him an exotic look. His eyes glittered slightly, looking more golden than usual in the dim light.

Maggie felt like crying, because she knew exactly why he was doing this.

But she must have hidden what she was feeling, because he reached across the table and took her hand, raising it to his lips and kissing her softly on the palm.

It was the perfect thing for him to do. He was perfect. Everything was perfect. Except none of this was real. He was only doing this out of pity.

“Matt,” she started, but he shook his head.

“Don’t say anything now,” he said. “Let’s take a walk.”

He tossed a small wad of bills onto the table, and held out his hand for her. She let him lead her out of the restaurant and onto the sidewalk that led to the marina.

The sky was clear and the moon was up.

Maggie shivered in the cool air, and Matt moved to put his arm around her shoulders, but she sidestepped him.

He caught her arm. “I made a mistake last night,” he said, breaking their silence.

“Matt, I know—”

“Wait. Just hear me out, okay?”

She nodded, moving over to the railed fence that lined the edge of the seawall. She couldn’t meet his eyes, instead looking at the moonlight reflecting off the surface of the water.

“I was trying to be noble,” he told her. “I thought I was protecting you. But I was wrong, and I want to rewind and take it from the hot tub, okay?”

She closed her eyes.

“Come on, Maggie, look at me.”

Slowly, she turned.

“I want to make love to you.” He pulled her toward him. She didn’t know how he did it, but he actually managed to make his eyes hot with desire.

“Matt—”

“I’ve wanted to make love to you since we were in high school,” he said as he pulled her close, as he kissed her neck, her throat, her jaw.

“Please stop,” she said weakly. If he kissed her on the lips, she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to stop.

And then he did. His lips found hers, and he kissed her slowly, languidly, his tongue exploring her mouth and…

Maggie smacked him on the butt with the cardboard flower box. He let go of her, staring as if she were insane.

Maybe she was. Anyone who would willingly stop a man from kissing her like that had to be more than touch crazy.

“I know what you’re doing.” She backed away so that there was distance between them. “I thought you’d try something like this. When you found out today about Vanessa and Brock…You feel sorry for me and you’re trying to make me feel better.”

He laughed. “Yeah, I don’t think so—”

“It’s not working,” she told him. “You can turn off the act.”

“This isn’t an act.” He reached for her, but she brandished the flower box again. He laughed. “Maggie, I swear—”

“And I’ve kissed you often enough on stage to know that you can play the part of the passionate lover with your eyes closed and both hands tied behind your back.”

“Oh, come on—”

“Please, Matt,” Maggie begged. “I’m exhausted. I don’t want to fight with you right now. Don’t make this worse than it already is.”

He shook his head and started to speak but stopped himself. Without another word, he led her back to his car.

They drove home in silence, but as he pulled into the garage, he looked at her. “It’s not an act.”

“Good night,” she told him, and nearly ran into the house, into the room she’d claimed as her bedroom.

She locked the door behind her. But she wasn’t sure if she was locking him out—or herself in.

Nine

Matt’s eyes opened as the sun streamed into his tower bedroom.

He glanced at his clock: 6:18. Four hours of sleep. Not bad. Not great, but not bad, considering…

Maggie was only one floor beneath him, but after last night, she might as well be a million miles away.

He’d spent most of the night tossing and turning, trying to ignore how much he wanted her, trying to figure out how he’d be able to return to his status of friend after tasting her lips. But he’d done it before. He’d fallen desperately in love with her more than ten years ago, and he’d survived.

Or had he?

Matt had spent the night alternately praying that it would simply be a matter of time before she came to him, and praying that he would have the strength to keep his distance from her.

It was probably a good thing that she’d told him no last night.

It was ten days and counting until he was scheduled to go back to the hospital for a checkup. He’d all but decided not to go, thinking it was little more than a visit to a high-tech fortune teller. Whether he was going to live for one year, ten years, or a hundred years certainly mattered to him, but knowing wouldn’t change the way he lived his life.

Except now everything had turned upside down, and now he desperately wanted to know.

He pulled himself out of bed.

He had work to do.

Maggie grabbed an apple from the refrigerator, still humming the melody from the summer musical’s closing number.

The first rehearsal—a read through of the script—had gone well, except for the fact that she’d counted seven different times she was going to have to kiss Matt on stage. Each kiss would have to be set up, blocked and rehearsed. Over and over again. She wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry.

As she took a bite of the apple, she opened up the connecting door to the office and turned on the lights.

“Whoa,” Matt said. “What are you doing?”

“I want to look over those numbers some more,” she said.

She held her apple in her teeth as she used both hands to clear a stack of file folders from one of the chairs. The conference table itself was stacked high with files and bound reports and computer printouts. They had worked hard all day, right up to the rehearsal.

“It’s nearly midnight.” Matt cleared off another chair so he could sit, too. “This will still be here tomorrow.”

“These numbers are bad,” Maggie said. “I’ve looked at the quarterly reports for the past four years, and the gross profits have remained pretty darn constant, even after your dad died. There’s not a lot of room for increased profits here, Matt.”

“So what do we do?”

She stretched her arms over her head. “I guess we have to start thinking creatively.”

“Oh, good.”

“Good?” She looked at him in disbelief.

He grinned. “Quarterly reports and gross profits make my head spin. But creative thinking is something I can handle.”

It was true. Even back in school, Matt had never had the patience for math. He hadn’t been very good at following rules. But in terms of creativity, he was a pro. Put him in an empty room with a canvas and paints, and you’d get a masterpiece. Most likely the canvas would remain blank and the masterpiece would be painted on the wall, but it would be truly magnificent.

“Tomorrow we should go down and take a look at the plant,” she said. “Maybe that will trigger your creative process.”

“Okay,” he said easily, idly picking up a thick file folder and leafing through it. “God, can you believe a temporary secretary costs more than forty dollars an hour from some of these agencies? That’s not within our budget, is it?”

Maggie searched through the piles of reports for the current year’s annual budget. “Actually, it is. But we can cut costs. I mean, jeez, we could hire Stevie to be our slave for fifteen dollars an hour.”

Matt smiled. “That’s a great idea. Let’s hire Steve.”

She looked at him in exasperation. “I was kidding.”

“Can he type?”

“Probably. He’s always online.”

“I’ll call him tomorrow.”

“Matt, sometimes I think you’re totally nuts.” She rubbed the back of her neck, twisting her head to stretch the muscles. She’d have to make time tomorrow to get in a workout at the club.

With a start, she felt Matt’s hands touching her shoulders. She stood up quickly, breaking free. “Don’t,” she told him.

“Mags, lighten up. I was trying to help you relax.”

“Well, just don’t, okay?”

He didn’t say anything then. He stood there, looking at her, his eyes guarded, his face nearly expressionless.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I know it must have confused you when I…did what I did the other night. I was upset and angry and I wasn’t thinking clearly. Sometimes I wonder if I’m still not thinking clearly. But I do know that you were right. Our friendship is far too valuable to throw away for a little sex.”

She risked a glance at him, and found he’d turned to stare out the window. Part of the lawn was lit by spotlights aimed at the house, and the semicircles of bright green grass stood out as islands in the surrounding sea of darkness.

“I’m still feeling really vulnerable,” she said softly. “Every time you touch me, I question your motivation. And damn it, I don’t want your pity, Matt.”

He just shook his head. “You know, if I’m feeling sorry for anyone here, it’s myself.”

She rolled her eyes. “I need you to give me some space so we can get things back to normal.” Sooner or later she’d start feeling human again. Sooner or later, she’d be able to accept a back rub from him without wanting his hands to caress her entire body.

“All right.” He glanced at her and forced a smile. “I’m going up to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.”

He made a wide circuit around Maggie, careful not to get too close, and went out of the office without looking back.

Wait, she wanted to say, but she kept her mouth tightly shut.

“You did what?” Angie’s voice sounded remarkably clear over the international connection.

Maggie smiled, imagining the look on her friend’s face. “I moved out. It was right after I had a fight with Van, who moved back home because she and Mitch are getting a divorce, and now she wants to go out with Brock, so he dumped me, but that’s okay because he was a jerk, and this all happened on the same day I quit my job because I’m working full-time for Matthew now.”

Angie’s stunned silence was extremely impressive because she was Angie and rarely stunned or silent.

“So what else is new?” she finally asked.

“I got the lead in the summer musical,” Maggie said.

“I was kidding,” Angie exploded. “Damn, Mags is that all?”

“That about covers it.”

She sat in her nightgown, with her feet up on the late Mr. Stone’s big desk, talking on his private line. She’d gotten up very early to give Angie a call. It was already lunchtime in London, and she knew her friend was rarely home in the afternoon.

“Let me get this straight. You’re working for Matthew?”

“Yep.”

“He’s paying you?”

“What, do you think I’d do it for free?”

“You? Yes.”

Maggie laughed. “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

“How is he?” Angie asked.

“He’s fine,” Maggie told her friend. “He’s great, actually. He’s changed an awful lot, Ange.”

She snorted. “Don’t count on it. With Matt, you never know what’s reality and what’s just an elaborate song and dance. My guess is right now he’s taken on the role of the prodigal son. He’s probably imitating his dear departed father, dressing like a businessman and saying things like, ‘Let’s do lunch.’”

“No,” Maggie said. “He’s not. I don’t know exactly what happened, but he went through some very tough times over the past few years. He’s different now. You’d probably have trouble recognizing him.”

“Now that I refuse to believe,” Angie said. “Hey, tell me what happened with that jungle guy from the club. You meet him yet?”

“Um,” Maggie said cautiously. “Yes, I did.”

“And…?”

“And…I don’t know.” She couldn’t tell Angie that her fantasy man and Matt were one and the same. She just couldn’t.

“Is he human?”

“Extremely human,” Maggie said. “Totally, absolutely human. Incredibly human.”

“Uh-oh.” Angie laughed. “You’ve got it bad, haven’t you?”

“It’s terrible,” Maggie admitted, pulling her feet off the desk. “I may never recover.”

“That’s the way I felt when I first met Fred. Obviously you don’t have a choice. You’ve got to marry the guy.”

Maggie closed her eyes. “I don’t think so. Angie, look, I’ve got to go. I’ve got to go down to the courthouse this morning, and there’s a ton and a half of paper sitting in the office waiting to be read. I’ll call you again soon, okay?”

“Mags, where are you staying?” Angie said. “You told me you moved out, but you didn’t say where you’re living now.”

“I’m staying with a friend,” Maggie told her, feeling doubly dishonest. “I’ve got to run. See you, okay? Bye!”

She hung up the phone and put her head down on the desk.

She should have told Angie the whole truth, but she couldn’t deal with the thirty-minute lecture on the evil of Matthew Stone that would have been sure to follow.

Maybe she wouldn’t ever have to tell Angie. Maybe her feelings for Matt would conveniently vanish. But her own words came back to her. I may never recover.

She had to smile, thinking of Angie’s solution. Marry the guy. Ange would be horrified to know that she’d even inadvertently advised her best friend to aim for marriage with Matthew Stone.

Angie would be even more horrified to find out that Mrs. Stanton thought Maggie and Matt were already married.

Married. To Matt.

She’d have a better chance of winning the lottery. Matt simply wasn’t the marrying kind.

He was however, the hot sex in the hot tub kind.

She had to stop thinking about that.

The clock on the wall said six forty-five. She was too wired to go back to sleep. She might as well get to work.

On her way through the kitchen, she put on the tea kettle and searched the cabinets for the tin of tea bags. Hoping against hope, she opened the refrigerator, looking for a lemon.

There were five in the lower drawer.

That was odd. Fresh fruit and vegetables filled the refrigerator. She’d been here for two days now, and she hadn’t noticed anyone delivering groceries. And Lord knows she hadn’t had time to pick anything up. Yet the refrigerator was packed with food—

“Hey, you’re up early.” Matt came into the kitchen. His skin was slick with perspiration and his shorts and T-shirt were soaked through. He was still breathing hard, as if he’d just finished some strenuous exercise.

“So are you,” she managed to say.

Matt wiped a bead of sweat that trickled down his face as he looked at her. She was backlit by the light from the refrigerator, and her nightgown had become diaphanous. Her hair was still messy from sleep, and without makeup, her face looked fresh and young. But her body was all woman.

She had no idea of the show she was putting on for him. And wasn’t that a shame. At first glance, he’d dared to hope that she was purposely trying to drive him crazy, that maybe she wanted him to pick her up and carry her into the nearest bedroom and make love to her.

God knows that was what he wanted to do.

“I didn’t expect you to be up so early,” she said, clutching a lemon to her chest.

Yeah, no kidding. She didn’t move, so he reached past her into the open fridge for the orange juice. He drank directly from the plastic container. “I was out running,” he told her. “I try to do five miles a day, but sometimes I miss.”

“You’ve already run five miles this morning?” The tea kettle began to howl, and she closed the refrigerator door—too bad—and carried her lemon to the stove. She took the kettle off the burner, then turned to look at Matt skeptically. “Sometimes I think aliens have invaded your body. The Matt I know had to be dragged out of bed every morning to make it to school on time. I remember when noon on a Saturday was unbearably early for you.”

“It’s not a Saturday,” Matt pointed out, finishing off the juice.

Maggie shook her head as she filled her mug with steaming water. “What time did you get up?”

“Four-thirty,” Matt told her. “Usually I don’t wake up till six o’clock, but for some reason I’ve been having more trouble than usual sleeping.”

And guess what—or rather who—that reason is?

She didn’t meet his eyes, because she knew.

“So far this morning,” he told her, “I’ve memorized the first ten pages of my dialogue for the show, and I’ve gone grocery shopping.”

“Grocery shopping this early?”

“The Stop and Shop is open twenty-four hours.” He shrugged. “Sometimes if I can’t sleep, I’ll go over at three a.m.” He smiled. “No crowds, you know.”

“If you write out a list, I’ll get the groceries next time we need them,” Maggie volunteered.

But Matt shook his head. “No, that’s okay. I like to do it.”

She took her mug of tea and headed for the door. “Aliens have definitely invaded your body.”

The Yankee Potato Chip factory was a huge brick building on the other side of town, surrounded by a parking area that was almost entirely filled with the employees’ cars.

Maggie flipped through her file as Matt pulled up in front of a parking spot marked President near the main door.

“I don’t know if I can do this,” he said.

“Of course you can.” She glanced up from the papers. “You own this company. You’re perfectly within your rights to inspect—”

“No, I mean, I don’t know if I can park here.”

Maggie looked at the parking spot, then at Matt.

“I mean, that word president,” he said. “It implies a certain dignity, a certain knowledge. Maybe I should have them paint over it with Ignorant Son.”

Maggie laughed. “I can think of better ways to use the money.”

“So can I.”

Inside the plant, the manager gave them a complete tour, explaining as they went what he saw as the strengths and weaknesses of the operation. Matt grasped each issue quickly, asking probing and intelligent questions. He stopped frequently as they walked, speaking to the employees, listening intently as they talked. By the time they were through, five hours later, Maggie was exhausted.

And Matt was silent in the car on the way home. It wasn’t until an hour later that he turned from staring out the office window to say, “Have you come across blueprints and specs for the construction of the plant?”

“I just saw them.” Maggie dug through the piles of papers and files, and found the thick three-ringed binder. She hefted the blueprints onto the table. “What do we need these for?”

“Hmm,” Matt said. He punched the speaker phone and dialed. “Hey, Steve, it’s Matthew Stone.”

Steve? As in Stevie? As in her brother? She hadn’t thought Matt was serious about…

“Yo, Matthew Stone.” It was indeed Stevie. “’Sup, my man?”

“How are you at Internet research?”

“I think I once surfed around looking for historical information on the Ramones,” Stevie said. “Why?”

Maggie rolled her eyes. “He got 1520 on his SATs.”

“Hush there, Mags,” Stevie said. “If you say that too loudly, you’ll ruin my rep. Chicks don’t dig the brainiacs.”

“You want to bet?” Maggie countered.

“Steve, you want to earn twenty bucks an hour?” Matt asked.

“Tell me who to kill,” her brother said. “I’ll ask no questions.”

“Consider yourself hired,” Matt said.

“When do I start?”

“Now. I need you to get me all the information you can find about…got a pencil?”

“No,” Stevie said, “but for twenty bucks an hour, I’ll open a vein and write with my own blood.”

“Get a pencil,” Matt said. He looked up at Maggie and smiled. “I think I can improve this company.”

“Okay, boys and girls.” Dan Fowler raised his voice and the actors immediately fell silent. “Break’s over. We’ve got mucho work to do tonight, so don’t turn off your brains yet. Let’s walk through the blocking for the opening number. Places on stage!”

The cast scrambled for their spots.

Maggie moved center stage. So far Dan’s storm-trooper attitude was working. He was among the most efficient directors she’d ever worked with.

“Okay,” Dan called. “Lucy is center. Spot comes up on her. The stage is dark and misty. Creepy crawly things start moving behind her….”

As he spoke, the cast walked through their on-stage movements.

“Lucy says, Stop, and the creepy things scramble away. Lights come up. Out from the wings come my men in top hats and tails. They pick her up and carry her around….”

Maggie looked nervously at the eight men who would be hoisting her onto their shoulders in this part of the opening number. They didn’t lift her now, since it was only a walkthrough, but they were going to spend a great deal of time rehearsing this particular move, to make it look effortless.

“On comes the full chorus, including all four secondary leads. We talk, talk, talk, sing, sing, sing. The stage is packed but the crowd parts as Cody enters upstage center.”

This was as far as they’d got before the break.

“Okay, Cody,” Dan ordered Matt. “You come directly downstage to Lucy. You sing your bit of the song and then you talk. Lucy, don’t back away, I want you directly center stage for the kiss that’s coming.”

Maggie nodded, glancing up at Matt, who was making notes on his script.

“This kiss has to be very 1940s Hollywood,” Dan continued. “Very big screen passionate. The music underneath swells, so you’ve got to time it just right. I think you’ve got eight bars of music to fill. Rhonda, dear, play it for them, would you?”

The accompanist played as Maggie and Matt listened. God, eight bars was an awfully long time.

“Try it with the music,” Dan ordered. “Whenever you’re ready.”

Matt tossed down his script and positioned himself next to Maggie. “Your last line is what? So go away,” he remembered. “You should turn your back to me, as if you’re going to walk away, stage left. I’m going to grab you by the arm and swing you back around toward me, okay?”

Maggie nodded, suddenly frightfully nervous.

“Give us about four measures before the kiss,” Matt called to Rhonda, who began to play.

Maggie listened for the musical cue, then turned away from Matt. He pulled her hard toward him, and she slammed into his chest. As Matt’s lips met hers, she couldn’t keep from giggling.

“Wrong!” Dan’s nasal voice interrupted. “Stanton, you’re as stiff as a board. Get into character! Think about your motivation! This is one of Lucy’s fantasies, and she’s as hot as hell for Cody, even though she won’t admit it. Come on, people, what happened to that chemistry I saw at your audition? I want steam! I want pheromones! Try it again.”

Once again the music started. Matt pulled her toward him, more gently this time, but she knew she was still too tense.

“I’m sorry,” she said, pulling away before he kissed her.

“Can we take a few minutes?” Matt called to Dan.

“Not right now,” Dan’s bored voice intoned. “Work on it at home. We’ve got to move on.”

“I couldn’t get into character tonight,” Maggie said in the car on the way home from rehearsal. “What’s wrong with me?”

Matt glanced at her. Her expression in the dim reflection from the dashboard light was woeful. She was stuck inside of her own head, that’s what was wrong.

He spun the steering wheel hard to the right, pulling into a side street. Maneuvering the car to the side of the road, he cut the engines and the lights, and they were plunged into total darkness.

“Matt—”

He grabbed her and kissed her.

“There,” he said as he let her go. God, he didn’t want to let her go. But that was probably why she was freaking out about kissing him in the first place. “That’s how long those eight bars of music are. That wasn’t so terrible was it?”

“No,” she said faintly.

“Good,” he said as matter-of-factly as he could manage. He started the car and did a one-eighty to get them back to the main road, glad that the car was too dark for her to see his face, because his eyes surely would have betrayed him.

Ten

Maggie read another selection from the endless pile of business reports as she ate a bowl of oatmeal. Matt sat across from her with a giant bowl of fruit.

She glanced up at him, and he smiled.

“Don’t you ever eat anything but fruit for breakfast?” she asked.

Matt laughed. “Wow, we wouldn’t do too well on the Newlywed Game, would we? No. The only thing I eat before noon is fruit.”

“Why?”

“Because it makes me feel healthier.”

Maggie gazed across the table at him, wishing he’d tell her why he’d been in the hospital three years ago. But whenever she brought the topic of conversation even vaguely in that direction, he changed the subject. Like right now.

“Speaking of newlyweds, your mother left a message on the answering machine. She wants us to come for Sunday dinner sometime next month. Talk about advance notice—I guess she figures this way we can’t make up an excuse.”

Maggie sighed.

“Also, we’ve got a rehearsal tonight,” he added.

She nodded. Great.

“We’re doing a run-through of the first four scenes,” he reminded her.

She nodded again, focusing her attention on her oatmeal.

He didn’t get the message. “You know that means we’ve got to go in there and do that kiss from the opening scene.”

The kiss. Oh, God.

“We should practice it,” Matt said. “Don’t you think?”

Maggie took a deep breath. “Yeah. We should. How about after lunch?”

“How about now?”

She looked at him, looked at the clock. Stevie was due to arrive in about fifteen minutes. “Okay.” Somehow that made her feel safe.

Safer.

She stood up and headed toward the stairs.

Matt followed. “Where are you going?”

“To brush my teeth.”

He caught her arm, pulled her in to him, and kissed her. His mouth tasted sweet, like watermelon and bananas with a hint of peaches thrown in.

“Yum,” he said. “Brown sugar is definitely better than mint at this time of day.”

Maggie’s insides were doing flip-flops. He hadn’t touched her since that kiss in his car after last week’s disastrous rehearsal. She’d thought she was getting over him—or at least used to him. But if all it took was one little nothing kiss to make her knees feel weak, she was in big trouble.

“Here’s what I’m going to do,” Matt told her. He maneuvered her around as he spoke, going through it in slow motion, putting her into the right position for the best angle for the kiss. She tried to pay attention, but couldn’t. “Lucy is really nuts about this guy, despite everything she says. We should show that right from the start.”

As Maggie looked up into Matt’s golden-greenish eyes, she realized that she understood Lucy’s motivation perfectly. Because, damn it, she wanted Matt, no matter how hard she tried to deny it. Maybe that was her problem. This role was hitting too close to home. But maybe if she kissed him not as Lucy, but as Maggie—Maggie kissing Matt. He’d never know the difference, and she’d bring a certain authenticity to the role.

“Ready?” Matt asked.

“Yeah.” She smiled. She was ready.

She stepped away from him as per the stage directions, and he pulled her toward him. This time, her movement was fluid, and she seemed to flow into his arms. Her lips went up to meet his, and she kissed him with all the fire in her soul. Unable to remember any of the blocking he’d just explained, she put her arms around his neck and pressed herself against him.

She heard him groan, and felt his hands move down her back to the curve of her derriere, as he kissed her harder, more deeply. His thigh pushed against her, and she opened herself to him, wrapping one of her legs around his. The sensation of her bare skin against his made her ignite, and she pulled him even closer.

And still she kissed him. The eight bars of background music could have played over and over and over again.

He slipped his hand up underneath her T-shirt and she shivered at the touch of his fingers against her skin. But then his hand cupped her breast and her heart nearly stopped beating.

“Yo, dudes—Oops, looks like I’ve come at a bad time.”

Maggie and Matt jumped apart to see Stevie backing out of the room.

“We were just rehearsing,” Maggie said breathlessly, her cheeks heating.

Matt sat down at the kitchen table and put his face in his hands. When he glanced up at Stevie, his expression was black, with only a hint of amusement in his eyes to offset it.

“Oh, gee, I just remembered, uh,” Stevie said, “I’ve got to run some errands—”

“Oh, knock it off.” Maggie was annoyed. “It wasn’t what it looked like.” She turned to Matt, blushing again as she remembered the feel of his hand on her breast, but determined to be professional. “I think we sort of overshot the mark, but at least I wasn’t stiff.”

Matt fought the urge to laugh at her word choice. She may not have been stiff….

“Do you want to try it again?” she asked.

“No,” Matt said. He couldn’t. He couldn’t even stand up right now. “Maybe later.”

Steve followed Maggie into the office, turning back to give Matt one last apologetic look. Matt made a face at him, shaking his head and rolling his eyes in frustration.

Stevie glanced in the direction Maggie had disappeared, then came back into the kitchen. “Maybe this is none of my business,” he said quietly to Matt, “but she’s in love with you.”

“I wish.”

“I’m telling you, it’s true.” Steve was serious. “I know her. She’s…Just don’t hurt her, okay?”

Matt was silent as he met the kid’s gaze, uncertain how to respond. He couldn’t decide himself which was worse torture—thinking she didn’t love him or thinking maybe she did.

As usual, Maggie and Matt rolled into rehearsal several minutes early.

The assistant director, the stocky woman with the cat eyeglasses and the clipboard—her name was Dolores, but Dan Fowler called her Hey!—approached Matt immediately, holding out a plastic-wrapped cup with a screw-on lid.

Maggie’s stomach took a downward plunge.

“Time for you-know-what,” Dolores said, tossing the cup to him. “The rules are I’ve got to walk you into the little boys’ room.”

Matt was serene. He just laughed. But when he glanced at Maggie, she knew this bothered him more than he was letting on.

She watched him walk away, wondering how it would feel to be haunted by a bad reputation. It didn’t seem fair that people didn’t notice how much he’d changed.

“Stanton!” Maggie turned to see Dan Fowler waving to her from up on the stage. “Come here for a sec.”

“What’s up?”

He was sitting on one of the chairs that served as makeshift scenery, and he motioned for her to sit, too. When she did, he crossed his arms and looked at her.

And she panicked. He was having second thoughts about casting her. He didn’t think she was going to be able to do those kisses, and he was figuring out the best way to break the news….

“How long have you been seeing Stone?” he finally asked.

She blinked. Stone. Matt. “I’m not…I mean, we’re not dating or anything, if that’s what you mean.”

“You always show up with him. And leave with him.”

What was this leading up to? Maggie didn’t have a clue. “We’re housemates,” she told him.

“You live together.”

“Yeah, but as friends,” she clarified. “We went to high school together.”

“And you’re not involved with him?”

“No.” Why was he asking this?

Dan smiled, his beard parting to expose white, even teeth. His eyes were warm, the dark brown flecked with gold. When he wasn’t frowning, he was actually quite handsome.

“I was wondering if you’d have dinner with me tomorrow night,” he said.

They ran through the opening number, even daring to hoist Maggie onto the shoulders of the men’s chorus. It was awkward and she giggled, but they were on their way.

Then the dread kiss approached. Matt gave her hand a reassuring squeeze as they began the sequence.

He pulled her to him, and instead of kissing her immediately, he gazed down into her eyes for several beats. When his lips finally met hers, Maggie melted. She forced herself to keep the embrace open, only putting her arms around his neck at the very end of the musical phrase.

When he pulled back, he didn’t immediately move away. He looked into her eyes again, and smiled.

“Perfect!” Dan shouted. “That’s exactly what I wanted.”

Maggie finished up the song on a cloud of relief and desire.

Al, the choreographer, was nearly as much of a slave driver as Dan Fowler. Sweat dripped off Maggie’s face as they stopped for a break.

“One of these days,” she swore as she threw herself onto the stage next to Matt, “I’m going to be in a show that rehearses in a theater that has air-conditioning.”

The dance they were doing was a blend of athletic street dancing and graceful jazz, with several steps reminiscent of the old dirty dancing craze thrown in. Most of the steps had no body contact—instead they had to maintain eye contact. Maggie found that almost more dizzying than when Matt actually touched her.

Almost.

She rolled onto her stomach and put her chin in her hand. “Matt? How well do you know Dan Fowler?”

He turned his head to look at her. “I don’t know. Well enough. I know he’s a good director—he gets the job done, and his end result is better than average. Why?”

She shrugged.

“Why?” Matt asked again, his eyes narrowing. “What aren’t you telling me?”

God, he knew her too well. “Nothing,” she said.

“Tell me.”

She laughed. “No.”

“Tell me.” He rolled onto his side, head propped up on one hand. She could tell from looking at him that he wasn’t going to let this slide.

And okay. Maybe she could actually get a rise out of him. She glanced around to make sure no one else was in earshot and Matt leaned in closer as she said, “Dan asked me out.”

He laughed. “You’re kidding.”

Was that jealousy in his eyes, or just amusement? “No,” she said. “He asked me to have dinner with him.”

“Dinner with Dan,” Matt mused. “Do you think he takes the time to eat anything but fast food?”

No, it definitely wasn’t jealousy. Was it possible he really didn’t care if she had dinner with Dan…? “I’ll let you know,” she said, even though she’d turned down the director.

Matt froze. “You’re going?”

Okay. That was a slightly better reaction.

“Actually—” she said, but he cut her off.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to…He’s great. He’s perfect for you, Mags. He’s honest and solid and…”

“Oh,” Maggie said.

“Break’s over,” Dan announced.

Matt gave her a smile as he pulled himself to his feet.

She’d been hoping for jealousy—not for Matt to give her and Dan his blessing.

Eleven

At 1:00 a.m., Matt rose stiffly from his seat at the conference table.

He’d worked muscles in that dance rehearsal tonight that he’d forgotten he had.

The evening had been an emotional workout, too.

The more he thought about it, the more he was convinced that Dan Fowler was perfect for Maggie. The guy was honest and dependable and basically decent. Not too tactful, but that was mostly by choice, since being tactful took too much time.

Matt also knew that Dan had a strict personal policy of never, ever dating the women from his shows. His feelings for Maggie had to be pretty intense if he was willing to break his rules to ask her out. Of course that didn’t surprise Matt at all. The surprise would have been if Dan hadn’t fallen instantly in love with her.

If he had to handpick a guy for Maggie to become involved with, Dan would be at the top of his list. It couldn’t have turned out better if Matt had planned it.

So here he sat, sick with jealousy, knowing without a doubt that no one, not even Dan Fowler, could love Maggie more than he did.

But he also knew that his love for her would do her absolutely no good if he wasn’t around.

Matt stretched, knowing that he wasn’t going to sleep tonight. Instead of lying awake in bed, he might as well make himself as comfortable as possible. He went into his father’s master bedroom—the room Maggie had fallen asleep in, that first night she spent here—and into the bath, where he uncovered the hot tub.

He tried to be quiet as he took the stairs up to his room. There was a paperback book up there he’d started reading several nights ago. He’d finish it long before dawn, but at least he’d fill a few hours.

He paused as he reached the landing on the third floor, looking at Maggie’s closed door. Slowly, he moved toward her room, stopping outside, staring at the doorknob, wishing for the first time in years for a beer.

If he had a beer or two or four, he could use the alcohol as an excuse for reaching out and opening that door. Without the beer, the responsibility was all his.

Maggie sat up in bed, her heart racing. As she listened, Matt’s footsteps faded back down the hallway and up the stairs to his bedroom.

With a sigh of frustration, she sank back in the bed. She couldn’t take much more of this.

Then she heard him coming back down the stairs, and again, she held her breath. But he went past her door without stopping this time.

Don’t think. Just do it.

But even as she threw back the covers and opened her door, she couldn’t help but think.

If she went to him, and threw herself at him again, they would probably make love.

Still, she went down the stairs, down the hall past the dining room, past the living room, to the master bedroom. The connecting bathroom door was ajar.

Quietly she went to the door and peeked in. Matt crouched next to the tub, dipping his fingers in to test the temperature.

She closed her eyes and pushed the door open. “Hi,” she said, and he jumped to his feet.

He didn’t say a word. He simply looked at her.

Now that she was actually here, her confidence faded. She crossed her arms in front of her, suddenly aware that she was wearing only her nightgown. “I heard you going up and down the stairs,” she said. “I know you can’t sleep. I can’t, either.”

And still he didn’t say a word, didn’t move.

“Do you want to talk?” she asked.

Matt shook his head, no. Jeez, she always knew just where to stand to be perfectly backlit. He could see her body through her gown, and he wanted her. Man, he wanted her. He had to get her out of here. This was just too difficult.

“I wanted to tell you that I’m not going out with Dan,” she said, pushing her hair back behind her ear and sitting on the very edge of the wicker chair. “It would just be…too weird.”

“No, Matt knew he should say, it’s okay. Dan’s a good man. You should go. But he couldn’t make himself say it.

Maggie rolled her eyes. “I started thinking, what if my mother calls when I’m out? If you answer the phone, what are you going to tell her? Maggie’s out on a date? She thinks we’re married.”

“But we’re not,” Matt said tightly. He forced himself to turn away from her and instead stared sightlessly out the window.

“The truth is, I told you I was going to have dinner with him, because I was hoping you’d be jealous.”

Oh, God. It had worked. However, it had also worked to convince him that Maggie deserved someone more like Dan—and less like Matt.

“You should go back to bed,” he said, his back to her, praying that she wouldn’t say anything else. “Please? I really don’t want to talk right now.”

We don’t have to talk, Maggie wanted to say, but the words stuck in her throat.

“Please,” he said again. It was little more than a breath, an exhale, but it held all the emotion of a cry of pain. “Go.”

And there she went. Running away. Too scared to speak out, to speak up.

Matt didn’t turn around as she left the room.

Maggie lay in the darkness, looking up at the shadowy canopy that was draped above her bed, calling herself names.

Chicken. Coward. Scaredy-cat. Baby. Wimp. Only a wimp would have run away like that.

The digital numbers of her alarm clock switched from 1:59 to 2:00.

Maggie swore softly. Sleeplessness had never been a problem for her before. Of course, she’d never loved anyone the way she loved Matthew.

And she did love him.

So why was she lying up here all alone?

Because she didn’t want to ruin their friendship? It was no longer a good excuse, because, face it, their friendship was already affected. She wasn’t going to pretend to herself that she didn’t feel anything for him, because damn it, she did. And she wasn’t going to hang back anymore, careful to stay his buddy. She wouldn’t be able to bear watching him find some other woman to spend time with.

So where did that leave her?

She knew that if she went to him and openly asked him to spend the night with her, he wouldn’t refuse her.

But how would she feel in the morning?

That was a question that only the morning light could bring the answer to. The question facing her right now was, how did she feel tonight?

Maggie shivered, remembering the sensation of his lips on hers, of his body against hers. She wanted him, and she knew he wanted her. She’d seen the way he’d looked at her when she’d walked into the bathroom. She’d seen hunger in his eyes.

She stood up and crossed to the door. Taking a deep breath, she put her hand on the knob and turned it, swinging the door open.

And oh, dear Lord, Matt stood there, his hair down around his shoulders, his handsome face unsmiling. Even though the night had turned cool, he wore only his running shorts, and she could see the taut muscles in his chest rise and fall with each breath he took

Gazing up into his beautiful eyes, Maggie knew that the desire she saw there mirrored that in her own eyes. She wondered if he could hear her heart pounding from where he stood.

She wasn’t sure who moved first, but he reached for her as she fell into his arms.

Matt kissed her, desperately, ferociously. And she clung to him, her mouth demanding, her arms wound tightly around his neck as he pulled her closer to him. Her tongue was in his mouth, and his hands swept the length of her body, and he knew that he shouldn’t be doing this, but he couldn’t make himself stop.

Their legs intertwined, and she rubbed herself against him. And still he couldn’t stop himself from reaching down to lift her up so that her legs encircled him.

He pulled back then to look into her face.

She gazed back at him, her cheeks flushed from the heat they’d created, and he felt giddy. He buried his face in her neck, breathing in her scent. She smelled like Maggie—clean and sweet. How many times in his life had he stood close enough to inhale her fragrance, close enough to drive himself mad with wanting her?

She pulled his face up and kissed him.

But again he pulled back. “It’s not too late to stop,” he said, his voice sounding breathless to his own ears. He prayed that she wouldn’t agree.

“Says who?” she countered, tightening the grip of her legs around him, then laughing at the expression on his face.

Another kiss propelled them across the room and they tumbled together onto Maggie’s bed, Matt kissing her again and again in an explosion of need and desire.

“I came up here to talk,” he tried to tell her.

“I can’t talk right now,” she said, kissing his cheeks, his eyes, his lips. “I’m busy.”

He laughed. She kissed his neck, and he closed his eyes, his laughter turning to a sigh of pleasure as he touched her, as he filled his hands with her breasts, as he stroked the smoothness of her soft skin.

“It’s important,” he breathed.

“I’m listening.” She trailed kisses down his chest to his stomach.

Matt felt her tugging at the waistband of his shorts, and he grabbed her wrist. He spun her over and pinned her to the bed with his body, his hands holding her arms above her head.

“Now I’m really listening.” She smiled up at him.

Unable to resist, he brought his mouth down to hers and kissed her slowly, sweetly, deeply. When he pulled back, she was trembling.

And he was, too.

“I really tried to stay away from you,” he confessed. “I know this is selfish, but I couldn’t help myself because…” He took a deep breath and said it. “I love you, Mags.”

“You don’t have to say that,” Maggie said quietly.

“But I do,” he told her. “I’m crazy in love with you. I have been for years. It’s important to me that you know that.”

She looked searchingly into his eyes, her expression dubious. “Matt, I’m not one of those women who have to think that you’re in love with them before they’ll—”

“No. Mags, I know that,” Matt said. “This isn’t a line. I love you. You have to believe me. God, I’ve never been more sincere in my entire life.”

She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter—”

“It does to me. Damn it, I love you! You better believe me.”

Maggie stared up at Matt. His eyes held a glint of determination she’d only seen since he’d begun improving the business, and suddenly, she realized that he was serious.

He was serious.

He loved her.

It was a good thing she was lying down, or she’d fall over. “I believe you,” she whispered.

Relief and satisfaction flared in his eyes before he leaned forward to kiss her again. His mouth caressed hers, gently at first, then with greater need. He was on top of her, and she wrapped her legs around him, pulling him even closer to her.

She was on fire. Everywhere he touched her, she burned. He stopped kissing her, and she pulled her arms free, reaching up around his neck to bring his mouth back to hers.

But he resisted. “Maggie…” His face was so serious.

She pressed one finger to his lips. “Matt, I love you, too,” she told him with a tremulous smile. “Make love to me.”

But he didn’t smile back. In fact, he looked even more troubled. “There’s more I have to tell you.”

Maggie pushed him off of her. “No.”

Well, that surprised him.

“Not now.” She crossed to the dresser and dug through her purse. Matt sat up slightly, leaning back on one elbow, watching her. “You just told me that you love me.” She found what she was searching for and crossed back to him, picking up his free hand and slapping the little package into it. “Use this and prove it.”

He looked at her in amazement. “You carry condoms in your purse?”

Maggie crossed her arms. “Oh, great,” she said in mock anger. “Now you want to talk about that, too?”

He pulled her down onto the bed with him and kissed her. Maggie wasn’t sure exactly how it happened, but when she came up for air, she was no longer wearing her nightgown.

He ran his hands and his eyes over her body, and Maggie felt the familiar rush of heat to her face as she blushed. Then a deeper, more powerful heat infused her as his mouth found her breast.

She ran her fingers though Matt’s long, shiny hair, arching her hips up toward him. She could feel him through his shorts, but that wasn’t good enough.

He clearly thought the same thing, rolling over and, in one quick motion, he yanked them down and kicked his legs free.

Matt had dropped the condom on the bed, and now he reached for it and put it on. He really didn’t need it—there was no way he could get her pregnant, and he hadn’t been with anyone else in—God, it was years. But it would take too long to explain, and Maggie had been adamant about this not being the right time for conversation.

He lay beside her and kissed her, intending to take his time. He’d waited so long for this moment. Every minute, every second was going to count.

But when she opened her mouth to him, when she threw one leg over his hips, he knew he couldn’t wait. And she was just as eager. He was surprised by her strength as she pulled him on top of her.

She reached for him, guiding him and then…

Oh, yes.

She moved with him, breathing his name, kissing him, touching him, surrounding him.

Time stood still and there was only Maggie, only these incredible sensations she was making him feel. His desire for her blazed through him, his heart pumping fire through his veins. His need consumed him and he heard himself call out her name as she exploded around him, as the rush of his own release nearly stopped his heart.

She kissed him, so sweetly, so completely, and he knew without a doubt that he would love her until the day that he died.

Please God, don’t let it be too soon.

Matt rolled over, pulling her with him so that her head rested on his shoulder. He kissed her again and again, kisses for the sake of kissing, delighting in the softness of her lips, the sweetness of her mouth.

Her eyes were so filled with love, he nearly wept.

“I love you,” he whispered.

She smiled. “I believe you. You’re a good actor, but you’re not that good.”

Matt laughed, but it faded away as he realized what he had to do now. There was no putting it off any longer. “We have to talk.”

Maggie sighed, running her fingers across his chest and arms, already starting to make him crazy again.

He couldn’t do this here. Not like this. “Why don’t we go into the kitchen?” he suggested. “Make a cup of tea?”

Something in his voice must’ve telegraphed his anxiety, because she sat up. “I’m listening,” she said. “Really.”

“Can we go downstairs?” he asked.

She nodded and reached for her nightgown.

Twelve

After putting the kettle on the stove, Matt pushed the kitchen windows closed. The night air had gone from cool to cold, with the wind blowing off the sound. Maggie had a sweatshirt on over her nightgown, but she still shivered slightly.

He sat down at the table, across from her, fiddling with the napkin holder as he tried to figure out how to start.

“Now that we’re down here,” he said with a laugh, “I’m not sure how to say this.”

She reached across the table, putting her hands on his. “Whatever you have to say, it can’t be that terrible, can it?”

He met her eyes. “Mags, it’s about when I went into the hospital. And yes, it’s terrible.”

She looked down at their hands for a moment, and when she looked back up, into his eyes again, there was so much love on her face, it nearly took his breath away. “You know there’s nothing you can say that will make me stop loving you. Nothing.”

“I had cancer,” he told her. There. He said it.

Maggie couldn’t breathe. She stared across the table at him, waiting, hoping, praying for it to be a joke. Any minute now he’d tell her the punchline.

“I was diagnosed,” Matt said softly, “with Hodgkin’s disease.”

“Oh, my God,” she whispered. It was indeed a joke, a cruel, horrible joke of fate. “Was? Past tense?”

“Well, yeah,” he said. Then he shook his head. “No, I don’t want to lie to you.” He looked up at her, his face apologetic, his eyes dark with unhappiness. “The truth is, I hope it’s gone, but I don’t know for sure. It’s been almost a year since I had my last treatment of chemo. The odds of a recurrence are pretty high for the first year—”

“How high?” Tears were slipping down her cheeks.

“Fifty percent,” he said. “Sixty percent, maybe more. I’m on the high end, because my cancer’s already recurred.”

How could he sit there so calmly and tell her that the odds of his cancer returning were so terribly high?

“But you know, instead of saying I’ve got a sixty percent chance of dying, I say there’s a forty percent chance I’m going to live to be an old man. And that’s great. That’s…There was a time during my second round of chemo that my chances of surviving barely broke double digits,” he said quietly.

“You had chemotherapy,” Maggie said, pulling her hands away to wipe her eyes and cheeks. “For how long?”

“Two six-month courses. The second was intensive and kind of experimental.”

“God, Matt, why didn’t you tell me?”

“Before we made love? I tried to—”

“No, damn it!” Maggie hit the table with the palm of her hand and the flower vase came perilously close to toppling. “When you were in the hospital!”

The teakettle began to whistle, and they both stood up. Maggie reached the stove first, switching off the gas. She turned back to Matt and glared at him. “Why didn’t you call me?”

He shook his head. “I couldn’t. Besides, what was I supposed to say? Hi, how are you, it’s been ten years, and oh, by the way, I have cancer?”

“Why not? God, do you know how it makes me feel that you were in that hospital, and I didn’t even know? I was living my stupid, mundane life, completely unaware that any minute you were maybe going to die?”

She began to cry again, and Matt wrapped his arms around her, holding her close.

“I didn’t die,” he told her. “I’m not going to die. Not now. Especially not now.”

She glared at him. “Cancer isn’t something you can wish away.”

He shrugged, pushing her hair back from her face. “Hey, why not? I’m willing to try anything. And wishing is relatively inexpensive and pain-free.” He kissed her gently. “Tonight was so perfect. I’m sorry I had to ruin it.”

“What, now you’re apologizing for having had cancer?” With her arms wrapped around his waist, he felt so solid, so vital. She could hear his heart beating, steady and strong. It didn’t seem possible that cancer was growing inside of Matt’s perfect body. “I’m so glad you finally told me.”

“I had to,” he said.

“No, you didn’t.” She tilted her head back to look at him.

“Yeah, I did. If you love me, you deserve to know. I just…don’t be scared, okay?”

“I’m not scared,” Maggie told him. No, she was terrified. She reached up to touch his hair. “When you had chemo…”

His smile turned rueful. “Yup. I was balder than Yul Brenner. Except I didn’t look as good as he did.”

“You probably haven’t cut it since…”

“Only to even it out.” Matt sat down, pulling Maggie onto his lap. “Or to trim the ends. I kind of have this superstition. It’s silly…”

“Tell me.”

“It’s dumb,” he admitted, “but after my hair started growing back in, I kind of saw it as a symbol of life. And I got this crazy idea that if I didn’t cut my hair, the cancer wouldn’t come back. I know it’s ridiculous, but it’s gotten to the point where it’s become like a superstition or a good-luck charm. It’s kind of like lifting your feet and touching the roof of the car when you cross railroad tracks, so you’ll have good luck. Deep down you know it’s not going to matter one damn bit, but you still do it—just in case.”

She fingered his hair again. “Gee, if you’re never going to cut it, it’s going to get pretty long. In about five years, you’re going to have to hire someone to carry your hair around behind you.”

“I hope so,” Matt said.

His eyes were sober as Maggie gazed into them, and she realized with a jolt of fear that there was a very good chance Matt wouldn’t be alive in five years. “When will you know?” she asked.

He knew what she meant. “I’m flying out to California at the end of next week.”

“California?”

“Yeah, I suppose I could go into Yale New Haven Hospital, but I’d rather go back to the doctor who treated me,” Matt told her. “We know each other pretty well. They’ll do a series of tests to find out if I’m still clean.”

“And if you are?” she asked. “What then?”

“Then I get happy.” He traced her lips with his thumb. “Then I come back and we make love for the rest of our long, happy lives.”

Maggie started to cry.

“Whoa,” Matt said. “Mags, that was the good part.”

“I love you,” she said. “Don’t you dare die!”

Matt held her close, his heart squeezing with pain, knowing that he couldn’t make her any promises.

Maggie turned on the light in the late Mr. Stone’s ostentatious office and went straight to the bookshelf. It didn’t take her long to find what she wanted—she’d seen the books before, even though she hadn’t realized their significance. She pulled the big American Cancer Society’s Cancer Handbook off the shelf, along with several others.

As she looked through the books, she realized that her suspicions were true. Mr. Stone had these books because he knew about Matt’s cancer. He had used a pink highlight pen to mark the sections on Hodgkin’s, and she silently thanked him as she leafed through, reading the marked pages.

She was still sitting there an hour later, books spread out in front of her on the huge desk, when Matt came in. His breezy steps slowed as he saw what she was reading.

“Sometimes it’s scarier to read about it,” Matt said. “The books tell you only so much and make you realize how many unanswered questions you have. And if they go into any kind of detail, you need a medical degree to understand—”

“There’s a lot you didn’t tell me.” Maggie tried hard to keep her voice from shaking. “You didn’t tell me that even if there’s no sign of a recurrence, that doesn’t mean the cancer’s gone. All it means is that you have a better chance of living five more years. And if you live the five years without a recurrence, all that means is you have a better chance of living another five years. And it just keeps on going. Forever.”

“Mags, people who live for five years without their cancer returning are virtually cured.”

She was silent, just watching him. He stared down at the red carpeting for a moment, then back up at her. His expression was unreadable, his eyes guarded. “Look, I know how tough it is to come to grips with this. If you don’t want to deal with it, with me, I understand—”

“No!” Maggie stood up fast and the big leather chair rocked wildly behind her. “I just need to know everything. Don’t hide stuff from me, okay?”

He nodded, watching her pace. “Okay. Then there is something else I should tell you.”

Maggie froze, gripped with a sudden rush of fear. “What?”

“The chemo and radiation made me sterile,” he said. “I’ll never be able to have children.” He laughed without humor. “At least not the regular way.”

Relief flooded through her. She’d thought he was going to tell her that he felt sick again, that he thought the cancer was coming back.

“I’ve got some deposits in a sperm bank,” he said, “but that’s not very romantic—”

“I read something in here that scared me,” she interrupted him. “I read that one of the symptoms of this kind of cancer is sleep problems. Night sweats and—”

“No,” he said. “The problems I’m having sleeping now is different. It’s in my head, Mags. I don’t sleep much because it’s important to me not to waste any time.” He stood up, crossed behind the desk and threw open the heavy shutters. Sunlight streamed in, and then cool fresh air, as he opened the big window. He turned to face her. “I don’t kid myself. I know I might not be here this time next year.”

“How do you live with that?” she asked softly. “Tell me, so I can learn how to live with it, too.”

He smiled at her. “You start by believing in miracles. You know, when I was diagnosed, they gave me seven months, tops. But here I am, three years later.” He put his arms around her, kissed her sweetly. “Every day I wake up, Mags, I think of as a gift. I’ve been given one more day to live, and I’m not going to waste it.”

“But don’t you feel it’s not fair? Don’t you feel cheated?”

“Cheated?” He laughed. “No way. I’ve been given a second chance. I won big, Maggie. They told me I was going to die. I was dead, it was a given. But miracles happen.” He kissed her again. “I’m more convinced of that than ever after last night. Not only am I not dead, but I’m living my dream. How incredibly great is that?”

He kissed her again, and she clung to him.

“Let’s go back to bed,” he breathed into her ear.

She made herself laugh instead of crying. “Taking a nap in the middle of the day,” she teased. “Doesn’t that fall into the ‘waste of time’ category?”

He laughed, a glint in his eyes. “Absolutely not.”

Matt took her hand and pulled her out of the office, into the main part of the house, all the way up the stairs to his tower room. The blinds were up and the windows were open wide, letting in the sun and the ocean breeze. The sky was a brilliant blue—it was like being on top of the world.

He undressed her slowly, taking his time to touch and kiss her, as she did the same to him.

And there they were. Naked in the sunlight.

They took their sweet time, falling together back on his bed, touching, tasting, exploring.

He would have spent hours in foreplay, but it was Maggie who grew impatient.

She pushed him back on the bed, straddling him, plunging him deeply inside of her.

She laughed at his gasp of pleasure, smiling down at him as she moved on top of him, setting him on fire.

“Hey,” he tried to slow her down. “If you keep doing that, I’m going to lose control.”

“I know,” she said. “I like it when you lose control.”

Oh dear God, what she was doing to him…But…“Mags, I’m serious—”

“Hey,” she said, pretending to frown at him. “Who’s on top?”

He had to laugh. “You are. Mistress.”

She laughed at that. “Damn straight.” God, she was so incredibly sexy. “Tell me when,” she ordered him.

Matt could see her love for him in her eyes, in her smile, on her face, radiating from her, and he knew that all the hell he’d been through had been worth it—if only to live for this one moment. And there would be other moments like this one, he knew, not just making love, but sharing their love.

She loved him. Maggie loved him. And it was all over for him.

“When,” he gasped, and just like that, she dropped out of warp speed. She didn’t stop moving, she just made each stroke last an eternity, and he crashed into her in slow motion. And then she was coming, too, and he couldn’t believe how incredible it felt.

She collapsed on top of him, and he held her tightly, their two hearts pounding.

“I like it when you lose control,” she whispered again.

Matt laughed. “Yeah, that kind of worked for me, too. Where did you, um, learn to…?”

She lifted her head to look down at him, her eyes sparkling with restrained laughter. “I’m extremely well read.” Her smile was devilish. “I liked the mistress thing.”

Oh, dear Lord, it was possible he was the luckiest man in the world. “I love you so much,” he told her.

And just like that, she started to cry.

“Oh, Mags,” he said, his heart breaking. “God, please don’t cry.” He kissed her. “Don’t be sad—”

“I’m not,” she told him, kissing him, too. “I’m crying because I’m so happy. Oh, Matt, I’m so glad you didn’t die.”

He held her close. “Me, too, Maggie,” he whispered. “Me, too.”

Thirteen

Maggie sat in the theater, looking up at the stage.

Matt was rehearsing a song that his character sang with a vocal quartet. The soprano, a woman named Charlene, was flirting with him, standing too close, her hand lingering far too long on his arm.

He glanced over at Maggie, caught her eye, and made a face.

“Some things never change,” she mouthed to him, and he laughed. “Behave,” she added, with a mock frown.

“Yes, mistress,” he mouthed back, heat in his eyes.

Oh, dear Lord, it was hot in here. And when would this rehearsal end?

The soprano was watching them, and Maggie smiled sweetly up at her. Tough luck, Charlene. Matt was taken.

“Time to take ten, no fifteen,” Dan Fowler shouted, and the cast scattered, knowing that the director was serious about the small amounts of time he allotted for breaks. “Stone! It’s time to deal with your hair.”

“Yeah, sorry, Dan.” Matt dug into this pocket for a ponytail holder and pulled his hair back from his face. “I’ll keep it pulled back if you want.”

“I want it cut.” Dan’s nasal voice echoed in the auditorium. “I got a friend here tonight who cuts hair down in New York. She’s ready to cut your hair right now.”

Matt froze. Maggie watched him make himself relax, one muscle at a time before he spoke.

“Tell her thank you,” he said, “but I’m not going to cut my hair.”

“Hello,” Dan said. “Cody works for one of the biggest advertising firms in Manhattan. He doesn’t have long hair.”

“I’m sorry,” Matt said, “but we’re going to have to work around this. I’ll tie it back and put it under my shirt. I’ll wear a wig if you want me to.”

Dan walked to the stage, followed by a woman in a black stretch jumpsuit. “Come on, Stone. It’ll grow back. Getting your hair cut isn’t going kill you. Don’t make me treat you like some rude child and tie you down—”

Matt backed away. “No,” he said, his voice sharp.

Dan stopped short. “Jeez, I was kidding.”

Maggie quickly climbed on stage and moved to stand beside Matt. She took his hand, squeezing it, and he glanced at her.

“What’s with you tonight, Stone?” Dan’s eyes narrowed. “You seem a little…I don’t know. Strung-out?” He turned toward the rows of seats. “Hey, Dolores!”

Dolores appeared instantly, as if Dan had conjured her up. She held a plastic specimen cup in her hand.

Matt exhaled loudly. It was similar to a laugh, but it held not a drop of humor. “I just don’t want to get my hair cut,” he said. “That doesn’t mean I’m on drugs.”

“Take the cup. You know what to do.”

“Are you saying that I can’t disagree with you without having to take a urine test?” Matt’s voice rose in volume despite his efforts to stay cool.

“This is not a disagreement,” Dan said. “This is weird behavior. Go do your thing, and then get back here and get your hair cut. Dolores, go with him to the men’s.”

Matt didn’t move. He just stared at Dan.

“What, you’re not going to do it?” Dan asked. “Then get off my stage.”

Matt still didn’t move.

“You think you’re irreplaceable? Well, you’re wrong. I’ll take over your part myself. No sweat. In fact, it would be a real pleasure.” Dan’s gaze flicked over to Maggie just long enough so Matt knew exactly what he meant.

Two little words were on his lips. Two little words that would tell Dan Fowler exactly what he should do with himself.

But Maggie was watching him, and he closed his eyes instead. He took a deep, deep breath in through his nose. He held it, and then exhaled in a large swoosh through his mouth. Eyes still closed, he drew in more air.

“What’s he doing?” Dan asked.

“I think he’s trying not to kill you,” Dolores said dryly.

Matt took three or four more deep breaths, then slowly opened his eyes. He took the specimen cup from Dolores, and even managed to give her a smile. “I’ll take your drug test,” he said quietly to Dan, “but you’re not going to cut my hair.”

Dan Fowler’s face was expressionless as Maggie explained why Matt didn’t want his hair cut.

But then he laughed. “You really believe this crap, don’t you?”

Maggie’s mouth dropped open. “Are you saying that you don’t?”

“Yeah, I think it’s fiction. Stone is what I call a pathological actor,” Dan told her. “When you deal with him, it’s impossible to tell where reality ends and fiction begins. I’m not sure he’s able to tell the difference himself.” He laughed again. “So much for you and him not being involved, huh? When did that happen?”

She didn’t answer.

“I suppose that’s what I get, making you guys practice all that kissing at home,” he continued. “Stone’s playing some kind of game with your head, Maggie. Cancer—my ass.”

Maggie stood up, spitting out the very same words she knew Matt had worked so hard not to say. “You may have no trouble replacing Matt,” she added, “but keep in mind that if he goes, I go, too.”

“Relax,” Dan said. “We’ll work around the hair thing. I don’t want either of you to quit, okay? I just think you shouldn’t take everything Stone says as the absolute truth. Did he say which hospital he was in?”

“Yeah. The Cancer Center at the University of Southern California. Maybe you should call and check, make sure he really was there, Dan.”

“Maybe I will. Oh, and in case you were wondering, his urine tests have all come up clean. So far, anyway.”

“It must really suck to be you,” Maggie told him.

He nodded, turning back to the papers on the table in front of him. “Yeah. Right now I wish I were Stone—imagine that.” He glanced up at her. “I’ll be here if you need me, you know, when you wake up from this dream you’re living in.”

“I won’t need you,” she said, seething with indignation as she walked away.

Fourteen

When the alarm went off at eight o’clock, Maggie was already awake.

Ever since Matt had left for California two days ago, she’d been unable to eat or sleep. The only thing she could actually do was work, so she’d dug in, working late into the night on the monthly accounts, searching for some legal principle to fall back on if they couldn’t increase profits.

Stevie and Matt had had their heads together for over a week now, working on something that Matt didn’t want to show her until they’d done some more research.

Maggie was still trying to get her hands on that mysterious codicil—tracking it down had been much harder than she’d thought.

She got out of bed, showered quickly and was soon downstairs in the office, wishing for the nine millionth time that she’d been able to talk Matt into letting her go with him.

But he’d been adamant she remain in Connecticut. “I want to keep then and now completely separate,” he’d said to her the evening before his flight. He’d smiled at her lazily as they lay in his bed. “I think of it as something out of science fiction—the time I spent there was kind of an alternate reality. If that and my present reality ever meet—boom. The whole world will explode.”

Maggie had rolled her eyes. “Matt, get serious.”

And he did. “I left behind an awful lot of pain and fear at the Cancer Center,” he told her. “I know they saved my life—at least they gave me some extra time—but it’s not a nice place. The tests aren’t a lot of fun. And waiting for the results…”

“That’s why I want to go with you,” she said.

“And that’s why I don’t want you to come,” he said. “Please. I don’t want you to see me there, like that.”

So here she was, waiting for him.

He’d called when his flight landed in L.A., and again several times over the past few days. He’d told her he wouldn’t have any test results until Tuesday night.

It was finally Tuesday.

Maggie looked at the clock.

Eight-thirty in the morning.

It was going to be another long day.

The telephone finally rang at nine o’clock that evening.

“Hey, Mags.” Matt sounded exhausted.

Maggie closed her eyes briefly, taking a deep breath. “Matt.” Tell me. Tell me, tell me, tell me.

“Sorry I couldn’t call earlier,” he said. “You wouldn’t believe what I had to go through to get to a phone.”

If he were okay, he would have told her without any delay, wouldn’t he? Maggie tried to still the fear that was rising into her throat. “Tell me,” she said.

“Well, there’s good news and bad news,” he said. “I thought I was going to be able to catch the red-eye home tonight—”

“Oh, God,” she breathed.

“No, that’s the bad news,” he said.

“Then tell me the good news.”

“The good news is that there’s no definite bad news,” he said. “The test results came back…weird. They want to retest before telling me anything.”

“Weird how?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I just know we’re back in wait mode. If you want to know the truth, I think there was some kind of error in the lab and they’re just afraid to tell me. I wish they would. It’s better than thinking—”

“Matt, I’m going to fly out,” she said.

“No,” he said. “Don’t. I’ve been picturing you sleeping in my bed, or working downstairs and…It’s been a great focus for me, Maggie. I need you there, waiting for me.” Over the line, she heard a murmured voice talking to Matt. “I have to go,” he said. “I’ll call you as soon as I know anything. I love you.”

“I’m coming out there,” she told him, but the connection was already broken.

The earliest flight to LAX left Bradley Airport several hours after midnight.

Maggie bought a ticket online, and then went about the business of getting through the day.

She had to file more papers in New Haven in an effort to get a look at that damned elusive codicil to Mr. Stone’s will. And there was a rehearsal starting at seven. She’d have to leave a little early to get to the airport on time.

The day passed interminably slowly. Maggie waited in line after line, dealing with disinterested, apathetic clerks as she tried to find out what had gone wrong with her petition to release that codicil.

She ate a tuna fish sandwich standing up in a dreary deli, then went back to slug it out with more bureaucrats. At three o’clock, after demanding to speak to a supervisor, she found out that there was a form missing from the paperwork she’d submitted, and she had to get Matt’s signature before anything else could be done.

She went out to join the wall of traffic on Route 95.

Back at the house, she hurried inside, only to find that she’d gone out without turning on the telephone answering machine. Matt might have called her, but she would never know. Bitterly disappointed, she sank down on the living room floor and cried.

Dan had taken the news that Matt wasn’t at rehearsal and that Maggie was going to leave early in surprisingly good form. He made arrangements for one of the men in the chorus to read and walk through the part of Cody for the evening.

They were running the second half of the second act, starting with a solo Maggie sang, alone in Lucy’s bedroom. The scene immediately following the song was the same one she and Matt had auditioned with—the scene with that brain rattling kiss.

It didn’t matter how many times they practiced it, Matt still left her breathless. God, she missed him.

Rhonda, the accompanist, started to play, and Maggie tried to focus on the song. It was a plaintive ballad, in which Lucy, after becoming engaged to Cody’s rival, wonders why she’s feeling so miserable when she should be happy. Maggie didn’t have any problem calling up feelings of misery this evening.

Please God, let Matt and me have a happy ending.

Finally, quietly, the song ended, and Maggie closed her eyes, following Dan’s blocking.

“Lucy, are you still awake?”

That voice was unmistakable, and Maggie’s heart leapt as she snapped her head up.

Matt stood on the other side of the stage, wearing his familiar blue jeans and high voltage white T-shirt. His face looked tired and maybe a little pale, but he was smiling at her.

“Matt!”

Two long strides brought him toward her, even as she launched herself at him. His arms went around her, and then she was kissing him—hungrily, breathlessly, impatiently, thankfully.

She pulled back to look up into his eyes.

He’d cut his hair. It was short—similar to the way he’d worn it in high school. She tried to swallow her fear as she wondered if he’d cut his hair because it hadn’t worked as a good luck charm.

“I’m okay,” he told her. “Maggie, I’m clean. The cancer hasn’t come back.”

The rush of relief was so intense that she swayed. He held her tightly, kissing her again.

“Uh, people.” Dan’s voice penetrated Maggie’s euphoria. “This little reunion is deeply moving, but it’s not getting us any farther along here. Do you mind sticking to what’s in the book?”

Still holding Maggie close, Matt looked out at the director. “Please, can we take ten?”

“You’ve already taken five,” Dan said grumpily. “We’ve got a scheduled break coming up in about twenty minutes. Let’s keep it going.”

“There’s so much I want to say to you,” Matt whispered to Maggie. He gave her one more kiss before crossing back to his mark on the other side of the stage.

They ran through their lines almost automatically as Maggie kept her eyes on Matt. She was afraid to blink, afraid he’d vanish as quickly as he’d appeared.

His hairstyle brought out the exotic planes and angles of his face. He was more handsome than ever. And as he turned his back to her slightly, she saw that he’d only cut the top and sides of his hair. The back was still long, pulled into a ponytail at his nape. He could stick it under a shirt and no one would ever know he had hair halfway down his back.

“And you’re wondering what it would feel like,” Matt was saying, “if you brought your lips up, like this…” He moved her face up toward him, and Maggie caught her breath at the love she saw in Matt’s eyes.

He didn’t say anything for several long moments. She could feel his heart beating against hers, he was holding her so tightly.

“Oh, Christ.” Dan’s voice echoed in the room. “Line! Somebody give him his line!”

“And if I brought my lips down, like this…” Dolores prompted from the edge of the stage.

But Matt didn’t seem to hear. “Maggie,” he said, his voice husky. “Will you marry me?”

She caught her breath. Marry him. As in forever. As in the rest of his life. As in, he now believed his life would last long enough for him to share it with her.

Joy and relief flooded through her. There was nothing Matt could have done to convince her more that he believed his cancer was truly gone.

And as for marrying him…

“Yes.”

With a shout of laughter, Matt kissed her.

The cast broke into a round of applause.

“Oh, Lord,” Dan’s bored voice cut over the clapping. “I guess we better take a break.”

Fifteen

“Stevie’s late,” Maggie said.

“No, he’s not,” Matt said calmly. “We’re early.”

“Aren’t you even the tiniest bit nervous?” she asked him. This still seemed unreal. They’d applied for the marriage license, waited the short time it took to get it processed, and now here they were, standing in a church, about to get…

Married.

Matt smiled down at her. “No.”

With her hair piled up on top of her head, dressed simply in a white sundress, Maggie was the most beautiful bride he’d ever seen in his life. No, he wasn’t nervous. Thankful, happy, joyous, excited—yes, he was all those things, but not nervous.

When he’d been in the hospital, when no one would give him a good answer as to why he needed more and more extensive tests, he’d been so sure his luck had run out.

Then, finally, he’d gotten a straight answer from his puzzled doctor. He was not only clean, but a precancerous condition in his lungs had vanished. No one could figure out what had happened. And the doctors hadn’t told him earlier, because they didn’t want to get his hopes up—they needed to be sure that somehow the tests hadn’t been botched, that the results hadn’t been switched with that of another patient’s.

Especially since they’d been so sure this time last year that he wasn’t going to survive. Yet, there he was, passing all the tests with flying colors, in apparent good health.

For now, at least.

Matt didn’t know if “for now” was to last five years, ten years, or one hundred years, but he did know that he wanted to spend every moment of his life with Maggie.

No, he wasn’t nervous.

But Maggie was.

“Are you really sure you want to do this?” she asked. “It’s so…permanent. And sudden.”

“Mags, I’ve loved you for over a dozen years,” he reminded her. “It’s not sudden. But it’s definitely permanent.” He laced their fingers together. “You’re my best friend,” he told her. “And the love of my life.” He had to smile at himself. “That sounds so corny, but…”

“It’s not,” she said. Her eyes were luminous. God, she was beautiful.

“I know,” he said, and kissed her.

“Yo, aren’t you supposed to wait until after the vows for that monkey business?” Stevie interrupted them.

“You’ve got to work on your timing,” Matt told him with a grin.

“Oh, great elder ones,” Stevie said, bowing with a flourish. “Allow me to humbly introduce my friend Danielle Trent.”

This was the girl who was providing Steve with so many sleepless nights. Tall and slim with short blond curls, her face wasn’t really so much pretty as it was friendly, with a smattering of freckles across her nose. Her eyes were lovely, though—an odd shade of violet with thick, dark lashes. She underwent their scrutiny solemnly, then exchanged a look with Stevie and smiled. Her smile transformed her face, and she became suddenly, freshly beautiful. Matt found himself liking the girl instantly.

“I’ve heard a lot about you guys,” Danielle said. “When Stevie asked me to come to your wedding, I couldn’t resist. I hope it’s really okay.”

“Of course it is,” Maggie said.

“Actually, you’re a vital part of the action,” Matt told her. We can’t get married without you—we need two witnesses.”

“You are eighteen, right?” Maggie asked.

“Just,” the girl said.

“Excellent,” Matt said.

The pastor of the church came in through a heavy set of double doors. He shook hands with all four of them, his round face beaming. “I haven’t done a small wedding like this in years,” he said as he led them to the front of the church. “We’ll go through the vows and exchange rings here in the sanctuary. Then you can all come back to my office, and we’ll do the paperwork.”

“Rings,” Maggie said in dismay. “I knew we forgot something!”

But Matt held out his hand and Stevie dropped a blue velvet jewelry case into his palm. “I took care of it,” he told her. “The rings aren’t sized or engraved, but I figured we could use them temporarily.”

Maggie gazed at Matt, realizing again how much he had changed from the reckless boy she’d known in high school. He stood there, tall and strong and calmly in control, and she knew without a doubt that agreeing to marry him was the smartest decision she’d ever made in her life.

“Ready?” the minister asked with a smile.

Maggie looked into Matt’s eyes and smiled. Yes, she was ready.

Their gaze held as the man began to speak, talking of love, of commitment, of trees growing stronger with their roots entwined.

Then he turned to Matt and began the vows.

Matt didn’t look away from Maggie once as he repeated the words that would bind them together. His voice rang out clear and true in the empty church, echoing among the beams and rafters of the high ceiling. There was not even the slightest trace of doubt on his face, nor the slightest glimmer of uncertainty in his voice.

Matt slipped the ring, a plain gold band, onto her finger and smiled at her, adding his own ad-lib to the well known lines. “I promise I’ll love you forever, Maggie.”

Forever.

The word had special meaning to them, since they both knew well that Matt’s forever might not be as long as most. Maggie felt tears spring into her eyes, but she smiled up at him.

Her own voice trembled a little as she pledged and promised herself to Matt. She pushed his ring onto his finger, then held tightly to his hand. “I promise I’ll love you forever, Matt,” she added, too.

“I pronounce you man and wife.” The minister smiled. “You may kiss the bride.”

Matt leaned down and brushed her lips with his, then wrapped his arms around her as he kissed her more thoroughly.

“You’re mine now,” Matt whispered to her. “You are mine.”

He picked her up and twirled her around, laughing, right there in the front of the church. “All right!” his joyous shout echoed.

Stevie looked at the smiling minister, one eyebrow raised. “I dunno,” he said. “I think he kind of likes her.”

Maggie stirred and slowly opened her eyes to see Matt smiling down at her.

The silvery light of dawn was streaming in the windows of the tower room. Maggie caught her breath as she saw, once again, the hundreds and hundreds of roses that sat in vases on every available surface. Those roses were the reason Stevie and Danielle had been late to the church. But they’d done a wonderful job. The flowers had given the room a fairy-tale-like quality by candlelight, a quality that survived in the pale light of the morning sun. Even after two days, the room looked gorgeous, and the scent of the roses perfumed the breeze that wafted in through the open windows.

“What time is it?” she asked Matt, lazily stretching her arms above her head.

“Almost six.”

“How long have you been awake?” she asked, snuggling against him.

“A little while.”

Maggie gave him a look. “What, only two hours or only four hours?”

He shrugged, smiling.

“I wouldn’t mind if you got out of bed when you can’t sleep.”

“I know,” Matt said. “But I didn’t want to get up. I wanted to be here. With you.”

“Do you just lie awake and think?” she asked, feeling the familiar rush of desire as her legs intertwined with his.

“Sometimes,” he said. “I like to spend some time every day centering myself—you know, keeping my perspective about what’s a big problem and what’s a little inconvenience. Actually, much earlier this morning, I went downstairs and got my briefcase. I was reading about the great controversy between using foil bags or plastic to package the chips.”

He rolled his eyes and Maggie laughed.

“After we win this inheritance thing,” Matt said, pulling her closer and running his hands down her body. “Let’s give the plant manager a big fat raise and tell him to hold down the fort while we go on a honeymoon to some exotic, tropical paradise where we can run naked on the beach.”

He kissed her, and she could feel him, heavy and hot against her.

“Or maybe Europe,” he said, his voice soft, hypnotizing. “I’ve always wanted to go to Europe. How about you, Maggie Stone?”

Maggie Stone. She sighed with pleasure as he—

The telephone rang shrilly, and she jumped, then caught Matt’s arm. “Don’t answer it. Please? Let the answering machine pick it up.”

Matt looked at her. “Who don’t you want to talk to?” She kissed him, trying to distract him again, but he pulled back. “Who else would be calling at six in the morning? Angie, right?”

Maggie sighed.

Matt laughed. “Mags, there’s no way Angie could have found out we got married on Friday. Steve and Danielle swore they wouldn’t tell anyone and—”

“My mother thinks we’ve been married for almost two months now,” Maggie said. “It’s something she would mention if Angie called, looking for me.”

“Maybe Angie knows, maybe she doesn’t.” Matt studied her face. “I think you should call her and tell her about us. Then you can stop feeling guilty.”

“I don’t feel guilty.” Her voice rose with indignation.

“Yes, you do.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Look at you—you’ve got guilt written all over your face.” Matt grinned. “You can’t feel guilty about going to bed with me anymore because we’re married. We’re supposed to be doing this.”

Maggie closed her eyes with a sigh of pleasure as Matt’s hands and mouth continued to roam.

“Call her, Mags,” he said. “Today.”

“Oh, okay.”

“Promise?”

She opened her eyes, looking down at him. “No fair. I’d promise you anything right now.”

He smiled and kissed her again. “Then maybe this is a good time for us to talk about that invitation we have to dinner at your parent’s house this afternoon.”

“Oh, no,” she said faintly. “Do we have to go?”

“Yes,” he said firmly. “We can use the opportunity to tell them we’re married. Of course, we’ll probably have to show your father our marriage certificate as proof.”

“You mean the new, unlaminated one?” Maggie said.

Matt laughed and kissed her, and they both stopped talking, for a little while at least.

“Hello?” Angie picked up the phone on the second ring.

“Hey, Ang.” Maggie’s stomach churned with dread. Whoever called this morning hadn’t left a message on the machine, but deep down she knew it had been Angie. Somehow her friend had tracked her down. “It’s me.”

“Maggie.” Angie’s voice was cool, with a distance that had nothing to do with the fact that she was on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. “’Bout time I heard from you. How’s Matt?”

“Funny you should ask—”

“You know I always thought you were the smartest person I knew, because out of all my friends, you were the only one who never let Matt get to you. Damn, Mags, what are you thinking? Living with him? You know, your mother told me you’re married, but I knew you wouldn’t be that stupid—”

“Angie—”

“Or even that naive to think Matt would ever commit to marriage. The man is a snake, Mags. He may be handsome, he might be good in bed, but you cannot trust him. He’ll promise you the moon, then he’ll walk away and find somebody else.”

“No, Angie—”

“He lies. He’s a liar and a cheat—he doesn’t have a soul. I swear, Maggie, get out before it’s too late—”

“Stop! Angie, just stop,” Maggie shouted into the phone.

She could hear her friend breathing hard on the other end of the line. Her own voice shook as she started to speak, so she cleared her throat and started again. “I don’t know what he did to you,” she said quietly, “but he’s never been anything but kind and honest to me.”

“Oh, please—”

“Stop talking,” Maggie said forcefully. “For once in your life, be quiet and listen to me.”

Silence.

“I love him.”

Silence.

“And two days ago, I did marry him.”

“What? Oh, God, you idiot—”

“He’s good and kind and funny and smart, and I’m crazy about him,” Maggie spoke right over her.

“I thought you were in love with that jungle man from the health club.”

“Matt is the jungle man. I didn’t recognize him at first.”

“Oh, come on! You didn’t recognize him? God, I should have told you to marry Brock. I don’t know why Matt’s married you, but he must have some ulterior motive.”

“Gee, thanks a million.” Maggie’s voice shook with indignation. “Like what? Tell me what on earth his motive for marrying me could possibly be!”

“I don’t know—”

“How about because he loves me? How’s that for an ulterior motive?”

“No,” Angie said. “Matt doesn’t know how to love. You’re just a prize.”

“What?”

“A prize. You’re something he always wanted but couldn’t have. Now he’s the winner. Except now that he’s married to you, every other woman on the planet is something he can’t have. How long ’til he goes after some other prize? One month or two?”

“No.” Maggie gripped the telephone so tightly that her knuckles were turning white. “He loves me, Angie. He’s my husband now, whether you like it or not.”

“I don’t like it. Damn you, Maggie—how could you do this to me?”

“To you? What is your problem? You sound jealous, like you’re still in love with him. Is that what this is about? You’re angry because I got what you couldn’t have?”

“No!”

“Damn right, no! You didn’t want him. You married somebody else, remember? It’s not like I slept with your boyfriend—”

“Did you?” Angie asked hotly.

“What?”

“Did you sleep with him when he was my boyfriend?” Angie’s voice was rough with anger. “Jesus, all this time I was trying to protect you from him, and maybe you were the one who started it.”

“I can’t believe you’re accusing me of—”

“And I can’t believe that you could do something like marry that lying bastard and expect us to continue to be friends as if nothing was different,” Angie spat.

“I won’t talk to you if you’re going to call him names.”

“Then obviously, we have nothing more to say to each other,” Angie said tightly. “Have a nice life, Mags. With luck, he’ll die young and you’ll still have a chance at happiness.”

There was a click as Angie hung up the phone, leaving Maggie staring sightlessly at the walls.

What a horrible thing to say—even more horrible, considering the circumstances. Angie didn’t know about Matt’s battle with cancer, but that was still no excuse to say such a thing.

Tears flooded Maggie’s eyes and she cried.

Maggie stood in her mother’s kitchen, cutting up tomatoes for a salad when Stevie breezed in.

“Hi, y’all,” he said. “Am I late?”

Maggie thrust a cucumber at him. “Wash this,” she said. “And your hands.”

“I know, I know.” Stevie pretended to be insulted. “What kind of skeevy type do you think I am, you have to tell me to wash my hands?” He looked at her over his shoulder from the sink. “How’s Matt? You bring him along, or is he locked in the office, reading financial reports from the 1960s?”

“He’s in the living room, talking to Dad,” Maggie said.

“You tell Mom?” Stevie asked.

“Tell me what?” Mrs. Stanton asked.

“Nothing,” they both said in unison, Maggie with a dark look at her brother.

“Maggie, please go find out what Matt and your father want to drink with dinner,” her mother said. “And where is Vanessa?”

“Where is Vanessa,” Stevie echoed, with a humorous look at Maggie. “Funny how she always disappears right before dinner, when there’s work to do….”

Maggie rolled her eyes, as she dried her hands on a towel and went into the living room.

Her father sat along in a chair, reading the newspaper.

“Dad, beer?” Maggie asked.

He looked up at her and smiled. “Please.”

“Have you seen Matt?” she asked him. “Or Van?”

“I think they’re out on the deck.” Her father got to his feet. “I better go see if your mother needs any help.”

Maggie crossed to the sliding glass doors that led out to the sun deck. She could hear Matt’s voice, talking quietly.

Looking out through the screen, she saw him sitting up on the railing. One cowboy boot was hooked around the bottom rail, the other foot swung loose.

Van was standing next to him. “…married probably next summer,” she was saying. “After the divorce is finalized.”

“You sure you want to jump into another marriage right away?” Matt asked her. “It seems to me you might want to take your time.”

Van snorted. “You’re a good one to give advice. I can’t believe you and Maggie are married.” She laughed, and just as Maggie was about to open the screen and join them, she said, “Do you remember that night we were up at Wildwood?”

Maggie’s heart stopped. Matt and Van? At Wildwood—Eastfield’s version of Lover’s Lane, where kids went to party and make out?

“How could I ever forget?” Matt’s voice was dry.

Maggie went back into the kitchen, feeling dizzy.

Matt had gone out with Vanessa. When? And why hadn’t she known about it?

How could he? He’d always disliked Van. Or so he’d told Maggie…

She sat at the kitchen table, trying to calm herself. It didn’t matter. It had happened ten years ago. Matt loved her. He’d married her.

Out on the deck, Matt gazed at Vanessa. “You were lucky it was my car you climbed into that night. If it had been someone else’s…”

She laughed. “I was so drunk.” She shook her head. “I couldn’t believe Bill Fitch dumped me. He dumped me. It was…mortifying.” She looked at him. “I would have slept with you, you know.”

He nodded. “I know.”

“You were in love with Maggie, though. Even back then, weren’t you?”

Matt nodded again. “Yeah.”

“She is so lucky,” Vanessa said. “Did I ever thank you for driving me home that night?”

He laughed. “Not exactly.

Stevie came to the door. “Dinner is served.”

Van caught Matt’s arm. “Thank you,” she said. “Be good to my sister.”

He smiled at her. “I will.”

Maggie was silent in the car on the way home. Matt glanced at her. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

No, it was terrible.

“Now that your folks know we’re married, we can tell the rest of the world,” Matt said. “I want to shout it from the mountaintops. Although, have you noticed that Connecticut is seriously lacking in mountaintops?”

Maggie couldn’t manage more than a wan smile. Try as she might, she couldn’t get the picture of Matt with Vanessa out of her head.

Had they made love in the back of Matt’s car? It was ancient history and it shouldn’t matter. But it did. And she had to ask him about it.

As they went into the house, Matt pulled her into his arms and kissed her. Ask him, she ordered herself.

“If you don’t mind, I’m going to do some work,” he told her. “I haven’t finished reading that crap on packaging. There must be three more files I haven’t even looked at yet.”

“Matt.” Maggie’s voice sounded breathless to her own ears. “Did you ever…”

Sleep with my sister? It was what she wanted to know, but she couldn’t ask. Not like that. Not point blank.

He was watching her, waiting patiently for the end of her sentence.

“Did you ever go out with Vanessa?” A better start. Much less difficult to ask. And although she already knew the answer—she’d heard him say as much—they could go from there, and—

“No,” he said. He was laughing, as if he found her question amusing.

Maggie stared at him, shocked.

“I never did,” he said. “I didn’t think she was that attractive. I still don’t. She’s so desperate, you know?”

“Not even once?” she managed to say. God, was he actually lying to her?

Matt smiled, his eyes so warm and sincere. “Not even once.”

Do you remember that night we were up at Wildwood? Maggie heard an echo of Van’s voice. And, How could I ever forget? had been Matt’s reply.

If he couldn’t forget just a few hours ago, it wasn’t likely that it had slipped his mind right now.

He was lying.

To her.

Lying.

He opened the door to the office and turned on the lights. “You coming?” he asked.

“I have to get something upstairs,” Maggie fabricated an excuse as she hurried away.

“Do me a favor and bring those files on packaging down from the bedroom, will ya?” he called after her.

She didn’t answer, taking the stairs two at a time, wanting to get away from him, needing to think.

She sat for a few minutes on Matt’s bed, looking out the windows, at the setting sun.

Matt had lied to her.

Even more frightening was the thought that if she hadn’t already known the real truth, she never would’ve suspected he was lying. His voice and expression had been so sincere, and his eyes…

Dan Fowler’s words came back to her. Matt is a pathological actor. Don’t believe anything he tells you.

And Angie had been adamant, calling Matt a liar again and again.

But Maggie loved him. And he loved her.

Didn’t he?

She couldn’t believe he would lie about something like that. He’d married her, for crying out loud.

She stood up, resolving to ask him again, and to tell him what she had overheard. There must be a good explanation.

Turning, she gathered up the files Matt had asked her to bring him. Three files, right? But only two were out on the bedside table.

Maggie opened his briefcase and quickly leafed through the file folders he had inside. None of them were labeled, so she opened the top one and flipped through the papers, hoping to identify its contents quickly.

She scanned an official-looking document. Then with growing shock, she read it more slowly.

It was the codicil to the will. Matt had had a copy all along. Why hadn’t he given it to her?

It was a wordy and lengthy document that boiled down to one thing: If Matt were to get married before the end of the fiscal quarter, he would automatically inherit.

The bedroom, still adorned with all those roses, began to spin.

Maggie sat down. The codicil specified conditions to the marriage—the woman Matt chose had to be over twenty-five years old, with a graduate degree. She had to be an upstanding member of the community, and preferably a longtime resident of Eastfield.

Maggie was that woman. The description fit her perfectly. Too perfectly.

Angie’s words of warning about Matt’s ulterior motive came back with a force that nearly knocked her over. By marrying her, Matt would inherit a fortune.

He didn’t love her. He’d never loved her. He had only married her because she was willing and available and met the conditions of the will.

Her mind lined up all of the facts and the implications, but still she denied it.

No.

Matt loved her. He loved her.

No one could lie so absolutely, so perfectly, so consistently.

Could they?

The phone on Matt’s bedside table rang.

Maggie picked it up.

“Hey.” She could tell from his voice that he was smiling. “You get lost up there or something? Where are my files? More importantly, where’s my wife?”

“I’ll be right down,” Maggie heard herself say.

Maybe it wasn’t the real codicil. Maybe the real one was different. Maybe it didn’t have anything to do with marriage. Maybe…

Tomorrow the real codicil was going to be released by the court. Please God, Maggie prayed, let it be different. Let this be one big mistake…

“Tomorrow I’ll pick up our wedding rings at the jewelers,” Matt said as they walked across the parking lot outside of the community theater. “We might as well wait to tell everyone that we’re married ’til then. Is that okay with you?”

She didn’t answer, and Matt laughed. “Mags, hey, where are you?”

Startled, she looked up at him, then tripped over a crack in the driveway. Matt caught her arm to keep her from falling. “You okay?” he asked.

She nodded, but he could see the strain around her eyes, and tension in her mouth.

“Dinner with your parents really blew you away, didn’t it?” He pushed a stray strand of hair out of her face. “I’m sorry. You didn’t want to go, and I talked you into it.”

“Matt, do you love me?” she asked.

What? “You know that I do.”

She nodded, but her smile was forced.

“You don’t…” Matt cleared his throat and started again. “You don’t doubt me, do you?”

“Don’t be silly,” she said and went inside.

Toward the end of the rehearsal, when Matt was up on stage for one of his solo numbers, Dan Fowler slipped into the seat next to Maggie.

“The Cancer Center at USC?” he said without any greeting.

Maggie felt the muscles in her face freeze. “Yes. That’s where he was.”

“No, he wasn’t.”

She looked at Dan, but he was staring up at the stage, at Matt. “All right,” she said, her heart starting to pound. “What are you accusing him of now?”

Dan finally looked at her. “I’m not accusing him of anything.” His voice was mild, but his eyes were flinty. “All I’m saying is that I called to verify his cancer story, and there was no record of a Matthew Stone ever having been at USC’s Cancer Center.” He shrugged and stood up. “I’ll leave all the accusing to you.”

Sixteen

Maggie’s hands shook as she dialed the telephone. It had been torture, waiting until noon—until nine o’clock California time.

Matt and Stevie were in the kitchen, making lunch, and she was thankful for the privacy that gave her to make this call.

A call that would prove Dan Fowler wrong.

An elderly woman answered the telephone. “Cancer Center at USC. May I help you?”

“Yes.” Maggie’s voice shook, and she took a deep breath. “My husband was there a few weeks ago, and I need to check the exact dates of his previous stay for our insurance forms. Can you put me through to someone who can help me?”

“I should have that information on my computer,” the woman answered. “What’s your husband’s name, dear?”

Maggie told her.

“Hmm,” the woman said, and Maggie’s stomach began to hurt. “S, t, o, n, e, right?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t have a Matthew Stone,” she said. “Not this past month or any other time. Perhaps you’re confusing us with the hospital at UCLA?”

“I’m sorry,” Maggie said, hanging up the phone.

Lies. It was all lies.

“Yo, Mags.” Stevie came back into the office. “Matt made you a salad. You want it out here or in the kitchen?”

Maggie just shook her head.

“Hey, ho.” Her brother crossed to the door. “Mail call! Here’s big Joe, the friendliest mailman in the Western Hemisphere.”

He opened the office door and took a pile of mail from the dour elderly man.

“Hey, homeboy,” Stevie greeted him, holding out a hand. “Gimme five.”

Joe slapped a certified letter into his outstretched hand. “Sign for this one.” He pointed to the form. “There and there.”

At least Matt didn’t have cancer. At least he wasn’t going to die.

“Yo, Mags,” Stevie said, closing the door behind Joe. “Looks like this is that legal thing you were waiting for.”

She put her head on the desk and burst into tears.

Stevie stared. “Well, gee, I get kind of emotional when Joe leaves, too, but, he’ll be back tomorrow, so—”

“How could Matt do this to me?” she said. “How could he put me through this? Pretending to go into the hospital, making me think he actually might die?”

“Is this another one of your acting things?” Stevie asked worriedly. “I hope?”

“Give me that goddamned letter.” Maggie snatched the envelope from his hand. She tore it open and with shaking hands spread the document out on the table.

It was the codicil—and it was the same as the one she’d found in Matt’s briefcase.

He didn’t love her. He was just using her.

Correction—he had used her, but that was going to stop right now.

“Do you have your car?” she asked Stevie, reaching for a tissue and blowing her nose violently.

“Yeah, why?” Her brother looked very nervous. “What’s going on?”

“I need a ride,” she told him.

“Oh, yeah?” Matt came into the room, all smiles. “You going someplace?”

Maggie turned to look at him. How could someone who looked so beautiful do something so ugly? And how could she have been such a fool as to believe him?

His smile faded as he gazed at her. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

“I know the truth,” Maggie told him. She was not going to cry in front of him, damn it. “You son of a bitch.”

Total confusion was on his face. “What?”

“God, you’re good,” she said. Taking a deep breath, she forced back her tears. She’d have time to face the hurt later. Right now, all she let herself feel was anger. It shot through her icy and cold. “But you can skip the act, Matt. The codicil to the will came today. You don’t have to fake it anymore. Obviously, you’ve won.”

“Maggie, you’re scaring me,” he said. “What are you talking about?”

She scooped the certified letter off the desk and slammed it against his chest. “It’s all right there in the codicil. But you might as well cut the crap. I know that you’ve already seen a copy of this.”

He frowned, pretending to skim through the document.

“Or maybe you only think you’ve won,” she told him, her voice shaking. “But maybe you lose. I’m going to file for an annulment.”

Stevie’s mouth dropped open as he looked from Maggie to Matt and back.

“What are you talking about?” Matt said again. He looked stunned, confusion and disbelief alternately crossing his face. “Maggie, you can’t be serious.”

“I’m dead serious.”

“What does this say?” Matt shook the document at her. “You know I can’t understand this legal stuff….”

“You know damn well what it says.” She headed for the door.

He lunged after her, catching her arm.

“Let go of me!” Maggie bit each word off clearly.

“Yo guys, I think I better go,” Stevie said.

“No!” Maggie said.

“Yes,” Matt countered. “Steve, go outside, all right. Give us some privacy, will you?”

“If I don’t come out in fifteen minutes,” Maggie told her brother, “call the police.”

Matt staggered back. “Oh, my God, do you really think I’m going to hurt you?”

“You already have,” she told him.

“How?” he asked, his eyes searching her face. “Christ, Maggie, tell me what this is about.”

She went out of the office and up the stairs.

“Maggie, talk to me,” he pleaded, following her to the room where she kept her clothes. “I love you, and you loved me. We’re married—”

She spun to face him. “Not anymore.”

“Why not?” he shouted, desperation in his face, the codicil to the will crushed in his fists. “Damn it, Maggie, you tell me why the hell not!”

“Okay, fine,” she said. “We’ll play this your way. Play the whole game out. The codicil states that you automatically inherit if you get married before the end of the fiscal quarter. But you can’t marry just anyone. The conditions are listed quite clearly in the fifth paragraph.”

He smoothed the crumpled paper, and read. And realization crossed his face.

“Oh, bravo,” Maggie applauded. “One thing I can say about you, Matt, is that you truly are a brilliant actor. But save it for the Academy Awards, because I know you’ve already seen this codicil. I found a copy in your briefcase.”

“If it was there, I didn’t know it,” he protested.

She laughed. “You know, I might’ve believed you. But combined with the rest of it…”

“What rest of it?” He was mad as hell now, too.

“All the lies.” She roughly wrestled her gym bag from the top shelf of the closet. As she spoke, she began pulling her clothes from the drawers and piling them on the bed. “All this time they were right, but I was stupid enough to believe you—”

“Who was right?”

“Angie—”

“Damn it! I should have known she was somewhere behind this!”

“And Dan Fowler.”

“He’s not exactly the president of my fan club, either,” Matt shouted. “So come on, I’m dying to hear. What did they tell you?”

“That you’re a liar,” Maggie shouted back. “And they’re right! You lied to me, you bastard. You used tricks and lies to get me to marry you!”

“God, Maggie, you don’t really think that, do you? I thought you believed in me, that you trusted me….” He voice shook and he broke off. Tears glistened in his eyes. “Damn it.”

The pain on his face was only an act. A tear escaped and slid down his face. It, too, was just part of his crap. “I never lied to you,” he said.

“Gee, I don’t know,” she said as she packed as much as she could into her gym bag. “I’d call telling someone that you have cancer when you really don’t more than a little white lie, wouldn’t you?” She turned to face him. “I called the Cancer Center, Matt. They never heard of you. You were never there.

“You told me that you never went out with Van, but I heard you talking to her about going parking at Wildwood!” She stopped to take a deep breath. “You lied right to my face when I asked you about her!”

“No,” he said, “I can’t believe that’s what you think—”

She plowed right over him. “But the biggest lie of all was when you married me.” It was harder and harder for her to hold back her tears. “You said you loved me, but I know that’s not true. I know why you married me, and it has nothing to do with love.”

The look on his face would’ve broken her heart if she hadn’t known it was all an act.

“But you know what?” she whispered. “I lied, too, when I told you I’d love you forever. Because I sure as hell don’t love you anymore.”

Matt turned and walked out of the room.

He came back a moment later, carrying an empty suitcase. He set it down on the bed. “I’ll get Stevie to help you carry your things out,” he said quietly. He was almost out the door when he turned back. “I thought you believed in me, Maggie. I thought you had faith in me. But why should you be different from anyone else?”

Seventeen

As Maggie walked into the auditorium, she saw Matt immediately, standing by the stage. He was dressed all in black, and he was surrounded by most of the female cast members. Still, he looked up at her as if he had some sort of sixth sense and could tell when she was around.

A wave of misery descended upon her, and Maggie knew in a flash that she would have to move away. She couldn’t stay in town with Matt living here, too. It would be horrible to be reminded constantly of what a blind fool she’d been.

“Places!” called Dolores. “We’re doing a complete run-through tonight, and we’re taking it from the top.”

Maggie dumped her bag into a seat and tiredly climbed the stairs to the stage.

Aware of Matt’s eyes on her as he watched from the wings, she found it difficult to concentrate on the show. God, any minute he was going to come out, and she was going to have to kiss him.

She had to stay mad. If she could stay good and mad at the bastard, she’d be able to get through this.

Matt watched Maggie and felt like crying. When had it happened? When had she begun to doubt him? Or had she mistrusted him all along?

If that was the kind of person she was, then he didn’t want her. Good riddance. She’d done him a favor by leaving.

Up on the shoulders of the men’s chorus, Maggie smiled dazzlingly.

Desire stirred, and he closed his eyes, angry at his reaction to her. She didn’t trust him—and he still wanted her.

And in less than a minute, he was going to have to kiss her.

Damn it. He couldn’t do this.

But the stage manager gave him his cue, and he went out onto the stage. The lights hit him, and there he was. Standing right in front of Maggie. Their gazes locked. Somehow his mouth opened and the lines he’d memorized came out.

She seemed so unaffected, so calm.

But as he pulled her in for the kiss, he saw a flash of anger in her eyes. His own anger began to build, and he kissed her hard, too hard, hating himself for still wanting her, and knowing that before the night was through, he was going to go to her and beg her to come back to him.

Maggie sat in one of the dark corners backstage, praying for the fifteen minute break between acts to end. She was using every ounce of her energy just being on stage with Matt—she didn’t want to use it up confronting him offstage.

But he found her. “Maggie.”

He was backlit, and his face was in the shadows. She stood up, prepared to move out into the auditorium—anywhere, to get away from him.

But he caught her arm. “We have to talk.”

She pulled away. “There’s nothing to say.”

He followed her onto the stage, out into the light. “There’s a hell of a lot to say. Come on. At least give me a chance to defend myself.”

“Just leave me alone.”

“Maggie, God, please. I love you.”

She looked up at him and saw his eyes filled with tears and all of her anger came roaring back.

“Good delivery. You sound very sincere. But the tears are a little too much, don’t you think?” She pushed her hair off her face, working hard to keep her hand from shaking. “Give up, Matt. I don’t believe you. Besides, you don’t need me anymore. I won’t file for an annulment. We’ll get a divorce—after you’ve gotten the inheritance.”

“You really think that’s what this is about?” he asked. “Money?”

She didn’t say a word.

He nodded. “You loved me enough to marry me,” he said. “You owe me at least the chance to tell you—”

“I owe you nothing,” she said.

“How can you say that?” Matt felt sick. Did she really believe that? “You should talk to your sister. If you don’t believe me, you should ask her. And I’ll call my doctor at the Center—he’ll call you. Or you can call him. I was there—”

“Forget it, Matt,” Maggie told him. “I just don’t care.”

Matt stared at her. She didn’t care. He was ready to beg, to plead, to crawl, but damn it, she was the one who had done him wrong. She was the one who didn’t trust him. He was even ready to accept that she’d found him guilty until proven innocent if it meant he’d have her back.

But she didn’t care.

The last bit of hope that he’d been carrying evaporated, and his heart broke.

Eighteen

“Where the hell is he?” Dan Fowler stormed. “I knew it. I knew I should never have trusted that bastard with the lead to my show!”

“My brother works with Matt,” Maggie told him. “I just spoke to him on the phone—he says he hasn’t heard from him all day.”

Outside, a storm was raging, and thunder crackled deafeningly, directly overhead.

“Beautiful, just beautiful.” Dan groaned. “You guys had a fight, didn’t you?”

“We split up,” Maggie said, and saying the words aloud made her sick.

“And now he’s gone.” Dan started to pace as he swore. “The understudy is awful. We’ll have to modify the dance numbers….”

“I think you should just take a deep breath,” Maggie said, “because Matt wouldn’t just blow off the show. He’s going to be here.”

Dan stopped pacing and stared at her. “You look like you’ve been run over by a truck. This guy does that to you, and still you defend him?”

“I just don’t believe he would desert us one day before opening night,” Maggie insisted. “He’ll be here.”

“Jeez, somehow I didn’t expect you to be my champion.”

Maggie whirled around to see Matt standing behind them. He looked exhausted. And he was soaking wet.

Dan swore at him, loud and long. “You’re late. We’re paying our orchestra by the hour, damn you. Where the hell have you been?”

Matt finally stopped looking at Maggie. “We’re getting tidal flooding from this storm. I’ve been organizing work crews at the factory—sandbagging. I should have called, but for the past hour I’ve been on the verge of getting into my car and coming over here. But there was always one more person who needed to talk to me. I apologize for being late.”

“Places!” Dan was already yelling. “Get Stone into costume and makeup! Now!”

After the dress rehearsal ended, Maggie reached over her shoulder to unzip the evening gown she wore for the show’s closing number. She pulled the zipper down as far as she could, then reached around behind her, struggling to find the tiny pull.

A warm hand on her shoulder stopped her, and she felt the zipper slide all the way down.

Holding the dress to her front, she turned to face Matt.

Matt.

Tonight she’d run out of anger. All she could feel was the hurt. And boy, did it hurt bad. Because despite everything he’d done, she still loved him.

His eyes were angry, the way they’d been all night long, but his face and words were polite, cordial. “You did well tonight.”

Maggie laughed humorlessly. “I know exactly how well I did. This is an endurance test for me, Matt. I can’t wait until it’s over.”

He nodded then, his eyes dark with misery now. “Yeah, me, too.” He cleared his throat. “I just wanted you to know that I’m going to go back to California after the fiscal quarter. I’ve already contacted a divorce lawyer and…I want you to have the house.”

She stared at him.

“There’s no way I could stay in town with you living here, too,” he said quietly. “I know you love it here, and…”

“That’s…that’s insane,” she said. That house had to be worth millions.

“It’s no more insane than any of the rest of this,” he told her as he walked away.

Maggie stood backstage in the dark, listening to the sounds of the people who had begun to fill the seats of the auditorium.

It was ten minutes to curtain on opening night.

Matt was in makeup, already in character, joking and laughing with everyone in sight.

She closed her eyes, wishing it could be that easy for her, too, wishing she could just snap her fingers and become someone else, if only for a little while.

But Lucy, her character, was too much like herself. It wasn’t enough of an escape.

“Yo, Mags,” came a whispered voice.

She turned to see Stevie. He was wearing blue jeans that were crusty with dried mud, and a T-shirt that was no longer white.

“Well, gee,” she said. “You got dressed up for the occasion.”

He grinned. “I’m coming to the show tomorrow night. With Danny.” He laughed. “We actually have a real date. Matt’s even letting me borrow the Maserati.”

“A date?” Maggie said. “You mean you finally—”

“Yeah, I finally took your advice,” Stevie said. “See, we were out with the gang, and I just couldn’t stand it another second. I said, ‘Danny, I’m madly in love with you, and if you don’t kiss me right this second, I’m gonna die.’”

“You did?” Maggie laughed. “Oh, my God.”

“So she laughed at me,” Stevie told her, “And I’m mortified, thinking, ‘Wow, how totally humiliating.’ But then—” he paused dramatically “—she kissed me. Boom. Right there. In front of everyone.” He smiled. “She actually loves me, too.”

“That’s so great,” Maggie said.

“So I came down here to say thank you and break a leg.”

“Thanks.”

“You and Matt patch it back together yet?” he asked.

She shook her head. “I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

Stevie rolled his eyes. “You are such a fool. He loves you, Maggie.”

“He married me to get his inheritance,” she told him. But even as she said the words, they sounded so wrong. And Stevie was looking at her as if she were the village idiot.

“You don’t really believe that, do you?” he said.

“I don’t know,” she admitted.

“Yes, you do,” Stevie said. “You know him, Mags. He’s a good guy. A little flaky with the weirdo diet and the strange sleep patterns, but…you know him.”

She’d thought she did.

“He’s been hanging out at the law library for very unhealthy periods of time,” her brother told her. “He’s working on something that would probably take you five minutes to do. He could use your help, you know. I mean, unless you don’t care if he makes himself sick….”

Maggie gave him a look. “That’s laying it on a little thick.”

“Will you please just talk to him?” Stevie said. “If not for him, if not for you, then for me?”

She just shook her head.

“Places!” Dolores said.

Her brother backed away, pointing to her leg and making a breaking motion with his hands, then miming a telephone, mouthing the words, “Talk to Matt.”

And tell him what?

Taking a deep breath, Maggie moved out into the center of the stage, to the mark where she would be standing when the curtain opened. She closed her eyes and bent her head, forcing her body to relax.

Tonight, her character, Lucy, was going to have a happy ending.

Maggie would give anything to have one of her own.

The cast went wild behind the curtains after the final bow. The show was a huge success—the audience had laughed at all the jokes, and the applause for the musical numbers had been deafening.

Laughing, Matt picked up Maggie and swung her around and around. She was smiling up at him, her arms around his neck and, without thinking, he kissed her.

Oh, God, he was kissing her. Her mouth opened willingly beneath his, and he drank her in, wishing he could slow this moment down, but too afraid even to move, for fear of breaking the spell. He could feel his heart pounding.

She pulled back, and he released her immediately. Their gazes locked, and Maggie cleared her throat.

“Cody and Lucy always did get a little carried away,” she said.

Cody and Lucy. Not Matt and Maggie. “Sorry,” he said.

“You were great tonight,” she told him.

“You were, too.”

The rest of the cast was making so much noise around them. Someone ran past with an open bottle of champagne.

“I don’t want your house,” Maggie said quietly.

“Too bad,” he countered.

“Seriously, Matt,” she said. “Stevie said you were working on something, but you don’t have to do that. We can go into court some time in the next few weeks, and show them our marriage license. You’ve already won.”

He laughed his disgust. “You call this winning?” His temper flared and he walked away from her, but then walked back. Breathe. He had to breathe, but he couldn’t get the air into his lungs. “I’m not just giving you the house,” he told her. “I’m giving you half of my share of the business, too.”

She looked shocked. “Matt—”

“Hey, like you said,” he told her harshly, “I won. And I wouldn’t’ve been able to do it without your help. The house is your payoff for that. The half of the business is yours because—believe it or not—I really did think of you as my wife. But if you’re more comfortable with it, you can think of it as payment for the sex.”

Her eyes flared. Ooh, that got her mad. Stupid, stupid, stupid. He should have just kept walking away.

In response, Maggie actually uttered words he’d never heard her say before. At least not in this decade.

But it wasn’t until he was in his car and driving—too fast—out of the parking lot, that he realized he wouldn’t have been able to get a rise out of her if she truly didn’t care.

Maybe he was going about this all wrong. Maybe instead of trying to show her how calm and collected he was—how much he’d changed over the years—maybe he should show her…

For the first time in days, Matt actually had hope.

He headed, fast, for Sparky’s—where the entire cast was meeting to toast the opening of the show. He wanted to get there first.

Maggie pushed open the door to Sparky’s feeling much less than enthusiastic.

But it was a tradition with the theater group to drink a toast to the show, and this year, because they’d had no volunteers willing to host a party, the party was here at the bar.

Maggie was only going to stay for the toast, and then run for home as fast as she could.

As she went inside, she saw Matt was already there—sitting at the bar. Charlene, the flirtatious soprano, was next to him. She leaned in close to tell him something. And, God, he actually had his arm around her.

Maggie looked away, but not before she’d met Matt’s eyes in the mirror.

He actually had the audacity to smile at her.

She found herself staring at the old-fashioned jukebox sightlessly, blinded by tears of jealousy. No, tears of anger. She wasn’t jealous, she was mad.

She couldn’t believe what he’d said to her after the show. Payment for sex…And now he was here, like this, with Charlene…

She glanced up to see Matt standing right behind her.

Quickly, she blinked back her tears and fished in her pocket for a quarter. She pushed the coin into the slot and pretended to be absorbed in choosing her song. But he reached over her shoulder and pushed the numbers for an old Beatles song. “P.S. I Love You.”

“Dance with me,” he said.

Maggie gazed up at him, suddenly beyond exhausted. She’d danced with him all night long, and that hadn’t solved a thing. “Why don’t you dance with Charlene?”

“Look, she sat down next to me. What am I supposed to do?”

“She made you put your arm around her?” Maggie couldn’t stand it anymore. “I think it’s kind of obvious that it’s over between us,” she said forcefully. “Why don’t you just relax and have a beer and a cigarette and Charlene while you’re at it.”

“Is that really what you want?” Matt said. God, she was playing right into this entire scene. It was perfect. And he was right about her still caring. Oh, man, she cared so much. He wanted to kiss her. Instead he shrugged. “Fine. You got it.”

He remembered the way he’d used to act, back in high school, before he’d learned to control his anger. It wasn’t hard to get back into character—the bad boy was a part he’d played for years. He’d already started, over at the bar with Charlene.

He spun now, nearly colliding with a waitress. He took one of the oversized mugs of beer from her tray, ignoring her protest, and crossed to a table where some of the cast members were sitting. He put down the beer, took a cigarette out of a pack on the table and, holding Maggie’s gaze, he very slowly and deliberately lit it.

He picked up the beer and crossed back toward her, taking a long pull on the beer and then an equally long drag off the cigarette.

Christ! He had to work hard not to cough. God, he hated the taste of both, but he didn’t let her see that.

“This is more like it.” He exhaled the smoke as he gazed at her. “Isn’t it? It’s what you expect from me, right? God forbid I should ever actually change.”

He took another long swig of beer as, from the corner of his eye, he saw Dan Fowler watching them with horrified fascination.

Maggie’s eyes were filled with tears. “Matt, stop.”

“Gee, I don’t know, Mags,” he said, his voice rising in volume. “I mean, you got me pegged for this role. I’m a liar and a cheat, right? At least according to Angie and Dan. A liar who smokes and drinks too much. And let’s not leave out Charlene. I think she’ll be glad to go home with me, don’t you? Oh, but wait, maybe not after she sees this!”

He pretended to chug the rest of the beer, but really just poured it down his shirt. “Or this!” he shouted, and slammed the mug down with such force on top of the jukebox that the record skipped with a wild screech. The music stopped.

The noisy bar was silent.

But Matt dropped character as he stubbed his cigarette out in a nearby ashtray.

“You’re ready to believe all that about me,” he said softly as he looked up at Maggie, “but you won’t believe that I love you. If that’s really true, then go to hell, Maggie. I don’t want you anymore.”

He turned and walked out of the bar, knowing all too well that his words had made him exactly what she thought he was.

A liar.

Maggie followed Matt out into the parking lot.

And found him on his hands and knees in the grass next to his Maserati, throwing up.

“Oh, my God,” she said.

He swore. “Go away.”

She dug in her purse for some tissues, crouching down next to him.

He took them from her, wiped his mouth, and sat up with his back and head against the side of his car. “Remind me never to smoke again.” There was dark humor in his eyes as he looked at her. “Well, that sucked. So much for the tough guy act, huh?”

“Do you want me to drive you home?” she asked.

He shook his head. “No, I’m okay. It just was…I haven’t had nicotine in so long, and, God, it just made my stomach…”

“That was impressive in there,” she said. “Making the jukebox shut off that way…”

“Too much?”

“No,” she said, starting to cry. “It was perfect.”

“That’s not me anymore,” he told her.

Maggie nodded. “I know. I know.” She couldn’t bear to look at him. His words were echoing in her head. I don’t want you anymore. “Oh, Matt, will you ever forgive me?”

“I’ll think about it,” he said. He pulled himself to his feet and unlocked his car door. He had a bottle of water in the cup holder and he took a swig, rinsing his mouth and spitting it out.

She wiped her face, her eyes. “Stevie told me you were working on something…?”

Matt looked at her. “Yeah. I’m not, um…I’d prefer not to use our marriage as a way to win this thing,” he told her. “I mean, if it comes down to it, I will—all those jobs are at stake. But I didn’t marry you because of that fricking codicil. I didn’t know I had that document in my briefcase.”

“I know,” she said. “Oh, God, I’m so sorry.”

“What’dya do, talk to Vanessa?” he asked.

“No,” she said.

“You call the Cancer Center? I gave them permission to give you whatever information you wanted.”

“No,” she said.

He was surprised. “You don’t want proof that—” He laughed. “Did Stevie show you the thing I’m working on?”

“Stevie doesn’t know what you’re working on,” Maggie countered. “He told me you were doing something and you could probably use some legal help. That’s all he said to me.”

Matt was trying to be casual, but for someone who was such a good actor, he was doing a truly lousy job. “So you just, like, decided that you believe me?” he said. “No proof, no…”

“It was actually something Stevie said tonight,” Maggie admitted. “He reminded me that I knew you. That I knew you. Matt, please, please forgive me. All those awful things I said…”

She met his eyes, and as she looked at him, she could see tiny reflections of her face in the darkness of his pupils. She belonged there, in his eyes, and she knew she had to do whatever she could to stay right there.

But he reached for her, and as she held him, she started, again, to cry.

“God,” he said, “no matter what I do, I seem to make you cry.”

She looked up at him. “I’m madly in love with you, and if you don’t forgive me, I’m going to die.”

Fire, life and tears sprang into Matt’s eyes simultaneously. He held her tightly as he laughed. “Yeah, like there’s any doubt I’m going to forgive you.”

“You said you needed to think about it.”

“I was kidding!” He laughed. “Hey, if this failed tonight, I was going to fly my doctor out from California, and pay him to follow you around until you believed me. I was going to take a lie detector test. I was going to—”

“I love you, Matt,” she said. “Do you still love me?”

“For always and forever,” he promised her.

She would have kissed him, but he turned his head. “I’m not kissing you,” he said. “I just barfed. But if you want to come home with me, and let me run upstairs and brush my teeth, you can try that line of Stevie’s again, verbatim this time, and I guarantee it’ll work as well for you as it did for him.”

She held him tightly. “I think I vowed to love you in sickness and in health.”

Matt laughed. “Get in,” he said.

Maggie got in.

And he took her home.

Nineteen

Maggie sighed as she lay with Matt in his bed. Their bed. It felt so good to be home.

“I was such a jerk,” she said.

“Yeah,” he said. “You were.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re not supposed to agree with me.”

“I’m not going to lie,” he told her as he touched her face. “Not even about something like that. I’m never going to lie to you, Mags.”

“I know,” she whispered.

He kissed her and she felt herself melt. And then she started to laugh.

“What?” he said.

“I’m madly in love with you,” she said, “and if you don’t go down on me right this second, I think I’m going to die.”

He shouted with laughter. “Can’t have that,” he said. “God, I missed you…”

Maggie woke up to find Matt sitting up in bed, reading the papers in a file.

The clock read 5:34.

“Hey,” he said, smiling at her.

She stretched. “Did you sleep at all?”

He shook his head. “I think I was afraid if I fell asleep I’d find out that your coming home was just a dream.”

Oh, Matt…“It’s not,” she said.

He nodded. And handed her the file. “You awake enough to put on your lawyer hat?”

She sat up, arranging her pillow behind her. “My lawyer hat seems to have disappeared with the rest of my clothes.”

He grinned at her. “I meant figuratively. And as long as we’re leaning heavily toward all honesty all the time, I should probably tell you that the idea of your giving me legal advice while you’re naked appeals to me in a very decadent way.”

“Do I need to call you Mr. Stone?” she asked, opening the file and starting to read and…

She closed the file. And looked at Matt. “Are you serious about this?”

He nodded.

She opened it again. He’d outlined his plan for improving the company. It included on-site day care and a fitness room. It also included joint ownership in the company for every single employee from the managers to the cleaning staff.

Maggie flipped through his notes. “You’re proposing to give the employees all but twenty-five percent of the company.” She looked up at him. “You’re just…giving it to them?”

He actually shrugged. “These people are the ones who’ve worked so hard to make this company successful. Can you imagine how much harder they’ll work if the company actually belongs to them?”

She kept flipping through his notes. “And what’s this? A grant program and…”

“Scholarships, too,” he said. “Funded through the sale of some of my father’s assets. I’m going to keep only two of the cars—I mean, thirteen cars? Come on. Some of those are antiques and worth a ton of money. I’m going to put it all into a trust. I’ve worked out the preliminary numbers—I need you to check my math. But I’m pretty sure that with the bulk of the cash inheritance included in the trust, there’ll be about three million in interest each year—to give away.”

“And you’re going to run the grant’s foundation,” she saw.

“With you,” he said, “if you’ll take the new position.”

Maggie looked up at him. “Matt, this is…”

“Crazy?” He shrugged again. “I never really wanted my father’s money—I told you that from the start. I was trying to save the company. I mean, don’t get me wrong—my twenty-five percent will keep me very comfortable. I’m not going to give it all away.”

She closed the file. “Well.” She frowned slightly, tapping it with her finger. “I guess my legal advice to you would be…Let’s try it. Let’s go for it. Let’s set it up, and present it to the court. I can’t tell you for sure if they’ll accept this as the kind of improvement your father intended, but I’m willing to argue it—I think I can put up a good fight. And we do have a failsafe—our marriage certificate. I know you don’t want to use it, but, like you said, you want these people to have their jobs come next Christmas.”

She reached for a pen from the bedside table, and started making notes right on the manila folder. Matt took both from her hands, and kissed her.

“We can work out the details later,” he said. “One thing I want you to do today is go through my briefcase, make sure there aren’t any other unpleasant surprises hiding in there.” He kissed her again. “Will you do that for me?”

“I don’t need to,” Maggie said.

“But I want you to,” he told her as he pulled her on top of him. “Later.”

“Later,” she agreed.

Matt’s briefcase was filled with roses.

Roses and his hospital records from California.

He’d also written out an explanation of the night he’d gone up to Wildwood to a party, telling her how Vanessa had come into his car, falling down drunk after breaking up with her boyfriend. She’d come on to him, but he’d taken her home. End of story.

There was a note from Dan Fowler, too, apologizing for giving Maggie misinformation, explaining that Matt had chosen a privacy option at the Cancer Center, which meant that all information about his illness—including information he himself requested—had to be optained via mail, in writing.

And there was a copy of an e-mail from Angie.

“Dear Mags,” her friend wrote. “Matt e-mailed me a few days ago. I’ve spent some time thinking about it, and I’ve come to the rather earth-shattering conclusion that I was wrong.

“I’m not going to tell you everything Matthew said to me (I wouldn’t want it to go to your head!), but I do believe that he truly loves you. He’s loved you for a long time, and I suppose I’m mostly to blame for you guys not getting together before this.

“You were right—I was jealous. Even now, even married, even completely in love with Freddy. I’m a bad person—if I couldn’t have Matt, I didn’t want you to have him, either. I think I knew back in high school that his feelings for you went way beyond my own relationship with him. Hell, they went beyond my relationship with you. I think I was afraid that if you and Matt got together, neither of you would have anything left to give to me.

“I know now that that’s not true. I love Freddy as much as Matt loves you, and love like that is like a fire. It just keeps spreading, it keeps burning brighter and bigger.

“I’m sorry for the things I said to you. I hope you’ll find it in your heart to forgive me.

“LOL! I know you will. I know you—you’ve already forgiven me. You’re such a pushover. You need to work on that all right?

“So stay good and mad at me another week—God, I’m such a rotten bitch—and then call me and tell me that you still love me, okay?

“I love you.

“Love, Angie.”

Maggie looked up to find Matt standing in the office door.

“I didn’t need any of this,” she told him. “I didn’t need proof or permission from anyone to—”

“I know,” he said.

She went through the pockets of the briefcase, but they were all empty.

“That’s all that’s in there,” Matt said. He’d made sure of it.

“Are you positive?” she said.

Uh-oh. “Did I leave something out?” he asked.

She sighed. “I was sure you were going to ask me…” She stood up. “I guess I’m going to have to ask you.” She took a rose from the bunch, and crossing to him, got down on one knee. “Matt, will you not unmarry me?”

He laughed.

She did, too, but back there, in her eyes, he could see that she wasn’t entirely kidding.

“Oh, Mags.” He got down on his knees, too, and kissed her. “Yes,” he told her. But then he looked at her. “Wait, maybe I need to consult with my lawyer. The wording of that question was a little complicated. Yes, I won’t unmarry you,” he figured it out. “Yes. Definitely, yes.”

Maggie kissed him. She kissed his face, his neck, his jaw, his cheeks, but then stopped, with only a whisper of space between her lips and his.

“I want,” she said, and he could feel her warm, sweet breath against his face, “my wedding ring.”

He kissed her—a long, lovely, heavenly kiss—then pulled back and reached into his pocket. He’d carried the jeweler’s box with him for days now, hoping…

Opening the box, he removed the two golden bands. Hers was so small, so delicate, compared to his. But both were engraved on the inside with the same inscription. “Maggie and Matt. Forever.”

Maggie looked at Matt as he took her hand. His face was serious, but his eyes were soft. She felt the world fade around her as she lost herself in his eyes.

“I promise I’ll love you forever,” he said softly, repeating the words he’d said at their wedding, so many long days ago. He slipped the ring on her finger.

She looked down at their hands and she knew she was never going to doubt him again. No matter what the future brought, she would stand by Matt’s side.

She held out her hand, and he placed his own ring on her palm. It was so big and solid, just like Matt himself. Yet she hesitated. “Matt,” she said. “I lied to you.” She forced herself to look up at him. “I lied when I told you that I didn’t love you anymore. I was so angry, and I tried to stop loving you, but…I couldn’t.”

“We both said a lot of things in anger,” he told her gently. “It’s okay.”

“I wanted to be sure you knew I didn’t break my promise to you. I promised to love you forever, too, Matt, and it’s a promise I intend to keep.” She pushed the ring onto his finger and kissed the palm of his hand.

“I’m madly in love with you,” Matt said, smiling at her despite the glint of emotion in his eyes, “and if you don’t kiss me right this second, I’m going to die.”

Maggie laughed. And then she kissed him.

And kissed him.

Forever.

ISBN: 978-1-4268-5106-3

SCENES OF PASSION

Copyright © 2003 by Suzanne Brockmann

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