Momentary Marriage (14 page)

Eventually, Stewart Black dropped his napkin in his plate, looking a little peevish. “I’m going to have to talk with some of our people about this, Mr. Barrett. Your position on this issue wasn’t clear before.”

“Certainly,” Jared pushed back his chair, “get back to me and let’s talk some more.”

He stood and went to pull back Kelsey’s chair.

“It was very nice meeting you, Ms. Layton,” Stewart said, no smile in his eyes. “Good evening.”

“Whew.” She gathered up her evening purse as the other man walked away. “Do you do this all the time?”

“Do what?” Jared lightly clasped her upper arm to steer her through the tables.

“Sword play over dinner.”

He laughed, escorting her toward the door.

Kelsey glanced back. “Don’t we have to take care of the check?”

“No.” Jared held the heavy wood door open for her. “It’s taken care of.”

“Mmmm. It’s nice to be rich,” she said, her voice teasing.

Jared smiled, taking her hand in his as they walked to the waiting limousine. “Money brings perks.”

“I’ll bet.”

Just then his breast pocket chirped.

Pausing on the sidewalk, Jared pulled out a tiny cell phone.

“Yes?”

Kelsey stood beside him, unsure if she should go or stay. Jared made up her mind when he reached out and snagged her hand.

“Listen, Clay, I don’t give a damn about the dismissal policy,” Jared said into the phone, his tone curt. “The money is the issue.”

Glancing up at him in surprise, Kelsey startled to hear him speak like a tough customer. She stood patiently waiting while Jared made several other terse comments about the contract into the phone. She’d always known there was more to Jared Barrett than a teasing smile and incredible biceps.

“I expected we’d hear from them pretty quick. Yes, I know what I told him about needing a free hand with the hiring and firing. Dammit, Clay, you’re a negotiator. You know how it works,” Jared said impatiently. “No, I’m not flexible on the length of sick leave, which I told Black. That was the straight truth.”

Jared, the shark, in action. He was so absorbed in his conversation that she didn’t hesitate to study him. The man was a mass of contradictions. Considerate and ruthless, controlled and wildly passionate. What the heck had she gotten herself into?

Maybe this was how his business was conducted. Certainly the advertising world wasn’t always a bastion of fair play.

Jared stood a few yards away from the waiting limo, still holding her hand.

“I know the guy’s a smooth number,” Jared declared. “But if I didn’t think you could handle him, I’d have said so. You know I only met with him tonight because you thought a little puff to his ego would help matters.”

It was all so interesting, seeing the inner workings of his world. Unsettling, too. She’d never realized just how calculating he could be. The union guy had no clue as to Jared’s real goal.

“Listen,” Jared said, his voice cool, “I’m not paying their asking price. You remember how they handled the last contract. We’ve been fair with them. I’m not giving another inch.”

When had she ever seen him so implacable, so…callous? He’d never seemed like a pushover, of course. But this side of him made her reflect on their dealings, just as she had after watching him manage the details of the hotel launch.

Clearly, Jared kept his agenda to himself. How could she tell if he was less than honest with her?

“Do whatever you have to,” he said to whomever was on the other end. “You know my position. Tell them whatever they want to hear and then get the approval on the contract we want.”

What exactly did she know about the man she’d committed herself to marry? Yes, he could reduce her to a panting fool with a single kiss. He was richer than most people dreamed of being. And he’d agreed to her terms…had claimed to want nothing more from this marriage than she had to give.

But listening to him now, she couldn’t help wondering if he had a hidden agenda with her, as well.

She was too far in to get out, of course. Her bailing out of this engagement could do nothing but reinforce Doug’s crazy ideas about the two of them. She might as well buy her sister’s ticket to
London
if she didn’t marry Jared. But if she was going through with the deal, she’d have to keep her eyes open.

Maybe Jared’s shark tendencies were confined to his work. They wouldn’t affect her then. Still, she was seeing her fiancé in a whole new light.

“Okay. I’ll talk to you later.” He pushed a button on the phone, folded it up and slid it back into his pocket.

“That sounded important,” Kelsey said lightly.

He shrugged. “Business.”

They walked toward the limousine.

Ignoring the driver who was hurrying out of his seat to open the door, Jared leaned down and opened it for her. The driver stepped back, returning to slide behind the wheel.

“I wish I could take you home,” Jared looked tired suddenly as they stood next to the open car door, “but I’ve got people waiting back at the office.”

Kelsey glanced at her watch. “But it’s after ten.”

“I know,” he looked down at her, a small smile curling his mouth. “I appreciate your coming this evening.”

“Just out of curiosity,” she said, raising her gaze to meet his. “Why did you want me here?”

Jared met her eyes for a reflective moment, then reached out, drawing her into his arms. She went willingly enough, standing enclosed in his embrace.

His warmth and the wonderful scent that was his alone, surrounded her. This was part of Jared the shark, too, this dangerously sheltered feeling he evoked in her. When had she ever known a more complicated man?

He made no move to kiss her, only holding her close, his head bent to rest against hers, regardless of the fact that they stood on a still-busy sidewalk in full view of passersby.

“It’s been a hectic week,” Jared said finally, his voice low and warm, vibrating through his chest. “I just wanted to see you.”

Warmth, sudden and insidious, curled through Kelsey. She lifted her head to look at him again, feeling the urge to comfort and sooth him. It was odd to think of Jared needing such a thing.

He brushed a kiss against her temple. “You need to go. Tomorrow’s a work day.”

“How will you get back to the office if the limo takes me home?”

“I’ll walk. It’s just around the corner.”

“Around several corners,” she corrected.

“Don’t worry. I’ll be fine.” Jared loosed her, stepping back. “I’ll call you.”

“Okay,” Kelsey said, obediently climbing into the waiting car. “Goodnight.”

As the limousine pulled away from the curb, she looked through the darkened windows to see him wave briefly before he turned and walked up the street.

Kelsey sank back against the car’s rich upholstery, puzzled as much by her reaction to Jared as by his sudden tenderness. She’d had her fair share of boyfriends, but Jared was something else.

They were entering into this marriage with nothing more between them than lust and necessity.

She really needed to remember that regardless of a few tender moments, a man like Jared Barrett could do permanent damage to her careful heart. If she let him.

*
**

“You saw Dad!” Amy’s voice rose to a squeak as she stood in the middle of Kelsey’s small, cluttered living area. “Well, what did he say? Was he nice? What does he look like?”

“He’s…tall,” Kelsey said, answering the easiest of the questions pouring out of her sister’s mouth. “Dark hair and a…nice face.”

The words seemed so inadequate. She didn’t have clue how to convey the jumbled emotions that rose in her when she sat looking at her father for the first time three days ago.

“And?” Amy prompted impatiently. “Did he hug you? Did he say why he’s never tried to see us?”

Kelsey turned away from where her sister stood, going to slump in a corner of the loveseat.

“I just went to the seminar,” she said haltingly, not sure she wanted to have this discussion at all. But she’d thought about John Layton many times since that night when their gazes had caught and held. Thought about the fact that he was Amy’s father, too. Still, she wasn’t sure she should have opened the subject with her impressionable younger sister.

“Okay,” Amy said, making an obvious attempt to calm down in the face of her sister’s inarticulate responses. She sat on the loveseat next to Kelsey. “You saw the seminar in the paper and you went, but what
happened
when you introduced yourself to him?”

“I-I got there late,” Kelsey said, her fingers fidgeting with the tassel dripping from the corner of the cushion on her lap. Suddenly, she wasn’t sure if her reticence that night was more about cowardice than indifference.

“What did he say when you told him who you are?” Amy said, clearly wild with curiosity and imagining a much warmer family reunion than Kelsey could report.

“I sat down in the back,” Kelsey said. “It had already started—the seminar—and I didn’t want to interrupt.”

“Okay,” her sister said reasonably, “then you went up afterwards?”

Kelsey slowly shook her head, trying not to feel that she’d somehow failed her sister. “I just sat there looking at him and thinking about all the times we wondered how he looked—“

She broke off, helplessly, looking at her sister.

“—wondered why he never called or sent birthday presents. Wondered if he’d like us.”

Amy’s expressive face shimmered suddenly with the remembered pain that Kelsey felt herself.

“And I just couldn’t speak to him,” she finished. “I sat there thinking of all the things I could say. ‘Hello, I’m your grown daughter.’ ‘So you’re the man who donated the sperm.’”

She shrugged. “I didn’t know what to do.”

“Yes,” Amy said slowly. “I guess it would be hard to know what to say.”

“Then, he looked at me,” Kelsey said, still fidgeting with the cushion. “You know, like he really saw me in the midst of all those other people. And I didn’t know what I’d do if he came up to me. So, to keep from calling him a bastard and bursting into tears, I just left.”

Amy sat next to her in silence, her face troubled.

“I wish you’d told me you were going,” she said, at last. “It might not have been so hard if we’d gone together.”

“Maybe not,” Kelsey agreed, returning her sister’s sudden hug. “But I didn’t really decide to go till the last minute. And besides, you’ve been so
up
about things with Doug. I didn’t want to bring you down.”

A smile dawned suddenly on her sister’s face. “Things are going well with Doug. We watched videos and ordered in Chinese last night. I mean, we’ve done that a hundred times before. But there was this moment—he had his arm around me and he looked down at me—you know, eye to eye? I thought he was going to kiss me again. He didn’t then, but I know he will soon.”

Amy’s glow of excitement sent a warm surge of satisfaction through Kelsey. This was why she would marry Jared in a few short weeks. She leaned over, hugging her sister again.

“I’m glad. He couldn’t kiss a better girl. I’m so happy things are finally getting straightened out with you two.”

“Me, too.” Her sister bounced on the seat like a four-year old filled with exuberance.

Amy threw her arms wide, falling back against the loveseat. “Everything’s working out for us both! Who’d have thought you would fall for Jared just when I was about to give up on Doug?”

Throwing her love-fogged sister an indulgent glance, Kelsey murmured, “Yeah, what a surprise.”

“And Jared’s such a great guy,” Amy enthused. “So perfect for you. Strong and, you know, masterful. Not like some of those wimps you’ve flirted with. Jared’s absolutely the perfect guy for you.”

“Yes.” Kelsey twisted the antique sapphire ring on her finger, thinking about the man with whom she’d soon be sharing her bed and her life. Jared Barrett was the perfect man for her…for one whole year.

*
*
**

Kelsey held the cool champagne glass in her hand, glancing around again in amazement at the crowded room. She had no idea how Jared’s friends had pulled this bridal shower/engagement party together so quickly.

The wedding was all set for a week from this evening, less than six weeks from the fateful day in her office when she’d announced to Jared that she needed a husband. As far as she knew, however, this elegant, if boisterous, soiree had sprung up as an impulsive celebration sponsored by two couples Jared had known since college.

They were a rowdy bunch, despite their accumulated wealth and dignified professions. She’d never seen such a group of normal, cheerful people. Jared ran with a more diverse crowd than she’d have expected. He’d already introduced her to a young, hot architect, a stockbroker, two doctors, an editor for a small press and several struggling artists.

Even Doug was here with Amy in tow. As one of Jared’s executives, Doug had naturally been included any festivities. Apparently, Jared was known to have an egalitarian management style that frequently included socializing with his staff.