This Matter Of Marriage

I remember watching the Academy Awards and wondering just how long it would take for the awards winner to spout off all the names of those who'd helped along the way. The list seemed endless. While I'm not an Academy Award winner—at least, not yet—I have my own list of people to thank, so please bear with me.

 

Thanks, first and foremost, to my husband, Wayne, who loved and believed in me enough to allow me to follow my dream. To my agent, Irene Goodman, who held my hand all through contract negotiations. To my best friend, Linda Lael Miller, who taught me everything I needed to know about power-shopping. And thanks to Susan Wiggs for our twice-a-month neurotic lunches.

 

No writer has been blessed with a better support team. Thank you, one and all.

 

Working with MIRA has been a writer's dream. Everything in life should be this much fun. Thank you, Paula, Dianne, Randall, Candy, KO, Stuart and Brian. I hope it was as good for you as it was for me.

One:
Starting Now

Two:
Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

Three:
Seven Down, Three To Go

Four:
First There Was Paul, Then George…

Five:
Bachelor #1

Six:
The Loan Ranger

Seven:
Make Mine A Double

Eight:
Bachelor #2

Nine:
Bingo!

Ten:
The Lady With The Curve Ball

Eleven:
Disappointments

Twelve:
Bachelor #3

Thirteen:
Bring On The Ice Cream

Fourteen:
Does He Wear Panty Hose?

Fifteen:
What Friends Are For

Sixteen:
Not My Type

Seventeen:
She Bakes

Eighteen:
Aunt Hallie

Nineteen:
Take It Like A Man

Twenty:
Chicken Soup For The Heart

Twenty-One:
Back In The Saddle Again

Twenty-Two:
The Girl Next Door

Twenty-Three:
Back In The Game

Twenty-Four:
Four Blind Mice

Twenty-Five:
When Todd Met Donnalee

Twenty-Six:
Second Chance At Love

Twenty-Seven:
Large Women Wearing Helmets With Horns

Twenty-Eight:
The Movies

Twenty-Nine:
Love Is Better Than Chocolate

Thirty:
Mr. Nice Guy

Thirty-One:
Goodbye, My Heart

Thirty-Two:
Wide Awake And Dreaming

Thirty-Three:
The Wedding

Thirty-Four:
The Wedding Bouquet

Epilogue

January 1

S
weat rolled down Hallie McCarthy's forehead, dripping in her eyes and momentarily blurring her vision. Using the towel draped around her neck, she wiped her brow. Although she'd promised herself she wouldn't, Hallie glanced at the timer on the treadmill.

One minute left.

Sixty short seconds. She could endure that. With a renewed sense of purpose, she picked up her pace and waited impatiently for the buzzer.

The treadmill had all the bells and whistles, as it should, considering what she'd paid for it (plus the three designer running suits, color-coordinated with the treadmill). At the end of her workout a digital message would flash across the four-inch computer screen, complimenting her on a job well-done.

Donnalee had suggested she join a gym to meet men, and she would, Hallie told herself, once she was at her goal weight. But not now. She wasn't about to go prancing around a gym with thighs that resembled ham hocks. Which, she supposed, was something like cleaning her house before the cleaning lady arrived—but she'd done that, too.

Huffing, her heart feeling ready to explode, Hallie gripped the sides of the treadmill as the timer counted down those final seconds. This last minute was proving to be the longest of her life.

Needing a distraction to take her mind off the physical agony while she raced toward an imaginary finish line, Hallie turned to look out her living-room window at the luxury condominium next door.

Hey, she was getting a new neighbor. A moving van was parked in front and a crew of able-bodied men—
very
able-bodied, she noted appreciatively—unloaded its contents. A big truck that probably required a step stool to climb into was parked behind it. The license-plate frame was one of those customized ones. Squinting, she was able to make out the words: BIG TRUCK. BIG TOOLS. Hallie groaned aloud and rolled her eyes. Men and their egos! Two muscular guys wandered into her line of vision, and she wondered if one of those good-looking hunks might be her neighbor.

Willow Woods, the condominium complex where she'd moved six months earlier, had all but sold out. She'd speculated it wouldn't take long for the place next to hers to sell. Especially since it was a three-bedroom unit, the most spacious design available. Must be a family moving in. She was definitely cheered by the thought of having neighbors.

The timer went off, and the treadmill ground to a halt. Hallie heaved a sigh of relief and rubbed her sweat-drenched face with the towel. Her cheeks felt red and hot and her short curly hair was matted against her temples. Her old gray sweats—she didn't feel comfortable sweating in her new color-coordinated ones—were loose around the waist. A promising sign. The temptation to run into the bathroom and leap on the scale was strong, but she'd made that mistake too often and vowed she'd only weigh herself once a week. Monday morning, bright and early—that was when she'd do it.

She'd lost five pounds in twenty-one days. The first two had fallen away easily, but the last three had been like chiseling at a concrete block with a tablespoon. She'd starved herself, exercised faithfully. She'd counted fat grams, carbohydrates, calories and chocolate chips to little avail.

Her best friend, Donnalee Cooper, claimed Hallie was putting too much stock in the physical, but Hallie believed otherwise. It was that packaging thing again. The men she knew based their reactions to women—at least their initial reactions—on looks. It didn't matter if the woman had a brain in her head as long as her waist was tiny…and her other assets weren't. Of course, attracting a man wasn't Hallie's
only
incentive for becoming physically fit. She didn't exercise nearly enough, had taken to skipping breakfast and was downing fast food on the run. Not a healthy lifestyle. Donnalee seemed unconvinced when Hallie explained this, though, pointing out that she hadn't worried about her health
before.

Donnalee was single, although she'd had a brief disastrous marriage in her early twenties. To Hallie's delight, when she'd shared her goal of finding a man and marrying within the next twelve months, Donnalee had decided to join forces with her. She said that she'd never meant to wait this long to remarry, and like Hallie, she wanted children. But Donnalee brought a different strategy to their marriage campaign.

“Just be yourself,” she'd advised.

“Being myself hasn't attracted a whole lot of attention so far,” Hallie complained. That, at least, shut her friend up. Dating opportunities had dwindled to a trickle in the last few years, but she was determined to improve the situation.

Hallie showered and changed clothes, then phoned her mother who lived across Puget Sound in Bremerton, on the Kitsap Peninsula. Hallie and her father had been close, both in personality and in appearance, but it was from her mother that she'd inherited her artistic talent. Despite her ability, Lucille McCarthy had never worked outside the home. It had always troubled Hallie that a woman so genuinely talented would be content to do little more than keep house. Not until she was an adult living on her own did she recognize her mother's contribution to the family. Over the months since her father's sudden death, Hallie had come to appreciate her mother's quiet strength. At Christmas, she'd encouraged her to take up oil painting, and Lucille had recently begun a class.

The conversation went well, with Lucille cheerfully describing the portrait she'd started to paint of a sleeping Ellen. Afterward, Hallie wrote her weekly grocery list, threw on a jacket and hurried out the door, eager to finish her Saturday-morning chores. It was when she climbed into her car that she saw her new neighbor. At least, she thought he was the one. He was tall and not as brawny as she'd thought at first glance. Solid, she decided. All shoulders, with good upper-body strength. Handsome, too, in an unobtrusive way. In other words, seeing him didn't make her heart beat faster—which was just as well, since he was obviously married with children.

He did have an interesting face, a lived-in face, and seemed the type of person she'd like to know. Not romantically, of course, but maybe as a friend. She turned her attention from him to the two kids at his side. A girl and boy, who were probably about eleven and nine. Great-looking kids. The girl waved, her smile wide and friendly.

Hallie waved back, inserted the key into the ignition and drove off.

The moving van was gone by the time she returned an hour or so later. The two kids were riding their bicycles when she pulled into her driveway.

The girl headed her way, long coltish legs pumping the bicycle pedals.

“Hi,” she called. “My dad just moved next door.” She stopped abruptly and hopped off the polished chrome bike.

“So I saw,” Hallie said, leaning across the front seat and removing her bags of groceries.

“I'm Meagan. That's my brother, Kenny.” She nodded toward the younger boy, and as if on cue, Kenny joined his sister.

“You got any kids?” Kenny asked hopefully.

“Sorry, no.” She balanced both grocery bags in her arms.

Some of the enthusiasm left the boy's eyes. “Do you know anyone around here who does?”

“Unfortunately, I don't think there are any kids your age on this block.” Most of the couples who'd moved into the complex were just starting out. Hallie suspected there'd be any number of children in the neighborhood within a few years, but not now.

“Here,” Meagan said, tilting her bike onto the grass. “I can help you carry those in.” She took one bag out of Hallie's hands.

“Thanks.” Hallie was touched by her thoughtfulness and said so.

The girl beamed at the praise. “Mom says I'm a big help to her now that she and Dad are divorced.”

Meagan's expression grew sad when she mentioned the divorce. Hallie's heart immediately went out to her—but she couldn't help musing that her new neighbor was available, after all. It was an automatic reaction, triggered by her newly activated husband-seeking instincts.

Hallie briefly recalled her first impressions of him and decided then and there that she wanted someone with a bit more…finesse. A guy who drove a truck with a license-plate holder advertising his big tools didn't overly impress her. It wasn't only that, either; she'd seen what the movers had carted into his house. Sports equipment. Boxes and boxes of it. There didn't seem to be anything this guy hadn't tried. From mountain climbing to kayaking to scuba diving.

Hallie led the way into the kitchen, where she dumped her sack on the countertop. Meagan carefully put hers beside it. “Thanks again, Meagan.”

“Are you married?” the girl asked.