Her Hired Husband

He lowered the trunk to the foyer tiles and took the device from Sally’s outstretched hand.

“I’ll get your fifty,” Sally whispered.

He shook his head, covering the mouthpiece. “It won’t do you any good. I won’t take it.” Noah made a point of turning away to indicate the subject was closed. “Hi, honey. What’s up?”

“Sugar!” came a familiar, breathy voice. “We’re waiting. What’s keeping you?”

“I’m just—”

“Noah, you have to get here. I’ve got a wonderful surprise for you!”

He didn’t doubt that, and grinned. When he started to reassure her, she rushed on. “Oh, I can’t stand it. I have to tell!”

His grin faded. This was wasting time, but he knew better than to try to stop Jane in the middle of a gush.

“Lovey,” she said, sounding coy. “I’ve made a slight change in the itinerary.” Her pause was just drawn-out enough for Noah to experience a prick of apprehension. “Dorothy told me about Bonaire, and I’m sure you didn’t realize there’s absolutely no night life there. Nothing but scuba diving.”

“That’s what we’re doing,” he reminded her, experiencing a twinge of irritation. “Remember, you said you wanted to learn.”

“Well, sure, but I thought we’d do that one afternoon, maybe two. I didn’t think you meant to scuba dive day in and day out for the whole vacation!” Her voice had taken on a slight whine. “Noah, with my delicate skin, I can’t spend a lot of time in the sun. That’s why I changed our reservations to the most scrumptious hotel on Aruba. You’ll adore it. Aruba isn’t that far away from Bonaire. You can maybe meet Sam and Dorothy a couple of mornings to dive while I sleep in. It’ll be absolute heaven!”

Noah heard his vacation plans getting flushed, but couldn’t believe it. “You’re kidding, right?” he said with a light laugh, presuming this was her idea of a joke.

He hadn’t been diving since college and was excited about starting again. For a long time he’d been searching for an antidote for the stress and long hours of his work. Something to balance out a career he loved, but found too all-consuming. He needed peace, a quiet place to go and rest, both physically and emotionally. The cool, silent primeval depths of the ocean seemed perfect.

His first effort in finding emotional peace had been his relationship with Jane. She was beautiful, always ready for fun. But after two years, he was starting to realize something was missing.

“Kidding?” she asked. “Why would I kid, Noah? We can do our thing and they can do theirs. Doesn’t it sound like heaven?”

He experienced a tightening in his gut as the detestable truth hit. “No, Jane,” he muttered. “It doesn’t.”

“What?”

Noah could almost laugh at the disbelief in her tone. She had no idea he might be angry, that he would consider what she’d done to be self-centered, high-handed manipulation. Just two months before, to Jane’s dismay, he’d turned down a plum job at Boston’s Women’s Hospital. According to her, in her invariable whine, “the Barrett name means something in Boston! You could do anything you want, be important there!” To appease her, he’d been forced to get Sam to cover for him while he took her on a long, romantic weekend in Las Vegas.

Yeah, he knew all about the Barrett name and the obligatory pomp and circumstance that came with it in Boston society. That was a major reason he’d left to attend the University of Texas, then Baylor’s College of Medicine. By the time he graduated he’d lost his Boston accent, loved the casual comfort of cowboy boots, so he’d stayed on to open his ob-gyn practice in Houston. The Barrett name didn’t mean a hill of beans in Houston. Besides, he liked his patients, especially the cases he saw one day a week when he volunteered at a charity clinic.

He remembered how Jane had complained, “But you can have your precious charity cases in Boston, too!” Noah didn’t bother to explain his feelings—that his patients were not merely names on files, but flesh and blood, and they depended on him.

At this moment he was not only furious and frustrated, but suddenly weary of the high-maintenance relationship with Jane. He needed a little space, some time to calm down. With a gritted curse, he caught sight of Sally Johnson, trudging up the stairs, lugging one of the bags. He frowned as a bizarre thought struck.

“Sweetie?” Jane’s query drew him back. “Where did you go?”

“Put Sam on,” he muttered, the vague beginnings of an idea forming in his mind.

“What?”

“Put Sam on, Jane,” he repeated, working to hold his temper.

He heard her call Sam. As he waited he ground his teeth.

“Hey, buddy, can’t find the goggles?”

“I found them.”

“Good. See you soon.”

“I don’t think so.” Noah was not ordinarily an impulsive man. But right now he was angry, so he wasn’t quite himself. “Your sister asked me to do her a favor,” he said, deciding to go with the impulse and let the chips fall where they may. “Tell Jane to enjoy herself. I’ll join her as soon as I can.” Literal translation, When I cool off.

Sam laughed. “Very funny.”

“I’m serious. I’ll mail your goggles.”

There was a pause. “Jane’s going to be royally ticked.”

“That’ll make two of us.”

“She told you?”

“Yeah.”

Sam cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, man. I didn’t know what she’d done until we got here.” In the silence that followed, Noah sensed Sam was working to keep from speaking disparagingly about his best friend’s girl. “So—what’s this favor you’re doing for my sister?”

“No big deal.” Angry and restless, he shoved a hand through his hair. “I’m just going to be her husband.”

CHAPTER THREE

SALLY lugged the heavy bag up the steps, trying to ignore the telephone conversation going on in the foyer. It wasn’t hard. The doctor had lowered his voice, so she couldn’t hear what was being said no matter how hard she strained—not that she was straining.

She fought off a wish that the plane had mechanical problems and her phony husband wouldn’t be able to leave right away. Maybe with a little reprieve she’d have time to come up with some plausible reason for him to be going out of town. A medical conference did seem like a workable idea.

“What a mess,” she muttered as she lugged the bag one step at a time. It thudded into the riser of each on-coming step as she labored, dragging and bouncing it to each, new level. Out of nowhere, a hand swept in to relieve her of the burden. Luckily she had a firm grip on the worn banister or she’d have tumbled backward in surprise.

“Hi,” Noah said, his expression less than delighted.

“I’ve got this one,” she said. “If you could just get the trunk before you go.”

“I’m not going.” His nostrils flared as he ground out the statement. “Not today.”

She stared, confused. “Did—did something go wrong with the airplane?”

He shook his head. “I just decided…” He shrugged. “Sam did me a favor a couple of months ago. I figured I could help out his sister for a day or two. Pay him back.” He shifted the bag to his other side and held out a hand. “Better give me that ring.”

She felt cotton-headed. “Ring?”

One corner of his mouth quirked upward, but there was no humor in his eyes. “With this ring, I thee wed?”

“Oh…” She found herself wholly focused on that cynical half smile as she listened to him repeat a line of the wedding vows. An unruly warmth sang through her body, and she wondered at her bizarre reaction. She’d never been through a wedding, though she’d been engaged. To a doctor. For a short time. But as pregnant as she was, standing beside this stranger, his lips twisted sardonically as he gruffly spoke a handful of sacred words, her heart did an odd series of flip-flops.

She shook herself. Sally Johnson get a grip. The man is being sarcastic. Besides, you look like a double-decker bus with a head! Belatedly, and fearful the burning in her cheeks meant she was blushing, she fished her daddy’s wedding ring from her pocket and handed it to him. “I—I don’t know how to thank you, Dr. Garrett.”

He lay the bag down, slid the ring onto his left hand, then scowled her way. “First, the name’s Barrett, not Garrett, and second, call me Noah.”

“Shouldn’t I—probably call you sweetheart or honey—like we did in the parlor?”

He picked up the luggage. “Call me whatever your idea of ‘deliriously happy’ is. Only quit calling me Dr. Garrett.”

“What are you going to call me?”

He’d taken a step up, but with her question he turned. That magnetic, twisted grin reappeared. “What about sugarplum? That has a deliriously happy ring to it.”

She wrinkled her nose. “Too gooey.”

He chuckled, the sound rich and deep. He was laughing at her, but for some reason it didn’t matter to her raging hormones. Another rush of heat washed over her. “You look like a sugarplum to me,” he said.

She frowned at his taunting. “Round and purple?”

He grinned, this time it wasn’t crooked or skewed, but with his whole mouth, if not his eyes. Even as halfhearted as the pleasant expression was, the effect made her catch her breath. “Not purple,” he said, then turned away. “More like fuchsia.”

She didn’t know why that last remark struck her as funny. Clearly he was taunting her. Still, she found herself fighting a smile. “I’d rather you call me honey or sweetheart.”

“Check—sugarplum.”

She experienced a prick of annoyance at his reckless disobedience and frowned at him as he climbed the steps. For some crazy reason, she couldn’t drag her gaze away. She wondered why. It certainly wasn’t the way his trousers fit across his backside, or the sly impression against khaki of taut muscle, shifting and bunching in his thighs and calves, as he moved.

Irritated with herself, she made a face. “Don’t lust after the doctor, Sally,” she mumbled. “Remember the last doctor you…” She clamped her jaws and headed down the steps to fetch another bag. She needed to concentrate on how she and Dr. Garrett—er —Barrett were going to carry off this farce.

Her little deception had seemed so easy, so foolproof, when it had just been for an hour. Who would have guessed things could get this fouled up?

As she stepped to the foyer tiles, a knock sounded at the door. She answered it to find the pharmacy delivery boy. She’d just closed the door when Noah reappeared, taking the stairs two at a time. To her great dismay, he looked every bit as sexy coming down as he did going up.

The baby kicked, and she winced. “Right. The doctor’s sexiness is none of our business.”

“Did you say something to me?”

She shook her head, fearing she wasn’t quite able to vanquish her sheepish expression. “I was talking to little Vivica.” She patted her stomach.

His thundercloud expression cleared slightly. “A girl?”

She nodded, taking the prescription from the bag and scratching at the name Barrett until it was mutilated and unreadable. “That’s probably something you should know.”

“What the hell are you doing?” he asked.

She peeled the little sticker off that said something about not driving while taking the medicine and restuck it over the rubbed and smudged area where the word Barrett had been. “What does it look like I’m doing, Dr. Step?”

With her emphasis on their fake married name, he got it. “Oh, right. Good thinking.”

“Thanks.” She replaced the prescription in the bag. “And, by the way, Vivica was my mother’s name.”

“The Vanderkellens’s daughter?”

“Right. And the baby’s middle name’s Charlotte. Daddy’s mother’s name. Grandmother and grandfather wouldn’t know that, but you should.”

“And when’s little Vivica Charlotte Step due?”

“Four weeks. April 1.” She raised a hand when he started to speak. “I know. I know. It’s April Fool’s Day, but Vivica has promised to be a little early or a little late.” She held out the pharmacy bag. “Here you go.”

He scooped up a couple of suitcases. “You and Vivica take it to him. I’ll finish with these.” He started up, then glanced back. “My bag is in my truck. Where do you want me to stow it?”

Sally was momentarily stymied. She hadn’t thought about the consequences of her fake husband staying on —an actual physical presence needing actual physical space. Drat! Why had Abigail Vanderkellen shoved Hubert into that sculpture? It had to be bad karma. Obviously, since she’d decided to lie, she was going to pay big! “Uh—I guess—the room upstairs at the end of the hall.”

He nodded. “Check.”

Sally was suddenly smacked in the face with a daunting reality. Miserable and shaky, she lowered herself to sit on a step. Other than the nursery, which at the moment had no bed in it at all, the room at the end of the hall was the only other bedroom in the house. Unfortunately for them both, Noah Barrett would be forced to share it with an extremely pregnant roommate.

Sally dropped her head in her hands, praying that her hired husband would take the news well. Or failing that, at least take it quietly.

The afternoon was long; tension filled the air. Hubert spent most of his time moaning and insisting he couldn’t move while Abigail spent her time insisting he get up and “walk it off.”

Sally cleared out some closet space, explaining the lack of masculine clothing in a vague statement that they were in the middle of “rearranging things for the baby.” Not that Abigail cared or even listened. She spent most of her time glaring at Hubert and spraying disinfectant.

Noah had been quiet and grim when out of sight of the Vanderkellens. He’d made one trip into town to pick up food for Abigail’s “delicate palate.” Which, translated, meant she assumed anything already opened in Sally’s refrigerator was contaminated.

Sally took a dinner tray of newly purchased cottage cheese, peach slices and freshly ground designer coffee to her grandmother. As she trekked back downstairs, she wondered if Abigail’s need to eat beside Hubert’s bedside was because she was so devoted, or because she hadn’t disinfected the kitchen.

She reentered the kitchen surprised to see Noah standing at the gas range, stirring the ingredients in her frying pan. At the sound of her entry, he glanced toward the door, his expression closed and unreadable.

She still reeled at his decision to forgo the first few days of his precious vacation to help her. Whatever the favor Sam had done for Noah must have been a whopper. It was clear he was far from happy he’d made this choice. Maybe she would ask what tipped the scales in her favor. Later. Right now she opted for a more immediate question. “What are you doing to the fried potatoes and onions?”

“They were starting to stick.”

She was amazed he’d noticed. Black smoke could have been billowing out, filling the room with choking smog and Sam wouldn’t have registered any problem. “Thanks.” She took the cooking fork from his hand. “I think the meat loaf is ready. We could eat.”

“What about a salad?”

She peered at him. She wasn’t a salad person, but she’d tried hard to include them in her diet. On occasion. “Uh, I don’t know what I have…but if you want one…” She waved the cooking fork toward the refrigerator, giving permission to look.

He indicated her belly, covered by a color-happy, ruffled apron. “I think some raw greens would be good for Vivica.”

Sally wasn’t accustomed to having anybody tell her what to do, but she held her temper. After all, Noah was doing her a favor. “Well—if you can find anything saladlike, feel free.”

He rummaged through the refrigerator. “So, how’s your grandfather?”

“Asleep. I think in self-defense. Unconscious he can’t hear grandmother accusing him of malingering.”

Noah’s deep, cynical chuckle filled the air. “I gathered from what I heard, the first week of their cruise included an extensive walking tour of the pyramids of Cozumel. I got the strong impression Hubert was not particularly hot for it.”

“The second week is supposed to take them to St. Martin, St. Thomas and Martinique where, according to Abigail, Hubert planned to play golf, golf and more golf, which she abhors with a passion.”

Noah straightened and it appeared from Sally’s vantage point at the stove, that he’d found a few items that might be considered saladish. “Sounds to me like you can count on Hubert recovering in a week.”

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