Luke's Promise

Luke glanced at the woman who was all but skipping along beside him on the way to his pickup. Maggie wasn’t much bigger than a bite, but her pint-size body held enough energy for any three normal people. Her cheeks were round and freckled, her hair was very short, but otherwise undecided—neither curly nor straight, brown nor blond. Her clothes were more definite, being divided between the defiant and the sloppy. Above wrinkled khaki pants, her T-shirt was a scream of purple. The brown leather bomber jacket she wore looked like it had been through at least one World War. The cast that peeked out of her left sleeve was a radioactive-green.

And she had a small, husky voice. A whiskey-and-sin voice that made a man think of rumpled sheets. He wanted to jump her bones. “I like your shirt.”

She glanced down at her chest. Yellow letters sprawled across the modest bumps made by her breasts asked, What Would Xena Do? She grinned. “It’s a reminder. Part of my antiwuss campaign.”

“Wuss?” His eyebrows lifted. “I’ve seen you compete. You could give lessons in determination to the Cowboys’ offensive line. Maybe you should, after their last season.”

“Oh, I’m fine on the back of a horse. It isn’t until I’m standing on my own two feet that my wuss tendencies take over. If you hadn’t forced things, I probably would have wimped out and left without my purse.”

He paused, his head cocked to one side, trying to figure out what was going on. He’d expected to have a hell of a lot more trouble talking her into this, but she was grinning at him as if they ran off together every other week. “You’re enjoying yourself, aren’t you?”

“Damned right I am.” She said it with a certain relish.

“That’s three.” He opened the pickup’s passenger door.

“What?”

“That’s the third time I can remember hearing you use a cuss word.”

“The habits of a lifetime are hard to break. I’m working on it.”

“Learning to cuss is part of your antiwuss campaign?”

“Yep.” She tossed her purse onto the seat and climbed in. “Would you really have busted a window on my father’s car if my mother hadn’t given in and unlocked it?”

He grinned. “Damned right I would.” Sitting on the bench seat of the pickup cab, she was slightly above him. He liked the perspective that gave him on those soft, smiling lips. He wasn’t crazy about the rush of heat and frustration that hit, along with the tantalizingly faint wash of memories.

He’d have to get used to that. “We couldn’t leave without your purse. You’ll need ID when we get to Vegas.”

“Oh, right. Of course. My mother would have thought of that sooner or later, wouldn’t she? If not, my father certainly would have when he got back. Then they’d never have believed we were really running away to get married.”

“Ah.” He nodded. “Now I understand. You don’t think this elopement is for real. You just want your father to think it is.”

“Well…the fact that he can’t stand you is a real plus, I’ll admit. I haven’t thanked you, Luke, but I do appreciate it. Asking me to run off with you was inspired. You think fast on your feet.” She chuckled. “The look on my mother’s face…anyway, I guess you came by to offer me a chance to ride Fine Dandy for you once my wrist is better, and I really, really appreciate that.”

“I do want you to ride Fine Dandy.”

“Then I’m sure we can work something out.” In the same friendly tone she added, “But I do wish you’d stop staring at my mouth that way.”

“I’ve always been partial to your mouth.”

“No offense, but you’re partial to any pair of lips attached to a female body.”

The sudden grinding in his gut—was it anger? Or guilt? “Only the pretty ones.” He tossed her suitcase in the back of the truck and climbed in on his side. “We’d better get going. The flight leaves at one-twenty.”

“You have a flight to catch? I guess you could drop me at Linda’s—her place is on the way. Or I can call someone from the airport to come get me. But maybe we could talk about Fine Dandy first?”

“No, Maggie, I don’t have a flight to catch. We do. For Las Vegas.”

Her eyes went huge, and her mouth parted—but no words came out. Satisfied, he started the engine.

The driveway was a long, concrete yawn leading to an equally boring street. Expensive—but boring. The houses here had grounds, not yards, and they were cared for by professionals. A three-man crew was stringing Christmas lights in the naked branches of several live oaks at one home.

Automatically Luke’s gaze flickered and veered away.

He hated winter, hated the empty trees and sky, the creeping gray defeat of the season. Christmas was a hurdle to be leaped, the red-and-green mania that swept the world every December a trial to be endured before he could settle in to wait for the promise of spring.

“Okay, Luke,” Maggie said abruptly. “It was a good joke. But enough is enough. You don’t want to marry me.”

“I don’t?”

“I suppose I’m not the last woman you’d want to marry, but there must be a hundred or two you’d prefer. They can’t have all turned you down already.”

“I haven’t asked anyone else.”

Silence. They pulled to a stop at the light and waited for the light to change, and she didn’t say a word—but he could almost hear her scrambling to pull her scattered thoughts together. He decided to help her out. “You know why I have to marry someone, the quicker the better, don’t you? Jacob must have told you about Ada when he proposed.”

“Well—well, yes, he did.” She shook her head. “This is so weird. In twenty-seven years I’ve collected exactly zero proposals of marriage, then last week Jacob…and now you…and neither one of you—you’re both friends!” Her breath huffed out. “This is just so weird.”

That was one word for it. Luke did take some satisfaction from hearing that Maggie thought of Jacob as a friend. “This proposing business comes as a shock to me, too.”

Two weeks ago, if anyone had suggested to Luke that he would ever dabble in matrimony, he would have laughed. But two weeks ago, he hadn’t known about Ada.

People outside the family didn’t understand. To them, Ada was just a servant—first his father’s housekeeper, now Jacob’s. But to the West brothers, she was much more. She was the one woman they all loved, the one constant in their lives. No matter who else had come and gone—and there had been one hell of a lot of comings and goings—Ada had always been there for them.

And now she was dying. Or she would be, if she didn’t continue the experimental treatments Jacob had arranged—the incredibly expensive, near-miraculous treatments at a Swiss research center. The only way to save her was for the brothers to do what they’d each sworn never to do.

They each had to marry. And fast.

Luke had turned onto the ramp to the Interstate before Maggie spoke again. “Jacob did tell me about Ada’s illness. And I honor you and your brothers for wanting to take care of her. That’s wonderful. But I don’t understand why—”

“You know the way my father left his estate tied up.” He stamped on the gas harder than necessary. His father might be five years’ dead, but he still had the power to make Luke want to be somewhere, anywhere, other than where he was. “Everyone does. I’ve seen articles about the trust in the New York Times, for God’s sake.”

“Yes, I know about the trust. Your father had some very peculiar views about marriage, Luke.”

His grin flickered to life. “Tell me about it.” After seven marriages to six women—he’d married and divorced Luke’s mother twice—any other man might have been a little sour on the institution. Not Randolph West. He’d been enthusiastically planning his eighth wedding when a heart attack had ended his participation in the matrimonial sweepstakes.

“What I don’t understand is why you have to get married.”

“I hadn’t planned on it.” But life was forcing some changes in his plans. He’d sure as hell never intended to marry. He didn’t need his inheritance, didn’t want it. The ranch was his. He’d worked hard to build it and his reputation as a rider and a trainer. What he needed a lot more than money was a good rider, someone to handle some of the competitions where the horses gained both experience and the attention of potential buyers. He was getting stretched pretty thin.

He glanced at the woman beside him. Maggie was a damned fine rider. Maybe after their marriage ended…no, he thought, shaking off the thought. He was going to do his damnedest to make sure they came out of this friends. That was enough to hope for. “Even Jacob can’t pay for Ada’s treatments by himself,” he said.

“I know that. But…Luke, I know you don’t like talking about it, but you were married at one time. Doesn’t that fulfill the conditions of the will as far as you’re concerned? Or is there some stipulation about how long the marriage has to last?”

His fingers tightened on the steering wheel. “No.” Meaning no to both questions, no to the memories. No to the whole, sorry subject.

She didn’t say anything, but she watched him expectantly, her hazel eyes solemn.

Dammit. This was the reason—one of the reasons—he’d always kept things light with Maggie. Casual friends, some teasing, a little flirting. No touching, no dating, no real come-ons. Not many people even knew about Pam, but Maggie did. She was Pam’s cousin. They’d roomed together in college. She’d been at the hospital that night…

Only he hadn’t always kept things light, had he?

“My father might have been slightly nuts on the subject of marriage,” he said, “but he wasn’t a hypocrite. His will doesn’t stipulate how long our marriages have to last, but all three of us have to be married when we petition to have the trust dissolved and stay married until it is. Pam and I divorced nearly ten years ago. Our brief, unlamented union doesn’t count.”

“Oh.” The hand without the cast started pleating the fabric of her T-shirt. “I see why you have to marry, then. But…I’m sorry, but that isn’t a reason for me to get married. There must be a thousand women right here in Dallas who would gladly take you on. And if we include the rest of Texas, why, the number would get sky-high.” She smiled at him hopefully.

“Thanks,” he said dryly. “But there certainly aren’t a thousand women I’m willing to marry.”

“But why me?”

He glanced at her, surprised. “Because I know you. If we agree on terms, I won’t have to worry about you deciding you want more and stirring up trouble trying to get it. This marriage…” He laughed, short and hard. “God, my throat tries to close up when I say the word. You know that about me, know that there’s no point in expecting too much, and there’s another reason to ask you. I can’t think of much worse than to be legally tied to a woman who thinks she’s in love with me.”

“Your ego’s showing.”

He shrugged. He knew himself. And he knew women. “With you…we can make things come out even, you and me. I need to get the trust dissolved. You need Dandy. Besides…” He grinned. “I like you.”

“Luke.” She sighed. “I like you, too. That’s part of the problem. We’re friends. I don’t want to mess with that.”

“We already did.” He didn’t look at her. “About a week before Christmas last year, we messed things up pretty thoroughly.”

“Oh, that!” Her breezy voice dismissed it. “That was a mistake, of course. A mutual mistake. We were both a little tipsy, a little emotional. But we’re adults, so we admitted we’d been a pair of prize idiots and put it behind us.”

No, he thought. They hadn’t put it behind them. They’d pretended it never happened. That was how she’d wanted to play it—how she still wanted to play it, obviously, and if he had some ideas about changing that, they could wait. “You’re right,” he said mildly. “We’re friends. I don’t want to lose that.”

“Okay, then.” She beamed at him like a teacher whose slowest student has finally given the correct answer. “We don’t want to risk our friendship on something as—as uncertain as marriage. Even a businesslike marriage can get sticky.”

She said the right things, said them with such matter-of-fact good humor that he might have believed her…if her hands hadn’t stretched the hem of her T-shirt all out of shape with their nervous pleating and unpleating. Or if he hadn’t remembered all too well the look in her eyes when he’d climbed out of her bed, given her a kiss and walked out the door.

She would probably try to climb out of the truck right here on the Interstate if he let on that he knew he’d hurt her. “I can’t argue with you about marriage being an uncertain business.”

“Exactly.”

“But it’s uncertain because people go into it with a lot of unrealistic expectations. We’ll make sure we’re both clear on what we want and expect from our deal. No emotions, no complications.”

“Luke…I’m sorry, but I don’t want to marry you.”

“But you do want Fine Dandy. And you want to continue to compete. I know you’d rather have a marriage based on the good stuff,” he said gently. “You deserve it—flowers and pretty words, moonlight and promises. Romance.”

“Romance? Good grief. You know me. Practical as a pair of old boots.”

He had his work cut out for him, all right. “Well, this would be a very practical way to meet both our needs.” Needs might have been the wrong word to use. It conjured vague, heated memories he couldn’t afford to indulge. “Think of it as a business arrangement.”

The stubby arcs of her eyelashes blinked once, slowly. “Like a marriage of convenience?”

“I guess.” He hadn’t heard the term before, and wasn’t sure what she meant. “If it were anyone else, I’d have to get a prenuptial agreement first. But I trust you. If we can agree to terms, I know you’ll honor them.”

She was thoughtful now, her fingers rubbing at her cast as if the wrist beneath it ached. “The problem is, I don’t trust you.”

“Ouch. I guess we can set our agreement down in writing. I’m thinking a million would be about right, once the trust has been dissolved.”

“I don’t—it isn’t—good grief, a million dollars? You can’t seriously propose to give me that kind of money!”

“Sure I can. I don’t know exactly what my share of the trust will come to, but a million won’t make that much of a dent in it.”

“You know what? You’re going to be a very rich man, Luke. I think you’ll need a bodyguard more than a wife to protect you from all the women who will be scaling fences and swimming rivers to get to you.” She chuckled.

Damn, he wished she wouldn’t do that. Her voice was whiskey and sex; her chuckle was worse. “A bodyguard would cramp my style.”

“And a wife wouldn’t?”

Best not to touch that. “So, do you want to run by the lawyer’s office and see how fast he can draw up some kind of prenuptial agreement?”

“I trust you about the money.” Her hands started fiddling again, this time with the zipper on her jacket. Up, down. Up, down.

“If you trust me about the money, then where’s the problem?”

“Sex.”

The truck swerved slightly in the lane.

“How long will this marriage have to last to get the trust dissolved once you’re all married? Two months? Six?”

“Maybe four months.” He had control of the truck, and himself, again. “Maybe more. I’m not the financial whiz in the family, but Jacob’s best guess is between four and eight months.”

“Well, I’m not crazy about getting a lot of pitying looks for the next four months or more because my husband has been seeing other women.”

His jaw tightened. “You think I’d embarrass you that way?”

She shrugged and went back to toying with the zipper. “I think you’d try to be discreet. The thing is, I do know you, Luke. Are you planning to swear off sex for the next four to eight months?”

He shot her an incredulous look.

She grinned. “For once, I can read your mind.”

No, she couldn’t. Or she’d be trying to climb out of the truck right now. Fortunately she hadn’t a clue what kind of images had popped into his head when she’d said “sex.”

But she’d been on target with the rest of it. Not that he’d actually thought it out. About all he’d taken the time to plan was how to get the two of them to Vegas as quickly as possible. But in the back of his mind, he’d assumed he’d find what he needed elsewhere…because no way was he going to hurt Maggie again. And sure as God made little green apples, if he took her to bed, she’d end up hurting.

But he hadn’t thought it through. Maggie talked tough. She was tough, strong as old leather—in some ways. In others, she was as soft and easily damaged as a rose petal. Fragile. If he married her and then fooled around on her—never mind the reason for the marriage—he’d bruise that petal. Again.

Guilt rose, thick and grim. “I think they include something about fidelity in the marriage vows, even in Las Vegas. You don’t think you could trust me to live up to any promises I make?”

“Luke.” Her sigh was small, husky, impatient. “They include something about ‘till death do us part’ in those vows, too. But we wouldn’t either one of us mean that part, would we?”

He couldn’t think of a damned thing to say.

“I take it this means that the marriage is off.” She shook her head. “Do you think we set any records for the shortest engagement ever? We’re nearly to the airport, I see. I can call someone from there to come get me.”

The hell of it was, he knew he could change her mind. Maggie wanted him. She didn’t like it, tried to hide it, but the simmer and spark were there between them. Always had been. If he could get his hands on her, he could persuade her to marry him…among other things.

Hell, she was right not to trust him. Just as well he had to keep his hands on the wheel—it forced him to do this right. Changing her mind while threading his way through the seventy-mile-an-hour traffic on I-35 was going to be tricky, though. “Let me see if I understand. You won’t marry me because you think I wouldn’t be faithful.”

“That’s about it.”

“Thought you’d found a deal-breaker, didn’t you?” He grinned. “All right. I promise I won’t fool around.”

“I—I didn’t exactly say I would marry you, even if—and realistically, a promise like that…Luke, have you ever been faithful to any woman for longer than, say, a week?”

“Realistically,” he said gently, “I don’t break promises. And this one is from me to you. Personal, not part of whatever vows we make in order to dissolve the trust.” His quick glance revealed that she’d gone from messing with the zipper to gnawing on her lip. “You’re cute when you’re worried.”

“I’m not worried.”

“You’re cute when you lie, too.”

“And I’m not marrying you.”

“Do you want me to promise that I won’t use you, Maggie? That I won’t take you to bed just because you’re handy and I’m horny?”

Her cheeks flamed. “That sounds awful.”

“It’s what you’re worried about, isn’t it? All right. You have my promise. I won’t cheat on you, and I won’t use you.” It wasn’t a hard promise to give. Keeping it…well, he’d have to, that was all.

She was staring unhappily at her lap, where the fingers of her right hand were rubbing at the hand that was partially encased in that radioactive-green cast. “You’re not used to celibacy, Luke.”

“No.” Time to lighten the mood, he decided, and flashed her a quick grin. “I won’t ask for a reciprocal promise, however. Feel free to use me. If, at any time, you become overwhelmed with lust—”

“Hah!”

“—my body is at your disposal.”

She muttered something under her breath, scowling at her clenched hands.

“I didn’t catch that.”

“Nothing. This just isn’t a good idea, Luke.”

“What’s wrong with it? You get Fine Dandy, I get what I need to take care of Ada and your father will be mad enough to spit nails.” Malcolm Stewart couldn’t stand him. He blamed Luke for everything that had gone wrong in that short, miserable marriage so many years ago.

With some reason, Luke knew.

“Now, there’s a great reason to get married,” she said dryly. “To irritate my father.” But at last her hands stopped tormenting her T-shirt.

“Think of it as a bonus.” This time, he’d be careful with her. He’d find a way to make her feel better about herself, to repair some of the damage he’d done. This time, he wouldn’t hurt her when he left. “Here’s another bonus. You need a trainer.”

“Yes, but—but do you mean you’d do it? You’d be my trainer?”

“Yes.”

“You’re good.” That was said grudgingly. “Almost as good as you think you are.”

He grinned and signaled for the turnoff to the airport. “Better than Walt Hitchcock, anyway.” He glanced at her. “Come on, Maggie. What would Xena do?”

She looked all over the place—at her shirt, her hands, out the window—everywhere but at him. And at last said, “Well…well, hell. I guess I will marry you, Luke.”

6:54 p.m.

Five hours later, they stood side by side in the “Love Me Tender” wedding chapel just off the Strip. Candles burned atop the unused piano. A few minutes ago, a stereo had played the chapel’s theme song while Maggie walked down a short aisle between empty pews.

The room was silent now, except for the words being spoken by the man in front of them.

Her mouth was dry. Her stomach was in revolt. In one hand she held a small bouquet of roses, while the other was clasped firmly in Luke’s. His palm was dry, unlike hers. The scent of the roses blended unhappily with the floral room freshener someone had recently sprayed in the small room.

She was still wearing her purple T-shirt and cargo pants.

The man who was marrying them wore a collarless black shirt that looked vaguely ecclesiastical. His thin black hair was combed back meticulously over the bald spot on top of his head. His tanned skin was stretched so tightly over his cheeks that she was afraid it would split if he smiled.

Face-lift, she thought vaguely. She wondered if it hurt when he went to the dentist and had to “open wide.”

Did ministers get face-lifts? Was he a minister? Panic clutched the pit of her stomach. She couldn’t remember. She remembered picking out the music and the flowers, and discussing what version of the marriage ceremony they wanted. Why couldn’t she remember who was marrying them? It seemed suddenly, vitally important to know. Was she making vows she didn’t intend to keep before a man of God or a civil servant?

He’d stopped talking and was looking at her expectantly. Luke squeezed her hand.

She blinked. “Oh, ah—I do.” What had she just promised?

She was losing it. She was truly losing it. What kind of woman didn’t even hear the words of her wedding service?

A terrified woman.

Maggie made herself listen carefully as the man who might or might not be a minister went through his spiel again with Luke. It sounded pretty standard…and awfully final.

Luke’s voice came out clear and strong. “I do.”

Then there were the rings, one for each of them, and more words to repeat. The double-ring ceremony had been Luke’s idea. She’d teased him about trying to buy a 24-carat bodyguard to protect him from all those man-and-money-hungry women who would soon be after him. She’d pointed out that even after they divorced, he could wear the ring sometimes to deter predators.

That had to have been one of the best performances of her life.

Her hand was shaking when she held it out so he could slip one of those rings on her finger. It stuck at the knuckle. “Uh-oh. My fingers are swollen from the cast.”

“No problem.” He grabbed her right hand. “You can switch it later.”

So he slid her ring onto the wrong finger. It doesn’t mean anything, she told herself. The ring meant nothing, just as the wedding meant nothing. And she was not going to throw up. She was definitely not going to throw up.

His ring, at least, fit perfectly.

The minister—if that’s what he was—managed to smile without splitting his skin. “You may kiss the bride.”

Luke’s hands moved to her shoulders, and he turned her to face him. There was a smile on his lips, but his eyes looked old and sad. Apparently this mockery of marriage didn’t scare him the way it did her. It just made him miserable.