Famously Engaged (22 page)

Brad’s mum gave Jake a strict look. “If you’ve still got that ring in your pocket, I suggest you find a way to convince our Beth to put it back on. Don’t just stand there,” she said when he didn’t react, “the clock’s ticking.”

Jake waited for Brad’s mother to head back inside. “If she knows it’s not for real will she still give you the cookbook?”

Beth stifled a sigh of regret, aware that Brad must’ve been meddling for Jake to know all the ins and outs of tonight’s scheduled events. The last bit of hope she’d foolishly clung to disintegrated as she realized he wasn’t interested in
them
. She wanted him, and all he was offering was
a book.

“That’s why you’re here? To help me cheat a woman you don’t even know out of an heirloom cookbook she’s prepared to give in good faith? You’ve wasted your time coming here today.”

She turned away. “I don’t want it enough to stoop that low.”

He curled his hand around her wrist to prevent her from leaving.

“That’s not why I’m here.” She would’ve interrupted, but his fiery look made the words catch in her throat. “You’ve already been married to her son.” He laughed although there was no humor in it. “You and Brad weren’t destined to be more than friends but you’re still a part of their family and always will be, even when you meet somebody new and have a family of your own.” His voice was thicker, as if the words were more difficult now. This wasn’t just about her, it was about him too.

“The damned cookbook’s an heirloom, Beth. You get that and your place in their family is assured. Every time there’s a celebration of any sort, they’ll land on your doorstep.” He let go of her wrist and spread his hands wide. “Guaranteed.”

She stared at him through the tears that welled in her eyes, scarcely able to believe that he’d come here today to secure for 
her
the one thing that was missing from
his
life—a family.

His profile was his ticket in, a fail-safe way to win her over.

But he wasn’t using it to gain anything, not personally. His family loyalty was secretly with Skyla. He had nothing to gain by charming Brad’s family—except the heirloom cookbook that would be Beth’s after he left.

She touched his forearm and hiked his sleeve up a tad to glimpse his cuff links. “BC,” she said and grinned. “I chose the right arm.”

Without a word, he mirrored her action with the opposite sleeve. The cuff links both read BC.

“It’s a time thing.” He shrugged as if it was nothing, but she noticed he had to clear his throat. “I can keep them till the end of time and take you with me any place I want.”

Wow. Aware that the ball was in her court, she waved the booklet in her hand. “And I can turn up on any of your doorsteps with a suitcase.”

“But you won’t.”

“Not for a temporary stay, no. Will you come back to Melbourne? To see Skyla?” Before he could answer, she tacked on another comment. “If you don’t play the role of my doting fiancé tonight, then the cookbook will eventually go to her.”

His head tilted an acknowledgement. “I know. But she’s marrying into Brad’s family anyway. This way she gets to land on your doorstep everytime she has something to celebrate, and I know she’ll spend the most memorable moments of her life in your house with you.” He tried for a smile and fell short. “It’s as close as we’ll have to a family tradition.”

“That sounds good in theory,” she murmured, her voice wavering along with her emotions. “But I’d want her to drink cognac at some stage and I know now that’s only going to be possible if you’re around. Besides, having Brad’s family turning up on my doorstep unannounced all the time might not be the best thing.”

His head shook as if he already knew what she about to say.

“It worked for you, but that was before I took up traveling as a hobby.”

“Beth.” The pain in that one word told her everything she needed to know. “Don’t even joke about it. Your whole life is here, it’s always been here, and you can’t pack up your house and everyone you care about and bring them all along on tour.” The regret in his eyes made her heart kick, then falter painfully in her chest.

“You can’t bring them,” he repeated. “And I can’t ask you to leave them behind.”

Replying was a struggle. “You’re not asking. I’m insisting.”

The glass door into the saloon closed with a resounding bang and Brad stood beside it shrugging apologetically. “Sorry for the interruption but most of the guests are seated, Beth. Five minutes, okay?”

She nodded and waited for him to go before puffing out a sigh and meeting Jake’s eyes. “I’ve got to go. I’m going to pop some eyedrops in and retouch my lipstick before checking on Skyla.

I’m so glad you’re here for her wedding. You’re the only family she has.”

Jake rocked her in his arms, his embrace a little too tight for comfort while he absorbed what she’d said. When he released her, she slipped her shoes back on and grinned at him.

“While the ceremony’s in progress you can try to justify the time and expense of flying back to Melbourne five or six times in the next year for various celebrations. And since we’ll be moving around a lot, I won’t be able to get a regular job and contribute financially.” His stunned expression gave her the confidence to carry on as if her whole future wasn’t on the line. “I’ll be doing volunteer work for charity, which isn’t very glamorous, but then neither am I.”

“No more pointy beads.” He sounded rather dazed.

“None,” she agreed. “You’ll have plenty of time to get used to me being around while you’re on the road, and to decide if it’s what you really want. I think we should leave the public engagement in place, and if we’re happy together after a year then we’ll make it privately official.”

“Will that be as good as it sounds?”

“I hope so.” She couldn’t help smiling. “I’ll ask Brad and Skyla to help us plan a big wedding. It’d be nice to get married here in Melbourne around this time next year.

“Oh, and I’ll be keeping my house, so you might want to

budget for some security fees or maybe organize a caretaker.”

“Beth.” He blew out an unsteady breath as if there weren’t

adequate words for what he wanted to say. “I’ve got tour dates

booked. Another album. It’ll be
three
years at least until—”

That was hope in his voice. It was. She wasn’t imagining it.

He was telling her all the negatives up front, just as she’d thought she’d wanted him to, but all she really wanted was for him to say they’d work it out. Somehow. Together.

“Three years.” She waved her hand as if it were nothing. “The thing you need to know is that if you do decide to marry me, it’ll cost you. I won’t want designer clothes or thousand-dollar shoes, but in a few years I’ll probably need a nanny.”

Jake’s arms were around her, crushing her against him before she could even finish her sentence. “A baby,” he said, sounding as if she’d suggested something so miraculous he couldn’t wrap his head around it. He stepped back a fraction and studied her face, his eyes a deep caramel well of hope and doubt that was quite mesmerizing.

“It’s a lot to give up, Beth. The tour’s got ten months to run and we’d be traveling the whole time.” He hesitated, then kept going as if he couldn’t bear her not knowing everything. “The next few years will be like that, and there’ll be times we won’t be able to get back here. There are too many people depending on me.

The best I can offer—”

“Is yourself?”

That seemed to steal all of his thunder. She watched as he struggled to come up with a response, never doubting that he’d say the right thing. Eventually.

A slow smile chased away his worried expression. “We’ll be living in a fishbowl. Are you sure that’s what you want?”

“Completely sure. If you’re there, I’ll love it because…I love you.” She smiled up at him, but her smile began to fade when he didn’t respond. He almost looked as if he were waiting for her to laugh and tell him she didn’t really care and she’d just been having him on. “Besides, I plan to wreak havoc with your schedule and retreat back here with you every chance I get.”

“There’s something I need to know before we go any further.”

The question should’ve alarmed her but it didn’t. “Oh yeah, what’s that?”

“Those pictures on your toenails,” he said with a severe frown that he couldn’t quite hold, “what were they?”

His frown morphed into a grin and she returned it, her heart light. “They were little cupids.” She lifted her mouth closer to his, in invitation. “When I put them on I had no idea you’d be landing on my doorstep later that day, but maybe they lured you there?”

“Cupids? That might explain why I fell for you so fast.”

“You did?”

“I love you, Beth. I was half-gone before we climbed into your kitchen. I want you in my life every single day. I need you with me. I love everything about you, especially that chicken suit of yours.”

“You’re kidding?”

“It’s my favorite way to picture you. Of course sometimes bits of it are on the floor or the counter or the couch. It’s so much fun to take off.” His lips whispered over hers. “Oh, what the heck, you’ve got to fix your lipstick anyway.” He ravished her mouth.

A gentle but persistent tap on her shoulder demanded her attention and she reluctantly eased apart from Jake to see what could be so damned important it’d interrupt a life-changing moment such as this one.

And then she blushed deeply as Skyla’s wedding dress supplied the answer. She’d been so busy securing her own future, she’d forgotten all about Brad and Skyla’s. “Important stuff.” She gestured at Jake, finding it hard to sound apologetic. “My timing’s not great, I’ll grant you that, but Brad and I have always competed like siblings. He’s adding to our family today so I thought I would too.”

Skyla’s bright smile switched to high beam and she flung her arms around Jake. “You and I are already related, but now we can pretend our spouses brought us together.”

Beth’s eyes filled as Jake’s voice cracked. “You knew?”

Skyla nodded and shifted so that both she and Jake could put an arm around Beth. “I’ve known for six days and I didn’t come to Beth’s house to see you in the hope you’d come here instead.

Would you”—she hesitated and then blurted her request out in a rush—“do you think you might be able to walk me down the aisle? No pressure. Only if you want to.”

Beth gave up trying to blink back tears as Jake nodded. Skyla crushed them both close and squealed in delight. “I’m assuming your engagement is real now? I couldn’t be happier for the two of you. For all of us.”

All three of them were laughing when Brad’s family and friends spilled out onto the deck to join the pre-wedding celebration. Catching the bemusement on Jake’s face, Beth smiled at him and shrugged. “I know everyone Brad knows. Sorry about the lack of privacy. You’ll get used to it.”

Jake rolled over in bed and studied the peaceful lines of his new wife’s face as she slept. That lovely peace would be gone in— he checked his watch—thirty seconds, but there’d be joy and tears and laughter to replace it. Beth caught every surprise he threw at her, and he threw a lot.

Under normal circumstances this next one might be unforgivable, but
normal
was a fluid concept. He adjusted the super soft collar of her new white chicken suit, the one he’d slipped into her suitcase among the delicate lingerie she’d bought for their honeymoon. The outer door of their hotel suite eased open and he gave Ken the signal, indulging in a smile as he slipped his hand beneath the sheet to curl around Beth’s breast where it belonged.

He closed his eyes and waited for the commotion to begin.

The lengthy silence put him on edge. He cracked one eye open and saw that his careful plan had been relegated to the scrap heap.

Shifting gears, he kissed Beth awake, smiling against her neck as her pulse picked up pace beneath his mouth. The photographer’s presence forgotten, he touched his lips to Beth’s. “I love you, Mrs. Olsen.”

“A little louder.”

Startled by the intrusion, he glared at the photographer who was supposed to be capturing the excitement of Beth’s surprise party. Where was everyone?

“Louder…for Beth.” The photographer’s lips twitched in a suspicious manner. She tapped the camera she held, then pointed to him. “I’ve been instructed to capture your good-morning speech, so you’d best get on with it.”

Beth lay on her back, instantly awake, green eyes alight with mischief and her hair in wild disarray over the pillow. She accepted the new reality without blinking. “A speech, huh? Just what every newlywed hopes for the morning after their wedding.”

A speech, hell, how was he supposed to come up with something memorable without a moment’s notice? He looked at Beth and decided to just speak the truth. “I love you. I’ve loved every minute we’ve spent together, and I want a lifetime of you by my side. I started to fall for you while we were on your front porch that first night. You told me I wasn’t welcome and I couldn’t accept it.”

“Want to know what I was thinking when I said that?”

He played his lips over Beth’s and smiled. “Probably not.”

She laughed when pandemonium broke out in their room, and her joy was exponential as she recognized a host of familiar faces. “Welcome to our honeymoon,” she said.

Jake flicked a glance at the photographer and got a nod for his efforts. He never would’ve thought he’d want a photographer in his bedroom or video footage of the morning after his wedding, but Beth made the strangest things necessary.

She caught his eye and waved her hand to encompass everyone. “Can I ask why we’re sharing our honeymoon with an entire rock band and our favorite in-laws?”

“I put my father’s health scare ahead of everything else and made you miss our big wedding in Melbourne—”

She put her fingers to his lips, her eyes telling him that his father’s heart attack was reason enough for changing their plans.

“I’m sorry that my parents have refused to see us. I thought a near-death experience would have softened my old man’s attitude and that my mother would be grateful for our support, but they’re as stubborn and closed off as ever.” He set her hand aside, freeing his lips so he could share the good news. “My brothers both want to meet you, though. And you, Skyla.”