Irresistible Attraction: Scenes of Passion / Midnight Seduction / Beyond Control

She elbowed him hard in the ribs. “You had your chance last night, babe,” she said. “Matt, how could you tell my parents that we were going to live together? Didn’t it occur to you that my mother might have a heart attack right there on the living-room rug?”

“And I’m telling you they weren’t going to believe that we could live here in platonic harmony,” Matt said, rubbing his side. “I can’t believe you came up with www.VegasWedding.com. It was beautiful—I wish I’d thought of that. You know, this was the best improv I’ve been in in a long time. Did you see their faces?”

Maggie glared at him. “That was no improv, Matt, that was my life. Now my mother thinks we’re married!”

“But it worked,” he pointed out. “You didn’t get pressured to go back home.”

“She’s going to want a look at our laminated wedding certificate,” she said. “Jeez! Laminated. Very classy, Matt!”

“I was thinking on my feet,” he said as she pushed past him into the house. “Give me a break!”

She turned back to him. “Give me the keys to your car.”

He went into the kitchen and came back with the keys to the Maserati. “Where are you going?” he asked as he handed them over. “Can I come along? After all, it is our honeymoon.”

“Shopping,” she said. “No. And stuff it.”

Eight

The sun was sinking in the sky by the time Maggie returned from the mall.

Matt was out on the front-porch swing. He watched as she unloaded one huge shopping bag after another from the car.

“Honey, I’m home,” she singsonged.

“Well, if it isn’t the little wife,” he said, coming to help her. “Thank God you’ve got your sense of humor back.”

“Nothing like a little shopping to ease the soul.”

“A little?” His arms were piled high with packages. “You’re going to be paying off your credit cards until you’re eighty years old.”

“Your credit cards,” she said smoothly. “We’re married now, remember?”

“Oh, good, I’ll keep that in mind, later, when it’s time to go to bed,” Matt said in his best Groucho Marx imitation.

“I was kidding,” Maggie said darkly.

Matt wasn’t.

“I paid cash for this stuff,” Maggie told him. “I worked at A&B for three years. Remember me? I used to live at home. I saved all my money all that time. I can afford to splurge. I wanted to splurge. So I bought myself clothes that I like.” She hadn’t bought one single corporate clone suit.

Matt pulled a sundress out of one of the bags. “Put this on,” he said, draping it over her shoulder. “I’m taking you out to dinner. We’re celebrating.”

She shot him a look. “Celebrating what? And if you say ‘Our recent marriage,’ I’m going to smack you.”

“How about celebrating our getting the leads in the summer musical?”

“No kidding?” Maggie’s face completely lit up.

“Nope.” He smiled back at her. “Dan Fowler called while you were out. You got Lucy. And I’m ‘Cody Brown, at your service.’ First rehearsal’s tomorrow night.”

“This is great!” Maggie did a victory dance around the entry hall. “I’m so jazzed—I really, really wanted this part.”

Matt grinned, watching her. But then she stopped and stared at him accusingly. “Why didn’t you tell me right when I got home?” she asked.

“I did. I mean, I am. I mean, this is right when you got home. So you want to go out and celebrate?” Dinner—and then maybe another, less public celebration…

“Definitely.” She beamed at him.

“Get dressed,” he ordered her. “I’ll meet you on the porch in twenty minutes.”

Maggie pushed open the screen door and stepped out onto the porch. The last traces of the sunset were facing from the sky. Matt had lit a citronella candle and was sitting back in one of the rocking chairs, his cowboy boots up on the rail.

“You look great,” he said simply, getting to his feet.

“You do, too.” Maggie laughed. “I thought you only wore T-shirts and jeans.”

He had on a pair of brown pants and a soft, white poet’s shirt with full, billowy sleeves. With his hair down, he looked like a time traveler from the past.

“This is about as dressed up as I get,” he said. “I mean, aside from a tux.”

It was plenty. Matthew Stone in a tux would create riots. Women would faint in the street.

In fact, more than one female head turned as they walked into the little harborside restaurant that was only a few miles from Matt’s house.

Maggie was much too aware of his fingers on her back as the hostess brought them to a table overlooking the water. He’s just a friend. He’s just a friend. He’s just a friend. Maybe if she chanted it silently, she wouldn’t do anything stupid.

Dinner was lovely, and Matt carefully kept the conversation on safe topics—movies they’d seen, books they’d read, and since they had ten years of catching up to do, they never ran out of things to say.

As they were finishing dessert, the waitress brought over a florist’s box and handed it to Maggie with a smile—and an appreciative glance at Matt.

Maggie gave him a quizzical look, but he just smiled.

She untied the ribbon and lifted the lid.

A dozen roses—deep red and gorgeous. “They’re beautiful.”

“Only eleven,” he said quietly. “You make it a dozen.”

There was a card among the flowers, and she opened the tiny envelope.

Make Love To Me Tonight was printed in plain block letters on the card.

She looked up at Matt. His face looked mysterious in the candlelight. Shadows accentuated his cheekbones, giving him an exotic look. His eyes glittered slightly, looking more golden than usual in the dim light.

Maggie felt like crying, because she knew exactly why he was doing this.

But she must have hidden what she was feeling, because he reached across the table and took her hand, raising it to his lips and kissing her softly on the palm.