The Man She'll Marry

‘Almost ten and a half, to be exact,’ he confirmed, frowning at the question.

Merry couldn’t see what difference that six months made! ‘Oh, let’s, by all means, be exact,’ she snapped caustically, looking him up and down, once again noticing the expensive cut of his clothes, his only jewellery a signet ring on the little finger of his right hand. ‘Are you married, Mr Kingston?’ she demanded in clipped tones.

His mouth twisted. ‘Fortunately not.’

She had thought not; he didn’t give the impression of a man in a hurry to get back to his home. Or a wife. ‘You do have some intelligence, then,’ she replied dismissively. ‘In that case—’

‘You consider it intelligent not to be married, Miss—Merry?’ he interrupted.

She looked at him pityingly. She could well understand his amazement at finding a woman who wasn’t interested in marriage; considering the way he looked, his apparent wealth and his bachelor status, she could imagine he had met far too many women desperate to get married—to him!

‘As I’ve already pointed out to you, marriage is an unknown quantity to me personally.’ She shrugged. ‘And it seems to me, from the amount of separation and divorce, that marriage has become an overrated state to be in!’

‘You—’

‘However, that does not mean I advocate single motherhood, either,’ she continued firmly. ‘I know from experience how hard that can be. For the mother left on her own to bring up the child, not the father,’ she added heatedly. ‘He usually walks away without any responsibilities!’

That deep blue gaze watched her consideringly. ‘Is that what happened to you?’

She bristled defensively. ‘We weren’t talking about me!’ Merry snapped back.

Zack shook his head dazedly. ‘Then I would like to know who we are talking about?’

‘Dani, of course!’ Despite her refusal of his wine a few minutes ago, she now took a grateful sip from her own glass. ‘You are the boy’s guardian. Didn’t you teach him any of the facts of life?’ She shook her head with angry disgust. ‘Or are you one of those men who believe it’s the woman’s responsibility to take care of the precautions?’ That seemed all too often to be the case nowadays; woman’s demand for equality, and therefore independence, had rebounded on them in the case of sexual relationships!

‘Dani suffers from a similar problem to me, in that she is medically unable to take the pill,’ she told Zack coldly.

‘I’ll file that information away for future reference,’ he said, sounding amused.

Merry could feel the heat in her cheeks. This man was making fun of her! ‘I’m glad you find this situation funny, Mr Kingston—’

‘“Funny” is far from the right word to describe how I feel about what’s happened,’ he bit out, suddenly looking at her with an arctic chill in his eyes. ‘You are obviously under some misapprehension concerning Dani and David’s relationship. Contrary to the conclusion you seem to have jumped to, your daughter is not pregnant!’

Merry stared at him uncomprehending. Not...? When Zack Kingston informed her of his nephew’s determination to marry Dani, it had seemed to her there could be only one reason for such impetuosity. Distressing as that conclusion might have been. But he was saying Dani wasn’t pregnant!

‘I don’t understand.’ She shook her head.

‘I didn’t,’ he rasped. ‘But, having now met you, I’m beginning to!’

Merry looked at him blankly. What was that supposed to mean? What could she possibly have to do with his nephew’s announcement that he intended marrying Dani; she had never even met the young man!

‘Perhaps you would care to explain that remark?’ she invited coolly, green eyes sparkling.

He gave an abrupt laugh. ‘I most certainly would,’ he rasped. ‘You obviously have an attitude towards pre-marital sex—’

‘I have an attitude towards marriage too!’ she jumped in. How dared this man come into her home and make snap judgements about her? He didn’t even know her! He was an arrogant swine, and if he thought she was going to let her daughter have anything to do with a relative of his, then he was sadly—

‘We’ll get to that in a minute,’ he dismissed, with that arrogance she had just mentally attributed to him. ‘I was about to say that, in the circumstances, your attitude towards pre-marital relationships is perfectly understandable.’

‘Exactly what “circumstances” would you be referring to, Mr Kingston?’ Merry prompted fiercely, raising herself to her full height of five feet and half an inch—and making absolutely no impression on him, judging by the way he looked down his arrogant nose at her!

As she had expected, he looked unperturbed. ‘Obviously the circumstances of Dani’s birth—’

‘Which you know absolutely nothing about!’ she returned furiously. He raised his blond brows questioningly. Well, he could question all he liked; it was none of his business what those ‘circumstances’ might have been! Besides, he seemed to have already drawn his own conclusions.

The silence stretched between them, as green eyes warred with blue. But Merry had no intention of being the one to back down.

‘Which I know absolutely nothing about,’ Zack was finally the one to slowly admit. ‘But I believe it has everything to do with Dani’s own feelings towards relationships.’

‘You already said that,’ Merry retorted.

His mouth tightened. ‘Having now thought about this, it’s my belief—though I won’t be able to confirm this until I’ve spoken to David again—that he and Dani are in love, and that, like all young people in love, they wish to consummate their physical attraction towards each other, but that Dani would rather wait until after they are married.’

‘I can’t see anything wrong with that,’ Merry scorned.

‘There is if their only solution to the problem is for them to marry immediately!’ Zack returned exasperatedly.

Dani had watched Merry’s struggles over the years to cope with working and being a mother, and she knew exactly how difficult it had been for Merry to acquire a career at all when she had become pregnant during her first term at university. Had that coloured Dani’s own views on marriage and lovemaking? If it had, was that really such a bad thing? Dani was so young still, not much more than a child, really, not old enough for the responsibility of either marriage or a family.

Thinking of Dani dissipated Merry’s anger and distress, cleared the initial panic from her mind. She and Dani were close, and she didn’t believe, now that she could think straight, that Dani would agree to marry someone and then not tell her own mother about it. Admittedly, Dani seemed to have kept the intensity of this particular relationship with David Kingston to herself, not seeming to have mentioned him any more than the other new friends she had made in the last couple of months. But a marriage proposal, and its acceptance, was something else entirely...

Merry looked up at Zack Kingston with a new confidence. ‘I don’t believe they have decided to marry, immediately or otherwise,’ she told him calmly. ‘I think you may have been a little premature in coming here today, Mr Kingston—’

‘For God’s sake call me Zack!’ he exploded. ‘And no matter what you may think, Merry, I did not imagine David’s announcement to me this morning—it totally destroyed my appetite for breakfast!’

Merry felt her mouth twitching with humour, had to bite her lip to stop herself from smiling. She could picture Zack now, seated at the end of a long dining table, newspaper spread out in front of him, while some meticulous, silent servant served him bacon and eggs—the latter would be scrambled, of course, no messy egg-yolks for this man to deal with’ And then, just as he was about to take his first mouthful of the mouthwatering food, David dropping his bombshell!

‘I trust you managed to eat lunch, Zack?’ she said soothingly. ‘It really isn’t good for the blood sugar for you to go without food for too long. It impairs your judgement, and—’

‘My judgement is not impaired, Merry,’ he bit out. ‘David told me—’

‘I’m not disputing what he told you,’ she assured him evenly. ‘I’m merely questioning the validity of the news that Dani intends marrying him. I must admit I was thrown for a few minutes after your initial announcement, but I’ve had time to collect my thoughts now. I know Dani, the two of us are friends, as well as mother and daughter, and if she were serious about your nephew then I believe she would have told me about him.’ Merry’s confidence increased even as she spoke the words. She did know Dani, and what this man was suggesting didn’t sound at all like her daughter. ‘I don’t disbelieve that David told you how he felt towards Dani—’

‘Thank you for that, at least!’ Zack snapped with sarcastic impatience.

She couldn’t exactly blame him for feeling this way; he had obviously had a tough day since David’s intentions had destroyed his breakfast. They had certainly dispelled her own earlier tiredness too!

‘I don’t mean to sound patronising, Zack,’ she assured him. She might not have meant to, but in retrospect that was exactly what she had sounded! ‘I’m just doubtful of Dani’s part in all of this.’ She absently poured them both another glassful of wine, wordlessly handing his over. ‘Dani and I have never had secrets. There’s never been any reason for us to,’ she revealed, thinking of her own years without romantic involvement.

When Dani had been very young there just hadn’t been the time, between studying and caring for a young child, and there had only been the occasional date in the years following. Most men of a similar age to herself were either already married, running away from an unhappy relationship, or had no interest in a woman with a young child. None of them had appealed to Merry either. In fact, there had been no relationships that she couldn’t happily talk to Dani about because there had been none that were serious!

‘If Dani were in love,’ she told Zack assuredly, ‘then I believe she would have told me about it. And about him!’

‘I—’ Zack broke off as the sound of the front door opening and closmg could clearly be heard.

‘That will be Dam now,’ Merry warned him softly, putting a lightly restraining hand on his arm. ‘Let me handle this, please,’ she advised gently as she heard Dani walking down the hallway.

‘Mum, I’m home—’ Dani broke off her cheerful greeting as she entered the kitchen and saw that her mother wasn’t alone, her glance resting interestedly on the man who stood there.