Hitched!

“It figures, that’s all. Anyway, bring your bride here to meet your dear old Uncle Trey and Aunt Rachel—we’re closest and easiest to convince. Then you can tackle the rest of ’em.”

“Time is of the essence here.”

“Time’s been of the essence for damn near ten years. Now all of a sudden you’re in a hurry?”

“Good point,” Rand said. “Okay. Gotta go, but you’ll be hearing from me.”

“Wanna bet?” Trey asked nobody in particular. He hung up the phone. Wait until he told Rachel about this. That kid was up to something, sure as the world. Trey wished him luck but knew it would take more than that to get anything past Daniel Boone and Jesse James Taggart, even if their wives tended to be soft touches.

“WELL, HELL.” Rand gave Maxine a dour look. “I must have been nuts to think that would work.”

“I told you so.” She picked up another tortilla chip from the basket on the tray delivered earlier by room service, painfully aware of the trembling of her hand. “I guess that’s that, then.”

“Not so fast. I haven’t given up yet.”

She waited, her heart in her throat.

Suddenly his eyes widened. “Why didn’t I see this before? We have to really get married. That should be easy in Mexico, and equally easy to get unmarried once we’ve achieved our ends.”

Maxine gasped. “You can’t be serious. When I get married it will be once and for all.”

“This won’t count against that,” he argued, “because this will be a business arrangement.”

“You just said—”

“It will be legal but not real, in that we won’t really be husband and wife.”

“Meaning no sex and I wouldn’t have to live with you?” Blunt but precise.

“Meaning no sex but you would have to make what Trey called the ‘grand family tour’ to convince everyone concerned that we’re married and madly in love. Then you can do anything you want to do, with my blessings.”

She regarded him for a moment in silence, her heart throbbing erratically. She had never expected anything like this, even in her wildest imaginings. Finally she said, “Isn’t that kind of a dirty trick?”

He obviously didn’t want to consider that aspect, but she’d forced the issue. “I guess it might look that way,” he said slowly, “but…my back’s to the wall, Maxine. There are complications you know nothing about.”

“Go on.”

“Not now. Look.” He hauled out his checkbook. “Let’s be businesslike about this. I want to hire you for a maximum of…say, one month? That should be enough time to do what I have to.”

“Hire me?” She couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

“That’s right. I’ll pay you ten thousand dollars now and another twenty if we pull this off and I get my inheritance.”

She gasped. “What makes you think I can be bought?”

“You’re out of a job, right? Besides, I don’t want to buy you. I just want to rent you for a little while. What do you say?”

“Give me a minute to think.” She pressed her palms to her temples. “If I do this—and I’m not saying I will—there will be absolutely no sex.”

His expression said he had absolutely no interest in her that way. “No sex. Agreed.”

“Put it in writing.”

“Sorry, no can do. You’ll have to trust me on that.”

“Why should I? Why should you trust me?”

He eyed her solemnly. “Maxine,” he said slowly, “I always go with my first impressions. My first impression of you is that you’re a woman who can be trusted. I liked the way you handled yourself on that airplane and the way you stood up for yourself when we had to share that room. As Great-grandpa Taggart would say, ‘Girl, you got spunk!’”

She couldn’t return that smile. “I suppose your first impressions are always right.”

“I wish. Sometimes you just have to go on faith.” He put out his hand. “Is it a deal?”