McKettrick's Choice - Linda Lael Miller [114]
She felt a flash of temper, but it died quickly, doused by the discouragement that threatened to swamp her. “Yes,” she said forthrightly, “I do believe it. Most women are married by the time they’re twenty, and I’ll be thirty come December. As for ‘some man’ doing me the grand favor of wanting me—”
“Damn it,” Holt broke in tersely, “there you go, twisting what I say—” He’d been carrying his hat; now, in a restrained fit of irritation, he slapped it against his right thigh once, then plopped it back on his head. “What if it was a business deal?” he asked.
Lorelei’s mouth fell open, and indignation surged through her, closely followed by curiosity. “A business deal? Oh, I will thank you to explain that question, Mr. McKettrick!”
He must have set his back teeth, because his jawline hardened visibly. “I wouldn’t mind having a wife and more kids,” he said, after a few moments of agitated silence. She’d have sworn he was working up his nerve, but this was Holt. He had a surplus of nerve. “Lizzie’s almost thirteen. Before I know it, she’ll be all grown-up, getting married or going away to school. It makes me lonesome just to think about that.”
Lorelei was amazed. Holt McKettrick, admitting to a human weakness? “I’m sure there are a lot of women who would like to marry you,” she said, reeling a little.
“I want a woman with some spirit,” he replied. “Some gumption.”
Lorelei felt as though she were caught in a current, being swept downstream at a breathtaking pace. And there was a huge waterfall just around the next bend. “That woman you left at the altar,” she blurted, hugging herself against a nonexistent chill. “Wasn’t she spirited enough for you?”
He glared at her, perhaps surprised that she knew. “No,” he ground out. “As a matter of fact, she wasn’t. And I didn’t ‘leave her at the altar.’ I told her I’d go ahead and marry her, even though I’d still have to come here to Texas, one way or the other, and she refused.”
Lorelei put her fingertips to her temples. “Of course she refused,” she whispered. “She knew you didn’t love her.”
“That’s the thing,” Holt said, calmer now, looking deeply into Lorelei’s eyes. She felt as though she had a harp inside her, and he was plucking at the strings. “About love, I mean. I loved Lizzie’s mother—I know that now—but the realization was a bit slow catching up to me.”
“Mr. McKettrick,” Lorelei began, with exaggerated patience, “where is this conversation headed?”
His answer practically knocked her back on her heels. “I want a wife,” he said. “You need a husband. Maybe we ought to team up.”
“‘Team up’?” Lorelei was incensed—or was it exhilaration she was feeling? “Like a pair of mules pulling the same wagon?”
He grinned. “That’s not a very romantic way to put it.”
Lorelei folded her arms, partly to form a barrier and partly to keep her heart from flying right out of her chest and perching beside his. “How would you put it?”
“Like I said, it would be a business arrangement in the beginning—”
“And you think that’s romantic?”
“I think parts of it would be.”
Lorelei blushed. She might be a spinster, and a virgin to boot, but she had a pretty good idea what those “parts” would be. “You,” she said, “are a scoundrel. Are you—are you suggesting…?”
“That we’d be good together?” He had the decency to lower his voice, at least, but that didn’t make the proposal any less outrageous. “Yes. Especially in bed.”
That did it. Lorelei drew back her hand, ready to slap him silly.
He caught hold of her wrist, rubbed at the pulse there with the pad of his thumb. “You’re not afraid, are you?” he taunted.
“No!” she spat. Everything inside her was churning like debris caught up in a twister. She couldn’t think straight.
“I think you are.”
“Well, guess what, Mr. Trail Boss—you’re wrong!”
“Am I?”
She wrenched free of his grasp and immediately wished she hadn’t been so rash. She moved to fidget with her skirts before realizing she