Mail-order Bridegroom Part 64

"Unless, perhaps, you want He gave her a suggestive leer.

Kate grabbed another pillow and flung it.

He fielded it, too.

"Then I guess we go to the Bahamas and make them think it's real."

Kate muttered something distinctly unladylike.

Damon grinned, unsure exactly why he was enjoying this. It wasn't as if hewanted to go on a honeymoon with her, for heaven's sake.Was it?The thought gave his stomach a curious queasy lurch."When?" she asked sullenly after a moment.He tried to shake off the feeling."Huh? Oh, the sooner the better.If my mother thinks Stephanos can handle the business, she's out of her mind.

But if I can spend tonight and tomorrow wrapping up what I absolutely can't trust to anyone else, we can go Sunday and be back the following weekend. "

"What about the Thanksgiving business your mother mentioned?"

"We don't have to stay for that."

"But your mother said-' " She can only push so far. I'm d.a.m.ned if I'm going to stay around for family bonding time. "

"Family bonding time?" Kate looked puzzled.

He grimaced.

"My father started it when he came to America, dragging everyone out to the

island to spend time together. He was busy always. Never home. So once ayear he would insist. And the American Thanksgiving was a natural.""It sounds nice," Kate said almost wistfully.He stared at her.

"Nice?"

"I only meant-' she gave a helpless shrug- that it's nice when a family want to be together."

Damon looked at her more closely. Was that yearning he saw on her face? He couldn't imagine it. If she wanted a family, she ought to get married andhave one. She never should have married a guy like him. "Stay if you want,"he said gruffly.

"No." Kate shook her head quickly. "That would be ridiculous. Why should I bond with your family when I'll be out of it in three hundred and fifty-seven days?" She gave Damon a brisk nod, turned and headed towards the bedroom.

"Goodnight."

She'd sounded--she hoped--considerably more sanguine than she felt. A week in the Bahamas with Damon? Kate wasn't sure it bore thinking about, but as she undressed for bed she couldn't seem to stop.

It's not as if it's a real honeymoon, she reminded herself, as she tugged her shirt over her head. She probably wouldn't even see him.

Once they got there, naturally they could go their separate ways. And would.

But something had been happening to her since she'd married Damon, something she'd never expected. She was remembering all the dreams and fantasies about marriage she'd had before she'd wed Bryce.

In those days she'd been an incurable romantic--a starry-eyed child who'd had dreams of her prince coming to carry her off to his castle, far from her uninterested father and his economic empire. And one of those dreams, she recalled now, had been a honeymoon on a beach.

She reached for her bathrobe. That particular fantasy hadn't even beenrooted in the far reaches of darkest adolescence. Right after she'd agreedto marry Bryce, she'd read a magazine article about honeymoons in the Bahamas.

She knew these articles were nothing more than travel come-ons. She knew the happy couples were not newlyweds, but really professional models from New York.

Still, she'd seen the photos of them frolicking on pink sand beaches, standing waist-deep in turquoise water, their arms around each other, smiling, kissing.

She'd smiled at the sight of them strolling through the foamy surf at

sunset. And she'd dreamed.Bryce had taken her to Atlantic City where he'd lost seven hundred dollars atthe tables and she'd broken out in hives. So much, Kate thought, for dreams.

The door opened suddenly.

Kate jerked around, clutching the robe against her b.r.e.a.s.t.s.

"What do you want?"

Damon looked puzzled.

"To go to sleep?"

Her eT She knew it was a yelp of indignation, but she couldn't help it.

He scowled.

"h.e.l.l, yes, here. And don't try to send me out to the sofa, either. We've been through that. Mrs Vincent lives in. She knows what goes on. I'm sleeping here."They glared at each other. In the five days he'd been gone, Kate had gotused to having the bedroom to herself. There was so little of Damon apparentin its very stark furnishings that she had managed to put him out of her mind.

Big mistake.

She edged towards the bathroom and scooted behind the door. Then she gave an

airy wave of the hand that wasn't still clutching the robe.

"Fine," she said, poking her head around the door to look at him.

"Sleep. You can have the floor."

"The floor! Like h.e.l.l!"

"We've been through this before, too, Damon, and you're not sleeping with me.

This is a marriage of convenience, nothing else. We never agreed to. . .to. . ." She couldn't seem to say the words."Make love?" Damon suggested, smiling.Kate scowled."Have s.e.x.""We didn't agree not to, either."She stared at him, outraged."You said " in name only"."

"That doesn't mean it has to be that way.""For me it does."He c.o.c.ked his head."Why?""Because. . because we aren't in love!" Were all men so obtuse?Damon seemed unfazed."Well, no, but--' " I don't have s.e.x with men I don't love. And I don't sleep with them, either. As I said, you can sleep on the floor. "

"It's my room," he reminded her.

"Yes, but I'm sharing it, and if you don't like it, I won't."

His eyes narrowed.

"Is that a threat?"

Kate licked her lips, then swallowed.

"It's a statement of fact."

"This marriage is as important to you as it is to me."

Kate deliberately refused to think about how he could affect the future of

her business."I can handle Jeffrey if I have to. Can you handle Mama and Marina?"Damon muttered something rude under his breath. He raked a hand through his hair. He stalked to the cupboard and took out a quilt and flung it on the

floor.

"You're all heart," he growled.

Probably, Kate thought. Getting into this mess certainly proved she didn't have a brain.

Torture took many forms and Damon felt as if he were discovering new and

varied ones every day since he'd been married to Kate.

Lying there listening to Kate's soft humming in the bathroom as she got ready for bed, Damon felt as if he'd found yet another. Nothing about this d.a.m.nable marriage was working the way it was supposed to!

He was supposed to have spent the hours he was in Paris trying to close a deal, not thinking about Kate.

[-Ie was supposed to maintain a disinterested distance, lot hurry back to her, ready to propose a cosy candle- ight dinner strategy session for dealing with his Tiother, and be disappointed when his mother was il ready there. He was supposed to ignore her, not use whatever excuse he could come up with to touch her and taste her lips.

And he certainly was supposed to fall asleep without i thought of her, not

lie on the floor of his own ^edroom wanting to creep into her bed!

What the h.e.l.l had he done, proposing this marriage my way It was supposed to be a business deal- pure and simple. It was turning out to be anything but!

And his mother, blast her, seemed intent on making t worse.

A honeymoon in the Bahamas! She knew how he loved Buccaneer's Cay. She knew