The Millionaire She Married. Christine Rimmer
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She longed to sit down again, to let her knees crumple and drop to her chair. But she remained upright. “Mack. I just want the signed papers. Please.”
And he just sat there, looking out at her through those totally unrevealing lawyer’s eyes. “As I said, you’ll have them. After you spend two weeks with me.”
She gulped. “Two weeks?”
“That’s right. Two weeks. Alone with me.”
She did sit down then. And once seated, she closed her eyes and raked her hair back from her face. “Mack. You cannot do this. I’ll…divorce you all over again.”
His lips curved, just slightly, as if he found that remark amusing, but only vaguely so. “You’re not serious.”
She forced total conviction into her reply. “I certainly am.”
He reached out and picked up his wineglass again. “Divorcing me all over again will take time.” He sipped, settling back in his chair. “It took over a year before, from the date that your lawyer first contacted mine until we reached a settlement. And then we were only fighting over Bub.”
Ridiculous, she thought, remembering. Ridiculous and petty. She’d been back home in Meadow Valley when she’d filed, and he was still in New York with that high-powered law firm. He’d hired one of the lawyers from his own firm and instructed him to demand “custody” of Byron. For months, his lawyer and hers had corresponded. And then, out of nowhere, Mack had decided to be reasonable. He’d let her have Byron. Everything had been settled.
All he’d had to do was sign the blasted papers, and everything would have been fine.
He sipped some more. “This time I could fix it so it takes forever. I hope the good doctor will wait for you. But then, I suppose he will. I remember him, how he hung around that one Christmas we spent here. He was waiting for you even way back then—when there was no doubt at all you were another man’s wife.”
Desperate, Jenna tried another threat—anything, she thought, to make him back down. “I’ll get a big chunk of your money if I divorce you now.”
He grunted in disbelief and sipped more wine. “Oh, come on. I know you, Jenna. Except for Bub, you wouldn’t take anything six years ago. And you won’t take anything now.”
She gave him her best level-eyed stare. “Don’t bet on it. I’m a lot meaner than I used to be. And besides, you weren’t a multimillionaire when I divorced you. You were just a lawyer in a big firm, killing yourself and ignoring your wife, spending every waking minute clawing your way to the top. Now you’re so rich, I might not be able to resist making a bid for half of all you’ve got.”
“So.” He was smiling again. “You know how much money I’ve got.”
The truth was, she had followed the stories about him. “I have a pretty good idea.”
“From whom?”
She shrugged. “I read the newspapers.”
Six years ago, Mack had taken on a class-action suit against a major automobile manufacturer, a suit no one else in his firm had been willing to touch. He’d ended up going out on his own to handle it. And his share of the final settlement had come to ten million dollars.
He advised with some irony, “If you’re after my money, you’ll be happy to hear that I’ve at least doubled the ten million I started out with.”
“I’m sure you’re a very wise investor.”
“No, I take big chances. And they pay off.”
“Well. Good.” She stabbed the air with her index finger. “That means more for me when I take you to the cleaners—which I will, Mack. I swear I will.”
He regarded her for an endless count of five. She glared right back at him, thinking how easy it would be to pick up her dinner knife and hurl it at his heart.
At last he said in a musing tone, “You’ve developed a temper. I don’t remember you having a temper before. You were sweet and shy. And you cried instead of getting mad.”
She pushed back her chair again and stood. It felt a lot better, looking down on him. “Right. I used to be a wimp. But now I’m all grown up. I make my own decisions. And I have a life. Do you understand that? There is a man I want to marry and a business I need to run. I can’t leave my store for two weeks. And I certainly can’t leave my fiancé to run off with another man.”
“Not just any other man, Jenna. Your husband.”
“You are not my husband, not in any but a purely technical sense.”
He lifted a brow at her, insolently, as if her assertion didn’t even deserve comment. “I’m sure you can find someone to look after your store.”
“I am not going to find anyone, because I’m not going anywhere.”
He set his half-finished glass of wine on the table and rose slowly to his feet. “Just leave all this right where it is. The restaurant will send someone over tomorrow morning to deal with it.” He pulled a business card from his back pocket and set it on the table. “Call this number. Tell them what time you want them to show up.”
She didn’t even glance at that card. She looked right at the maddening man standing across the table from her. “I am not—repeat, not—spending two weeks with you, Mack.”
The look he gave her then was almost tender. “Think about it, Jenna. Two weeks isn’t that long. We’ll go to my place in Key West. I think you’ll like it there. The house is old, like this one. It needs…a woman’s touch.”
“Hire a decorator.”
He didn’t reply to that, only looked at her indulgently before adding, “Once the two weeks are over, you’ll be rid of me for good—unless we both decide we shouldn’t be divorced after all.”
She couldn’t hold back one sharp, disdainful cry. “I don’t need two weeks to decide that. I decided that a long time ago.”
He actually had the gall to pretend to be wounded. “You’re really hurting my feelings here.”
She gaped at him, wondering how he could joke about this. It was not funny. Not funny in the least. “This is…blackmail. It’s…it’s kidnapping. It has to be illegal.”
He shook his head. “It’s not. Trust me. I know. I’m a lawyer.”
“Mack. Please.” She pulled out all the stops and stooped to pleading. “Please. There is no point in this. Don’t you see? Nothing good can come of it. I don’t want to…to reconcile with you. It’s over for me. And even if it wasn’t, how can you possibly imagine that forcing me to go away with you would somehow make me change my mind?”
“Answer me this. Is there anything that would make you change your mind?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Then this is the only option I’ve got.”
“That’s insane. I just told you it can’t work.”
“Maybe you’re wrong. And since you have no other suggestions…”
“Suggestions? You want suggestions? What about keeping your word? What about giving me those papers and going back where you belong?”
He shook his head. “Uh-uh.”
“Mack. I don’t want to get back together with you. And I do not want to spend two weeks alone with you.”
“But you will spend two weeks with me. If you want those divorce papers.”
“Mack, be reasonable. You have to see that doing this will get you nowhere.”
He smiled, a rueful smile. “I’m staying at the Northern Empire Inn. Give me a call when you’re ready to agree