Carter Bravo's Christmas Bride. Christine Rimmer
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you get through to her. But there’s no way I’m up for trying again with someone new anytime soon. As long as we’re putting it right out there, Murray, the truth is, I always make a mess of it with women somehow. I’m losing heart, you know? I’m about done.”
Murray jumped up. He turned to the side wall and stared at the Prime Sports and Fitness calendar hanging there. November had an image of a gorgeous woman’s back and shapely arms as she executed a lat pull on a Universal machine. “Well, how about Paige?” Murray asked without taking his eyes off the calendar.
It took Carter a moment to make sense of Murray’s question—and even then, he didn’t really understand it. “What do you mean, how about Paige?”
Murray faced him then. “I mean, why the hell don’t you just settle down with Paige? Everyone in town can see that you two are meant for each other. And come on, you practically live together already. You sure you’re not already with Paige and just keeping it a secret for some reason known only to the two of you?”
“Already with Paige? Have you lost your mind, Murray?”
“No, I have not. What I’ve lost is my heart. To Sherry. I want her to get over you and love me back.”
“And I sympathize with that. I would love for her to forget about me and be all about you. I’ve told her it’s over more times than I can count. I don’t take her calls or answer her texts or her emails. If she drops in on me, I send her away. I’ve done everything I can to—”
“No. No, you haven’t, Carter. You haven’t shown it’s over by moving on. And if you think about it a little, you’ll see I’m right. You and Paige are a great match. And frankly, if you choose Paige, Sherry will definitely wake up and smell the coffee. She’s always gone on about Paige, always believed that you’re secretly in love with Paige.”
Carter made a strangled sound. “Are you crazy? Of course I’m not secretly in love with Paige.”
Murray grunted. “Sherry would never admit it, but we both know she sees Paige as the rival she couldn’t beat.”
“Uh, we do?”
A firm nod from Murray. “You bet we do. So if you and Paige finally get together, finally couple up and admit what’s really going on between you, Sherry will have to accept that she’s never getting you back.”
Carter cleared his throat. “Murray.”
“What?”
“I’m sorry, Murray, but no. Just...no.”
Murray glared at him. “I’m only asking you to think about it.”
“There’s nothing to think about.”
“What is the matter with you?” Murray practically shouted. “Why can’t you see?”
“Murray, whoa. Chill.”
But Murray did not chill. “Open your mind, Carter!” He turned and flung the door open. “Open your mind and see the light.” Murray left, slamming the door good and hard behind him.
Carter stared at that door for several very long seconds. And then he shrugged and opened his laptop again and put Murray Preble out of his mind.
Or tried to.
Unfortunately, Murray’s weird visit stuck with him, made the Cobra engine schematics blur in front of him, made it so all he could think about was Paige.
“Open your mind!” Murray had yelled at him just before he slammed the office door.
Carter kept thinking about that. About his mind opening.
Opening like a door, a door that hadn’t really been there before. He looked through that new open door and saw everything he wanted: marriage and a family.
To a sane and even-tempered woman.
A woman like Paige.
Because Murray was right. Paige was perfect for Carter.
No. Of course, he wasn’t in love with Paige. He wasn’t in love with anybody. Carter had no intention of going to the stupid place, thank you very much. But now that he’d opened that door, he could clearly see that Paige was just about as good as it got for a man like him.
How come he’d never realized it before?
Paige was smart and fun, and he loved being with her. She was completely reasonable, no drama, not ever. He worked with her and he hung with her and her little sister was family to him. Even their dogs were best friends.
He couldn’t imagine his life without Paige. And to marry her and have kids with her...
Hot damn. That could work out. That could be good.
Carter got up from his desk and stared at the fine back and arms of Miss Superfit November as he worked out the kinks in the plan he was formulating.
Kinks like the fact that to have kids together, he and Paige would have to have sex with each other.
That could be weird. He’d never considered sex and Paige in the same sentence before—or wait. Scratch that. He had been attracted to Paige way back at the beginning. But then they’d decided to be friends without benefits and he’d accepted that.
So the idea of having sex with her didn’t gross him out or leave him cold. It had just always seemed like a bad idea to go there, to take the chance of messing up a great friendship—not to mention a successful business partnership.
However, now that he’d let himself consider the concept of Paige as a bed partner, well, it didn’t strike him as awful. He could get into it. He was sure that he could. And sex didn’t necessarily have to screw up what they had. If they got married, that would only make their friendship and business partnership stronger.
Oh, yeah. The door was open, all right, open wide and showing him everything. It all fell into place.
He didn’t have to be alone. He could get married and have a family, after all.
A family with his best friend.
A family with Paige...
Talk about huge.
Carter left BCC at a quarter after five that night. He’d planned to go home and shower, then take Sally and head over to Paige’s.
But after opening that door in his mind and seeing a family with Paige on the other side, well, he wasn’t quite ready to spend the evening with her. It was all too new and also a little bit scary.
He had to find just the right way to bring it up to her.
And he needed to find out for sure if they had the necessary physical chemistry together.
And hey. What if she just said no?
Uh-uh. He wasn’t ready to see Paige. He could blow this whole thing before it even got started if he didn’t handle it right.
So that night he stayed home.
* * *
Paige spent the day on household stuff. She bought groceries and baked a casserole, vacuumed and dusted the downstairs.
And the whole day she kind of dreaded the evening, when Carter would show up and she’d have to deal with him while knowing that her sister—and apparently most of the people they knew—believed that Paige was in love with him.
And that he was in love with her.
Awkward. Embarrassing. Too strange for words.
She hardly knew what to say to him—to Carter, of all people.
But then, as it turned out, he didn’t show up.
And that just made her sad. So she put on some old yoga pants and a baggy sweatshirt, streamed a tearjerker on Netflix and ate a quart of Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey.
* * *