Billion Dollar Bride. Muriel Jensen
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for the hungry. You remember? We went to the dinner.”
And because she’s going to charge me a fortune, he thought, to fulfill all your wild ideas. She’ll probably be able to retire on what you have in mind.
He reached across a small desk to shake hands with this paragon. The woman was strikingly beautiful, if a man had a preference for brunettes. Personally, he’d sworn off them since Lauren. It was a senseless prejudice, he realized, but since he’d been unable to see what was inside his former fiancée and protect himself from her deception, it was a sort of defense mechanism to stay away from women who had her outward appearance.
Still, this woman had none of Lauren’s petite fragility.
She was five-seven or maybe five-eight, with a woman’s maturity in her breasts and hips. His mind took her out of the silky white blouse and cranberry suit and put her in black lace. Accustomed to Caroline’s slender, leggy proportions, he’d forgotten how much he’d once appreciated roundness in a woman.
She had eyes the color of dark ale, and rich, deep brown hair, bundled up in a knot at the back of her head. It was side-parted and glossy in the sunlight shining through the window, and he could imagine how glorious it would look if she wore it loose.
This was the kind of woman who should bear a child, he thought. One who seemed all warmth and soft curves.
Then he noticed that the expression in her eyes was pitying and sad. That snapped the moment back into place.
“Ms. Maitland,” he said, drawing his hand away, erasing his previous thoughts. “The pleasure is mine. Carrie has some pretty wild ideas. Do you think you’ll be able to accommodate them?”
She nodded. “All except the butterflies.”
He’d been against that one himself, though he hadn’t said much about it. He didn’t want to do anything to discourage Caroline from going through with their arrangement.
“We can manage without butterflies,” he said.
“Good. Then I’ll contact a costumer and an armorer first thing tomorrow.”
He wasn’t sure he’d heard that correctly. “An armorer?” he asked.
“For the knights who’ll line the entrance to the church,” Caroline said.
Knights? “I thought you had a Regency period theme going? Carriages, maypoles…”
Caroline shook her head then rolled her eyes indulgently. “I told you about it last night in the limo, but you were reading stock reports and probably didn’t even hear me.”
He had to do better in that regard, he knew. He did tune her out sometimes because she tended to go on and on about details in which he really had no interest. He wanted a marriage in order to have a baby, but he didn’t care at all about the wedding.
“We’re doing medieval.” Caroline hooked an arm in his and winked at Anna. “I was thinking it’d be more dramatic, more exciting. We’re bound to get a couple of pages in Vanity Fair.”
“And that’s a goal of ours?” he asked wryly.
“I think it’s a given, darling. Austin Cahill is marrying Caroline Lamont. Two stars of Texas royalty getting hitched. Nothing cliché, nothing less than first class. Everything magical.”
God, he hated this. But he made himself smile. “Well, I’m sure you’ll make it spectacular. But…where are we going to find new armor?”
Caroline shrugged. “That’s Anna’s job. And afterward you can put it in the garden or something. Or I can take it with me. They’re bound to make spectacular conversation pieces.”
He had to grant her that. “Okay. Are we finished here?”
Caroline turned to Anna. “Can I call you as I get ideas and come up with questions?”
“Of course.” Anna handed Caroline a business card. “This has my cell phone, my e-mail and my fax.”
“Great.” Caroline tucked the card in a tiny lavender bag slung over her shoulder. Austin always wondered what was in there that could be important enough to carry around and still be small enough to fit in the four-by-four-inch space. She turned to him and giggled. “Anna thinks you’re medieval.”
Austin was surprised to learn that this beautiful woman had any opinions about him. But he was interested, also. “Have we met before?” he asked Anna.
She’d closed her eyes at Caroline’s statement, apparently in dignified mortification. She obviously hadn’t known Caroline long enough to learn that she expressed aloud every thought that came into her head.
Anna opened her eyes, and with a sigh and a fatalistic smile, she replied, “No, we haven’t. I…”
“She wanted me to save money on the wedding,” Caroline said, laughing, “so we could go shopping on our honeymoon, but I told her about our arrangement.”
He didn’t know why he should feel embarrassed in front of a wedding planner. Most of his close friends and several of his staff knew why he was getting married—they’d even suggested Anna as a consultant. Some praised his practical approach and others told him they thought he was crazy, but none of them had looked at him with such condemnation in their eyes.
“I didn’t realize,” he said a little stiffly, “that you were concerned with the reason for a wedding. I thought your job was to insure everything goes smoothly.”
She nodded, as though she’d expected him to say just that. “You’re right, of course,” she agreed. But before he could feel too righteous about having put her in her place, she added quietly, “I guess I thought the face of a woman being married solely for the purpose of producing a baby might reflect a less than joyful expression as she walked down the aisle. There should be something blue at every wedding, but it’s not supposed to be the bride.”
Smart-mouthed and quick. Not necessarily desirable qualities in a woman. Particularly when he couldn’t think of a comeback that wasn’t rude.
Then Caroline came to his rescue.
“So I explained that I was doing this willingly,” she said, squeezing his arm, “and that there was no problem.”
“Thank you, Carrie.” He turned a look on Anna intended to intimidate. “I assure you I’m not a villain, Ms. Maitland. But I realize you know nothing about me. Perhaps you’d prefer not to…”
“I know a lot about you, Mr. Cahill,” she said, clearly unaffected by his glare. He must be losing his touch. “You went to Harvard on a scholarship and hold a master’s degree in business administration. You’d made a million dollars in the hotel business by the time you were thirty and added mall development to your ventures, along with a few odds-and-ends companies like…” She narrowed her eyes as she obviously worked to recall a name. “Gordon Maps and Books,” she finally said with a little smile of triumph, “and Bronson Builders. Today you are the head of a multibillion-dollar company, Cahill Corporation, and—” she sniffed the air and smile devilishly “—your fragrance is Brooks Brothers.”
He was more fascinated by her knowledge than annoyed by her one-upmanship. “You read Forbes?” he asked. The magazine had done a piece on him several months before.
“My son does,” she replied. “You’re his idol.”
The compliment took him by surprise. “Me?” he asked incredulously.
She nodded, a soft light coming into her eyes. “Will is ten, and he isn’t into athletes or rock stars, but business moguls. He intends to be one himself one day.”
He had to laugh. “Good for him. I had a lucrative lawn and garden care business going when I was ten.”
“He takes care of my sisters’ and my stock portfolios,” she said, “and has formed a Fuzzy Buddies clearinghouse for his friends