Grimly, Hunter fought for control. He looked at her again and tried to see past the softly curling dark red hair and bright green eyes. He shoved aside the memory of how she’d felt in his arms and instead tried to figure out how much of her “I’m innocent” act was for real. On the surface, she seemed to be exactly what she was portraying. A young woman doing a favor for a lonely old man. But for all Hunter knew, she was just a hell of a good actress. And if she was playing him, how much easier it would have been for her to play Simon.
They never had gotten around to having their “talk” earlier. After kissing her, Hunter hadn’t trusted himself to be alone with her. So instead, he’d taken one of the horses Simon still kept and went for a ride over the property. Not that the long ride had done a thing for his sanity. Because images of Margie had ridden with him every step of the way.
“More wine, Hunter?”
Hunter looked at his grandfather and nodded. “Yeah, thanks.”
But he knew even as more of the dark red wine was poured into his glass that there wasn’t enough liquor in the world to ease the wild, churning thoughts running through his brain. Why her? he asked himself. Why this short, argumentative con artist? Hell, he’d just finished a relationship with Gretchen, a six-foot-tall model with the face of an angel and even she’d never gotten to him as deeply as this one tiny redhead had.
Gritting his teeth, he took another bite of the pot roast prepared just for him. It might as well have been cardboard. He’d been looking forward to coming home. Having a few days to relax and not worry about a damn thing. Well, that was shot, he told himself. Everywhere he went in the damn house, someone was winking at him or smiling knowingly.
Having every servant in the house treating him like a newlywed was annoying. Having his “wife” within arm’s reach and untouchable was irritating. Hell of a homecoming.
The last mission he’d been on, Hunter had been wounded, cut off from his team, and he had had to find his own way out of hostile territory. Eight days he’d been alone and fighting for his life-and what he was going through now made that time seem like a weekend at Disneyland.
“There’s a dance at the end of the week,” Simon said, dragging Hunter gratefully from his thoughts. “To celebrate the new addition to the clinic.”
“That’s nice.” He didn’t give a damn about a dance.
“Now that you’re here, you’ll take Margie to represent the family,” Simon said.
“I’ll what?” Hunter looked at his grandfather and out of the corner of his eye noted that Margie looked just as surprised as he felt.
“Escort your wife to the town dance. People will expect it. After all, you and Margie are the ones who made it all possible.”
“I didn’t have anything to do with it,” Hunter reminded the older man.
Simon bristled, narrowed his eyes on him and said, “As far as people in town are convinced, you did.”
“He doesn’t have to go with me,” Margie said quickly, apparently as eager as Hunter was to avoid any extra amount of togetherness. Now why did that bother him?
“I’ll just tell everyone he hasn’t recovered from his injuries,” she added.
Now it was Hunter’s turn to scowl. Not that he wanted to go to the damned dance, but he didn’t want someone else, especially her, making up excuses for him. The day he needed help-which would be never-he’d ask for it.
“Damn good at lying, aren’t you?” he asked.
She turned her head to spear him with a long look. Then giving him a mocking smile, she admitted, “Actually, since I’ve had to come up with dozens of reasons why you never bother to come home to see your grandfather, yes, I have gotten good at lying. Thank you so much for noticing.”
“No one asked you to-”
“Who would if I hadn’t?”
“There was no reason to lie,” he countered, slamming his fork down onto the tabletop. “Everyone in town knows what my job is.”
She set her fork down, too. Calmly. Quietly. Which only angered him more.
“And everyone in town knows you could have gotten compassionate leave-isn’t that what they call it in the military?-to come home when Simon was so sick.”
Guilt poked at him again. And he didn’t appreciate it. “I wasn’t even in the country,” he reminded her, grinding each word out through gritted teeth.
She only looked at him, but he knew exactly what she was thinking, because he’d been telling himself the same damn thing for hours. Yes, he’d been out of the country when Simon had his heart attack. But when he’d returned, he could have come home to check on the older man. He could have taken a week’s leave before the next mission-but he’d settled instead for a phone call.
If Hunter had made the effort, he would have been here to talk his grandfather out of this ridiculous fake marriage scheme and he wouldn’t now be in this mess.
With that realization ringing in his mind, he met Margie’s gaze and noted the gleam of victory shining in those green eyes of hers.
“Fine. You win this one,” he said, acknowledging that she’d taken that round. “I’ll take you to the damned dance.”
“I don’t want-”
“Excellent,” Simon crowed and reached for Hunter’s wine glass.
“You can’t have wine, Simon,” Margie said with a sigh and the old man’s hand halted in midreach.
“What’s the point of living forever if you can’t have a glass of wine with dinner like a civilized man?”
“Water is perfectly civilized.” Apparently, Margie had already forgotten about her little war with Hunter and was focused now on the old man pouting in his chair.
“Dogs drink water,” Simon reminded her.
“So do you.”
“Now.”
“Simon,” Margie’s voice took on a patient tone and was enough to tell Hunter she’d been through all this many times before. “You know what Dr. Harris said. No wine and no cigars.”
“Damn doctors always ruining a man’s life for his own good. And you,” he accused, giving Margie a dirty look, “you’re supposed to be on my side.”
“I am on your side, Simon. I want you to live forever.”
“Without having any damn fun at all, I suppose,” he groused.
Hunter watched the back-and-forth and felt the oddest sense of envy. His grandfather and Margie had obviously had this same discussion many times. The two of them were a unit. A team. And their closeness was hard to ignore.