Darling obstacles (9 page)

"Like on a date?" Kevin asked, wide-eyed.

"Um, yes," Maggie said.

"Can we still watch TV that night?" Karl asked.

"Of course. Kristin can baby-sit. It will only be for a few hours and she is in junior high now. Or, if you prefer, 111 ask Mrs. Jenkins to come over and stay with you."

"Just the three of us here by ourselves?" Kevin's blue eyes sparkled with enthusiasm. "Oh, boy!"

4 Td be happy to baby-sit, Mom," Kristin said. "You go out on your date. Well be fine." She grinned at her brother and sister.

"Are you sure?" Maggie looked at Kari.

"Sure," replied her baby. "Go, Mommy. Have fun."

The sound of the doorbell precluded any further discussion, not that any more was needed. The children had given their unanimous approval. Maggie was wiping the baby's face and hands with a wet cloth when she heard Kristin say deferentially, "Hi, Dr. Wilder. Come on in."

Maggie froze and nearly dropped little Nicole. Greg!

"Oh, goody, Wendy is here," cried Kari, rushing from the kitchen. Kevin followed her.

And then she heard Greg's voice. "No, I didn't bring the kids. Paula is staying with them. Where's your mother?"

Greg without the children? Maggie hoisted little Nicole onto her hip and joined Greg and her children in the cramped entranceway. Although the kids had changed from their "Sunday best" into jeans and sweatshirts, she still wore her silky, long-sleeved kelly green shirtwaist dress. Her auburn hair, clean and shiny, swung against her neck in its smooth pageboy style. Just as she was about to greet Greg, little Nicole grabbed one of her gold hoop earrings, held on tight, and pulled.

"Ouch! No, no, Nicky!" Maggie caught the baby's hand and carefully uncurled the little fingers from around the earring. It was not the entrance she would have wished to make.

"Hello, Maggie," Greg said, his eyes widening slightly. "Where did the baby come from?" He sounded like his old friendly self. Were yesterday's arguments—and kisses—forgotten?

"From the cabbage patch," Maggie said, resuming her old role, complete with light banter. Greg responded with his customary chuckle. The kids giggled. "This is Nicole," she explained. "We have her from six to six today and the girls are in seventh heaven." She was pleased to hear herself sounding just like her usual efficient baby-sitter/mother self.

"YouYe baby-sitting today? On Sunday? From six to six?" Greg fired the questions at her. Curiously, a look of annoyance crossed his face. "Do you ever not work?"

"Not as long as my kids and I want to eat," she replied lightly. It wasn't really that desperate. Johnny's policeman's death benefits were ample and there was social security for the children as well. But Maggie wanted much more for her children. She wanted them to have nice clothes and whatever lessons they wanted to take and special toys and, most of all, a college education. For her son and both her daughters. So she held a full-time, though not high-paying, job and baby-sat in her spare hours.

"What can we do for you today, Dr. Wilder?" She deliberately made her tone briskly impersonal. What was he doing here?

Greg was again wondering the same thing. Some compulsion that he couldn't begin to understand, much less explain, had caused him to leave Paula with the younger children and drive to Woodland Courts. Although Kristin had immediately invited him inside when she'd answered the door, Maggie had clearly resumed her role in their previous superficial, impersonal doorstep relationship. What was he doing here?

"Well, I thought I would—" he began, only to be interrupted by Kari.

"Mommy, can I take Nicole upstairs to my room?"

she asked. She was clearly bored by the adults' company. Nicole was bored too; she was making wild grabs for Maggies earrings. Maggie handed the baby to Kari.

"She balances her on her hip just the way you do," Greg observed, smiling at Maggie in spite of himself. It was a cute sight, Kari carrying little Nicole that way. Maggie smiled too.

"Mom, call me when Jennifer gets here. She said she was coming over after lunch," Kristin called over her shoulder as she followed Kari up the stairs.

"I'm going out to play now, Mom," Kevin announced on his way out the door. " Bye!" The door slammed shut, leaving Greg and Maggie alone.

"It's always incredibly busy around here," Greg said with a slight smile.

Maggie nodded, too intensely aware of him to respond with the bright chatter that the situation demanded. Today he was wearing a well-cut pair of khaki slacks, a blue oxford cloth shirt, and a navy windbreaker, casual clothes which complemented his muscular physique. She wished again for that distancing note of animosity they had parted on the day before. It was easier to handle her attraction to him when she was angry with him.

"I was in the, uh, neighborhood—I stopped in at the drugstore—and I thought I would ..." Greg swallowed, his eyes focusing on the soft curve of her mouth. "I thought I'd drop by and finalize the babysitting arrangements for tomorrow."

"I'm to take Josh and Wendy with me after school, pick up Max at the day-care center, and bring all of them here. You'll pick them up at six-thirty and I'm not to give them dinner,'' Maggie said automatically.

"Er—yes. I believe those were the arrangements." Greg thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his slacks. "Oh, hell, that isn't the real reason why I came over."

"Oh?" Maggie felt a ridiculous surge of anticipa-

tion. He was staring fixedly at her, a strange expression in his clear blue eyes. She wasn't exactly sure how to define it. Uncertainty, confusion, surprise? As she returned his gaze, she realized her lips were parted and trembling, that every nerve in her body was blazing with sensual awareness. She heard the sounds of the girls playing upstairs, Nicole's pleased squeals, Kari and Kristin's laughter, but they seemed far away and irrelevant to the flames shooting through her.

"Maggie." Greg said her name in a low, husky voice. He took a step toward her and she didn't move. Her eyes were focused on his mouth with a hunger that hurt. They seemed to be caught in some strange, silent time warp, just the two of them, far removed from the rest of the everyday world.

Greg was standing so close to her now that she could feel his body heat, inhale his heady masculine scent. Her heart seemed to be crashing against her rib cage as she lifted her eyes to his. She was aching to touch him. She wanted to feel his mouth on hers with an intensity that shook her to her core.

"Come here," he said hoarsely, reaching for her, pulling her roughly, urgently, into his arms. Maggie felt the solid hardness of his chest against her breasts and her body melted into his, shuddering with an intense pleasure. "I have to hold you, Maggie. I can't look at you without wanting to touch you, feel you ..." His voice trailed off as he slowly lowered his head to hers. Their mouths met and they kissed with a wild, desperate urgency, as if starved for the touch and feel and taste of each other.

His big hands caressed her, moving greedily over her hips and waist and back. When he took possession of her breasts, cupping and kneading them with his palms, Maggie moaned with the mad hunger that was coursing through her body. He pulled her closer, bending her back slightly so that her body fit beneath his, and she had to cling to him for support. She was dizzy with the sensations and emotions pulsing

through her. The feel of his strong shoulders and powerful chest beneath her fingertips excited her as much as his passionate caresses. His tongue surged into her mouth, and she met it and rubbed it with her own. A moan escaped simultaneously from each of their throats and the kiss deepened, becoming more demanding, more intimate.

The insistent, incessant pounding seemed to come from another dimension. At first Maggie thought it was her own heartbeat thundering in her ears; then she thought it was Greg's. It wasn't until the shrill ring of the doorbell shattered the sensual silence of their private world that Maggie recognized the sound for what it really was. Someone was pounding on the front door and alternately ringing the bell. She broke away from Greg, her face flushed and her body shaking with arousal and unmet needs. As she rushed to the door, Greg walked in the opposite direction, into the kitchen.

"Hi, Mrs. May," Jennifer greeted her cheerily. "Kristin here?" She was looking past Maggie toward the stairs where the children's voices drifted downward.

Maggie was grateful for a child's typical lack of interest in an adult. Jennifer was looking for her friend and had scarcely glanced at Maggie. Why should she? Thank heavens, Maggie thought, her tousled hair and flushed face and slightly swollen lips weren't even noticed by Jennifer.

"Go on up, Jennifer. Nicole is with them. We're baby-sitting for her all day." Maggie smoothed her hair with nervous fingers. Her knees were trembling so much that she was amazed she was able to stand. Jennifer raced up the stairs, taking two steps at a time.

"Another kid," Greg said as he rejoined her at the door. "Just what you need around here." His pupils were still dilated with passion and his mouth was tight and fixed. Maggie's eyes dropped inadvertently to his belt buckle and the straining masculinity

below. She blushed. "Yes." Greg grimaced wryly as his eyes followed the direction of hers. "What are we going to do about that, Maggie?"

She said nothing, wanting desperately to toss off some glib and flippant remark. Now was certainly the time for it. But she couldn't. She'd never been able to make light of her deepest emotions.

"Maggie, will you go for a drive with me? I want to be alone with you and there's not a chance of it here."

What was he really asking? she wondered confusedly. Did he want to go for a drive and talk, or would they drive to some motel and seek a quick release for their pent-up frustrations? It seemed likely that he meant the latter. They could certainly talk here, couldn't they? Maggie burned at the thought, feeling shamefully wanton and horribly confused. "No!" She sounded more harsh than she'd intended and Greg frowned.

"Why not?" he asked. "Can't Kristin and her friend stay with the little ones for a while?"

"I think we had this same conversation yesterday." Maggie was slowly recovering her wits, sanity was returning. She thought of the tempestuous Francine and Greg's urgency the day before; she remembered the chic Taffy and Greg's urgency today. "Struck out with Cookie last night, did you?" She couldn't bring herself to say the woman's name aloud. It was bad enough being a stand-in for an adult named Taffy.

Greg looked puzzled for a moment, then his scowl deepened. "Do you mean Taffy? Taffy Smithton?"

"Whatever. I knew it had something to do with sugar." Maggie set her jaw and eyed him defiantly. "I'm just as averse to being used as an outlet for your frustration today as I was yesterday."

"Meaning what?" Greg snapped.

"Meaning that you didn't make it to bed with— with your date last night either. It shows, Greg."

"Ah, yes, your theory. Now I remember. And so, according to your insightful premise, I've gone a

whole weekend without sex and am now a raving maniac, ready to accost anything in a skirt. Why else would I want you?"

Put that way, it sounded terribly crass and unflattering. Maggie felt a hot flush crawl up her body.

"And you, of course, being a hot, sex-starved widow, are hungry for any male body that happens to come your way. Why don't I just shove you against the wall and give it to you, Maggie? That should satisfy both of us sex-crazed animals."

He was furious with her, and some calm, detached part of him recognized the conversion of his passion into anger. While he'd tossed and turned the night before, his racing thoughts came to rest inevitably, obsessively, on Maggie May. Her physical effect upon him was stunning, and so totally unexpected that he still couldn't quite fathom it. Why? he wondered rather desperately. How?

"All right," Maggie said, interrupting his thoughts, "I—I shouldn't have implied that you're a sex-crazed animal." She wondered what was going on in Greg's mind. She saw a range of emotions playing across his face, watched his eyes alternately lighten and darken as he thought, but he remained a complete enigma to her. "I don't appreciate the allusion myself." She smiled suddenly, disarming him completely. "By the way, how was your evening with Mrs. Smithton and her, uh, boys?"

"You knew! You knew about those two psychopaths and you didn't even warn me!"

"I didn't know until Kevin told me about them, after you'd already left." Greg looked so disgruntled, Maggie couldn't help grinning. "And you said you were old friends. I assumed you knew the boys as well as their mother."

"Believe me, Taffy keeps them under wraps and with good reason. Alicia and I knew Taffy and Jack Smithton casually, but we'd never gotten together

with our families. If we had, I would have known not to come within ten miles of those twin monsters."

"So you didn't have a good time?" Maggie asked with false sympathy, her green eyes glowing with glee.

"A good time?" he repeated incredulously. "Let's put it this way, I'd rather repeat my entire neurosurgery residency than ever spend another hour with those two little fiends. I can clearly see prison in their future and I'm not a shade psychic,"

She laughed and a moment later he joined her. "It's been one hell of a weekend," he said, smiling ruefully. "The only good parts have been with you."

Maggie's heart lurched. She wanted to believe him, yet was too uncertain to do it. Greg was an experienced man. He could have any woman he wanted and it seemed doubtful that he would want a woman as average and as ordinary as she. Oh, she didn't doubt that she and her children fared better in his estimation than did the Smithton horrors. Who wouldn't? So she must not read too much into his words. Why would a man with as much to offer a woman as Greg want to become involved with a financially strapped widow with three young children? He had four children of his own to contend with. Why, between them they had seven children, quite an awesome thought!

There was the sound of footsteps and children's voices on the stairs, and Kristin, Kari, and Jennifer appeared with little Nicole perched on Kristin's hip. "Can we take Nicole for a walk, Mom?" Kristin asked.