Hoodwinked (18 page)

“Good night,” he choked and got out quickly.

They had the blood tests the next morning and got the license. The ceremony was arranged for Monday. It would have to be a civil service, Jake informed her, because he had to fly to Chicago that night for a meeting.

Maureen was shocked that he couldn't even find one full day off to get married. “But it will be our wedding day,” she said hesitantly.

He stared at her with narrowed eyes. “I'm not a ‘mechanic' anymore. I head a giant corporation, and I've already had hell keeping it together because I spent the last year delegating too much authority. I've spent the past few weeks finding out why my jet wouldn't fly. I'm out of time, Maureen. The honeymoon will have to wait.”

“Then, can I come to Chicago with you?” she asked hopefully. “I'll be very quiet…”

He moved closer to her and took her gently by the arms. “I don't like it any more than you do. You can come if you like, but I'll be gone almost all night. We'll see very little of each other. And I have to be there four days or so—what about Bagwell?”

She grimaced. “I can't board him. He'd die away from me. And I can't take him with me…”

“We've got our whole lives ahead of us, baby,” he said quietly. “These few days aren't going to matter. Especially,” he added ruefully, “when we've already jumped the gun and had our wedding night.”

She colored and lowered her eyes to his chest. “Yes, I know. I…still feel rather guilty about that.”

“You might not believe it, but so do I,” he said surprisingly. “That's why I've insisted that we wait until we're married. Don't make such a big thing of it, okay? It's just for a few days. I'll call you when I can. Be a good girl and use the time to wind things down at the office and get your gear together. When I come home we'll go find a house to live in.”

She gave in, because what else was there to do? She'd known when she agreed to marry him that his main interest was his corporation. She could hardly ask him to throw it to the wolves just for her.

“Okay,” she agreed and tried to smile. “I won't make a fuss.”

“I didn't think you would,” he said easily. “You aren't the demanding type. That's one reason I married you. I don't want a woman who clings and can't manage if I'm not home every night. That's why I've never married before. I like my freedom.”

She remembered those words with a shudder when she went to bed. He liked his freedom and the corporation came first. Where was she going to fit into his life? Was she going to fit at all?

He was giving her an impossible choice. She wanted to marry him, because she loved him. But it wasn't working out the way she'd expected.

She went to church alone on Sunday. He hadn't called, and he didn't answer his phone when she tried to call him. But he phoned her after church and agreed rather reluctantly to come to supper that night, but he was preoccupied and left early to make a long-distance phone call. Even his good-night kiss was absent, as if he'd only just remembered that he needed to kiss his fiancée good-night.

Maureen was getting more nervous by the minute. She didn't sleep that night, worrying about whether or not to go through with the wedding. MacFaber didn't love her, and that was one strike against them already. They had different backgrounds and different life-styles, and that was another. She didn't know if they had any chance at all, but she loved him too much to back down and call it off. Maybe things would change, she thought. Maybe he'd fall in love with her and want her so badly that he couldn't bear to spend a night away from her. She hugged that thought to herself as she finally fell asleep, long after midnight.

They were married at ten o'clock in the morning by a justice of the peace, with Charlene and one of the executive vice presidents—Charlene's fiancé—as witnesses. Maureen cried at the simple beauty of the service, standing proudly beside Jake in a white suit and white hat with a tiny veil. When he put her wedding ring on her finger and kissed her, the tears were still there, but she smiled through them with pure joy.

There wasn't time for a reception, so they thanked the witnesses and went home so that Jake could pack for the flight to Chicago.

She'd half expected that once they were in her apartment he might want her, since they were married
now. But he sat down at her table while she made coffee, and his eyes stared blankly into space as if he were thinking.

“Well, we're married,” she said when she'd put coffee and rolls in front of him and was sitting across from him.

“So we are.” He sipped his coffee. “Do you want to go house hunting while I'm away, or do it when I come home?”

“I'd like to go with you,” she said. “It wouldn't be fair for me to pick out someplace alone.”

“Why not?” he asked with raised eyebrows. “After all, you're the one who'll be there most of the time. I'll be away sometimes for a week or two at a stretch, and most nights I work until nearly midnight. On weekends I have business meetings and conferences, and even when I'm home, I'll have reports and statements to go over and decisions to make.”

She could have cried. It was her wedding day, and he was already talking about leaving her alone most of the time in the future. “Do we get any time together, Jake?” she asked miserably.

He didn't like the hurt look in her eyes or the plaintive tone. He hadn't thought of Maureen as a clinging woman, and he didn't think he could manage to live with her if she turned into one. Better, he thought, to nip this in the bud now. He glared at her. “I don't make the rules. A corporation runs on the brains of its management, and I've spent too much time delegating responsibility. I did it so well that it almost lost the business for me. I can't fall back into that rut again. I've tried to explain to you that my corporation is the biggest part of my life. I hope you
don't expect to replace it with a few pleasant hours in your bed?”

She went red. “I don't understand.”

“What I mean, Mrs. MacFaber,” he said with a mocking smile, “is that you have a sweet body and I enjoy it very much. But sex is only one small part of my life, not the whole ball game.”

Her world was coming down around her ears. She was hearing him tell her quite plainly that he'd only married her because he enjoyed her body in bed; that outside it, he had no interest in her.

“Is that why you married me?” she faltered. “Because you wanted to sleep with me?”

He took a harsh breath. That wasn't how he'd meant to put it. She was backing him into a corner. “You know why I married you,” he said, his tone curt and commanding. “I enjoy being with you—when you aren't giving me the third degree.” He stood up. “I'd better get packed. Listen,” he added, pausing at the door to look back at her with cold, chilling eyes, “don't start trying to tie me down. I've done things my own way for a long time. The last thing I need is a possessive woman. Do we understand each other?”

She had to grit her teeth to keep from making a scene. It was her wedding day, and he was treating her like an unwanted piece of furniture.

“Yes, I understand,” she said, lowering her eyes to the floor. “You don't even…even want me?” she whispered.

The answer seemed to take forever. “Now, you mean?” he asked.

She nodded, her cheeks reddening.

He laughed mirthlessly. “It won't work,” he said coolly. “You won't convince me to take you to
Chicago that way,” he went on when he saw her perplexed stare.

“I never thought of that,” she responded miserably. “It's our wedding day. I thought you…Never mind.”

“No, I'm not eaten up with desire,” he said. He checked his watch. “Even if I were, I don't have time for it. I'll see you Thursday.”

She started to speak to ask if he wasn't going to kiss her goodbye, but in his present mood, it wouldn't do any good to ask. He'd just bite her head off.

She watched him go out the door with a sinking heart. She was Mrs. Joseph MacFaber. She knew absolutely nothing about his parents, except that they'd let him go to reform school. She didn't even know their names. She didn't know where Jake was born, where he grew up, or what kind of toothpaste he used. She knew almost nothing about him. And right now she was wondering what had possessed her to let him rush her into marriage.

It was possible that he was old-fashioned enough to feel guilty that he'd seduced her. He said he wanted her, but he certainly hadn't acted like it today. His mind had been totally on work; not on her. He was leaving to spend the week in Chicago alone, leaving her here by herself only hours after they'd been married.

She glared at the closed door. He was being unreasonable. She ought to go over to his apartment and tell him so. But he was probably too busy packing to listen.

Well, if he expected her to sit here for four days while he went to Chicago on business, he was in for a surprise. She wasn't going to be his doormat. If he wanted a society wife, he was going to have one.
She'd have herself done over and buy some clothes, then she'd start looking for houses. She'd engage her own staff, thank you very much, and if he didn't like it, he could divorce her and go and live with his company!

She felt much better with her mind made up. The only thing was they didn't have a joint bank account and she had only the money in her savings account. She pulled out her bankbook and grimaced at the small figure in it.

So much for having herself made over. Maybe she could set her hair or something and paint her body green and make a toga out of one of the colored bedsheets and meet him like that at the airport. The reporters would probably love that. She'd make all the evening editions.

She laughed at her own absurd idea. No, she couldn't do that even to MacFaber. It would have to be something less spectacular.

For one thing, she decided, she could tear up her resignation and keep her job. The way things were going, she might need it until she could find a job working for somebody else. If MacFaber was going to relegate her to the outfield of his life, she'd need something to occupy her time. He wasn't going to let her run the house or cook for him, and he'd just said that he'd only want her now and again in bed, so she might as well work.

“Car-rot!” Bagwell called from the kitchen table.

“You'll turn orange,” she cautioned as she handed him another carrot and began to prepare a beef stew. “I'll get to eat this myself, you realize,” she told the big green bird. “Bagwell, do you like beef stew?”

Too busy with the carrot in his claw, he didn't answer her.

She started the stew and sat down to watch television. There was a movie on and she stared at it blankly, thinking that, of all the wedding days in the history of the world, this must surely be the very worst.

Maybe Jake would come back by the apartment and apologize. Maybe he'd kiss her goodbye hungrily and decide he couldn't bear Chicago without her, even for a few days. Maybe he'd rush in on his knees with passionate declarations of love.

Bagwell stared at her, because she was laughing a little hysterically.

She got herself back under control, but as the minutes ticked by, there was still no sign of her new husband. Finally, unable to stand the waiting any longer, she picked up the telephone and dialed his number. It rang and rang and rang.

She hung up and went outside, around to his apartment. It was locked, and the lights were all out. He'd gone without a single word, as if she no longer existed for him.

Probably, she thought miserably, she didn't. Marrying him had been her biggest mistake. But she didn't have to compound it by mooning over him. She'd make the best of her situation until she could decide where to go, because she certainly didn't want to live with a man who could treat her like that.

She'd go to work tomorrow, she decided. Then she'd give herself a few days to decide what she was going to do with her life. One thing was certain: she wouldn't take a red cent from MacFaber, so he wouldn't have to worry about alimony or anything.

The only other worry would be pregnancy. She hadn't taken precautions and neither had he. A child was a definite possibility, and she remembered that he'd said he wanted one. Then why had he treated her like this, on their wedding day? Had he been temporarily insane when he proposed? Try as she might, she couldn't come up with a better explanation for his behavior.

He'd lived alone for a long time, she recalled, and that was by choice. What if he couldn't adjust to another person? And he might have some real doubts about her ability to handle his house and servants and give parties and do all the other things expected of a society wife.

She pursed her lips. She could go to the library, she supposed, and read some books on parties and such. She could check out some biographies of well-known hostesses. Now there was a thought. She'd do it, she decided, the very next day. Before she cut and ran, she would show MacFaber that she wasn't too stupid to organize a dinner party or motivate staff or be a successful hostess. And she would.

J
ake's trip to Chicago lasted one day longer than he'd expected. It was Saturday morning, five days after the wedding, and Maureen was waiting for Harry to pick her up in the Rolls, as Jake had arranged by phone, and take her to the airport to meet Jake's plane. He'd promised to phone her, and he had. Once. It had been a quick, terse conversation, with neither of them giving an inch. Maureen had hardly slept all night after it.

She'd taken back her resignation and kept on with her job. If she and Jake were going to have a fight, she reasoned, it might as well be a proper one. She wasn't going to become a glorified mistress. If he wanted a wife, he was going to have to let her be one, in every sense of the word—a cook, housekeeper and lover. She wouldn't settle for being made a convenience. And just because he was a tycoon, used to making people jump, he needn't think that he was going to make her jump, too.