Marrying Maddy (10 page)

She should sit down. Maybe on the blue chair. Sit down, wait…mind her own business.

That thought stayed with her as she walked through to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator and pulled out a can of sarsaparilla soda, popped the top and took a long drink.

Her stomach growled an indignant protest, reminding Maddy that all she'd had to eat today had been a salad, telling her that sarsaparilla soda was okay for starters, but it wasn't meat and potatoes.

So she made herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Munched on it as she walked back through the house, pretending she wasn't really looking into every room, imagining every room complete, yes, down to painting over all the dark wallpaper the Harrises had favored.

Her fingers caught at the newel post, held, and she turned her body to look up the long, curving flight of stairs that led to the second floor.

No. She couldn't do that. She wouldn't do that. It was too personal, too private. Looking into a
man's bedroom? She couldn't. She just couldn't. Not even Joe's bedroom.
Especially
Joe's bedroom.

He wasn't the black satin sheets type, was he? She didn't think so, hoped not.

Still, she probably ought to check, just to make sure. Only heaven knew what sort of debauched creature he might have turned into after she'd jilted him.

No. She hadn't
jilted
him. Not exactly. Jilted meant she'd left him for someone else, right? She hadn't done that. Okay, so she was marrying Matt next week, but that didn't count. Couldn't count for much. Could it?

“Get a grip, Maddy,” she told herself as she climbed the stairs, knowing exactly which was the master bedroom suite. “You're thinking too much, rationalizing stupid moves and now you're talking to yourself. Rubber room, here we come. And yet…”

And yet, what? And yet, she wanted to see Joe's most private space. And yet, she cared enough about him to want him to be happy. And yet, she'd just have to murder him if there was another woman's photograph on his dresser….

There couldn't be another woman. He wouldn't be here if there were another woman. He wouldn't have listened to Allie, bought this house, for crying out loud. He wouldn't be making a bit of a fool of himself, opening himself up to more hurt…not unless he loved. Not unless he really, really loved her.

Ah, rational thought. Wasn't it a blast!

Maybe not, but it got her into his bedroom and, right now, Maddy would content herself with that.

The first thing she saw was herself, an eight-by-
ten blown-up photograph of herself from that long-ago day in Atlantic City. There were other pictures. About five of them in different sizes, mostly snapshots; all of them of her, of her with Joe.

Not enough pictures to have him looking like some sort of stalker, but just enough to let her know that he went to sleep looking at the two of them in happier times, that he woke to her smile every morning.

She had many of the same pictures in her room, although she had put them into a drawer once she had Matt's ring on her finger. She still pulled them out, looked at them, traced her fingers over Joe's smiling face, but that was all.

She didn't know if they were both hopeless romantics, or simply pathetic.

She had made her decision, taken the steps necessary to get on with her life, believing that Joe hadn't cared enough, loved enough, to come after her. To persuade her to marry him, be with him. To give up his dream and become her dream of him and how their life should be…

Maddy winced, that particular shaft of insight slicing sharply into her chest. That was it, wasn't it? He was supposed to bend, to agree with her, to become her dream of happily ever after. He wasn't supposed to ask her to leap blindly into a future that could end with the two of them left with nothing but each other.

Nothing but each other.
Was that so bad? Was struggling so terrible…or had she run from Joe because she hadn't been able to get him to sit, heel, behave as she felt he should?

“You sure do pick your times, Maddy,” she
scolded herself. “These were questions you should have been asking yourself when you were running to cooking classes, instead of running to Philadelphia, running back to Joe, accepting him as he was, accepting yourself as you were.”

She walked over to the head of the king-size bed, planning on fixing the bedspread as it lay bunched on top of a pillow. She turned down the spread, picked up the pillow, and was immediately caught by the scent of Joe's aftershave. Her stomach bunched, her eyes closed. And she hugged the pillow close to her. Tears stung her eyes.

There was a slight noise, nothing she could readily put a name to, and she opened her eyes once more, to see Joe standing not ten feet away from her.

He was rubbing a towel over his wet head, and wore another towel low around his waist, a wide smile, and nothing else. His furry chest was still glistening with water droplets and his bare arms and long legs had retained their sculpted Greek god look for the past eighteen months. “To what do I owe this unexpected visit? Have I been a very, very good boy today?” he asked, grinning.

“You…you're…” Maddy threw the pillow back on the bed and pointed a shaking finger at him. “You're not supposed to be here.”

“And you are?” Joe asked, taking two steps in her direction.

“Yes! Yes, I am, darn it. I'm here to wait for the cable guy because Allie couldn't do it and…and…” She slapped a hand against her forehead. “Yeah, sure, like Allie would ever volunteer to wait for a cable guy. What was I thinking? Or
not
thinking.
Maybe those pills haven't worn off after all. How could I be so
gullible!
”

“Having a nice conversation with yourself, Maddy?” Joe asked. “Tell you what, let me put some clothes on, and maybe we can do it the old-fashioned way. You know. You talk to me, I talk to you, and we both listen. It would be something new and different for us, of course.”

“We have nothing to say to each other,” Maddy said, striving to collect herself. “I hate you for coming here and that's all there is to say about anything.”

“Except for me to apologize for buying this place out from under you. That was mean, Maddy, and I know it. But you're looking at a desperate man.”

She was looking at a near-naked man, and she would have to walk straight past him to get to the door, which was what she was doing. “Apology accepted,” she said shortly, raising her chin defiantly. “Now, if you'd please move?”

He stepped back, motioning for her to proceed past him, then he shot out a hand as she did, took hold of her arm at the elbow. “When are you going to tell him, Maddy? Because you have to tell him.”

Her arm burned where he touched her. Her chin wobbled as her resolve to leave him standing there fled in a heartbeat. “I'll tell him,” she said quietly. “I know I have to tell him. But that doesn't change anything, Joe. I'm still going to marry Matt next week.” She turned tear-bright eyes up at him. “Oh, Joe, why couldn't you have let well enough alone?”

He let go of her arm, let her run away, run down the stairs and out of the house. Run all the way home. The front door banged shut behind her and
she stopped just inside the foyer, trying to regain her breath.

“Home so soon?” Almira said, walking out from the drawing room.

Maddy narrowed her eyes and glared at her grandmother. “You evil old woman,” she growled. “Joe was home. He was in the bathroom, taking a shower. I know, because he came out, wearing nothing but a towel.”

“Nothing but a towel? And you were there, waiting for him? Right there in his bedroom?” Almira said, smiling quite happily, and not even bothering to deny her guilt. “Wow, that was even better than I'd hoped for.”

“Aaaargh!”
Maddy screamed, and ran up the stairs.

M
addy stood in front of the mirror in her bedroom, dressed in her wedding gown, and thankfully not breaking out in hives. Modern medicine hadn't been able to do anything with her mental turmoil, but at least it had put those itchy hives to bed for a while.

“Take a deep breath, Miss Maddy,” Mrs. Ballantine said, attempting to pull up the zipper covered in faux buttons. “I seem to be having a little trouble here.”

Maddy looked at her reflection in the mirror, pulled a face. “Is that a polite way of saying, ‘Maddy, you're fat?'”

“You're not fat, Maddy,” Jessie said, watching as Mrs. Ballantine gave a mighty tug, and got the zipper to go all the way up. “That gown is a size six petite, remember? You're just pleasantly rounded, and in all the right places. Now,
I'm
skinny.”

“Yeah, if you say so,” Maddy answered. “But I
sure would like to know why I got all the short and fat genes and you got all the tall and thin ones. Oh, I never should have eaten that chocolate cake last night.”

“You made it, you might as well eat it,” Jessie said. “Seven layers.
Mmm-mmm.
Maddy, I can't tell you how impressed I am by all your achievements these past years. Even after you came home from college, you still seemed like my baby sister, and not much more. Now? You seem so much more complete now, more your own person. And you've found something you really enjoy, taking care of a house, turning it into a real home. It's like you're some sort of Martha Stewart or something.”

Maddy stood very still while Mrs. Ballantine checked the hem of the gown, inspected her work for any hint of a flaw. “I am pretty good at this home and hearth stuff, aren't I, Jessie? And I really like it, every minute of it. I guess I just wasn't born for the big, bad corporate world. I'd much rather stay home and raise a half-dozen kids.”

“Good,” Jessie said. “You can have enough for both of us, as I'll be much too busy working at the plant with Ryan who, by the way, now thinks we should be working twenty-seven hours a day. Personally, I'm beginning to think he wants to bury himself there, at the plant, and not have to be bothered with even pretending to live a real life.”

Maddy looked into the mirror, looked at her sister. “And you'd let him do that? To himself? To
you?
”

Jessie shrugged. “Why not? It's not as if I've got anything else to do with my life, right?”

Maddy was confused. “You mean you're really
going to stick with this career stuff? Never get married or anything?”

Jessie stood up, walked over to the nearest window. “Prospective grooms aren't exactly kneeling three deep at my feet, Maddy, asking for my hand in marriage.” At least not the
right
prospective groom…

“There you go, all set,” Mrs. Ballantine said, unzipping the gown, so that Maddy gratefully let out her breath. “But I'd stay out of the kitchen between now and Saturday, Miss Maddy. Not that you aren't cute as a button, but I have to say that taking a gown in is a whole lot easier than letting it out. You'll remember that, won't you?”

“Yes, Mrs. Ballantine,” Maddy said, guiltily remembering the homemade waffles she'd fixed for herself that morning in her own kitchen. Still, she'd eaten them with fresh strawberries, not maple syrup, so how bad could that have been? Pretty bad, obviously, when she considered how uncomfortable her gown had felt a moment ago.

Not that it mattered how the gown felt. It wasn't as if she was going to get to wear it. Not once she got done telling Matt what she had to tell him. Telling Joe what she had to tell him, as well.

“Is Matt coming over this evening?” Jessie asked, her tone conversational, not at all concerned, or wary. She'd become quite a good actress, accomplished at hiding her feelings these past six months since Matt had proposed and Maddy had accepted.

“Um-hum,” Maddy said, nodding. She then bent her knees and raised her arms, allowing Mrs. Ballantine to raise the entire gown up and over her head. Once she'd emerged from yards and yards of
ivory silk, she asked, “Are you going to be home? You're never home for dinner anymore. Matt asked me yesterday if you'd run away from home. I mean, when we see Ryan at the dinner table and he tells us you're still at the plant—well, I just wish you'd be here tonight, Jessie, okay?”

Jessie suddenly got the feeling Maddy wanted to use her as some sort of buffer between herself and Matt. “Is Joe O'Malley invited to dinner tonight, Maddy?” she asked carefully. “I wouldn't put it past Allie.”

“Joe?” Maddy slipped into a pale yellow sundress. “I have no idea. Not that I could care less.”

Behind her, still struggling with the train of the gown, Mrs. Ballantine snorted, rolled her eyes. “I'll leave you two girls alone now. To
talk.
”

Jessie watched the housekeeper close the door behind her. “Okay, what's up? What's going on?”

Maddy bit her upper lip for a moment, the upper lip that had stayed remarkably hive-free, even though she had stopped taking the antihistamines this morning. “I'm not getting married,” she said at last, looking at her sister as calmly as she could.

“You're not…you're
not…
” Jessie hated herself for the way her heart all but jumped out of her chest, probably to hop up and down in glee. “Ah, Maddy,” she said, pulling her baby sister into her arms. “Are you sure?”

Maddy wrapped her arms around her sister's slim waist, nodding her head against Jessie's shoulder. “I'm sure. I don't know how I'm going to tell Matt, what we're going to do about all the presents, and the caterers, and all that sort of thing. But I can't
marry him, Jessie, not when I'm so confused. It wouldn't be fair, not to either of us.”

“Or to Joe,” Jessie said, putting her hands on Maddy's shoulders, pushing her slightly away from her. “Would it, Maddy? Be fair to Joe? To Joe, and to you.”

Maddy looked down at her shoes. “I want to kill him,” she said quietly.

Jessie laughed shortly. “He is rather like a wad of gum on the bottom of your shoe, isn't he? You just can't get rid of him. I think that's because he's in love.”

Now it was Maddy's turn to walk to the window, to look out across the way, to the sight of Joe's sparkling blue swimming pool beyond the tall trees. “Is he, Jessie? Am I? I don't know. Maybe he just doesn't like to lose. Maybe I'm just remembering how it was, and forgetting that back then I'd believed what it was was all we could have, that we'd only ruin what was if we kept on with it.”

Jessie knitted her brows together, playing over that last statement in her mind. “Could you excuse me a moment, Maddy, while I go get my secret decoder ring? Because I sure need some help deciphering that one.”

Maddy turned from the window. “So do I, Jessie,” she said with a wan smile. “I don't know about Joe and me, I guess that's what I'm saying. But I do know that having one question, just one niggling question, is reason enough to tell Matt I can't marry him on Saturday.”

“Postpone the wedding, you mean.”

Maddy shook her head. “No, Jessie, not postpone it. Call it off. And you know what? I think Matt will
be relieved. We're friends, good friends, but I think we both knew something was missing. Some sort of spark, you know?”

“And is there a spark with Joe?”

Maddy smiled, sniffed. “Try a bonfire, Jessie. That would be more like it.” She twisted her hands together and looked at her sister. “So, will you be here tonight, Jessie? Will you be here to help me somehow get through dinner, and then wait for me after I tell Matt? I…I think I'm going to need you.”

“Ah, sweetheart,” Jessie said, gathering the now weeping Maddy into her arms once more. “Of course I'll be here. You know that. I'll always be here. I just want you to be
sure.
”

“I'm sure,” Maddy stated as firmly as she could as her chin continued to wobble. “If I'm sure of nothing else, I'm sure about this.”

“Well, then,” Jessie said bracingly, trying to put a smile back on her sister's face, “then let me help you compose a note to Great-Aunt Harriet, telling her how much you regret having to return her lovely gift.”

Maddy looked at her sister. Smiled. Shook her head. “Ah, Jessie, what would I do without you?”

“You're not going to find out,” Jessie promised, kissing her sister's cheek, and at the same time remembering that Maddy's future might have changed, but hers had not. She could never let Maddy know that she was secretly in love with her sister's soon-to-be ex-fiancé. “I just want you to be happy.”

 

Maddy was up to her elbows in peat moss, bits of it clinging to her “I'm the gardener” apron, her
bare knees, her scraped-back hair.

She knelt on the edge of the brick path, leaning forward with one arm braced as she swept peat moss around the base of a deep green ornamental grass. The view of her from the back had Joe smiling even as he wondered if he'd be as welcome in Maddy's garden as a plague of locusts.

He'd never seen her like this, not during their whirlwind courtship that had taken place in the middle of the city. But she looked very much at home as a country girl, happy in her own element.

He'd loved her in Philadelphia.

He damn near adored her here in Allentown.

The girl he had met, swept off her feet as she'd swept him off his, had been just that. A girl.

But Maddy was a woman now. He'd broken her heart and she'd run home, but she hadn't stopped living, hadn't become bitter. She'd picked up the pieces and moved on. Taking classes. Finding out who she really was. Becoming engaged to be married.

And what had he done? First, he'd gotten drunk. Stinking drunk. He'd had a real pity party for himself in that hotel room for two days, until Larry flew out to bring him home, remind him of his obligations, offer him work as a cure for what ailed him—
who
ailed him.

On so many levels, Larry's therapy had worked. Joe had worked hard, murderously hard, driving himself to succeed, day in, day out. Driving himself to be better than he was, more than he had been, everything he'd told Maddy he could be. Each morning he woke to her smiling face. He fell into
bed at night—on the nights he actually made it to his bed—with her face being the last thing he saw before falling into an exhausted sleep.

Maddy had been the reason for his success. She was the carrot at the end of the stick, the prize at the end of the race. She didn't know; maybe he didn't know it. But she was.

And he'd made it. He'd made it big. Bigger than big. Gigantic. But, funny about that, having it all didn't make him nearly as happy as he'd thought it would. Knowing that Maddy was bound to hear of his success did less than nothing for him.

For months, nearly two years, he had pushed himself so that he could prove to Maddy that she'd been wrong. Rub her nose in it? Damn straight.

Only it hadn't worked. He still had this big, empty space inside. So he'd given up his monklike existence and taken his smiling self out into the society that seemed ready to welcome him with open arms. He met women; lots of women. But he never took them home, never took them to his bed.

Because they weren't Maddy. Nobody else was Maddy. She was one of a kind…and he was a one-woman man.

That was when he'd called the Chandler household, and asked to speak to the woman who'd walked away from him. Not to rub her nose in his success, but to beg her to please, please, let him see her, talk to her, see if they could start over again. Almira Chandler had answered the phone and, as the saying goes…the rest was history.

History. Yes, they had plenty of history, he and Maddy. But did they have a future?

Joe watched as Maddy sat back on her heels, ad
miring her work, giving a final pat to one area, then slapping her gloves together to rid them of clinging peat moss.

“Very nice, Maddy,” he said, wincing as she all but jumped to her feet to glare at him angrily for having surprised her. “I'm sorry. I didn't realize I'd been sneaking up on you.” He walked up to her, took out his handkerchief, wiped at a smudge on her left cheek. “God, Mad, but you're beautiful.”

He couldn't help himself. He lowered his head, slowly, so as not to frighten her, and pressed his mouth against hers. Gently, barely touching her lips. He kissed her once, twice, then spread his legs slightly, slid one hand behind her head, and pulled her closer, increasing the pressure of his mouth at the same time.

She didn't fight him; couldn't fight him. Maddy just stood there, her eyes fluttering closed, and let him kiss her. And it all came rushing back. The melting heat. The hunger. The wish for his kiss to go on, and on, as he held her until the stars fell and the moon went out.

Joe was near to trembling, finally having Maddy in his arms again. How soft, how warm, how maddening and comforting and exciting and simply wonderful she felt. She was more than his love, his lover. She was
home.

When the kiss was over, too soon, too soon, Maddy lay her head against Joe's chest, too weak to move away, both physically and emotionally. “You…we shouldn't have done that.”

Joe stroked her hair, gave her ponytail a playful tug. “I know. But I'll go to hell if you will.”

Now she did push away from him, to look up at
him through tear-filled eyes. “Why, Joe? Why did it take you so long to come after me? Why did you come after me now?”

He pulled a face, tried to lighten the mood. “Lousy timing?” When she frowned, he went on, “Okay, honesty time. Pride. Arrogance, stupidity, stubbornness and pride. I was going to come to you a success on my own terms, or I wasn't going to come to you at all. It was vain, stupid, and anything else you can call it, and I have no excuse for any of it. Not a single day went by without me missing you, and still I didn't come after you. There, is that good enough?”