What Were You Expecting? (10 page)

“You ready?” he asked, his lips tilting up slightly.

“Are
you
?” she teased.

“As ready as I’ll ever be, Maggie May.” He surprised her by putting out his hand and helping her down from the top of the picnic table, but she couldn’t help the wave of disappointment when he dropped it quickly.

Stop it now, Maggie. Friendship. That’s what he wants and that’s what you’ll
cheerfully
offer him.

“Nils,” she said, putting her hand on his sleeve to stop him from starting back to the car. He turned to her and she looked up at his face. “I meant what I said last night. I’m grateful to you. I’ll always be grateful.”

He glanced down at her hand, then back into her eyes. “I asked you to marry me instead of Paul. No one’s forcing me to do something I don’t want to do.”

“I know that,” she whispered. “But you’re still doin’ it. Swoopin’ in and savin’ me again.”

“Gotten kind of used to it.” His eyes searched her face and his voice was soft and kind. “I don’t mind.”

She swallowed. She had promised herself she’d get this next part out and she wasn’t going to chicken out now. “And what you said last night? About nothin’ changin’? Well, I’m all for it. I’m lucky to have a f-friend like you.”

She stumbled over the word “friend,” but otherwise she’d said her piece. She withdrew her hand from his arm and walked over to his car.

***

Four and a half hours later, as they approached Gardiner after the painless procedure of obtaining an official marriage license in Livingston, Nils wondered why he couldn’t shake the sinking feeling he’d had since he picked her up. Her words: “I’m lucky to have a
friend
like you” had left him feeling so damn sad, he was sinking deeper into melancholy as the afternoon wore on.

Last night when they’d been alone in the Prairie, it was his last chance to reconfirm that their arrangement wouldn’t muddy the waters between them, mostly because he’d woken up yesterday morning with the sort of hope he had no right to. As he’d shaved and brushed his teeth looking at his reflection in the mirror, he hadn’t been able to keep the elation out of his heart:
I’m marrying Maggie tomorrow. By the end of the day tomorrow, Maggie Campbell will be my wife. My
wife
.
The very thought had almost knocked the wind out of his lungs and made him giddy and ridiculous, staring at himself with a dopey, almost drunken, grin. It hadn’t taken him long to sober up and realize all over again that he was only offering her his name for legal purposes and they were about as far from a real marriage as two people could get.

“She’s not your wife,” he told his stupid face. “She’s not ever going to be your wife. Not in any way that actually matters.”

The grin had faded as he reminded himself of Wednesdays and Sundays at the Prairie Dawn. One Wednesday evening and Sunday afternoon a month, Maggie converted one corner of the little café-bookstore into Little Café on the Prairie Story Time. Parents from miles away brought their children for the free, homemade shortbread and tart lemonade that Maggie made with real lemons. But mostly, they brought their children to bask in her loving warmth and to listen to Maggie’s magical voice read fairytales and legends for an hour or so.

The first time he’d stumbled across children’s story time, he’d backed up toward the door immediately to leave, but just like all of those beautiful, eager, young faces, Nils had been captivated by Maggie’s lilting accent and found himself leaning against the doorway, listening to the story about a princess who wanted to be a regular girl. At one point, Maggie had lifted her eyes from the story and caught his, stumbling over the next few words and blushing before composing herself and resuming the story with gusto. The small café was bursting with other adults, mostly parents ordering coffee from Maggie’s teenage helper, or quietly listening to the stories from a respectable distance behind the children. Nils was probably the only unattached adult in the room, so it made sense that his watchful, relaxed presence would surprise her.

As she started each story, she’d ask for a volunteer to sit on her lap and help her turn the pages and every little hand would shoot up in the air, fluttering and waving to be chosen. And that child would nestle against her, close to her melodic voice and encouraging smiles. She knew all of their names and welcomed new children every week. Sometimes the stories ended after an hour, but one Wednesday she chose a longer book and not one child stirred until the story was over, almost two hours later. She loved those children and there was no doubt that they loved her.

After that day, any fantasy he’d had about making a move on Maggie had died. Of course a woman as warm as Maggie wanted children of her own one day. The pain of this realization—of knowing he could never give her what she wanted—had forced him to firmly place Maggie in the “friend zone.” And there she’d stayed. All the way up to today. Today. Their wedding day.

And yet.

The longing he felt for her—the deep, uncomplicated love he bore for her— had never stopped growing since the day the roots had planted themselves deeply and permanently in his heart. Even now, as she sat beside him in the comfortable quiet of his car, he ached from wanting what he could never have.

“It’s a strange day. Here we are, license in hand, about to get married,” she said, turning to him, a teasing grin softening her words. “I never pictured my weddin’ day like this. No white dress, no tuxedo. No friends or family. No bonny flowers or cake or…bagpipes.”

“Bagpipes?”

“Aye. Bagpipes. If we were marryin’ for real, there’d be bagpipes. In the mornin’ as I dressed. As I made my way t’ the kirk. As we walked back down the aisle. And later, on the kirk green as we stuffed ourselves with cake. Lots of bagpipes.”

“You miss Scotland, Maggie?”

She shrugged. “I didna live in highlands, Nils, in lovely Inverness.”

“Where they have the castles,” he said, remembering their first conversation.

“Aye. The castles. And lochs. And monsters.” She chuckled beside him and his lips tilted up for the first time all afternoon. “I lived in Glasgow, a modern city, in a flat with my mum and brother and aunt and cousin, all together in one small space. It was cramped and a little drab. Everyone worked too hard and made too little. When Lily invited me over, I jumped at the chance to come here.”

“And you’ve never gone back.”

“Nae. I love my mum and Ian, my Aunt Janet and cousin Graham. But…”

“Your life is here,” he finished for her.

“Aye.” He felt her eyes on him, soft and warm. “Aye, thank goodness for Lily.”

Nils realized that in all the years he’d been playing cards with Maggie and stopping into her shop for coffee, she hadn’t talked much about her life in Scotland. Now he found himself rapt with interest, wondering about this woman who’d left everything behind to come to Montana.

“I didn’t know your aunt very well. But, she and my Mamma were friendly. They both loved books. Your aunt started a book group and my Mamma attended it for years.”

“I’m verra sorry I never met her.”

Nils nodded. He’d lost his mother to cancer several years ago. “She was a good woman. A lot like Jenny.”

“Then she was a
verra
good woman.”

They passed the sign indicating Gardiner was only five miles ahead and Nils felt Maggie shift in her seat. He wondered if she felt as nervous as he did, and damn but he wished he could grab her hand again and hold it, but he had promised himself not to confuse her anymore. All that touching on Monday was like a gateway drug and he was perilously close to becoming addicted. He glanced at her quickly, at the red pillow of her lips, wishing things were different. Wishing for bagpipes and cake and flowers. Wishing for her to have more than a green-card wedding to a man who couldn’t love her the way she deserved to be loved. Wishing for
anything
to make today just a little bit more special for her.

Suddenly he had an idea.

Without a word, he jerked the wheel and pulled into the parking lot of the small grocery store to his right, found a space, and left the engine running. Maggie looked over at him, surprised.

“Give me a sec, okay? I have to grab something.”

While the young woman in the bakery section wrapped up the two white-frosted cupcakes in a white box, he downloaded the first song that came up on iTunes when he searched for bagpipes. Then he quickly paid for his purchases and returned to the car.

“What in the world?” asked Maggie, looking pointedly at the small bag in his hand, the whisper of a curious smile on her pretty lips.

“How much time do we have?” he asked her.

She glanced at her watch. “Twenty minutes.”

“That’s just enough time.”

He put the car in gear, backed out of the parking lot and took a right onto Main Street. After crossing the bridge, he turned the bend and headed for the Roosevelt Arch, the gateway to Yellowstone. He pulled up beside a picnic table and cut the engine, opening his car door and stepping out without a word.

Maggie joined him a second later, looking at him with wide, worried eyes. “Is this cold feet? Because you dinna have to do this. I can just—”

He’d already pressed play on his iPhone and her face changed as she realized that the strains of bagpipes surrounded them. He offered her his hand and helped her up on top of the picnic table, placing the white grocery store bag on her lap, and then stood back a step to watch her face.

“Bagpipes,” she whispered and her green eyes, glistening and tender, held his for a moment before she opened the bag and pulled out the little box, looking inside at the little white cupcakes side by side. She bit her lip as a tear snaked its way down her nose, finally resting on her lip. He couldn’t help himself. He stepped forward and swiped the droplet away with the rough pad of his thumb.

“Cake and bagpipes,” he said softly. “I know they’d come after the wedding if you were home in Scotland, but we’re not doing anything in the right order anyway.”

She was still staring at the cake box, but now she raised her eyes. She reached out with both hands and placed them on his cheeks, as tears coursed down her own. As she pulled him gently toward her, he was powerless to look away or pull back from the stark emotion in her eyes. When they were almost nose to nose, she tilted his face, then leaned forward and brushed her lips against his cheek.

His held breath released with an almost inaudible sigh into her hair, and his eyes closed for a second as his brain memorized the feeling of Maggie’s lips touching his skin—at once the most erotic and most meaningful touch by anyone in all of his adult life.

Finally she withdrew her lips, and her breath was warm in his ear as she whispered. “For all my livin’ life, I will never forget you did this for me.”

The urge to lean his forehead in the warm, sweet-smelling curve of her neck, to pull her small body against his and savor the warmth of her, the goodness of her, was so overwhelming, it physically hurt him to pull back. But he did. Holding on to the last shred of his self-control, he did.

She reached up to swipe the back of her hand over her cheeks, sniffled, and then offered him the most brilliant smile he’d ever seen.

“By the way, this song is called ‘Highland Cathedral.’ Proper weddin’ music. Of every tune in the whole world you
could’ve
chosen, somehow you chose the right one.” She chuckled lightly, her face bright with happiness as she raised the white box on her lap. “Cupcake?”

Chapter 6

Beck glanced at the license again then lifted his troubled gaze to Maggie.

“You sure about this, Maggie?” Nils had excused himself to use the men’s room and she and Beck were left alone for a moment. “I don’t mean to pry, but…I don’t remember you and Nils being a couple. Recent, huh?”

“You could say that,” she responded. She and Nils had agreed not to include Beck in their charade, but allow him to believe they were an actual couple. It seemed safer just in case the immigration people ever questioned him about the legitimacy of their marriage. “And yes, I’m sure.”

“You just…I mean…” Beck stumbled over his words, finally opening his hands, palms up, as though in petition. “I think I sort of hoped…”

Maggie had sensed for some time that Beck was interested in her—he came in frequently for coffee and lingered at the bar, looking for reasons to chat with her, his eyes often drifting to her lips or her chest in the course of conversation. He wouldn’t be a bad catch either: only a few years older than she, country lawyer, not bad-looking. If her heart hadn’t already been attached to someone else, she may have even encouraged him. For a moment she wished that her heart had been taken with Beck. How much easier would it have been to love someone already attracted to her, already interested in her?

“Beck,” she said gently, “it’s always been Nils for me.”

He nodded slowly. “I can see that. I guess my question is…has it always been you for Nils?”

Huh. They weren’t fooling Beck one bit. “Does that matter?”