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A Man for All Seasons
HEATHER MACALLISTER


Marlie Waters's Christmas List:1. Get a roommate so she can afford her mortgage after broken engagement.2. Check! Her old family friend Tyler Burton needs a room. So what if he's been her longtime crush?3. Ramp up her home-business success.4. Oops. She works so much that Ty presents her with a 12 Days of Christmas charity auction dating package–just to get her out of his hair!5. Okay, get a move on with twelve surprisingly fun dates.6. Hmm. Start to see Ty as pretty hunky…and living under the same roof.7. Wow. Kiss Ty. Get hot 'n' heavy under the tree one night!8. Start to believe in holiday magic…9. …until Ty breaks her heart again.10. Make a new Christmas list. Well, maybe after unwrapping Ty just one more time….









Praise for Heather MacAllister…


“Witty, romantic, sexy and fun…and Heather’s books aren’t bad, either.”

—New York Times bestselling author Christina Dodd

“Curling up with a Heather MacAllister romance is one of my favorite indulgences.”

—New York Times bestselling author Debbie Macomber

“For quirky fun and sexy wit, Heather MacAllister is my go-to author.”

—Award-winning author Amanda Stevens

“Clever, funny and with a completely satisfying ending, this is a must read.”

—RT Book Reviews on His Little Black Book

“Great humor and great sex abound.”

—RT Book Reviews on Undressed

“A one-sitting read for me. I got so caught up in this story that I really didn’t want it to end.”

—The Best Reviews on Male Call

“The plot was inspired, the dialogue was witty and the secondary characters were extraordinary.”

—Writers Unlimited on How to be the Perfect Girlfriend







Dear Reader,

I’ve always been fascinated by the twelve days of extravagant Christmas gifts given by someone’s true love in the carol. What was with all the poultry? Every year, there are articles about updating the gifts, but what I admire is the time and thought involved in giving presents for twelve days. You’ve really got to like somebody to go to that much trouble. I reversed things in A Man for All Seasons because Tyler discovers his childhood friend, Marlie, is his true love—but only after he gives her dates with twelve other men.

I hope you enjoy their story and Marlie’s dates based on the “Twelve Days of Christmas.”

Merry Christmas!

Heather MacAllister

www.HeatherMacAllister.com




A Man for All Seasons

Heather MacAllister







www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)




ABOUT THE AUTHOR


Heather MacAllister lives near the Texas gulf coast where, in spite of the ten-month growing season and plenty of humidity, she can’t grow plants. She’s a former music teacher who married her high school sweetheart on the 4th of July—is it any surprise that their two sons turned out to be a couple of firecrackers? Heather has written more than forty romantic comedies, which have been translated into twenty-six languages and published in dozens of countries. She’s won a Romance Writers of America Golden Heart Award, RT Book Reviews awards for best Harlequin Romance and best Harlequin Temptation, and is a three-time RITA


Award finalist. When she’s not writing stories where life has its quirks, Heather collects vintage costume jewelry, loves fireworks displays, computers that behave and sons who answer their mother’s emails. You can visit her at www.HeatherMacAllister.com.


To Andy,

my man for all seasons




Contents


Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14




1


“SORRY, SORRY, SORRY!” Marlie Waters winced at her housemate’s grim expression.

Tyler stood in the doorway of her home office and jammed his arms into his shirt sleeves. He looked exactly like a man who’d been about to get laid and had been interrupted. Because he had been. By her. Not the laying, the interrupting.

“I was distracted.” Marlie gestured to her computer. “I was concentrating on the website and checking to make sure it looked the same in every browser and decided a snack sounded good and while I was thinking about code and something to eat, I wasn’t thinking about you and…” Your chest.

Her gaze danced ahead of his fingers as he did up his shirt.

“Axelle.” Tyler finished buttoning his shirt and glared at her, fists on his hips, his hair rumpled. A little smear of eye shadow gleamed on his cheek.

No doubt whatsoever about what he’d been doing on the big, brown, comfy sofa—and with whom—even though Marlie had raced back downstairs, eyes averted.

Awkward, yes, but more disconcerting was seeing her housemate as a desirable man through Axelle’s slate-shad-owed eyes instead of her own naked, puffy, over-worked ones. Intellectually, Marlie had known Tyler was a good-looking guy, the All-American, touch-football-on-the-weekends type, but emotionally, he’d never pushed her buttons. She’d disconnected those buttons, anyway. Maybe forever. Life was much less stressful without those buttons connected.

But now, here he stood in all his rumpled, sexy glory, and right in the middle of her apologetic explanation, her buttons decided to reconnect themselves just in time for Tyler to lean on them.

Lust sucker-punched her.

Marlie needed a moment. Ty was like a brother—okay, never a brother. More like a cousin. Her gaze skipped over his face, gritted jaw, and the rise and fall of his chest. A really distant cousin. By marriage.

A muscle worked in the cheek unadorned by Axelle’s eye shadow.

Tyler Burton, the son of longtime friends of her parents, her reluctant playmate on several joint family summer vacations, the sulking teen from their last, shared camping trip—that Tyler Burton—had grown into a manly man. One might say he was a hunk. Tyler inhaled deeply, his chest rising impressively before he exhaled in a whoosh. And that person would be Marlie.

How convenient that he was temporarily living with her and how incredibly remiss of her not to have taken advantage of that fact sometime in the past eighteen months.

Whoa. Marlie beat the lust back into long-term storage and summoned the memory of the skinny, surly Ty of her youth. “Axelle,” she repeated to ground herself. Axelle, Ty’s current girlfriend. And her client. In fact, Axelle’s website was the one Marlie’d been working on this evening. She didn’t think they’d appreciate the irony. “Anyway, I forgot you and Axelle were here when I came upstairs, and then I remembered and—”

“Screamed.”

“It was more of a yelp.”

The muscle twitched again.

“I’m sorry! I closed my eyes, I swear.” Unfortunately not before the image of a shirtless Ty and, oh, this was not good, her shirtless client, was burned into her retinas.

“You spoiled the mood.” Tyler tucked in his shirt and buckled his belt.

Marlie thought he’d been overdressed for a casual dinner at home, but Axelle’s idea of casual was more upscale than hers. Probably a French thing. “You can get it back. I’ll stay in my office for the rest of the night, I promise. Look, I’m shutting the door.”

There was a rustling at the top of the stairs and Tyler glanced up before fixing Marlie with a look that told her their discussion wasn’t over. “I’m driving Axelle home now.”

Marlie went into her office and stayed there, anyway, but she could hear their voices murmuring. She couldn’t make out what they were saying, so she pressed her ear against the door.

“But she never goes anywhere!” she heard a frustrated Ty protest.

“No boyfriend?” Axelle asked. “Well, no, she wouldn’t I suppose.” And the door to the garage closed.

Ouch. Ouch not because Marlie was pining for a boyfriend—she wasn’t—but because in the nearly three years since Marlie had had a boyfriend—a fiancé, actually—she’d embraced a simpler style. Simple meaning Marlie no longer bothered with make-up, stuck her bushy, over-grown hair in a ponytail, and adopted yoga pants, a tank top, and flip-flops as her uniform. It wasn’t as though she spent her days in pajamas, she thought virtuously. But that was only because she slept in her clothes.

So what? It was an efficient, time-saving system and there was nobody around to see her, except Ty, who didn’t count. He wouldn’t have noticed anyway. But Axelle had noticed and that was the ouchy part. Axelle had forced Marlie to acknowledge that there was a difference between simple and unkempt.

The first time they’d met face-to-face, when Axelle had been bringing by the new menus for the downtown Houston restaurant she and her brother owned, Axelle’s gaze had swept over Marlie, and her expression had immediately changed to concern.

“You should have told me you were sick!” Axelle had made little French tsking sounds. “We won’t be using the new menus until next week, so updating the website can wait. Please. Return to bed. Get well.”

“Okay” was all Marlie had been able to manage as Axelle had quickly backed out the door.

Marlie hadn’t been sick. Or in bed.

After hurrying across the hall to the powder room beneath the stairs and really studying herself in the mirror for the first time in months, Marlie couldn’t justify feeling insulted. Especially when Axelle returned later with leftovers from the restaurant, including veggies swimming in the most intensely flavored broth Marlie had ever tasted.

Axelle was explaining that her brother, the chef, had made it especially for Marlie when Tyler, who’d been lured downstairs by the smell of the food, appeared in the doorway.

At the sight of Marlie’s housemate, Axelle had beamed a smile so bright it had dazzled Ty, who’d remained dazzled and smitten to the point of goofiness ever since.

Marlie was going to have to make this up to him somehow.

She stood by her office door several more minutes, just in case Ty and Axelle fell into a passionate clinch on the doorstep and needed the sofa again. Yeah. “Need the sofa” was going to be their new code for alone time. “Alone time” being code for doing the horizontal mambo. Which was—

The garage door opener cranked and a few moments later, Tyler’s car engine started, interrupting Marlie’s mental avoidance of the word sex.

Ty’s car zoomed away. The garage door closed with a final “thunk” leaving Marlie in silence. It was weird because even though she hadn’t heard them upstairs, the place seemed overly quiet now.

Marlie folded back the double doors of her office and took the three steps across the entryway that brought her to the foot of the stairs leading to the living area. She gazed up at the sound-absorbing carpet that had been her undoing. Ty and Axelle hadn’t heard her approach and she’d been too preoccupied to notice the soft jazz playing.

Ty had wanted privacy for tonight—a perfectly reasonable request. Marlie climbed the stairs. The first time he’d brought a date home, Marlie had gone to a movie, but wasn’t away long enough. The next time, she’d taken her old laptop, which she kept on hand for computer-crash emergencies, and hung out in her car in the garage. She’d enjoyed surfing the internet and posting on discussion boards. Unfortunately, she’d fallen asleep in her car and Ty had discovered her the next morning. He got points for being horrified even though she hadn’t minded. Sure, she owned the townhouse, but he lived there, too, and was entitled to time alone. It wasn’t his fault that she didn’t have anywhere to go.

Reaching the top of the stairs, Marlie saw the remains of Ty’s dinner for Axelle—bouillabaisse, bread and salad. She fixed her eyes straight ahead to avoid looking at the sofa, and made a beeline for the kitchen. Maybe there was still some soupy goodness in the pot on the stove. She lifted the lid. Score! Not only that, but a pastry box from Axelle’s restaurant sat on the counter. Inside, Marlie saw two black and white wedges, their tops decorated with chocolate scrolls twining around one perfect raspberry. Ty and Axelle hadn’t gotten around to dessert. Regretfully, Marlie closed the box and scooped a bowl of tepid soup, which she zapped in the microwave. Doing so toughened the chunks of seafood, but Ty wasn’t here to protest that she was ruining his one and only impress-the-date specialty.

No, he wasn’t here. She might have a problem. Marlie leaned against the counter and ate, all the while wondering if Ty was angry enough to move out. He would eventually, but construction on the townhouse he’d bought had been delayed because the developer had run into permit issues with the city. Marlie sent up a silent cheer for government bureaucracy and the extra time it gave her to build a financial cushion. If the delay was long enough, Ty would be the last renter she’d be forced to have in order to afford her mortgage.

He was a really excellent roommate. Because their parents were longtime friends, she knew his background, a major plus. And until a few months ago, he traveled so often for his job with an oil company that he wasn’t around much.

Marlie tore off a hunk of bread and sopped the last of the bouillabaisse from the bowl. Yeah, the situation with Ty was as good as she’d ever find and she’d blown it because she’d been distracted.

He was really hung up on Axelle, who was the anti-Marlie. Axelle was French, for one thing, which gave her a sophistication Marlie could never equal, even when she was on her game. Axelle was also one of those women who always looked put together. Marlie suspected it was genetically impossible for her to look sloppy.

A little broth dribbled down Marlie’s chin and onto her tank top. She set the bowl in the sink and dabbed at her chest with a paper towel. Perfect example. This would never happen to Axelle.

Tyler always went for the polished types. She guessed that he’d be shocked at the hours and expense Axelle invested in her ever-glossy appearance. It took time and money to keep up with manicures and facials and highlights and who-knows-what skin treatments and fitness classes. Axelle made an effort. Marlie didn’t. Simple as that.

As she dropped the wadded paper towel into the trash can beneath the sink, Axelle’s pastry box called to her. Technically, what was in the box was doing the calling. Marlie eyed it before surrendering and lifting the lid. Chocolate fumes made her momentarily light-headed. She couldn’t simply help herself, although she really wanted to. On the other hand, it wasn’t as though Tyler would eat both pieces.

Axelle probably wouldn’t have eaten a piece. No elastic-waisted pants for her. She was the glamorously chic hostess of Ravigote, the restaurant she owned with her brother. She handled the business side as well, and Marlie knew for a fact that Axelle worked as many hours a day as she did. So, no, Marlie was not in any way jealous of Axelle.

Except for having unlimited access to fabulous desserts and clearly being able to resist their siren song. But that’s what elastic was for, right?

Maybe she could cut a little from each wedge. Just a taste. While they were fresh. Choosing a long, sharp knife—one of the set Axelle had given Ty—Marlie carefully sliced a sliver from the side of one of the pieces. At least she thought she was carefully slicing, but the dessert had warmed, softening the cakey part, and the hard icing on top cracked when she pressed on it. The raspberry rolled down the side, leaving a pink trail. If the knife hadn’t left an impression, Marlie would have stuck the box into the fridge and pretended not to know anything had happened.

Fine. She’d just eat the whole thing and if Ty objected, or even noticed, she’d go buy him another piece. He probably wouldn’t be back tonight, anyway.

Taking a bite from the point of the wedge, Marlie closed her eyes in sugary, chocolatey, bliss. Fabulous. Ravigote, serving Texas-European fusion cuisine—Marlie had made up that term—was out of her price range, so she enjoyed the samples that came her way now that Ty was dating Axelle.

The dessert was so rich that Marlie felt a little sick after eating it. “And that’s what they call ‘just desserts,’” she said aloud and laughed.

Oh. She looked down at her chocolatey fingers. “I’m telling myself jokes. Not a good development.”

After putting the pastry box into the fridge, Marlie loaded the dishwasher and wiped the counter. She knew Ty would have, but it was her fault he wasn’t here to do it.

She’d finished and had just clicked off the kitchen light when she heard the back door open and close. She hadn’t locked it. Adrenaline shot through her. The clock glowing on the microwave display told her it had been less than half an hour since Ty had left. He couldn’t be back already. He wouldn’t have had time to do more than drop off Axelle and return. Barely enough time for a good-night kiss.

She hadn’t heard his car enter the garage, but maybe it was because the water had been running in the kitchen sink. The living area’s mood lighting stretched into the darkened kitchen. Stepping into a shadow, Marlie clutched the dish towel and had two thoughts at the same time: as a weapon, the towel wasn’t going to do a whole lot, and the footsteps were climbing the stairs two at a time the way Ty always did. Usually when he came home, Marlie was working downstairs and heard them receding; it was odd hearing them coming toward her. Still, she exhaled in relief as his head became visible through the slats in the banister.

“Hey,” he said when he saw her.

“Hey,” she said back. Ooo, yeah. He was still angry, but he was trying to hide it from her as he walked toward the kitchen bar.

Dropping his keys in the ugly ceramic dish Marlie had made during a joint family vacation many summers ago, he nodded toward the empty dining table as he took off his jacket. “You didn’t have to clean up.”

“I know.” Marlie folded the dishtowel over the rack. “But I figured I owed you and I had no idea when you’d be back.” Or if you’d be back.

“It’s not like I could stay over there.” Ty’s profile was to her as he looked across at the sofa. He still had eye shadow on his cheek.

Nope. Not gonna look at the sofa. “Because…?”

“Because she lives with her brother.”

“I didn’t know that. Since when?”

“Since the week we met.” Ty draped his jacket over a chair. “Business is down and since Paul lives in a loft across the street from the restaurant, it made sense for Axelle to move in and take a smaller salary until things turn around.”

“Very practical.” If there was anything Marlie understood, it was needing a roommate to share expenses.

“And, look, I know we’re all adults, but sound really carries in a loft and we’re talking about the guy’s sister—”

“Okay! Got it!” Marlie smiled brightly as Ty gave her a strange look. “I promise you that we can work this out. Just let me know when and I’ll…I’ll go stay in a motel somewhere.”

Ty shook his head and walked past her to open the fridge. “You don’t have to do that.” The light illuminated his face as he stared inside.

Don’t take out the box. Don’t take out the box.

Thankfully, he grabbed a beer, twisted off the cap and took a long swallow, drawing Marlie’s attention to his throat.

How many times had she seen him do just that? Not specifically drink a beer, but a bottle of water or an energy drink or some other liquid? He’d open the container and immediately take his first swallow standing by the refrigerator while the door closed. Had she ever noticed his neck before? No. Why would she notice Tyler Burton’s manly neck, for pity’s sake? Why was she noticing it now?

He lowered the bottle and gave her a long look. Marlie braced herself for the announcement that he was moving out. Since she’d hung up the towel, she didn’t have anything to do with her hands, so she crossed her arms.

Tyler walked toward her, looking very predatory.

Marlie’s heart thumped even harder than when she’d heard the door earlier and thought someone was breaking in. Except this wasn’t fear; it was anticipation. But what exactly was she anticipating?

Tyler moved across the room as though in slow motion, his blue eyes steady, his cheek bones sculpted—but not in a modelly way, in a manly way. He didn’t smile. His lips looked fuller when they weren’t stretched in a smile. Very kissable lips, as a matter of fact. Nice and smooth. Maybe he used ChapStick to keep them in peak kissable condition.

Marlie might have some ChapStick around somewhere. It wouldn’t hurt her to swipe it over her mouth every so often, if she happened to remember. Not as if she was going to get kissed any time soon, she thought, staring at the mark on his cheek. And then it sure wasn’t going to be by somebody who was wearing more eye shadow than she was.

Without breaking eye contact, Ty stopped in front of her, not exactly in her personal space, but definitely close enough to smell the chocolate on her breath.

His eyes narrowed slightly as he tilted the beer bottle and took another long swallow.

Oh, he was getting ready to say something Marlie didn’t want to hear. In fact, he was probably thinking about how to break the bad news to her. Marlie clamped her lips together because she refused to beg. And because maybe then he wouldn’t smell the chocolate.



TYLER LOOKED DOWN AT the woman who’d been sabotaging his love life since the summer between fourth and fifth grade.

He vividly remembered that summer. Their families had rented cabins in Colorado and enrolled Ty and Marlie in soccer camp. Marlie, being two years younger, practiced with the seven and eight year olds, while Ty was with the nine-tens, including dark-haired, dark-eyed, long-legged Blanca with the wicked kick. Blanca fascinated him—specifically her hair which blew all around, yet always fell smooth and gleaming back into place. And after practice, did Ty get to go with Blanca and the rest of the team and hang around the pool? No. Ty had to go over to the next field to collect little red-faced, sweaty Marlie with her bushy ponytail and walk her back to their cabin. Blanca never sweated.

Blanca could have been his first girlfriend. Could have, but wasn’t, not with Marlie tagging along with him everywhere.

And every other year or so, his summer was interrupted by a trip with Marlie’s family where he ended up responsible for her. Forget any possible summer romance. Even worse, while he was away, any girl he liked back home would find someone else to hang around.

The only good thing was that Marlie never got a crush on him, so they got along okay. And there was the one good summer, when he got his driver’s license and they met the twins—a girl for him and a boy for Marlie, so she had somebody else to follow around. That was the only time he ever actually enjoyed one of the vacations.

A boy for Marlie. Somebody else to follow around.

Hmm. Maybe grown-up Marlie needed a boyfriend to follow around.

Ty studied her as he tilted the beer back. She wasn’t his type, but she’d been engaged, so she was somebody’s type. Or she had been. Her hair was still bushy—it kind of went with the eyebrows—but her face was pale and bland. Her eyes were wide as she watched him, arms hugging her torso, her hands disappearing into the sleeves of a gray hoodie she wore with baggy pants. She always wore a gray hoodie and baggy pants.

Depressed. The thought came to him and he wondered why he hadn’t seen it before. She spent hours in her office dungeon staring at a computer screen. It was enough to make anybody depressed.

“You need to get out more,” he told her.

She blinked and visibly relaxed.

What? Had she thought he was going to hit her or something? When had he ever threatened her? Sure, he’d been mad earlier, but that was mostly frustration and he was over it. Or as much as he would ever be over it.

“I know,” she said. “And I’ve already promised you that next time, I’ll find—”

“I meant, for you. You look like a mole.”

Another blink. “I get out. What do you call running with you every morning?”

“We’re running together?”

He raised his eyebrows and she held up her hands. “Okay, we leave at the same time. Give me a break. I’m still increasing my endurance.”

“You need light, Mole Girl. It’s dark outside then.”

“That’s because it’s December.”

And that was another thing. “Is it?” Ty looked all around. “Where?”

“What do you mean, where?”

“I couldn’t help noticing the lack of holiday spirit around here.”

When she gazed at him warily, he gestured with the bottle. “Over there is a two-story bay window with nothing in front of it.”

“I like the uncluttered look.”

“You can be uncluttered for the other eleven months of the year, but that spot is begging for a tree. Where’s your tree?”

“Still growing, I guess.”

“Same as last year?”

“Trees take a long time to grow.”

Yeah, she was depressed all right. He should have noticed before now. “Why don’t you decorate?”

“Because then I’d have to undecorate.” She spoke with exaggerated patience.

“Well, yeah.”

She stared at him, one of those I’m-dealing-with-a-crazy-person stares. “What kind of look is that?” he asked her. “It’s a reasonable question.”

“We both went home for Christmas last year,” she reminded him. “Putting up a tree would have been a waste of time.”

“We’re not going anywhere this year. Our parents are doing that Christmas and New Year’s cruise.”

“So?”

Ty opened his mouth, but when he couldn’t think of anything to say, he took another sip of beer.

Marlie’s face suddenly cleared. “I get it. You and Axelle want to decorate for Christmas.” She flapped a long sleeve at him. “Please. Go ahead. Knock yourselves out.”

Ty hadn’t thought of it, but a decorating date wasn’t a bad idea. Hot cocoa with a shot of Kahlua, sugar cookies, the air conditioning set on low so there could be a fire in the fireplace, jazzy Christmas music playing, maybe those cinnamony candles burning, all the good feelings associated with the holidays… Ty was so caught up in the idea, he almost didn’t notice that Marlie had turned away and was headed upstairs to her bedroom.

“Hey.”

She stopped and looked down at him, no curiosity in her eyes. Not much of anything, actually. But then, he hadn’t spent a lot of time looking at Marlie Waters. When they were younger, he’d never paid attention because he was usually irritated.

For the first time, he considered that she was probably equally annoyed to have been dumped on him during their summer trips. Kind of like the way he’d been dumped on her the past few months.

There was a thought he hadn’t expected. This was her house after all; although it was so easy living here he tended to forget. Their moms had cooked up this scheme when he’d been transferred to Houston. At first, Ty had only contacted Marlie to be able to say he had, but once he’d seen all this empty space and she seemed okay with him staying here…but had she been? Okay with it? Had her mom pressured her? Was having him living here making her depressed?

As he looked up at her, he tried to remember if her expression had always been carefully blank and he was only noticing now because of the new vantage point, or if he should get her into therapy ASAP and find some place else to live.

She was waiting for him to say something.

“I appreciate you letting me stay here. I know it’s been a lot longer than we thought it was going to be.” He watched for a reaction, a clue to her thoughts.

“It’s not a problem.”

Nothing. “Yeah, but you can’t buy your own furniture when I’ve got mine taking up all the room.” He nodded toward the living area. His stuff looked great in there, but it was guy stuff—an overscale chocolate-brown sofa, a massive coffee table he liked to put his feet on, and the flat screen TV mounted on the wall. You could barely see Marlie’s glass dining table and she’d moved her loveseat downstairs to her office. “If you want me to put it in storage, say the word.”

“It’s fine,” she said with a hint of emotion. “Furniture shopping isn’t in the budget, which is why if you weren’t paying rent, I’d have to find someone else.” She took a step and then added, “But don’t feel obligated to stay here if it’s not working for you.”

She seemed sincere. “I want to stay here,” Ty assured her. “It’s a great location. Better than my house, assuming it ever gets finished.”

“That’s why I picked this place.” She gazed into the distance. “How could I pass up a revitalized neighborhood in the heart of the city with a chance to build a brand-new home just the way I wanted?” Marlie looked around. “And now I have my dream house. I chose every fixture, the colors, the floors, the crown molding, the upgraded granite counter tops, the marble around the fireplace, the appliances, the vanities and tile and the rain head in the shower.” Marlie’s voice grew louder. “I looked at over a thousand door pulls to find just the right ones.”

“And they’re perfect.” He’d never noticed them. Who paid attention to hardware?

She gripped the banister. “You see this maple? I chose this.” She slowly caressed it.

“Gorgeous.” Why hadn’t he let her walk upstairs?

Marlie nodded dreamily. “The builder thought I wouldn’t notice when he substituted oak, but I did and I made him redo our railings.” She blinked and froze. “My railings,” she corrected in a quieter voice. “My. Railings.”

Oh, no. The broken engagement. No, no, no. Not going there. They’d never discussed it and there was no need to bring it up. If he did, he was in for tears and sobbing and wailing and who knows what hysteria.

Marlie’s face had gone even paler and she seemed to shrink.

Say good-night he told himself. Escape now.

She white-knuckled her precious maple banister.

Ty groaned inwardly. What the heck, the night was already shot. He might as well man up and let her sob on his shoulder for a few minutes. “Marlie, my mom told me you’d been engaged, but she didn’t know what happened.”

“That’s because my mother doesn’t know what happened, so she couldn’t tell yours.” Her lip trembled. “I don’t even know what happened.”

And then, of course, she proceeded to tell him what happened.




2


“ONE MINUTE, I WAS WAITING for Eric in the reception area at the title company so we could close on the townhouse and the next, he got off the elevator and told me he can’t do this.”

Eric would be the ex, Ty surmised.

“I thought he meant he didn’t have time right then because something…”

This was going to take more than a few minutes.

“…could have called me on my cell…”

Ty jiggled his beer bottle. Empty.

“…and he said ‘any of this.’ The house. The job. The wedding. It was too much. He felt pressured. How could he feel pressured?” She poked at her chest. “I was the one who ran around taking care of all the details. I met with the builder, I planned the wedding, I arranged for the movers. I even packed. All he had to do was show up!”

“Maybe that was the problem.” Ty made the mistake of saying.

Marlie’s eyes went huge.

He tried to explain, also a mistake. “Maybe he felt left out. Maybe he wanted to be more involved.” Even as he spoke, Ty knew he was saying the wrong thing. Besides, what guy wanted to be more involved in wedding plans?

Marlie’s response was to run up the stairs.

“Marlie!”

Hell. But only the first level. It was going to get worse. If she hadn’t told her own mother the details of Eric bailing out on her, that meant she probably hadn’t told anybody. She’d kept everything bottled inside for what? A couple of years? Tonight would be her first venting. It was going to be epic. He was looking at the fourth or even fifth level of hell for sure.

Ty set his empty bottle on the kitchen bar and followed Marlie upstairs all the way into her bedroom. He was going to drag the story out of her if it took all night. Then he’d have the fun of convincing her that It Was Over and time to move on with her life. If all went well, Marlie’d find another guy and hang around with him, and then Ty could finally, finally spend quality time with Axelle.

“Marlie—” And he broke off.

He’d never been in her bedroom. His room was down the hall to the left and there was no reason for him to go to her end. There was an unspoken understanding that they stayed out of each others’ bedrooms, and the most he’d seen of hers was a chair by the window if she’d left her door open.

So that was why he was hit with the full force of the bed. At first, he didn’t even realize it was her bed. The mattress was entirely enclosed in a ceiling-high, open-sided white box with a charcoal-gray interior and rounded corners. He moved closer and saw task lights, speakers and a control panel in the padded headboard. It extended upward to form a solid canopy housing a projector, and continued in one piece all the way down past the foot of the bed to the floor. The interior of the footboard was a screen that stretched the width of the bed.

He’d gone slack-jawed. “That’s…is that…?”

“The European media bed that was in all the magazines? Not exactly.” Marlie came to stand beside him. “I couldn’t afford the real thing, so I had this one made.”

Ty glanced at her. She sounded better. Calmer. His interest in the bed seemed a good distraction for the moment, so he checked out the upholstered interior and the headboard controls. “You designed this?”

“Not by myself. I talked to the carpenters who built the house and showed them pictures. I ended up bartering a website for the bed frame. And then the electrician got involved and he knew a man who installed sound systems and so on. It was a collaborative effort.”

“Wow.” Every guy’s fantasy bed. Ty had lived here a year and a half and had no idea something like this existed down the hall. Even more intriguing, he’d lived a year and a half with a woman who not only allowed the thing in her bedroom, she figured out a way to make it happen. He would never have picked Marlie for the type to have a techno bed. As far as he knew, she spent most of her time in her office, anyway. “Just wow,” he said, thinking Marlie had become a lot more interesting and that her ex was an idiot.

“The bed adjusts for when you want to watch the screen.” Marlie pressed a button on the control pad in the headboard and elevated the side nearest him.

“Each side has its own controls?” Did his voice actually crack?

She nodded. “Go ahead. Try it.”

Ty ignored the fact that he was climbing into Marlie’s bed and stretched out. His feet weren’t anywhere near the end of the mattress, which meant it was a custom size. “It’s comfortable,” he said, thinking of all the things he’d like to do in this bed.

“That’s the idea.”

“You’d think. But I’ve run across a lot of great-looking, uncomfortable furniture.” Ty ran his hands along the side of the mattress. “Good thing you didn’t skimp on the quality. This mattress has probably had quite a workout.” That didn’t sound right. “From watching movies and…stuff.”

Marlie’s eyes met his in one of her bland looks before she picked up a remote control. Curtains whirred across the sides, blocking the light, leaving Ty cocooned in total darkness. A moment later an ocean scene appeared on the screen.

The camera had filmed from a vantage point on the bow of a sailing ship. He heard the waves, the sails flapping in the wind, ropes creaking. Surround sound. Unbelievable. Ty half expected mist to shoot from the canopy ceiling to complete the experience.

What an escape. Imagine coming home to this bed after work. It would be like going on vacation every night.

Relaxing, he stared at the screen as the view bobbed up and down. Up and down. Up and—“Marlie?”

He heard laughter and the image disappeared.

“Getting seasick?” The curtains drew back and Marlie grinned down at him, taking him back in time.

Today we get to go on a hike! Mom packed our lunches—peanut butter, the smooth kind. Come on! Get out of bed, Ty! If we’re late, they’ll leave without us.

And he’d said, I don’t want to go on a stupid hike, even though he did, and I hate peanut butter, even though he didn’t.

Marlie had stopped grinning then, which was what he’d wanted. Why should she be happy if he wasn’t?

He didn’t want that now. A smiling Marlie was better than a crying Marlie. Smiling looked good on her, gave her a friendly, comfortable vibe. If she smiled more often, it wouldn’t take long for her to find another guy. “This is a seriously awesome bed,” he complimented her. “I don’t know why you’d ever leave.”

“Food?”

“Have it delivered.”

“Uh, the thing that happens after you eat food?”

Ty leaned over the side and checked the height of platform. “There’s room for a bedpan under here.”

“You’re talking about a chamber pot, but still ewww.”

He noticed something else while he was leaning over. “No way.” Pressing on a panel, he released the latch and opened the door of a small refrigerator. At the moment, it held a single bottle of no-name water and a lot of potential. He looked up at Marlie. “You are a goddess. Men everywhere should fall to their knees and worship you.”

Ty expected her grin to widen, not fade. “What?”

“This bed was my wedding gift to Eric,” she said, her voice flat.

Eric seriously annoyed him. “What was he, nuts? This is the greatest bed in the history of beds. How could he leave this bed?” Too late, Tyler realized how that sounded. “You. I meant how could he leave you.”

Her expression didn’t change. She wasn’t buying it. He wouldn’t have, either. “Because…any woman who’d give a guy a bed like this…shouldn’t be left.” Seriously? That the best he could do?

“He never saw it.”

“Well, there you go. If he’d—” A beat passed. “What I meant—”

“Are you trying to make me feel better, Ty?”

“Yes. But I am doing a crappy job of it.”

“You are doing a spectacularly bad job of it, and yet you keep hanging in there.”

“I should stop.”

“No.” She sat at the foot of the bed by the screen. “I find it oddly endearing.”

She might as well have patted him on the head. “As long as it keeps you from going over the edge.”

“I’m not near an edge,” she said, sounding edgy.

“Are you kidding? You’re sitting on it with your feet dangling over the side.”

“You think I’m still hung up on Eric?” She rolled her eyes. “Oh, please.”

“Then ditch the drama and finish telling me what happened.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to know.”

“No, you don’t.”

Did he truly want to know what caused Marlie’s broken engagement? Marlie was a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of person. Not glamorous, but solid and reliable. A team player, not a diva. She had “wife” written all over her. A man didn’t mess around with a woman like Marlie.

He studied her familiar, bare face and those eyes that met his with disconcerting directness. He could never lie to those eyes. No matter what he said or how he acted, those eyes saw the truth. Except, apparently, where her ex was concerned.

So, yeah. He wanted to know what happened. “Given our past, I can see why you’d think I wouldn’t care. I didn’t figure it was any of my business. But now, I’m making it my business.”

She didn’t say anything, but some of the hurt left her expression.

“I want to find out what he did to turn you into a hermit who never goes anywhere and doesn’t have any friends.”

“I have friends,” she protested.

“Your online buddies don’t count. I’m talking about living, breathing friends you see in person.”

“They’re back in Seattle where I left them when I quit my job and followed Eric here to Houston!”

A little temper there. “Make new friends.” Anger was encouraging. Wasn’t it one of the stages of grief? He was fuzzy on the order.

She glared at him. “This is about you getting the place to yourself so you can sleep with Axelle, isn’t it?”

Busted. “That’s blunt.”

“But I’m right.”

“If helping you get out of your rut benefits me, I’m not going to complain.”

She smirked. “That’s the Ty I know.”

“Following a guy around—that’s the Marlie I know.” He sucked air between his teeth. “Ignore what I just said.”

She didn’t. “We were engaged.”

“I was out of line. I apologize.”

“Our parents made me stick with you!”

“I know. I’m sorry for the crack. Can we get past it?”

She gave him a sulky look. “You’re not endearing anymore.”

“Endearing’s not my style. Fixing things is my style. C’mon, let’s get this over with. Spill.”

“You are really bad at sympathy.”

“Do you want me to make a lot of ‘oh, I’m so sorry’ and ‘poor little Marlie’ noises, or do you want a guy’s perspective on what was going through your ex’s head?” Ty already had a solid theory. Two theories, but he hoped he was wrong about the second.

“I don’t care what he was thinking,” Marlie said. “I want to know what happened between kissing me goodbye that morning and walking out of my life at noon.”

Ty had theories about that, too. “Did you ask him?”

“I was so shocked, I don’t remember saying anything.” Marlie drew her feet onto the bed. “The bed was a surprise.” She gazed around the interior. “I’d arranged for the carpenters to install it while we were at the closing. Then afterwards, we were supposed to come here and christen it.”

An image of Marlie and the unknown Eric flashed in Ty’s head and his mind rebelled. “Too much information.”

She tilted her chin. “And your love life with Axelle isn’t?”

“Point taken.” He gestured. “Go on.”

“I only told you so you’d understand that I was completely blindsided. He’d never complained or expressed any doubts. About anything. When Eric left for work that morning, everything was fine. Then he got off the elevator at lunchtime and gave his ‘I can’t do this’ speech. He told me he felt tied down. He didn’t like his job and he didn’t like Houston, and apparently he didn’t like me, either.”

“He said that?”

Marlie gave him a look. “He called off the wedding. It’s implied.”

“Did he ask for the ring back?”

Marlie shook her head.

“So he didn’t leave you for another woman,” Ty said, glad that theory was toast.

“How do you know?”

“He would have wanted the ring so he could reset the stone or trade it in.” At least Ty hoped Marlie had the sense not to hook up with a guy who was the type to give the same ring to another woman.

“Oh.” She thought for a moment. “Is that supposed to make me feel better about being dumped?”

“It makes me feel better,” Ty said. “Now I know we’re only dealing with rejection and not betrayal.” Betrayal was messier. Lots of crying and runny noses with betrayal. “If there had been another woman, you would have found a way to make the breakup all your fault. You would have blamed yourself for not being pretty enough or thin enough or whatever enough. Then you would have tried to fix yourself and punished the next guy you dated for being attracted to the ‘new you’ because he’s supposed to be able to see past the ‘new you’ to the ‘real you’ hidden inside. But he doesn’t know that. So you accuse him of being shallow. And then you break up with him—but not until he’s wined you and dined you and paid for a couple of pricey bed-and-breakfast weekends.”



“NOT THAT YOU’RE BITTER.”

Ty so clearly spoke from experience that Marlie wanted to laugh. She actually felt like laughing. Maybe she would. “I hope she was good in bed, at least.”

He met her eyes before giving her a rueful look. “She was okay. Tried too hard.”

“Poor you.” She snickered. It felt good. For the first time, Marlie experienced something other than bewildered hurt and anger when she thought about the horrible day Eric left. And who would have thought she’d be confiding in Ty, of all people?

Astoundingly, he seemed to care. Sure, it was self-serving, but it was genuine caring. And the clunky way he tromped all over her feelings might be just what she needed. She wasn’t ready to admit it, though. He was smug enough already.

“Go ahead and laugh,” he said. “But be glad you’re not That Woman. At least you know Eric’s issues had nothing to do with you.”

Did she know that?

Ty settled back into the bed. Marlie wondered what he’d say if she told him he was the first man to be in it. But she didn’t wonder enough to tell him.

“So he calls off the wedding and then what?” he prompted while he fiddled with the control panel, figuring out which buttons controlled the head elevation and the lights.

“He told me to keep his half of the down payment on the townhouse to cover the deposits I’d lose by canceling the wedding.” Marlie thought of what she went through and got mad all over again. “Like that even began to make up for it. We were within sixty days of the date. The invitations hadn’t been mailed, but they’d been printed. My dress had already been altered. The bridesmaids’ dresses couldn’t be returned and I couldn’t make my friends pay for those, so I reimbursed them. Everybody had bought their plane tickets—”

“Focus,” Ty cut her off. “What else did he say?”

“He just said ‘sorry’ and got back on the elevator.”

“I mean, later. After that.”

“There was no later,” Marlie told him. “I haven’t seen or talked to him since. No text, no email. Nothing.”

“That was it?” Ty stopped playing with the buttons and stared at her. “You’re kidding.”

“No,” she whispered, her throat tight. That was probably the most difficult aspect for her to accept—that Eric could walk away as though their life together had never existed.

“Jerk.” Ty looked outraged. “What about his stuff?”

She swallowed past the tightness. “The movers told me he packed his car. He knew I had a couple of appointments that morning before I was to meet him at the title company and he must have come back after I left.”

“So the coward planned it all in advance.” Ty was gratifyingly incensed on her behalf. It helped.

“I thought it was stress. I thought he was having a meltdown and he’d get over it in a few hours. I mean, it happens. Even I— Anyway, they called me in for the appointment and what was I supposed to do? We had to vacate the apartment. The movers were already loading the truck. I had nowhere else to go. This was supposed to be our home. So I bought it. I went in and signed the papers and I bought it. Not that moment, because the papers had to be redone, but I moved in and paid the bank rent for a few days.” Marlie breathed deeply, just as she had after walking into the room and indenturing herself to a mortgage.

“I would have done the same thing.” Ty leaned over the side of the bed. “I’m going to drink your water.” He opened the fridge, took the bottle she’d forgotten was in there, and twisted the cap.

Marlie smiled as he drank while the door clicked shut. He looked good in the bed. Very much at home. Nice broad shoulders, the kind she could rest her head on after he’d thrown an arm around her while they watched a movie.

Marlie thought all kinds of warm, fuzzy thoughts until the rational part of her pointed out that she was fantasizing about Tyler Burton.

It’s only because he’s here and he’s male, she told herself. You do not want Tyler Burton in particular; you want a man in general.

Ty lowered the bottle. “How long did it take you to figure out he wasn’t coming back?”

“A couple of days. He wouldn’t answer his cell phone and I had visions of him lying in the hospital in a coma. I went by his work and they told me that he’d quit to take a job overseas.” Yeah. His coworkers had to tell her. An echo of the humiliation she’d felt reverberated through her. “Overseas? Like any country would do as long as it was on a different continent than the one I was on?”

“Marlie.” Ty leveled a look at her. “Drama free.”

No coddling from Ty, which was probably the only reason she was able to get through her story without crying. “I just couldn’t believe it. He’d never said anything about wanting to live in another country. Why didn’t he ask me? I would have been up for it.”

“Do I really have to answer that?” Ty asked. “Do I really have to tell you it was because he didn’t want you to go with him?”

“That’s cold.”

“Marlie!” He looked pained. “This cannot be news to you. Forget about it. You went to his office—he wasn’t there, then what?”

Marlie skipped the part about crying for hours after discovering he’d put her name on the “block personal information” list at his new company. As if she was a stalker. “I called his mom, who, by the way, was under the impression that Eric had bought me this house as a lovely parting gift. I set her straight on that, as well as what it was going to cost to cancel the wedding.”

“Details I don’t need.”

Marlie exhaled in frustration before continuing, “She expressed her opinion. I expressed mine.”

Ty gave her a thumbs up.

“And she refused to tell me where he was. Not even what country he was in.”

“You’re not looking too good here,” Ty said.

Marlie’s jaw dropped. “I’m not?”

“You’re the one who fell in love with that turkey.”

“I didn’t know he was a turkey.”

“We’ll work on your turkey-detecting skills after I fix this problem,” he said.

“Other than a really large mortgage and a really small income, I don’t have a problem.”

“Yes, you do.” Ty sipped more water. “You’re not over him yet.”

“Oh, I’m over him. But I don’t know how I missed the signs that something was wrong.”

“Hey. Listen to me.” Ty leaned forward, holding her gaze intently. “There weren’t any signs. He made sure of it because he wanted out. Confronting you in public, breaking your heart, and taking away your dream home was calculated to make you hate him.”

Marlie believed him. She didn’t want to, but she knew Ty was giving her the unvarnished truth. “But why?” It was the question she’d asked herself way too many times. If Ty could answer it, he was a genius.

“Because then you wouldn’t want him back. No hoping you could ‘work things out.’ It would be a clean break and you both could move on. Like ripping off a bandage. It stings, but it doesn’t hurt for as long.”

“It was a lot more than a sting.”

“For you, yes. But he’d been planning his move for a while. He’d already checked out of the relationship. You don’t do what he did to somebody you love.”

Unvarnished truth hurt. “You’re saying he’d fallen out of love with me?”

Ty nodded.

“But he, but we still—”

“That would be him hiding the signs.”

“Did he have to hide them twice just the night before?”

“He was being thorough,” Ty said implacably.

Details from their last night together flooded her memory. “We talked about our future that night. We talked about having children.” Marlie swallowed. “I feel sick.”

“Now, if you had a bed pan in here, we’d be all set.”

She stared at Ty. “You are unbelievable. How can you say such a thing? He broke my heart and you act like it was nothing more than a broken date. Don’t you have any empathy at all?”

Ty offered her the water bottle.

“I don’t want any water!”

“Still feel sick?” He tilted the bottle to his mouth.

“I’m too mad at you to feel sick. Oh.” She watched him, or rather she watched his neck as he drained the water. “You made me angry on purpose. I suppose you think that was clever.”

“Yeah. I’m getting better at this.”

“You’re getting lucky.”

“That is not what I’m getting.”

“Aaaand we’re back to that.”

“I never left.”

As much as Marlie wanted to be mad at him, she wasn’t. Ty was blunt and sometimes annoyed with her, but he was here and he’d never lied to her.

Marlie suddenly looked back on all those summers in a different light. He’d hated having to be responsible for her and yet, not once had he failed to show up when he was supposed to. He hadn’t taken it out on her, either. Sure, he obviously resented babysitting her, but other than that, they were friends. Just not friends who liked each other. Ty was the kind of friend who told her the truth because she needed to hear it and he didn’t care how it made him look.

He screwed the top back on the empty bottle. “Okay, here’s what happened with Eric.”

Good, Marlie thought. Finally I’ll know.

“He took one of those overseas jobs for single guys.”

“Why do they have to be single?” Because women were involved? Marlie tried to imagine Eric as a sort of exotic male escort. No. Now Ty…

“It’s common in the oil business. Some countries don’t allow foreign women and children to live there, so companies recruit unmarried men. That way, they’re not separating families. It’s less complicated all around. The deal is you sign a contract for a year or two years, work twelve hour days and live in on-site corporate housing.”

“You’re saying he’d rather do that than marry me?”

“It’s the cash,” Ty said. “You make a pot full. I’ve seen these guys when they come back stateside after finishing a contract. They party hard and throw a lot of money around. They get the flashy cars and the flashy women and it looks pretty sweet, especially when you’re stuck in a cubicle earning a lot less and about to take on a wife and mortgage.”

“Eric proposed to me,” Marlie clarified. “He is the one who asked me to quit my job and move halfway across the country with him.”

Ty nodded to himself. “Now what he did really makes sense.”

“Not to me.”

“Say I’m Eric.” Ty paused. “Do I look like him?”

“You look exactly like him,” Marlie said, and then watched the emotions flicker across Ty’s face. She added a gooey look and saw the beginnings of panic. Good. He was entirely too smug. “Except that Eric’s hair is dark and curly. And his eyes are brown.” She touched her chin. “He had a beard thing here and he wore glasses. He might have been a little chunkier than you, not that he was out of shape, but he was buying the relaxed-fit Dockers, if you know what I mean. But you two could be twins. From different families.”

“You could have said no.”

“Where’s the fun in that?”

A slow smile slid across his face. “You’ll be okay.”

Marlie had not been the direct recipient of such a smile from Tyler. It warmed her middle and caused her heart to give a few syrupy thuds. Remember that he reconnected your buttons. Just don’t connect with him. She poked his foot with hers. “Keep channeling Eric.”

“Right. Eric.” Ty gazed up at the canopy. “So I’m Eric and these guys head out for drinks and whatever, but I can’t go because I have to taste wedding cake samples with Marlie and her mom and her girlfriends.”

“It was just me, you were late, and you’d been drinking beer, so none of the cakes tasted good to you.”

Ty looked at her. “For real?”

“Yes.”

“You were mad.”

“Well, yeah.” Eric had embarrassed her in front of the other couples who’d been there.

“When I told the guys, they gave me a hard time about being on a leash.”

“A leash?”

“Words to that effect.” Ty waved his hand. “There were more instances like that and I started thinking the ‘if onlys.’ If only I weren’t getting married. If only I could take a year or two and make some big bucks and buy the kind of car I really want, go where I want and do what I want. If only I didn’t have to follow Marlie around to caterers and florists and invitation makers—”

“I didn’t bother you with any of that. And I thought it would be fun to taste a bunch of cakes. You like cake.”

“Marlie, work with me.” Ty gave her an impatient look. “It’s not the details. I’m showing you his frame of mind and how he got there. While you were all involved with the wedding and the house, he was seeing a really great life pass him by. These guys had money and freedom and no responsibilities. What would he have? Kids and a giant mortgage.”

“He’d have me,” she said in a small voice.

“But you wouldn’t be you—you’d be a mother.”

“Of his children!”

Ty spread his hands. “I’m telling you the way a guy thinks.”

Truly, it was like watching a special feature on a DVD, the one where the director explained different scenes. “That’s the way all guys think?”

“Nah. Some guys are into it.”

“Is that the way you think?” It would explain why he never dated the PTA mom type.

Ty considered her question. “I’m in the middle—buying a house, but definitely not ready for a wife and kids.” He regarded her with a touch of sympathy. “He wasn’t ready, either, Marlie. You need to find a guy who’s ready.”

She’d thought she had. “Why didn’t he just tell me?”

“He felt guilty after dragging you halfway across the country.”

“I would have waited for him.”

“And he knew that.” Ty shook his head. “I hate to say it, but the guy actually did the decent thing. He just didn’t expect you to mope about it for so long.”

Men always stuck together in the end. “I’m not moping. I’m working.”

“Then you’re moping while you work.” He eyed her before swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “This is a great bed.” He leaned on his hands as he scanned the interior. “Too bad you have to get rid of it.”




3


“WHAT? WHY?” MARLIE asked.

Ty’s jaw hardened. “Because every time you come in here, you see it and think of your ex and what he did.”

And Marlie knew he was right.

“You don’t enjoy this bed. You hardly spend any time in here. Half the nights you fall asleep on the loveseat in your office.”

He knew? He would have had to come downstairs specifically to check on her. While she was sleeping. Her breath hitched. “I work late.”

“Because you’re avoiding the bed. You never would have chosen this bed for yourself and it will always remind you of a wedding that didn’t happen. Stop punishing yourself for something that wasn’t your fault and ditch the bed.”

“I can’t afford to.”

“Sell it,” Ty said, and Marlie knew he wasn’t going to let up until she agreed. “You know you could in about thirty seconds. Sell it to me. I’ll give you whatever it cost you. There. Done. Problem solved.” He looked pleased with himself.

Except… “It won’t fit in your room.”

“It’ll fit in my new house.”

“Which isn’t finished,” she reminded him.

“It’s getting there,” he said. “I meant to tell you, the city inspectors signed off on the new street plans and the council approved them this week. I drove by and crews are already replacing sewer pipes and widening the roads. The builder says once that’s finished, it’ll only be six weeks until I can move in.”

Sooner than she’d thought. But the road wasn’t finished yet. Besides, it was December and construction always slowed down in December. “So until then, your plan is to leave the bed here?”

Ty stared longingly at the screen behind Marlie. “I’ll put it in storage.”

That could work, but Marlie didn’t know if she was ready to handle the thought of Axelle and Ty having sex in her wedding present to Eric. “Actually, the carpenters have dibs if I sell it.”

“There’s no ‘if.’ You’re going to sell it.”

Ty was right. Somebody should have sex in her wedding present to Eric. “I’ll check to see if they’re still interested.”

“Do it.” Ty exhaled heavily. “But I wish you’d told me before I bonded with the bed. I had great things planned for this bed.”

“So did I.”

They sat in silence. Marlie thought about how long it had been since she’d had great things, and then she thought about Ty and his plans for the bed. He was probably great at things, and she already knew the bed was great, so naturally she wondered about great things with Ty in the bed, but Eric kept creeping into her thoughts. Marlie realized it would be impossible for her to have great things in this bed. Ever.

“I’m calling the carpenters tomorrow,” she said at the same time Ty said, “I can’t buy your bed.”

“I thought you wanted it,” she said.

He looked at her accusingly. “I know the story. That means every time I’m in this bed, I’ll think of you. It would be distracting at certain crucial times.”

“Sorry.” But she really wasn’t.

He exhaled. “If the carpenters want it, tell them to haul it off right away. As soon as the check clears, go bed shopping. You need a bed that’s you.” He ran his hand over the frame. “This was never you.”

How did he know that? “What kind of bed do you think is me?”

“Unbleached cotton, a thick comforter, squashy pillows,” he said immediately. “Beach colors. No patterns because you want to rest your eyes. Maybe a four poster, but nothing heavy. You need a bedside table with a soft light and a CD player where you can play New Age relaxation music.”

Marlie had expected him to say something like “blue” or “traditional.”

He was on a roll. “Get a good mattress that will support your back so it won’t get sore from sitting all day. No computer outlets. Maybe a TV across the room, but I’d say no. You need an electronic-free zone.”

“Okay,” Marlie said, dazzled with the details and amazed that he’d described her perfect bedroom before she even knew it was her perfect bedroom. Except for the New Age music.

He stood and looked around. “If you want to paint in here, I’ll help.”

“Okay,” she said again. He was being awfully nice. She tried not to be suspicious.

“It’s late.” He flexed his shoulders, drawing his shirt across his chest and she thought, his chest is nice, too. “Get some sleep.”

It will be a while, Marlie thought as she stood. “Thanks. And, again, I’m sorry about ruining your dinner.”

He looked down at her. “Want to make it up to me?”

“Yes,” she said before finding out what he had in mind.

“Get a Christmas tree.”

That was not what she hoped he had in mind. But he wouldn’t think that way about her. She wasn’t his type. And as soon as she tightened up her current date requirements to being beyond male and breathing, she’d remember he wasn’t her type, either.

“A tree is easy enough.” Marlie thought of the little pre-decorated table top trees. She could order one online.

“‘Easy’ means you’re thinking of some wimpy thing. I’m talking about a big tree for the front window.”

“Oh, come on.”

He headed for the door. “Those are my terms.” His terms? “Or what?”

He stopped at the doorway and grinned evilly. “Or I will call your mother and tell her I’m worried about you.” Marlie gasped.

“I’ll tell her all you do is work and the stress is getting to you.”

“Oh, that’s low, Ty.”

“And I’ll say that I suspect you’ve never gotten over your broken engagement and you’re depressed—which might be true.”

“It’s not true,” Marlie insisted.

“Convince me. Get a tree.”

“Okay! I’ll get a tree. Is pre-lit okay, or do you have rules about that, too?”

“Pre-lit?” Ty looked as though she’d suggested serving one of Santa’s reindeer for Christmas dinner. “You’re talking about an artificial tree?”

“Well, yeah.”

He stared at her.

“My house, my tree,” she said. “Do not call my mother.”

“Okay. I won’t call your mother. I’ll call my mother. All I have to say is that you’re not yourself and I’m concerned about what will happen when I’m not here to check on you.”

Marlie’s blood ran cold.

“And you know if your mom hears about it from my mom, it’ll be ten times worse.”

“It would be a thousand times worse.” Marlie had visions of her parents canceling their cruise and arriving on her doorstep. “You win. I’ll get a tree. A giant, needle-dropping, fire-hazard of a tree.”

Ty hadn’t said anything about ornaments.



THE NEXT DAY, MARLIE received flowers from Axelle. Before noon. Which meant Ty must have gone straight from blackmailing Marlie over the Christmas tree to discussing her with his girlfriend.

Good times.

Marlie held the heavy, square glass vase and searched her office for an empty flat surface. Eventually, she had to clear off the top of a file cabinet and set the exotically chic arrangement there, where she could see it while looking up the names of the flowers on Google. They were bright, beautiful and out of the ordinary. Like Axelle.

Not a carnation, rose or daisy in the bunch. Like Marlie. If she hadn’t gone to seed.

If anyone should have been sending flowers, it should have been Marlie, but now that Axelle had outclassed her, Marlie had no choice but to dig out her good stationery, ordered for her wedding thank-yous, and write a charming, lively note to Axelle.

Charming and lively did not come naturally to Marlie, so writing the note took some time. She was not helped by staring at her given name, Marlene, written across the top of the stationery. Her mother had insisted on it, just as she’d insisted that Marlene be on the wedding invitations. They’d never looked quite right to Marlie, as though it was someone else marrying Eric. And look how that turned out.

She had to access the U.S. Post Office website to find out what a first-class stamp cost these days, and then walk down to the mailbox cluster at the end of the block and drop it in the slot.

No wonder people emailed everything.



WHEN TYLER ARRIVED HOME that evening, the bed was leaving. He felt a pang, because it was a stupendous bed, but it came with baggage and Ty didn’t need baggage. To be honest, he was still a little freaked that he kept picturing Marlie when he thought of the bed. Adult Marlie was bad enough, but as he was mentally planning an evening with Axelle, the Marlie that had intruded was the eight-year-old Marlie. He couldn’t help it. Even now, when he thought of Marlie, her sweaty little red-cheeked face came to mind. It was the ponytail. Marlie may have changed, but the messy, bushy lump hadn’t. Ty just couldn’t have sex in a bed he associated with an eight-year-old.

Marlie had moved fast. Four men were dismantling the frame and carrying pieces downstairs to a pickup truck. Ty stepped aside as two of them passed him carrying the screen that had been at the foot of the bed.

He consoled himself with the thought that he would have replaced the projection system with a flat screen anyway. Newer technology.

Marlie was in her office—no surprise. Except that she seemed remarkably sanguine about getting rid of a bed she’d kept as a shrine to a failed romance.

Ty leaned against the doorway. Marlie wore headphones and didn’t see him at first. A bouquet of bright flowers partially obscured her from view. He waved a hand so the movement would attract her attention.

She saw him and removed the headphones as she raised her eyebrows. “What’s up?”

She looked the same as always, maybe faintly curious, since it wasn’t his habit to interrupt her when he came home. He seemed more affected by last night’s discussion than she was.

“The bed.” He hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “I guess the carpenters wanted it.”

“Yeah. They couldn’t get here fast enough. I don’t think they’ve decided who gets to take it home, though.”

“Did you go shopping for a new one?”

“I haven’t had time.” She indicated the arrangement of colorful exotic blooms that she’d set on a file cabinet. “Your girlfriend sent me flowers.”

Ty smiled. “She’s great like that.” Axelle’s impulsive generosity was one of the things that attracted him to her. It was also how she’d ended up in charge of the Midtown Business Mentors Charity Auction this Friday. And how he’d been corralled into helping. And how Marlie had ended up doing a website for them. It was difficult to say no to Axelle.

“I broke out my expensive wedding stationery and wrote her a thank-you note for the ‘day brightener.’” Marlie looked at him. “I wonder where she got the idea that I needed a ‘day brightener?’”

“You mind that I told her about your jerk of a fiancé?” he asked. “You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of.”

“I’m not ashamed, but it was almost three years ago,” Marlie said. “I’m more embarrassed about walking in on you last night and seeing Axelle half-naked.”

“You said your eyes were closed.”

“They were. After I saw you both.”

Ty drew a long breath. “I should have sent her flowers.”

“You’re in luck,” Marlie said. “As it happens, I’ve got some right here.”

“I’m not going to take your flowers.”

“Why not? I feel I owe her.”

“She’d rather have you do a little extra on the auction website.”

“It would be cheaper to send her flowers.” Marlie nodded toward the computer screen. “They’ve had twice as many donations as Axelle anticipated. Each one means I have to put up a picture and a description and a link to the company or person who donated it,” she told him. “I’m setting the whole thing up so I can stream the auction and take online bids Friday night. It’s taking a little more time than I’d estimated.”

Ty came over to look at the screen. “It’s for a good ca—what the heck is that?”

“That,” Marlie said, “is why I don’t mind the extra time.”

A shirtless man wearing suspenders and a fireman’s hat grinned at him from the monitor. “What’s he donating?”

“A date,” Marlie answered.

“Did he have to look like he was posing for a calendar?”

“Actually, he did. You’re looking at Mr. May.” She smiled. “And I’m sure the lucky winner hopes he will.”

Ty raised his eyebrows.

Marlie typed a caption to the picture and then read it aloud. “Oh, yeah. I’d like to see the partridge in his pear tree.”

“Uh, Marlie?”

“Hmm?” The picture on the screen changed and another man appeared. This one was wearing more clothes, but his smile promised he wouldn’t be wearing them long. Ty had a passing acquaintance with that smile and a guy shouldn’t ever be photographed smiling that smile.

“And you can coo in my ear anytime.” Marlie typed “Two Turtle Doves.”

“What are you doing?”

“This is the 12 Men of Christmas Dating Extravaganza.”

“Is it legal?”

Marlie laughed. “Axelle found twelve men to agree to take the winners or winner on a date inspired by verses from ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’ song.” She typed as she spoke.

“Axelle didn’t ask me,” Ty said, wondering how Axelle knew the men.

“Axelle doesn’t want to share you,” Marlie told him.

“Or she doesn’t think anyone would pay to go out with me.”

“More likely, she’s afraid you’ll embarrass the other guys by starting a bidding war.”

Ty liked the sound of that. It could happen. He envisioned hordes of women emptying their bank accounts and shouting bids faster than the auctioneer could keep up.

And then he noticed Marlie looking at him with her all-seeing gaze. He gestured with his chin toward the computer screen. “How high does Axelle think women will bid to go out with these men?”

“I have no idea,” Marlie told him. “But there’s a minimum bid of six hundred dollars.”

“Fifty bucks a date? What a deal. You can barely go to the movies and get popcorn, drinks and a pack of Junior Mints for fifty bucks.”

“I don’t fix the starting bids. I just put up the auction items. But I think the low minimum is because this is offered as an all or nothing package,” Marlie explained. “Axelle said some of the guys were afraid no one would bid on them. This was the only way they’d agree to participate. She’s encouraging women to form buying cartels and split up the guys among them.”

He nodded. “In case anyone is too shy to bid by herself. Good idea. So show me the men’s package.”

Marlie slowly turned her head and looked up at him.

“I meant,” Ty said, feeling irritated, “are there women for sale?”

“You meant that, did you?”

“Is there a women’s version of the dating dozen?” he asked heavily as Marlie continued typing, visibly fighting a grin.

“No—ooolala, Mr. Three French Hens. I wonder if French is his specialty.”

Ty looked at the screen. “That’s Axelle’s brother!”

“So that’s Paul.” Marlie propped her chin on her elbow as she zoomed in. “Mmm.” She traced his lips with the cursor and then zoomed in even more until just his mouth and square chin with the cleft filled the screen.

How did he shave that thing, anyway? Ty wondered. Judging by the dreamy expression on Marlie’s face, that was not what she was wondering. Sighing, she zoomed out. “I’m glad Axelle has no problem sharing him.”

Ty looked at her in concern. Now that he’d helped her get over Eric, she wasn’t going to go wild, was she? The idea was to find an area between nun and nymphomaniac.

The next photo popped up. “Four calling birds. Call me anytime.” Her voice dropped to a sexy purr.

“You do know it’s actually ‘colly’ birds.” Ty sounded uptight and condescending. He always sounded uptight and condescending when he was losing control of a situation. There is nothing here to control, he told himself.

“Why, Tyler.” Marlie looked up at him and mercifully away from the lumberjack Jo in his unbuttoned flannel shirt. “I do know that, but I’m amazed that you do.”

“I took chorus for my Fine Arts credit in college,” he said, condescendingly. Stop that.

Mr. Five Gold Rings appeared. “A gymnast?” The photo had been taken during a competition. The man’s arm muscles bulged as he suspended himself by the ring apparatus.

“Look at that form,” Marlie said with admiration. “And gymnasts are so flexible.”

Ty waited. “Aren’t you going to say ‘he can run rings around me’ or something like that?”

“I was thinking that if he’s that good with two rings, he’ll be spectacular with five. That’s golden.”

“What does that even mean?”

“Mmm.” Marlie smiled a little smile as she typed.

Ty felt out of his depth, a totally foreign feeling. Depth like this was supposed to be his specialty.

“This next guy is all about laying.”

Of course he was.

Marlie clicked the mouse to bring up the next photo. Sure enough, there was a guy holding a goose. Shirtless. The man, not the goose. Though technically, the goose was already shirtless. “Axelle found these guys?” Ty’s voice was pitched higher than normal.

“Yes. Isn’t it great?”

Ty deliberately relaxed his throat. “Couldn’t she have found anyone with a hobby requiring clothes?”

“You mean like a sports uniform?”

“Yes.” Ty thought about baseball. “Exactly.”

Marlie brought up the next picture. “Behold. Seven Swans a Swimming.” She glanced up with mock innocence. “Check out the uniforms.”

Speedos. Speedos worn by men with no body fat. Or modesty. “The entire swim team?”

“No,” Marlie said, her voice regretful. “Just him.” She cropped the other men out and enlarged the remaining swimmer, not that he needed enlarging, a point amply made by the skin-tight suit. “But he’s enough, don’t you think?”

“Yes. Plenty.” Which one of them had been afraid no one would bid on him? Sheesh. Ty didn’t lack for self-confidence, but these guys were enough to make him add another mile to his morning run.

“And he’s a breast stroke champion. I should put that in the caption.”

“Marlie.” Tyler began to sweat. He’d never seen this side of her. He didn’t know she had this side. She should keep this side to herself. He didn’t want to be responsible.

He wasn’t responsible, was he?

“What?”

Eight maids a milking was up next and Ty could only imagine. “How is it possible for you to make ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’ sound smutty?”

“Smutty?” Marlie looked the picture of offended virtue. “Tyler, these men are donating their time in an effort to raise money for a program that provides a positive activity for underprivileged youth when they’re most vulnerable to bad influences. What exactly do you find smutty about that?”

“I—”

“Furthermore, I’ve been posting all these auction items and I’ve yet to see what you’ve donated. Don’t you support the business mentors program?”

“I donated you,” he said.

Marlie blinked. “Excuse me?”

He gestured to the screen. “I suggested you for the website, since you do Axelle’s restaurant already.”

Marlie’s eyes narrowed. “You mean I do the work and you get the credit?”

How did he end up the bad guy, here? “I’m covering the expenses for the site and your fee after the discount.”

“Oh.” She looked back to the screen. “I’d like to tell you to forget about my fee, but I need the money.”

“No problem. You’ve put in a lot of hours and it wasn’t really your cause to begin with.” Or his, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t worthwhile. “You should find a cause. Volunteering would be a good way for you to interact with people.” And by people, he meant men. And by interact, he meant talking in a controlled setting that was not a bar.

“I’m volunteering right now.” Marlie had flipped into her photo editing program and was removing background clutter from the crop of the swimmer. “And I am so interacting.” She zoomed in on his head and removed the red rings his goggles had left around his eyes. “There. Not that anyone is going to be looking at his face.”

Ty hadn’t known Marlie was so visual. “I meant interacting in person.”

“I’m all for that.” She sighed at the picture.

“Then volunteer for something other than computer work,” Ty said. “Something that gets you out of the house.” He got an idea. “In fact, why don’t you come with Axelle and me to the auction on Friday? You’ll get a chance to see everything first hand.” And maybe Axelle could set her up with someone. Axelle knew everyone. Yeah, they could introduce Marlie to as many men as possible. One of them was bound to ask her out. Brilliant. Tyler Burton, you are brilliant.

Marlie’s ponytail brushed against his arm and he looked down. She had an appealing casual vibe, but maybe Axelle could give her some tips about her hair before Friday. Figure out a way to contain it. Maybe lend her some lip gloss.

“I can’t go,” Marlie said. “We’re streaming the auction live, remember? I have to monitor it from here.”

Too bad. He’d practically had her married off.

“I’ll get to see everything Friday afternoon when Randy and I set up the webcams.”

“Randy?”

“Computer geek.” Marlie clicked through to Nine Lords a Leaping.

A guy in a black Dominion of Zartha T-shirt posed against a stone wall, crossed arms displaying biceps not normally associated with computer geeks. At least he was clothed.

“He’ll have a laptop down front at the auction. Our computers will be networked so I can control the webcams from here and Randy will be able to relay the online bids to the auctioneer.”

“Axelle,” Ty supplied.

“She decided to do it herself?” Marlie made a sound. “I thought she was going to ask someone else.” Her eyes met his.

“Me?”

Marlie shrugged. “She wasn’t specific.”

Axelle had never come out and asked him. Had she expected Ty to offer to be the auctioneer? “I’ve never done anything like that before. This is a big deal. She should have gotten someone with experience.”

“Whatever.”

Did Axelle feel that he’d let her down? It was hard to figure out what she was thinking or wanted from him.

Marlie turned back to the computer. “By the way, she’s coming here to change clothes before the auction. It’ll save you a trip to pick her up.”

“Sounds good.” At least Axelle would be able to introduce Marlie around during the afternoon before people got dressed up. A casual setting was more Marlie’s style, anyway.

There was a knock on the door jamb and one of the carpenters stuck his head in. “We’ve got it all, Marlie. We patched the holes where the brackets held the frame to the wall. I’d give it a day to dry before you paint over it.”

“Okay.”

“And thanks again!”

She gave a distracted wave and he let himself out.




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