Wife on Approval Read online

Tricia chuckled and reached down to ruffle the child's dark hair. "How formal you are, my dear. But I'm sure we're going to be the greatest of friends."

  The child sidestepped the touch and moved away from the door and into the entry hall, where she paused, halfway out of her parka. She made Paige think of a ruby-throated hummingbird - delicate and dainty and full of motion even though at the moment she wasn't going anywhere.

  It took a moment before Paige realized what had stopped the child. Jennifer Weaver was staring at her. "Daddy," she said, without taking her gaze off Paige. "Who's that?"

  Paige squared her shoulders and stepped forward.

  The super turned to stare. "Oh, Ms. McDermott. You're still here." Her voice was full of disdain.

  "Just finishing up," Paige said. She was proud of herself; her voice didn't even tremble. She looked beyond Tricia to where Austin Weaver was standing in the shadow of the doorway.

  She'd caught just a glimpse of him a few weeks ago, when he'd been interviewing for the job at Tanner Electronics. Even that transitory glance had been enough to make her feel hollow. Still, with the first shock past, the worst was over, she'd told herself.

  And now she'd had weeks to get used to the idea of him living in Denver. To ready herself for the inevitable. To get her psyche in shape to meet him once more...

  But she had been wrong, she realized as she got her first good look at the man. That single fleeting sight hadn't done a thing to prepare her for coming face-to-face with Austin Weaver. And a whole year of thinking about it wouldn't have done the job, either.

  Paige could feel her heart slowing until each beat was like the pounding of a gong, echoing and reverberating through her body. It wasn't fair, she thought. The only change in his face - the only sign that he might be startled - was the slight lift of one dark eyebrow. But then, she thought, Austin Weaver had always been a poker player at heart...

  His photographs didn't do him justice, she thought. It wasn't a matter of looks, though indeed the chiseled lines of his face were far more handsome in person than on paper, his dark hair softer-looking, his eyes almost silvery instead of the chilly gray they sometimes appeared in pictures.

  What was missing from the photographs was the force of his personality. No camera could begin to capture the magnetic field which seemed to surround him. At a glance, it was apparent that this man not only possessed power, but that he wielded it easily and without hesitation.

  It was no wonder the super was practically drooling, Paige thought. Power, money, and good looks all wrapped up in a package and practically delivered to her doorstep... she must have taken one glance and gone straight into vamp mode.

  Not that it appeared to be doing her any good. Without turning his head to look at the super, Austin said, ' "Thank you for bringing us up, Ms. Cade."

  "Oh, call me Tricia." The super laid a hand on the sleeve of his leather coat. "It'll be so much more comfortable if you feel you can call on a friend for help."

  More comfortable for whom? Paige wanted to ask.

  "Now I must show you through the apartment," Tricia coaxed. “Every place has a few eccentricities, you know. Not that there's anything wrong, because we're very careful about maintenance here at Aspen Towers. But I'd be shirking my duties if I didn't show you around."

  Paige wanted to applaud. Not only had the super neatly circumvented Austin's attempt to get rid of her, but she'd provided Paige with a line of retreat, as well. The moment the two of them were out of sight, Paige decided, she'd burn a path to the kitchen, jam the flowers into a drinking glass, and get the heck away from Aspen Towers and Austin Weaver....

  Coward, she told herself. Running away would only create questions that she didn't want to answer. It would be far better to stay and act casual. As though this sort of encounter happened every day.

  Though of course, she reflected, she could always say - and honestly, too - that with her work done there had been no reason to stay longer.

  The child dropped her parka in the precise center of the hallway and started toward Paige.

  Austin said, "I don't see a coat hook on the floor, Jennifer."

  She grinned at him. "But it's all new, so I don't know where it goes."

  "Perhaps you should try looking behind that door." He pointed. Then, without checking to see whether she obeyed, he followed the super down the hall.

  Jennifer picked up her parka and opened the closet door. "There aren't any hooks my size," she complained and turned to Paige with wide-eyed helplessness.

  Unable to resist the appeal in those big brown eyes, Paige took the parka. The soft fur trim tickled her hands as she hung it up. "This is a very pretty coat."

  "It's new. I didn't need a thick coat in Atlanta."

  "I suppose not."

  "I don't like it here. It's cold."

  "Yes," Paige said. "It is definitely cold at times. But there are good things about Denver, as well. The mountains, for one, and the wildflowers in the spring - "

  "We had a mountain in Georgia. Stone Mountain - with faces carved on it."

  "It's true," Paige admitted, "that none of the Rocky Mountains have faces carved on them."

  "Told you Atlanta's better," Jennifer said, as if there was nothing further to discuss. "What's your name?"

  "Paige," she said reluctantly.

  "You mean like in a book? That's funny. Are you like a housekeeper?"

  "Not exactly. Aren't you going to go look at the apartment?"

  Jennifer wrinkled her nose. "She'd just try to pat my head again."

  Paige tried to smother a smile. "You don't like Ms. Cade much, do you?"

  "She's sticky."

  And that, Paige thought, was a pretty good description. Tricia Cade had certainly clung to Austin like caramel on an apple. Paige closed the closet door and started for the kitchen. There were still the flowers to deal with, and then she could escape.

  Jennifer dropped into step beside her. "If you're not the housekeeper, who are you?"

  "I'm just helping put things in order so you and your father will be comfortable here." Paige took a heavy glass mug from the cabinet. "Will you hang on to this to keep it from upsetting while I arrange the flowers in it?"

  From the doorway came a quiet voice. "There you are," Austin said.

  Paige's hand slipped and water splashed across the counter. She hadn't heard him come down the hall, but that was partly explained when she realized that he was alone. She wondered how he'd managed to dislodge Tricia so quickly.

  "Go explore, Jennifer," he said.

  "I don't want to."

  "I don't recall asking if you wanted to," Austin said gently. "Your room is just past the front door."

  With her lower lip stuck out and her feet dragging, the child went off. "Not my real room," she muttered.

  Paige put a shaggy mum into place in the mug.

  "So it is you," Austin said.

  Puzzled, she shot a look at him. Had he not recognized her immediately? Surely she hadn't changed so much that he hadn't known her - though perhaps, since he hadn't been expecting her to reappear in his life...

  And yet, he'd almost sounded as if he had expected to run into her. So it is you, he'd said, as if he was confirming a hunch.

  But of course, she thought, both Sabrina and Cassie had talked to him - frequently, in fact - during the weeks they'd been looking for and preparing his apartment. One of them might have mentioned her, and if they'd done so casually, using only her first name - well, it stood to reason that Austin wouldn't have asked pointed questions about a woman who just happened to be named Paige, any more than she'd rushed to volunteer the facts the moment she'd heard he was in line for a job at Tanner. But of course, he would have wondered, and even been watchful.

  "It's me." She felt incredibly foolish for not being able to think of anything else to say.

  Austin folded his arms across his chest and leaned against the counter. "How have you been?" he asked genially. "And what have you been doing with yourself
in the last...let me think, how long has it been, Paige? Six years, I suppose - since our divorce?"

  CHAPTER TWO

  PAIGE'S voice sounded so taut that Austin wouldn't have been surprised if it had cracked under the strain. "Seven," she said. "It's been almost seven years since the decree was final."

  "Has it really?" Deliberately, he kept his tone lazy. "How time does get away."

  "When one is having fun, I suppose you mean to say?"

  He moved across the kitchen and perched on the edge of a tall stool pulled up to the breakfast bar. Besides being more comfortable than standing, the seat had the advantage of being a safe distance from the counter where Paige was arranging flowers. The downside was that from the breakfast bar he could see three of her - the real one and two hazy blonde reflections in the highly polished stainless- steel doors of the refrigerator.

  She didn't look much different, really, than the last time he'd seen her all those years ago. She didn't even look older. Her face was a bit thinner, the fine bone structure more prominent. But perhaps even that change was simply the result of her hairstyle - shorter than he'd ever seen it before, like a fluffy mane that looked as if she could run her fingers through it in the morning and be done with it for all day.

  How typical of Paige that would be, he thought, with her almost-Puritan practical streak. While she'd always taken care to look neat and attractive and feminine, Paige had never put much emphasis on the glamorous extras. He almost laughed at the understatement. In fact, he thought, she'd practically gone out of her way to avoid them...

  It seemed to him that outlook of hers hadn't changed in the least, despite the passage of time. Her attitude showed not only in her hairstyle - for flattering though it was, the cut had obviously been chosen for convenience as well as looks - but in her manicure. He watched her slim fingers as she worked with the flowers. Even from across the room, he could see that though her nails were evenly trimmed and buffed to a shine, they were completely innocent of polish.

  She'd always avoided bright nail polish, he remembered. He'd told her once it was a shame not to emphasize the delicate grace of her shapely hands by painting her nails red, but she'd simply shaken her head and said brilliant nails were a waste of time, requiring almost constant care and upkeep, with attention to each minuscule chip or scratch.

  Yes, he thought, she was the same old Paige....

  He drew himself up short. She wasn't the same old Paige, he told himself. If anything, she was probably even more set in her ways than she'd been seven years ago - and he'd be wise to remember it.

  She stabbed another stem into the mug. "I should have thought our divorce would be an easy date for you to remember."

  Austin frowned. "I don't celebrate it, if that's what you mean."

  "Of course not. I'm certainly not saying that our divorce is important enough for you to recall it for its own sake."

  She'd gotten better at sarcasm, Austin reflected. More controlled, far more subtle. It flicked him on the raw nevertheless.

  "But you can surely remember how old your daughter is," Paige went on sweetly, "and how long it was before she was born that you met her mother. From there it should be no step at all to recall -"

  "How long I'd been free at the time. I see what you mean now. If we've been divorced nearly seven years, and Jennifer's soon going to be six... You're quite right, Paige." He let a congratulatory note creep into his voice. "It was very nearly the same time as when you filed for divorce." He saw her tiny, almost-concealed shudder. "What's the matter? Are you jealous because I moved on with my life, and you haven't?"

  "Of course I'm not jealous. Your choices have no significance for me. Besides, why would you think I'm stuck in a rut somewhere?"

  "Your name, for starters," he said. "The super called you Ms. McDermott - just as you asked of the judge in the divorce petition, when you got tired of being Paige Weaver."

  She shrugged. "I made the mistake of giving up my name once, when I married - and it was terribly untidy to get it back. Perhaps the next time around I was just wiser."

  "And perhaps," he said curtly, "if you were talking about the truth instead of vague possibilities, you'd be making definite statements instead of subjective ones."

  She tilted her chin up. It was a gesture he remembered well; in the old days it had usually meant she knew she was on less-than-solid ground. "All right, so I haven't married again. At least I learned my lesson."

  "Meaning what? That I didn't?"

  "What other conclusion is there? You got yourself mixed up with a woman while you were on the rebound - "

  He picked up an apple from the polished fruit bowl on the counter and rubbed it against his sleeve. "You're giving yourself quite a little credit there, I see."

  "If you're talking about your bad choices, they're not my responsibility."

  "No. I mean your assumption that I was on a rebound from you," he said gently, and watched with slightly malicious pleasure as the dart hit her dead center. He bit into the apple with a satisfying crack.

  Irritation flared in her big hazel eyes. "Oh, come on, Austin. Even bad marriages - especially bad marriages - have aftereffects. People do crazy things after a divorce, no matter how much they wanted to be free."

  "You sound as if you're speaking from personal experience. What crazy things did you do?"

  "None," she said crisply.

  Austin shook his head sadly. "What a shame - to be so repressed that you've forgotten how to let your hair down."

  "Attacking me doesn't change the circumstances. It's obvious just from the timing what happened to you - to say nothing of the fact that the relationship obviously wasn't successful. You're here, with your little girl, and her mother is - do you even know where?"

  He said wryly, "I don't have a forwarding address, no."

  "As I said, at least I learned my lesson."

  "Have you." He didn't intend it to be a question. "How is your mother, by the way?"

  Paige looked wary. "She's fine."

  "Still enjoying her invalidism, I suppose?"

  "There's nothing fictional about Mother's disability."

  "Only about her dramatic way of coping with it."

  "I don't have any idea why you would think I'm interested in your opinions about my mother, Austin."

  "Really? That's just about the way I feel concerning your opinions about my life."

  She closed her eyes momentarily and he saw a flicker of pain in her face, as if the shaft had gone home.

  "It's ironic," he mused, "that the woman who didn't want to be married to me ends up as my hired wife."

  "But not for long." Paige wiped off the counter and set the mugful of flowers to one side. "I've left a chicken casserole in the oven for you, and a salad in the refrigerator. Don't worry, neither includes anything but healthy ingredients - the last thing Rent-A-Wife needs is a case of food poisoning laid at our door."

  Jennifer bounced down the hall and across the kitchen to fling herself against her father. "It's exactly like my old room! It's just like you promised!"

  Over his daughter's head, Austin met Paige's eyes. "Thank you," he said stiffly.

  She shrugged. "Not me. Jennifer's room was entirely Sabrina's doing." She washed her hands. "The grocery list you sent has been filled and everything stored away. And now that I've done all I can to make the place ready for you, I'll get out of your way and leave the two of you to settle in."

  She brushed past him and picked up her coat from a kitchen chair. "Goodbye, Jennifer." Her voice grew softer. "I hope you'll learn to like Denver despite the cold."

  Then she was gone, through a back door Austin hadn't even seen.

  Jennifer stared after her. "Why did she go away?"

  "Probably because she had other things to do right now."

  "Why did she sound like she's never coming back?"

  "Perhaps because she doesn't intend to."

  "Oh. That must be because she doesn't like you." The child's voice was matter-o
f-fact.

  It wasn't the first time that Jennifer's precocious insight had set Austin back on his heels. Sometimes, he thought, she seemed to be five years old going on thirty - both perceptive and acute.

  And even more dead on target than Paige had been, as she'd so curtly diagnosed his weaknesses. Paige, he thought, had missed the mark in a couple of critical areas.

  He'd made his share of bad choices, just as she'd deduced, and he wouldn't deny it. But not everything he'd done in the months after their divorce had fallen into the category of things to be regretted.

  Take Jennifer, for example. She had been anything but a bad choice.

  Why, Paige asked herself miserably, had she let herself be drawn into that insane discussion? Why had she allowed herself to voice her opinions at all? And why had she left herself open to that cutting remark about his lack of interest in what she thought of him?

  She could have simply refused to take part in the whole conversation. She could have maintained a cool silence. She could at least have avoided any mention of Jennifer's mother.

  But no - she'd had to go behave like a shrew. Not that she didn't have some cause; Austin must have taken up with the woman practically before the ink on the divorce decree was dry, to have a child who was almost six. And it wasn't much comfort to tell herself that many men wouldn't have waited even that long; for all she knew, Austin hadn't waited, either. Though Paige hadn't so much as suspected the existence of another woman at the time, perhaps he had just been very careful, very lucky at keeping a double life under wraps -

  "At this rate," she said aloud, "you're going to drive yourself nuts over something that happened years ago and has no significance now. So cut it out."

  Paige took a deep breath and tried to clear her mind as she steered the minivan out into rush-hour traffic.

  At least, she reminded herself, the first and most difficult encounter was over. And now that Austin knew about her, he'd no doubt be every bit as careful to avoid another run-in as Paige intended to be.

  Her cell phone rang, and she took advantage of a red light to dig it out of her leather tote bag.

  Sabrina said, "When are you going to be leaving Austin's apartment?"