The Husband Contract. Kathleen O'Brien

tunic. He had no doubt that, if her sword had been real, she would have run him through on the spot.

      Her instinctive antagonism wasn’t personal, of course—when she’d believed he was the tennis pro, she had been all smiles. No, this smoldering resentment was directed at her uncle’s lawyer. She had hated her uncle, and apparently that contempt spilled over onto anyone who had been his ally.

      And, God help him, she didn’t even know about the terms of the will yet. If she despised Clay already, what would she do when she learned the details, when she heard about the nasty little clause Joshua had insisted on inserting?

      Suddenly Clay wished himself anywhere but here. What had he been thinking? Had he really believed he could soften the blow by delivering the terms of Joshua’s will face-to-face? Had he really thought that she would appreciate the personal touch? What a fool he’d been! If ever two people were destined to be enemies…

      The crowd was growing restless, but she showed no signs of moving. Finally, with a strange reluctance, Clay lifted his own sword and slowly applied pressure to hers. The sparkling aluminum foil bent easily under his crude black blade, curving into an impotent droop that pointed only at the ground.

      She looked at the ruined sword for a moment, then, tossing it onto the grass, she raised her angry eyes to his. “I was supposed to capture you,” she said tensely. “You were supposed to die. You’ve spoiled the match.”

      “I’m afraid,” he said slowly, “that I’m about to spoil a lot more than that.”

      

      Her elbows propped behind her on the picnic table, Melanie sat backward on the bench, staring out through the dappled branches of the overhanging magnolia and deciding that sometimes life was just too ironic to bear.

      She could see Clay Logan out of the corner of her eye. He was buying two snow cones from a diaphanously garbed princess in a heart-shaped headdress. The princess seemed to be enjoying the transaction immensely. She had offered him extra syrup three times.

      Not that Melanie could exactly blame her. For a moment, back when she had mistaken Clay for Mr. Gilchrist, Melanie had been a little dazzled herself. She had taken one look at those aquiline features, those springing waves of rich brown hair and broad, elegant shoulders, and she had instantly begun debating whether it would be bad parenting to date Nick’s tennis instructor.

      Yes, darned ironic, Melanie repeated to herself, pretending not to watch. This gorgeous human being was Clay Logan. Wouldn’t you just know it?

      He didn’t even look like a lawyer. In spite of his twentiethcentury power suit, he had the air of a knight who would bring his lady treasures, a chest heaped high with golden coins and rubies as big as his fist. Or at least one ruby. Was that too much to ask? One twenty-five-carat, heart-shaped ruby that had been in her family for a hundred years. The beautiful, infamous Romeo Ruby.

      But that, of course, was the final irony. Clay Logan wasn’t bringing her anything but a slap in the face from good old Uncle Joshua. I’m afraid that I’m about to spoil a lot more than that, Clay had said, but she had known it before he spoke. Joshua had disowned her eight years ago. Why should the tyrant have changed his mind on his deathbed?

      No, her uncle hadn’t left her a penny. All that remained now was to find out how this slick lawyer, Clay Logan, had worded it. She closed her eyes against the bright May sunlight. How exactly does a lawyer justify robbing someone of her birthright?

      And how was she going to manage without it?

      “Here you go.” The picnic bench rocked slightly as Clay settled his weight on it She opened her eyes and stared at the cup in the outstretched hand as if she hadn’t ever seen such a thing before. “You wanted a snow cone?” he repeated patiently.

      No, she hadn’t She had been trying to buy a little time to collect her composure. His showing up like this had been oddly unsettling. All that robust masculinity and suave confidence…Industrial-strength machismo was a rarity on a boys’school campus.

      And then there was the way he had turned her lovely sword into a piece of overcooked silver spaghetti—don’t tell her that wasn’t a deliberate power play. He knew that she had needed this inheritance desperately, and he was warning her that there was no way she could fight her uncle’s will—or the lawyer who had drawn it up.

      A sudden stinging behind her eyes startled her. No, damn it. She wouldn’t give in to weakness now. She wasn’t the type to whimper and beg. She straightened her spine. So what if his sword was bigger than hers? When he informed her that she was disinherited, she intended to laugh in his movie-star face.

      “Melanie? Do you want this?” He sounded irritated, as if he had begun to suspect he was dealing with a simpleton. She took the paper cup, glancing at his shirtsleeve as she did.

      Suddenly she frowned. What was that? That pink blob…surely he wasn’t wearing a pink polka-dot shirt? That would be a cute sight in a courtroom. The image pleased her. She felt a satisfying urge to chuckle.

      He seemed to sense her amusement. “Cotton candy,” he said, turning over his wrist so she could see the extent of the damage. “Insidious stuff. I can’t get rid of it.”

      “Suck on it,” she said. She raised her gaze to his, enjoying the surprised furrowing of his brow. She blinked innocently.

      “I beg your pardon?”

      “Suck on it,” she repeated sweetly. “You do know how, don’t you? It’s easy. Just put your lips over the stain and—”

      “Yes,” he interrupted, “I think I remember how it works.”

      She raised her brows, daring him, knowing, of course, that it would be miles beneath his dignity. But hey—she could play power games, too.

      To her amazement, he shrugged slightly, slipping his jacket free of one broad shoulder, then the other. He folded the expensive coat, laid it over the picnic table and then, watching her the whole time, he slowly raised his wrist to his mouth.

      He was going to do it. Oh, heavens… She hadn’t noticed before what a sensual mouth he had, but there was no missing it now. Oh, my… A generous mouth, lips full but hard-edged, as if they had been laser-cut into the perfect shape.

      Damn. She had meant to throw him off balance, but now, like a fool, she was the one blushing. Oh, Lord, wouldn’t she ever learn to squelch these hotheaded impulses? She should have known one little off-color word wouldn’t embarrass a man like this.

      She couldn’t quite take her eyes off those lips. A tiny wriggle of discomfort moved in the pit of her stomach as he lowered them over the stain and covered it. She held her breath and waited. His lips were almost motionless. Only a subtle rhythmic pulse at the corner of his jaw hinted at his mission, but that pulse seemed suddenly to beat in time with her blood.

      Inhaling a stiff breath, she lifted her gaze. He was still watching her. His brown eyes were flecked with gold, the irises deepening to dark chocolate over the pure white of his sleeve. She opened her mouth to say something, anything. Preferably something lightly sarcastic—that was her specialty. If she could only think of something.

      But her mind was on strike. Before she could come up with a single witty syllable, he was finished. He lowered his arm and, without exhibiting the slightest interest in the results of his labors, smiled at her enigmatically.

      “Interesting,” he said. “It’s not as sweet as you’d think, is it? A lot of things are like that. They look quite innocent, but—”

      “Mr. Logan,” she broke in tersely, holding her snow cone so tightly that blue syrup trickled over her fingers, “why don’t you get to the point? You didn’t come all the way out here today to swap laundry tips.”

      “No.” Still smiling, he leaned back against the table, getting comfortable. He obviously knew that their symbolic tussle for superiority was over, and he had drawn first blood. He flicked a glance at her fingers. Blue blood. “I came because