His Wife for One Night. Molly O'Keefe

if she still knew the practical stranger that stood here, found in him the boy she’d known better than anyone else.

      He saw that girl he’d known. She was right there in that stubborn line to her chin. The nose that led her into more trouble than one half-size female should ever see.

      “I missed you. It’s been a long time, Mia,” he breathed, the words squeezed through a tight throat.

      She blinked, as if jerking herself out of a daze.

      “Where do you want me to put my stuff?” she asked, and the moment was shattered. She dropped her duffel on the floor, plumes of dust erupting into the air at the impact.

      “There works,” he muttered. Whatever was in that bag couldn’t be in good shape. “You know, maybe I should have made it clear, but this is a formal thing…”

      Her eyes sliced through him. “You worried I’ll show up to your fancy shindig with dirt under my nails?”

      “No, well, maybe. And I don’t care.” He reached out his hands, showing her the red dirt that stained the skin around his fingernails. “I just don’t want you to be uncomfortable. There’s going to be a lot of scrutiny—”

      “Because you’re Indiana Jones and making Cal Poly a whole bunch of money?” She said it as a joke and guilt clobbered him.

      You’re an ass, he told himself, bringing her here to be scrutinized and gossiped about.

      “No,” he said and took a deep breath. No other woman in his life owed him enough to stand beside him and face down the firestorm of academia gone wild. “I should have told you this in my email,” he said.

      “Uh-oh, this doesn’t sound good.” She crossed her arms over her flannelled chest and those curves she’d always worked so hard to hide were unmistakable.

      “Mia, I’m sorry—”

      “Out with it, Jack. You always were a wuss when it came to dealing the bad stuff.”

      That was a low blow and his temper flared. It was easy for her to judge him. She’d stayed. He’d left. Big freaking deal.

      “Fine, because the dean has accused me of having an affair with his wife.”

      She didn’t look at him. Not for a long time. The air conditioner kicked on, loud in the silence. He counted her breaths, the rise and fall of her chest, wondering why it mattered.

      “Have you?” she asked.

      “No, Mia. Of course not. But Beth…the dean’s wife, has been…” How did he put this? “Indiscreet.”

      “She wants to have an affair with you?”

      “So it would seem.”

      “And you can’t just say no?” she asked, her eyes snapping.

      “It’s delicate,” he said.

      “You want me to tell her?” she asked. “You made me drive two hundred miles over the mountains two months before calving season, when I’m so busy I can’t see straight, to tell some woman to keep her hands off you?”

      In a way. In his head it made so much sense. But that was his problem—what worked in his head didn’t always translate to other people. To real life.

      Mia picked up the duffel bag, leaving dust on the floor. This trip out to Santa Barbara was a big deal for her, he knew that. Things were busy at the Rocky M and as far as he knew, she was still doing most of the work.

      And now she was here and angry with him, which wasn’t what he wanted at all.

      Give him a hundred feet of sand and seventy-mile-an-hour winds, and he could make things work.

      Add another person to the equation, someone he had to deal with face-to-face, and he’d find a way to blow it.

      “No, Mia, it’s not quite that dramatic. With you here, she won’t try anything. And people won’t…speculate about an affair. They won’t be watching me like a hawk. It will be forgotten.”

      Her eyes got wide and her lips got tight.

      “Because they’ll be talking about me,” she said. “I’m a distraction?”

      He nodded and shrugged. Attempted a smile. “You’re my wife.”

      She nodded once, anger rolling off her like the smell of burned tires. “Sure,” she said. “Makes perfect sense. I need to shower.”

      “Through there,” he said, pointing to the far door. “We need to go in a half hour.”

      MIA SHUT THE DOOR behind her and collapsed against it. The wood cooled her flaming face.

      Jack, she thought, gutted. Gutted at the sight of him, the sound of his voice. Hell, the smell of that man killed her. He’d opened that door and her heart beat its way right up into her throat.

      I missed you. It’s been a long time.

      Whose fault is that? she wanted to yell. An emotion she tried so hard to suppress and restrain bubbled up, sticky and insistent.

      You left me, she thought. You married me and left.

      But that had been the deal. She’d known it going in.

      This pain was her own damn fault.

      If only he weren’t so handsome. So familiar and beloved.

      The whole drive over the mountains she’d wondered what kind of changes the past year would have carved out of him.

      His intelligence still lit up his chocolate eyes like a brilliant pilot light. The crow’s-feet growing out of the corners were deeper, from a year spent under a harsh sun. The silver hair peppered through the close-cut blond was a surprise.

      His shoulders were broader, the calluses thicker.

      Jack was a man who worked. Got his hands dirty and his back bent out of shape. He dug holes and built things and that kind of work made him comfortable in his own skin. Confident in himself.

      Which was so different from the angry and serious kid he’d been. A kid who hadn’t known his place in his own family.

      But that had all changed. Jack McKibbon knew who he was now and it was so unbelievably sexy.

      It was no wonder deans’ wives were throwing themselves at him.

      The pain cut her off at the knees and she sagged farther down the door.

      Maybe tomorrow she’d laugh about it. Or next week. But right now it hurt.

      A year and two months since she’d seen him. Since she’d gone to that dive hotel in Los Angeles thinking, like a fool, Now…now it will change. He’s going far away, someplace dangerous, and the fear has made him realize how he feels about me. About us.

      Instead, he’d had her witness his will, sign power of attorney papers. He’d taken her to dinner, thanked her when she gave him the book she got him for Christmas. He slept on his stomach, his face turned to the window in the other bed in their hotel room, while she stared at the ceiling on fire with love and pain.

      That should have taught her the lesson she just couldn’t seem to learn.

      Jack McKibbon didn’t love her.

      But, once again, she drove over the mountains today, thinking this time was going to be different, too.

      It’s what she always did. Five years into this nonmarriage and with every email, every phone call, the rare visit, she kept thinking things were going to change.

      That he would miss her. That he would wake up in the desert and want her beside him.

      You’re an idiot, she told herself for perhaps the hundredth time since climbing into her truck a few hours ago.

      Her sister Lucy’s words rang in her ears. You’ve let a crush