The Best Bride. Сьюзен Мэллери

breath about men being pinheads.

      Travis leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Louise is going through a stage right now.”

      The chesty blonde glared at him. “I can hear every word you’re staying and this is not a stage. I’m exploring my art.”

      “She’s driving me crazy. She makes things and gives them to me.”

      “It’s a sign of affection, but if you’d rather I didn’t, then fine.” She slammed the refrigerator door shut and turned her back on them.

      “I have this drawer full of sweaters and socks.”

      Elizabeth stared at him. “Why is that a problem?”

      “They’re not—” he glanced from her to Louise and back “—normal. Most of the socks have no heel. The sweaters aren’t anatomically correct.”

      Louise walked over to the table and grinned. “I’ll admit I didn’t quite get the hang of knitting. I never could figure out parts of the patterns, but some of the wool was real lovely.” She held two eggs in her right hand. “How would you like them cooked?”

      Elizabeth blinked several times. “Scrambled?”

      “Fine.” She glanced at Travis. “I know what you want, but the way you’ve talked about me this morning, I’m of a mind to let you go hungry.”

      “Your threats don’t scare me.” As Louise passed him, he reached out and patted her rear end affectionately.

      “Don’t you try your wild ways on me, Travis Haynes,” she said, giving him a mock glare. “I’m old enough to be your very young and attractive aunt.”

      Elizabeth couldn’t help it. She started laughing. Even the sharp pains in her side couldn’t stop her from chuckling.

      “Mommy.”

      Mandy entered the room. She was washed and dressed in a pretty blue dress with tiny white flowers. She came over to her and held out her arms for a hug. Elizabeth pulled her close.

      “Are you ready for your first day of school?” she asked. Travis was going to walk Mandy to the elementary school and register her.

      Mandy nodded. “Travis helped me pick out this dress to wear. Did we choose the right one?”

      “Of course, Mandy. You look perfect.”

      “I have ribbons.” She held them out. “Will you put them in my hair?”

      “Sure.”

      Elizabeth turned and Mandy slipped between her legs. When the girl saw Louise, she squealed with excitement. “Louise, you found us.”

      Louise looked at her. “Morning, baby girl. What do you mean I found you?”

      “Travis said you were lost.”

      Elizabeth glanced at him. He’d taken a sip of coffee just as Mandy spoke and now he started to choke. Louise came over and pounded him on the back several times while he coughed.

      Louise gave her a quick wink. “He probably said I was trying to find myself.”

      The next thud on his back sounded a little harder. He turned to her and held up his hand. “That’s enough,” he said, his voice raspy and faint. “I’m fine.”

      Elizabeth wasn’t sure, but she thought she saw a flush of color on Travis’s cheeks. She bit back her laughter and concentrated on Mandy’s hair. When the braid was secured with the length of blue ribbon, Mandy pulled out a chair and climbed onto the seat. As Louise fixed breakfast, Many chatted with Travis and Louise about what Mr. Bear had told her in the night. Louise slid a plate in front of the girl, containing a waffle shaped like a popular cartoon mouse. Cut strawberries formed a bright collar at the bottom of the waffle. A glass of milk completed the meal.

      Elizabeth looked up at the older woman. “Thank you for making that.”

      Louise shrugged. “It’s nothing. The first day of school should be special for a little girl. And Alfred was never impressed with my waffles.”

      Elizabeth wanted to ask if Louise really did feed her dog waffles, but she didn’t dare. As the smells of eggs, bacon and coffee mingled in the kitchen, she leaned back in her chair and savored her feeling of relief. She and Mandy were going to make it. In three weeks she would start her new job and move into her own place. In the meantime, they were safe here.

      She glanced at Travis and found him staring at her. His gaze dropped briefly to her mouth. The sensation of being touched was so real, she wanted to touch him back. The attraction flickering just below the surface fanned to life.

      He was her salvation and her greatest problem. This, this mindless reaction to him, had to stop. She knew better than to get involved with a man, any man. But he was even worse than most. She knew what his easy ways and quick, tempting smile meant. She’d already been seduced by one charmer and those results had been more awful than she could ever have imagined. The only decent thing to come out of her relationship with Sam Proctor had been Mandy—and that had been an accident.

      Louise served them breakfast, then poured more coffee. Elizabeth hesitated before picking up her fork.

      “Dig in,” Travis said. “Louise is a great cook.”

      “I don’t doubt that, it’s just…”

      He leaned across the bleached oak table and laid his hand on top of hers. Heat flooded her fingers, warming her blood and making its way up her arm. She told herself to ignore it, and him, but she couldn’t seem to look away from his dark gaze.

      “It’s just nothing,” he said. “Everything is going to be all right. I’ll make it all right. I’m the sheriff. I can do anything.”

      “I believe you,” she said and was rewarded with a smile. She did believe him. That was the problem.

      She picked up her fork. It was only for a few weeks, she reminded herself. She just had to stay strong and resist the powerful charm of Travis Haynes. She could do it, she had to. Her life depended on it.

      * * *

      Elizabeth sat in the family room and stared at the television. The screen was blank. She picked up the remote control, then tossed it down. She didn’t want to watch television; she wanted to be with her daughter on her first day of school.

      She swallowed against the lump in her throat, but the pressure didn’t go away. Her eyes burned and she wanted to scream at the unfairness of it all. Little Mandy had gone off with Travis an hour ago. She’d waved and smiled, and promised to make her mom something pretty in class.

      “I should have been with her,” Elizabeth said softly, fighting the frustration. She touched her side, feeling the bandage under her shorts and panties. There was no way she could have made it from here to the school and back. It took all her strength to walk from the kitchen to the family room. But she’d so wanted to see Mandy’s classroom and meet her teacher. Her daughter would only enter the first grade once and she’d missed it. What kind of mother did that make her? It wasn’t enough she’d taken Mandy away from everything she knew in the world, but now the girl was going to a strange school, escorted by a strange man. It wasn’t fair.

      “Television is generally more interesting when you turn it on,” Louise said.

      Elizabeth looked up at her. The other woman stood in the doorway to the family room. She had a mug of coffee in each hand. “I wasn’t really planning on watching,” she said.

      “Would you like some company?”

      Elizabeth nodded. “That would be nice, if you have the time.”

      Louise handed her one of the mugs and plopped down at the opposite end of the butter-soft leather sofa. “I’ve got plenty of time. That boy hasn’t even furnished most of the rooms in this monstrosity. There’s not that much cleaning to do. I suspect he hires me so that he can have a taste