on.”
“There is one thing you can do.”
“Which is?”
“You can marry me.”
CHAPTER THREE
AS A conversation stopper it took some beating. Jenny sat with her mouth open for all of two minutes. There was not a single word she could think of to say.
It was Michael who finally broke the silence. Jenny looked as if she’d still be goggling in half an hour. “Aren’t you going to say something?” he asked, half amused.
“I don’t think I can,” she said breathlessly. She sounded as if it took a real effort to make her voice work. “I feel like I’ve been slapped in the face by a wet fish.”
“Gee.” He chuckled again, the second time in one day. Amazing! He smiled at her stunned expression. “As a romantic, maidenly reply to a proposal of marriage, that takes some beating. Slapped in the face by a wet fish. Good grief!”
She smiled, but her face was worried—humoring-a-lunatic worried.
“Michael, this is just plain crazy. You don’t want to marry me.”
“No,” he agreed. “I don’t.”
“Well…”
“But that’s just it,” he continued smoothly. “I don’t want to marry anyone. So it might as well be you.”
“I beg your pardon?”
He sighed, and his face tightened. He didn’t discuss his private life with anyone, but there was no getting out of this. Not if she was to take his proposal seriously.
“Jenny, let me tell you something. Like you, I’ve done the love thing.”
“I don’t…”
“Just shut up and hear me out.” He closed his eyes, and when he opened them he was no longer seeing her. He was seeing events of two years ago, and he was seeing them as though they’d been yesterday. “You know I’ve been a cop?”
“Yes.” Her frown deepened. What on earth was he talking about?
“And I left the force when my partner was killed?”
“I’ve heard that, too,” she admitted. Gossip among the staff at Maitland Maternity had told her that much about him, though Michael’s private life was very much a closed book. He kept himself to himself—absolutely.
“What people don’t know,” he said heavily, “was that my mind wasn’t on my job the night my partner died.” He hesitated, then went on, but he sounded as if it hurt to say every word. The pain was real and terrible. “I’d gotten myself into a relationship,” he confessed. “My first. I’d never had much time for women. But Barbara… Well, she seemed different—special—and I thought I could get involved.” He shrugged. “Okay, so I got involved, and I was stupid.”
“But what happened?” This wasn’t making any sense.
“Dan and I were on night duty, but we’d just attended a call near Barbara’s place. It was quiet, we were due for a meal break, so Dan went for a hamburger while I dropped in to see Barbara.”
“And?” She didn’t want to ask, but she knew he had to tell. The words were being torn out of him.
“She was with another guy. In bed. Stupid, sordid, the sort of thing that happens every day—but to others, not to me. I was so damned angry, so hurt that I slammed out of the house without a word—and then Dan got killed.”
He still wasn’t making any sense. “Would you mind telling me,” Jenny said carefully, “how you getting two-timed by some woman with no taste in men could get your partner killed? I don’t see it.”
Part of his mind registered the compliment, and a weary smile curved the corners of his mouth, but the story was too black for humor. The smile died.
“It was easy,” he said bleakly. “My mind wasn’t where it should have been, and I needed every scrap of attention that night.” His words were savage, and she could tell the night was still nightmare fresh. “We had a call to say there’d been an armed robbery. What they didn’t say was that the owner had shot one of the intruders. So we got to the store and the owner was out on the pavement yelling about a carload of kids that had got away. As I said, I wasn’t on the ball. I radioed in details of the car, and while I did that, Dan went into the store to check damage.”
“Oh, Michael…”
“The kid was lying on the floor, wounded, out of sight of the doorway, and he shot Dan from almost point-blank range,” Michael said bleakly. “And then he died himself. It was a stupid, stupid waste.” He shook his head. “So when backup arrived, I was blubbering like a baby, and I left the force soon after. To this job.” He compressed his lips and squared his shoulders.
“That was the first time in my life I’ve ever tried having a relationship,” he went on bleakly. “My sisters and brother—they’re the emotional hotheads. I’ve always had a sense that I should stand apart. Be alone. Maybe it’s because our birth mother dumped us—who knows? I only know the feeling’s deep-seated and real. And then, the one time I cracked and let Barbara close, the world exploded around me. Stupid, stupid, stupid. So you see, I’m not in the market for any sort of relationship. Ever.”
Jenny shook her head. What on earth…? His birth mother dumped him? There was so much she didn’t understand about this man, but maybe it needed to be put aside for now. He was holding himself responsible for another man’s death, and who could believe that of Michael?
“Michael, Dan’s death couldn’t have been your fault,” she whispered. “Even if your mind was a hundred percent focused, it might have happened anyway. Dan must have assessed the risks, too. You won’t always feel like this.”
“Yes, I will,” he said flatly. “I’ve never felt emotional. I told you—my brother and sisters have enough emotion for the four of us combined. I’ve never seen the sense of this love bit, and when Barbara betrayed me and Dan was killed—well, that was the first and last time I’ll ever feel like that. Giving yourself to someone…”
He shrugged again and gave a self-conscious grin. “Enough. We’re not talking about me. All I’m saying is that I intend to stay a bachelor, which means there’s no reason I shouldn’t marry you to get you immigrant status.”
“A green card marriage.” Her mind switched to her problems, but a part of her stayed with his.
“It’s been done before.”
“It’s not legal.”
“Legal enough.” He gave a bitter smile. “We’ll be married. I have a huge town house.”
She gasped and almost visibly withdrew. “You’re saying you want me to live with you?”
“No, but we’ll need to for a bit.” He gave one of his characteristic self-mocking grins. “Call it self-preservation. This way I’ll get myself a decent secretary again.”
