just stopped herself from physically recoiling at his let’s-get-serious expression.
“Well, I was going to offer...” He shrugged then turned to Amanda. “But seeing as the idea seems utterly repugnant to Murphy here—”
What?
“I guess I won’t bother.”
Wait a minute! Her mind fuzzed with too much to process.
What?
A little no-no-no whimper came out of her before she could stop it. Sure, she wanted to stay in Miami more than anything, but not with...with...Mr. Perfect!
“Oh, don’t listen to Murphy. We accept!” Amanda jumped in, charming as a stewardess getting everyone to buckle up on a bumpy flight. “She’s a bit...” Amanda turned, crooking her arms through Santi’s and her own as she steered them all out into the early evening warmth and chose her words carefully. “Murphy’s a bit...shy...of relationships right now.”
“Suits me,” Santi riposted, seemingly unaffected by the scowl growing on Saoirse’s face. “I have no plans to get married myself so I might as well earn some brownie points with the best partner I’ve ever had on an ambulance.”
“I’m the only partner you’ve ever had on an ambulance,” Saoirse shot back, wondering how he could be so...cavalier about all of this.
Santiago Valentino was a still-waters-running-deep kind of guy. That was easy enough to divine amid his wisecracking, lighthearted approach to things. Something didn’t feel right about this. And she wasn’t going to be hoodwinked into agreeing to it. Not for one second.
Blanking her completely, Amanda continued, “And for the record, because I don’t want to see my dear friend Sohr-shuh—”
“It’s Murphy!”
“As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, I won’t have my dear friend Sear-shuh hurt again. This has to be strictly business. So, Santiago...why exactly do you think a quickie marriage with no emotional ties whatsoever is for you?” Amanda was clearly relishing the role of Chief Marital Prospects Interviewer.
Saoirse was almost relieved to see the smile disappear from Santi’s lips. Finally! A bit of reality was sinking in. Sure, she needed a visa, but not with someone so...so fall-in-love-with-able. If she’d thought her first almost marriage had been doomed, this one had lightning strikes and heavy clouds gathering around it from the get-go.
“Let’s just say...” Santi began carefully, then abruptly turned his considered expression back to nonchalant. “Like I said, it’s always good to earn some brownie points with the boss lady.”
She’d seen that shift in Santiago before. The one where he was all frowny and serious one minute and then transformed into Santi the Fun-Loving Clown the next.
It was the fake-it-till-you-believe-it-yourself sort of mask she’d worn often enough to spot another’s a mile off.
Agreeing to this harebrained scheme was big. Of the megatropolis variety of big.
“Right.” Saoirse jabbed a finger in his chest. “You. Me. Mad Ron’s. Now.”
“The little lady has spoken!” Amanda trilled, waving them off as if they were heading to their honeymoon.
“Where’s your motorcycle?” Saoirse glowered.
“Just over there, across from the ambulance bay.”
“Good. Can there just...?” She waved her hand between them, doing her best to swallow down the swell of nausea threatening to bloom. “Just no talking on the way there.”
* * *
“Here, put this on.” Santi shrugged off his leather jacket and held it out for Saoirse to put on. He couldn’t tell how much responsibility he bore for the murderous expression working its way malevolently across her features.
“Uh-uh. You keep it. I don’t need your help. Leather or otherwise.”
A fair bit, then.
“You’ve got goose bumps all over your arms.”
“They’re goose pimples where I come from,” she retorted.
“Well, unless you want to go back to where you come from, I suggest you put this on and we go talk about your friend’s proposal. Or—more accurately—my proposal.”
Okay. That was a sentence he’d never thought he’d hear himself say.
He gave the coat a pointed shake directly in Saoirse’s eye line, lifting a finger from the black leather to make the spinning-around gesture so he could slip it on her. Something a husband would do.
Dios.
He was sliding into the fictional husband slippers a bit too easily. Cinderella, on the other hand, wasn’t interested in increasing her shoe count.
The lines between real and fake were going to be blurry. In the eyes of the world? He’d be a real husband for a real woman. A woman glaring at him for acting chivalrous.
Mars and Venus popped into mind. Saoirse on a half shell...
“I’m not helpless, you know.” His unbetrothed yanked the coat out of his hands and stuffed her arms into the sleeves.
“So you keep saying.”
Saoirse’s temper at the prospect of marrying him was rapidly unearthing something deep inside him. Something organically at odds with what he knew to be true.
He wasn’t reliable.
He wasn’t someone who was there when it counted.
And yet with each passing moment he wanted to do this.
A chance to prove he had staying power that wasn’t entirely selfish? Hell, yeah!
He felt his shoulders sink...just a fraction.
Force himself to prove he had staying power was more like it.
The veneer of elation he’d felt at volunteering suffered a fault line.
Making a commitment like this would be...a commitment. One he couldn’t break.
He watched as Saoirse shrugged into the oversize leather jacket, becoming aware, as he did, how good it made him feel to—in just this little gesture of keeping her safe and warm—be looking after her.
¡Dale! It would feel good to be believed in again.
Field medics were under such pressure to do the best they could by the men they fought alongside, and the more he’d lost... It was tough to keep the whole thing at arm’s length. There were only so many jokes a man could pull when he’s living in hell every day.
Basta.
It was why he was here. Why he’d come back after the stream of coffins he’d been forced to send home had become too
