Page 15 of Keeping My Wife
“How many spot checks are we talking here?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
I picked up my wine. “I’m not sure if he actually cares if it’s a marriage in name only.”
He took a sip. “Is that what you want?”
“I’m only doing this to save the house.”
He grinned behind the lip of his glass. “Not that big payout?”
“The money is nice. It would allow me to stick around instead of going back to my soul sucking job.”
His eyebrows shot up. “What do you do?”
“Marketing specialist. I work my ass off there and idiots keep getting promoted over me.”
“Let me guess, male idiots?”
I busied myself with the bread on my plate, tearing it into shreds. Suddenly his hand covered mine. Startled, I looked up to find him far too close.
“I wish I didn’t know the type, but it happens around here too.” He squeezed my hand and gave me a sad smile before releasing it. “Better question…what do you want?”
“I honestly don’t know. I focused on getting out of Indigo Valley for so long.”
“Okay then, how about right now. If you didn’t have to worry about impressing anyone other than yourself.”
“What would you do?” I countered.
He leaned on the marble and my eyes couldn’t help traveling over his shoulders to the lean lines of his back. How the heck many muscles were hiding under that flannel shirt?
“Eyes up here, Maxie.”
Thankful my skin didn’t show off a flush easily, I straightened. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. I’m going to be your husband, right? You can look all you want.”
“I told you it was just?—”
He grabbed his glass and straightened up. He had more than a few inches on me since I was just in a pair of socks. “On paper. Sure, if that’s what you want.”
“Bed and breakfast.”
He frowned.
“If I could have whatever I wanted. I’d convert this house into a bed and breakfast. It would need a lot of work to get it there.”
“Oh.” He looked around the kitchen. “Would you hire people to host or do it yourself?”
“Me.”Surprised when it came out, I realized it was true. “My grandmother raised me more than my mother. She showed me how to be a gracious host, how to throw a party, even how to run a household. Back then I thought it was like living in an episode of an old British television show.”
“And now, you have skills. Add in the marketing background you have and voila. You know how to do this.”
“I do.”
Now that I said it out loud, something shifted in me. The grief that had been sitting in my chest moved a little. It was still there, but excitement came to the forefront.
“Would you help me with that?” At his half smile, I backtracked. “I mean your company. The Murdock Brothers.”
