If you ain’t making waves, you ain’t kicking hard enough.
Baby Alexa whimpered louder. Axell rocked her cradle with his toe, but she seemed determined to wake this time. He’d have to remember how inconvenient and intrusive children were. Perhaps he should be glad Maya had turned him down flat. Constance and the restaurant kept him busy enough. If he was bored with his orderly life, he could run for mayor.
He wasn’t bored. He was lonely.
Leaning over to lift the infant, he grimaced at Alexa’s soggy diaper. Another good reason to hope Maya didn’t agree to his absurd argument. Babies were dirty and wet and he didn’t know what to do with them. He could save his liquor license some other way. Constance might be better off with Sandra.
He wasn’t accustomed to rejection, but Maya probably had it right. They’d never work out. What could he have been thinking? He couldn’t run for mayor with a wife with purple hair and dragons on her shoes. He should be feeling relief, not this looming shadow of dread, as if the dry sands of the Sahara whispered closer.
Alexa blinked at him with big round eyes and grabbed his finger. The knot in Axell’s stomach twisted tighter as they stared at each other.
“Hand her here. I’ve got dry diapers in the drawer. One of the mothers from the day school gave them to Selene. She would never have remembered on her own.” Maya leaned over and produced a disposable diaper and waited patiently for Axell to hand over her daughter.
Her daughter. Just because he’d delivered Alexa and worried about her welfare didn’t make Alexa his. Almost reluctantly, Axell handed the whimpering infant to her mother. A tiny fist wouldn’t let go of his finger. If Alexa were his, he’d have the right to continue letting her hold it as she nursed. If Maya were his... He was doing this for the kid, he reminded himself.
“Infant formula is expensive,” he argued, unable to give up without a fight. “The stuff you brought home from the hospital won’t last much longer.” He’d spent too long studying this issue. It grated on his self-esteem to think he could lose an argument to a twenty-five-year-old gypsy who didn’t know where her next meal was coming from.
His mistake had been treating her as one of the empty-headed college students working at his bar for clothes money — like Angela. It was easier to work this out in his head by thinking of Maya as malleable, but that nonconfrontational attitude of hers hid a world of hard-earned wisdom. It would behoove him to remember that.
He watched as Maya efficiently changed the soggy diaper, dropped the soiled one in a trash can beside the bed, and turned her shoulder on him to place the child to her breast. “I haven’t given up yet. And there are programs to help children from families of limited income.”
Food stamps. She was probably living on food stamps. My God, a teacher with a master’s degree, and she was living on welfare. How in hell did single women with only a high school diploma make it?
That wasn’t his problem. Right now, his problem was providing a mother for Constance, a quality mother, not some socially ambitious, money hungry female. Maya was the only woman he knew who met the requirements as a mother for Constance, and who might conceivably fit into his life without constant demands and emotional upheaval. And she still wasn’t accepting his offer.
“I’ll get her bottle — just in case,” he added when Maya threw him an annoyed look. The damned woman didn’t know when to give up, but he didn’t have a problem with perseverance. He just wasn’t going to let the kid starve.
When he returned with the warm infant formula, Alexa was fretting and beating her fists hungrily against Maya’s breast. Hot lust shot straight to his groin at just the sight of a full ivory breast.
This was ridiculous. He’d seen women’s breasts before. He wasn’t a frigging adolescent. This had to be some possessive caveman reaction to the idea of acquiring a wife. But as Maya removed the infant and he caught a glimpse of an engorged nipple, he grew harder than a piling rod. Nervously, Axell dropped back to the chair and hid his lap with a Dr. Spock baby book from her nightstand.
In his experience, a good offense beat a tardy defense every time. Marrying Maya was the best thing for the children. Period. That was enough to make the decision imperative. But their marriage would also force the mayor to realize his dirty tricks wouldn’t drive Maya back to California, so he could let up on the building inspections and liquor licenses and whatever other cards he had up his sleeve until he found another outlet. Axell could almost swear there would be an investigation into the day school’s license by now. After they were married, if the school lost its license, he wouldn’t have to worry about Constance losing Maya.
And with a wife by his side, he’d be more appealing to voters come election time. He was uncertain of Maya as a political wife, but the mayor’s job in a small town like Wadeville wasn’t precisely as demanding as a governor’s. If she stuck to taking care of the kids, he could keep the rest of his life in order.
He’d just have to learn to live with kites flying from his roof and cats in his kitchen and whatever else she demanded. He hadn’t really given much thought to that aspect of marriage. He’d been working on the assumption that she’d slip quietly into the empty places in his life as she had thus far. He supposed he could get used to Aretha Franklin roaring through the house.
As Alexa burped contentedly on her mother’s shoulder, Axell decided he could manage the material disruptions. He spent most of his time at the office anyway.
He took the infant from Maya and admired her sleepy, wrinkled features. “She doesn’t look like she has a temper.”
“Give her time. She’ll grow into it.” She looked at him quizzically. “Don’t you have to be at the office or something?”
“Not until we get this settled.” He tucked Alexa into her cradle. “You’re ignoring my offer.”
She regarded him warily. “You’re offering me more than I have ever dreamed of, in return for what? A mother for Constance? You could go to the bar on Friday night and choose any woman you like. Why me?”
Startled, Axell raised his eyebrows. “I haven’t noticed women falling all over me,” he countered. “And I doubt that any of my acquaintances have your credentials for dealing with children. I’ve watched you at work. You know what you’re doing. I’m not walking into this blindly.”
She shook her head and leaned back into the pillows. “You’re going to wear me down over this, aren’t you? Why don’t you give me a few days around here and see if you don’t change your mind? Admittedly, I’m not up to my usual standards right now, but I think even my brand of low-grade chaos will drive you screaming for the doors.”
Axell relaxed a fraction. He had her hooked. He just needed to reel her in. He cringed mentally at the fishing reference. He’d have to remember he was lousy at fishing, and Maya was more intelligent than any fish, but he would win, whatever the cost.
“If you’re feeling well enough, we can go down to the courthouse for the license tomorrow.” With this suggestion, he called the signals for a touchdown run. She didn’t stand a chance against a planned offensive, and he played with a home field advantage.
“It will take a few days to meet the requirements and line up the preacher’s time...” Axell glanced at her speculatively. “Constance and I attend church on Sundays. Will that be a problem for you?”
Maya grimaced and tugged at the purple strand of her hair. “And I thought I was the insane one around here.”
Axell held his breath, but she fell for his setup.
She shrugged. “Matty and I haven’t gone because we have no clothes and no transportation. Church isn’t a problem. Don’t sweat the small stuff. It’s the big stuff that worries me. Isn’t a license a little premature?”
“A license isn’t a permanent thing. We can always tear it up.”
She looked doubtful but didn’t argue, as usual.
With the knowledge that he had her trapped, relief flowed through Axell’s veins. In celebratory triumph, he leaned over and kissed Maya’s worried frown. It felt so right, he let adrenaline overrule caution and transferred the kiss to her lips.
Mistake. Hot blood shot downward so fast his brain bubbled air and all intelligence fled. Taking advantage of the easy access supplied by her surprised intake of breath, Axell indulged in the orange-juice sweetness of Maya’s mouth. When her tongue hesitantly caressed his, Axell nearly tumbled into the bed with her. Lust had damned well never steered his course before. Not in years, anyway.
Light-headed, he shoved his hands against the pillow and reluctantly peeled his mouth from hers. He wanted another sample. He didn’t have that right yet.
Propping himself up with one hand, Axell brushed the wayward strand of purple from her forehead and watched Maya warily. She seemed more bemused than affronted as she stared back at him.
“I’m sorry, I...” Axell halted his automatic apology when Maya’s lips quirked upward and her eyes crinkled in the corners. She had the most damnable way of laughing at him. “I take that back. I’m not sorry in the least,” he said dryly. “And I don’t think I’m ready to hear your comments either.”
“You definitely haven’t lost your Prince Charming status yet,” she admitted. “I’ve been feeling like one of those bedraggled mice Muldoon presents for my approval. Treating me like Cinderella isn’t hurting your cause at all.”
Axell nodded, afraid to admit his overwhelming relief. The next few months would be pure torture, but if she accepted his proposal, he could exist on those amazing kisses for a while. He needed another, just to prove it hadn’t been a fluke, but he knew better than to press his luck.
“Just don’t paint any fairy tales in your head,” he warned, pushing himself upright and out of reach of temptation. “I’m no good at flowers and romantic dinners. I spend twelve- and fourteen-hour days at the restaurant. This is no picnic we’re embarking on.”
The warning helped. As Maya watched Axell stride out, once more the assertive businessman, she understood her place in this “relationship” a little better. She really and truly would be his live-in convenience, someone to keep the children’s schedules organized, to keep his personal life in order, to give him sex on demand. She had a sneaking suspicion she might manage that last, but she already knew she’d be a failure at the rest. Organization was not one of her stronger qualities.
With a tear in her eye from the devastating tenderness of his kiss, she wondered if one out of three would count, because he was offering almost everything she had ever dreamed of, and she had a hard time not believing in her dreams.