Expecting at Christmas by Charlotte Maclay

Author:Charlotte Maclay
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2011-05-30T00:00:00+00:00

The parking lot at the Santa Monica store was nearly empty when Loretta pulled her Datsun into a slot. She turned off the key, and the car coughed twice before shuddering into silence.

“Here we are,” she said brightly. “See, my car got us here just fine.”

“If you don’t count the two times the engine died, one of which was in the middle of the busiest intersection in town. We’re lucky we weren’t killed by that trucker you blocked.”

“Oh, pooh.” She waved off his complaint as unimportant. “The poor man was probably just having a bad day. He didn’t mean all those nasty things he said.”

“Trust me, Loretta. Guys with that many tattoos and arms like beer kegs mean every word they say.”

“You forget my brother Marco has tattoos, and he doesn’t intimidate me a bit.” Grinning, she squeezed out from behind the wheel and stood.

Using her car had been part of her incognito plan. To go along with her scheme, Griffin had worn ragged cutoffs that displayed well-muscled legs roughened by pecan-brown hair. His gray T-shirt was shorn above the waist and the sleeves were ripped out; he’d intentionally mussed his hair and neglected to shave, leaving whisker stubble on his cheeks. The unkempt combination made him look like the world’s sexiest beach bum. Which had seemed to irritate that truck driver no end.

In contrast, her simple maternity dress made her look as though she bought her wardrobe from a tent maker. Fortunately that same truck driver had a soft spot in his heart for pregnant women or they might have been faced with an eighteen-wheeler rolling over the top of her tiny Datsun instead of having the man gently push them by hand out of the intersection.

She swallowed hard as they walked up the steps into the Compuware store. The way she looked, little wonder Griffin hadn’t wanted to pretend to be her husband. She was as big as a house and waddled like an overfed elephant. As far as she could tell, his type of woman was long, lanky and elegant, something she’d never been, even on her best days.

Pity the health food industry didn’t have a cure for short and stumpy.

He held open the door for her as they entered the store. Red, white and green metallic crepe paper streamers looped across the room, and big red bows were tied around stacked boxes of mock merchandise to create a holiday atmosphere. In the background, Christmas carols played over the in-store music system.

Racks of computer games, software manuals and computer accessories were located up front near the cash registers. The display computers, monitors and printers were in the back; expensive laptops were stored in locked glass cabinets along a side wall to protect against shoplifting. But the hoped-for hordes of customers were missing.

Loretta and Griffin wandered toward the back of the store. Her hand accidentally brushed his, sending a warm spiral of awareness up her arm. He was an amazingly virile man, and whether he was dressed in a suit or in cutoffs it made little difference.

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