Carole Mortimer - To Be A Husband

He chuckled. ‘You should have seen your face when Jarrett walked in!’

‘I can imagine.’ She groaned her embarrassment. ‘Hopefully everyone will have forgotten about it by the time I go back on duty!’

‘You won’t be at the clinic tomorrow?’

Gaye shook her head, her hair moving silkily about her shoulders. ‘I have two days off now.’

Damn! He had thought, had depended on the fact that he would at least be able to see her at the clinic when he visited Abbie. And Gaye had very neatly avoided answering him about the cup of tea!

He gave a frustrated sigh, lightly grasping the tops of her arms. ‘You’re an infuriating woman, Gaye Royal.’

She gave a rueful quirk of her lips. ‘So I’ve been told—Jonathan Hunter.’ She released herself, turning and walking down the gravel driveway to the large, imposing house, without so much as glancing back at him to see if he still watched her.

Somehow Jonathan sensed a reluctance there, felt that this was the last place she wanted to be. Who waited for her behind that huge oak front door?

And who else had told her she was an infuriating woman...? It sounded like something a lover might say. Yet she had told him she didn’t have one...

There was so much about Gaye Royal that he either didn’t know or didn’t understand.

But, whether she liked it or not, he intended finding out!

CHAPTER THREE

JONATHAN HUNTER made Gaye nervous.

Her two days off duty had been more fraught than they usually were, mainly because she had lived in dread of the doorbell ringing, and opening the door to find him standing on the doorstep. He hadn’t seemed to her like a man who would accept no for an answer, especially where a woman was concerned. She doubted he had had to very often!

But the doorbell had remained silent. As had the telephone. No one came to the house any more; the telephone calls had ceased long ago. The fickleness of humanity. But, for all his lazy charm, she hadn’t received the impression that Jonathan Hunter was a fickle man...

Which made his silence over the last two days doubly nerve-racking! He had been so persistent in trying to get her to go out with him that the silence that had followed her refusal seemed alive with tension.

However, the doorbell hadn’t rung, and she hadn’t opened the door to find Jonathan Hunter standing there, and by the time she left the house for work this morning she was feeling strangely irritable. It didn’t help that the first patient she had to attend to was Abbie Hunter. Or that her arrogant husband was with her.

The other woman was beautiful. Not only that, but she was warm and friendly too. She was also so obviously happy in her marriage. Frankly, Jarrett’s aloof manner made Gaye feel as nervous as his brother did, but for different reasons. The golden eyes, which all of the Hunter brothers had, seemed to look at her and see beyond her own cool veneer to the vulnerable woman beneath.

Jarrett Hunter stood up at Gaye’s entrance. ‘I’ll leave you two ladies to chat,’ he announced smoothly before bending to kiss his wife and baby son goodbye. ‘I’ll be back this afternoon,’ he told his wife huskily. ‘See you later, Gaye,’ he said before leaving.

Gaye stared after him; he had known her name! And she could think of only one source...

Abbie laughed softly as she watched her. ‘They’re very close, these Hunter men. But also very loyal,’ she added gently.

Gaye swallowed hard, forcing a bright smile to her lips as she held up the bouquet of flowers she was delivering. ‘Roses,’ she announced lightly. Although, looking at the room already filled with flowers, it was difficult to know where they were going to go!

Abbie took the flowers, although she made no move to read the card attached to them, still looking up at Gaye. ‘Did you enjoy your days off?’ she enquired. ‘Did you do anything exciting?’ she added mischievously.

Gaye thought of those two days off, of the usual routine, the strain of always having to be cheerful. ‘No,’ she answered flatly.

The other woman raised dark brows. ‘No—you didn’t enjoy your days off, or no—you didn’t do anything exciting?’

No—to both questions! Life had taken a strange turn two years ago, and despite all her efforts she had no idea how to turn it back again. One thing she was certain of: becoming involved with the Hunter family would only make things more complicated!

‘I didn’t do anything exciting,’ she answered tonelessly.

‘Oh.’ Abbie looked perplexed. ‘Jonathan seemed to think you had a very busy two days ahead of you.’

Jonathan Hunter hadn’t thought any such thing. He had been told precisely why she wouldn’t go out with him—and it had nothing to do with being too busy!

‘Jonathan was mistaken,’ Gaye said with a ghost of a smile curving her lips, almost—although not quite—sure this beautiful woman knew exactly what had happened between herself and Jonathan.

‘He should be in later today,’ Abbie said casually.

Gaye kept her expression deliberately bland, at the same time making a mental note to make sure she was busily ensconced in a store cupboard or something when he arrived. ‘That will be nice for you,’ she answered noncommittally.

The other woman burst out laughing, a sound of pure enjoyment. ‘I’m sorry, Gaye,’ she chuckled as she sobered a little. ‘It was just that you reminded me of someone else just now. Me,’ she supplied at Gaye’s questioning look. ‘Two years ago, when I was beating an equally hasty retreat from Jarrett’s bombardment. And look what happened to me!’ She grinned happily, obviously completely content with what had ‘happened’ to her.

Gaye shook her head. ‘The situation is hardly the same,’ she dismissed, knowing a little about Abbie’s life before she married Jarrett Hunter. She had been a successful model, and then the wife, and widow, of wealthy Daniel Sutherland; apart from the fact that Gaye’s parents had been quite well-off, the two of them had very little in common.

What about the Hunter men? crept in a small, betraying voice.

No, not even them, she told herself decidedly. She wanted her life left exactly as it had always been, well out of the limelight, away from the public eye.

‘It could be,’ Abbie told her softly.

‘I don’t think so.’ Abbie would be discharged in the next day or so, and then Gaye wouldn’t have to make a point of making herself scarce when Jonathan Hunter was around... ‘I have to get on,’ she replied briskly. ‘Please ring if there’s anything else you want. I’m sure—’

‘Next to Jarrett, Jonathan is my favourite man,’ Abbie told her huskily.

Gaye turned to her. ‘I’m sure he’s very nice,’ she answered guardedly.

The other woman slowly got up from her chair placed near the window. ‘He’s more than just nice, Gaye. He—’

‘Talking about me again, Abbie?’ The youngest Hunter brother bounced into the room, golden eyes alight as he placed a kiss on Abbie’s cheek before turning to grin at Gaye. ‘Is she telling you how she jilted me in order to marry my big brother?’ he said devilishly. ‘She promised to be the mother of my children, and then—’

‘I promised to be godmother to your children,’ his sister-in-law corrected him dryly. ‘When you have any, that is! And stop telling Gaye such nonsense, Jordan, or she’ll think the whole family is mad!’ She shook her head reprovingly.

Not mad, exactly, but they were certainly a family few could ignore. Even if one tried very hard!

‘Take my advice and stay well away from Jordan, Gaye,’ Abbie told her with an affectionate grin at the man she spoke of. ‘He’s the breaker of hearts in this family.’

‘So it was Jonathan’s virtues you were extolling,’ Jordan realised mock-disgustedly. ‘Gaye, I could tell you a few things about my brother Jonathan that would—’

‘Did I hear my name being mentioned in vain?’ Jonathan drawled as he strolled into the room, smiling a greeting at Abbie before turning the full force of his gaze onto Gaye.

She could feel the hot colour enter her cheeks as she stared back at him, tall and handsome in the tailored suit and pale blue shirt. When Abbie had said Jonathan would be in later, she hadn’t realised the other woman meant almost immediately! But by the too innocent expression on Abbie’s face as Gaye glanced at her Gaye realised she had known only too well that Jonathan’s arrival was imminent. Was that the reason she had kept Gaye talking... ?

This family wasn’t just unforgettable; they were also dangerous. All of them!

‘I shouldn’t listen to anything Jordan has to say, on any subject, if I were you, Gaye,’ Jonathan told her merrily. ‘It’s inevitably suspect.’

‘That’s all the thanks I get for delaying Gaye’s departure until you had parked the car,’ Jordan muttered, his irritated tone belied by the mischievous twinkle in his eyes.

A family conspiracy! Gaye had thought she might have been being fanciful where Abbie Hunter was concerned, but as the other woman gave her an apologetic smile she knew her first suspicion had been correct. This family certainly wasn’t mad!

Just what had Jonathan told them about her for them all to be behaving this way...?

‘Remind me to thank you for that later, Jordan,’ Jonathan rasped, giving his brother a narrow-eyed look of warning before turning back to Gaye. ‘Have you had a good two days off?’ His tone softened as he spoke to her.

‘Busy,’ she bit out abruptly, challengingly; after all, wasn’t that what he had told his relatives?

She felt sure that, under normal circumstances, Jonathan’s family wouldn’t even have been aware of her existence; she would just have been a woman he’d asked to go out with him and had turned him down. She was sure his family didn’t usually get to hear about his rejections! Or, perhaps, it had never happened before...?

Men like Jonathan Hunter were rare, she acknowledged: handsome, charming, self-confident, incredibly rich, and, best of all, still single. Most women wouldn’t have turned down an invitation from him! But she had her reasons, very good ones, and no amount of cajoling from either Jonathan or his family would change her mind.

Although, she had to admit, being around the Hunter family certainly kept one on one’s toes!

‘It gets easier,’ Abbie assured her gently, seeming to sense Gaye’s mental turmoil.

Gaye had no intention of staying around long enough to find out! ‘For your sake, I sincerely hope so,’ she returned with feeling. Thank goodness, for her own sake, Abbie Hunter would be discharged from the clinic soon. ‘I’ll leave you now to talk with your two visitors,’ Gaye added, keeping her gaze firmly averted from Jonathan as she knew he continued to watch her with those enigmatic golden eyes.

He did make her nervous. There was about him the same air of self-confident stillness she had sensed earlier in Jarrett Hunter, a quiet determination that ensured he arrived at wherever it was he wanted to go. As she looked at him now, the forceful glint in his eyes seemed to imply that the silence of the last two days had merely been a pause, not an end, in his pursuit—

She was being fanciful now. He had asked her out, she had refused; that was the end of his pursuit. There were too many women out there willing to say yes for Jonathan Hunter to bother with the ones who said no.

She felt a heavy weight settle inside her, and knew it was the responsibility she carried around with her. Always...

‘Try not to tire yourself out,’ she advised Abbie before turning sharply on her heels and leaving the room, aware that she was once again very close to tears. What was it about Jonathan Hunter that affected her in this way?