The Bachelor Takes A Wife - Jackie Merritt

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and instead of diving into his exercise program, he dawdled around for about ten minutes, then lost interest and went down to his kitchen for some coffee and the morning paper.

      The coffee tasted good but he couldn’t concentrate on the daily news. Frowning slightly he leaned back in his chair and stared off into space. He felt adrift, uncentered, and he didn’t have to wonder why: It was all about anticipation and the knowledge that Andrea would be at the ball.

      For years they had ignored each other, or tried to ignore each other. When something unforeseen and unpreventable brought them together—always briefly—they said hello, but Andrea’s polite voice and unsmiling countenance emitted enough ice to chill to the bone anyone within hearing range. He had to ask himself why he was forcing them to meet again when Andrea had only tried to avoid him. He didn’t doubt that she would be civil at the ball—he’d observed those cool, impeccable manners of hers more than once—but since when had an evening of distant, chilly civility from a woman held any appeal for him?

      Deep down, Keith knew the answer to all of his questions about Andrea. He wanted things to be different between them. He wanted her to talk to him without that famous chill, to look at him and really see him, and to treat him as she once had. Would the ball change anything? Maybe not. Probably not, if he was completely honest about it. But it was an opportunity to spend some time with her.

      Accepting that summation with a knot in his gut, Keith turned his thoughts to the problem of proving Dorian Brady’s guilt. It was frustrating as hell to be certain of something and not be able to come up with enough evidence to take to the police. Mulling it over for at least the tenth time since his last meeting with Sebastian, Rob, Jason and Will, something that had been niggling at Keith abruptly rose to the surface. Getting up from the table, he went to the telephone, took it from its cradle and walked around the room while he dialed a number.

      “Sebastian? I’m glad I caught you. Listen, I’d like to pick up Eric’s computer. I should’ve thought of it before. I know the police checked the computer and so did Rob. He found Eric’s personal journal and that e-mail message and, believe me, I’m not minimizing Rob’s…or the police expert’s…computer abilities, but if there’s one thing I know through and through, it’s computers. There could be more information in disguised or hidden files that everyone thus far has missed. I think I should check it out.”

      Keith’s extremely successful career had been built around computer software, and no one got very far with software unless they understood computer hardware—the nuts and bolts of the machine, so to speak. He could take a computer apart and put it back together in mere minutes. Hell, he could build one from scratch if he had the components on hand. In some cases he could actually create the components. Owens Techware was a well-known and highly respected contributor of technical software the world over.

      “Yes, you’re the logical person to do that,” Sebastian agreed with a spark of excitement in his voice. “You may be on to something, Keith. Pick it up anytime. I had it put in storage.”

      “Great. I’ll come by Wescott Oil sometime today.”

      After hanging up the phone, Keith let Andrea enter his mind again, but only for a few moments. Heaving a sigh because he had never understood himself where Andrea was concerned, he went to take the shower he should have taken earlier.

      The elegant old clubhouse and its immaculate grounds seemed magical on ball night. Hundreds of tiny white lights bedecked shrubbery and trees, and every window in the building glowed with warm, golden light.

      The limousine in which Andrea was riding crept toward the club’s entrance. It was following a long line of luxury cars and limousines that stopped only long enough to dispatch beautifully dressed guests, so it was stop and go, stop and go, for about ten minutes.

      Seated in the limousine’s back seat Andrea drew a long breath rife with disapproval and dissatisfaction. She had accepted being manipulated into attending this year’s ball, but she was adamant about it not happening again under any circumstances. If club members chose to bestow some of their wealth on New Hope again, she was going to weasel out of this duty by hook or by crook. She absolutely hated the club’s insistence on picking her up in a showy limousine. She was not a limousine person, and she felt completely out of place in it.

      This, too, she blamed on Keith Owens. No one would ever convince her that he hadn’t dreamed up this whole scenario just to embarrass her, and, however much she would like to cut him cold tonight, she was going to have to smile and chat and act as though she didn’t resent the air he breathed.

      She had not willingly given Keith the time of day since college, though they ran into each other every so often. Accidental meetings—inevitable in towns the size of Royal, Texas—never failed to unnerve her. Just the sight of Keith raised her blood pressure and made the fine hairs on the back of her neck stand up, a condition she attributed to a mix of extreme tension and dislike. He had, after all, nearly destroyed her that night so long ago. That night when she’d naively expected a marriage proposal, and instead Keith had proposed a business partnership. A business partnership! He’d been full of himself then, and from the little she’d seen of him over the years, he was still full of himself.

      On that particular night she’d been totally crushed and had angrily let him have it, making it clear that she was going to major in education and wanted nothing to do with his business plans. To make matters worse, Keith had derided her choice of careers—teaching—and boasted about his ambitions. Although Keith had made a fortune in computer software, Andrea had felt in her heart that her career rewards as a teacher far exceeded Keith’s. But he would never, ever understand putting joy in one’s personal accomplishments ahead of an ever-increasing bank account.

      Andrea shook her head just as the limousine braked precisely at the club’s main entrance. She disliked these particular trips down memory lane. Usually she had no trouble avoiding these memories in favor of those that gave her pleasure instead of riling emotions that she would rather not poke and prod to life.

      The limo door was opened by a uniformed greeter. Andrea took his outstretched hand and allowed him to assist her from the vehicle. People were everywhere, she saw—going into the club or standing outside to chat. Laughter and conversation mingled with the muted music inside the club and floated out on the evening air. The dress code for the ball was formal, which had once dictated that men wore black. Not these days. There were tuxedoes in many different colors, and the males in attendance were almost as flamboyantly clad as their female companions. The ladies, however, were also gleaming from the exquisite jewelry around their necks, in their hair, on their wrists and fingers, and anywhere else they could attach diamonds, emeralds, pearls and rubies to their person.

      The limousine moved away and another vehicle immediately took its place. Andrea began walking toward the entrance and gasped in surprise when someone took her arm.

      “Good evening,” Keith said, his lips brazenly close to her ear. “I wasn’t sure whether you would arrive alone or with an escort, so I’ve been out here watching for you. Since you’re alone, I’m appointing myself your guide, counselor, escort and buddy for this evening’s festivities.”

      Despite her annoyance, Andrea couldn’t help but register his good looks, which shook her aplomb and irritated her no end. His tuxedo was a wonderful shade of tan that was almost exactly the color of his light-caramel-hued hair. The quirky smile that had captured her heart back in college was still his best feature, although his thickly lashed dark-brown eyes ran a very close second. Admiring and eventually drooling over Keith Owens’s good looks had caused her pain and heartache in her college years. Maturity had provided her with some advantages, thank goodness, one of which was an understanding of just how unimportant good looks really were. She’d figured that out only a few years after college, because the man she’d married had been wonderfully pleasant-looking but not drop-dead handsome, as Keith was. Frankly, everything about Keith galled her, especially his overbearing assumption that he could appoint himself her escort for the evening.

      “I think not,” she said coolly, trying to pull her arm out of his.

      “Think again. It’s only good protocol for

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