The Tempting Mrs. Reilly
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Maureen Child
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12
One
“Ten thousand bucks is a lot of money,” Brian Reilly said and, grabbing his beer, leaned back against the scarred, red Naugahyde bench seat.
“Don’t make plans,” his brother Aidan added quickly as he snatched a tortilla chip from the wooden bowl set in the middle of the table. “You don’t get it all, remember.”
“Yeah,” Connor added. “You have us to share it with.”
“And me,” Liam said with a smile, “to guide you.”
“Don’t I know it.” Brian grinned at his brothers. Liam, the oldest by three years, looked completely at home, sitting in the dimly lit barroom. Not so unusual, unless you took into account the fact that Liam was a priest. But first and foremost, he was a Reilly. And the Reilly brothers were a unit. Now and always.
As the word unit shot through his brain, Brian turned his gaze on the other two men at the table with him. It was like looking into a mirror—twice. The Reilly triplets. Aidan, Brian and Connor. Named alphabetically in order of their appearances, the three of them had been standing together since the moment they took their first steps.
They’d even joined the Marine Corps together, doing their time in boot camp in stoic solidarity. They’d always been there for each other—to give moral support or a kick in the ass—whichever was required at the time.
Now, they were meeting to celebrate a windfall.
Their great-uncle Patrick, himself the last surviving brother of a set of triplets, had died, and having no other relations, he’d left ten thousand dollars to the Reilly triplets. Now all they had to do was figure out how to split the money.
“I say we split it four ways,” Connor said, shooting Liam a glance. “Reilly’s—all for one and one for all.”
Liam grinned. “I’d like to say no thanks,” he admitted. “But, since the church really needs a new roof, I’ll just say, I like how Connor thinks.”
“Twenty-five hundred won’t buy you a new roof,” Aidan said. “Won’t buy much of anything for any of us, really.”
“I’ve been thinking about that, too,” Liam said and looked at each of his brothers. “Why not have a contest? Winner take all?”
Brian felt the zing of competition and knew his brothers felt it, too. Nothing they liked better than competing. Especially against each other. But the quiet smile on Liam’s face warned him that he wasn’t going to like what was coming next. Sure, Liam was a priest, but being a Reilly first, made him tricky. “What kind of contest?” Brian asked.
Liam smiled. “Worried?”
“Hell no,” Aidan put in. “The day a Reilly backs off a challenge is the day when—“
“—when he’s six feet under,” Connor finished for him. “What’ve you got in mind, Liam?”
Their older brother smiled again. “You guys are always talking about commitment and sacrifice, right?”
Brian glanced at his brothers before nodding. “Hell yes. We’re Marines. We’re all about sacrifice. Commitment.”
“Ooh-rah!” Connor and Aidan hooted and high-fived each other.
“Yeah?” Liam leaned back and shifted his gaze between the three other men at the table. “But the fact is, you guys know zip about either.”
Aidan and Connor blustered, but it was Brian who shut them up with a wave of his hand. “Excuse me?”
“Oh, I’m willing to acknowledge your military commitment. God knows I spend enough time praying for the three of you.” His gaze drifted from one to the other of the triplets. “But this is something different. Harder.”
“Harder than going into battle?” Connor took a sip of his beer and leaned back. “Please.”
“Anything you can come up with, we can take,” Aidan said.
“Damn straight,” Brian added.
“Glad to hear it.” Liam leaned his elbows on the tabletop and gazed from one triplet to the next as he lowered his voice. “Because this’ll separate the Marines from the boys.” He paused for effect, then said, “No sex for ninety days.”
Silence dropped down on the table like a rock tossed from heaven.
“Come on,” Connor said, shooting his siblings a look of wild panic.
“No way. Ninety days?” Aidan looked horrified.
Brian listened to the others, but kept his mouth shut, watching his older brother while he waited for the other shoe to drop. He didn’t have long.
“I’m only talking about three months,” Liam said, that wily smile on his face again. “Too hard for you guys? I’ve made that commitment for life.”
Aidan shuddered.
“That’s nuts.” Connor shook his head.
“What’s the matter?” Liam challenged. “Too scared to try?”
“Who the hell wants to try?” Aidan added.
“Three months with no sex? Impossible.” Brian glared at Liam.
“You’re probably right,” the oldest brother said and smiled as he took another long drink of beer. Setting the bottle down onto the tabletop, he cradled it between his palms and said with a shrug, “You’d never make it anyway. None of you. Women have been after you guys since junior high. No way could you last three months.”
“Didn’t say we couldn’t,” Connor muttered.
“Didn’t say we would, either,” Aidan pointed out, just so no one would misunderstand.
“Sure, I understand,” Liam said, shooting each of them a look. “What you’re saying is, that clearly, a priest is way tougher than any Marine.”
There was no way they were going to be able to live with that statement. In a matter of a few seconds, Liam had his deal and the triplets had signed on to the biggest challenge of their lives.
How they’d been sucked into the rest of it, Brian wasn’t able to figure out, even days later. But he was pretty sure that Liam had missed his calling. He should have been a car salesman, not a priest.
“No sex for ninety days,” Brian said, his gaze shifting to each of his brothers in turn. The other two Reilly triplets didn’t look any happier about this than he did. But damned if he could see a way out of it without the three of them coming off looking like wusses. “Loser forfeits his share to the whole.”
“And if you all lose,” Liam added cheerfully, “my church gets the money for a new roof.”
“We won’t lose,” Brian assured him. Not that he was looking forward to a short spate of celibacy, but now that he was in the competition, he was in it to win. Reillys didn’t lose well.
“Glad to hear it,” Liam said. “Then you won’t mind the penalty phase.”
“What penalty?” Brian eyed his older brother warily.
Liam grinned.
“You’ve been planning this, haven’t you?” Connor demanded, leaning his forearms on the table.
“Let’s say I’ve given it some thought.”
“Quite a bit, obviously,” Aidan mused.
Liam nodded. “The church does need a new roof, remember.”
“Uh-huh.” Brian glared at him. “But this isn’t just about a roof, is it? This is about torturing us.”
“Hey,” Liam said with a crooked grin. “I’m the oldest. That’s my job.”
“Always were damn good at it,” Connor murmured.
“Thank you. Now,” Liam said, enjoying himself far too much, “onto the penalty phase. And I’m especially proud of this, by the way. Remember last year, when Captain Gallagher lost that round of golf to Aidan?”
Aidan grinned in fond memory, but Brian’s brain jumped ahead, and realized just where Liam was going with this. “No way.”
“Oh yeah. Gallagher looked so good in his costume, I figure it’s perfect for you guys, too. Losers have to wear coconut bras and hula skirts while riding around the base in a convertible,” Liam said, then added, “on Battle Color day.”
The one day of the year when every dignitary, high-ranking officer and all of their families was on base for ceremonies. Oh yeah. The humiliation would be complete.
Aidan and Connor started arguing instantly, but Brian just watched Liam. When the other two wound down, he said, “Okay, big brother, what’s your stake in this? I don’t see you risking anything, here.”
“Ah, I’m risking that new roof.” Liam picked up his beer again, took another long swallow, then looked at each of his brothers. “My twenty-five hundred is riding on this, too. If one of you guys lasts the whole three months, then he gets all the money. If you all fold, which I suspect is going to happen, then the church gets it all, and the new roof is mine. Ours.” He frowned. “The church’s.”
“And how do you know if we last the three months or not?”
“I’ll take your word for it.” Liam grinned. “You’re a Reilly. We never lie. At least not to each other.”
Brian looked at the mirror images of himself. He got brief, reluctant nods from each of them. Then he turned back to Liam. “You’ve got a deal. When does the challenge start?”
“Tonight.”
“Hey, I’ve got a date with Deb Hannigan tonight,” Connor complained.
“I’m sure she’ll appreciate you being a gentleman,” Liam said, smiling.
“This is gonna suck,” Aidan said tightly.
Brian admitted silently, that Aidan had never been more right. Then he shifted his gaze to each of his brothers and wondered just which of them would be the last Reilly standing.
He fully intended that it would be him.
Tina Coretti Reilly parked her rental car in her grandmother’s driveway, then opened the door and stepped out into the swampy heat of a South Carolina early-summer day.
She instantly felt as though she’d been smacked with a wet, electric blanket. Even in June, the air was thick and heavy, and she knew that by the end of August everyone in town would be praying for cooler weather.
Tiny Baywater, South Carolina, was barely more than a spot on the road outside Beaufort. Ancient, gnarled trees, magnolia, pine and oak, lined the residential streets, and Main Street, where dozens of small businesses hugged the curbs, was the hub of social activity. In Baywater, time seemed to move slower than anywhere else in the South, and that was saying something.
And Tina had missed it all desperately.
She stared up at the wide front porch of the old bungalow and memories rose up inside her so quickly, she nearly choked on them. She’d grown up in this house, raised by her grandmother, after her parents’ death in a car accident.
From the time she was ten years old until five years ago, Baywater had been home. And in her heart, it still was, despite the fact that she now lived on the other side of the country. But California was far away at the moment.
Not far enough away though to block the memory of the conversation she’d had only yesterday.
“Are you insane?”
Tina laughed at her friend Janet’s astonished expression. She couldn’t really blame her. Janet had, after all, been the one to listen whenever Tina complained about her ex-husband.
“Not legally,” Tina quipped.
“You are nuts. You’re volunteering to go back to South Carolina, for God’s sake, in the middle of summer, when the heat’ll probably kill you, not to mention the fact that your ex is there.”
“That’s the main reason I’m going, remember?”
“Yeah,” Janet said, easing her six-months pregnant bulk down until she could sit on the edge of her friend’s desk. “I just don’t think you’ve thought this all through.”
“Sure I have.” Tina sounded confident. She only wished she were. But if she stopped to think about this anymore, she just might change her mind and she didn’t want to.
At twenty-nine years of age, she could hear her biological clock ticking with every breath she took. And it wasn’t getting quieter.
“Look,” she said, staring up into Janet’s worried brown gaze, “I know what I’m doing. Honest.”
Janet shook her head. “I’m just worried,” she admitted, running the flat of her hand across her swollen belly with a loving caress.
Tina’s gaze dropped to follow the motion and she swallowed back a sigh that was becoming all too familiar lately. She wanted kids. She’d always wanted kids. And if she was going to do something about it, then it was time to get serious. “I know you’re worried, but you don’t have to be.”
“Tina, I didn’t meet you until six months after your divorce,” Janet reminded her. “And you were still torn up about it. Now, five years later, you still carry his picture in your wallet.”
Tina winced. “Okay, but it is a great picture.”
“Granted,” Janet agreed. “But what makes you think you can let him back into your life and not suffer again?”
A nugget of hesitation settled in the pit of Tina’s stomach, but she ignored it. “I’m not letting him into my life again. I’m dropping into his life. Then I’m going to drop out again.”
Janet sighed and stood up. “Fine. I can’t talk you out of this. But you’d better call me. A lot.”
“I will. Don’t worry.”
Of course, Janet would worry, Tina told herself as she came back from the memory. If she wasn’t so determined on her own course, maybe she would be worrying, too. Her gaze slid from the front porch to the driveway and the garage and the apartment over that garage.
Maybe, she told herself, Janet was right. Maybe this was a mistake.
But at least she was doing something. For the past five years, she’d felt as though she’d been standing still. Sure, her career was terrific and she had good friends and a nice house. But she didn’t have someone to love. And she needed that. Now, whether she was making the wrong move or not, at least she was moving.
That had to count for something.
“Of course,” she muttered, tearing her gaze from the apartment, “you’re not moving at the moment. And you’ve only got three weeks, Coretti—so don’t waste time.”
Grabbing her luggage from the trunk, she pulled up the handle and rolled the heavy case along the bumpy brick walk leading to the front door. The suitcase thumped against the four wooden steps and the wheels growled against the wide planked front porch.
When she unlocked the front door and stepped inside, Tina stopped in the foyer. The big front room was bright with sunshine streaming through the picture window. The air was cool, thanks to the air-conditioning her grandmother insisted on running even when she wasn’t home and a vase full of lemon-yellow roses scented the room. It was just as she remembered and for a moment or two, Tina just stood there, enjoying the sensation of being home again.
Until the frantic barks and yips cut into her thoughts and reminded her that she wasn’t entirely alone.
Closing the front door, she abandoned her suitcase and walked through the living room, into the kitchen and straight back through the mudroom to the back door.
Here, the noise was deafening. Tina chuckled as she fumbled with the deadbolt. Thumps and scrapes against the outside of the door blended with more high-pitched barking that had the same effect as fingernails scraping across a blackboard.
In self-defense, she whipped open the back door and the noisemakers tumbled in, as though they’d been balanced against the door. Which they probably had been. Instantly, the two little white puffballs leaped at Tina. What felt like dozens of tiny feet with needlelike claws clambered over her legs and feet.
Muddy paw prints decorated the legs of her pale green linen slacks, looking like smudged black lace. The two little dogs tumbled over each other in their quest to be the first one petted. The sniffing and licking continued until Tina gave up trying to calm them down and fell to the floor laughing.
“Okay, you guys, I’m glad to see you, too.” She tried to pet them but they wouldn’t stand still long enough. And, as if sitting on her lap wasn’t nearly good enough, both teacup poodles tried to dig their way inside her, squirming and pushing each other off Tina’s lap.
Muffin and Peaches, one a pale cream color and the other, well, the color of ripe peaches. Nana’s unimaginatively named, unclipped poodles were nuts about women and hated men. Which, Tina thought, put them pretty much in the same boat with a lot of Tina’s friends.
Tina on the other hand, didn’t hate men.
She didn’t even hate the one man she should have.
In fact, that one man was the real reason she’d come back to Baywater.
Oh, Nana had asked her to stay at the house and take care of “her girls” while the older woman and two of her friends were taking a tour of Northern Italy. But the timing of Nana’s trip and Tina’s private epiphany seemed destined by fate. It was as if the universe had grabbed Tina, given her a shake and said Here you go, girl. Go get what you want.
Because as happy as Tina was to do Nana a favor, there’d been another, more important reason for agreeing to come home for two weeks.
She wanted to get pregnant.
And the man she needed to get the job done was living here, over the garage.
Her ex-husband.
Brian Reilly.
