The Rebel (The Millionaire Malones Book 3) Read online

  She asked herself the question once again: what if Cooper had chosen her that night?

  She turned on her side and shoved her face into her pillow. It was no use going back, she knew that. Things happened because they happened. And maybe she hadn’t ended up with Cooper then was because Evan needed a father. Cooper was that person to him, always had been and, in the years since, he’d been the man of the family without being the man in her bed. Oh, the universe worked in mysterious ways.

  Which was exactly how she wanted it, right?

  *

  Hours later, half asleep, Maggie tossed and turned and gave in to being awake. She felt the familiar pressure in her stomach and groaned. Since having Evan, her bladder had never been the same. She glared at her bedside clock, one eye barely open. Of course it was three a.m. On autopilot, she pulled herself upright, planted her feet on the rug and shuffled to the bathroom. Every morning, three a.m. It was such a habit now that she could almost do it in her sleep. No lights necessary, she knew her way around her compact house, illuminated by the glow of moonlight through the open curtains and Evan’s night light spilling dimly into the hallway.

  Pee, don’t flush in case it wakes Evan, and tiptoe back to her bed. She passed the spill of light from Evan’s room, turned left, crossed the room, felt the familiar shag pile of her rug under her feet, turned back the sheets, climbed in, and fell back to sleep in seconds.

  Chapter Five

  ‡

  Maggie slowly came to life, limb by limb, breath by breath, one eye blinking open, then the other. It was hard to rouse from her sleep. She’d never been a morning person, although she’d been forced to be one since Evan was born. Once, in a fit of sleep-deprived madness, she’d attempted to add up all the hours of sleep she’d lost since becoming a mom and finally gave up in sheer exhaustion. All she knew right now was that she was awake and, judging by the silence in the house, her son wasn’t.

  And that was bliss.

  Was it Saturday? Yeah, it was Saturday. And Saturday meant no school and no client work, just hanging out with Evan. The forecast was for a clear, warm day so maybe they’d walk down to Del Mar to grab some lunch and then walk along the pier. But for now, sleep. Maggie yawned and indulged in the sleepy and luxuriously decadent feeling of having time to herself. She turned onto her back and splayed out her arms like a starfish.

  Her right hand hit something hard.

  Had Evan left a toy on her bed?

  Had she left a toy in her bed? No, her vibrator was safely tucked away in her walk-in robe.

  Her heart began to pound when she realised what the hard thing was.

  It was muscle and man.

  Maggie turned her head to the right. It was a big, blond hulk of a man, still asleep.

  And now she was wide awake. Shit shit shit.

  She must have climbed into her bed by mistake in the middle of the night. Damn her middle of the night bladder.

  She checked again. Cooper was on his side and facing her, his slumberous eyes closed and his full mouth relaxed. She could hear his soft breathing and hoped he was still out to it enough that he wouldn’t wake when she got out of bed. She took one last look. Half uncovered, his broad chest was on full display and one muscled arm lay loose in the space between them. He really was a fantastic looking specimen. If someone were designing a man from scratch, he would pretty much look like Cooper Malone. Tall, broad-shouldered, strong without being a muscle man. His sun-bleached hair, his tanned face and his strong jaw always reminded her of the way he’d looked the night they’d first met.

  Stop it, she told herself.

  If Cooper caught her out, his teasing would go on for years. Maggie slowly turned, trying not to tug at the sheet covering them, inching across the mattress to the side, hoping her movements didn’t wake him. She was about to push herself up to sitting when her son appeared at her open bedroom door.

  ‘Wait, Evan, you—’ She held out a hand to stop him.

  Too late. When Evan saw the sleeping form of Cooper next to her, her son transformed from half asleep to wide awake in a millisecond.

  ‘Cooper Cooper Cooper!’ Evan ran to the bed and drummed his palms on the mattress. And before Maggie could say another word, to shush him, or even to get out of bed herself, Evan had begun climbing over her to get in the middle between her and Cooper.

  ‘Whoa, wait a minute, matey.’

  Damn it. Cooper was awake, but barely, judging by that gravelly early-morning rasp.

  ‘Hey, Cooper Cooper Cooper. Can I get in there?’ Evan pointed to the gap. And then, in a flash, before her wiggle worm of a five-year-old son could manoeuvre his way into the space, Cooper’s strong arm reached for Maggie like a slingshot and he pulled her backwards. Her back slammed up against his chest. His arm was strong and tight around her, his forearm crushing her breasts underneath it, his shoulder curved in a protective pose around hers, and her butt had become wedged in the curve where his thighs met his hips.

  In the curve where his hard as a rock cock was pulsing against her.

  Her eyes flashed wide open in shock and awareness and, damn it all, pure womanly desire.

  She acted with warp-speed motherly instinct. ‘Evan,’ she managed to say in a calm voice, although she sure as hell didn’t know where it had come from. ‘Why don’t you go to your room and get your dinosaur book and I’ll read that to you?’

  ‘Cool!’ Evan jumped off her bed with a superhero leap and ran to his room.

  Maggie jerked herself out of Cooper’s grasp and leapt out of bed with a superhero leap all of her own. She stomped to the door and buttressed herself against it so Evan couldn’t get back in.

  ‘What the hell?’ she stammered. Her breath was hard and fast and she wondered why the short distance from the bed to the door was enough to make her breathless.

  Cooper had prised himself up on his elbows and was looking at her through squinting eyes. ‘What the hell yourself? I thought you were sleeping on the sofa bed?’

  ‘I was. I am. I got up in the night to go to the bathroom and I guess I was on autopilot and I forgot you were here and I … I just got back in like I’ve done a million times.’

  ‘I guess you did.’ He really did look half asleep. His blond hair was mussed and sticking up and his eyes were still drowsily half-closed. The sheet had slipped down to his hips. She’d seen him in board shorts a million times. So he had muscles and a tan. Big deal. But it was what was under the loose sheet that caught her attention. The tent pole happening right there. She tried not to look. Hell, she looked. People could camp under that thing.

  ‘Maggie?’ He looked at her across the room, his gaze direct. She blinked. The way he said her name, the sight of his cock … stop it. She couldn’t think like this. She lifted her gaze to meet his face and saw his lips were beginning to curl in a smile.

  ‘You could have warned me,’ she whispered fiercely.

  He looked down at the tent. ‘You mean the dawn horn?’ He shrugged, grinning now. ‘I’m a man. It’s what happens. I know it’s been a long time for you, Maggie Mac but it’s basic biology.’

  Cooper’s morning voice sounded rough and sexy. She didn’t want to hear it. ‘Oh, that’s hilarious.’

  He raised an eyebrow at her. ‘Don’t take it personally.’

  She chuckled. ‘You think I think that’s for me?’

  ‘Do you?’

  ‘Not for a second,’ Maggie whispered.

  ‘Believe me, it’s not,’ Cooper said with a determined head shake.

  ‘Good,’ she said.

  ‘Good.’

  ‘I’m glad that’s clear.’

  ‘Me too. Clear as a bell.’ Cooper swiped a hand over his eyes. From across the room, his gaze dropped from her tight-lipped expression to her skimpy panties and the worn and loose camisole top. She glanced down and realised it was gaping under her arms and God, oh God, her nipples had budded like headlights.

  She met his eyes and flat out lied. ‘They’re not for you, if th
at’s what you’re thinking.’

  ‘Not for a second,’ he replied, his expression dark.

  ‘Look.’ She took a deep breath in the hope it would settle her jangling nerves. ‘You’ve got to get out of bed,’ Maggie gestured. ‘Evan’s coming back.’

  Cooper didn’t move. ‘Even if I could move, I’m not going anywhere for a few minutes.’

  ‘You think this is a joke?’

  He let out a frustrated sigh. ‘That biology thing I was talking about? It ain’t going anywhere with you standing there dressed like that.’

  ‘Mommy?’ Evan banged on her door. ‘I’ve got the dinosaur book.’

  ‘Coming, sweetie,’ Maggie answered, but it was a long moment before Maggie moved. Her breath was fast and tight in her chest and the way Cooper was looking at her right now, it was the least friendly thing they’d ever shared.

  She closed the door behind her with a loud bang.

  *

  Holy shit.

  Cooper flopped back down on Maggie’s soft and girly pillows and covered his eyes with a forearm, trying not only to block out the light but to erase the image of her standing there all-but naked. He’d seen her in a bikini a million times and that had been hard enough to bear, but this was different. He’d never been naked with a hard-on that could crack rocks when she was across the room barely dressed. Sleepy-eyed. Hair messy. Drowsy looking. And if he thought that seeing his friend dressed like that and looking like that would see his erection deflating like a pricked balloon, he’d clearly been wrong.

  You can’t think this way.

  He blinked his eyes closed, trying to erase the memory of how it had felt to have her tight up against him. It was an exquisite pressure that had made him harder and it had felt so good that for a minute there he’d forgotten who she was. Grabbing her and pulling her that close had been a purely defensive move, seeing her son was about to leap onto the bed in a single bound like a little Superman. He had no choice. And he’d liked it. Or at least his dick had, judging by the insistent throb he was still feeling right down into his balls.

  He couldn’t feel that way about Maggie Mac. They were friends and he’d liked it that way for a good long time. What they had was uncomplicated and easy. Sure, she was beautiful. Sure, he’d wanted her from the first time he’d seen her across that crowded Bali bar. But Vance had moved in first and changed everything. Cooper had been determined to be a father to Evan and a friend to Maggie, and he’d done that. It had half killed him to keep that distance, but he’d done it. He’d made a vow when Evan was still safely inside Maggie, and he wouldn’t break it.

  She’d created something real and solid here with Evan, something that he’d never had but had always wanted in his life. But it was impossible. His life was out on the waves and on the road. It was in a million places: planes, cabs and mini-buses and remote beaches and crowds and the media. And sometimes, not enough times, it was out in the water with the breeze on his back and the sun in his eyes. He could be a visitor to their life, but he couldn’t be a part of it. And that realisation hurt.

  Despite their history, her softness, the fit of her curves against him, the way her nipples had pebbled when she was guarding the door, that was a place they could never go.

  *

  Once Maggie had read the dinosaur book to Evan three times, he settled. She managed to convince him that Cooper needed to rest and that she would decide when Evan could go in and play with Cooper. She made her son some breakfast and then left him in his room, playing happily with his toy dinosaurs, while she took a shower.

  Standing under the warm and soothing spray of the water, she finally had time to process what had just happened. It wasn’t as if she was unfamiliar with Cooper’s body. She’d been up close and personal with Cooper Malone. Loads of times. They’d hugged over the years, in the way friends do, quick and tight, with collegiate pats on the back. He may have held her longer on a few occasions, on those days when everything about her single-parent life had come at her like a flood and overwhelmed her. The point was, she knew he was strong, and it was no surprise he was tanned given all the time he spent out in the water. And anyway, she could see bodies like his every day down at the beach if she wanted. San Clemente’s surf beaches, The Trestles, were a haven for surfers from all over the area. And this was Southern California, for God’s sake. It was filled with beautiful people.

  His body wasn’t a surprise to her.

  But the size and strength of his cock was.

  It was … it was just … totally unexpected.

  She sighed. It was only natural that she was thinking about it. She was a woman who hadn’t been anywhere near that part of a man’s body—or anywhere near a man for that matter—since Evan was conceived.

  ‘You’re a freak,’ she told herself, ‘You know that?’ She shook her head at the ridiculousness of her predicament. It wasn’t that she didn’t like sex. She loved sex. If she could remember it. Six years without sex. It hadn’t been anything she’d planned in advance, as if she’d been saving herself for some mythical perfect man. Time had just slipped by, month after month, year after year, until suddenly here she was, a single mom and a born-again virgin. Maggie closed her eyes and rested her forehead against the tile, savouring the warm throb of the water on her skin. She’d probably forgotten how to do it. Her body probably wouldn’t know how to react if she had the chance to have sex.

  Oh, that was such a lie.

  Her body would know exactly what to do and it was doing it right this second. Her nipples were budded and hard, aching and tight, and she pressed her palms flat against them to stop the throbbing. And down in her sex? Well. Fireworks were exploding down there.

  And it was all Cooper’s fault. Because the way he’d looked at her back in the bedroom, when she was pushed up against the door, her nipples on high alert and with side-boob happening? That wasn’t a friendly look at all.

  She wanted to enjoy it, the way his burning look had made her feel, but she couldn’t let herself hold on to it. That was too dangerous. She’d put her regrets about Cooper away in the back of her brain years ago. She couldn’t long for Cooper. She had to find a man who was solid, grounded. A man from San Clemente, or maybe from Orange County, who was dependable and reliable.

  What she needed, more than anything, was a man who would stay.

  Chapter Six

  ‡

  After her shower, Maggie felt antsy. Parts of her were still traitorously throbbing as she pulled on knee-length shorts, a plain cotton bra, and her baggy Foo Fighters T-shirt. If she wanted to stop the firecrackers, she needed to dress down. Way down.

  When she turned the corner from her short hallway into the kitchen, the two most important men in her life looked up at her. Something about the view took her breath away.

  ‘Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!’ Evan called. ‘Come and see!’ He had a tea towel tied around his little waist and he was standing on a chair at the kitchen table. As he spoke, he flicked his wooden spoon in the air and a dollop of whatever he was mixing hit his instructor, who was sitting on a chair next to him.

  Cooper squinted and a hand flew to his eye. ‘Ow.’

  Maggie smothered a laugh.

  ‘We’re making pancakes, Mommy!’

  She approached, rolling her lips in to stifle a giggle. Cooper had grabbed a corner of Evan’s makeshift apron and was wiping his face. When he was done, he looked up at her and smiled.

  She felt the tension leave her tight chest. It was the old Cooper. She had to remember that he was her friend, first and foremost. The world settled back on its axis. Things were right with the world. Good. That was very good.

  ‘Pancakes sound delicious,’ she said as she wrapped her arms around Evan. ‘Can I have one?’

  *

  Saturday went by in a flash. After the delicious pancake breakfast, Cooper had offered to sit with Evan and watch cartoons—he’d tried to convince her it was an enormous sacrifice—while Maggie had run some errands and shopped at the groc
ery store. When she’d come home, she’d found Evan eating lunch—another thing Cooper had taken care of—so she’d hit the computer for a couple of hours. She didn’t normally work on the weekends but, given she’d lost valuable time that week being with Cooper in hospital, she had to make up some hours for a couple of clients. Maggie liked to be diligent and hand in work on time. Her reputation was everything and, safe in the knowledge that Evan was completely enthralled with Cooper’s choice of entertainment, she burrowed herself away in her office slash bedroom and worked. And she worked carefully and fast. She’d had no other choice being a single mom who worked from home. On weekdays, once Evan was in school, she rarely stopped for lunch. She didn’t have the safety net of another income earner in the house so she worked. And then picked up Evan and came home and shrugged off her accountant persona and became his mom. It wasn’t the life she’d expected but she loved her son and she loved her life with him.

  Her phone rang. It was her mom. She loved her mom to bits, too. She leaned back in her chair and pressed her phone to her ear. ‘Hey there.’

  ‘Hello, darling. How’s everything there at General Hospital?’

  Maggie laughed. ‘I take it you mean with my patient?’

  ‘Of course. Has he asked you to give him a sponge bath yet?’

  ‘Mom!’ Maggie spluttered and tried to hear the joke in the words but her cheeks flamed. They wouldn’t normally redden after such a raucous comment from her mother—neither of them were prudish—but the thought of Cooper and a sponge bath made her think about him being naked and wet and then she had a flash of how it had felt to be in his arms, the warmth and the shock of how good it felt, the tremor of her heartbeat while she stood there barely dressed, with his eyes on her breasts.

  Maggie pulled herself back from the memory. ‘What are you up to today?’

  ‘Well, I figured you might need a night off after looking after two boys for a couple of days. Would you like me to have Evan over here for a sleepover tonight? I thought I might make pizzas and then take him to the Farmer’s Market tomorrow morning. We could pick up some things for lunch and then come home and share it all with you. How does that sound?’