Free Kissing Maggie Silver by Sheila Claydon Page A

in control as he returned her smile, pushing all thoughts of how kind he had actually been to her right out of her mind. And she would have managed to maintain her cool demeanor if he hadn’t bent down and kissed the children goodnight and then angled his face to hers, smiled deep into her eyes, and kissed her cheek.
    “Until tomorrow then,” he said.
    “Until tomorrow,” she agreed, hoping he hadn’t noticed a sudden shakiness in her voice, and then she kept her back towards the bathroom door so she wouldn’t have to watch him walk away. Time enough for that when he goes for good, she told herself, pressing her fingers to where his kiss lingered on her cheek.
     
    * * *
     
    As Maggie had anticipated, Mark arrived home mid-evening, tired and disheveled but much happier and very talkative.
    “He’s coming out of the incubator tomorrow,” he told her. “And then June will be able to feed him. The doc says that because he’s such a good weight, and really strong, he’s making a faster recovery than they anticipated. He is pretty sure everything is going to be fine…”
    Maggie let him talk on, only half listening as she busied herself in the kitchen, determined to ge t some proper food into him now he could eat without worrying about his new son. As she weighed out pasta and then chopped garlic and tomatoes, her mind made its inevitable circle back to Ruairi.
    How would he have reacted if it had been his son? Did he even want a son? Despite being sure he was just sticking around out of a sense of duty, she had to acknowledge he was good with children, even seemed to like them. The feeling appeared to be mutual too, if Sophie and Amy were anything to go by. They had hung onto his hands chattering nineteen-to-the-dozen as they walked along, and they had clambered willingly up onto his shoulders whenever they got the chance.
    She was draining the pasta when she suddenly remembered Johanna, the tall, slim, blonde who was shortly to fly in from New Zealand. She put the saucepan down with a bang. How could she have forgotten her? It was obvious she was the person Ruairi thought of when he thought about his future; why else would he have gone to so much trouble to find her an apartment? Johanna had to be the woman who would eventually give him children and turn him into a family man instead of a rover.
    “Mark…food’s on the table,” she deliberately pushed the painful thoughts of Ruairi and Johanna to the back of her mind as she called to her brother, who, after pouring out all his hopes and fears to her, had taken himself off to the study to telephone the rest of the family.
    He came when she called him even though the phone was still clamped to his ear. “I promise you everything’s fine,” he was saying. “No! No! You certainly do not need to return home. Maggie has everything under control and Ruairi is helping out too, and Mrs. O’Connor. Everything is fine Mum. Just enjoy the cruise and tell Dad to order some champagne so you can both wet your new grandson’s head.”
    He grinned at Maggie as he cut the connection. “Thank goodness I was able to give her good news. I don’t want to think about what she might have done if the baby was really sick.”
    “Me neither,” Maggie placed a bowl of pasta in front of him as well as a small dish of grated Parmesan cheese.
    “Thanks sis, this looks great,” he tucked in hungrily. Then he looked at her. “Aren’t you having some too?”
    “No…I’m not…I mean I ate earlier,” Maggie stretched the truth to breaking point because she had no intention of telling him she wasn’t hungry and that she didn’t ever expect to feel hungry again, at least not while Ruairi O’Connor was anywhere near the vicinity of her heart.
     
    * * *
     
    When Maggie awoke the following morning she discovered Amy and rabbit had already joined her while Sophie was rooting through the pile of books she had left on the floor beside the bed the previous day.
    “More stories,”