Adam gazed at her in puzzlement. "Is that true?"

Candace adjusted an earring. "Couldn't you have found something catchier?"

"I don't remember hearing about this," Doug said.

"Neither do I." Chet set down his coffee cup. "Nobody tells me anything."

"I told you," Kate replied tartly. "Unfortunately, I didn't have it announced on the Golf Channel."

"What kind of company?" Lucille said.

While Adam explained that his sister was a matchmaker, Doug pulled out his BlackBerry. "I'm sure it didn't occur to you to investigate trademark protection."

Heath realized he was losing them, and he turned up the volume. "The point is… Until I met Annabelle, I thought I had my life figured out, but it didn't take her long to point out that I'd made some serious errors in my calculations."

Kate winced. "Oh, dear. I know she's not always tactful, but she means well."

Annabelle picked up Adam's wrist and looked at his watch. Heath wished she had a little more trust. "I know everyone here recognizes how special Annabelle is," he said, "but I haven't known her as long, and it took me a while to figure it out."

Annabelle went after a gravy spot on the tablecloth.

"Just because I was slow to catch on," he said, "doesn't mean I'm stupid. I recognize quality when I see it, and Annabelle is an amazing woman." Now he had her full attention, and he got that familiar adrenaline rush that signaled the final moments before he closed on a deal. "I know today is your birthday, sweetheart, and that means you should be the one getting the present instead of me, but I'm feeling greedy." He turned, first to one end of the table, and then to the other. "Chet, Kate, I'd like to ask permission to marry your daughter."

Shocked silence fell over the room. A candle sputtered. A spoon clattered against a dish. Annabelle sat frozen while the rest of her family gradually came back to life.

"Why would you want to marry Annabelle?" Candace wailed.

"But I thought you were-"

"Oh, sweetheart…"

"Marry her?"

"Our Annabelle?"

"She never said anything about-"

Kate dove for her tissues. "This is the happiest moment of my life."

"Permission granted, Champion."

Grinning, Doug reached across the table to poke his mother. "Make it a Christmas wedding before he realizes what he's gotten into and changes his mind."

Heath stayed focused on Annabelle, giving her time to adjust. Her lips formed a lopsided oval; her eyes turned into puddles of spilled honey… And then her eyebrows slammed together. "What are you talking about?"

At the very least, he'd expected a joyous gasp. "I want to marry you," he said again.

Her frown grew more ominous, and he found himself remembering Annabelle seldom did what he expected, something he should possibly have recalled before he'd stood up.

"And when did you have this magical revelation?" she asked. "No, let me guess. Tonight after you met my family."

"Wrong." Here, at least, he was on solid ground.

"Then when?"

"Last weekend, at the party."

Disbelief shone in her eyes. "Why didn't you say something then?"

Too late, he realized he should have stuck with his original plan, but he refused to let himself panic. Always meet strength with strength. "I'd only broken up with Delaney a few hours earlier. It seemed a little premature."

"This whole thing seems a little premature."

Kate braced her hand on the tablecloth. "Annabelle, you're being peevish."

"That doesn't begin to describe how I feel." He winced as Annabelle shot up from her chair. "Did anybody hear him mention the L-word? Because I sure didn't."

Just like that, she'd cornered him. Had he really thought she wouldn't notice? Was that why he'd decided to do this in front of her family? He began to sweat. If he didn't handle this exactly right, the whole deal would collapse around him. He knew what he had to do, but at the precise moment when he most needed to keep his head, he lost it. "I hired the Northwestern marching band?"

Stunned silence greeted this revelation.

He'd made himself look like an ass. Annabelle shook her head with a quiet dignity that unnerved him. "You have lost your mind. I only wish you could have done it privately."

"Annabelle!" Kate's neck was turning red. "Just because Heath doesn't want to air his most intimate feelings in front of virtual strangers doesn't mean he's not in love with you. How could anybody not love you?"

Annabelle kept her eyes locked with his. "Here's what I've learned about pythons, Mother. Sometimes it's more important to pay attention to what they don't say than to what they do."

Kate came to her feet. "You're too upset to discuss this now. Heath is a wonderful man. Just look at the way he fits in. Wait until tomorrow when you've had a chance to cool down, and then the two of you can talk this through."

"Save your breath," Doug muttered. "All you have to do is look at her, and you know she's going to blow it."

"Come on, Spud," Adam pleaded. "Tell the guy you'll marry him. For once in your life, do the smart thing."

Help from her brothers was the last thing Heath needed. These were guys you wanted by your side in a foxhole, not around a pissed-off female. Proposing in front of her family was the worst idea he'd ever had, but deals had turned sour on him before, and he'd still managed to pull them off. All he needed to do was get her alone… and avoid the one topic she'd most want to discuss.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Annabelle rushed into the deserted hallway. Soft music played through the speakers, and dim, romantic lighting cast a soothing glow over the garnet walls, but she couldn't stop shaking. She'd thought Rob had broken her heart, but that pain was nothing compared to what she felt now. Just past the dining room, she stumbled into a nook furnished with a love seat and a pair of Sheraton chairs. Heath followed her, but she kept her back to him, and he was smart enough not to touch her.

"Before you say anything you're going to regret, Annabelle, let me suggest you turn on your fax machine when you get home. I'm sending you a jeweler's receipt for a very large diamond ring. Notice when I ordered it. On Tuesday, four days ago."

So he'd been telling the truth when he'd said he'd decided to marry her the night of the party. She didn't feel comforted. Even though she'd known he had this emotional hole inside him, she'd thought she could keep herself from ever tumbling into it.

"Are you listening to me?" he said. "I'd already made up my mind to marry you before I met a single member of your family. I'm sorry it took me so long to get my head straight, but, as you've been quick to point out, I'm an idiot, and all I did tonight was prove you're right. I should have talked to you privately, but I started thinking how much it would mean to them to be part of this. Obviously, I got carried away."

"It didn't occur to you that I'd refuse, did it?" She stared blindly at her watery reflection in the window. "You were so sure I was head over heels in love with you that you didn't even hesitate."

He moved behind her, standing so close that she felt the heat of his body. "Aren't you?"

She'd thought she was being so clever dangling Dean in front of him, but he'd seen through her charade, and now he'd stolen what was left of her pride, in addition to everything else. "Yeah, but so what? I fall in love easily. Thankfully, I get over it just as easily." What a lie.

"Don't say that."

She finally turned to face him. "I know you so much better than you think I do. You saw how well I got along with the guys at the party, and that was when you realized I'd be enough of a business asset to compensate for not being gorgeous."

"Stop putting yourself down. You're the most beautiful woman I've ever known."

She might have been able to laugh at his sheer gall if it didn't hurt so much. "Quit lying. I'm a compromise, and we both know it."

"I never compromise," he retorted. "And I sure as hell didn't compromise with you. Sometimes two people fit together, and that's what happened to us."

He was slick as an eel, and she couldn't let him get to her. "It's starting to make sense. You don't believe in blowing deadlines. Your thirty-fifth birthday is coming up. Time to get a move on, right? At the party, you saw that I could be a business asset. You like being with me. Then tonight you found out I was born with that silver spoon you've been looking for. I guess that hit it out of the ballpark for you. But you forgot something, didn't you?" She made herself meet his eyes. "What about love? What about that?"

He didn't miss a beat. "What about it? Pay attention, because I'm going to start at the top. You're beautiful, every part of you. I love your hair, the way it looks, the way it feels. I love touching it, smelling it. I love the way you wrinkle your nose when you laugh. It makes me laugh, too, every time. And I love watching you eat. Sometimes you can't shovel it in fast enough, but when you get interested in a conversation, you forget there's anything in front of you. God knows, I love making love with you. I can't even talk about that without wanting you. I love your pathetic attachment to those seniors. I love how hard you work…" On and on he went, pacing the small square of carpet, cataloging her virtues.

He began describing their future, painting a rosy picture of their life together living in his house, the parties they'd have, the vacations they'd take. He even had the temerity to mention children, which brought her to her feet.

"Stop it! Just stop it." She balled her hands into fists. "You've said everything except what I need to hear. I want you to love me, Heath, not my awful hair, or the way I get along with your clients, or the fact that I have the family you've always dreamed of. I want you to love me, and you don't know how to do that, do you?"

He didn't even blink. "Have you been listening to anything I've said?"

"Every word."

He drilled her with his eyes, tried to swamp her with his lethal confidence. "Then how could I not love you?"

If she hadn't been so painfully wise to his tricks, she might have been taken in, but his words fell flat. "I don't know," she said quietly. "You tell me."

He threw up his hand, but she could feel him scrambling. "Your family's right. You're a personal disaster. What do you want? Just tell me what you want."

"I want your best offer."

He stared at her, his gaze intense, intimidating, overpowering. And then he did the unthinkable. He looked away. With a sinking heart, she watched his hands slide into his pockets, his shoulders drop almost imperceptibly. "You already have it."

She bit her lip, nodded. "That's what I thought." And then she walked away.

She had no money with her, but she climbed into a cab anyway, then made the driver wait at her house while she went inside to get the cash to pay him. Her family would be descending at any minute. She grabbed a suitcase before that could happen and began stuffing it with whatever her fingers closed around, not letting herself feel or think. Fifteen minutes later, she was in her car.

Just before midnight on Saturday, Portia got the news about Heath's marriage proposal in a phone call from Baxter Ben-ton, who'd waited tables at the Mayfair Club for a thousand years and had eavesdropped on the Granger family party. Portia had been curled up on the couch in an old beach towel and sweatpants-her jeans no longer fit-with a sea of candy wrappers and crumpled tissues surrounding her like a barbed-wire fence. By the time she hung up, she was on her feet, excited for the first time in weeks. She hadn't lost her instincts after all. This was why she hadn't been able to find the perfect woman for that final introduction. The chemistry she'd detected between Heath and Annabelle that day in his office hadn't been imaginary.

She stepped over the beach towel she'd dropped and snatched up an unread copy of the Tribune to check the date. Her contract with Heath ran out on Tuesday, three days from now. She set the newspaper aside and began to pace. If she could pull this off, maybe, just maybe, she could leave Power Matches behind without feeling like a failure.

It was midnight, and she couldn't do anything until morning. She gazed at the mess that had accumulated around her. Her cleaning lady had quit a couple of weeks ago, and Portia hadn't replaced her. A film of dust covered everything, the trash cans overflowed, and the rugs needed vacuuming. She hadn't even gone to work yesterday. What was the point? She had no assistants, just Inez and the IT guy who ran the Power Matches Web site, the one part of the business that interested her the least.