Some Like It Charming (A Temporary Engagement) by Megan Bryce Read Free Book Online

all these plans against him. As his grandmother, I have a duty to protect his future and the future of the O’Connor name. This girl’s exactly right for him. We need new blood. And he needs someone he can’t schmooze all over.”
    Mackenzie felt a little queasy thinking about future O’Connors. His mother didn’t look all that well herself.
    Mackenzie sat down slowly on the couch, staring at Christine hopefully. “Maybe you could have both of them committed?”
    Ellen sat next to her. “There are a lot of perks to being an O’Connor. I’m sure we could come to a mutually beneficial agreement in regards to grandbabies.”
    Right about there, Mackenzie realized she wasn’t going to get anywhere with his mother. Maybe if Ellen had been against it, but between Ethan and his grandmother, her cause was lost. His grandmother had already told her she would bet for whatever she thought was best for Team O’Connor. Apparently she’d decided Mackenzie would make a great addition.
    Mackenzie left as fast as she could and found herself at the batting cages. She changed into the sweats she kept in her car for just such emergencies and proceeded to knock the hell out of a ball that looked unsurprisingly like Ethan Howell O’Connor.

    Ethan gave Mackenzie nearly an hour to calm down before he returned to try and sweet talk her again. He grinned to himself, thoroughly enjoying having to beg to get her to even pretend to marry him. After years of fending off women, he was enjoying the challenge. Although when he found her office empty, he started to enjoy it a little less. No one knew where she had gone, no one had her cell number, and she didn’t answer her home phone.
    He frowned. He hadn’t expected her to run.
    He ran through his voice messages, hoping she’d called, but even he realized how slim that chance was. His grandmother, though, had called to tell him that Mackenzie had arrived there very upset with him. His grandmother sounded pretty amused about it.
    He called her back real quick.
    “Is Mackenzie still there?”
    “Nope. Came to see if we could get you to stop with this pretend engagement, then ran off in a huff after I started talking about babies and ways to keep the O’Connor men in line. She wants to have you and me committed.”
    Ethan rubbed his forehead. “I should have told you it wasn’t real, but I wanted to talk Mother into it in person. Mackenzie is just doing me a favor.”
    Ellen laughed outright at that. “She’s not doing you any favor if she can help it. But I’m hoping the engagement will stick. She’s the best one you’ve dated in years and I hope that brain of yours will start working and realize that before too long.”
    His grandmother could be just as bad as his mother at trying to get him married off. She was just a bit more discerning.
    “Did she leave a cell number or tell you where she was going?”
    “No, but if I was you I’d just sit still. She’ll be back eventually to have it out with you.”
    Ethan relaxed. She was right. Mackenzie would be back to give him hell, he just had to let her get over the shock.
    “And Ethan. Get that girl a ring! An engagement’s not real until there’s a ring on her finger.”
    He hung up. That wasn’t a bad idea, actually. He’d always found jewelry to have a calming effect on women.
    He drove by her house on the way to the jewelry store, unsurprised to see a TV crew waiting already. Mackenzie would be surprised, but it was her fault for not giving her cell number out at work. Then he drove to a jeweler that he’d visited a number of times at the end of a relationship. He’d never needed jewelry at the beginning before and he wondered if Mackenzie would find that as funny as he did.
    He doubted it. She would probably say it had something to do with the kind of woman he normally dated and he wouldn’t disagree with that. Mackenzie was a different breed altogether.
    He found a diamond ring that would work until he could get her a