Read Must-Have Husband for Free Online

birthday. What a gift this is to me. My very last granddaughter getting married! And just in the nick of time. You are bringing him to the party, eh? Just like you promised?”
    “You promised to bring him to the party?” Linda spewed under her breath. “Why didn’t you say so?”
    She hadn’t said so, because leaving out that little detail hadn’t seemed worse than omitting all the rest of the truths she’d left unsaid. She really was in a horrible mess. Maybe she should come right out and say it. “Grandpa,” she began tentatively, “the truth is, I have something to tell you…”
    He choked up on the other end of the line, springing into another coughing and wheezing spell. “Hang on, dear granddaughter. Hold on.” He breathed between fits and starts. “That’s my Connie,” she heard him tell one of the nurses. “The last single gal in the family. But she’s going to do it before I die. Make me and her late grandmother proud.” He started coughing again, and someone took away the phone.
    “I’m afraid Mr. Oliver will have to call you back,” a female voice said while the coughing continued.
    “Of course,” Connie said as Linda studied her with a sad look. “Oh, Linda,” she said, feeling defeated. “What am I going to do? He may not even live until my imaginary wedding.”
    “He didn’t sound good,” Linda agreed.
    Emotion roiled within Connie at the thought of losing her grandfather. He’d been more like a dad to her and her siblings than their real father had, always taking an interest in their lives, asking about and supporting their goals. It was only in advanced old age that he’d begun getting ornery, a little pigheaded perhaps, and intent on getting his way. But considering the constant love and support he’d provided the family throughout the years, everyone saw fit to indulge him. Even if that meant supplying him with three beautiful nurses, when one homely one would have been sufficient. “You don’t know how I hate ruining his party. Especially thinking that…” Connie’s eyes welled with tears.
    Linda reached out and took her hand. “Then don’t.”
    “I’m not taking some crazed, suicidal maniac back to Napa!”
    “We’re not sure he’s suicidal. Why don’t we see what the doctor says first?” Linda pulled a tissue from her pocket and handed it over.
    “Sure, and then what?” Connie dabbed her eyes with a sniff.
    “Well, if he’s willing. I mean, wanting to make some money…”
    Connie sat up a little straighter. “You’re saying we should buy him?”
    “ Rent him is more like it. Just for the weekend. What do you say?”
    The idea was ridiculous. Ludicrous. And yet it would keep her grandfather from knowing. At least for the next little while, until he got past his eightieth birthday. “But Grandpa thinks I’m marrying Walt!”
    “That doesn’t matter. You just say that Walt got away and you found a new one. A better one. An environmentalist.” Her voice rose with excitement. “That’s got a ring to it!”
    Connie cocked her head, considering this. An environmentalist with a beard. Hmm.
    Linda clasped her hands together, gaining more enthusiasm as she spoke. “He seems intelligent, well-spoken. Plus, he is rather handsome. You admitted it yourself. And, ooh , this is the best part. You can say that he saved you!”
    “Saved me?”
    “That’s how you met.”
    “But Linda, he nearly killed me! Fell right down on top of me!”
    “Details.” Linda held her gaze. “You’ve got to look at the big picture. And, at the end of the day, he saved us both from a fate worse than… I don’t know…coyotes.”
    “Or grizzlies.”
    “Snakes even!”
    “Spiders.”
    “All of it. Absolutely.”
    “But we can’t say we met this weekend and got engaged already.”
    “We’ll claim we came hiking before. That you and he have been an item for weeks.”
    Oh, what a tangled web we weave, Connie thought, heaving a sigh. “What makes you think he’ll do