The Man She Married by Ann DeFee Page A

what that was all about?” he asked once they were away from the main building. Although Clay was trying to be patient, he was almost at his wits’ end.
    Maizie glared at him. “You don’t pay any attention to me. I can dress up, or I can dress down, or I can get buck naked and nothing makes any difference. How do I get your attention?”
    Clay sighed. “How about acting like a grown-up instead of a spoiled brat?” Oh, brilliant. Sleep deprivation had turned him into the village idiot.
    Initially, Maizie was speechless. But then she started stammering and turned bright red.
    Crap!
    “Look.” Clay took a deep breath. This wasn’t the best time to tell her about their financial situation but better late than never.
    “Our company is on the verge of going belly-up. AllI’ve been able to think about lately is how to save our rear ends.”
    Maizie didn’t utter a word. She didn’t have to; her face said it all. At least she wasn’t screaming.
    “We realized that doing the engineering for the highway was almost too big for us to handle, but we bid on it anyway. In the past six months we’ve had problems with the state, the county and the contractor. As a result of all the confusion and the planned slow downs, we haven’t been paid by the contractor in months. And we won’t be anytime soon.”
    Clay had assumed Maizie would be sympathetic, or at the very least understanding.
    “You dolt! Why didn’t you tell me? You were going through something like that and you didn’t let me know? I’m your wife,” she screeched. “We’re supposed to share everything. Everything!”
    Clay almost expected her to deck him. Why was she getting all frothed up? He was the injured party, wasn’t he?
    “Calm down and I’ll explain.”
    But Maizie wasn’t ready to listen. She closed her eyes to tune him out. “I don’t think I want you in my house right now. Wait, change that to I know I don’t want to see you in my bed.” Even though she made the announcement quietly, Clay could sense the fiery volcano bubbling beneath the surface.
    That did it. “Fine. If that’s how you feel about it, that’s just peachy. I’ll find someone to take you home.”
    “Fine!” She stomped her foot. “Don’t bother to come by for your stuff because it’ll be gone. Do you hear me? Gone, goodbye, adios.”
    “You’d better not do anything with my things. If you don’t want to live with me, that’s great, but don’t mess with my possessions.”
    “What valuable possessions, your Little League trophy?”
    “Yeah, my Little League trophy.” Clay stepped back to take a deep breath.
    “I’m leaving.” He had to get out of there before he said something they couldn’t recover from. They’d gone from okay to catastrophic in two point two seconds. How had it happened? And even more important, where did they go from here?

Chapter Twelve

    Maizie didn’t know how long she’d been sitting on the concrete bench before Liza appeared. She’d ruined everything. When was she going to learn to control her temper?
    “What’s going on out here?” Liza asked as she put an arm around Maizie’s shoulders.
    That did it. Maizie broke into sobs. “I’ve made such a mess of things,” she wailed, punctuating the flood of tears with a series of hiccups.
    “Honey, what happened?”
    “Clay and I had a huge fight. He walked off and left me here.”
    “A fight? Is that all?”
    Maizie shook her head. “I told him I didn’t trust him and I didn’t want to live with him.”
    “Good gravy! Why would you say that?”
    Maizie explained as much about the fight as she could. It was almost like childbirth—it couldn’t be explained and shouldn’t be remembered.
    “Is that why he wanted me to take you home?”
    “I suppose so. Did he say where he was going?”Maizie sniffed. Darn! Her nose was running like a faucet and she didn’t have a tissue or a sleeve. When things went bad, they went bad in a big way.
    “Let’s take the back