Blindsided by Love: The Bold and the Beautiful

by Hilary Rose

  “And when did pig become the new beef?” said Gigi, shaking her head in wonder.

  “A few years ago,” said Caroline. “You must have missed it while you and your lawyer were negotiating another divorce settlement.”

  Gigi stuck her tongue out at her friend. Caroline realized she had been peevish all night—peevish since she got back from LA, in fact. “You need another cocktail. Or maybe you’d rather have another saucy sow?” The restaurant’s signature appetizer was a slider filled with shredded pork smothered in bourbon sauce, and even Caroline had to laugh when a waiter in a safari outfit and a pith helmet stopped by with a tray of the sows and offered her one.

  “No, thanks,” she told him, wishing she could just go home and stay there. Attending restaurant openings and art gallery shows and fundraisers to save the unicorns had become tedious. She’d rather spend her nights at the townhouse, parked in front of the television with a glass of wine and her sketchpad.

  “Then how about a boar dog?” the waiter suggested, nodding at the tray’s other item, a mini hot dog topped with coleslaw. “They’re awesome.”

  “I bet, but I’m really stuffed,” she said. “I’ve been pigging out on your pig all night.”

  The truth was she hadn’t eaten a thing since breakfast. Her appetite was practically non-existent since she’d got back from LA, and she’d dropped more pounds than was becoming.

  “You’re wasting away,” Gigi said as if reading her mind.

  Caroline smirked. “Like you should talk. You’re a walking carrot stick.”

  “Yeah, but I’ve always been this way. You’re on some sort of hunger strike and it’s ridiculous. Eat something or I’ll have to force feed you.”

  “Actually, I was just about to force feed her.”

  Both women spun in the direction of the male voice that had intruded so rudely on their conversation. Caroline rolled her eyes as she wheeled around to face the interloper, assuming it was yet another husband on the prowl while his wife was off discussing her latest juicing cleanse with her girlfriends.

  Arranging a phony smile on her face as she turned, she said, “Thanks anyway, but I’m busy with—”

  And then, of course, she saw the male the voice belonged to, let it register in her brain, and she stopped talking—stopped breathing too.

  “You have to try their slow-roasted buffalo Reuben on grilled rye,” said Ridge, as he chomped on the appetizer-sized sandwich. “The tangy barbecue sauce gives it a nice kick, but it’s the melding of the warm Swiss cheese, the Russian dressing and the sauerkraut that creates an intense mouth feel and makes you wonder why anybody would make a Reuben with pastrami. Here, taste.”

  Before Caroline could protest or shake her head or ask why in the world he was in New York, at the Wild Boar, no less, he was popping the rest of his canape into her mouth and letting his fingertips trail across her lips. She was so stunned she couldn’t even swallow.

  “It’s good, Caro. I wouldn’t steer you wrong,” he said. He was grinning like a fool.

  “Whatareyoudoinghere?” she said around the mouthful as she started to chew so she wouldn’t choke.

  “Sorry. I didn’t catch that.” Ridge laughed. “But if you said buffalo tastes just like chicken, I’ll have to disagree. It’s velvety and rich like beef but leaner, without all the artery-clogging fat, and it’s lower in calories for those of you ladies who watch that sort of thing.” He smiled at Gigi. “We haven’t met. I’m Ridge Forrester.”

  “Yes, I know,” she said dryly, looking him up and down. “I’ve heard all about you.”

  “Only positive things, I hope,” he said.

  “Not exactly,” said Gigi. “You destroyed my friend when you dumped her.”

  “I didn’t dump—” Ridge hesitated. “There’s more to it, trust me.”

  “I hate when guys say, ‘Trust me,’” Gigi snapped. “It makes me not trust them. I notice you’re not wearing your dark glasses, by the way, and you didn’t seem to have any trouble finding Caroline in this crowd. Are you cured of your blindness, or what?”

  Caroline gulped down the last of the sandwich, her head swiveling back and forth as if she were at a tennis match while watching the two of them talk, wondering if she should just let them keep at it. Maybe it would be easier to stay quiet and be a spectator. On the other hand, she didn’t need a surrogate and she was itching to launch into her own line of interrogation for Ridge Forrester.

  “Okay, everybody,” she said, washing the food down with the Belgian beer the restaurant was serving. “I’d like a minute with Mr Chowhound. Gigi, would you mind?”

  Her friend groaned, either because she didn’t want to leave Caroline alone with the guy who’d treated her so shabbily or because there were no interesting men at the party and, therefore, not a single potential target. But after giving Ridge one last dirty look, she made herself scarce.

  “So.” He gazed at Caroline, his eyes clear and bright and shimmering with love.

  “So.” Caroline said, echoing him, her lips tingling with the feel of his fingertips, her body buzzing with the memory of his naked body pressed hard against hers that night in his bedroom. Still, the sheer audacity of him showing up on her turf—again—after everything that had happened between them was infuriating.

  “I love you, Caro,” he said softly, brushing her hair off her shoulder with a gentle caress of his fingers. “I have a lot of explaining to do, but I needed to get that off my chest. I really, really love you.”

  Her pulse quickened and she felt her legs buckle, but she wasn’t about to just collapse into his arms. She wasn’t one of his little playthings and she wasn’t Brooke, who boomeranged in and out of his life for so many years. “Nice sentiment,” she said stiffly, “but I’d rather start with how you knew I’d be here tonight. Or is this a coincidence like the last time? Is the chef another buddy of yours from Paris, someone you met at your favorite café where you were wearing a beret, sipping cognac and listening to Edith Pilaf?”

  “It’s Piaf—if you mean the singer, not the rice.”

  “Whatever.”

  “No, no coincidence and no idea who the chef is here. It was Karen who told me where I’d find you. I camped out at your door earlier. Luckily, she didn’t slam it in my face.”

  “My mother has manners, unlike some people.” She studied his face and was struck by how at peace he looked now that he was free of the blindness and the accompanying dark glasses and light restrictions. She couldn’t help but be elated for him that his sight had returned—or so it seemed.

  He took her hands, held them in his. “It turns out that there was more on that recorder, the one Pam left at Dad’s house.”

  “Oh, please. Not the recorder again.”

  “Rick was determined to keep us apart, so he only played us half of it; the battery did run out but not when he claimed it did. Pam listened to all of what was still there and after waiting and wondering if she should pass it along to me—she was afraid of upsetting me, I guess—she decided I needed to hear it.”

  “Hear what, for God’s sake?” It had been months since she’d had the fateful conversation with Eric. At this point, who could remember what was said and by whom? She was sick about the recorder, sick of dwelling on how an innocent visit with Eric had upended her relationship with Ridge.

  “You told my father you loved me unconditionally, that you were in it for the long haul, even if my sight didn’t come back.”

  “I told you the same thing at your house.” Caroline flashed back to the scene in his library when she’d stated her case but he hadn’t believed her, hadn’t taken her seriously. “You didn’t need the recorder for that.”

  “I’m talking about Terry Jarvis, Caro.” He gripped her hands tighter as if he’d never let them go. “When I heard you tell Eric about him, I realized you were capable of so much more than I gave you credit for, and I’m ashamed of myself, ashamed that I was so filled with self-pity, as you said, that I couldn’t see, literally and
figuratively. I realized that you’re not someone who cuts and runs when the going gets tough, that you hang in there no matter what the obstacles, that you don’t view the people you love as a burden just because they need your help, and it humbles me to know you, to learn from you. I had to come here and tell you.”

  “Oh.” Caroline certainly wasn’t expecting such a profound and stirring confession, and she was stunned, dumbfounded, her head swimming with the implications. “And your vision?” she asked tentatively. “Is it … ?”

  “It’s good, really good,” he said. “The doctors were right. I just needed to give it time … and patience.” He smiled, looking at her with the laser-like focus of the old Ridge, the one she’d run into at Luc’s. “Remember all those senses I was always pontificating about? I finally came to mine … about everything.”

  Acknowledgments

  When I moved to LA and was introduced to Rhonda Friedman, supervising producer of The Bold and the Beautiful, we connected in a way only women who are destined to be close friends are connected—i.e. we immediately told each other everything. Since then, we’ve been each other’s champions, personally and professionally. What’s more, Rhonda makes a fabulous Thanksgiving turkey and I can’t imagine not being at her table for her annual event. I’ve become a big fan of her show, watching it every afternoon while I take my daily break from writing. When she alerted me that B&B was teaming up with Pan Macmillan Australia for a series of novellas and asked if I’d be interested in writing one even though they weren’t my usual genre, I said without hesitation, “You bet I would.” So my first thankyou goes to Rhonda for suggesting me to the Pan Macmillan team.

  Thanks, too, to Claire Craig of Pan Macmillan, who was not only receptive to my joining her roster of talented authors but offered me the best editorial advice I’ve ever gotten in my over twenty years of writing novels: “HAVE FUN!” And yes, she used all caps in her email.

  Much gratitude to Claire’s crew, in-house editors Rebecca Hamilton and Danielle Walker, and freelance editor Kylie Mason, for their outstanding work on this book. They’re not only pros but nice people too.

  Thanks to Trident Media Group’s extremely capable Claire Roberts, Director of Foreign Rights, who helped me make the trans-Pacific leap.

  And because Blindsided by Love involves a wildfire in California, I must thank Geri Ventura of the Montecito Fire Department, who took the time to help me craft a plausible scenario for Ridge. I had help, too, from Dr Henry Spector, who provided information about flash blindness, the temporary condition from which Ridge suffers.

  I could never have written so passionately about the characters from B&B if it weren’t for Brad Bell, the genius behind the show who makes daily watching a habit I have no intention of breaking. And bravo to actors Linsey Godfrey, who plays Caroline Spencer, and Thorsten Kaye, who stepped into the role of Ridge Forrester and made the character very much his own. Their portrayals were all the inspiration I needed for this book.

  Lastly, thanks to my husband, Michael Forester (no relation to the Forrester clan!), who continues to be amused by the soap opera diva in me.

  About Hilary Rose

  Hilary Rose is the pseudonym for Jane Heller, the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of thirteen novels of romantic comedy, nine of which have sold to Hollywood for films and all of which have been entertaining readers around the world. She’s also the author of two non-fiction books: a survival guide for caregivers and a humorous memoir about her passion for baseball.

  A New York native and former book publicist, she currently makes her home in Santa Barbara, California, where she lives with her husband Michael, reads nonstop except when she’s going to the movies, and is hard at work on her latest novel. And, of course, she continues to follow the trials and tribulations of the Forresters and the Logans and anybody else who shows up to create drama at Forrester Creations.

  About Dangerous Love: The Bold and the Beautiful

  By Ros Baxter

  Donna is convinced that Eric is the man she needs to get her life back on track.

  But then Ridge returns to Forrester Creations determined, it seems, to tease and taunt her.

  When Donna, Eric and Ridge travel to the South of France for a photo shoot, Donna thinks that, finally, Eric is about to reveal his love for her.

  But a yachting accident changes everything . . .

  For more information, please visit momentumbooks.com.au/books/dangerous-love/.

  About Heart’s Desire: The Bold and the Beautiful

  By Amy Andrews

  Taylor is being threatened by a stalker in New York.

  Rick Forrester is in town for Fashion Week and insists on helping her through this trauma.

  They enjoy their days together but when they kiss in Central Park, the moment is ‘snapped’ by the paparazzi.

  The next day, their kiss is on the front page of every scandal sheet in the country. And so the fallout begins . . .

  For more information, please visit momentumbooks.com.au/books/hearts-desire/.

  About Sunset Love: The Bold and the Beautiful

  By Shannon Curtis

  Thorne has turned his back on Forrester Creations and headed for his Texas ranch.

  Brooke is bereft. She is already feeling out of control and misses Thorne’s guidance. Determined to convince him he has made a mistake, she visits the ranch. But there, she discovers a very different Thorne.

  Suddenly, everything she thought she knew about life – and love – is turned upside down.

  For more information, please visit momentumbooks.com.au/books/sunset-love/.

  First published by Momentum in 2014

  This edition published in 2014 by Momentum

  Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd

  1 Market Street, Sydney 2000

  Copyright © BBL Distribution 2014.

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  A CIP record for this book is available at the National Library of Australia

  Blindsided by Love: The Bold and the Beautiful

  EPUB format: 9781760082109

  Mobi format: 9781760082116

  Cover design by Carrie Kabak

  Edited by Kylie Mason

  Proofread by Melissa Kemble

  Macmillan Digital Australia: www.macmillandigital.com.au

  To report a typographical error, please visit momentumbooks.com.au/contact/

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