“Mr. Right Now?” Bethany’s gaze returned to the sexy cowboy behind the bar.
He sported the kind of neatly trimmed beard stubble that would have made him her type . . . if she was allowing herself to have a type these days. The faded Stetson he wore might have been overkill on a less rugged man. His jeans were worn in delicious places. His soft chambray shirt elicited fantasies about smoothing her fingers across the muscles that rippled beneath as he and Law worked in fluid tandem.
She shook her head, appreciating the view and her friends’ concern. But the kind of flirty hookups Nic and Clair thrived on weren’t for Bethany anymore. Her heart, she’d learned the hard way, hadn’t come with the necessary off switch. She fell too hard, too fast. And she’d already loved enough men in her life.
She glanced out McC’s windows to the gently falling night, longing to be back at Dru’s fighting to make something happen with her paints and canvases. Instead, she was at a bar, watching Benjie Carrington’s latest descent into public intoxication.
“Is he actually wearing jeans?” she asked.
Nic snorted. “Who knew it would take half a decade in New York City to yank the stick out of his uptight butt.”
Benjie made eye contact with Bethany finally, as if he’d just realized she was there. His smile went all intimate and How you doin’? The room seemed to shrink, everyone between them zeroing in on Bethany’s eye roll. The fury she hadn’t shaken in five years bubbled higher. Like an overheated pot of soup, threatening to soak everything.
Clair finished her Stella and motioned for another, flashing the new bartender a smile. “Too bad Papa Carrington’s check to that fancy school couldn’t buy Benny some actual talent.”
Nic drained her vodka cranberry. “I hear he’s thinking he can get his work into a local gallery. He’s been flashing a lot of green around, donating serious bank to the Atlanta art community.”
Bethany had peeked at the sculpture samples he’d pinned to various social media boards—both school projects and freelance attempts. They were as flat and uninspired as the sketches and paintings she’d tried to help him bring to life when they’d dated. But in high-end art circles, money often trumped talent.
And money—unlike inspiration—was something Benjie had never lacked.
“His pieces have a better shot getting placed somewhere prominent in the city than mine ever will,” she admitted.
“Fraud,” Clair said.
“You’re a hundred times the artist he’ll ever be,” Nic reminded Bethany.
“Except I’m not making art anymore.”
“Not since he—”
“Screwed me?” Bethany’s gaze locked with the gorgeous brown eyes of Law’s new colleague.
The guy gave her a slow smile and a fresh glass of pinot. A jolt of adrenaline sizzled through her. She went to look away and couldn’t. Neither could he, evidently, his eyes widening as their fingers grazed. His touch lingered. His easy wink said he’d meant it to.
“Stop avoiding the inevitable,” Nic said.
“Inevitable?” Bethany mumbled, sizing up the six-foot-tall-and-then-some bartender who’d caught her attention as soon as she’d walked into McC’s.
Nic poked her with another elbow.
“Ouch!” Bethany yelped.
“You’re drooling.” Her friend pulled Bethany’s hand and glass toward their side of the bar. She handed Bethany a napkin.
The cowboy winked again before walking away. His backside had Bethany spilling her wine as she gulped it. She wiped her mouth. Her attention wandered lower, snagging on obscenely scuffed boots that looked to be for hiking, not riding.
“Earth to Bethany,” Clair called.
“I . . .” Bethany said. “What?”
Her friend hitched a thumb over her shoulder. “BenStalkin’YouBaby’s here.” She grinned at the running massacre she and Nicole insisted on making out of Benjie’s name. “Pull yourself together.”
Their bartender had returned with a cold Stella for Clair, who preferred her fancy Belgian beer out of the bottle. He passed Nic a fresh cocktail, then propped a brawny arm on the counter and settled in for the show.
Who was this guy? And what the hell was wrong with Bethany, sitting there thinking that if the only way to teach Benjie a lesson was to get her Girls Gone Wild on one last time . . . Wouldn’t it be fun to do it with an easy-smiling cowboy?
She cocked her head at him. Not that she was seriously considering hooking up with a total stranger who was studying her as if he were sorting through the first pieces of a complicated puzzle. Not when just the sight of the man left her desperate to find out whether he felt and smelled and kissed as good as he looked.
But Benjie didn’t have to know that, right?
“We’ve never met . . .” she heard herself saying to the Rick’s new hire. “But would you consider maybe helping me out of a bind with my—”
“Hello, gorgeous.” Benjie invaded her personal space, sliding between her and Nicole.
“Back away slowly,” she warned him, “and no one gets hurt.”
He’d always been James Bond handsome. Pierce Brosnan’s Bond—tall and lanky, almost effeminate. The most strenuous physical activity Benjie had ever embraced was lifting his arm to ask his parents for a handout.
“I was hoping you’d be here tonight,” he said, meaningful and sincere and fake beyond bearing. “I guess destiny has taken a hand.”
Nicole mimed a gag at his Casablanca misquote. “Or you’re destined to step outside and stand in front of Bethany’s truck.”
“While she runs you down,” Clair offered.
“In overdrive,” Bethany concurred.
The bartender chuckled his approval.
When Benjie slashed the guy a killing glare, the cowboy—why hadn’t she bothered to even ask him his name?—tipped back his weathered hat and casually checked the flat-screen overhead. The Braves were in the bottom of the sixth. His brown eyes twinkled when he glanced back to Bethany, and Bethany only, as if Benjie didn’t exist.
It felt as if the guy had hugged her.
Then Benjie and his bourbon breath crowded Bethany even closer.
“Let’s get a table,” he cajoled, “so we can talk privately.”
“I believe the lady asked you to back off,” said the hunk she’d invited into her problems.
“I did,” Bethany told her ex.
“I know we have a lot to work through.” Benjie’s words kept slurring around the edges. “But I—”
“I get that you’re a miserable failure,” Nicole interrupted, “running back home with your tail between your legs. What I don’t understand is how you think it’ll make things better getting your drunk on and trying to hit on our girl after the way you used her.”
“Go home and lick your wounds, Benny,” Clair told him, purring the nickname he despised. “You’re just making yourself look silly.”
“As opposed to you walking through the center of town herding a dozen dogs at one time?” Benjie glared down his nose at Clair the way all bullies did when they meant to puff themselves up by beating away at someone else.
Clair had cornered the concierge pet care market in Chandlerville and three adjoining communities. The suburbs north of Atlanta were becoming bedroom communities for young, dual-income, affluent families. Caring for their pampered pooches, felines, exotic birds, and fish (and even snakes, hamsters, and once a potbellied pig named Princess) had flourished from Clair’s part-time high school gig into a growing empire that required a full-time staff of four to meet the growing demand for her services.
“Do you need someone to scoop up after the next boom-boom you drop on the curb?” Nicole asked before Clair could sink her gel-polished talons into Benjie’s jugular. “Maybe we can fit you for one of those doggie diapers.”
“They make unfortunate potty training accidents a cinch to handle,” Clair offered, ever so helpful.
“I need the two of you”—he cupped Bethany’s elbow and sneered at h
er friends—“to stop pointing your bony fingers at my and Bethany’s relationship, just because we all shared the same air in high school.”
“Relationship?” Bethany’s wine rebounded up the back of her throat.
She jerked away and pushed off her stool, swallowing the sickening burn.
Annihilation. That was what it had been. Her very public comeuppance for believing Benjie Carrington was where she’d find the love and security, the forever she’d always craved. They were going to take the art world by storm, he’d said. And she’d left her heart wide opened to him, when she hadn’t been able to with anyone before that, not since she was a little girl.
“You never gave me a chance to explain, sugar,” he insisted. “To really apologize. It was a long time ago. And I know I made a mistake. But I can make it right now. We could still be good together. Let’s meet for lunch. Dinner? There’s Dru’s wedding next month. I’ll escort you. It would be a great way for me to break the ice with your whole family. Surely—”
“Surely you’ve lost your mind.” Bethany was in his face, fists clenched. Shaking. “Make it right? I loved you! You said you loved me . . .”
To hell with what anyone else heard. Screw him, and screw not letting things get back to her family. Long-buried rage was bubbling over, choking her, fueling the need to do something, anything, to make him understand. He’d been her first but by no means her last mistake of the heart, and she’d never forgive him. She’d never forgive herself for being so stupid.
Her friends were right.
Enough was enough.
“I dare you to show up at Dru’s wedding,” she said. “I’ve been patient. I’ve even felt a little sorry for you. But if you get anywhere near me or my friends or my family on my sister’s big day, I’ll—”
“Bethany?” Clair gripped her arm.
Bethany shrugged her off and silently wished for the several inches of additional height it would take to put her eye-to-eye with the dirty dog in front of her.
“You actually think,” she said to Benjie, “that I’d—”
“Bethany . . .” Nicole said, a split second before McC’s cowboy bartender appeared from out of nowhere and eased Bethany to his side.
“Is there a problem, darlin’?” he asked. . .
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Oliver Bowman surveyed the spectacle beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows of his Midtown Atlanta loft. Disappearing before its setting sun, the dusky sky was a twilight miracle. It made him think of home.
Another high-stakes IT project was behind him, his second since he’d returned to the South. He’d conquered a kick-ass gauntlet of anticipated challenges, more than earning the ridiculous hourly rate he’d quoted his client. Plus a bonus for juggling last-minute crises and beating his deadline.
Two potential deals were in the pipeline awaiting his next pitch: one in Seattle, the other in Toronto. Within the hour he’d pull the trigger on his top prospect. And he would land it, beating out competing contractors—other guns for hire who’d good-naturedly curse him in their congratulatory e-mails. By the first of next week he’d relocate. There’d be no time to focus on anything but work.
But tonight, staring at his sunset view after a nerve-settling run through town, there was nothing to distract him from looking back. From wanting to go back—if for no other reason than to silence the question he couldn’t stop himself from asking. What did it say that all these months he’d lived and worked only miles away from the foster family he’d crashed out of at eighteen? Yet no one from seven years ago knew he was back except for Travis, the foster brother Oliver had been closest to.
He was focused on the right things, he reminded himself. And working his ass off to make those things possible. Dwelling on the past was a pointless distraction for a man who made his not-inconsiderable living grinding out the day-to-day present. His demanding career fed his drive to compete and achieve. It kept him on track and freed everyone else to focus on what they needed to—including his foster parents. It kept quiet, nostalgic nights like tonight to a minimum.
He’d just ridden the elevator up after jogging through streets heavy with May’s suffocating humidity. The temps in Georgia weren’t what got to you this time of year. The moisture in the air, rain or shine, made you think you needed a snorkel to breathe. And while he’d been away he’d missed even that for some godforsaken reason.
He was drenched in sweat, logging five miles in under forty minutes. He’d left himself plenty of time to shower before his conference call to a top-shelf West Coast CIO whose six-month contract would solidify the rest of Oliver’s business year. Now he was going to smell like a locker room when he Skyped about cloud computing data solutions. Because he couldn’t stop wrestling with the impulse to turn a brief blip of downtime into an excuse to visit Chandlerville—a suburb twenty miles northeast of the A-T-L.
It was natural to want to see how his foster parents were helping a new crop of kids learn they were worthy of love—one hug, one gently set boundary at a time. And if he were being honest, to want to be seen by Marsha and Joe Dixon now that Oliver had “made it.”
Grunting, he scanned his sparsely decorated apartment with an objective eye. It was a flashy penthouse unit, its staggering lease covered by the latest corporation needing his expertise. The top-of-the line 4x4 in an underground garage was another high-end perk, freeing up his cash for better uses. But beneath the glossy surface he was still the guy who’d walked away from his last chance at a family with a threadbare backpack over his shoulder and the entire contents of his life inside. Just like he’d have to be wherever and whatever a new client wanted him to be next week.
Joe and Marsha’s world was rocking on just fine without him. They didn’t need him barging in and mucking with that. They needed the money he sent home every month to help them raise a fresh crop of parentless boys and girls. And it was a sweet deal for a man who’d nearly pissed away the second chance he’d been given.
Enough delaying the inevitable. Time to rip off the Band-Aid. One firm pull. A rush of pain, followed by the soothing relief of having done what he’d dreaded. Because living this close to Chandlerville, he’d never stop wondering whether his foster parents were proud of what he’d accomplished. Or if the beautiful girl he’d lost on another late spring night might smile one of her perfect smiles if she could see him now.
He rocked on the heels of the worn running shoes he kept forgetting to replace. The light beyond his windows faded, purple bleeding to gray. Barely realizing what he was doing, he rubbed a hand over the tattoo he’d had inked above his heart after he’d left the Dixon home. The ball-busting teen still lurking inside him sneered.
Why would Selena Rosenthal be thinking of him after all this time?
Since they were eighteen, they’d been as over as two people could be who’d sworn to love each other forever. Travis had said she’d left Chandlerville not long after Oliver. His first love had married, had another man’s baby. She’d created a totally new life for herself, light years from the small-town reality she and Oliver might have made together.
Meanwhile in the last year and a half he’d satisfied two right-place, right-time, big-dog Atlanta clients. He’d regrouped and was working harder and better than ever for his foster family. Work that kept him perpetually on the move. Which made it out of the question—his getting any closer to the people it would gut him to have to walk away from again.
His apartment phone rang, ripping his gaze away from the final streaks of light dusting the horizon. The handset in the kitchen sounded off a second time.
Only one person on the planet knew how to contact him on anything but his cell. Wherever Oliver moved for business, he maintained a landline and the international messaging service it fed into. He’d shared the number with no one but Travis, who knew better than to use it except for emergencies. Their sporadic conversations over the years had been the result of Oliver contacting his foster brother, not the other way around.
Oliver headed across the loft’s Berber carpet, his gut twisting. He ripped the phone from its receiver.
“Hello?”
“You need to come home,” said the ragged voice on the other end of the line. Travis still lived in Chandlerville, surrounded by the court-appointed family whose love had saved them both. “It’s Dad. It’s bad, man.”
Oliver was back in Chandlerville.
Through Tuesday morning shadows, Selena Rosenthal locked gazes with the one who’d gotten away. Next door, a ruggedly handsome man stared at her from the front steps of Joe and Marsha Dixon’s sprawling house—a yard, a hedge, and another yard away. Dark hair. Dramatic green eyes. Oliver had the face of an angel and a mouth that could tempt a woman into just about any sin on the books. She’d have known him anywhere.
Years had passed. Seven of them, filled with her wanting to go back and fix the mistakes that had led to her and Oliver’s last disastrous argument. She’d been too busy to miss him since she’d returned to town. At least she’d refused to dwell on how much she missed him—every time she saw someone from before or stumbled into a familiar place. And instead of reveling in the poignant memories she’d felt like half a person, because Oliver wasn’t there to share the moment with her.
Then he’d stepped out of a shiny red truck in his foster parents’ drive just now, dressed in a wrinkled white T-shirt, jeans, and ratty running shoes.
Her mother’s screened front door whooshed shut behind her, smacking Selena in the butt. She waited for Oliver to respond, to move, to do anything except stare back. She couldn’t stop her smile, or the pathetic half wave that followed it. While his non-response dripped with you’re dead to me, until she forced herself to look away.
Oh. My. God.
Oliver.
Waiting for Your Love (Echoes of the Heart) Page 10