Bravo Unwrapped

by Christine Rimmer

  She swallowed. “Your half-brother…”

  “One among many. I met Marsh last year. Great guy. Blake used to beat him—and his mother, too. A lot. So in hindsight, with the information I have now, I can’t say I regret that dear old Dad didn’t show up much, or that he stopped coming around when I was so young.”

  B.J. felt a faint twinge of something that might have been sympathy—for Buck, for all the left-behind children of the evil Blake. With that twinge came the urge to reach across the table, to cover Buck’s hand with her own, to reassure him, the way a friend would. It was an urge she took care to suppress.

  Nadine set Buck’s second drink in front of him. “Everything okay?”

  B.J. swallowed again. “Great,” she said, and popped the last of the roll into her mouth.

  Nadine beamed at B.J.—and scolded Buck. “Eat your salad. Steaks are on the way.”

  “I’m getting to it, Nadine.”

  The waitress clucked her tongue and left them—and Buck reached over and turned off the recorder. Before B.J. could swallow that last chunk of bread and object, he leaned closer and spoke low. “I talked to Ma—about what’s up with Bowie and Glory.”

  Okay, she was curious. She washed the bread down with water. “So, and?”

  “Glory’s pregnant.”

  “Pregnant.” She set down her glass. She probably should have guessed—and was this too close to home, or what?

  “Bowie wants to marry her.”

  “So he said—more than once. And she said no. Repeatedly. At the top of her lungs, as I recall.”

  Buck finally picked up his fork. “It doesn’t matter what she said. He’ll marry her, one way or the other.”

  “Not if she keeps saying no.”

  “You just don’t get it.”

  “That’s right, I don’t.”

  “Bowie’s a Bravo.”

  “And that explains…what?”

  “Everything.”

  “Oh. Well. To you, maybe.”

  He wore an excessively patient expression. “My brothers and I were raised minus a father. That’s not going to happen to our kids.”

  “Ah.” And given her own circumstances, B.J. wasn’t sure she liked the sound of this. “Okay. Just to recap here. Bowie’s a Bravo. So he has to marry Glory—because she’s going to have his baby?”

  “Yeah.”

  “As in, one and one equals two?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Buck. Hello. Twenty-first century, U.S. of A.”

  He waved his fork for silence. “Look. A Bravo may make mistakes in life. Big ones. But you can bet your favorite pair of sexy shoes that when there’s an innocent kid involved, a Bravo will always find a way to do the right thing.”

  A stream of perfectly valid arguments scrolled through B.J.’s brain: that sometimes marriage just isn’t the right solution, that a child can have a productive, happy life without her parents being married. That some people—herself among them—just aren’t meant for marriage, that a bad marriage is never a good thing, for the child, or her parents….

  She kept those arguments to herself. This was much too dangerous a subject to get into right now.

  Chewing on another roll, she watched him as he ate his salad, thinking, I am now going to turn on the tape recorder and get on with the interview.

  But then again…

  Okay. She had to ask. “You, too, Buck? You’d marry some woman you didn’t care about, didn’t…love, just because she was having your baby?”

  He speared a tomato wedge. “Bowie does love Glory. He said so.”

  “Well, yeah. To convince her to do things his way.”

  “Uh-uh. I don’t think so. I think he really does love her.”

  “And you determined this, how?”

  He considered a moment. “Call it an informed opinion. He’s my baby brother. I grew up with him. It’s my informed opinion that he meant what he said. He loves Glory.”

  There was a moment. They looked at each other and B.J. felt…sparks. Heat. That burning energy, way too sexual, zipping back and forth between them.

  Why this guy? she thought, as she’d thought a thousand times before. Why, always, in the end: Buck?

  Nadine appeared with their steaks. She served them and took their salad plates away.

  Buck started in on his T-bone. B.J. sipped her water and told herself not to go there—after which, she promptly went there. “And anyway, I wasn’t asking about Bowie. I was asking about you. If you got a woman pregnant, would you think you had to marry her, whether you really wanted to or not?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Just curious,” she baldly lied.

  Those eyes of his seemed to bore holes right through her. And then he lifted one hard shoulder, sketching a shrug. “Honestly, I can’t say for certain. It hasn’t happened.” Then he frowned. “Wait a minute. Are you trying to tell me something?”

  “No. No, I’m not.” Well, it was the truth. Barely. She wasn’t trying to tell him. Not now. Not yet…

  “I’ll say this much.”

  She gulped. “Yeah?”

  “Any kid of mine is going to know his dad and know him well.” His steak knife glinted as he sliced his T-bone.

  B.J. realized she’d been holding her breath and let it out. Slowly. “Buck?”

  He set the knife aside. “Yeah?”

  “Why are we doing this?”

  He arched a dark brow. “Because it’s dinnertime? Because we have to eat—by the way, your filet’s getting cold.”

  Stop, a voice inside her head commanded. Drop it. Now. But her mouth kept right on talking. “No. I don’t mean dinner. I mean this whole thing. You and me, here in your hometown. Why did you find it necessary to drag me across the country with you? We both know there’s no reason you can’t write this damn piece yourself.”

  “No denying it now,” he said wryly. “You are talking to me.”

  “Against my better judgment,” she shot back, then cut the sarcasm enough to ask, “And will you please answer my question?”

  He looked at her in a measuring sort of way. The seconds ticked by. At last, he said, “Eat your steak so we can get out of here.”

  “And then?”

  “You’ll get your answer.”

  Buck said nothing after they left the restaurant. In the chilly Sierra darkness, they strolled down the street, around the corner and across the bridge. The stars overhead, no city lights to mute them, shone thick and bright against the black-as-velvet night sky.

  At the Sierra Star, the curtains at the front window were still open. Inside, as they mounted the steps, B.J. could see Chastity, sitting alone by the fire, reading a paperback book, an orange tabby cat curled in her lap.

  Buck opened the door and ushered B.J. in—still without saying a word. Evidently, he’d decided against explaining why he’d forced her to head for the hills with him.

  Fine. She was having second thoughts, anyway, wondering what had possessed her to ask him why in the first place. Whatever his reasoning, she didn’t need to hear it.

  And it had been a long day. She’d go upstairs, enjoy a soak in her own private claw-footed bathtub and then watch some TV. Maybe jot a few notes for the story. Play a computer game. Read a book.

  Whatever.

  The keyword here was disengage. When it came to Buck, prolonged contact inevitably meant trouble. If she didn’t watch herself, she’d start obsessing over how attractive he was, how smart, how funny. In no time she’d be thinking that maybe they could get something going, after all.

  It could end up just like that night in September—with her naked on top of him, demanding more. Or beneath him, begging for more. Or…

  Now, see? See what she was doing? All it took was dinner and a little semi-friendly conversation, and she was back with the vivid images of the two of them doing things they were never going to do again. Italics intended.

  Chastity looked up from her book. “Did you two have a nice dinner?�
��

  “Great,” said Buck.

  “We did,” B.J. agreed. She brought her hand to her mouth as she faked a yawn. “I’m pretty tired, though. Jet lag, I guess. Goodnight.”

  “Sleep well,” said Chastity with a serene little smile. The cat looked up at Buck’s mother and twitched its caramel-colored tail. Chastity petted it as she turned her attention back to her book.

  Buck said nothing. Why? What was he thinking? What did his silence mean?

  Bad questions. Pointless questions. Keyword: disengage. B.J. turned for the stairs.

  He fell in behind her. He walked softly. Still, she could feel him at her back all the way up the stairs and down the hall to their side-by-side rooms. She had her key ready. She slid it smoothly into the lock and pushed the door open. Stepping swiftly in, she turned to shut it behind her—to shut him out. She almost made it, too.

  At the last possible second, he said, “Five minutes.”

  Disengage, disengage. Without a word, she shut the door the rest of the way and shot the bolt, heard that reassuring click as the lock slid home. She turned with a groan and sagged against the door.

  “Shit,” she said to the empty room. Five minutes. What did that mean?

  Six

  Once B.J. had shut her door in his face, Buck turned and headed back down the stairs. Chastity glanced up with a questioning smile as he entered the front room.

  “Where’s the brandy?”

  “Try the mirrored sideboard.” She gestured toward the door that led to the formal dining room. “Top shelf on the left.”

  “Thanks, Ma.” Buck continued on through to the dining room, got the brandy and two small snifters and retraced his steps back through the front room and up the stairs again.

  In his own room, he waited the final two minutes until the five-minute deadline and then exited the French doors onto the balcony. Three steps and he stood at the glass doors that led into B.J.’s room.

  She hadn’t pulled the curtains. He could see her in there, sitting on the edge of the bed, slim shoulders drooping, looking…what? Dejected?

  Could be. He smiled to himself. B.J. would never let her shoulders droop if she knew someone was looking. She was too tough by a mile. As long as Buck had known her, she’d been that way. Probably because she had to be. No choice in the matter, with a father like L.T.

  It wasn’t easy getting through that toughness, no simple task to peel B. J. Carlyle down to her soft, passionate feminine core. But Buck had this crazy idea he was man enough now to understand that things didn’t always have to be easy—especially the important things.

  He tapped lightly on one of the panes and watched her slim back snap straight. Slowly, carefully, she turned her head in his direction.

  They regarded each other through the glass—a stare-down. Her gorgeous frosty eyes sent a clear message: Go away.

  He held up the brandy and the two snifters.

  She pinched her mouth tight and shook her head. He nodded.

  At last, she stood and came toward him.

  “Chilly out here,” he said, when she pulled open the door.

  She stuck her head out far enough to peer around toward his side of the balcony. “I didn’t know we shared the balcony,” she muttered glumly.

  “Let me in. We’ll have some brandy.” He stepped forward. Reluctantly, she moved back.

  “I don’t want any brandy.” She shut the doors. “Why are you in my room?” He set one glass on the nightstand and poured a nice, stiff drink into the other. He held it out to her. She didn’t take it, asking instead, “What part of no do you find confusing?”

  He shrugged—elaborately—and drank from the snifter himself. It burned all the way down to his stomach where it spread out to become a warm and satisfying glow. “This is excellent.”

  “Oh, I’m so glad. I’ll ask a second time. Why are you here?”

  A small wing chair waited across from the bed. He dropped into it. “You asked me a question back at the restaurant, remember? I’m here to answer it.”

  “Never mind my question. It wasn’t important. And now that that’s settled—” she flung out a hand toward the French doors “—you can go.”

  Other than to set his brandy on the little table by his chair, he didn’t move.

  “I’m serious,” she said. “I don’t need to know why you boxed me into coming here.”

  “I think you do.”

  “How charming. Now you’re telling me what I need.”

  “Okay, okay. Let me put it this way. I need to tell you.”

  She turned from him, wrapped her arms around herself and stared out at the silver ribbon of river, the shadowed pine-thick hills, the unreadable face of the moon. When she spoke this time, there was no sarcasm. “Buck. Please. It’s no good.” She looked at him then. “When are you going to accept the truth? That night in September? Never should have happened. I regret it. I honestly do. It was a mistake. A huge one.”

  A mistake. A huge one…

  Okay. That hurt.

  Yeah, he’d already known she felt that way. How could he help but know? He’d called and called and she’d never answered, never called him back. Still, to hear her say it right out…it cut. A ragged cut made by a rusty knife.

  “A mistake?” he repeated, keeping it light, relaxed, not letting the hurt show. “I don’t think so.”

  He watched her slim throat move as she swallowed. “It was…just something that happened, something that shouldn’t have. Because you and me, well, that was over a long, long time ago.” He sipped his brandy and didn’t say a word. She must have read what he was thinking in his expression, because she insisted, “It is, Buck. It’s over. Long over. You have to accept that.”

  He set down the snifter and said what he should have said years ago. “I’m sorry, B.J.”

  She blinked and put her hand to her throat—and then pretended to misunderstand. “I meant what I just said. It was one of those things. It happened. No more your fault than mine.”

  He laid it right out for her. “I’m not talking about that night in September. I’m talking about that other night—the one six years ago.”

  She fell back a step. “Buck. Look…”

  He went on as if she hadn’t spoken. “I’m not the least sorry for what happened in September. As far as I’m concerned, that night was long overdue.” She whirled for the glass doors again, for the cool, silvery face of the moon. He called her back. “B.J.”

  With obvious effort, she turned his way again, met his eyes. “Let’s just not go there, okay? It was a long time ago and—”

  “Don’t give me that. Listen. I screwed up six years ago. I screwed up bad. I didn’t believe in you. Not enough—not in you, or in myself.”

  “Buck—”

  “Not that anything I might say is any kind of excuse. I blew it. Blew it all to hell and I know it.”

  “Buck. It was over. I’d turned you down. You had a perfect right to—”

  “If I had a perfect right, then why did you look like I’d stabbed you to the heart when you walked in on us?”

  She marched over and dropped to the edge of the bed again. “Please. Will you just go?”

  “Not till you hear me out.”

  She gave him a long look. “Let me get this straight. You speak—and then you go?”

  He nodded.

  “All right, then.” She crossed those slim legs, leaned back on her hands, and stared at him defiantly. “Get it over with.”

  Now she’d said she would listen, he hardly knew where to start. He took a stab at it. “I never should have let you walk away back then.”

  “As if you could have stopped me.”

  He pinned her with a glance. She pressed her lips together and shrugged, but she did keep her sweet mouth shut.

  He clarified, “The point is, I didn’t even try to stop you. You want to talk mistakes? Well, that was the real one. That I let you walk out of my life without a fight. I despise myself for that. That won’t happ
en again. This time, things are going to be different.”

  “Buck. Get with reality. There is no ‘this time.’”

  “Yeah, there is.”

  The light in her eyes threatened dire consequences. “Oh, you are so asking for it, you know that?”

  “I am. And I do.”

  She gave up the defiant pose and jumped to her feet. “Okay. Get this. If you insist on dredging up all that old stuff, I’m done being fair about it.”

  He looked her slowly up and down. She was, and always had been, real easy to look at. “Good. Because you being fair about it? That’s all just crap and we both know it.”

  She took a step toward the chair where he sat. “Your turn to listen.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Okay, then. This is how I really feel. What you did was scum-sucking low. What you did proved that you’re nothing but a dog, Buck. You asked me to marry you. I said I wasn’t ready—not get lost, not never. Just not now. I said not now and you said we were through. Then you went right out and got drunk and picked up a stranger, an innocent bystander, and took her home. I came to find you, to try to work things out. And there you were, boinking some brunette. It was, to say the least, a pivotal moment. It was the moment I realized you weren’t worth my time, let alone my pitiful, ridiculous broken heart.”

  He waited to see if she’d say more. When she didn’t, he nodded. “You’re right. I wasn’t worth it. And I’m sorry.”

  “It’s a little damn late to say you’re sorry.”

  “It’s a lot late. I’m saying it anyway.”

  “Why?”

  “Better late than never?”

  “That’s no answer.”

  “Best I can do.”

  She made a face. Not a happy one. “Just go now. Please.”

  “I will. Soon.”

  “Promises, promises.”

  He rose from the chair. “There’s still that question of yours. Remember? The one about why I made you come with me on this trip in the first place.”

  “I told you. It doesn’t matter. It never mattered. I shouldn’t have asked.”

  “But you did ask. And it does matter.” He dared another step.