The Bravo Family Way

by Christine Rimmer

  Fletcher dropped into the easy chair next to the bed. “You didn’t have to wait up.”

  She gave him a tight smile. “I know.” Her wonderful news seemed—what? Not the issue anymore, not the thing she really wanted—needed—to say to him. She watched him as she had so many nights before. He loosened and removed his tie, his jacket, his cufflinks, his shirt.

  He bent to untie his handmade black shoes. He was on the second set of laces when he slanted her a look— one that questioned and yet somehow managed to warn at the same time. What’s on your mind? the look said. But don’t tell me, because I don’t want to hear.

  She ignored the warning and went with the question. “What really went wrong between you and Belinda?”

  There was a silence. A long one. Taking his sweet time about it, he removed his shoes. Once he had them both off, he lined them up like good little soldiers beside the chair. Then and only then did he sit back with a weighty sigh. “I thought we went through all that weeks ago.”

  “Yes. But I still don’t really understand….” How to say it? How to get him, at last, to trust her, to open up to her.

  “What?” He asked the question in a patient tone— too patient, really. “You don’t understand what?”

  Cleo tugged on the blankets, smoothing them more snugly across her breasts. “You know, maybe I do understand. Maybe that’s the real problem for me, as your current wife. I do understand why Belinda left you— or at least, I can guess why. Because I think that you probably treat me the same way you treated her.”

  His strong jaw was set. He sat in that chair as if he’d been carved out of stone. “All right,” he said so patiently it set her teeth on edge. “Let me get clear on this. You don’t understand anything. Or wait. You do understand—everything, including the motivations of my ex-wife, a woman you’ve never met, a woman you know next to nothing about.”

  “Yes. Exactly. I know nothing about her. Nothing except what you’ve told me, and that isn’t much. Because you don’t talk to me—not about Belinda, not about anything that really matters to you.”

  “Cleo.” He sounded more patient than ever now. A mature adult dealing with a thoroughly stubborn child. “What the hell is the problem here? What’s the matter with you tonight?”

  I’m having your baby and I don’t even know you, that’s what’s the matter. “I want to feel…close to you. But I don’t. Except when we’re making love. That’s what the problem is, that’s what’s bothering me.”

  He raked his hair back from his forehead, a gesture that clearly communicated how aggravated he was with her. “Look. I told you. I told you all of it. Belinda didn’t like Atlantic City, she didn’t like my line of work. She wanted me to move back to Bridgewater and get myself a nice, steady nine-to-five job. I wouldn’t do that. She knew when we got married what I would do for a living. She said she accepted that that would be our life. And then, as soon as she married me, she started trying to change me. So maybe you ought to ask yourself, Cleo, is that what you’re doing? Trying to change me?”

  She replied softly, with certainty, “No.”

  He picked up his shoes, laid his jacket and shirt over his arm and swept to his feet. “Sure as hell seems like it to me.” He started for the dressing room, his long strides swift.

  She spoke to his back. “I don’t want to change you, Fletcher. I just want to know you.”

  He stopped and turned to her, light eyes somber and full of shadows. “You know me as well as anyone does.”

  “Which is not very well at all.”

  His mouth was a thin line. “If you wanted some guy you could push around, you probably should have stuck with that damn mechanic.”

  That hurt. A lot. Maybe I should have, she thought. But she managed to hold the cruel words back. She didn’t really feel that way. It would only have been anger talking, the sharp urge to wound him as he had just wounded her.

  “I don’t want a man to push around,” she said carefully. “And just for the record, I never pushed Danny around. And you’re right. I might have married him. He’s a good man.”

  His lip curled in something very like a snarl. “You think I want to hear about how terrific your old boyfriend was?”

  With effort she kept her voice even and calm. “You didn’t let me finish. Danny is a good man. But he’s not the man for me. You are, Fletcher. I love you. I truly do. I want to feel close to you. And I just don’t.”

  He looked at her for the longest time, a bleak, closed-in sort of look. And then he turned and went into the dressing room, quietly shutting the door behind him.

  Once he’d shut the door on his wife, Fletcher stripped off his slacks, his boxers and socks.

  He took his sweet time about it. No need to hurry. There was nothing but trouble waiting back in the bedroom.

  Yeah. He was mad.

  It bugged him, just thinking about her old boyfriend. He never should have brought that subject up and he knew it. But now and then he did wonder….

  Did she make comparisons? And when she did, was it Fletcher who came out the loser? She was always talking about openness, about trust and sharing. He’d only met the mechanic once, but he’d recognized him instantly as one of the nice guys, one of the guys women always say they can talk to.

  Cleo claimed that she loved him. Fletcher believed in her love. He also believed she could love him and still wish she’d made a different choice.

  He wondered if she imagined what it might have been like had she stayed with the mechanic, gotten herself a nice white-picket-fence kind of life with a husband who spilled his guts to her every night of the week, a husband who was always home for dinner and eager to tell her all about his feelings, a husband who shared.

  Feelings, sharing, openness…

  Lately he’d gotten so angry just hearing those words that it made him want to break something.

  He wasn’t a touchy-feely guy in the first place. And then there was the uncomfortable fact that she had it right.

  Fletcher did have a secret—a secret he saw no percentage in sharing. Not with Cleo, not with anyone.

  After he undressed, he carefully hung up all of his clothes, though he knew damn well he didn’t have to, that Mrs. Dolby would take care of it all in the morning. He was stalling. He was making her wait. It was a petty way to behave and he knew it. But he did it anyway.

  By the time he’d finally returned to the bedroom, Cleo had switched off her lamp and turned on her side, facing the wall, leaving the overhead recessed lights on low so he wouldn’t be left completely in the dark.

  She lay very still—too still—the blankets up tight around her neck. He knew damn well she wasn’t sleeping.

  He moved quietly to his side of the bed and looked down at her bundled shape beneath the covers. In spite of his fury with her, he admired the soft gleam of her hair in the faint light from above, the gentle inward curve of her waist, the tempting swell of her hip….

  He felt his sex stirring. He wanted her. He always did. But this time, he knew, she wouldn’t welcome his kisses. If he touched her, she’d only pull away—or insist on hashing things out some more. Neither possibility appealed to him. So he turned off the dim lights, slid under the blankets and kept his hands to himself.

  He lay there, feeling her tight stillness beside him, aware of her careful, too-quiet breathing.

  In time, her breathing grew more relaxed, more shallow and even. She slept. But it wasn’t an easy sleep. She made small, unhappy noises. She kept turning restlessly from her side to her back and then over to her side again.

  Still wide-awake, Fletcher stared at the shadowed ceiling. Déjà vu all over again, as the old ballplayer once said. His second marriage was ending up way too much like his first.

  Ending up…

  Bad word choice.

  His marriage to Cleo was not going to end. Cleo wasn’t the least like Belinda. Cleo had a life of her own, a busy, successful career. And she’d been born and raised in Vegas. There was nowhere e
lse she was dying to escape to.

  And even if she did sometimes imagine a life without him, she would never leave Ashlyn. Cleo loved Ashlyn unconditionally and without reservation.

  She was also incredible with Ashlyn. His daughter had been a damn good kid before Cleo came along. But the little sweetheart was downright amazing now. She called Cleo Mommy and she was happier, more outgoing, more sure of her place in the world.

  Hell, he was happier with Cleo in his life. She made coming home the best part of the day.

  And yeah, he knew he wasn’t home enough. He’d promised her he would be. He would have to watch that, make a constant effort not to slip back into workdays that never seemed to end. Maybe that would do the trick, make it so she didn’t feel the need to rag on him.

  As to the other, to those questions about Belinda…

  She would stop asking eventually. At heart, Cleo was a practical woman. She’d get the picture that demanding to know all his secrets was getting her nowhere—fast. She’d give it up and settle in to enjoy the good life they had together. She’d forget about Belinda. She’d stop hounding him for answers he was never going to give her.

  Chapter Fifteen

  One day faded into the next and Cleo failed to tell Fletcher that they were having a baby. The moment never seemed right—or so she told herself. But when six days had gone by and she still hadn’t said the words, I’m pregnant, she began to realize that her silence had nothing to do with getting the timing right.

  She was angry with him. And she was hurt at the way he’d hinted that she might still have romantic feelings for Danny. So she was getting even by not telling him about the baby.

  Talk about self-defeating behavior. She felt he didn’t share his heart with her—so she refused to share her news with him. Uh-uh. Bad approach. Not constructive in the least.

  As a matter of fact, since the argument Tuesday night, they were hardly speaking. They were…achingly polite with each other. But nothing that mattered got said. At night, in bed, they would turn to each other and share lovemaking as passionate as ever.

  But the rest of the time?

  Strained would be the word for it.

  Still, Fletcher did continue to make an effort to be around on the weekends, to get home by a reasonable hour. On the next Tuesday night, a week from the day she’d taken the home test, he called at six and promised he’d be in by eight.

  She had Ashlyn fed and bathed and all ready for bed when Fletcher came in the door. The little girl ran to hug her father, and Cleo met Fletcher’s eyes over the silky brown head of the child.

  “Hi,” he said softly.

  She gave him a tremulous smile. “Hi.”

  Ashlyn pulled back enough to look at him. “I had a wonderful day, Daddy. At school, we are adding and taking away. And working with shapes. You know, triangles, squares, circles? We made foot butterflies. You put your feet together on paper and trace them and then make a butterfly from the shape. That was fun. And I am filling my word box, Daddy. I am filling it sooooo full.” She stretched out her arms wide to indicate just how full. “Words are popping out all over.” She laughed—a happy, musical laugh, a laugh that was new over the past few weeks. Then she hugged him hard again. “Oh, Daddy. I’m so glad you’re home.”

  He planted a kiss on her velvety cheek. “And I’m glad to be home.”

  When he let her slide to her slippered feet, she grabbed his index finger. “C’mon. Let’s go in the fam’ly room and you can—”

  Cleo cleared her throat. When Ashlyn sent her an impatient sideways glance, Cleo shook her head.

  The little girl let out a heavy sigh. “Oh, o-kay.” She faced her father. “Mommy let me wait for you, but now I have to go to bed. You can take me.”

  “Lead the way.” He cast another glance at Cleo.

  She said, “I’ll be in the family room.”

  He gave her a nod, and Ashlyn towed him off down the hall that led to her room, chattering away about her friends and her latest book as they went.

  Ten minutes later he joined her.

  On edge over the news she would soon be sharing with him, she jumped to her feet as he entered the room. “Are you hungry? I could—”

  But he was already shaking his dark head. “I had a late lunch. I’m fine.”

  So she dropped to the couch again, folded her hands in her lap and stared blindly down at them. She’d promised herself she would tell him tonight. Absolutely.

  Too bad she had no idea how to begin. Her gaze fell on the latest issue of NightLife magazine. It lay before her on the coffee table. Her father’s picture was on the front. She gestured at it. “Did you see this? I’m officially outed as Matthew Flint’s love child.”

  “I heard. And yes, Marla made sure I had a copy on my desk, so I got a chance to read the interview this afternoon.”

  She shook her head. “I never thought I’d see the day. He volunteered the information, did you notice?”

  Fletcher nodded. “Your father’s proud of you. That’s very clear. And he has every reason to be.”

  She warmed at his praise. “I, um, called him this morning, after I saw the article.”

  “Great.”

  “We had lunch. It was really nice.” Things were working out beautifully with her father.

  Too bad she couldn’t say the same about her marriage. She cleared her throat and looked down at her hands again and didn’t know what to say next.

  The couch shifted as he sat beside her. “Hey.”

  “Hey.” She made herself look up into his eyes. Did she see hope there, a desire that things might be better between them? She chose to think so. “Oh, Fletcher. I do want…for us to get along, you know?”

  His gaze scanned her face. “I’m with you on that one.”

  “I’m sorry that we haven’t been very, um, friendly with each other these last few days.”

  “I’m sorry, too.”

  She stared in his eyes and she believed that he was sorry. Not sorry enough to tell her what troubled him, but regretful that they’d shared harsh words, that they hadn’t made up until now.

  It wasn’t the heart-deep closeness she couldn’t stop longing for. But it was probably the best she would get from him.

  He took her hand. And then he stood, pulling her up with him. He kissed her and she marveled as she always did at her own instant heated response to him.

  When he raised his head, it was only to put one arm at her back and the other behind her knees and lift her high against his chest. She tucked her head into the curve of his shoulder and clasped her hands around his neck. He swept her off down the hall.

  In their bedroom he undressed her slowly and made beautiful love to her. She responded eagerly to his every caress.

  Later, lying close beneath the covers, they spoke of Ashlyn’s upcoming two-week trip to see her grandparents in Bridgewater. Ashlyn was scheduled to leave that weekend. Cleo would fly out with her and return alone on Sunday, then repeat the same process when it was time for Ashlyn to come home.

  “You don’t really have to go with her,” Fletcher said. “She’ll have staff to look out for her every minute of the trip.” They were taking one of the Bravo Group jets.

  “But I want to go,” she told him. “She’s only five. And it’s nicer for her to have a parent with her on a long flight like that.”

  He reached across to tip her chin his way. His smile was tender. “You’re a hell of a mother, Cleo.”

  She made a soft noise in her throat. “Thank you.”

  The truth was she wanted to meet Belinda’s parents. She hoped to get to know them a little. They were Ashlyn’s grandparents after all. They might even shed some light on the mystery of Fletcher’s relationship with their daughter.

  He pulled her close once more. The slow, sweet loving began all over again.

  And when the morning came, she still had yet to tell him that she was having his child.

  Cleo and Ashlyn took off on Saturday at four in the morning.
They arrived at Teterboro Airport a few minutes after twelve noon. Deanna and Jim Norton, both white-haired and well into their sixties, were there to meet them.

  The Nortons lived in a rambling farm-style house set far back from the street, reached by a sweeping turnaround driveway shaded with well-established oaks and locust trees. Inside, the house was homey and inviting, with hardwood floors, clean white walls and comfy-looking floral-upholstered furniture. Pictures of Belinda lined the hallway that led to the bedrooms.

  Cleo spent some time studying those photos of Fletcher’s former wife. She saw Belinda as a fat little baby, naked on a yellow blanket after her bath. And as a little girl who looked much like her daughter, but with Jim’s blue eyes and Deanna’s slightly pointed jaw. There were pictures of Belinda with her parents, with girlfriends or perhaps cousins, a shot of her in a sundress out on the front lawn beneath the oaks, smiling shyly, her arm hooked in the arm of a young Fletcher—Belinda Norton, who became Belinda Bravo, a tall, pretty brunette with an engaging smile. She stood outside a brick building in a graduate’s cap and gown. And in a church with a stained-glass window behind her, she was gloriously beautiful in a white wedding dress…

  Deanna, who had a soft voice and a gentle smile, told Cleo they’d lived in the house for thirty-five years. Belinda had never known another home until she’d married Fletcher.

  Late in the afternoon, when Ashlyn was napping and Jim had settled into his favorite recliner with a fat James Michener novel open on his lap, Deanna asked Cleo if she might enjoy a walk.

  Outside, it was humid but not too hot. A slight breeze teased the oaks. The two women walked down the curving drive and along a well-maintained road from which driveways very much like the Nortons’ curved away under the dappling shadows of the trees. Cleo, accustomed to the desert, marveled at the silky moistness of the air and the lush green growth all around them.

  There were no sidewalks. A car rushed by a little too close for comfort, the air it stirred up ruffling Cleo’s hair.