Wedding Bell Blues

by Heather Graham Pozzessere

  “Want to start the evening over?” There was something wonderfully warm and yet decadently provocative about the way he said the words. About the moist heat of that whisper against her earlobe. She felt that touch, and she felt his hands, and deep inside, she trembled.

  She turned quickly. “You’re not supposed to seduce me, Brendan.”

  His eyebrows shot up. “Am I that good? It was really just an innocent question.”

  “No, you’re not that good,” she lied. “I just don’t want you getting any ideas.”

  “Sweetheart, you were the one with the ideas, remember?”

  She let out a soft oath and hurried into the house. He followed, flicking on the light. She left him in the living room and headed for her bedroom, then paused, calling back, “Yes!”

  “Yes, what?”

  “I want to start the evening over.”

  “Good, we’re going to have to. I’ll try to postpone our dinner reservations, since we’re not going to make eight-thirty by any stretch of the imagination.”

  She winced and called, “That’s no way to start the evening over.”

  “Hey, it’s the truth!”

  “But there was a lot of sarcasm in your voice. Like it’s all my fault.”

  “Well…”

  “As if you’re not willing to forgive.”

  She paused by her bedroom door. She couldn’t see him, so she just waited. And then he said softly, “All right, I forgive you for being late.”

  She smiled. “And I forgive you for walking into my office like an avenging angel.”

  He didn’t answer her. A second later she heard him on the phone with the restaurant where he had made their dinner reservations.

  She hurried through her shower, then slipped into clean stockings and swore softly as she searched through her closet. She found an elegant black knit with subtle beadwork and a softly flaring skirt and slipped it on, then stepped into her high-heeled black pumps. She paused briefly before the mirror to do her makeup, then started to wind up her hair. After a moment, she let it fall. Brendan had always liked her hair loose.

  “Stop it,” she warned herself. “You’re acting as if we’re dating again. Again? We never really dated. We fell in love, we fell into estrangement, we fell into anger, into almost parenthood, then into distance and divorce. We never really dated. Oh, and then we had dinner once. Dinner and sex!” Her reflection stared at her mockingly.

  “No champagne, I swear. I’ll drink iced tea all night!” she vowed to her reflection.

  She dumped a few things from her big leather purse into a small beaded bag and glanced at her watch. Thirty minutes. He couldn’t complain.

  He didn’t. He was sitting on the sofa, watching a newscast, waiting for her. When she appeared, he rose quickly.

  “Was I too long?” she asked him.

  He smiled slowly. Rakishly. Just like he had smiled in high school. “You’re definitely worth waiting for,” he told her. He came to stand before her and took her arm. His whisper touched her cheek, and for a moment she thought he was going to kiss her. “Very definitely,” he said softly.

  Then he turned away and opened the door for her. When they reached the car, he opened that door for her, too. Brendan had a knack for such things. She had to admit that he’d always been courteous without being patronizing. Now, leaning against the comfortable upholstery, she smiled.

  “You’re not a bad date,” she told him. “Sorry—appointment.”

  He cast her a dry glance. “Is this an appointment?”

  “You tell me.”

  “I have appointments with professors and congressmen and students and my divers. I think I want this to be a date.”

  “We never really dated, you know,” she told him.

  He flashed her another quick, amused glance. “Well, we did just about everything else, so we might as well get the dating in now, huh?”

  She didn’t answer him, but she could tell that he wasn’t expecting an answer. And it was a nice silence that developed between them. A companionable silence. The car had a wonderful speaker system, and soft rock rolled out from it as gracefully as the car itself rolled down the road.

  The restaurant was in an old hotel in Coral Gables. It was one that Kaitlin loved. When they were seated, the maître d’ handed her a rose. A waiter took her shoes, and a soft satin pillow was placed beneath her feet.

  Brendan arched a skeptical brow to her when he was given the wine list. “As long as it’s not champagne…” he offered.

  “I’ll have tea,” she said primly. “Iced tea.”

  But he pointed out that the restaurant had half bottles of a very nice white wine, and she decided that she could manage just a little wine with dinner. Then they ordered escargot and crab cocktails, and Kaitlin decided that she just might enjoy the night.

  He told her about the place he had booked for Donna’s party, then he drew out the menu and handed it to her. She looked at him and sighed. “Brendan, I really don’t have any right. You’ve been planning this—”

  “I’ve gotten a place for the party, Kaitlin, that’s all. We’re in this together.”

  She took the menu from him. “Only if I get to pay for half.”

  “Kaitlin, it’s really no big thing.”

  “Yes, it is! It’s their shower!”

  He was silent for a moment. “When I left the beach the other day, your assistant insisted on paying me for modeling.”

  Kaitlin grinned, looking at her plate. “Brendan, we had to pay you. It would have been illegal not to.”

  “Okay. Did you pay yourself?”

  “Actually, yes.”

  “Neither of us intended to do that commercial, right? So we’ll use the money we made to pay for the party.” He leaned back and waited for her answer.

  Her smile broadened. “Perfect!” she told him softly. Then she bent and began to study the menu. “This sounds wonderful.” She laughed. “Really wonderful! We couldn’t begin to get such a nice selection for these prices down here. I’m glad Barbara wants a traditional girl thing.”

  “I don’t think what Joe wants is really traditional,” he told her.

  She looked up. “Oh? What does Joe want?”

  “A cruise. One of those one-day things.”

  “A cruise?” She frowned.

  Brendan laughed. “He doesn’t want a blonde to jump out of a cake. He just wants to gamble.”

  She grinned and turned her attention to the menu. She read off the appetizers, and they both decided on Donna’s and Bill’s favorites, then went on to the salad, the main course and dessert. She promised to make up the invitations and get them out by the next night if he could give her the guest list.

  The crab cocktails disappeared, then the escargot. The chef suggested a fish delicately seasoned and cooked in a paper bag. Although Kaitlin had never really gotten used to the idea of eating a fish that still had its head intact, she felt daring and opted for it when Brendan enthusiastically endorsed it.

  The fish was delicious, the wine perfect. She felt both relaxed and clearheaded. She and Brendan discussed going in together for their gifts to the various bridal couples. They toyed with several ideas, then decided that they still had time to choose.

  Finally their waiter brought them espresso, and they lingered over the tiny cups.

  Kaitlin idly stirred sugar into hers and found herself studying Brendan intently. He looked at her, and she quickly turned her attention to her cup. Then she looked at him again.

  “Yes?” he prompted.

  “I was just curious.”

  “About what?”

  It sometimes seemed that he hadn’t changed at all, that things hadn’t changed. He’d barely walked back into her life, yet it almost seemed as if he’d never been out of it. But he had. There were eons between them, yet it seemed that he had never really been very far away.

  “You have your house in the Keys,” she said.

  He shrugged. “Yes.”

  “But
you must go home often enough. You’re still such good friends with Bill that he wants you to be his best man.”

  “I keep a house in Massachusetts, too,” he told her.

  “In the Worcester area?”

  He shook his head. “I have a place in the country. Out by Orange, almost on the New Hampshire border. I have about twenty acres there.”

  She was staring at him blankly.

  “Is that all right with you?” he asked.

  She gave herself a little shake. Of course. It was fine. It was just that no one had ever told her.

  Well, she had said once that she didn’t want to hear about Brendan O’Herlihy. And it seemed that all her family and friends had taken her words to heart.

  “Of course it’s all right. I guess I had just been wondering…what you’d been up to all these years.”

  “Piracy, remember?”

  She nodded. “Yes, right.” She was silent for a moment. “And I take it that you’ve seen a lot of Barbara and Joe over the years, too.”

  “Obviously. You know that.”

  “You come up from the Keys very often?”

  He hesitated for a moment, then shrugged again. “Sure. I need to go by the research facilities at the university now and then. And I take students out for dives. I have a lot of colleagues who are professors. I keep an apartment on Brickell.”

  Brickell! It was right down the street from her office.

  And Barbara had known all along, but never said a word to her.

  “How long have you had the apartment?” she asked stiffly.

  “About two years.”

  “And they all knew…” she muttered beneath her breath.

  He made an impatient sound. “Kaitlin, you’ve known that Joe and I kept up. And that meant that Barbara and I did, too.”

  “I didn’t know how much. I knew that Joe knew where you were, since he told me where to find you when—”

  “When you came down to offer me your…bargain.”

  “I didn’t come down to bargain.”

  “What were you doing, then?”

  “I came in an effort to make things easier for both of us.”

  “Like hell!”

  “I wasn’t seeing anyone seriously at the time.”

  “Well,” he mused, his green gaze bright as he leaned back in his chair, studying her broadly, “I’m glad to hear that.”

  “What—”

  “I’m glad you weren’t deeply involved with another man while you were bargaining with me.”

  “Brendan, how can you make it all sound so—so decadent!”

  “Because it was,” he said flatly.

  “I lead the life of a cloistered nun—” she began furiously, then broke off, aware of just how much she was giving away about her own life.

  “What?”

  “Nothing! I wasn’t bargaining with you!”

  “Well, you did fall into bed with me rather easily. I’m glad that you weren’t contemplating another marriage at the time.”

  She gasped, her temper rising. “Damn you, Brendan. Maybe I fell into bed easily with you, but you fell into bed with me easily, too!”

  He didn’t reply for an instant. Then he said, very softly, “But I wasn’t asking you for an annulment.” She suddenly sensed that he was looking behind her rather than at her.

  She twisted around to see that their waiter, his face an impossible shade of crimson, discreetly attempting to give Brendan the check.

  She felt the blood rush to her face as she recalled the last few lines of their conversation. She wanted to explode, to sink beneath the table….

  Or tear out every ebony hair in Brendan’s head. The silver ones, too.

  She stood, grabbing her handbag. “Thank you for dinner,” she said stiffly, then hurried blindly out of the restaurant.

  She had barely made it through the front door, though, when he came striding up behind her, catching her arm and swinging her around.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” he demanded.

  “Going home. I’ll get a cab—”

  “The hell you will.”

  “I’ll do—”

  “You came out with me tonight, Kaitlin. You’ll damn well go home with me, too.”

  His hand was on her elbow. She gritted her teeth, looking down the street. There wasn’t a cab in sight, and there wasn’t likely to be. Not at this time of night, in such a quiet area.

  He started walking toward his car, with her following slowly, digging her heels in stubbornly. He opened the door for her. “Will you get in, please? And quit being so mad at me because the waiter heard you talking about your sex life—or lack thereof.”

  Her eyes flew to his with renewed fury. “You son of a—”

  “Kaitlin, it’s late. Get in.”

  She did so only because she had no choice. He quickly walked around and slid into the driver’s seat, then revved the engine. After he had pulled onto the street, he met her eyes.

  “If you weren’t seeing anyone, why did you want the annulment?”

  She shook her head, unwilling to explain.

  “Why?”

  She lifted her hands vaguely. “My parents had mentioned a cousin who was married again. The right way. In—”

  “The right way!” he exploded, his green eyes dark and shadowed and angry in the night. “What is the right way to be married, Kaitlin? Is it still only real to you if there are a million guests and you wear a dress worth a few thousand bucks? Is that it?”

  She gasped, furious. “No, that is not it! The right way is the way that any individual deems to be important! For me that means in the church. For others it may be different. And it doesn’t matter in the least what the hell anyone wears, or who attends. It’s in the heart, Brendan, it’s—oh, never mind!”

  “You’re damn right I’ll never mind. However the hell it was done, Kaitlin, we were married. Man and wife. And we were expecting a child, and we lost that child. And I’ll never pretend that it didn’t happen. I’ll never sign any piece of paper that says it didn’t. So get that straight right now.”

  “I got it straight!”

  He pulled over to the curb abruptly. She was suddenly afraid of his temper, wondering what he was doing. Then she realized that they were in front of her house. He got out of the car. She knew that he was going to come around and open her door, so she leaped out hastily, unwilling to have him come too close.

  “Thank you for dinner!” she snapped.

  “Oh, no, we’re not done yet.”

  “Yes, we are. I wouldn’t dream of asking you in. That might be construed as bargaining!”

  “Kaitlin—”

  “Go to hell, Brendan!”

  She headed for the front door. She strode up the walkway in a searing temper, but as soon as she reached the door, she remembered that her car was still parked by the office.

  She turned. Brendan was waiting for her to remember. He was leaning against the passenger door, looking superior.

  She strode down the walk. “You knew all along that my car was still at the office,” she snapped. “So why did you drive me here?”

  “I didn’t know all along. I remembered right after you went flouncing out of the car.”

  “I do not flounce, Brendan O’Herlihy. And I don’t appreciate—”

  “Kaitlin, let’s go get your car.”

  “I can get a cab in the morning, thank you.”

  He shrugged. “Suit yourself. It will only take us ten minutes to go back. And taking a cab in the morning isn’t going to change the fact that you will be seeing me again.”

  “Yes, but I’ll have a few days’ grace,” she said sweetly.

  “Not so many. Your grandmother invited me to her wedding, you know.”

  “Yes, I assumed that Gram would do something like that.”

  “I have to go.”

  “I imagine.”

  “And I really should be your escort.”

  Her mouth fell open. “What?”

&nbs
p; “Do you have a date for her wedding?”

  “I don’t need a date!”

  He smiled. “All right, then, an escort.”

  “If I wanted an escort, Brendan, I would get one.”

  His smile deepened. For a moment he looked at the ground, his dark lashes sweeping over his eyes. “You still sound like the very proud young woman I met all those years ago. Kaitlin, I know that you can get a date. You can get what you want from almost anyone just by opening those baby blues and batting an eyelash or two.”

  “Brendan—”

  “Get in. I’ll take you to get your car.”

  She hesitated. He stepped away and opened the door for her. She got in.

  He was silent as he drove through the quiet night streets to reach her car. He parked behind it, got out and walked her over to it.

  “I’ll follow you home,” he told her.

  “It isn’t necessary,” she said stiffly.

  “It is to me.”

  She got into her car and started it.

  Yet as she drove home, she saw that he had followed her, and that he was following her all the way.

  She parked in her driveway. When she got out, he was leaning against his car once again, watching as she headed up the walk, fitted her key into the lock and turned to wave.

  “I’m home. Safely,” she said.

  He nodded. “Call me if you change your mind about Saturday. We could use the practice.”

  “For what?”

  “Weddings,” he called back. “We’ve got two to attend together.”

  “I won’t change my mind,” she said sweetly.

  He chuckled softly. “Call me if you do. But not too late. I might pull a date out of a hat myself.”

  She didn’t answer as she stepped into the house, then closed and locked the door.

  She stripped off her clothing and donned a nightgown quickly. She was exhausted.

  But she didn’t sleep. She wondered what Brendan did with his time when he wasn’t working. She had told him that she wasn’t seriously involved.

  She had told him that she lived like a nun!

  She sighed and tossed around, and tried again to sleep. When she finally dozed, she was beset by dreams.

  Of Brendan. And in her dreams, he was curled up beside her; they were naked, and he was holding her close.

  In her dream they were married again. Sleeping together, entwined. His chin was resting on the top of her head, and she was comfortable and secure….