by Carol Grace
Her eyes looked back at him, warm and kind and encouraging. And he knew without a doubt that she only wanted his happiness. His and Max’s. Now and forever. He knew, too, that happiness was within his grasp. If he would only take that chance.
“I don’t know how Bridget feels,” he said. “But I wanted, I needed to talk to you before I did anything. I had to let you know.” He pressed the framed picture against his forehead for a long moment and he realized that the glass, instead of cold and hard as it was a moment ago, was now warm to the touch.
“Thank you, Molly,” he whispered. Then he took the picture and carefully wrapped it in one of the small yellow hand towels they’d gotten for their wedding, and put it in a wooden box on the shelf in his closet next to Molly’s jewelry box.
The Wild Mustang men’s cologne launch party was a huge success. The first floor of Macy’s department store on the comer of Geary and Stockton Streets was packed with women lined up to buy the highly touted fragrance for the men in their lives, and with men wanting to buy it for themselves. There was a country and western band playing on the mezzanine. Even Bridget’s ex-fiancé, Scott, was there, looking and sounding suitably impressed, both with the cologne and with her.
“What have you done to yourself, Bridget?” he asked, his gaze sweeping over the hat and the leather boots she’d purchased at the dry goods store in Harmony. “You look terrific. This Western motif suits you.”
“Does it?” How was it she never noticed how cool he was, how effete and how superficial? Or was he just an average, normal city man who paled in contrast with the honest, earthy, sexy rancher she couldn’t get out of her mind?
“You’ve done a fantastic job with this cologne thing, you know. Tell me…” Scott motioned to the picture of Josh on the wall. “Is this guy for real? Or is he a computerized image?”
“He’s real.” Very real. The most real person she’d ever known. Her gaze veered to one of the huge colored posters of Josh on his horse silhouetted against the western sunset She had to admit it was a spectacular shot. It conveyed everything she’d hoped it would. Strength, virility, power and sex appeal, all that and more. Even after all these weeks, she couldn’t look at it without feeling a surge of heart-wrenching loss.
“It must be lonely out there, in business for yourself,” Scott said. “Come back, Bridget We can work together again. I know we can. I’ve missed you.” He gave her his most charming smile, and she felt a cold chill go up her spine.
“Not a chance,” she said, matching his smile with one just as phony as his.
“Well, no harm in asking,” he said. Then he kissed her on the lips and drifted away.
Bridget wiped his kiss off her lips with the back of her hand. Lonely? She’d never known the meaning of the word until she came back from Harmony. But it had nothing to do with being in business for herself, and it had everything to do with missing Josh. Every minute of every day. No matter that she’d been busier than she’d ever been in her life. Kate told her it would take time to get over him. She’d known that. She just hadn’t known how painful it would be.
From where she stood on a riser she could see the main entrance to the store. Though she kept it in her line of sight she wasn’t looking for Josh. She wasn’t waiting for him to come through the door. She knew he wouldn’t come, though she’d sent him an invitation with a check for the work he’d done. Then who was she looking for? Nobody. She didn’t know. She only knew there was a knot in her stomach just under her rib cage that had been lodged there since early morning and that nothing could unravel—not even an offer to go back to her old agency.
It shouldn’t be surprising that she felt nervous. This was a big event She’d planned it she’d worked on it for months, and she was responsible for its success. Of course she was jumpy. The client had wanted Josh to be there in person, dressed in his checkered shirt, his vest and his well-worn Levi’s as he was in his picture. Bridget told them it was impossible. He was busy. He was tied up. They didn’t have to know he was violently against men’s cologne— wouldn’t buy it wouldn’t wear it, wouldn’t promote it any more than he’d already done, wouldn’t even smell it. Especially if it smelled like wild mustangs. And certainly wouldn’t come to an event celebrating it. Especially if he knew Bridget would be there.
She’d never forget that last night and she knew he wouldn’t either. The way he’d held her at arm’s length after confiding in her was symbolic of how he was going to keep her at a distance for now and forever. He’d probably forgotten about her already, while she thought about him every minute of every day. That was understandable. She’d been working on promoting this cologne nonstop since her return from Harmony. After tonight she could forget about men’s cologne and Josh and Max and start on a new account. She was in demand now, and there were several possibilities.
One possibility was a new facial tissue. Another was nonalcoholic beer. Strange how they didn’t excite her the way wild mustangs did. Face it, nothing excited her the way wild mustangs did, except the man who trained them. She rubbed her hand across her forehead and leaned back against the kiosk at the edge of the men’s department She’d get excited tomorrow, after this was over. She was just tired, that was all. Tired of the rat race. Tired of the traffic and the noise on the street and the constantly ringing telephones inside her office.
She’d take a rest before she decided which account to take on next. Get away from it all. Her mind drifted back to the most get-away-from-it-all place she’d ever been. To its clean fresh air. To the friendly people who’d opened their hearts and their homes to her. To a little boy whose little freckled face would forever haunt her memory as would his voice, saying, “If my dad finds out, he’ll have my hide.” It seemed like yesterday that he’d come out of nowhere, crashing into her on his bicycle.
Bridget had stood there so long, staring at the giant poster of Josh on his horse, she was beginning to hallucinate. As the band played “Stand by Your Man” she imagined she saw him in the middle of the crowd, not in his checkered shirt and well-worn Levi’s, but in a blue chambray shirt, a dark tie and khaki pants and brown leather Top-Siders. That’s how she knew he was a mirage.
The Josh Gentry she knew didn’t wear a tie. Or anything on his feet but boots. Yet there was something about the way he walked, the way he shaded his eyes from the bright lights, the way his hair fell over her forehead that made her blood race, her heart pound and her mouth go dry as Nevada dust.
She couldn’t move. She just stood there watching him. When he saw her, he dropped his arm to his side, and their eyes met and held for a long moment. Before she knew what she was doing, she was pushing her way through the crowd, her heart in her throat, fearing she might lose him in the masses of customers desperate to buy an ounce of cologne. Why was he here? Why had he changed his mind and decided to come to the launch? Why, why, why?
Breathless, panting and pink-cheeked she finally ran into him somewhere near the accessories counter. Really ran into him, hard enough to feel muscles in his chest, the heat from his body, to smell the crisp clean smell of all outdoors, of horses and leather and most of all of him—the man she’d missed so much there was an heavy ache in her heart that threatened her ability to speak or think.
Instantly she backed away from him as if she’d been burned and gripped the edge of a nearby counter to keep from falling on the floor or blurting something stupid like she was glad to see him. She forced her lips into the semblance of a smile.
“This is a surprise,” she said, proud of how steady her voice was. “I didn’t expect you.”
“I didn’t expect to come,” he said, his hands on his hips, his eyes probing, searching, asking questions she couldn’t answer.
“Why did you?” she asked. She had to know. She couldn’t allow herself to hope, to believe, to imagine....
He looked around the room at the crowds, the lights, the band, the posters. The muscles in his jaw tensed and then forcibly relaxed before he spoke. “I had to see for my
self. What your life was all about. What it was you wanted. What drove you. Now I know. Congratulations.”
“Thank you. But this isn’t all of my life.” She gestured to the hot-air balloons in desert colors and the acres of people still milling around. “I do have a personal life, too.”
He smiled grimly. “I’ll bet you do.”
“I’m finished here. Come home with me. See my place.”
“I don’t think so.”
“You’re not going back tonight, are you?” she asked.
“No, but—”
“Spend the night on my couch. I owe you.” She tried to sound casual and not as desperate as she felt. If he said no, she’d throw herself at him, beg him, plead with him, follow him home if need be.
He looked like she’d asked him to let her take target practice with him as the target. “I’m not spending the night on your couch,” he said.
“At least come for coffee. I-I’ve missed you.”
He shrugged, and before he could say no, she was trying to keep up with his long-legged stride as he walked out of the store and up the street to the Sutter-Stockton garage where he’d left his truck. Fortunately she’d left her car at home and come by taxi, because she was terrified that if she let him out of her sight, he’d disappear from her life forever. He might do that, anyway, but she was going to do her damnedest to keep that from happening.
She sat next to him in the passenger seat of his truck, her hands holding on to the edge of the seat for the white-knuckle ride to her Russian Hill apartment. He drove fast, expertly, up and over the steep hills as if he’d lived there all his life. He didn’t speak, he just turned where she said to turn and parked in the garage under her building.
The apartment seemed smaller than ever with him there. He filled the living room with his presence, overwhelmed the leather furniture, the lamps and the carpets—and especially, her.
“I’ve got to get out of these clothes,” she said, tossing the felt hat onto her desk and kicking off her boots. “I feel ridiculous. Here I am in Western clothes, while you look like you belong here.”
“But I don’t,” he said
“I know that,” she said, taking a step toward her bedroom so she could change.
“Any more than you belong on a ranch in Nevada.” His voice was a low monotone.
She whirled around. His features were cast in stone. Like the words he said.
What could she possibly say to show him, to tell him, to ask him— “You mean because I wasn’t born there, is that it?”
“Because you belong here,” he said, with a glance out the window at the sparkling lights of the city and the Bay Bridge in the distance. “Because you want what this life can give you.. .has given you. Don’t tell me you don’t want it I saw you tonight. I saw you the people congratulate you, the man who kissed you. I heard the music, I saw the band. I can’t compete with that.”
She stared at him in disbelief. “You think I want that? You think that means anything to me?”
“You told me it did.”
“I know I did,” she admitted, walking back into the living room. “Yes, I told you I wanted success. I couldn’t tell you I wanted love even more. You would have pitied me. I couldn’t tell anyone how much, all these years, I’ve wanted a husband, a house and a baby. Of course I needed money. I had no one to support me, and I had to prove it to myself and to everyone who didn’t believe in me that I could do it. Well, I did it. And now I want what I’ve always wanted more than anything. If I hadn’t come to Harmony I never would have known you. I might have gone on for years in this world, from ad campaign to ad campaign. But my life wouldn’t have been complete. There would have been a void in it ten feet wide. Because I never knew what it was like to belong to a place, a community, a family like yours.” She stopped and licked her dry lips.
“Not that I belong there...not that I’d ever belong there the way you do.” Oh, God, she was going to break down, to start crying before she’d even said what she wanted to say.
“So what are you going to do?” he asked. “Come back and set up shop on Main Street? How long do you think you’d last? No challenge, no business, no view, no adulation?”
“Would you stop that?” she demanded hotly. “I told you I’ve done what I set out to do, to prove I could make it on my own. Yes, I’m a success. Yes, I’m proud of myself. But I don’t need people telling me I’m wonderful every day. I just need...I just need—” She choked on the word she couldn’t say. The hot tears gushed down her face. She turned and ran to her room, not caring if he left in disgust or not. She had swallowed every bit of pride she’d ever had. She’d come as close as she could to confessing she loved him, to begging him to take her back to Harmony with him. And there he stood, stony-faced and unfeeling. Now it was up to him. She slammed the door behind her and threw herself on her bed, crying such anguished sobs that she didn’t hear him throw her door open.
She was only vaguely aware of his footsteps crossing the room, of him sitting on the edge of her bed, of his hands on her shoulders, soothing, calming, massaging gently. “What is it you need, Bridget?” he asked, when her sobs had died down to a mere torrent instead of a flood. “Tell me and I’ll get it for you.”
He wiped the tears from her cheek with the pad of his thumb, and she started in again. This time so touched by his tenderness she was unable to stop crying. He stretched out next to her on her blue-and-white handmade quilt, facing her across the pattern of hearts and flowers.
“Please stop crying,” he said, tracing his broad callused finger around her cheek.
She nodded and swallowed hard. “I’m all right now.”
“Sure?”
She heaved a shaky sigh and nodded.
He dug his elbow into her quilt, propped his head on his palm and looked at her. His expression had softened, a hint of a smile tugged at one comer of his mouth. His eyes were no longer ice-blue; they flickered with pinpoints of light “You still haven’t told me what you need,” he prodded.
She hesitated. What did she have to lose? Just Josh and Max and her whole future, that was all.
“I need you,” she said so softly he would have missed it if he hadn’t leaned forward, if his lips hadn’t been so close he could feel the words as she formed them.
He put his arms around her then and crushed her to him until she felt his heart beating in time to her own.
“Are you sure you can give up everything else?” he muttered in her ear. “All the things you’ve worked for. This view, this—”
“This noise, this stress, this pressure, this city. This is nothing compared to...”
“To what, Harmony? Would you really consider living with me, with us, on the ranch?” Josh asked, rolling over so she was lying on top of him, her breasts cushioned against his chest, her hips pressed invitingly against his, her full lips only a breath away from his. He thought he knew the answer to his question. But she didn’t speak. She just lay there looking at him, her expression dazed, her eyes glazed with disbelief.
“Are you sure, sure you’re ready to take a chance with me?” she asked anxiously.
“Sure. Very sure. I tried to ignore you. I tried to pretend I didn’t love you. I tried to put you out of my life and out of my mind and out of my heart. But you refused to budge. Molly will always be a part of my past. But you, you’re my present and my future. My life. Say yes, would you?” he demanded. “Would you just say yes? Because my heart has stopped beating, and my watch has stopped running. Nothing works without you. I need you, Bridget, don’t you see that? And I love you. More than anything.”
She exhaled lightly, and her smile lit her face. “I love you, too,” she breathed. “So the answer is yes, I’ll consider it.” She twined her arms around his neck and kissed him. Then hungrily and deeply, showing him better than words, how seriously she would consider living with him forever and ever.
“Another thing,” he said, coming up for air, minutes or maybe hours later. “Would you consider t
aking on the public relations for the Wild Mustang Association? It’s time for the world to know about them.”
“As long as I have time for my bike riding and slingshot lessons,” she said, nuzzling her face against his neck.
He grinned. “I want to tell somebody. I want to tell the world about us. Tell them how much I love you.”
“You mean you’re going to put it in the Harmony Times?” she asked.
“I mean I’m going to shout it out the window, right now.”
“Josh,” she said, sitting on the edge of the bed, wide-eyed, her hair tousled, her eyes glowing, her heart spilling over with love. “You wouldn’t.”
He stock his head out the open window. “I’m in love with Bridget McCloud,” he said into the night air. “And she’s in love with me.”
Bridget jumped up and joined him at the window. Horns honked, sirens shrieked and lights went on and off as the whole city seemed to celebrate their love. Bridget sighed happily and closed the window.
“Wait a minute,” he said, taking her by the shoulders. “I forgot to tell the world you’re going to marry me. You are, aren’t you?”
Smilng, she nodded, deliriously, ridiculously happy. “The sooner the better.”
“And we’re going to give Max the brothers and sisters he needs to keep him from becoming a spoiled only child?”
“Absolutely,” she said loosening his tie and tugging him toward her until his face was so close she could see into the depths of his eyes and his mouth was just a kiss away from hers. “The sooner the better.”