Game Changer

by Melissa Cutler

  “Exactly. Unfortunately, I don’t think you’re going to be here long enough to get a base tan during this trip.”

  “Maybe next time I come visit.”

  His smile faltered. “Assuming I stay in Miami.”

  She heard his gypsy spirit in his tone. “You’re already restless for someplace new?”

  “Maybe new, maybe not.” He picked up her suitcase. “I’m still not getting clear signals from the Powers That Be on what I should do next and it’s ticking me off.”

  “Well, that’s awfully rude of them.”

  “You’re telling me.” He nodded toward the exit. “We’ve got a few hours to kill before we have to be at the skydiving airstrip, so I was thinking we could swing by my place and drop off your stuff. I have some champagne chilling for you. Liquid courage for your big jump. And then afterward, I’ve got reservations for us at a great restaurant on the beach.”

  “You’re quite the vacation host.”

  “I’d like to think so. And then tonight, I’ve got to make an appearance at a nightclub as part of the show’s promo. I was hoping you wouldn’t mind tagging along.”

  “Won’t that look bad, like you’re bringing a date to the club?”

  “I was thinking we’d tell Lucinda, my handler on the show, that you’re my personal assistant.”

  “You wish I was.”

  He draped an arm across her back and gave her shoulders an affectionate shake. “It wouldn’t be a bad gig if that bar thing you’ve got going doesn’t work out.” Then he angled them toward the exit. “Let’s get out of here and get started on your birthday celebration.”

  The second-floor condo that Brandon rented had come fully furnished with blah pieces of furniture and even more blah wall coloring and window treatments, but he’d added little touches here and there to make the place his own. Photographs of the two of them, of his family in Connecticut, and of Bomb Squad graced nearly every flat surface. The kitchen counter was loaded with vats of protein powder, fruits, and vegetables. And a pile of the magazine covers he’d graced sat on the coffee table.

  The awkwardness that had plagued their first few minutes in the airport never returned, thankfully, not even when they were alone in his apartment. Not even when they walked to his bedroom together so he could set her luggage on a chair and show her where the fresh towels were. They were just Brandon and Harper, the best of friends.

  When she emerged from the bedroom after freshening up, he was standing in the kitchen and had a glass of champagne and a plate of fruit and toast waiting for her on the bar that separated the kitchen from the dining area.

  “Wasn’t sure if you were hungry, but I thought a little food might help with the champagne.”

  She slid onto a bar stool and watched him pour about an inch of champagne into a second flute. “Don’t go too crazy,” she joked.

  “Yeah, you know me. The life of the party.”

  She held up her flute up. “Let’s toast. To second chances at life.”

  “And to friendship,” he added.

  She took a sip, rolling it around her tongue. Tasty. “Talk to me. What’s new with you? You’re down to three finalists, right? So, what’s the next step?”

  “Only one episode left to film before the final candle ceremony, but it’s a doozy. Remember when I told you I’d be going to visit the three finalists’ hometowns?”

  There would’ve been no way she’d forget that nugget of pain. Every time she thought about him going off to play meet-the-parents with his gorgeous finalists, she felt like throwing up. She drained the rest of her champagne. “Danielle is from Atlanta, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “What are the other two places you’ll be traveling to?”

  He refilled her glass. “Jennifer is from a ranch in Colorado and Winnie is from Los Angeles.”

  “You’ll be all over the place. Your leg’s going to be killing you with all those airports.”

  “I was worried about that, too, but it seems that they’ve chartered us a private plane.”

  Harper raised her glass in a mock toast. “La-dee-dah. That’s pretty fancy.”

  “I’m a fancy guy.”

  She lounged back. “So Mr. Fancy Guy is about to meet three sets of parents. That’s got to be hell for a commitment-phobe like you. That’s, like, triple the girlfriend parents of a normal dating relationship.”

  He took a small sip of his champagne. “Gee, thanks for bringing that up. That totally sets my mind at ease.”

  “Have you ever had to meet a girlfriend’s parents before?”

  “In high school, all the time. But only once since then, and it was an accident. This girl duped me into it because I’d been dragging my feet.”

  “Clever girl,” Harper said.

  He braced his hands on the counter. “I was just about to ask you if you’d brought a guy home to meet your parents, but your mom died when you were fourteen and you didn’t live with your dad after that, right?”

  “That’s right. He grieved for my mom in the same way he’d parented and the same way he’d approached marriage. By ignoring it.”

  “Ignoring you.”

  She rolled the edge of her flute against the counter. “Yes.”

  “Who did you live with after your mom died?”

  “My mom’s younger sister.”

  “Shit. I’m sorry I brought all this up.”

  Judging by his curse and the way he reached across the counter to take her hand, he remembered how that brief chapter in Harper’s life had ended.

  “That’s okay. I don’t mind. I found a photograph of my mom in the carry-on luggage I brought with me on this trip. Like I told you, the last time I flew was to my father’s funeral. I’d taken a photograph of my mother with me to put in his casket, because she never stopped loving him, even after he left us, but it was a closed casket, so I brought the picture with me back to New York. And I guess I left it in the suitcase.”

  She walked to where she’d set her purse and retrieved the photograph from her wallet, then took her place at the bar again and handed it to Brandon. It was a portrait shot, a close-up of her face against a pea-green backdrop that was probably all the rage during the seventies. According to the date on the back, she’d been thirty-two at the time.

  “She looks like you. Blonde hair, same nose, same eyes.”

  “I have different ears.”

  He angled his head to study her ears against her mother’s in the photograph. “Yeah, I guess so. You have a narrower chin, too.” He handed the photograph back.

  “Finding her picture now, after all these years, felt like a good omen. I mean, I have a lot of other photographs of her, albums worth, but I never take them out to look at. It felt like this one found me. I’m going to take it skydiving with me today.”

  “That would be perfect. Your mom would be thrilled. She’d be so proud of you.”

  Harper pushed her fork around her plate. “Yes, she would. After today, I’ll only have one more item on my original bliss list.”

  “You’re kidding. You did everything?”

  “I’ve added more since then, but all I’ve got left from the list you and I made together is fishing, and the girls and I are doing that on my birthday this weekend. We’re going on a full-day charter on Lake Ontario.”

  He covered her hand again. “What a difference two months makes.”

  She threaded her fingers with his. “You could say that again. I know who I am now, and I know what I want for myself. I owe so much of that to you.”

  He shook his head. “This is all you, baby.”

  “No, it’s not. You were the one who pushed me to change. You were right that I was hiding in that brick fortress. You’ve been right about everything, and that’s because you see me clearer than anybody else. Throughout the whole surgery drama, you were
the only one who didn’t pity me. And you’ve stopped me from pitying myself.” She cupped her free hand over their joined ones. “You’ve helped me find myself. I could never thank you enough.”

  A look of shock rippled over his features. He dropped his head forward to stare at the counter.

  She felt the shift, the tension rising up between them. His hand twitched, as though he wanted her to release it. She did. He pulled it back and gripped the counter hard. She hadn’t meant to make him uncomfortable and she wasn’t sure what she’d said to bring that about. All she’d wanted to do was thank him and let him know how important he was to her.

  “I was just trying to thank you. I’m sorry if I—”

  He sniffed, interrupting her. Then he pulled himself up straighter and raised his head. When he met her gaze again, his eyes were rimmed in red. He set his hand on the bar counter again, palm up. She set her hand in it and he brought it to his lips. He kissed her palm, then placed it on his chest, over his heart. “You don’t owe me any thanks, Harper. The honor was all mine.”

  ***

  No doubt about it, Brandon was a friend zone failure. Officially.

  He was still getting used to seeing Harper flat-chested, but she was more beautiful than ever, filled with a radiance that left him breathless. From the moment he’d picked her up at the airport, he couldn’t stop staring at her. He couldn’t stop touching her, either. That airport hug of hers had broken the dam and now he couldn’t seem to stop.

  He drove to the airstrip in a trance, numb to everything except the way Harper moved and the sound of her voice. Checking in with the receptionist, the training class before the jump, taking off in the plane—he remembered nothing. Nothing except Harper. How she’d nervously played with her hair during the training class and he’d wanted to run his fingers through it himself. How she’d held his hand as the plane taxied down the runway.

  When she confessed that she was nervous, he put his arms around her and whispered words of encouragement, reminding her that she had nothing to fear.

  “I know that,” she said over the roar of the plane’s engines, turning in his arms to look at him. “I’ve got this second chance at life, I’ve got you as a best friend, and I’ve got the whole world in front of me. And I’m about to cross the second to last thing off my bliss list. That’s pretty sweet. No fear, no holding back.”

  No fear, no holding back.

  He believed in that statement, except that the truth was, he was holding back. He’d been holding back with her since the moment she’d stepped into view at the airport. And he was afraid, too. Afraid of what he felt, afraid for what that meant for their future. He was so afraid he was going to ruin everything that there was no choice but to hold back. My God, how had he been so blind for so long?

  As they lined up for the jump, she pinched his chin. “Hey, smile. We’re about to jump out of a plane together and I believe there are rules against skydiving sad.”

  He forced a smile. “I’m not sad.”

  He watched her strap in with the jumpmaster she’d be riding tandem with and finished triple- checking his own equipment for his solo dive. He flipped on the GoPro camera he’d attached to his helmet, the better to capture Harper’s big moment for all of posterity.

  When the cabin door opened and they lined up for their respective jumps, she turned to him, a smile so big that Brandon had to remind himself how to breathe.

  “This is incredible,” she called to him over the wind. “You were right.”

  No. He’d been so wrong. So very, very wrong about so many things. “About what?”

  “Seizing the day.” She leaned past the jumpmaster and kissed Brandon on the cheek.

  And then she jumped.

  He was in love with her. He was crazy, eternally in love with Harper Johnson. There would be no getting over her. There would be no other women, no other path in his life. There was only Harper.

  He stood in the open door, stunned once again by the truth—as he had been in his apartment that morning—until the jump facilitator appeared by his side. “If you don’t jump now, you’re not going to be able to get a good shot of your friend with that GoPro.”

  He soared after her, catching up gradually, but his only view was of Harper. He caught up enough to hear her whoops of joy and watch the way her hands spread in the wind, her fingers outstretched.

  When he was level with her, she smiled him. His heart. God, his heart. He’d wasted so much time fighting it. What the hell was he going to do now? He had obligations to Meet the Groom. Contracts that forbid him from being romantically involved with anyone but the contestants until the finale aired in December, more than four months away. But how could he choose a fiancé on the show without dishonoring Harper and the way he felt about her?

  Not only that, but he and Harper worked as friends. They’d tried dating and they’d tried sex, and they’d crashed and burned both times. They didn’t work as a couple, and they both knew it. Why would he even consider rocking the boat now and risk losing her altogether if she didn’t feel for him what he felt for her?

  On the ground, the moment the jumpmaster detached his jumpsuit from Harper’s, she ran to Brandon and launched herself at him, clearly in the throes of an adrenaline high, laughing the loudest he’d ever heard her. “That was epic!”

  He rubbed her back and buried his nose in her hair, willing his heart to keep beating, his lungs to keep trying, despite the ache inside him. “You should have seen how big you were smiling while you fell. I should be checking your teeth for bugs right now.”

  “I don’t even care.” She kissed his cheek. “Thank you for making that happen. That was the best birthday present ever.”

  She turned away, laughing and skipping, her adrenaline spiking. He clutched his heart and nearly fell to his knees.

  He was in love. He, Brandon, the biggest commitment-phobe of all time, a self-proclaimed bachelor for all eternity. He didn’t want to settle down. He didn’t want to be shackled to one place and one woman. Except that now, he could think of no better fate than to spend the rest of his life bound to Harper. His Harper.

  He was a goner. How had he been so blind?

  Chapter Twenty

  Brandon had been acting distant since the conversation they’d had that morning about Harper’s mom, but he refused to tell her why or even acknowledge his discontent. He’d taken her to dinner at a pricey restaurant that overlooked Miami Beach, but he couldn’t keep a conversation going. He asked her question after question, but often didn’t seem to hear her answers. And when she asked him questions, especially about Meet the Groom, he changed the subject.

  He held her hand as they watched the setting sun together from the window seats in the restaurant. She tried to take that for what it was. Two of the very best friends having a quiet, yet platonic moment. But, no matter how she tried to deny it to herself, she sensed the quicksand they were standing on as friends. She wasn’t sure how much longer she’d be able to continue ignoring the way she felt about him, but she was going to give it her best effort until she left town the following day.

  After dinner, Brandon was obliged by the Meet the Groom producers to make an appearance at a Miami club. They were picked up at his condo by Lucinda and a cameraman who didn’t introduce himself. Lucinda seemed offended by Harper’s presence.

  “This is my personal assistant, Harper,” Brandon told her.

  Lucinda gave Harper a once-over, and Harper immediately knew what Brandon had meant when he’d told her over the phone on many occasions that Lucinda had a stick up her ass.

  “I’ve never heard you mention a personal assistant before,” Lucinda said.

  Brandon flashed his most charming smile and said, “That’s the personal part.”

  Lucinda gave Brandon a long, analyzing glare, then her gaze shifted to Harper, then back to Brandon. “You do remember that you’re under c
ontract, right? There are a lot of people’s jobs riding on you fulfilling your obligations to this show, not to mention the viewers you’ll inspire.”

  What a bitch, zeroing in on and manipulating Brandon’s Achilles’ heel—his overdeveloped sense of responsibility to inspire others with his life.

  Brandon’s smile fell. “Absolutely. I understand.”

  Protectiveness surged inside Harper. How dare that bitch make Brandon feel guilty when he’d done nothing wrong. She stepped in front of him, her arms crossed over her chest. “Hey, Lucinda. Only one of us in this room is replaceable. Don’t forget that.”

  Lucinda looked from Brandon to Harper again, her expression gelling into a mask. “The car’s waiting downstairs.”

  In the car, the atmosphere was tense. Lucinda sat up front with the driver, while the cameraman, Brandon, and Harper rode in back. Brandon was quiet, his gaze distant as he stared out the side window.

  Harper touched the back of his hand. “It’s going to be a fun night.”

  He shifted his eyes toward Lucinda as though to say, “Not with her around.”

  “Seize the day,” Harper whispered.

  He cracked a smile, then reached for his phone. If we’re going to have any fun, then we need to ditch Lucinda.

  Leave it to me, as your assistant, she texted back.

  He chuckled at that and typed, I could kiss you right now.

  She stared at the message. Such a common phrase, a benign show of gratitude. She could kiss him right now, too. The possibility sent a tingle up the back of her neck.

  She loved kissing Brandon. He was great at it. She could kiss him tonight and it wouldn’t have to mean anything because they’d kissed tons of times, so it was nothing special. They were friends, end of story. Nothing would change that, not even kissing.

  So why can’t you look at him right now?

  To prove she was being silly, she raised her face and couldn’t stifle a gasp. In the shadows of the limousine, his expression blazed with dark hunger so intense, she reeled, flattening her back against the seat.