by Janet Dailey
"I didn't think you would miss me before morning," she admitted with a tired sigh. She knew her parents would want a more explicit account of what had happened than the carefully worded details she had given the reporters, and at this moment, she didn't feel up to it. "Look, Mom, what I really want right now is a long, hot bath," she said, changing the subject while she still could. "Why don't you go ahead and fix us something to eat and it'll be ready when I get out of the tub."
AN HOUR LATER, she entered the spacious kitchen of coral and white where the tantalizing smell of hot tomato soup made her stomach growl. Her freshly-washed hair curled damply about her head, droplets of water dotting the shoulders of her clean, blue-striped blouse. Revitalized by the bath, she sniffed appreciatively at the soup on the stove and sent her parents a sunny smile.
"What happened to that little girl that looked like a desert rat?" her father teased, rising from the chair at the table to hold one out for Brandy.
"She got washed down the drain," she declared.
With the ordeal over, the appetites of all three had returned. Not until that had been partially satisfied did her parents' curiosity surface and Brandy was faced with relating what really happened.
"A cattle rustler," Stewart Ames chuckled softly when she haltingly explained her failure to recognize Jim Corbett. "That really must have been a blow to his ego!"
"Well, he certainly paid me back," retorted Brandy. "It was unforgivable of him to let me go on thinking he was a cattle thief. He should have told me who he was. When I think of the way he was laughing at me behind my back—" She attacked the crackers in her soup, leaving the sentence unfinished. "It's humiliating!"
"You must admit there's an amusing side of it, Brandy," her mother chided the indignant outburst. "And it might have been awkward, even embarrassing, for Mr. Corbett to tell you who he was."
"Nothing could embarrass that man!" she snapped, then realized that it wasn't fair to answer so sharply. None of this had been her parents' fault and she shouldn't be taking her wounded pride out on them. "Can we change the subject? I don't want to talk about James Corbett any more."
Those were famous last words, as she learned to her chagrin the next morning when she arrived at the arts and crafts shop to go to work. She had barely stepped inside the rear door when she was accosted by her wide-eyed, carrot-topped girl friend, excitedly waving the morning paper.
"Brandy, is this true?" Karen Justin demanded in a gleeful voice. "Did James Corbett really find you wandering around in the desert, lost and frightened? James Corbett, the movie star?"
Brandy turned away to hang up her jacket on the employees' rack in the back room, fighting the waves of frustration that swamped her.
"Actually I found him," she answered in a tautly controlled voice. "Is the coffee done?" The first one to arrive at the shop in the morning always put the coffee pot on so that there would be time for a shared cup before they unlocked the doors.
"Yes, I think so," Karen shrugged indifferently, and reverted back to her original topic. "You've got to tell me everything that happened!"
Brandy's lips thinned with exasperation as she filled a mug with hot coffee from the pot. "It's all in the papers. You can read it for yourself," she said with determined disinterest, turning toward her friend.
Karen's brown eyes twinkled brightly. "Not all of it is in the papers, I'll bet. Come on, Brandy," she cajoled, "you can tell me everything. I won't tell a soul, I promise."
"I was out riding; my horse bolted; I started walking home and got lost in the dark. Then I stumbled into his camp, spent the night, started for home in the morning, got caught in the sandstorm, and the helicopter rescued both of us after that. And that's it," Brandy declared with an upward motion of her open palm.
There was a denying shake of Karen's flame-colored hair. "But what did you think when you realized he was James Corbett?"
"I was shocked." Brandy smiled bitterly at the memory of that moment. She sipped at the coffee. "Where's Mrs. Phillips?" she asked, referring to the owner of the shop.
"At the bank, and quit trying to change the subject," was the scolding answer. "Now tell me, what all did you think about? Did he tell you about the movie he's starring in, the one they're filming out at Old Tucson?"
"No." Brandy picked at the hem of her cream-colored smock, the front richly embroidered with orange, yellow and blue intertwining flowers.
"Well, what did you talk about?" Karen asked after waiting and not receiving a more explanatory answer.
"Nothing in particular." Frowning, Brandy smoothed the hem over the blue of her cotton slacks.
Karen tipped her head to the side, the expression in her brown eyes becoming thoughtful. "There's something you aren't telling me, isn't there?" Her friend was much too perceptive. "You were alone in the desert with him, sitting around a campfire with a skyful of stars overhead. He made a pass at you, didn't he?"
"Don't be ridiculous!" Brandy denied forcefully.
But Karen saw the cherry-red dots that rosed on her cheeks. Breathing in sharply, she gasped, "He did kiss you! Oh, Brandy," Karen giggled, "James Corbett kissed you!"
That incident Brandy had not related to her parents. It was the one thing she was most anxious to forget about her weekend episode.
"It's not the way you're thinking at all," she denied self-consciously. "It was really quite innocent. Why, at the time I didn't even know who he—" She closed her mouth abruptly.
Karen stared at her bewilderedly. "You didn't know what?" she asked curiously. "You didn't know who he—was?" She completed the sentence with a question mark in her voice, a sandy red brow arching in disbelief at the seemingly only logical verb that could be inserted. "Is that what you meant?"
With an impatient, frustrated motion, Brandy set her coffee cup on the small utility table. "Yes, that's what I meant," she admitted grudgingly. "I didn't recognize him."
"You didn't recognize James Corbett!" Even though she had guessed the fact a second ago, Karen still didn't believe it when she heard Brandy confirm it. She sank on to the seat of a tall stool near the utility table. "You aren't serious?"
The newspaper had slipped from her hands on to her lap, opened to the page where the story of Brandy, and James Corbett's rescue was printed.
"Look at that picture of him." Brandy pointed defensively to the grainy newspaper photograph taken of the two of them being interviewed by the reporters. "Who would recognize him in that beard? Besides, the last person you're going to expect to meet camped out on the desert is a movie star!"
"What was he doing out there anyway?" her friend asked, momentarily sidetracked.
"I don't know," Brandy shrugged in irritation. "I heard him tell the reporters that he was looking for some peace and quiet."
Karen hugged her arms about her middle. "What was it like to be kissed by James Corbett, Brandy?"
A sharp pain knifed into Brandy's heart. Even now, hurt by the way Jim had made her the object of fun, she found the vivid memory of his kiss very pleasant. She was vaguely ashamed to admit how much she had enjoyed it. A girl had her pride.
"Since I didn't know he was James Corbett when he kissed me, I didn't take notes. If I'd known, maybe I could have checked to see if there was any acceleration in my heartbeat or if my temperature rose," she retorted churlishly.
"You don't have to bite my head off." Karen recoiled slightly, startled by the sarcasm coming from Brandy, who was usually so easy-going and good-natured.
"I didn't mean to," she apologized with a tired sigh. "It's just that I'd like to put the whole incident out of my mind. It isn't very much fun to remember how he must have secretly laughed at my ignorance when I didn't recognize him." She glanced at her wristwatch, adjusting the leather sportsband around her wrist. "It's nearly nine. Did Mrs. Phillips leave the front door key on her desk?"
"I think so," Karen nodded, following as Brandy walked to their employer's office. "Are you going to see him again?"
Brandy stopped an
d frowned over her shoulder. "See him again? What do you mean?"
"Did he ask you out?"
"Of course not," Brandy laughed, but the sound had a hollow ring. "You see too many movies, Karen."
"You don't see enough. Stranger things have happened in real life than what's shown on the movie screen, you know," the redhead declared with an airy toss of her head.
"Well, he didn't ask me out and it's quite improbable that he will," Brandy stated firmly. "If he did, I wouldn't accept."
"You wouldn't!" Karen repeated incredulously.
"He's already had enough laughs at my expense. Compared to someone with his experience I'm just a country girl. Sophisticated glamour girls, like his leading ladies, are definitely more his type anyway."
"Maybe he wants a change of diet," Karen suggested with an impish smile.
"Then he can find someone else. I don't care to see him again." Or at least, that was what she kept telling herself.
Chapter Four
THE SUN GLEAMED through the window on Brandy's honey-bright hair as she bent to sniff the gentle fragrance of the roses. The bouquet of long-stemmed red roses had been waiting for her when she came home from work that day.
Her first inclination had been to throw them away even before she had read the card that came with them. It was a childish reaction, but Brandy had been hounded all day by friends and strangers wanting to hear the "inside" story about her night on the desert with James Corbett.
Finally she had stopped protesting when they declared what a thrilling adventure it had been and let them think what they liked. Nothing she said ever seemed to change their minds.
After second thoughts, she had decided it would be wrong to throw away such beautiful flowers simply because she felt frustrated and unable to cope with the situation and the subsequent notoriety.
The message on the card was simple enough, a wish that she had suffered no ill effects from the episode, and signed "Jim." She refused to concede that part of her decision to keep the roses had been because of the signature. Subconsciously she knew that she was accepting the bouquet from Jim, the cattle thief, not from handsome James Corbett, the celebrity.
Nibbling at her lower lip, Brandy stepped back to survey the arrangement and nodded in satisfaction at the result. She had chosen the china vase that had been in her mother's family for generations. Its translucent cream finish with a delicate design of pink buds was a perfect foil for the darkly shimmering ruby red roses.
Carefully she picked up the vase and carried it into the living room. There she hesitated before deciding that the backdrop of the white wall behind the walnut stereo cabinet would better suit the bouquet than an open display on the coffee table in front the vibrantly green sofa.
She was just centering the vase on the stereo when the front door opened, and its closing was followed by the light footsteps of her mother.
"Hello, Brandy." The casual greeting was followed immediately by a delighted, "What beautiful roses! Where did you get them?"
"From Mr. Corbett," Brandy answered in a deliberately noncommittal voice.
"How thoughtful of him." Lenora Ames walked over to admire the full blooms.
"Hardly thoughtful, Mother," she shrugged, "I'm sure he was just trying to keep up his image."
"That's a very cynical remark coming from you." There was a thoughtful look in the green eyes that studied Brandy's composed mask.
"Not cynical really. The roses were only a polite gesture. I'm sure Mr. Corbett just told his secretary or agent to send me some flowers. They're very pretty and I appreciate them, but I'm certainly not going to make a production out of receiving them," Brandy responded coolly.
"I wasn't suggesting that you should," Lenora said dryly.
Moving away from the vase of roses and the questioning eye of her mother, Brandy walked toward the kitchen. "I'll go start dinner. Where's Dad?"
"Putting the car in the garage. He'll be in shortly." There was a pause. "Brandy, what happened today?"
Halting in the kitchen archway, Brandy turned slightly. "Nothing happened. I went to work, that's all."
"Stewart and I were besieged with questions about the incident this weekend. You must have been, too. I know you feel some bitterness about the experience and I thought—"
"I do feel bitter," she agreed forcefully. "No one likes to be made fun of, and you know he must have found it terribly funny that I didn't know who he was. Everyone is making a big fuss of it, saying how romantic and thrilling it must have been. I found it humiliating.'' Pride tipped her chin to a more aggressive angle. "Now if you don't mind, I'll go fix dinner."
There was no protest from her mother or any further attempt to bring the conversation back to James Corbett. Her father, when he came in, commented that the roses were lovely, but never asked who had sent them. Brandy surmised that her mother had told him.
The next day, she deliberately omitted mentioning the bouquet to Karen. Her friend's imagination would have been immediately triggered by the gift of a dozen long-stemmed red roses. Karen would have undoubtedly read some significance in them, and Brandy was tired of her romantic flights of fantasy concerning James Corbett.
The furor caused by her escapade in the desert had finally trickled to an odd remark here and there by Thursday. The tension that stretched Brandy's nerves taut had eased. She no longer felt constantly on guard when a customer or acquaintance entered the shop. At last now she could finally believe that, in time, the whole episode would be forgotten.
By Thursday evening, with her parents busily preparing the content of their next day's classes in the large den, Brandy felt that life was beginning to return to normal. Sighing, she leaned back against the overstuffed cushions of the redwood chaise-lounge and tucked a hand behind her head.
The glare of the sun had abated as it lingered above the western hills and the enormous Papago Indian reservation that lay beyond them. A scarlet-pink hue was beginning to edge the yellow glow. The spectacular display of sunset colors had started.
From her vantage point on the southern side of the L-shaped patio that covered all of the south side of the house and part of the east, Brandy could view the magically silent yet colorfully explosive end of the day.
"With a view like this of sundown, why did you ride out into the desert?" a low voice inquired behind her.
Sitting upright with a start, she turned toward the voice. She hadn't heard the sliding glass doors open from the house to the patio. Yet there stood James Corbett.
This time there was no possibility she could mistake his identity. The only trace of the old Jim that she could see was in the glitter of his dark eyes and the latent impression of something dangerous. The beard was gone, revealing the carved cheek and jawline and the faint cleft in his chin while also exposing the cynically mocking grooves near his mouth. The faded denims were gone, too, and the sheepskin-lined suede vest and dust-covered shirt. No stained and dusty stetson covered the curling dark hair.
There was nothing disheveled and unkempt about him now. A silk shirt in understated colors of blue, cream yellow, and green molded his wide shoulders and chest, the long sleeves rolled up to reveal his tanned, muscled forearms. Snugly tailored slacks of pale blue covered his legs and thighs. The force of his magnetism was unmistakable, so compelling that Brandy marveled she had not guessed who he was before.
As the shock of seeing him again finally receded, she found her tongue. "H—how did you get here?" she asked weakly.
At her absence of greeting, his mouth shifted into a crooked line that wasn't exactly a smile. "Your mother let me in. She said you were out here watching the sunset."
"Yes," she murmured as if he needed confirmation that she was on the patio. Disconcerted by the thudding of her heart at his unexpected appearance, she averted her gaze. "I received the flowers. Thank you." That sounded so abrupt and insincere that she wished she hadn't mentioned the roses.
"You're welcome." There was a faintly taunting inclination of his dark
head. "May I sit down?"
"Yes, of course." Her hand gestured nervously for him to take his pick of the empty patio chairs.
To her dismay, he chose the one closest to the chaise-lounge where she was seated, the chair already angled to face her. As he sat down, she stood up and walked to one of the hardwood pillars that supported the beamed overhang shading most of the patio. The fingers of one hand closed over the rough wood. "This isn't a social visit, Mr. Corbett. Why have you come here?" She turned to look at him as she voiced the taut question, unaware that she was framed by the setting sun. Its golden flame ignited the amber curls of her hair.
"What makes you so positive that it isn't a social visit?" He tipped his head to one side, sooty lashes veiling the watchful look in his eyes.
Her mouth tightened as again she glanced away from his powerful features. "If you've come to see if I weathered the ordeal satisfactorily last weekend, then the answer is yes, I have."
"I'm glad to hear that, Brandy," Jim replied diffidently.
The use of her given name grated across her already raw nerves. Mostly, she admitted silently, because when she wasn't looking at him and he spoke, she could almost believe it was Jim sitting there and not James Corbett. It was crazy to keep thinking of him as two different people.
Her fingers were pressed against the wood pillar and she stared at the contrast of golden tan flesh and the umber brown wood. "Now that I've reassured you on that point, Mr. Corbett, there isn't any need for you to prolong your visit out of politeness."
A low chuckle mocked her attempt to get rid of him. "I've never been accused of being a gentleman—I suspect it's because I'm not. So your thinly disguised invitation for me to leave isn't going to work."
Brandy pivoted sharply, an angry glare in her turquoise green eyes. "That I can believe, Mr. Corbett," she snapped. "I had proof of the fact that you aren't a gentleman, a fact I unfortunately forgot for a few minutes."
