American Diva

by Julia London

  He stepped out of the bathroom so suddenly that she jumped. He smiled a little at her obvious surprise as he walked to his bag on a chair and pulled out some boxer briefs.

  With a wink, he reached for the towel at his waist.

  Audrey quickly looked the other way as her pulse picked up another notch.

  “There’s one more thing,” Jack said casually as he presumably dressed. “I don’t like to shop. You might say I hate to shop. So whatever it is you want, we’re going in, we’re getting it, and we’re out of there.”

  “I don’t think you get to decide that.”

  “I have a lot to do, Audrey. I really don’t have time to baby-sit.”

  “Baby-sit!” she exclaimed, whipping around, and just as quickly turning away again as he was standing in his boxer briefs like he’d just walked out of an underwear ad.

  “Baby-sit,” he said again.

  She heard him digging through his bag. A moment later, he walked past her, wearing a pair of unbuttoned jeans and leaving a waft of cologne in his wake.

  “I have a legitimate need for security,” she said, starting to get a little miffed as he shrugged into a crisp, white shirt. “What makes you think I don’t have a lot to do, too? It’s not like I have a lot of time to shop, but I need some shoes, so I am going to go and get them. In and out.”

  Jack snorted.

  “What?” she demanded.

  He suddenly grinned. Her pulse jumped to a full staccato.

  “I have yet to find a woman who is in and out,” he said. “And I’d be willing to bet dinner that you, of all women, can’t do it.”

  She put aside the image of him shopping with a variety of women to say, “That is a very sexist statement, Muscle Man. You must be hanging out with high-maintenance princesses. Some women have a lot more to do than spend your money.”

  “So is it a bet or not?”

  “Absolutely!” she said confidently.

  “Good. You shop for anything besides shoes, then dinner is on your considerable nickel, sweet cheeks,” he said, and blithely tucked the tails of his shirt into his open pants. “If you go in and get your shoes and get out of there, it’s on me. Deal?” he asked, punctuating his challenge by zipping up his pants.

  “Deal,” she said. It would be steak. She could definitely do with a little red meat.

  “Come on, let’s go,” she said and stood, headed for the door.

  “Not so fast.”

  Audrey paused and glanced over her shoulder.

  “First, ask me nicely if I am ready.”

  “Oh for God’s sake. Are you ready, Jack?”

  “Almost. And you aren’t going out like that.”

  She glanced down, confused. She was wearing a low-slung linen skirt, a spaghetti strap camisole, and some slinky kitten-heeled sandals. “What’s wrong with what I have on?”

  “Not . . . a damn thing,” he said as his gaze raked over her. “But you need a hat and some shades. Didn’t Genius teach you anything about moving around incognito?”

  Audrey reached into her bag and pulled out a pair of Chanel shades and shoved them onto her face, knowing they covered most of it. “Will this do? I don’t have a hat.”

  He sighed and gestured to her hair. “We’re going to have to do something with that,” he said. “Try and put it up,” he added as he walked around to his bag. He rummaged inside and produced a New York Mets baseball hat, which he held up for her to see.

  “The Mets?” she said, peering at it. “I thought a good ol’ Texas boy went for the Rangers or the Astros.”

  “A good ol’ Texas boy does, unless his brother plays for the Mets.”

  Audrey made a sound of surprised delight. “Your brother plays for the Mets? I love baseball! I can’t believe it. Ohmigod, is it Parker Price?”

  He stuffed the hat on her head. “It’s Parker all right. What’s that look? You thought the Price boys couldn’t play a little ball?”

  Audrey smiled wryly, took the hat off her head, and handed it to him. “I’m not surprised the Price boys can play ball. I’m just surprised one of them is playing for the Mets,” she said as she put her hair up in a ponytail.

  “Play your cards right, and I might take you to see a game sometime.”

  He said it as if they had known each other for ages instead of only days. Audrey stilled only slightly, but it was enough for Jack to notice. “I’ll get you tickets,” he amended himself, and thrust the cap at her again.

  She took it, threaded her hair through the hole in the back, and fit the cap on her head, tucking up curls of blond beneath it. When she’d finished, she turned around for Jack’s inspection.

  He let his gaze drift over her, long and slow, and nodded. “You’ll do.”

  Audrey laughed. “Okay. Let’s go.”

  “Uh-uh,” he said.

  “What now?”

  He frowned playfully. “Aren’t you forgetting something?” he asked, and looked meaningfully at Bruno, sitting at her feet, peering up at her.

  “Oh my goodness. Bruno!” She scooped him up and put him in her bag. “Now if you are ready, I will show you how a real woman shops.”

  A pained look came over Jack’s handsome face. He sighed, pressed his lips together, and nodded.

  Audrey couldn’t help laughing.

  Twelve

  In the third shoe store and the sixth chair he’d occupied since this “in-and-out” shopping had begun, Jack shifted the packages on his lap: two pairs of shoes, three blouses—at least he thought they were blouses—and the enormous bag in which Bruno was patiently awaiting his next outing.

  Jack had decided in the first shop that if women ever ruled the world, they would do well to torture male terrorists into talking in just this way. There was absolutely nothing more painful than watching a woman pick through racks of clothes or shoes, particularly if they held up each article of clothing that caught their eye, and asked, “What do you think? Too pink?”

  Was there such a thing as too pink? Wasn’t pink just pink?

  Jack was staring at the shoes on the wall (Why did shoes have names? Did shoemakers really believe women walked into establishments such as this and ask for the Maria or the Bethany?) when Audrey cleared her throat in a loud and obtrusive manner.

  He turned his head to the right—and almost dropped his packages. She was standing before him, her legs planted apart, her linen skirt gathered even higher above her knee. On one leg, she wore a dark red leather, over-the-knee, stiletto boot. On the other foot, she wore the spikiest, reddest, badass stiletto sandal he’d ever seen on a woman.

  She bent slightly at the waist and looked at the shoes, then straightened and looked at Jack, her expression very serious. “Which one?”

  Was she kidding? Both shoes made him want to drink heavily—he couldn’t take his eyes from her legs.

  “So?” she asked in a low voice. “Which do you think?”

  Which did he think what? They were both killer. He wanted to put her on her back right there, in the middle of this fancy little shoe store, and have her wrap those shoes around his back.

  She shifted her weight to one hip and waited for him to speak. When he didn’t, she turned the foot encased in the stiletto sandal, and with a sexy smile, she asked, “Which do you think would do best on stage?” She slid that leg a little closer to him. “The sandals?” She turned again, sliding the leg in the boot toward him. “Or the boots?”

  Jack swallowed down a lump of intense lust and lifted his gaze to hers. “I don’t know which would do best,” he said sincerely, “but personally, I think I prefer the boots.”

  She smiled seductively. “Aha . . . a boot man.”

  “Did either of those work for you?” a woman suddenly trilled, her voice slicing across the moment. Jack suppressed a groan as the saleswoman appeared between him and Audrey. “Oh my,” she said, nodding approvingly. “Those are lovely.”

  “Which do you think?” Audrey asked.

  “It depends on what event you�
�re shopping for,” the saleswoman said, boggling Jack’s mind even further that she could break this sale down to a single event.

  Audrey leaned around her and smiled pertly at Jack. “I think I’ll take them both,” she said, and turned, waltzing like she was on a runway across the store to where she’d left her shoes.

  The saleslady chuckled. “She has the legs for either style.” She glanced at Jack. “I can tell that you are a veteran of shopping with your wife.”

  Jack started. “She’s not—”

  “Don’t worry, hon,” the woman said, putting her hand on Jack’s shoulder. “It won’t be much longer. I think your wife has found what she was looking for,” she said with a wink.

  Of course the saleswoman was speaking of the shoes, but nevertheless, as she bustled off to divest Audrey of her money, Jack’s stomach did a weird little flip.

  Audrey lost the bet, though she argued that she shouldn’t have been held to the terms of the bet because she’d stumbled onto such a great sale, and no one in their right mind would have passed up 50 to 75 percent off designer shoes. But Jack held up her packages as proof that she had shopped, and therefore, lost.

  Audrey gave in. She called Lucas’s cell and, thankfully, got his voice mail. “I’m going to dinner,” she said. “A steak place, the Brasa Grill or something.” She glanced at Jack. “With, ah . . . with Jack. I owe him,” she added hastily, as if she needed to explain. “Ah . . . see you later.”

  She was relieved Lucas wasn’t around. The last thing she wanted was for him to show up at dinner. Frankly, she was looking forward to dinner with someone other than Lucas for a change. Every time she and Lucas went to a restaurant, he spent the whole meal watching to see who noticed Audrey, or pushed his latest plan to make them fabulously rich.

  It would be nice to have dinner with someone who wasn’t worried about who she was or what important press person was in the area or her career. Fortunately, so far, no one in Cleveland seemed to know or care who she was.

  Audrey was in such a good mood that she removed her ball cap. “I’m not going into a restaurant looking like I just ran the bases,” she said to Jack, and then reached into one of her many bags. She withdrew a sheer blouse to dress up the linen skirt and pulled that over her head. Then she dug through another bag, withdrew a shoebox, opened it up, and took out a pair of gold beaded sandals.

  When she had finished, she turned to Jack and smiled. “How do you like me now?”

  His gaze turned sultry. “I like you,” he said low. “And you look fantastic.”

  If there was one thing Audrey had learned in her life, it was that there were two ways a man could tell a woman she looked nice. One was to say, “You look nice,” with a quick smile and a pat on the hand or the shoulder. The other was to say, “You look fantastic,” with a gaze full of the promise of fabulous sex. That was exactly the way Jack was looking at her, and a shiver shot down her spine and landed squarely in her groin.

  She knew she should look away, shouldn’t encourage that look any more than she already had, but she didn’t. She couldn’t. She couldn’t even speak, and just held his gaze, believing with everything she had that he was feeling the desire flow between them as acutely as she was.

  It wasn’t until the cab had pulled up in front of the Brasa Grill that she could finally draw a breath. A helpful salesclerk had directed them to the restaurant, and it was, as promised, a happening place. At the entrance was a patio lounge; the tables were already full at seven o’clock.

  “Oh God,” she said when she saw the crowd. She felt defeated, trumped in her illicit outing before it had begun.

  “What’s wrong?” Jack asked, peering over her shoulder.

  “There are too many people.” As if in agreement, Bruno whimpered.

  Jack looked at the crowd, then at her. “I have an idea,” he said. “Are you up for it?”

  “Anything.”

  He asked the cabbie, “Is there a park nearby?”

  “Yep. Just a mile or so from here.”

  “What about a Wal-Mart?” Jack asked.

  “A Wal-Mart?” Audrey echoed laughingly.

  He took her hand, wrapped his fingers securely around hers. “Trust me,” he said.

  She did trust him. Remarkably, she did.

  Jack directed the cabbie to a Wal-Mart, where they picked up a blanket and some wineglasses. Then they stopped at a liquor store, where Jack went in alone and emerged with two bottles of very nice wine. The last stop was a barbeque joint. He bought chicken and the accoutrements for everyone, including the cabbie and Bruno. After that, they headed for a park. Any park. And Jack paid the cabbie to wait.

  For the first time in a long time, Audrey felt like a normal, regular person, the sort of person she used to be when she would drive to gigs in her Honda with an amp in the trunk and the trunk roped shut around it. She was sitting under the stars with Jack, drinking excellent wine and eating moist, tender chicken, with Bruno chewing happily on a rawhide bone (“You do like him,” Audrey had accused Jack when he picked it up at Wal-Mart. “Do not,” he’d said with a smile. “He’s just a rat.”). It didn’t get any better than this.

  The tension she’d created by kissing Jack at the lagoon was gone. They were comfortable together, like a pair of old friends enjoying a lazy summer evening. She looked at Jack stretched long on the blanket, propped up on one arm, and watching some people at the far end of the park.

  “So tell me something about yourself, Rambo.”

  He gave her a wary smile. “What do you want to know, starlight?” he asked as he polished off the last of the chicken.

  She wanted to know everything—how old he was, where he went to school, if he’d ever been in love. She wanted to know which of her songs he’d heard first, if he ever danced, if he had a family that drove him nuts, like her. “Start with the obvious,” she suggested.

  “Like?”

  “Like . . . any great love in your life?”

  “You don’t beat around the bush, do you?” he asked with a winsome smile. “Honestly?”

  “Honestly.”

  He sighed. “Yeah . . . I’ve had the same great love most of my adult life.”

  A wave of disappointment swept through Audrey, which she immediately dismissed as asinine. Good for him! He’d found that one great love, the thing that eluded most people. “What’s her name?” she asked breezily, stabbing a little too hard at a piece of chicken.

  “She doesn’t have a name.”

  Audrey glanced up. “What do you mean, she doesn’t have a name?”

  He grinned. “The great love is flying.” At Audrey’s look of confusion, he casually moved her sleeve away from the chicken it was about to touch and said, “You know. Planes. Helicopters. Dirigibles.”

  “You can fly?” she asked, happily surprised and curious.

  “Yes.”

  “Dirigibles?”

  He laughed. “Okay, I was kidding about the dirigibles. But just about anything else with wings,” he said.

  “Ooh, tell me,” she begged him.

  Jack had flown everything—big planes, small planes, propeller planes and jets. He told her about his years in the service where he’d learned how to fly. And then he mentioned his desire to teach others his love of flying.

  Impressed, she smiled broadly. “You have a flight school?”

  “Not yet,” he said with a proud grin. “But I’m working on it. It’s why I took this job, to be honest.” He told her about the hangar he’d rented in Orange County, the plane he was rebuilding (rebuilding, she noted, as if that were an everyday task, like changing a flat tire), and how he hoped to be up and operational in two years’ time. She watched him as he spoke of his dream, could see the excitement in his blue eyes, the pride he took in his work. She understood it, too—she felt that same pride with her songwriting, knew the sort of thrill of having achieved something special when one song out of one hundred turned out to be really good.

  What she envied about Jack w
as his ability to pursue his dream on his own terms—to pursue what he wanted as opposed to what the world wanted from him.

  “But . . . I thought you were part of a stunt group,” she said, when he’d finished telling about the work he’d put in on his flight school.

  “Thrillseekers Anonymous,” he said, and laughed a little as he poured more wine for them. “Yeah, that’s another little venture I’m into.”

  “Stunts?”

  “Stunts, yes . . . but we’re really all about the sports.” He told her more about TA, how he’d grown up with his partners Eli McCain and Cooper Jessup in West Texas. He laughed as he talked about how, as boys, they’d developed a love for sports—football, baseball, basketball, rodeo—whatever sport they could play. He told her that when regular sports got to be too easy, they began to create their own.

  “How do you create your own sports?” she asked with a laugh.

  “Well, you start by diving into old mines that have been filled with water. Or creating dirt-bike trails through the canyons. Or you make a game out of breaking horses without a bit. And when you get tired of that, you build things that look a little like cars and a little like trouble and race them across fallow wheat fields.”

  Audrey could imagine three boys racing across empty fields. “How exactly did you parlay that into a business?”

  “Oh, I didn’t,” he said, shaking his head as he pushed his plate away. “Eli and Cooper did that. By the time we finished college, we were into the extreme side of sports in general. We’d done it all—white-water rafting, rock-climbing, canyon-jumping, kayaking, surfing, skiing—name the sport, and we’d tried it. Except flying.” He grinned and leaned back. “I wanted to fly, but the only way I could afford to learn how was to join the Air Force. Coop and Eli weren’t as interested in flying as they were in jumping off buildings and blowing things up, so they headed out to Hollywood to hire on as stuntmen. They got their start working on some of the biggest action films in Hollywood, and before too long, they were choreographing some big-picture action sequences.”

  “What about you?”

  “Me? I was in the service. That’s where I met Michael Raney, our fourth partner. He and I met on a couple of classified missions, discovered we both had a love for extreme sports, and started hanging out when we could.” He chuckled low and shook his head. “Raney and I did some crazy shit. But when I came to the end of my tour, Cooper and Eli had come up with the idea to start up Thrillseekers Anonymous. It sounded good. So I came out to Hollywood to work with them.”