by Mary Eason
His Favorite Mistake
By Mary Eason
PUBLISHED BY:
Mary Eason
Copyright © 2013 by Mary Eason
This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to the author and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work. This book has been re-edited and refreshed. This book was previously published as That's What Friends Are For.
A Note from the Author
Dear Reader,
I hope you enjoy Reyna and Brody's story as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it. His Favorite Mistake is the second book in the series, Baby Its Cold Out.
At the end of their story, I’ve included a sample chapter from the first book for your enjoyment.
In The Book Of Love – Book One of Baby Its Cold Out, had Lila Taylor known the fate waiting her outside her door that morning, she would have pulled the covers back over her head, dismissed the cat’s complaining entirely, and ignored the flood on the first floor. But you see, Lila wasn’t expecting anything life changing to happen to her. Why you might ask? Because nothing exciting ever happens in Endsville, Colorado.
Chapter One
Brody parked his truck beneath the canopy of a poplar tree and stared up at the window of Rayne's apartment. His stomach twisted into a hard knot. He sat staring up at her apartment and wondered what in the world was wrong with him lately. What had happened to the in-control, never-lose-any-sleep-over-a-woman guy. He didn’t let anything shake him—especially not a woman.
The guy looking back at him in the rearview mirror had never felt so uncertain about a woman before. He’d certainly never tried this hard to make one happy. This whole friendship slash I-don’t-have-any-idea-what-I’m-doing-anymore thing with Reyna James was bordering on obsessive and as out of character as it got for him.
Friendship—with a woman he found attractive? Was this the first real sign he’d finally slipped over the edge? Maybe working twenty-hour days had finally started to take its toll on his mental stability.
Nevertheless, friendship was all that Reyna had left to offer any man. After all, Cad had been the love of her life.
Brody couldn’t keep from cringing all over again. Guilt gnawed at his conscience he was betraying his best friend by having these feelings for Reyna.
Was it betrayal? If he was the only one who felt this way? Friendship was the only hope he had with her and he was just desperate enough to take whatever she would give him. He could be happy being her friend, couldn’t he?
Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to convince himself of that now any more than he had been the dozen or more times, he’d had this very same argument. What he felt for Reyna went way beyond wanting to be her friend. It might be all she had to offer him, but it was the last thing he wanted to settle for with her.
No matter how hard he tried to convince himself that he had her best interests at heart, Brody knew he would do anything to keep in his life. Even if it meant just being her friend.
Eight months ago, this whole conversation would have seemed pretty funny. After all, the thought of him, one of Denver’s most notorious bachelor’s, falling helplessly in love with any woman was hilarious. Especially one who didn’t know he existed beyond that dreaded F word.
Love wasn’t even supposed to be a part of his vocabulary. He was business first, and then women, which translated to physical satisfaction, second.
Oh sure, he enjoyed the dating thing—the hunt— but the forever-after? No, he'd never believed it until he'd met Reyna. She'd given him a glimpse of it, and he wanted it with every fiber of his being. But how could he take it - when she was his best friend's widow. A small town girl with an ageless innocence he'd found addictive.
“If you were the kind of friend you thought you were, you'd walk away now.” he admonished himself, knowing walking away was the furthest thing from what was going to happen.
Now, considering the circumstances, Brody was just grateful he had managed to keep his mouth shut. He couldn't imagine Reyna would ever allow herself to be involved in drugs. Harvey had been hurting over the loss of his son and needed to blame someone.
God help him if he were wrong, because he’d just invited her into his home.
So what was it about Reyna that made him want to throw all of his reservations out just to be close to her? After all, he’d known Cade for over ten years. He barely knew her at all.
The thing that bothered him the most was that no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't find an answer to that question. He didn’t understand why he felt this way about her but whatever it was it made him that much more determined to find the answer.
“Enough. Let’s just get this over with,” he said aloud before forcing himself to get out of the truck. “You asked for this, Samuels, so deal with it.”
With any luck, being close to Reyna every single day would kill whatever feelings he thought he had for her. He’d never had a relationship that lasted more than a few weeks. What was going to make this one any different? Just because he’d let his fantasy grow into unrealistic proportions didn’t mean the real Reyna James stood a chance of living up to that dream now, did it?
Unfortunately, Brody could still remember the way she’d felt in his arms the night of Cade’s funeral. The night he’d held her close all night long while she cried those useless tears for a man who had chosen to take his own life. A man who hadn’t been capable of being faithful to her from the very beginning of their short marriage. A man who didn’t deserve her.
He’d come so close to touching her that night. Experience told him she wouldn’t have resisted. She’d all but asked him to make love to her. She’d wanted him. But she’d wanted him for comfort. To wipe away the memories of the terrible day. He couldn’t accept that from her.
Even today, Brody couldn’t look at her and not remember those tears. Or how much he’d wanted it to be him who she cared so much for.
As he locked the truck and stood staring up at the building, the last words Cade had said came back to haunt him. Some comment made in passing a few days before his death along the line of things coming to a head. At the time, Brody had thought Cade was simply blowing off steam. No doubt, they’d had another argument and he was once again, regretting marrying Reyna. Brody had simply thought Cade was looking for sympathy.
The night of the accident, he couldn’t get those words out of his mind any more than he could keep from wondering if somehow, his friend had seen the end coming.
After Cade’s funeral, out of frustration and probably guilt, Brody had brought up Harvey’s accusations and asked Reyna about the drugs found in Cade’s car.
He could still see the hurt in those brown eyes of hers when she’d answered him. And God help him, he hadn’t fully believed her.
She was hiding something it was easy to see. She was almost like an open book. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know what that something was had been just as clear. He hadn’t believed a word of what she’d told him during the course of the night.
The apartment Reyna shared with Cade was in one of the nicest buildings in the neighborhood. This building and most of the others in the exclusive neighborhood belonged to Harvey James.
It hadn’t really came as any great surprise when Harvey insisted Reyna move out of the apartment but what he couldn’t understand was why she was so adamant about not taking a single thing beyond her few personal possessions w
ith her. It was as if she wanted to put her marriage in the past. That had only made Eric even more suspicious. After all, Cade was the love of her young life, wasn’t he?
The lobby was all but empty this rainy night. Brody headed toward the elevator bank lifting a single finger in greeting to the doorman who knew him by his first name.
Another sin.
As he left the elevator and walked the half dozen steps to her door, he hated he couldn’t bring himself to dismiss Harvey’s accusations from his thoughts any more than he could Cade’s innuendos. God help him, but he hated that he didn’t believe Reyna’s innocence.
Unfortunate for him, none of that mattered the moment she opened the door. It didn’t matter that he had more doubts than answers.
The second he saw her standing there in the doorway, the second he spotted that smile of hers that lit up his heart and dispelled those doubts, he didn’t care what she was involved in or how much trouble lay ahead for him. It didn’t matter how many broken loyalties he’d committed by being here now, or offering her a place to live. By wanting her, the way he did right then.
None of those things mattered anymore. He was crazy about this woman and that was all that mattered to him. He was crazy about her and too far-gone to walk away from her now.
Chapter Two
“Reyna, what’s going on between you and Brody anyway? I’ve been asking you to get us together for weeks now and all you do is stall.”
Reyna James held the receiver away from her ear and counted to ten. Not now. Not again. Not today.
Of course, it certainly didn’t come as any great surprise that her cousin was asking her the same question yet again. Not anymore than she was questioning what was going on between herself and Brody. After all, Reyna had known it was coming the second she answered the phone and heard Jenna’s voice on the other end. It was always only a matter of time.
No matter what the pretense of the call was in the beginning, Jenna always brought the conversation back to Brody Samuels and each time, Reyna skirted around the whole unpleasant and frankly unsettling question she’d come to hate with the same evasive answer.
Soon.
“Reyna.” Jenna’s pitiful wail resounded through the telephone line making her reaction perfectly clear. Even with the receiver held at arm’s length, Reyna hadn’t missed the anger in her cousin’s voice.
From past experiences, Reyna knew Jenna Vanderhaven was not accustomed to having her wishes ignored. Once she’d made up her mind about something, she went after it with the same amount of force as an invading army.
Jenna had made up her mind weeks ago that Brody was the perfect man for her. Just like that. Without a thought for Brody’s wishes, or Reyna’s, for that matter.
The second Reyna had introduced her cousin to Brody, Jenna had probably pulled up his financial report in her head. Reyna secretly believed Jenna had every single eligible man’s personal history filed away in some compartment in her mind. Without saying more than two words to Brody beyond that first simple hello, Jenna had made up her mind. It wouldn’t have surprised Reyna one little bit if her cousin hadn’t started picking out wedding gowns already.
“Jenna, I told you I don’t really know Brody all that well. He was more Cade’s friend than mine.” That was sort of the truth. If she didn’t count the fact that, for all practical purposes, she’d spent the night with him. Would have spent much more than just that single night in his arms, if Brody hadn’t been strong. She certainly wasn’t. Mostly because she’d dreamed about such a thing happening, had wanted Brody since the first time she’d met him.
“I’m not really sure how I feel about asking him.”
“Reyna, don’t you dare. Don’t even think about backing out of this. You promised. It’s the least you can do, considering everything I’ve done for you. Besides, you said yourself, Brody stops by just about every day to see you. He makes it a point to stay in touch since Cade’s death. I’m sure the poor guy feels some responsibility, although I don’t really know why with the way things turned out. My point is you see him all the time, so what’s the problem? Just ask him about it for God’s sake. I mean, surely you’re not going to tell me that during all those visits you two haven’t gotten close?”
Reyna listened to silence on the other end as Jenna considered another possibility for the first time. Jenna was so close to guessing the truth.
“That is, unless you’re not telling me everything about your relationship with Brody. You’re not avoiding bringing this whole subject with him simply to keep him for yourself, are you? Reyna, don’t you dare tell me you’re interested in Brody as well. was all that weeping widow stuff just an act to get his attention?” Reyna hated the way Jenna almost sounded impressed by the thought. “Is there something going on between you two that I should know about?”
At that moment, Reyna was tempted to just hang up the phone and let her cousin draw her own conclusions. Did Jenna ever listen to anything Reyna said? How many times had Reyna told her cousin that she never intended on going down that road again? Marriage to Cade had been enough to turn her off love and commitment forever.
Somehow, Reyna managed to catch the words that were always so close whenever Jenna started in on this subject. The last thing Reyna needed right now was for her cousin to know just how wrong she’d been in assuming Reyna’s marriage to Cade was perfect.
“Jenna, I’ve told you I’m never going through that again.”
Jenna was right about one thing. Since Cade’s death, she and Brody had become close. Far closer than Reyna had ever imagined possible with another man. Brody was the one who stood by her through all the scandal that followed Cade’s accident.
For the life of her, Reyna just couldn’t understand why. After what had happened, she wouldn’t have blamed him one bit if he’d walked away from her and the whole ugly mess, and never looked back.
It wasn’t as if he owed her anything. Brody was Cade’s friend—his best friend, according to Cade. They’d known each other since their university days. Brody didn’t know her at all. Not really. She’d lied to him. About her feelings. About her marriage to Cade.
In the weeks since Cade’s death, Reyna had come to realize one thing. Brody wasn’t anything like her husband, and she couldn’t understand what had kept their friendship together for so long. Especially the past few months. Brody had to know about Cade’s addiction. From the way Cade talked sometimes, it almost sounded as if he were jealous of his best friend and boss.
In those last few weeks before his death, Cade had treated Brody and everyone around him with reckless disregard. No one other than Reyna knew the whole truth behind Cade’s behavior until after the accident, although Brody clearly suspected something from the few comments he’d made since that time.
Brody probably knew Cade better than anyone. Definitely better than Cade’s own father, who refused to see his son’s destructive behavior for what it was.
While Reyna might not be willing to admit the truth to Jenna, she was closer to Brody than she’d been to her own husband. Far closer than she had ever expected, considering Brody’s relationship with Cade. Closer than she had a right to be.
Of course, Brody’s concern for her was all due to some misplaced loyalty he felt toward Cade. That and perhaps the circumstances surrounding Cade’s death.
That was where Brody’s interest in her began and ended.
In the weeks since Cade’s death, Brody had treated her with a gentle respect, but there was always a certain amount of distance in his behavior. Their relationship could be neatly summed up in one little word. Friendship. With the exception of the night of Cade’s funeral, when they’d both been emotionally drained from the event and things had gotten out of hand. It would have been so easy. Thank God, Brody had been strong enough for the both of them, even if she hadn’t exactly felt thrilled about it at the time. It was probably for the best because she was never going down that road again. Never again. Not for anyone. As far as she was concerne
d, she’d find herself a nice little puppy and leave it at that.
Once, Brody had talked her into having dinner with him just to get her out of the apartment for a while. That evening could not have been a bigger disaster and one Reyna was determined never to repeat again. It was just too awkward being out with Brody and trying to pretend she wasn’t attracted to him. She was aware of every little thing about him. She was supposed to be a widow in mourning for crying out loud. Brody, however drop- dead gorgeous he was, had been her husband’s best friend, which meant, off limits.
Even if he weren’t her husband’s best friend, Brody was way out of her league. He traveled in a world she’d only caught glimpses. The ultra-rich social world of Denver’s elite.
Brody was probably their poster boy. The all-American success story. A good-looking, middle class guy—tall, dark and extremely handsome with the most amazing blue eyes Reyna had even seen—Brody had moved to Denver after graduating from a first class university and made it to the top of the corporate world in just five years. Brody’s company, Samuels Advertising had just been named one of the hottest firms in all of Denver.
Normally, someone like Brody wouldn’t even give her a second glance. She’d never even heard of most of the places he frequented. Growing up in Silverton, Colorado with her grandmother had been light years away from the fast-paced life of Denver. She and Brody had nothing in common. Well, besides Cade.
Often, she’d found herself wondering what Cade had told Brody about their marriage.
She couldn’t talk about her marriage. Not with Brody. Every single time Brody brought the subject back to Cade, Reyna found all of her old frustrations, and fears resurface. She’d been such a disappointment to Cade. He’d certainly told her that enough times to make her believe it was the truth. Even now in death, Cade still held the power of fear over her.
“Reyna, you know you promised.” Jenna’s growing irritation cut through those unpleasant memories, bringing her back to the present and to Jenna’s frustration at not having heard a single word of what she’d just said.