by Carol Devine
True to form, he grabbed her arm before she could make it out of the room. "Mandy, look at me."
She stubbornly refused, staring instead at his grip as though his hand was a disgusting piece of filth. Which it may very well be. Bram said the words again, trying to get her to see his regret, aware that the only thing greater than his need to persecute her was his remorse at doing so. It came to him how much she reminded him of his ex-wife, and how he wanted to punish her for it.
"I shouldn't have said that," he said.
"Let go of me," she retorted, her fury evident in the stark emphasis she gave each word.
His grip tightened along with his gut. "I'm trying to tell you I'm sorry."
"Tell it to the judge when we go to court. Maybe he'll believe you. I certainly don't."
Her utter contempt made him remember the first time he'd seen her at ringside. How scornful she'd looked. Just like now.
"Do you know why I picked you out of that audience in the first place?" he asked, dropping her arm to emphasize the importance of his confession. "I told myself I was trying to get out of doing something I didn't want to do. But the truth is," his voice cracked. "The truth is, I wanted to embarrass you. Sitting there like a corporate queen, daring to look down your nose at me even though I stood five feet above, working like a demon to get a rise out of everyone, including you. That's been the story of my life. Proving myself."
She refused to look at him and wiped her hand on her skirt as though his hand was dirty. He really couldn't blame her. All that, and he still hadn't managed to get to the point. He took a deep breath and went on.
"Five years ago I met and married a woman who I thought I could spend the rest of my life with. But nothing pleased her, nothing, and finally I had to step back and see that the only one worth pleasing is myself. Only I hurt you in the process, Mandy. For that I am sorry. I'm not just talking about here and now. That night at the arena, I didn't want to admit how selfish it was to take you. So I blamed you for making me do it. Once I got rolling, I blamed you for every single thing my ex-wife ever did to me."
He watched her profile, thinking that he owed her much more than an explanation and a whiny one at that. He hadn't allowed himself to think about Elizabeth for years, the memories were that painful. But he realized he'd been carrying her around all this time, putting her face on every woman who remotely intrigued him. This one most of all. For she looked like Elizabeth with the blonde hair and the blue eyes, but there the resemblance ended. Where Mandy was built slender, Lizzy's curves had never stopped, becoming overblown in the end. And where Elizabeth conned and bitched, this woman spoke her mind, giving him no quarter. As he said last night, it was a rare person who stood up to him. Elizabeth never had. She manipulated her way around instead, looting his bank accounts, lying about her age, her fertility. Everything.
Tears stung his eyes and he thought about how he'd never cried over the loss of a love he now knew he'd never had. He'd married Lizzy because of a dream he'd carried of how it should be when you grew up. A woman to love you, who'd make you feel like a man. Only a woman couldn't do that. A man had to do it for himself.
That's why he'd poured so much time and energy into saving the animals. He'd created something of his own. Because of the emptiness, he had learned to do that much. But deep inside, he'd still carried the dream of husband and wife, still blamed Lizzy for ruining it for him. When all along he'd ruined it for himself by staying isolated, alone. So alone.
Got that, Masterson? he thought. He'd pushed Amanda to come clean when all along, he'd been the one lying to himself. Who was he to talk about honesty, to demand that she expose herself when he wouldn't? All along, he'd shown her his worst. Yet she'd fought back, demanding respect, a respect he'd begrudged her every step of the way. If he were truly a man, he'd have the guts to admit he thought of her as something more than a quick roll in the hay.
Chapter Eleven
When Bram stopped speaking, Amanda saw a man wrestling with something so deep it made him human. Her throat thickened and she knew she had to leave the room, giving him privacy and herself time to think. As she edged toward the door, he raised his head.
"Wait."
It was more entreaty than command. She hesitated, made more unsteady by the rasp in his voice. He pinched the bridge of his nose, then spread his forefinger and thumb to his closed eyes. When he dropped his hand and looked at her, the sheer regret in his bloodshot gaze brought her to a standstill.
"Apologies are too easy," he said low. "None of this should have happened, not at the arena and certainly not here. I'll do anything you want, even sell the ranch to pay a settlement, but I know you don't want Tasha and the other animals hurt. I'll need time to find homes for them. That may take awhile ."
Amanda didn't move. She drew a deep, slow breath and framed her words carefully, matching his tone. "You don't have to find them new homes. I don't want to take away your animals. Or your ranch for that matter. What I want, what I wanted all along, is for you to stop carting women away in your shows."
"You must want something more. It can't be that simple."
"It is that simple. The stunt reinforces the belief that women somehow enjoy being victimized. After everything you told me last night, I don't understand how you can condone that kind of behavior."
"I've been trying to get out of doing it for a long time. That's what I was trying to do when I picked you at the arena that night." He explained the whole evolution of the stunt, ending with, "It's written in my contract. There's nothing I can do to change that."
"Break the contract."
He wanted to say the solution wasn't that easy but looking at her, he could see it was, that the contract was merely a piece of paper. If he offered the GWL promoters something of equal value, something which defined his persona and attracted as much publicity as the stunt, the league would go for it. Studying her face, the germ of an idea came to him and he faced her fully.
"In order to change my image, I'll need your help. The league will reinstate me only when you drop the suit. When you do, we'll call a press conference to announce the elimination of the stunt from my act. It'll be a zoo because I'll have to play the part of the Beastmaster and bring Tasha, but I know it'll work."
They hashed out a complete plan in his study over a late breakfast, the latter consisting of fresh buttermilk biscuits and strawberry jam, both courtesy of Mrs. Barton, who'd raised her eyebrows when he'd wrapped up a half dozen biscuits in the bunkhouse kitchen after polishing off that much and more food at her table earlier that morning. Even then, not one of the ranch hands dared ask him about the Caddy parked in the drive.
Amanda drank a lot of coffee he noticed and didn't eat as much as he would have liked, but in the end she agreed to be his accomplice. And something more.
"I'd like to take the tour now," she announced as they dumped dishes into the sink.
He glanced at the clock above the stove. "I thought you had to go to a seminar."
She nodded. "It's about plea bargaining. Thanks to you, I learned the first lesson. If I shower and change my clothes here, I can drive directly there in time to catch the afternoon session. It's a two-day seminar, so I’ll catch up on what I missed from my colleagues once I get there.”
He held the back door open for her. "Does everyone in the D.A.'s office work such long hours?"
"Some do," she said, negotiating a short flight of wooden stairs. "Most of the people I work with are married, with young children. They try to reserve weekends for their families."
She paused at the base of the stairs. Fifty feet from the back door rose a steep cliff, forming a natural and dramatic border fence. A twenty foot chain link fence closed off both ends, framing the huge rectangular yard.
"Tasha's playground," Bram said.
A cottonwood grew alongside a small pond, shadowing a corner of the yard with deep shade. A thick carpet of grass covered the rest of the ground, extending to the cliff. Several junipers were planted alo
ng the fences. An abandoned log, a thick length of rope and a battered silver beer keg lay scattered under the tree.
"Toys," Bram explained. "The keg is empty. Tigers require playthings which are indestructible."
He crossed the yard and led her through a locked gate which opened onto a narrow path winding through trees. Pines scented the air. She could see them dot the ridge which rose above the cliff. The morning breeze was cool but the fierceness of the sun promised more heat later in the day. Amanda followed Bram's lead through a grove of aspens, impressed that so much of his land had been kept in a natural state.
"How big is your ranch?"
"About a thousand acres. This area is deceptive because the working part of the ranch is located northeast of here. I didn't want Tasha bothering the horses or cattle, so I bought twenty adjoining acres for myself. The terrain is too rugged for farming or good grazing, but it's perfect for me and exotic animals."
"What about your parents? Do they live here?"
"My mom lives in Florida. My Dad died of a heart attack about ten years ago."
"I'm sorry," she said simply.
"You would have liked him. He worked fifteen hour days all the time. And he certainly admired your father. Losing him when you were so young must have been tough," he said, slanting a look of sympathy at her.
She stripped a leaf from a passing branch and twirled it between her fingers. "In a way, I was lucky. My brother and sister were much younger. They don't remember him as vividly as I do.”
"What do you remember most?"
She looked to the tops of the trees and searched for words, wanting to communicate the essence of her father. He'd been such a motivating force in her life. "How strong-minded he was," she answered softly. "He never let fear stop him from doing the right thing, even at great personal cost."
"The definition of leadership," Bram said, nodding."I sometimes wonder how the world would be different if he'd lived. He inspired people to think beyond themselves, to believe in the greater good."
"I've wondered, too," she admitted, moved by what Bram had said. Most people were reluctant to bring up the name of John Bertram Tarkenton, afraid of stirring up old wounds, not only in her, but in themselves ."'Once hope is lost, all is lost,'" she said, quoting one of her father's famous sayings.
"Did you get to spend a lot of time with him when you were growing up?"
"Not as much as I wanted. When he wasn't in Washington, he traveled all over the country, campaigning for civil rights legislation. But once I learned to read, he used to write me little notes. Fatherly advice, he called it. “Study hard' or 'You can do it, I know you can.' That sort of thing."
She tilted her head, her smile wistful. "He always made a point to be home on Sundays, to spend the day with us. We'd go to church in the morning, then he'd quiz us about the sermon on the drive home. He was the one who taught me how to think fast on my feet."
"To my everlasting regret."
She punched his arm, surprising herself. She could tell he was surprised, too. To cover her sudden confusion, she asked, "Did you agree with his politics?"
Bram lifted one shoulder in a half-hearted gesture. "Generally. But I tend to be something of a maverick in how I view the world."
"You're kidding." Amanda feigned total shock, which got him chuckling.
"I know it's hard to believe. My reputation for going against the establishment appears to be something I was born with. My father used to call me the hell-raiser. Always moving, getting into things. I loved to toss guys around on the football field. Wrestling in high school, too. His favorite question was, 'What's the damn hell-raiser done now?'"
"What did your mom call you?"
"Abraham Marcus Masterson. But only when I got into trouble."
"You in trouble? I don't believe it."
"My brother Zach was the one who made the most trouble. Me, I used to bring home stray animals. We had a few fights over the snakes and skunks.” His smile faded and he admitted, "She left home when I was fourteen."
"Divorce?"Amanda murmured.
Bram nodded. "My father was a hard man to live with and they fought all the time. I learned words can wound the same as fists can.” He looked out across the yard, remembering. "They didn't start out that way. I’m the oldest so I can recall times when I was very young, when there was a lot of hugging, a lot of laughter. My father had major plans for the ranch back then. He was a farmer at heart and worked to improve our wheat production by mortgaging what we had and buying more land. Unfortunately for him, his timing was lousy. Wheat prices fell and so did the value of farm land."
"How did he manage to hold on?"
"By selling out," Bram said flatly. "He abandoned the wheat, sold what land he could and hunkered down, taking a huge loss. He did pay down the debt, but it became what he lived for, and the fact that he gave up on his dreams made him bitter. My mom stayed through the worst but left soon after the loans were paid off, taking my two sisters with her. My brothers and I lived with my dad."
"That couldn't have been fun."
"Let's just say I worked my butt off in order to get a football scholarship to an out-of-state school. You know what happened after that. By the time I came back here with Tasha, not knowing where else to go, a lot of water had run under the bridge. Dad helped me nurse Tasha back to health. And he was the one who suggested I develop an act around her."
"He actually encouraged you to become a professional wrestler?"
"He knew I'd never make it as a rancher. Don't have the patience for it or a feel for the land."
"But you studied business in college."
Bram shrugged. "Pro Wrestling is a business. Hardy works as my agent, taking and turning down offers at my direction. Then there's the management of the animals plus all that goes along with overseeing the ranch."
She nodded, realizing his various avocations all seemed to go hand in hand. The path they were walking on opened up into a landscaped compound. Bram showed her the cages that were not cages. Similar to Tasha's playground, they were set into the natural cliffs and ridges of the land, using a state of the art electrical field to keep both animals and nature in. Then there was the cathouse, which reminded her of the long enclosed buildings she'd seen at the zoo. Bram explained that many of the cats were so used to the small confines of a ten by ten cage, they needed the same security while they acclimated to the ranch. Each of the ten rooms in the low house opened up into an outside run. Closed off at first, it was opened for longer periods each day, until the animals could tolerate their new freedom. The indoor section was also used during the worst part of the winter .
She met Zeus, a magnificent male lion who'd been sent by a circus when a paw was mangled in an accident. And Ebony, a black panther who'd been abandoned by her mother in the wilds of Southeast Asia. Bram's brother, Zach, who sounded like a world traveler, had hand-fed and raised her, eventually bringing her to Bram, although it was extremely difficult to export such animals into the United States.
Listening between the lines, Amanda concluded that Zach Masterson possessed the same determined streak as his brother.
There were fifteen cats in all, including three lionesses to keep Zeus happy and a couple of cougar cubs Bram was holding temporarily until they were old enough to be released back into the wild. And finally there was Tasha, who joined them outside to cool herself in her very own pond. Unlike domesticated cats, Amanda learned how much tigers love water.
She also learned that some beasts weren't so ferocious after all.
After she'd showered and changed into her other clothes, a navy suit and her usual ruffled blouse, Bram accompanied her out to the driveway and helped her into her car. Amanda slid inside and he shut the door, the slam of it punctuating the end of their time together. Starting the ignition, she powered down the window on the driver's side. "Bram? I’d like to thank you for taking care of me last night, for the breakfast, the tour, for letting me use your shower, in short, everything."
&nbs
p; "You don't have to thank me," he said and squatted beside the car. "You did me a favor by coming here."
"What about your truck? I'd offer to drop you off, but my seminar is on the north end of town."
"Don't worry about it. One of the ranch hands can give me a lift."
"I'll have my lawyer contact yours by the end of business Monday. All the paperwork should be finished up by the end of the week. You can hold your press conference then."
"Fine."
She ran out of things to say. Before the moment grew awkward he stood up, although his hands lingered on the door sill. Staring at the rough brown knuckles, Amanda experienced a yearning so strong, she had to blink. She didn't want to leave. Not now, not when she'd finally begun to really know him. She laid a hand on one of his and screwed up her courage. "May I call you?"
"Sure. I'd like that."
He dictated his phone number and she wrote hers on the back of one of her business cards, the unlisted home number that only her closest friends and family had. He held the card between forefinger and thumb and leaned down to smile at her. "This is the second card I've gotten from you. Is that a hint, Ms.Tarkenton?"
"A big one, Mr. Masterson. The telephone goes both ways."
His smile grew wider. She was very conscious of his body heat beneath her palm and a schoolgirl flutter shook her when he placed his other hand on hers. "Goodbye, Mandy."
"Bye, Bram." She didn't want to let go. Neither, apparently, did he. Within her, hope built. Maybe this wasn't so impossible. Maybe she could have a relationship with him. And not a friendship. They were headed toward something deeper.
"Drive carefully." The back of his hand grazed her chin as he bent and kissed her cheek. She closed her eyes and breathed in, holding his scent, his nearness. Before he could move away, she grabbed the collar of his shirt. Their noses bumped and she angled her face, seeking his mouth.
As soon as she sampled his lips, she knew one taste would never be enough. Their tongues touched and blood rushed to her head. Hope spun into need, dizzying need. He must have felt it too because he knelt by the side of the car. "Do you have to leave?" he asked against her mouth.
