A Bride for Jericho Bravo

by Christine Rimmer

  Marnie Jones, who still loved a nice, normal citizen of a guy named Mark.

  She insisted that Mark was not an idiot. And if Mark was not an idiot, chances were he would be back around to try and work things out with her.

  Jericho was loving every minute of this ride they were on together. But he had no illusions. She would go with her old boyfriend when he came to get her. And if the boyfriend didn’t come, she would go anyway.

  She moaned in her sleep. He glanced over as she rolled from her side to her stomach. She grabbed the pillow again, whispered a name.

  Not his name.

  “Mark…”

  Chapter Eleven

  Marnie woke up alone.

  She had that moment of complete disorientation. The night-dark room, the bed, all of it was strange to her. She had no idea where she was.

  And then everything swung into focus. She remembered: the cabin, the two glorious rides through the Hill Country….

  Jericho.

  They’d made love. She’d fallen asleep beside him. This was a big night, their first whole night together. The first time they would wake up in the morning in the same bed.

  And how was that going to happen if he was gone?

  She sat up, tamping down the sudden swirl of unhappy emotions: worry, anger, hurt. It might be a big deal to her, the whole-night-in-the-same-bed thing. But that didn’t mean it had to be all that significant for him. They didn’t have that kind of relationship, the kind where greeting the morning together was an important link in the chain of caring, another step toward commitment, a proof of their growing closeness.

  They were supposed to be living in the moment. She wished her foolish heart would stop trying to make the moment into something more.

  She threw back the covers. “Jericho?”

  No answer. She listened. Heard the faint songs of night birds outside, through the half-open window.

  She got up. “Jericho?”

  Quickly, she checked the bathroom, the living area, the kitchen. All empty. She started for the door—and then realized she was naked. So she detoured back to the bedroom to get something to put on.

  His T-shirt was there, tossed on a chair, tangled with hers. His boots waited on the floor with hers, one tipped on its side, a sock dangling out.

  Her mood lightened considerably. If he’d left, he would have put on his boots at least.

  A pair of white terry-cloth robes hung from twin hooks on the back of the bathroom door. She put on the smaller one and went out through the main room onto the front porch.

  Out there, the night birds’ songs were louder. Clearer. The three-quarter moon silvered the hills and gave a muted blue luster to the chrome on the two choppers waiting in front of the porch. She turned her head toward the small round table and the pair of blue chairs and saw him, a darker shadow among shadows, sitting in the far chair.

  He didn’t say anything.

  Neither did she.

  But her heart felt suddenly lighter inside the cage of her chest. She went to him, not making a sound in her bare feet. Taking the other chair, she gathered her feet up and wrapped her arms around her knees.

  He moved, reaching out. Offering her a sip of the beer in his hand.

  She lowered her feet to the rough boards of the porch and took the bottle. Tipping her head back, she put it to her lips and let the cool, bitter taste slide down her throat. She set it down on the table between them.

  “I always liked it up here,” he said after a moment, his voice low and velvety-rough. “My dad bought this land back in the eighties, when we were kids. We used to come camping up here, the whole family. This cabin wasn’t much more than a shed back then. We’d bring tents. And sometimes horses, from the ranch. Those were good times, simple times.”

  He fell silent. She looked over and saw him pick up the beer and drink the rest. He bent to the side and put the empty on the porch floor by his chair on the far side. Then he turned her way.

  She knew he was watching her. His eyes shone at her through the night.

  He said, “Coming here makes me remember that it wasn’t all bad, growing up a Bravo. I might have been a misfit, but sometimes I was happy. Now and then, I even felt like everything would be all right.” He reached out his hand toward her.

  She met it with hers, her fingers curving into his waiting grip. His thumb traced the line of her wrist, back and forth, bringing those warm little flares of erotic sensation, of promise.

  He gave a tug. She came up out of her chair and over to his, sinking down to him, turning sideways so her bare legs hung over to one side, dangling above the boards of the porch floor. He bent and slid the beer bottle back against the wall behind them, out of the way of her feet.

  When he straightened, she touched his jaw—beard-rough, warm—and then palmed his cheek, learning the feel of him anew, there in the dimness of the middle of the night.

  He whispered, “Say my name.”

  It seemed an odd request. Still, she happily obeyed. “Jericho,” she said against his waiting lips. “Jericho, Jericho…”

  He kissed his own name right off her lips.

  She said it again. “Jericho. It’s a very sexy name.”

  “You like it?”

  “I do.” She framed his face between her hands, kissed him some more. Slow, lazy kisses, tender and deep.

  His eyes opened to meet hers. “My mom chose my name.”

  “It’s so…biblical.”

  He laughed, a low, sexy sound. “We all went to Bible school, when I was a kid. I learned there that Jericho is where the Israelites ended up when they returned from bondage in Egypt, led by Joshua, successor to Moses.”

  “Like I said, biblical. And your mom chose the name for you because…?”

  He shrugged. “She said once that she liked the way it sounded. And we’ve all—at least the boys in the family—got biblical names. Asher, Gabriel, Luke, Matthew, Caleb, me. I’m not sure about Travis, though. Is Travis biblical?”

  She laughed. “Like I would know—and have I met Travis?”

  “He’s not around all that much.” He touched her lower lip with his thumb, rubbing a little. It felt so good, his touch. It always did.

  She confessed with a sigh, “I was named after a character in an Alfred Hitchcock movie. Marnie was a beautiful compulsive thief. In the movie, Sean Connery plays the guy who loves her and marries her and helps her find out why she is the way she is.” She didn’t mention that Sean Connery’s character’s name was Mark, though she and Mark used to joke about it, back in the day. “I always hated that my mom named me after a disturbed woman who steals anything that isn’t nailed down and hates the color red—oh, and she’s frigid, too. Did I mention that?”

  He was grinning, showing even white teeth. “You did steal my chopper.”

  “Only to make a point.”

  “I thought it was to get even with me for saying rotten things about you.”

  “Partly, but to make a point, too.”

  “What point was that?”

  “That I still had a spark, an edge. A wild side.”

  He widened his eyes in mock terror. “That was somehow in question?”

  “It was. Yeah. It was.”

  “But not anymore.”

  “Uh-uh.”

  “What about the color red?”

  She thought of the killer dress she’d bought for the charity ball. “I happen to love red, as a matter of fact.”

  “Unlike Marnie in the movie.”

  “Right. And I am not frigid.”

  “You need someone to testify to that? I’m there for you, Marnie.”

  “Good to know. I mean, just in case I ever feel the need to prove it in court.”

  “Forget court.” His voice had that certain wonderful roughness, that ragged heat. “You can prove it right now….”

  She whispered, “Again?” Though she didn’t need to ask. After all, she was sitting on him. She could feel him, feel the hard, thick ridge of him, press
ing against her, beneath the fly of his jeans.

  He answered, low, on the verge of a groan, “Yeah. Again.”

  She slid off his lap. He seemed to know exactly what she meant to do. The top two buttons of his jeans were already undone.

  He ripped them wide and pushed the jeans down enough to free himself. “Come here. Here to me…” He reached for her, his hands clasping her waist.

  She came back to him, straddling him. She had nothing on beneath that robe and her body knew him so well now, welcomed him. It was a simple thing. Perfect. Smooth.

  He slipped inside, pushing so deep. The robe settled around them, providing privacy they didn’t need in that isolated place.

  Her soft cries filled the night.

  The next day they shared a late breakfast. Then they rode on up to Austin, where everything was lush and green. And the traffic was bad, even on Sunday. He insisted that they visit Barton Springs, in Zilker Park.

  He said, “You haven’t been to Austin if you haven’t seen Barton Springs.”

  It was a pretty sight, a huge natural pool fed by an underground aquifer, the water clear and so inviting. They paid the three-dollar fee, each, so they could take off their boots, roll up their jeans and stick their feet in.

  Jericho said the water was the same temperature, sixty-eight degrees, year-round. The pool was packed in the summer, but people swam there in all seasons. There were lifeguards on duty that day—and every day, Jericho said. And there was a bathhouse with changing facilities and a gift shop, too.

  For lunch, he took her to another landmark: Old No. 1, the original Threadgill’s on North Lamar, home of good Southern-fried cooking—and famous as a birthplace of the early Austin music scene. They had fried pickle spears and seafood po’boys while the jukebox blared classic tunes—including a certain bump-and-grind song, “You Can Leave Your Hat On.”

  She grinned at the sound of that, remembering it from that funny nineties movie, The Full Monty, about unemployed working guys in England who became strippers to bring in some cash.

  When the song started playing, she sent Jericho a glance. He was already looking her way, waiting to catch her eye.

  They both started laughing. She knew he was thinking what she was: of how she’d made him promise never to mess with her hat. She asked the guy behind the bar who the singer was.

  Before he could answer, Jericho said, “Tom Jones.”

  She raised her bottle of root beer to him out of pure respect, she was so impressed.

  Then they got back on the bikes and rolled down through the Hill Country, taking their time, stopping in at the cabin again for a while, sitting out on the porch in the blue chairs, drinking ice water and enjoying the warmth of the day and the way the wind made the wild grasses ripple and wave.

  Around two, they headed for San Antonio, where they went straight to the shop to put the bikes away and switch to the whip again. By then, Marnie was kind of considering it a weekend created to indulge her every fantasy.

  Which was why she lured him into the empty building, grabbed a hat from the merchandise display and then dragged him upstairs to his workshop. There, she had her way with him on the daybed, wearing the hat, which she strictly forbade him to touch.

  Afterward, he held her in his big arms and sang that song they’d heard at Threadgill’s. He sang a little off-key, but he knew all the verses, which surprised her.

  And made her laugh.

  It was after five when he dropped her off at the guesthouse. She asked him if he wanted to come in. He shook his head and kissed her one more time. She got out of the car and gave him a wave as he backed out of the driveway.

  And then she went inside and filled the tub and sank into it with a grateful sigh, groaning only a little when she turned her backside to the power jets and let them beat away the stiffness from spending most of the day on a chopper. She rolled up a towel and used it for a pillow, settling back and closing her eyes, letting the events of the past twenty-four hours play through her mind, reliving every moment of the weekend’s freewheeling, hard-jarring ride.

  It had been a great time.

  The best…

  Her cell rang. It was in reach, right where she’d set it, on a small wicker stand by the tub. The sound startled her. She’d been kind of drifting off to sleep. Water sloshed over the edge as she shot to a sitting position.

  The ringing continued. She swiftly dried her hand on the towel she’d used as a pillow and answered without checking the display.

  Big mistake.

  It was Mark. “Marnie. Don’t hang up.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Her pleasure—in the hot bath, in the tired, sore, sexually satisfied state of her body, in the beautiful weekend just past—it all evaporated.

  Mark. Why? She drew her legs up and wrapped her free arm around them tightly. “What is it? Is something wrong?”

  “Marnie…”

  “Marnie, what?”

  “I…How are you?”

  “Tell me what this call is about or I am hanging up.”

  “It’s…nothing.”

  “Nothing. You’re telling me you’re calling me for nothing. Nobody died. No one’s in the hospital. There’s no blood and no fire. Nothing.”

  “I just…I miss you, you know? I come home at night and the house is so empty. I don’t like it. I want—”

  “Stop. Don’t. I’m sorry you’re unhappy. But it’s just…It’s not my fault.”

  “I know. I know it’s not. I only…I want to know that you’re okay.”

  She let out a slow sigh and reminded herself not to engage. There was no point in getting into it with him. He had to know that as well as she did.

  Still, the yearning in his voice did affect her. It hurt. It hurt terribly that he seemed to be suffering. She had to school her voice to an even tone. “Look. I asked you not to call me. You said you would leave me alone.”

  “I know I did. Just five minutes.”

  “Mark.”

  “Three, okay? Three.”

  She drew another slow, steadying breath. “Talk, Mark.”

  “Fine. Okay. I think I made a big mistake. I was an idiot. I’m seeing that now.”

  She might have laughed if she didn’t feel so much like crying. An idiot. He admitted that he was an idiot. And after she’d defended him so staunchly to Jericho, insisting that he wasn’t one.

  “Mark. You said it wasn’t working out, remember? That you weren’t happy. That I wasn’t what you wanted, that we didn’t want the same things. And that you were worried about me. You were afraid I’d lost touch with my real self, my wild side.”

  “I didn’t know what I was talking about.”

  “Yes, you did. And you were right.”

  “It had been a rough time, at work.” Mark was a hotshot at Santa Barbara’s biggest ad agency, a driven man. He was always having a rough time at work because he was killing himself to get ahead. “I lost touch with what matters, that’s all. I said things I shouldn’t have….”

  “No. You didn’t. You said what needed saying. I thank you for that.”

  “What do you mean, you thank me?”

  “Come on. It’s too late. You have to see that.”

  “No, Marnie. I don’t. I don’t see that at all. Listen, I know what you want, I know what you’ve always wanted. And I’m ready now, I swear it. Marnie, let’s get—”

  “No.” She cut him off before he could say it. “Don’t you dare, Mark Drury. It’s too late and you know it and now you’re feeling bad about it. Well, get over it. Please. Get over it and move on. Find someone who’s right for you.”

  “Marnie. I’m begging you. Listen, I—”

  “Mark, I have to go now. I’m hanging up. Don’t call me anymore.”

  “Marnie—”

  She made herself disconnect, although his voice, calling her name so desperately, echoed in her ear.

  And then, with a furious cry, she hurled the phone against the far wall. It made a hard smack as
it hit and then dropped to the floor. Probably broken—which was okay. Fine. Mark had bought it for her, after all. It was still on his cell phone plan.

  She needed to get herself her own damn phone.

  Marnie let the phone lie there all night. The next morning, she went to toss it out and found that it wasn’t broken. Not even chipped.

  She threw it in the trash anyway.

  And that day, on her lunch break, she went out and bought herself one of those pay-as-you-go phones. Fifty-five bucks for a whole month of unlimited minutes, including texting. Then she called Tessa, her mom, her dad and her grandpa and told them to use the new number.

  Her grandpa wanted to talk. No surprise. She told him about her temporary job at SA Choppers and how she loved it, about how she’d learned to ride a chopper.

  He shouted, “Maybe you’re gonna be settlin’ down there in Texas.”

  Even though he’d yelled it, she found it hard to believe her grandpa, who thought everyone should live in North Magdalene, would suggest such a thing. Stay in Texas? She had to admit that the thought held a certain appeal. She could work at SA Choppers for the rest of her life and not get bored. And the thing with Jericho…

  Well, she knew it wasn’t going to last forever. But she sure wouldn’t mind if it went on longer than just the three weeks that remained until Desiree came back to work.

  But no, she reminded herself. She really was a California girl at heart. When Desiree came back, she would go home, pick up the pieces, figure out what she wanted to do next with her life.

  “Oh, Grandpa. I’m only here for a while. Of course I’ll come home.”

  He went on as if she hadn’t spoken, just the way he always did. “Tessa would love that, you stayin’ right there in San Antonio,” he yelled. She held the phone away from her ear in order not to cause eardrum damage. “I mean, what with that new baby coming and all. A woman needs blood family around her. And it sounds like things are goin’ good for you there.”

  “Grandpa, I—”

  “Never say never. It’s all I’m tellin’ you.”

  She gave in and promised she wouldn’t say never. After which he launched into a long-winded update, filling her in on what was happening with every one of her North Magdalene relatives. She had a lot of relatives and his update took a while.