A Fine Romance

by Christi Barth

  Ben’s whining cracked her up. No matter how much he complained, it couldn’t be more obvious the two men shared a serious bromance. She turned to look at Gib. “You live in a hotel?”

  “I manage one. The Cavendish Grand, over on Michigan Avenue.”

  Wow. Mira would give anything to be able to sink into one of their famous marble bathtubs right about now. Unfortunately, she hadn’t been able to afford to darken the door of a Cavendish since she walked away from her family and its stupid, condition-laden trust...and all its attendant money. “I’m impressed. I haven’t been to yours yet, but I’m a big fan of the Cavendish brand worldwide. It’s always the best hotel in the city, no matter what country you’re in. The Egyptian cotton sheets, heated towel racks—such a high and reliable standard of luxury.”

  Gib’s eyes lit up. “Funny you mention that. We’re brainstorming ideas for a new motto, and the frontrunner is Limitless Luxury.”

  “It would certainly entice me to check in.” If, and it was a big if, she had the limitless funds to subsidize such a wildly expensive treat. The last time Mira stayed in a hotel, it had one-ply toilet paper. ‘Nuff said.

  Gib swiped at the sweat gluing his bangs to his forehead. “I let Ben use the gym facilities. Mostly because he lived in the hotel for three months, but also because it makes me laugh to watch him suffer and sweat. You’re welcome to swing by and use them, too. Unless you’ve already joined a health club?”

  “Not yet. I’ve been too busy to do anything but go to work and crawl home at the end of the day. Lots of quality time zonked out on the couch watching movies with Daphne.” Not to mention the tricky business of not being able to afford a gym membership at the moment. One of the best things about running was that it was free.

  “All work and no play makes Mira stressed out and boring,” said Ben. “You need to get out and meet people. Start dating all the decent guys around town who are pining away now that I’ve taken Ivy off the market.”

  Dating. Right. That thing she and Sam were supposed to do. Mira’s frustration, not at all eased by her heart-to-heart with Helen, burned at the base of her throat like the remnants of a bad Mexican meal. Yes, they’d agreed to keep their first date a secret. But as far as she was concerned, Sam gave up that privilege the moment he stood her up.

  “Getting a date hasn’t been hard so far,” she said. “Getting the guy to actually show up, now, that’s a level I haven’t cracked.”

  Gib put a hand on Mira’s arm, pulling them both to a stop. “Do you mean to say some wanker stood you up? You of the flowing locks and eyes as seductive as a siren’s song?”

  Wow. Over the past few years, she’d heard scores of stories from Ivy about Gib’s legendary charm with the ladies. Seeing it up close and personal was something else altogether. “Why do I get the vague sensation that you’re hitting on me?”

  “No idea. Several reasons, really. The first being that if I chose to set my sights on you, as it were, there’d be nothing vague about it.” He trailed a finger softly down her cheek, the merest hint of a caress. It set every nerve in Mira’s body into the upright position, grabbing for a seat belt and bracing for one heck of a ride. He finished by tracing the bottom edge of her lower lip. “And you’d have already said yes.”

  Well, he was right about that. Gibson Moore was a consummate seducer. Mira couldn’t imagine any woman saying no to him. “How about we leave that as a possibility down the road?”

  “Ah, how I’d like to, but as I said, there are multiple reasons why you’re surrounded by metaphorical caution tape.” He started jogging again. “Secondly, Ben here informed us in no uncertain terms that your loveliness is off limits. Something about keeping harmonious working relationships within our little group.”

  “Wait a minute. I call foul on that one.” Mira ran a lazy circle around Ben. “Not only did you and Ivy date while you filmed her show, but your first kiss with her was on the job. Or did you think she wouldn’t tell me about you smooching her on the balcony with wedding guests right downstairs?”

  He grimaced, flattening out the dimples that usually flashed in his cheeks. “Precisely why I know it is a bad idea to mix work and wooing. We’ve got a tight group here, with Gib and Daphne and Sam. And now you, of course. Our little makeshift family gets us through the tough times. Better not to put it at risk.” He stopped, panting like a thirty-year-old poodle, and bent in half to rest his hands on his thighs.

  Mira felt sorry for him. However, she also felt loose for the first time in days, and wasn’t nearly ready to cut the run short. “Man up, Westcott. You can’t stop already.”

  Ben shook his head and, still bent over, threw an arm out straight ahead. She turned and fell in love. Well, not with Chicago as a whole, but with the most beautiful fountain she’d ever seen. It looked like a three-tiered pink marble wedding cake. Surrounding the enormous fountain was a moat. Four Art Deco seahorses covered in a lovely green patina sprayed water onto the fountain. “It’s spectacular.”

  “Bowled me over the first time I saw it, too.” Shuffling off the path a bit, Ben slurped at a water fountain, then waved for Gib and Mira to take a hit. “They do a light show at night you’ll have to see. And if you weren’t so fired up to keep running, we could hang out and catch the big spray. There’s a center jet that shoots up one hundred and fifty feet, straight into the air.”

  “We can do it on the way back.” Gib used the back of his arm to swipe his forehead. “If she liked Buckingham Fountain, she’s going to love Millennium Park. Off we go,” he ordered.

  They fell into a loose horizontal line. Mira could’ve stayed and stared at the fountain all morning. But something niggled at the back of her brain. “Gib, do you really have more reasons you can’t hit on me? Be gentle—my womanly pride is at stake here.”

  “Ah. Can’t have that. The last, and least important reason, is that Sam growled at me when I commented on your alluring combination of beauty, charm and wit. I don’t know what’s going on there, but I do know the man’s got biceps the size of Queen Elizabeth’s corgis. I usually aim to not piss him off.”

  “What? He’s got no right,” she spluttered. “I take it back. What he’s got is a load of nerve. How dare he? He hasn’t got a leg to stand on!”

  Ben took her hand and steered her over to a curlicued wrought-iron bench. “Whoa. The only thing I’m clear on is that Sam’s got you twisted up in knots over something. Want to back up and clue us in?”

  Without bothering to cool down or stretch, Mira plopped down. She waved her hands back and forth as if trying to pull the right words out of the air. But once Ben and Gib crouched in front of her, each holding a hand, she gave up. What did the right words matter to describe how he’d done a very wrong thing? “Sam’s the one who stood me up.”

  “Son of a bitch.” Ben’s grip tightened to the point of pain, then released. Mira resisted the urge to flex her hand. “I don’t know what pisses me off more. That he went after you after I told him not to, or that he jacked you around.”

  “Easy choice.” Gib’s low tone soothed as much as his thumb rhythmically brushing across her knuckles. “You don’t leave a lady waiting for five minutes, let alone all night. His behavior is inexcusable.”

  The validation was a bit of a salve to her wounded ego, but Mira needed more. “Oh, it gets worse. Want to hear his reason? Sam needed to help his mother with her bunko night.” In perfect synchronization, they leaned back on their heels and stood. Ben looked at Gib. Gib looked at the ground and shrugged. Then they crossed and sat down, one on either side of her. What was going on? What happened to the righteous sympathy?

  “There’s...more to Sam than meets the eye,” Ben said.

  Gib chimed in right on top of him. “You shouldn’t judge him too harshly.”

  “Wait. What?” They’d pulled a U-turn on their sympathy so fast she could almost smell the
burning rubber. “Why? Why does he suddenly get a free pass as soon as I mention his mother? He’s thirty-one, not three.”

  “It’s a long story. I’m not even sure if it’s our story to tell,” Ben said.

  “Well, it certainly isn’t for you to tell. You’ve known Sam less than six months. Just because Ivy talks your ear off incessantly doesn’t mean you know all the nuances of Sam’s story and can do it justice.” Gib scooted into the corner of the bench to face Mira on an angle. “I’ll fill her in.”

  They hadn’t begun the story, and she’d already had enough of this pussyfooting around. Mira wanted to pout, to lick her wounds and have them soothingly agree that Sam’s behavior was crappy. “This is ridiculous. Unless this tale ranks up there with Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, I’d say you two are overhyping whatever chapter of Sam’s life you’re about to recap.”

  Ben pushed sun-streaked bangs off his face. “Sorry. We’re very protective of Sam and his mother. At least one of us pops in every day, and not just for the doughnuts. Kathleen’s a wonderful woman. Somehow she makes us feel mothered without feeling smothered.”

  Mira had never experienced either end of that spectrum. Distant neglect and disapproval was a more apt description of her mom’s parenting style. What would it be like to have that sort of connection? Pretty darn awesome, she assumed. So now, in addition to being miffed with Sam, a certain green-eyed monster had also shown up at the pity party.

  Solemnity darkened Gib’s startlingly light blue eyes. “After college, Sam worked full-time at the bakery. Then he got this notion that he wanted to make chocolate. Drove his father nuts for months and months, asking to go train with a master. Mr. Lyons didn’t see the point, and didn’t want to go back to the workload he had before Sam came on board. But finally, Kathleen talked him into it.”

  “I’ve recently learned it is impossible to say no to the woman you love,” Ben said with a small, private smile. Mira wondered if a man would ever think about her and smile like that.

  “Huh. Well, I’ve recently learned you are one whipped puppy,” Gib retorted. “As I was saying, Sam flew off to Europe to study with the best chocolatiers in the world. He bopped from France to Belgium to Switzerland.”

  “You don’t say.” When Sam heard about her sailing in the Mediterranean, the man had shut down faster than a bar at closing time. And now she learned he had the money to roam from country to country at will? Where did he get off judging her? Sure, he’d apologized at the time, but this put a whole different spin on his reaction.

  “Three months turned into six, turned into almost two years. That’s when Mr. Lyons had his heart attack. Do you remember that huge storm a few years ago? The one that shut down every airport in Europe for a couple of days? Sam got stuck. He rushed right to the airport after the first frantic call when they loaded his dad into the ambulance. All through the quadruple-bypass surgery, Sam wore a hole in the linoleum of the Belgium airport.”

  “How awful. He must’ve felt so helpless.” Mira’s simmering resentment disappeared. What a horrible situation. If she knew one thing about Sam already, it was how much he valued his family. She couldn’t imagine how hard it must’ve been to do nothing but wait. Mira shoved to her feet and walked down the path. It was impossible to sit still and listen. The guys flanked her as Gib continued.

  “When he got the call that his dad survived the surgery, he started to hope things would be okay. Spent the night on the floor with hundreds of other stranded travelers. By noon, everyone said no flights would be able to get out for at least another day. That’s right about when Sam got the next phone call. He knew from the number it was his mother, but she didn’t say a word. Just sobbed into the phone for an entire half hour. Sam was out of his mind. He didn’t know how to comfort his mother, and he especially didn’t know how to do it from another freaking continent. It was the worst day of his life.”

  Mira walked faster, on the verge of jogging. She didn’t want to hear any more. Experiencing his pain even through a third party was almost unbearable. Desperate for a distraction, she focused on the surroundings. On her left was a hulking marble building that must be the Art Institute. Clustered in its shadow were students carrying sketchbooks and oversized watercolor pads. Pierced and tattooed on every visible inch of skin and all about twenty pounds underweight, they looked like the epitome of modern artists.

  Relentlessly, Gib pressed on. “Sam never got to say goodbye to his father. In fact, the last time they spoke, they’d had a huge fight. Yet in the hospital, Mr. Lyons wouldn’t stop asking for Sam. Said he couldn’t go until he’d made things right with his boy. Mrs. Lyons felt horrible. He never would’ve gone to Europe if it wasn’t for her. She took on all this guilt about Sam and his father not being together at the end. Figured it was her fault Sam couldn’t say goodbye, and that her husband couldn’t be at peace when he died.”

  “The woman’s got a heart as big as Lake Michigan. Too bad sometimes, that comes around and bites her in the ass,” Ben said.

  With a hand at the small of her back, Gib steered Mira across the busy intersection toward the museum. “By the time he made it back to Chicago, it was the morning of the funeral. Kathleen had locked herself in her room and hadn’t spoken to anyone or eaten in two days. Sam’s little sister, Diana, pulled the whole funeral together by herself. When Sam got there, they both fell apart on him. He never got to properly grieve himself, he was so busy holding the two of them together.”

  The heat pressed inexorably against Mira like a smothering velvet fist. Her head ached, whether from the sun or the oppressive pain of the unfolding story or the blare of car horns. This casual morning jog had taken one heck of a dark twist. She wanted to break away, run to Sam and hug him until they were both breathless. Instead, all three stood on the curb, waiting to cross again as taxi after taxi sped past. Gib raised his voice to be heard against the din.

  “Diana was young and resilient, and bounced back in a few months. But Kathleen was a mess. She wouldn’t eat. She wouldn’t work. She wouldn’t leave the house, except for the twice-weekly therapist visits Sam bullied her into. Sam had to keep the bakery going all by himself. He worked crazy hours, doing the work of three people. Some of us tried to pitch in when we could, by manning the register during the early morning rush a few times a week. After a month, Kathleen admitted herself to the hospital. Well, Sam gave her no choice. He was so worried she’d just fade away. Paying off the bills from his father’s surgery, and then her hospital stay on top of it—well, money was super tight for a while.”

  Finally Ben took up the story, words gushing out now that he could share what he knew. “Without telling Sam, his parents had taken out a second mortgage to help finance his trip to Europe. If the payments didn’t get made, his mom would lose her house—all because of him. He had to find a way to bring in more money. That’s when Sam upscaled the wedding cake side of the business. Lyons Bakery was known for delicious cakes, but the works of art he turned out almost looked too good to eat. He could charge triple their going rate, and still have customers offering huge tips just to get on his books.” Ben smacked his lips. “When you get the chance, take it from me and don’t just stare at a Sam Lyons cake. Eat every crumb of that deliciousness.”

  “Watch out, mate. I know that look in your eye. If you nip over to Lyons for a slice this afternoon, I’ll make you pay for it with an extra twenty sets when we hit the weight machines tomorrow,” Gib warned.

  Ben grabbed his ankle and twisted it behind him for a deep thigh stretch. “Why don’t I just join a real gym and get a trainer who doesn’t bully me?”

  “Because I let you use the gym at the Cavendish for free?”

  “Yeah, that’s the kicker.” Ben leaned behind Mira and gave him a playful punch in the arm. “I’ll do the weights, as long as we finish with a stint in the pool. What was it I beat you by last time—a lap and a half? Can’t wait to see
if I can better that record.”

  Gib ignored him as they crossed the street. “Things turned around for Sam after a while. His father’s life insurance finally made it through probate and fixed the cash-flow problem. Kathleen came back to work, only making outpatient therapy visits. But she was still so fragile. Sam’s entire life dwindled to taking care of her and the bakery. Diana insisted on following in his footsteps and going to Europe. We insisted he come to our weekly poker games through all of this. He needed the normalcy, the chance to hang with other guys and not worry about his mother’s nervous breakdown for a few hours.”

  Passing between a cluster of hedges, Mira was suddenly transported. Clusters of low, leafy bushes and wildflowers were on the right. To the left, deep purple flowers made up a carpet for the backdrop of the downtown skyline. It was exactly the pick-me-up her spirits needed. “I love it here,” she exclaimed.

  Gib turned to stare at the city. “Thought you might. Millennium Park’s one of the best things to happen to downtown in a long time.”

  “This garden is too pretty to be spoiled by depressing reality. Is there much more to this story?” Mira asked. “If so, I might as well turn around and stare at traffic while you finish.”

  Ben shook his head and pulled her deeper into the garden. “Nah, we’re finished bringing you down. Kathleen’s much better now.”

  “They say that when you break a bone, it heals twice as strong.” Gib paused at a trickling fountain that dripped into a slow-moving, glistening trough. “She was broken, alright, but now she’s right as rain. Unfortunately, Sam’s having a bit of trouble accepting that. He’s too used to watching over her every second of every day. His mother’s independence is hard for him to trust. She had a lot of setbacks along the way. Let’s just say he’s got a hair trigger when it comes to her. And you’ve been the unintended victim a few times now.”