by Maggie Wells
He might have redeemed himself if he’d stuck to delivering the world’s shortest valedictory address. But then he planted a kiss on the salutatorian that shook the entire auditorium.
Brooke never forgot the way her kiss-swollen lips tingled as he whispered the Alabama fan’s mantra of “Roll, Tide, roll” into her Auburn-bound ear. Nor would she forgive him for the scalding rush of humiliation he left in his wake as he walked away.
The hell of it was, nearly a decade later, she could still taste him. Salty and sweet. The brainy boy seemed to have ocean water in his veins and coconut-scented sunscreen embedded in his pores. She pressed her glass to her bottom lip, sternly reminding herself that a kiss could not linger for ten years. No matter how much pent up passion a guy put into it.
Laney broke into her thoughts. “I always thought your mama might be convinced to give up on her dream of you marrying Jack Tucker if a bigger fish came swimming along.”
“If Brian’s the fish you’re referring to, I’ll remind you that you used to want to see him flopping on the floor gasping for breath.”
“We’ve grown up. Matured. Besides, nerds are hot these days. Didn’t anyone tell you?”
That was where Laney’s assessment went wrong. Brian’s hotness wasn’t simply a trend. It was a matter of perspective. As a teenager, he might have been quiet, bookish, but he’d always been good looking. If one could get past the annoying arrogance.
He stood in the center of the room like he’d ruled the school all along, and the sight of all the other Laney-come-latelys flocking the boy they once snubbed irked Brooke to the bone. The fact that she was the only one who saw it used to make her feel superior to the rest of the world. Now, she wondered if she’d missed out on something when she watched him walk away.
Miffed by the train of thought, Brooke turned and gave her friend the hairy eyeball. “I can’t believe you’re lusting after Brian Dalton. What’s the world coming to?”
Her friend’s chuckle was genuine. “I was talking about you, not me.”
“Me?”
“The world we once knew came to a screeching halt the day that boy kissed you.”
“It did not.”
“You might sell that to someone else, sugar, but not me. You lost all interest in Jack Tucker the minute you locked lips with the delectable Mr. Limpet.”
“Incredible,” Brooke murmured into her glass. She took a quick sip, her eyes locked on her quarry. “The movie was The Incredible Mr. Limpet.”
Laney huffed. “It could have been The Incredible Hulk for all I care.”
“How about The Incredibles?”
“As long as you’re not trying to deny he kissed you senseless and it was incredible.”
“He kissed me, it was incredible, then he left,” Brooke said flatly. “He left. Period. The end.”
“And you still think he’s incredible.” Brooke started to shake her head but Laney raised a hand to ward off further protest. “Shelbrooke Hastings, are you trying to tell me that you have absolutely no interest in spawning with Aquaman?”
“I prefer Batman. Maybe Superman. Hell, I’d even take Captain America, though I suspect he’s a prig in bed.”
Her friend barked a short laugh. “I’m betting Superman has a stick up his ass, too.”
“Yes, but he has that ice castle thingy. I always thought that looked awesome.”
Laney nodded, the corners of her mouth pulling down as she gave the argument due consideration. “Beats the hell out of a damp, musty cave.”
“Yes, but Batman has the black cape. And all the cool toys.”
“Can you imagine the vibrator Wayne Enterprises could manufacture?” Laney clutched imaginary pearls. “A Bat-brator. Exactly what every single girl needs.”
Brooke frowned and shook her head. Listening to her friend verbally fondle Brian was more than vaguely disturbing. Sure, Brian had the looks, the money, and his picture printed in People, US Magazine, and on the cover of the tabloids, but that shouldn’t make him fair game for everyone. Especially not here. This was supposed to be his home. But a star was a star, even if he was a little burned out, and everyone in the room seemed to be caught in the man’s gravitational pull.
Not many women would pass on a chance to de-pants Brian Dalton these days. If she felt like being scrupulously honest, Brooke would number herself among them. But she didn’t want to hear it from Laney. Or anyone else, for that matter. Her relationship with Brian, whatever it might have been, was always separate from everyone else in her life. Their odd friendship had been as fascinating as exploring an uncharted island—intellectually stimulating, undeniably appealing, but treacherous as high tide.
Judging by the sardonic smirk on his face, this new and improved Brian would be equally challenging. And intriguing. He was undoubtedly mouthwatering.
The cut of his jacket showcased the broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped perfection of a body that spent hours in the water. Days working in the sun threaded his brown hair with hints of gold. A minimalist flash of white teeth evoked a visceral reaction in females from eighteen to eighty. The suit screamed matinee idol rather than marine biologist. It was no wonder a bevy of elegantly dressed women flocked to him like seagulls after a saltine. Grown-up Brian might still spend his days talking about plankton and marsh grass and amoebas, but the idea that he could spend his nights with his pick of women seemed more a given than a hypothesis.
Brooke held her breath when he scanned the room, torn between wanting to step forward and the urge to shrink away from his probing gaze. Oxygen seeped from her lungs when she spotted the familiar flash of arrogance in his eyes. Curious, she dragged her attention from the knot of back-slappers that closed around him and surveyed the room, trying to see it all through his eyes.
Brian turned and bestowed a dazzling smile on the woman next to him. The kind that made normally sane women flibbertigibbety. That weapon wasn’t even turned on her, and Brooke went weak in the knees. Darting a glance at Laney to see if she’d witnessed the same phenomenon, she found her friend’s dreamy-eyed gaze turned in the opposite direction.
Pitching her voice low, she jabbed an elbow into Laney’s ribs. “Don’t you dare ditch me.”
Laney had the good grace to grimace when she was caught ogling her millionaire. “I won’t.” She tore herself from whatever crazy eye sex mojo Harley was using on her and turned back to the task at hand. Clearing her throat, she gave the bodice of her dress a surreptitious tug. “Brian Dalton. Did I mention wanting to be his barnacle?”
It was Brooke’s turn to grin. “Liar.”
Cradling her drink in both hands, Laney darted one last wistful glance at the bar area. “Okay, fine. But I’m telling you, if Mr. Cade so much as blinks you’ll be scraping me off Brian’s…hull.”
“I’m starting to think you might be hooked on Harley.” Raising her glass in a mocking toast, she smiled sweetly. “But if it makes you feel better, I still think you’re a hussy.”
Laney grinned. “Thank you.”
At that moment, Brian turned his head and their gazes locked. Her breath snagged when he took a step in her direction, but she refused to show any sign of weakness. Taking a casual sip of her drink, she rolled her shoulders back, edged one foot in front of the other, and arched her back ever-so-slightly. A trick that her mother, like any former Miss Alabama worth her salt, passed along to her daughter the moment she left the cradle.
Brooke learned the power of the pose long before she’d had any assets to display. By the time she finished puberty, she’d honed it to sharp perfection. It never failed to rile Emmaline Hastings’s that her daughter chose to wield the power of the written word rather than the ceremonial sash. Wearing a smile to cover the uncertainty that twanged her nerves, she surveyed the room with studied nonchalance.
It seemed she’d been doing this her whole life. Measuring, testing, and gauging. Checking herself against the competition. From her first Little Miss Mobile crown to th
e Pulitzer Prize nomination she’d garnered at the tender age of twenty-six. To her mother and the world outside the microcosm of print journalism, she was a wunderkind, a prodigy, a savant. But those on the inside knew the glow of that nomination faded the second someone used her story to line their parrot cage. And one of those people was her boss.
Despite the critical acclaim her series garnered in the aftermath of the Gulf Oil Spill crisis, The Courier, like many other print news outlets, was suffering an acute case of declining circulation. The sinking numbers put a lot of pressure on the paper’s management and reporting staff. Her boss wasn’t only the news editor, he was the publisher’s son and heir apparent.
She needed a big story and she needed one bad. And to that end, she also needed Brian Dalton, but not in the way that Laney or Emmaline might hope.
Her pulse beat a frantic strobe when she saw her mother snare Brian’s arm and pull him into the slipknot of people eddying at the edge of the dance floor. Blond and beautiful as the day she was crowned thirty-three years before, people naturally gravitated to her mama. Brooke’s father liked to say Emmaline was a force of nature. One that left the people in her wake reeling and off-kilter. Like the hurricanes that battered the coast with disheartening regularity, Brooke had learned long ago that the best course of action when caught in her eye was to hunker down and wait it out.
Laney sighed as she watched Emmaline work her magic. “I swear she made a deal with the devil.”
“Don’t kid yourself. My mother is the devil.”
Joking or not, it was a plausible explanation. Emmaline looked obscenely good for a woman who’d hit the half-century mark and barreled right past it. The dress she wore clung to curves disciplined by hours on the elliptical and skimmed the long, lean legs that nabbed first place in every swimsuit competition she’d ever entered. If Brooke didn’t love her mother so damn much, she wouldn’t have bothered hating her. She would have gone straight to putting glue in her shampoo bottle.
Lifting her glass, she tossed back the remainder of her drink then plopped the empty glass onto the tray of a passing waiter. She fought the urge to stomp her stiletto-clad foot as she watched her mother bathe Brian in the spotlight of her attentions. Then he blinked and gave his head a bewildered shake. Emmaline’s eyes narrowed a millimeter, and the side-to-side wag morphed into a weak nod.
Her mother out-sparkled the chandelier above their heads. Familial pride rippled through Brooke. A woman wearing a blue and green plaid kilt pressed a glass of stout into Brian’s limp hand. Emmaline patted his arm, marking the end of negotiations. The man’s befuddled expression confirmed a direct hit.
“Damn, she’s good,” a deep voice drawled.
Blatant admiration dripped from each word. Brooke didn’t need to glance over her shoulder to know her father was standing behind her. “The best.”
Henry Hastings pressed a kiss to his daughter’s cheek, an indulgent smile creasing his time-worn, but still handsome, face. Seizing the chance for escape, Laney murmured her excuses and headed straight for the bar and Harley Cade.
A speculative gleam lit her father’s forest green eyes. “How much do you think she got him for?”
Brooke let a shoulder rise and fall before she returned her father’s conspiratorial grin. “Five?”
Her father snorted and rocked back on his heels as he wet his lips with what was surely very good bourbon. “Chump change. She got at least ten large out of that boy.”
She couldn’t help but smile when her daddy smacked his lips, clearly savoring the splash of eau de banned booze that lingered there. Emmaline only allowed him one drink a night these days. Henry made certain it was exceptional and nursed it through the entirety of whatever social event he was forced to endure that week. Her father would have happily ponied up ten grand to get out of the room, but after three decades of marriage he knew better than to try.
Her parents had what genteel society might call an understanding. He was allowed to shoot, stuff and mount as many woodland creatures as he desired as long as the trophies remained in his garage or the hunting cabin his granddaddy built. She could buy as many pretty party dresses and accept as many invitations as she pleased, but her husband would serve as an accessory no more than once a week.
Her father was far more approachable. Affable and indulgent, he masked his sharp intellect with a smooth Southern gentleman veneer. As dark as her mother was light, the two of them were a striking and formidable pair. The tartan plaid of his tie might have been a concession to the occasion, but the effect played up the roguish features of his Scots-Irish heritage.
Brooke chuckled. “What was I thinking? Of course she got ten.”
Her reward was a kiss on the cheek and a one-armed squeeze. “You look awful pretty, pumpkin.”
The familiar scent of her daddy’s aftershave was all she needed to reinforce the steel in her backbone. Henry Hastings was her biggest fan and staunchest defender. They were a unit, a team, a mutual admiration society made for two.
Lifting the glass of rationed mash, he toasted her. “Thank you for comin’. You made your mama very happy, and you saved me from utter and complete boredom.”
“It’s the least I could do. After all, you allowed me to get a top notch education without having to resort to smearing Preparation H under my eyes.”
“Now, now. Don’t mock your mama’s scholarship programs,” he warned, a smile quirking his lips.
Knowing they’d arrived at an impasse, she reached for two of her most effective weapons—distraction and deflection. “What’s this I hear about you buying a new boat?”
His answering huff confirmed a direct hit. Her parents’ latest struggle for marital control revolved around a news magazine article on funding retirement and what her mother considered an excess of unnecessary discretionary spending. His.
“It’s a johnboat, for Christ’s sake, not a cabin cruiser.”
Squeezing her father’s arm, Brooke darted a glance around the room, checking to be certain none of St. Pat’s few remaining nuns stood nearby to hear her father blaspheme. “Hush, Daddy. I was teasing you.”
Henry took a hasty gulp of his beloved bourbon. “It’s not funny. I tell you it’s a crying shame when a man who works as hard as I do wants to buy himself one little toy and he ends up getting nothing but a bellyful of guff.”
“Damn straight.”
The words were soft-spoken but heartfelt enough to break into the conversation. Brooke jumped and whirled, but the butterflies in the pit of her stomach identified the owner a heartbeat before their gazes met.
A smug smile played at the corners of Brian’s mouth. The same one he wore when she missed the Advanced Chemistry review due to an impacted wisdom tooth. He’d refused to lend her his notes, the bastard. For months after that graduation day kiss she stewed and simmered, wondering if whatever precious data he captured in his Mead three-subject spiral cost her the chance of giving the Valedictory address.
“Hello, Brooke.”
