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She cleared her throat. “Hey.”
He shrugged, then lifted the brown grocery sack. “I thought you might need some company tonight. And something to make you feel better.”
“What’s that?”
He reached into the bag and whipped out a large package of Oreo cookies. “A few months back you told me this was your drug of choice.” Then he pulled out a bottle of merlot. “And this is mine.”
Carly laughed, a soft bubbly sound that made him glad he’d come by, after all.
“So,” he said, tossing her a crooked grin and tipping his chin at the fancy doorknob she gripped. “Are you going to let me in?”
“Sure.” She stepped aside, and when he entered, she closed the door and led him to the den.
As he followed, he couldn’t help studying her comfortable attire, appreciating the casual way about her, the natural sway of her hips. How her pretty bare feet padded against the expensive hardwood floor.
She wore a pair of gray sweatpants that rode low on her hips, and a white, cropped T-shirt that flashed a bit of midriff. He liked that style on women, but Carly tugged at the hem of her shirt as though uncomfortable, embarrassed to show her flesh.
He couldn’t understand why she’d feel awkward. She looked good this evening, even with her hair pulled up in a messy kind of ponytail. And although he’d seen her looking a lot more glamorous in the past, he preferred her like this—down-to-earth and approachable, rather than all dolled up and model-perfect.
Once inside the den, which no longer looked as though it had been on the cover of a Better Homes and Gardens magazine, she turned and faced him, tugging at the hem of her shirt again. “If I’d have known you were coming by—”
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“Apologize. It’s getting old.”
She shot him a possum-in-the-headlights look. “What are you talking about?”
“You’re far more attractive and a lot more appealing when you let your guard down.”
It was true—but a real understatement.
When he’d first met her while working on the McMansion, he’d initially thought she was too caught up in herself, too wrapped up in her appearance. But tonight she looked sexy as hell—and she didn’t have a clue.
Apparently, there was a lot more going on inside of her than he’d realized. More than most people realized.
He’d heard the sincerity ringing in her apologies, heard the honesty in her critical self-appraisal.
God. She had no idea. And the fact that she didn’t realize she could turn a man’s head, even Bo’s if he’d let her, was mind-boggling.
He felt compelled to help her figure it out and he couldn’t help teasing her, couldn’t help the grin that pried at his lips. “So where is he?”
“Who?”
Bo let the smile he’d been holding back run its course. “You look like you’ve been entertaining a lover and just sent him out back to avoid being caught in the act.”
Her eyes widened, as though she was taking his joke way too seriously. “I don’t have a lover.”
Maybe not yet. But she deserved one. And he suspected the dry spell wouldn’t last long.
He set the wine on the glass-topped coffee table, next to a TV Guide, a crossword puzzle book, a ball-point pen, a wadded up napkin and a nearly empty glass of milk.
“The cleaning lady comes tomorrow,” Carly said.
Bo hoped she wasn’t going to apologize for not having things spic-and-span.
Back when he’d been working at the McMansion, the place had always been picture-perfect and more like a model home than a place where someone would want to kick back and relax.
But it looked as though she’d been spending a lot of time in this small downstairs room, rather than wandering around the big, empty house.
Heck, he couldn’t blame her for that. He’d get lost in a mansion like this. Most people would.
He wondered if that’s how she felt, now that she was living alone.
“The rest of the house is in good shape,” she added, glancing around the den.
“If you apologize for one more thing, I’m going to start pelting you with Oreos.”
She smiled in that waiflike way, and he wondered where it came from. But he knew better than to pry.
He nodded toward the merlot. “I don’t suppose you have something we can open this with?”
“Sure. I’ll be right back.”
While she was gone, he opened the package of cookies. And when she returned, carrying a couple of glasses and a corkscrew, he offered her one.
“No thanks.”
“Cutting back?”
“Cookies and wine don’t go together.”
He shrugged, then uncorked the bottle, poured them each a glass and handed her one.
Carly took the wine Bo offered her, and when he chose one side of the leather sofa, she sat on the other.
“So what’s with your obsession with perfection?” he asked.
“Excuse me?”
He didn’t reiterate, and she was glad.
Yet knowing she might be missing something left her wildly curious. “You make trying hard sound like a character flaw.”
“Taken to an extreme, it can be.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I’d like to.”
She paused for the longest time, trying to figure out how to explain. She might appear vain on the outside, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.
“All I wanted to do was make my husband happy he married me.”
Bo didn’t say anything, but he didn’t have to. It had to be obvious to him and the entire neighborhood that her efforts to please Greg hadn’t worked.
She thought long and hard before explaining. She wanted to answer honestly without revealing too much. It was a tricky row to hoe, but she’d give it her best shot.
“I was brought up in a blue-collar home where we didn’t have money for extras. And when Greg took me to meet his parents, I just wanted to fit in. To be accepted.”
“Greg wouldn’t have married you if he hadn’t seen something of value in you. If you hadn’t been good enough already.”
There was some truth to Bo’s words, but he had no idea how imperfect she’d been, how hard she’d had to struggle to prove herself.
“You don’t know the Bannings,” she said. Nor did he know the Aldersons. The families were complete opposites.
Bo took a sip of his merlot. “Tell me about them.”
“Greg’s parents? They are ultrawealthy and have high expectations for their son, for his wife.”
“Did they treat you badly?”
“Not really. Gregory was all right, I suppose. But Vanessa was almost impossible to please.”
“But you tried.”
She nodded. “Yes, I did. And it was a constant struggle.”
Her thoughts drifted back in time, to the only memories she was willing to share.
“For example, as a wedding gift, my mom and sister sent us a fancy coffeepot. But the Bannings gave us enough money to purchase a house on Danbury Way.”
“You can’t measure love by the cost of a gift.”
“I don’t. Believe me. My mom loves me as much or more than the Bannings love Greg, but she’s on permanent disability, and it’s a struggle for her to get by each month.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
So was Carly. But she did what she could to help out. “I send her money regularly, but she hates taking it from me.”
“I can understand that. I’ve always wanted to build my folks a new home in a better part of town, but they refuse to leave the old neighborhood. Still, I’m not sure if it’s because they really don’t want to move, or if their pride won’t let them accept my help.”
“It sounds like we have something in common.”
“Maybe so.” He took another drink.
She followed suit, then fingered the stem of her glass. “Within two years, Greg was a rising star at his father’s company and a great provider. I didn’t have to work, so I had plenty of time to focus on the house and on becoming a good wife.”
But a lot of good that had done.
Carly had started by working on her physical appearance—something she actually had power over. She’d even gone so far as to have a nose job, but she didn’t mention it to Bo. Nor did she tell him about the grueling daily workouts with a personal trainer, the regular visits to the salon, the shopping trips that kept her wardrobe constantly updated with stylish clothes and shoes.
“I threw myself into decorating the house,” she admitted. “And as Greg gained a more prestigious position in the company, we bought the lot next door, tore up both houses and rebuilt a larger, fancier one.”
Plans for a deck turned into plans for a pool, and soon they had the biggest, most impressive house in town.
All right. So Carly was the one who had pushed for the renovations, but Greg had been happy with them. At first, anyway.
“But the new construction wasn’t enough,” Bo said. “Was it?”
“Apparently not.” She lifted her glass, took another sip of wine. “The neighbors all came to ooh and aah, but there was talk behind our backs that our house was too ostentatious for the neighborhood.”
“Does it bother you that people refer to this place as the McMansion?”
“No. I guess not.”
Thanks to the gourmet cooking classes she’d taken, Carly was soon known as the Martha Stewart of Danbury Way. Everyone looked forward to coming to one of her parties or get-togethers. Well, at least they used to. She hadn’t issued any invitations in ages.
“It sounds as though you took great pains to be the perfect wife.”
She had. “And a lot of good that did me.”
“Maybe Greg would have preferred you to be yourself.”
“I don’t know. Maybe. He told me that marriage wasn’t about how pretty I was, how perfect our house was or whether we had a baby ‘on schedule.’ He wanted someone who really cared about him, someone he could be himself with.”
And Carly had failed him in that respect.
She’d been devastated by the rejection she’d been afraid of all along.
“My pride took a hard blow when he said he didn’t love me anymore, and I threw him out of the house. Maybe if I hadn’t…”
She didn’t continue, but didn’t suppose she had to. Bo was a man. And he probably understood where Greg had been coming from, even if Carly was still struggling with it all.
“If you hadn’t, then you wouldn’t be alone,” Bo murmured.
“That’s about the size of it.”
“How many brothers and sisters do you have?” he asked.
“Just a sister. Shelby.” That’s about all Carly wanted to offer.
“Is she in Texas?”
Carly nodded. “How did you know?”
“Just a guess. But I figured that’s where you’re from because of that soft Southern drawl you have.”
