Practice Husband

“Edwards,” Joe said. “I’ll be with you in a minute.”

“I don’t mind waiting, and you were here first.” Addy gave David an encouraging smile. If Joe didn’t put the man out of his misery pretty soon, she was liable to get to practice her CPR skills on him.

To her surprise, Joe scowled at her. “I’ll see Edwards after you.”

“That’s okay,” David assured her, and Addy, confused by the undercurrents she could feel but didn’t understand, followed Joe into his office.

Addy watched him curiously as he closed his door with a decided snap. “I really don’t have anything else to do.”

“He can wait.”

“But should he?” She probed Joe’s tense attitude.

“Have you got a hankering for the country-club set?”

“I am not a snob, but I’m beginning to have my doubts about you,” Addy replied, defending herself.

“Me!” Joe looked dumbfounded.

“You sound very much like a reverse snob,” she insisted. “Either variety is a pain.”

Joe pressed his lips together and glared at her. “You don’t understand.”

“That much is clear,” she conceded. “So explain.”

Joe shoved his long fingers through his thick, dark hair and finally said, “Do you know who he is?”

“He said his name was David Edwards. Isn’t it?”

“Yes.” Joe bit the word off.

“Is there supposed to be some special significance to his name?” she finally asked, thoroughly confused.

“You don’t remember the son of the town’s leading citizen?” he mocked. “He owns that huge, white, pillared place just south of town.”

“Oh, that Edwards.” Addy shrugged. “I don’t think I ever meet him before. Is he a competitor of yours?” she asked, trying to figure out why Joe disliked the man so.

“Hardly!” Joe’s tone was scathing. “He’s got no more business sense than you do.”

Addy looked down her nose at him. “There is no need to be so superior. For all I know I could have lots of business sense. I simply have no interest in finding out. And, besides, having business sense is not a measure of character.”

“I told you,” Joe said tightly, “he’s an Edwards.”

“So you did. What you didn’t tell me was why being born an Edwards should qualify him as a social pariah.”

Joe stared at her, his eyes narrowed to blue slits. Addy stared back, refusing to be intimidated by his forbidding demeanor. This was Joe, she reminded herself. Her old friend.

“Don’t get mixed up with the bastard,” Joe ordered.

“Chance would be a fine thing,” she said dryly.

“I saw the way he was looking at you,” Joe insisted.

“Like he’s just found a friendly face.”

“Well, he had,” Addy pointed out reasonably. “Why don’t you like the guy? Does he cheat on his income tax?”

“Can’t you just take my word for it?” Joe said in exasperation.

“No,” she said succinctly, feeling a strange exhilaration in arguing with Joe. “Part of relating to a man is learning how to have meaningful discussions. This is a meaningful discussion.”

Joe stared at her for a long moment as if considering his options, and just when Addy was beginning to think that he wasn’t going to say anything else, he dropped a bombshell.

“David Edwards is my half brother.”

Addy opened her mouth, closed it, swallowed and then muttered, “Run that by me again.”

“We have the same father but different mothers,” Joe elaborated.

Addy dropped into the chair across from Joe’s desk and simply stared at him, having a great deal of trouble taking it all in. “I never heard anything about it before,” she finally said.

“As far as I know, no one else knew. My mother went to work for Edwards right out of secretarial school, and he promptly seduced her into an affair. When she got pregnant a couple of years later, he broke the relationship off and abandoned her.”

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