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“And why would that be?” Chase asked, feeling as if he was going to explode if he had to sit there for one more second.
Bridgett looked at him sternly. “Because if Gabe was kissing her today, Chase, that can mean only one thing. Gabe still has the hots for Maggie. Even after all this time. And he doesn’t care who knows it.”
Chase vaulted to his feet, grabbed his shirt and shrugged it on. “I’m tired of talking about me and my unconscionable behavior. Let’s talk about you and yours,” he said, leaning back against the closed bathroom door.
Bridgett squared her slender shoulders and shot him a stern look. “I don’t behave unconscionably.”
Chase quirked a brow, wondering if she had missed seeing him as much as he had missed seeing her. And how was it the two of them had grown so far apart, anyway? Was it just because they were older with different personal and career agendas to pursue? Or was there more to it than that? “You used to get into trouble right along with me,” he said softly, thinking about the fun the two of them had had during their childhood and teen years. It had only been later, after college, that they’d begun to drift apart. To the point that these days they rarely saw each other at all. And then, only by chance.
The picture of efficiency, Bridgett put the first-aid kit back in the medicine cabinet. “I’ve grown up,” she told him plainly.
Too much, Chase thought, wondering when it was, exactly, that Bridgett had gotten so serious. “So I see.” he shot her a teasing leer, meant to make her laugh.
“Cut it out, Chase,” she ordered. Frowning, she gathered up the paper bandage wrappers and excess bits of tape and tossed them into the trash.
Chase could see he had offended her, when that was the last thing he’d wanted. “You used to have a sense of humor.”
Bridgett shrugged and continued to avoid looking at him. “I used to be immature.”
“And now you’re not.”
“No.” Bridgett lifted her head and looked at him coolly. “I’m not.”
Silence fell between them. Chase knew she was ready to leave the intimate confines of the guest bath, but he didn’t want to let her go. Not yet. Not with the mood between them so unexpectedly tense and distant. He folded his arms in front of him and asked seriously, “How was your book tour? I assume you just got back.”
Finally the sun broke out across her face. “Last night,” Bridgett confirmed happily. “And the experience was wonderful, if grueling, and very satisfying, economically and personally. Just the way every three-month book tour should be.”
Chase found himself warming to the deep satisfaction he saw on her face. He had always wanted the very best for her. Always known she would get it. “Did you really cover every region across the country?”
Bridgett nodded, the depth of her devotion to her work apparent. “And I helped more women than I can say,” she confided, leaning back against the sink.
Maybe it was because he had grown up wealthy as sin and knew firsthand how little real joy a hefty bank account could bring a person, but it bothered Chase to know that Bridgett valued money more than just about anything these days. She used to treasure more than that. She used to treasure her friends—especially him. “Just what this world needs.” Chase sighed, ready to goad her back to sanity, if need be. “Even more women who think money is the route to happiness.”
Bridgett scowled at the sarcastic note in his low tone. “It is.” She crossed her arms beneath her breasts defiantly.
Chase kept his eyes on hers. “If you say so.” He inclined his head indifferently.
The fire in Bridgett’s eyes sparked all the hotter. “Don’t belittle what I do for a living, Chase.”
“Why not?” Chase pushed away from the closed door and stood straight, legs braced apart, once again. “You certainly belittle what I do,” he reminded her as he narrowed the distance between them to just a few inches.
Bridgett straightened, too. “That’s because your magazine—”
“Modern Man,” Chase helpfully supplied the publication’s name, in case she’d forgotten.
“—does nothing but teach guys how to get what they want from women!”
“What’s wrong with that?” Chase demanded. Clueless for as long as he could remember about what women really wanted or needed in this life, he had started his magazine as a way of collecting data from other men, about what worked and what didn’t with the women in their lives. As far as Chase was concerned, he was providing a public service, making both men and women a little happier, while doing his part to tamp down the battle of the sexes and reduce the number of unhappy relationships overall.
“I’ll tell you what’s wrong with that.” Bridgett planted her hands on her hips. “It makes guys think that women are ‘a problem to be handled’ and that there is something fundamentally wrong with marriage.”
“There is something fundamentally wrong with marriage,” Chase shot back flatly, not about to sugarcoat his opinion on the subject on her account. “Or hadn’t you noticed the soaring divorce rate in this country?”
Bridgett released a long slow breath. She looked as if she was fighting for patience. “Lately the divorce rate has actually been going down. No thanks to you!”
Chase brought his brows together in consternation. “You don’t know that,” he argued back. He was tired of taking the blame for things that were way beyond his control. “Maybe I’m the one to credit for that.” He knew for a fact, from reader mail, that there were a lot of guys who had really appreciated his series on how to get their women not to just tolerate, but love the sports they followed. The same went for his series on cooking in, instead of eating out.
Bridgett rolled her eyes. She stared at him, making no effort to hide her exasperation. “And how do you figure that?” she asked drolly.
“Because,” Chase said, thinking how much he had always enjoyed a spirited argument with Bridgett and how much he had missed having them with her since she’d been away, “I also run articles that convince guys not to get married when they’re not ready.”
Bridgett’s eyes turned even stormier. And worse, looked hurt. “Exactly.”
Too late Chase realized he had hit a real sore point with Bridgett. The fact that her own parents had never married, even when Theresa Owens had gotten pregnant. “I’m sorry,” he said swiftly, seriously. “I know your, uh—”
“Illegitimacy?” she provided when he seemed unable to blurt it out.
“—is a real sticking point with you,” Chase continued, with some difficulty. It was, he knew, probably the biggest hurt of her childhood, though she rarely talked about it.
Bridgett waved him off, already done talking about it, and ready to move on. “I just think you’re doing a disservice to men with that whole marriage-isn’t-really-all-that-necessary attitude you and your magazine perpetuate.”
“Yeah, well, I think I’m helping my readers,” Chase said stubbornly. He was making them see that marriage was a serious step. And if they weren’t serious about a lifetime commitment, or the women they were chasing weren’t serious about the same, marriage was not the path to take. He certainly didn’t want them to end up a public laughingstock, the way he had, when his bride had ditched him just days before they were to marry.
“Whatever.” Bridgett tugged the sleeves of her elegant silk-and-cotton cardigan down to cover her wrists. “It doesn’t matter to me.”
Like hell it didn’t, Chase thought, studying the wealth of emotion on her face.
“I’m late, anyway,” Bridgett continued.
“For what?” Chase asked curiously. And that was when he saw it. The big fat emerald ring.
Chapter Three
Bridgett thought she was past the third degree when it came to Chase and her beaux. Apparently not. He still felt—wrongly so—that he had the right to comment on the men she chose to date. Not to mention the gifts they might have or have not chosen to give her.
“What,” Chase demanded, his handsome features sharpening in disapproval as he looked down at the emerald ring glittering on the ring finger of her right hand, “is that?”
Bridgett had an idea what he was going to say. She didn’t want to hear it. Deliberately misunderstanding where he was trying to go with this, she lifted her shoulders in an indifferent shrug. “I can’t buy myself a ring?”
Chase’s sexy slate-blue eyes narrowed even more. He took a step closer and said, very low, “I know you, Bridgett. You invest in real estate, growth stocks, a car that will go a couple hundred thousand miles before it quits. You don’t spend thousands of your hard-earned cash on baubles. Someone gave you that very pricey emerald-and-platinum ring.”
Someone he apparently already didn’t like, even though he had yet to find out who it was. “So what if it was a gift?” Bridgett shot back just as contentiously. Expensive as the ring was, she knew that to a man like Martin, it was just like penny change. Martin never did anything in a small or inconsequential way. When they dined out, it was at the very best restaurants. They drank the rarest, most expensive wines. He didn’t just send her roses. He gave her vases of the most exquisite orchids or lilies. Once, he’d flown her to Europe for the weekend, simply because he wanted her to see Paris in the springtime. Initially, of course, she’d tried to discourage such lavish gifts. Now she knew that was just the way Martin and everyone else in his family lived.
Chase braced a hand on the wall just beside her head. “I want to know who gave you that ring.”
Bridgett refused to let him intimidate her with his I’m-in-charge-here body language. Honestly, she didn’t know how Chase did it! She had been back in Charleston less than twenty-four hours and already Chase—the bad boy of the Deveraux clan—was already under her skin. Big time.
She angled her chin at him defiantly “I don’t have to answer you.”
“Darn it, Bridgett. You know how much I care about you.”
Cared, Bridgett thought, but didn’t love. Would never love. At least not in the way she had once wanted desperately for Chase to love her. Now she knew better, of course. Chase might have once considered her his very best buddy and partner in mischief, but when it had come to dating, he had always chosen others. At first she had thought—wrongly—it was just because he was romancing women from his own social class. That theory had been blown out of the water when he became engaged to Maggie Callaway, who was from the same working class background as Bridgett. Then she had known that social status was not the reason Chase didn’t pursue her. He simply wasn’t attracted to her. Not in that way. So she had put any lingering hope of a romance between them aside and kept her distance from Chase as much as possible. She had known then what she had to remind herself of now. Chase protected her and watched out for her in a familial sort of way. There was nothing the least bit romantic in his feelings toward her—and never would be.
Silence fell between them. “Your mother didn’t tell me you were engaged,” Chase said finally when she didn’t respond to him.
“That’s because I’m not yet,” Bridgett explained with a great deal more patience than she felt.
He dropped his arm, stepped back until he was once again leaning against the opposite wall of the first-floor powder room, his six-foot-two-inch frame dwarfing her own five-foot-seven one a little less. “But you’re close,” Chase asserted unhappily, still studying her face.
“I think we’re definitely headed that way. Yes.”
Abruptly Chase looked as if he had received a sucker punch to the gut. Again Bridgett warned herself not to take his reaction personally. Chase was probably just suffering the pangs any “brother” would have about seeing his “sister” married off.
“Who’s the lucky guy?” Chase asked finally in a rusty-sounding voice.
Bridgett tried not to notice how handsome Chase looked in the soft lighting of the room. After all, it wasn’t as if she wasn’t used to his stunning good looks. She had grown up looking into those long-lashed, slate-blue eyes of his and knew full well they were the color of the ocean on a stormy day. She had committed to heart the rugged planes of his face, the square jaw, the high cheekbones and wickedly sexy smile. Okay, maybe his shoulders did look a little broader and stronger, his abdomen a little flatter, since the last time she had seen him. Maybe he was a little more tan and rough around the edges. But the ensemble of pleated khaki shorts, loose-fitting short-sleeved shirt and sneakers was the same. Chase wanted people to see him as a slacker when she knew full well he was anything but. Deep down he was as ambitious and determined to succeed in business as she was, if not more so.
“The guy?” Chase prodded again when Bridgett failed to answer his query. “The ring giver does have a name, doesn’t he?”
Bridgett flushed. “Martin Morganstern.”
Chase shook his head and looked all the more disappointed and distressed. “Not the art-gallery guy over on King Street,” he said, groaning.
“One and the same,” Bridgett confirmed, unable to help the haughty edge that came into her voice. “And you needn’t speak of him with such derision.”
Chase rolled his eyes. “Man, Bridgett! That guy is old enough to be your father!”
Bridgett forced a droll smile as she allowed, “Only if I were sired when he was thirteen.”
“Which makes him…?”
Bridgett pushed aside her own lingering uneasiness that there was something just not right about her and Martin, despite the fact that on paper, anyway, when it came to all the relevant facts, they looked very good as a couple. “He’s forty-five.”
“To your thirty-two.” Chase blew out a gusty breath and slammed his hands on his hips. “The guy’s too old for you. Way too old.”
Bridgett shrugged. She didn’t know why, exactly, but Chase was making her want to punch him. “You’re welcome to your opinion,” she told him icily. “Fortunately,” she said as she tried to step past him once again, “I don’t have to abide by it.”
Chase smiled as if he had an ace up his sleeve and once again stepped to block her way. “What does your mother think about that ring?” he asked smugly.
Another alarm bell went off in Bridgett’s head. Ignoring the probing nature of Chase’s gaze, she said stiffly, “She hasn’t noticed it yet.” She’d been too busy in the kitchen.
Chase immediately had an “Aha!” look on his face.
Bridgett grimaced all the more. “I was about to show her when you and Gabe started brawling.”
Chase smirked. “Likely story.”
Not for the first time in her life, Bridgett wished Chase didn’t know her so well. “I’ll do it later,” she said.
Chase ran a hand along the light stubble on his jaw and continued to regard her smugly. “I think you’re stalling.”
Bridgett squared her shoulders as if for battle. “I am not.”
Chase lifted his dark brow in silent dissension. “Your mom won’t approve of you accepting such a lavish gift from him,” he predicted matter-of-factly.
Unfortunately Bridgett was pretty sure Chase was right about that, since to date Theresa hadn’t approved of much of anything Martin had done.
“In fact,” Chase predicted, leaning even closer, “I bet she doesn’t like you dating Martin any more than I do, does she?”
“Fortunately for me,” Bridgett parried, ignoring the warmth emanating from Chase’s tall strong body, “it’s not up to my mother whom I should or should not spend time with.”
Chase’s brows drew together like twin thunder-clouds. “You should listen to her, Bridgett. Your mother has always had a lot of sense.”
“In most matters.” Bridgett felt her hackles go up as she delineated precisely, “Not this.”
“You need to give that ring back, Bridgett.”
“Really.” Taking exception to the tone of his voice, Bridgett folded her arms beneath her breasts contentiously and glared at him. “And why would that be?”
Because that ring is the kind of gift a man gives to announce a woman is his. And his alone. And I just can’t see you with a smooth talker like Morganstern, Chase thought. Aware she was waiting for an answer and fuming while she did so, Chase did his best to conjure up an answer. “Because you’re too young to get that serious about someone,” he said finally.
“I’m thirty-two,” Bridgett shot back, temper sparking her beautiful brown eyes. “If I want to have a family of my own—”
“You’ve got plenty of time for that.”
Again she looked down her nose at him, as if he just didn’t get it. “I’m ready to get married and settle down now,” she explained as if to a moron.
Chase frowned, and unable to help himself, blurted out in frustration, “At least find someone who can make you happy while you do it!”
Bridgett propped her hands on her hips. “What makes you think Martin won’t make me happy?”
Because I just know, Chase thought, uneasiness sifting through him. Aware how lame that would sound, he remained silent.
Bridgett stared at him as if she had never seen him before and had no clue who he was. “Like I said, I’ve got to go.” She ducked around behind him and exited the powder room without another word.
CHASE WAS DISAPPOINTED he hadn’t been able to make Bridgett see what a mistake she was making even dating Mr. Wrong. But that didn’t mean he was giving up. He figured it would take time—and persistence—to make Bridgett see the error of her ways. But he figured she’d be grateful to him in the end. He didn’t want her suffering the way he had when he’d been betrothed to the wrong person.
In the meantime he needed to check on his mother. He found Grace upstairs in the guest room where she always stayed. She had changed out of her travel clothes and into a slim apple-green dress that only seemed to emphasize her recent weight loss. The strain lines on her face seemed all the more pronounced in the late-afternoon sunlight streaming in through the windows. “Are you going to be okay?” He didn’t know why, but she seemed more vulnerable now than when she had first arrived and told them she’d been fired. He wasn’t used to his take-charge, kick-butt mother being weak.
“Of course I’ll be all right,” Grace said in the firm parental voice she had used on him and his siblings. She looked at him sternly. “I don’t want you worrying about me.”
“Can’t help it.” Chase sauntered into the bedroom and shut the door behind him, so they could talk privately. “In the first place, I’m the oldest son.”
“Which does not make you responsible for me.”
Maybe that would’ve been true had there been someone else—like a husband around all the time—to protect her. But there wasn’t. “Even so, in your place, I’d be reeling,” Chase told her frankly.
Grace opened the first of several suitcases with a beleaguered sigh. “I’ve suffered setbacks before, Chase.”
