Wedding Bell Blues Read online

  “Oh!” Kaitlin gasped, startled. She stared at the sand miserably. She couldn’t ask him. He had told her once not to come back unless she came because she wanted him—and not something from him. But he’d made such a fool of her, hurt her so badly, that she’d never been able to go back. And now…

  “She seems to want you,” Brendan observed.

  “Yes,” Kaitlin said. She turned so she could see Janis hopping up and down, too. She waved reassuringly and stared at the sand again.

  “If you need to get to work…” Brendan began.

  “I don’t. Not really. The shoot fell apart and Netty Green is pulling the spot.”

  “Why?” he demanded sharply.

  She gazed at him. “She wants you.”

  “Who wants me? For what?” he asked, annoyed.

  Kaitlin exhaled and scrambled to her feet. She stared at him without answering, holding her skirt at her thigh. “Brendan, I wouldn’t hurt my cousins or ruin their weddings for anything. We can get along for the little time we need to be together, I’m sure of it.”

  He had a very skeptical look on his face as he got to his feet. “Sure,” he said briefly. Then he caught her hand. She felt his fingers moving against her palm, and she wanted to scream. “Now, tell me, what’s going on with your shoot?”

  “It isn’t your problem, Brendan.”

  “Tell me.”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it isn’t any of your business. Because…” She hesitated.

  “Go on.”

  “Because you told me not to ask you for anything again.”

  He stiffened. “Oh. So you did walk down the beach to ask me for something.”

  “Yes. No! I walked down the beach because I had to talk to you. Because we had to straighten this out. And because—”

  “Because what?” he snapped. She had forgotten that his hold could be so steely, that his fingers could clamp around her wrist like a vice.

  “You heard her!” Kaitlin snapped. “She wants you to be her model.”

  “I’ve never modeled in my life! I race boats and I dive for wrecks.”

  “I know, Brendan, but—”

  “You mean that woman is going to pull the entire campaign if she doesn’t get me in her commercial?” he asked incredulously.

  “Yes. She—she thinks you’re perfect,” Kaitlin replied irritably.

  He was grinning as he released her suddenly. “Well,” he murmured, stroking his chin.

  “I’m not asking you to do it, Brendan. I can’t afford your price.”

  His grin faded. She could read nothing of his thoughts from his features, and his dark glasses shadowed his eyes. “I told you I wouldn’t seduce you again, Kaitlin,” he said harshly. “If that’s what you’re afraid of.”

  “I’m not afraid of you, Brendan. I told you, it was as much my fault as yours.”

  “How interesting. And magnanimous.”

  “It’s nothing.”

  “We’re going to be seeing each other a number of times,” he reminded her.

  “Yes, we’ve established that—”

  “And I won’t stop you if you try to seduce me,” he said softly. Huskily. His words seemed to hang on the breeze. To linger. To reach out and touch her more surely than any caress.

  “That should hardly worry either of us,” she murmured coolly.

  “We’ll see. What happened to your model?” he asked suddenly, changing the subject.

  “What?”

  “Your model. Why does your lady need a male body to begin with?”

  “Oh.” He had changed from her personal life to her professional life too quickly. She shrugged. “An illness in the family. And it doesn’t matter. I lost my female model, too. I—”

  “All right,” he said suddenly.

  “All right what?” she asked nervously.

  “All right, I’ll do it.”

  “You’ll do what?”

  “I’ll model for your commercial. You’re supposed to be talking me into it, right? That’s why your friend keeps hopping around and tapping her watch. I’ll do it. On one condition.”

  “And what’s that?” Kaitlin asked softly, suspiciously.

  He was quiet for a minute, watching her. The sun beat down on them, and she found herself studying him, seeing the man she had known forever, but also seeing the stranger he had become. The little touches of silver at his temples added to his mystique. The dark glasses shadowed his eyes, kept him from revealing any truths. The set of his jaw was as square as ever; his shoulders were as taut and broad and square as they had always been.

  One condition…

  Maybe he would ask for one last night. One last chance to be together, to believe in magic. To forget time and eternity and the world, and bask in the moonlight and the night air. To feel the caress of the breeze, and of one another. To soar and savor flesh and blood and passion.

  Her cheeks colored, and she lowered her lashes, fearful that her eyes would betray her thoughts. She knotted her fingers into fists and held them behind her. The desire to touch him was suddenly so strong she could hardly resist. To touch, to stroke. To follow the thin dark line where the mat of chest hair narrowed provocatively at his waistband. To step closer and press her lips against his, to feel the hunger of his kiss…

  “One condition,” he repeated.

  “Yes?” Her lashes were falling, closing over her eyes. Let it be decadent, let it be crude! She could protest, of course, and be indignant, but then…

  “You have to model, too.”

  Her eyes flew open. “What?”

  “Well, if I’m going to spend the day being a piece of meat, you can join me. I’ll model—if you will.”

  Her secret desires came spiraling through her with shocking clarity, and she stared at him incredulously. He didn’t want to go to bed with her. He didn’t want one last night together.

  Not even an hour.

  He just wanted to make sure she didn’t get anything for free.

  She shook her head, backing away, feeling like a fool—and wishing she could dunk him in the ocean.

  “I can’t. It’s out of the question.”

  “Why not? Gained too much weight in the thighs?”

  “No!”

  “Well, then?”

  “I’m not a model!”

  “And neither am I. But I’m willing to give it a fling to save your business. Why aren’t you?”

  “My whole business will not fall apart if I do not keep this account!”

  “Ah, but it will be injured,” he said smugly.

  “How can you be so sure?”

  “Because of that person up there, hopping away like a pogo stick.”

  “Oh!” She spun to see that Janis was desperately trying to get her attention. And Netty Green was walking toward the table. It was now or never.

  The Seashell Sunblock account was important. No, she wouldn’t lose her business, but…

  Other clients would know that Seashell had pulled out. They would wonder why, and few people would stop to realize that Netty Green was a pain in the…

  “Hey, kid, this one is up to you,” Brendan reminded her softly.

  She spun to face him. “All right, all right!”

  “Don’t jump down my throat. It’s your business, not mine.”

  “That’s right. You make a living out of being a pirate.”

  “A pirate?” His brows shot up. “Because I search for ships that sank hundreds of years ago?” He wasn’t really expecting an answer. “There’s more, too,” he told her.

  “What do you mean, there’s more?” she asked suspiciously. A little dance of heat was already taking place all along her spine.

  “Dinner.”

  “What dinner?”

  “Any dinner. You and I alone. Just to discuss the basics—”

  “What damn basics?”

  His brows shot up in surprise, and he smiled then, very slowly. “The weddings, Kaitlin. Some of
the things I know Donna and Bill and Barbara and Joe would like. What I think we should do for them.”

  “What you think…!”

  “Kaitlin, damn it, I want your opinion, too. That’s why I’d like to go to dinner. A friendly dinner. To discuss things. Look, these ladies are your cousins, and I said I would step aside—”

  “No! I told you I don’t want that.”

  He was silent for a moment. As she watched him, she wondered why he couldn’t have lost every hair on his head.

  No…he probably would have been attractive bald, too. He’d need to lose his whole damn head. Turn pink. Cease to smile, to speak…

  And he wanted dinner.

  “Kaitlin, I know you wish I’d disappear from these weddings—actually, I imagine you wish I’d disappear from the face of the earth. But you don’t want to be responsible for my absence.”

  She smiled sweetly. “Brendan, you’re wrong. I hope you live forever.”

  “Just nowhere near you, right?”

  She shrugged, and he laughed. Then his smile faded, and he demanded abruptly, “Have we got a deal?”

  “What?”

  “A deal, Kaitlin. I model if you model, and then I get dinner. The weekend after next. I’m working this weekend, and this is supposed to be at my convenience.”

  “But if I model—”

  “It’s your business, remember?”

  The weekend after next was Gram’s wedding.

  “Wednesday. I don’t have a weekend night free.”

  “I’ll get you at eight.”

  Still, she hesitated. Dinner. With Brendan. Alone. Well, he wasn’t going to seduce her. Did she trust him?

  Damn. Did she trust herself? Twice burned…

  He pointed toward the hotel once again. “Your friend is getting very nervous.”

  “Yes!”

  “You’ll model and join me for dinner?”

  “All right, all right. I’ll model, and—and go to dinner. And I won’t renege.”

  “Fine,” he said flatly.

  Janis was slamming her fingers against her watch. Netty would be walking away any second.

  “Okay, Brendan, come on, then,” Kaitlin muttered, turning. “Please, let’s just do this and get it over with.”

  “Gee, when you phrase things so charmingly, it really is hard to resist,” he mocked.

  What was the matter with her? He could still back out of the deal.

  But he was behind her. “It won’t be quite over with,” he reminded her.

  “Right. Dinner,” she said.

  He laughed huskily, but he was with her. And that was important. He was behind her all the way past the cameraman and the equipment and to the table, where Netty Green was beaming.

  “Oh, I am so pleased, Mr. O’Herlihy. I do understand that this is not your vocation, and I thank you sincerely. I promise you that my product is a very good one.”

  “I know your product, Mrs. Green,” Brendan began.

  Terrified of what he might say, Kaitlin jumped in quickly. “Is Lenny close by, Janis?”

  Janis nodded, her eyes darting from Kaitlin to Brendan, and started to speak. “Yes, he’s in the suite, waiting. He said—”

  “Well, Mr. O’Herlihy, what do you think of Seashell Sunblock?” Netty demanded.

  Kaitlin held her breath. Brendan was going to tell the truth—no matter what it was.

  “It’s a good product. It compares with the established brands, and the price is low enough for the young mother with a bunch of kids to stock up on it. I wouldn’t have agreed to this—no matter what—if I had been asked to sell something I couldn’t truly endorse.”

  Netty was beaming, absolutely beaming. Kaitlin didn’t think she could take any more of it. “Did Cissy leave the suit, do you know?” she asked Janis.

  Janis stared at her blankly for a moment. “Oh, yes, yes, she did. But I haven’t called for another model, because I didn’t know—”

  “It doesn’t matter. I’m going to do it,” Kaitlin said.

  “You’re going to call?”

  “No, I’m going to be the model.”

  Janis dropped her jaw, Netty cocked her head, and Kaitlin could feel the smile on Brendan’s face.

  “You’re—you’re going to be the model?” Janis said.

  “Yes!” Kaitlin snapped. Then she spun around. “I’ll go change. I’ll be right down. I’ll send Lenny to the beach, and you alert the cameraman.” Janis had yet to close her mouth. She kept looking from Brendan to Kaitlin, who ignored her.

  “Brendan, Lenny may want to put some pancake makeup on your face. I know that—”

  “Fine.”

  He wasn’t going to fight with her. He was still wearing the glasses, but his features were calm and composed, and he was being completely charming, the easiest man in the world with whom to get along.

  She wanted to hit him.

  Instead, she smiled. “Well, then, I’ll go change.”

  She swung around and hurried up to the suite. Lenny was sitting on the sofa, watching a talk show. He looked up, surprised, as she breezed in. “Are we on or off?”

  “On!” Kaitlin snapped, marching by him and heading for the bedroom. The two-piece bathing suit was on the bed, and there was an array of makeup spread out on the dresser.

  “Glad to hear you so pleased and excited!” Lenny called to her.

  She slammed the door. In seconds she had stripped, throwing her clothes wherever they landed, and donned the suit. She sat before the mirror, darkening her eyes carefully and doing her face. There was a knock on the door.

  “Hey, Kaitlin! What’s up?” It was Lenny.

  “Come on in,” she called to him.

  He opened the door and stared at her, then began to smile. “So…”

  “Don’t ‘so’ me.”

  “I think you’re perfect.”

  She groaned softly. “And don’t use that word, please!”

  “Okay, you’ll stink, but what the hell.”

  “Lenny…”

  “Seriously, I think you’ll be great. I think it’s a major loss that you never put yourself in front of the camera before.”

  “Lenny, how’s the makeup?”

  He came over and studied her closely. “Seems perfect—sorry, seems fine. Where’s Mr. Perfect—whoops! Sorry, can’t seem to shake that word.”

  “Manage it, huh?” Kaitlin murmured.

  He grinned.

  “Why doesn’t anyone take my temper seriously?” she moaned.

  “An Irish temper? I take it very seriously, Kaitlin, me love,” he teased. “I’ll go down and check out your man.”

  “He’s not my man.”

  “He is today,” Lenny advised her. He closed the door, and Kaitlin closed her eyes, then opened them and studied her face once again. Maybe she would be all right. The makeup made her eyes huge, and, if nothing else, her hair had color and luster. It was probably too long, but she wasn’t going to go around chopping off her hair for a sixty-second commercial.

  Sixty seconds…that would take them hours. Hours and hours of putting sunblock on Brendan or—worse—feeling him put it on her.

  She groaned and leaned her head against her arms. Well, she was committed. She might as well face the music.

  She stood and hurried out of the room to the elevator. Then she realized she had brought nothing with her, no shoes, no towel, no cover-up. And there was a slightly balding man in the elevator with her. Leering. She felt naked. She was half naked. Anyone in her right mind would have grabbed a cover-up.

  She wasn’t in her right mind.

  When the elevator stopped, she nearly ran to the table. Janis was waiting for her; the others were already down on the beach.

  “You look like dynamite!” Janis assured her. “But how—”

  “Don’t ask.”

  “You’ll be just per—”

  “Don’t! Don’t say it! Let’s just go, okay?”

  Janis studied her and nodded, grinning from ear to ear des
pite her best efforts. “All right, you look like pure garbage. Is that better?”

  “No!”

  “I wouldn’t be so grouchy if I was the one putting lotion on him,” Janis commented.

  “You weren’t married to him.”

  “No,” Janis said with a sigh. “I wouldn’t have let him go.”

  “I didn’t—oh, never mind. Please, let’s just get this over with!”

  It wasn’t going to be that easy; she had been sure of that, and she’d been right.

  Lenny had worked on Brendan, who was wearing makeup on his nose and cheeks and shoulders. His sunglasses were gone, and his eyes were a startling deep green against his bronze flesh, his dark hair a perfect frame for his face. He watched Kaitlin approach, and his gaze swept slowly over her. He smiled, but she wasn’t sure whether it was because she hadn’t changed—or because she had. She was about to speak when Netty came rushing forward.

  “I knew it, I knew it! It’s exactly the look I want. Older, sophisticated—well, not too old, of course, but—oh, Kaitlin, I am so pleased and eager to see the final product!”

  “We should get to it,” Lenny advised. “Morning light, you know.”

  “Sure,” Kaitlin murmured.

  There was a huge towel stretched out on the beach in front of the cameras, and a large bottle of Seashell Sunblock was waiting on it. An ice chest sat on one corner of the blanket; sandals and a couple of paperbacks were strewn on another. It was an average day at the beach.

  “Kaitlin, Brendan, remember, there’s going to be a voice-over. Don’t worry about sound. The surf and breeze will be added to the mix later. Action is all that we need. Is that all right, Brendan? Do you understand?”

  “I think I’ve got the basics,” Brendan said dryly.

  “Great.”

  “Brendan, the voice-over is saying, ‘When you touch her this afternoon, touch her with Seashell Sunblock’—then the scene will switch. Janis will read the line. And what I want is Kaitlin on her knees, and you right behind her. Make use of her hair. Sweep it aside to get the lotion on her nape and along her back and shoulders. Okay? Kaitlin, down on your knees.”

  She went down. This was her commercial. She had written it. She hadn’t planned on being the one on her knees…with Brendan behind her.