THREE
NICK stood in the kitchen of his three-bedroom house and wrestled with the iron, cursing whoever had invented the damned thing. “Remind me again why I’m going to this shindig.”
“Because you’re a guy who cares about kids,” said his brother, Daniel, who was making his regular visit to Nick’s house. He’d already raided the fridge, complained about the dearth of acceptable meal choices, flipped through Nick’s DVD collection twice and taken two of the newer flicks, as if Nick’s house was Blockbuster. Nick didn’t complain. He liked the company, and tolerated his brother’s intrusions. Most of the time.
A writer, Daniel had the same dark brown hair and blue eyes as most of the Gilberts, but preferred a more relaxed approach to clothing, meaning anything fancier than jeans didn’t exist in his closet. “And you better,” Daniel added. “You grew up with four brothers and sisters.”
“I didn’t mean about the kids, I meant, why am I attending an event where Carolyn’s going to be?” Earlier, he’d told his brother about running into Carolyn at the toy store.
A coincidence? Or a second chance with the woman he had never really forgotten?
Nick cursed the iron again as the steam sent globs of water over his shirt. “What is it with these things?”
“Didn’t Mom teach you how to take care of yourself before she released you into the wild?” Daniel slid into place beside his brother. “Here, let me do it. For Pete’s sake, you’re making a mess of it.”
Nick stepped back, amazed that his younger brother could wrangle the machine into doing his will. In five minutes Daniel had the golf shirt pressed and ready to go. “How do you do that?”
“It’s called being a bachelor and being too poor to afford dry cleaning.” Daniel grinned and held out the shirt, then waited while Nick slipped it on. Then he unplugged the iron and set it on the ironing board to cool. “And I’m not distracted by thoughts of a woman right now.”
“I’m not distracted.”
Daniel arched a brow.
“Okay, maybe I am. A little.” Nick picked up his keys, slid them into his pocket, then faced his brother. “I thought I was over her. Over the whole damned thing. Then I see her last night at the toy store and—”
“It was Love Story all over again?” Daniel hummed a snippet of the movie’s famous theme song.
“Not at all. More a remake of our worst moments together.” But there had been one moment when he’d remembered why he’d been attracted to her. Why he’d married her. They’d had fun—for a few minutes—and then Carolyn had gone back to being the stuffy city prosecutor, the woman who was about as much fun as a bag of rocks, and Nick was reminded all over again why they’d broken up.
Yet guilt pinged at him still. She hadn’t been the only one at fault, and he knew it. He hadn’t exactly been Joe Sensitive, nor had he been Husband of the Year.
“I’m just glad I got out of that marriage after a few days instead of a few years,” Nick said. “Carolyn was always too damned straight-laced for me. I want a woman who can have a good time, make me laugh, live a little. Not drive me absolutely insane. And when I think of Carolyn Duff, driving me crazy is the term that comes to mind.”
Daniel bent down to pat Bandit, Nick’s German short-haired pointer. The spotted dog wagged his tail with furious joy, nearly knocking over the scraggly ficus tree beside him. A shower of dry leaves littered the floor. “There were some good times, too, from what you’ve told me. Some very good times.”
An image of one particularly good memory—with the neon lights of Vegas shining on Carolyn’s peach skin while they made use of every surface in their suite at the Mirage—flashed in Nick’s mind. He saw her smile, heard her laughter, could almost smell the scent of her raspberry bubble bath.
“Okay, maybe one good memory. Or two.” Another one popped into his mind, followed quickly by a third, slamming with a sting like pellets into his chest. Nick shook his head. As good as those times had been, the end had been fast and unforeseen, like a sneak guerrilla attack that came and ripped him apart in the middle of the night.
Carolyn had been stubborn about leaving him in that diner, adamant about ending the marriage as fast as it began, claiming he hadn’t cared, he hadn’t been listening.
And back then he probably hadn’t. But she hadn’t given him much of a chance, either.
Just as well. They’d been totally unsuited for each other.
Since the day of the divorce, Nick and Caroline had become nothing more than strangers, albeit strangers who had once shared a bed. And yet last night he’d sensed a vulnerability in her, a chink in the Carolyn armor, that made the lawyer in him see a flicker of doubt in the witness’s case.
He wondered—could he have been wrong in letting her go? Could they make it work if they tried again now?
Nick shook his head. He hadn’t changed much in three years, and from what he’d seen, neither had she. “We were insane to get married in the first place,” he said to Daniel. Definitely insane.
Still, at odd moments, Nick thought the exact opposite. Crazy thoughts, the kind that hit him in the middle of the night when he awoke from a dream that had featured a lot of neon lights and left him pacing the floors. He’d raid the fridge or pour a scotch, and still the memories would tickle at the edges of his mind.
He was a lawyer. Even though he’d had a lot of evidence, and a whole lot of facts in the case of his marriage, he knew when someone was hiding the truth. Carolyn most definitely had been keeping a tidbit or two in check when she’d handed back the plain gold band, sliding it across the table of the diner, then walked out of his life.
Until yesterday.
Nick shrugged it off. They were totally different people—and they were over. Two very good reasons to put Carolyn out of his mind.
Daniel straightened. Bandit let out a whine of complaint, then trotted off to find a toy for fetch. “Maybe this wasn’t just serendipity, you two running into each other. Both of you getting kids to sponsor for that picnic thing. Maybe it was a sign from the Fates or whatever.”
“Will you let it go?”
“Only if you tell me what made you two start talking to each other after all this time apart.”
“Desperation.” Nick chuckled. “We were both stuck in the toy aisle, me with a girl to buy for, her with a boy, and we didn’t know what we were doing. Forced allies, nothing more.”
“Uh-huh. You couldn’t have asked any of the moms there? Or called your sisters?” Daniel said. “All of whom would have willingly given you advice.”
“I, ah, didn’t think of that.”
“Told you. You were blinded by the pretty woman who still gets your car engine racing.”
Nick rolled his eyes. “If you weren’t my brother, I would stop talking to you. I’ve told you a thousand times that Carolyn and I aren’t any good together. You know that old adage about the bird and the fish?” Daniel nodded.
