I live on pure oxygen and Bach concerts in the park. But if you like, I’ll start sneaking cream cakes for breakfast.”
“You do that. We Italians like a little meat on our women’s bones.”
She laughed and fell into step with him. It was spring, and suddenly the world was bright and beautiful and blazing with new color. Overhead, the streetlights took on a magical quality as she walked toward home with a stranger who was rapidly becoming a friend...
“GREAT SHOTS, GABY,” Harry Dean grinned as he helped her up from a lounging position on the hood of a rebuilt 1956 Chevrolet. “Motocraft, Inc., will love it! You’ll sell auto parts by the barrelful.”
“I’d better sell transmissions.” She laughed, stretching lazily in the skimpy halter-and-shorts set she’d worn for the layout. They were white, and she was nicely tanned from her long auburn hair down to her pretty toes. Slender, green-eyed and vivacious, Gaby Bennett was a top model and earned big money at her profession. This layout for Motocraft, Inc., had been one of her best jobs to date. She was rapidly becoming known as the First Lady of Parts, an in-joke with her modeling friends.
Apparently the executives of the auto parts and transmission specialists corporation had been very picky, because ten girls had been turned down before they had approached her agency about the layout. Gaby had been picked immediately. This was the first of a series of commercials she was shooting for them, and it might involve some travel if the commercials caught on.
A thin, dark-looking man had been watching the photographer shoot the stills, and now he came closer. He had dark hair and eyes, and he looked oddly nervous. Gaby frowned, wiping her perspiration away with a towel as she relaxed away from the brilliant lamps she’d been bathed in for the session. He looked so familiar...hadn’t she seen him before?
“You’re Gaby,” the man said in a pleasant voice. His manner was hesitant, rather shy. She smiled because she liked that shyness. It was an unusual quality, making him seem very different from most of the men she’d known.
“Gaby Bennett,” she agreed pleasantly. “Excuse me, but do I know you?” she asked. “I’m sure that sounds like a line, but you look familiar somehow.”
“We’ve met, but it was a long time ago.” He looked at her hesitantly, as if not sure whether or not to go on. “I’m Joe Stephano,” he said, finally introducing himself. “I, uh, I’m the executive vice president of Motocraft, Inc.”
Gaby felt the blood draining from her face. No wonder he’d seemed familiar. She remembered him all too well, a shy, younger version of his big brother Marcus. Joe had always been nervous around her. They hadn’t seen too much of each other during that brief period of her life, but she remembered him. He brought back memories that were unbearable nine years later, memories of his brother.
She hadn’t connected Motocraft, Inc., with the Stephanos because the account had come through a Mr. Smith, an executive of the company. She hadn’t realized that Marc had achieved such fame and fortune. So he was Motocraft, Inc. Suddenly she realized why she’d been given the account. Was he trying to make amends? Well, it was years too late!
“It’s nice to see you again,” she said, forcing herself to keep smiling and extending her hand. After all, what had happened wasn’t Joe’s fault. “Do I thank your brother for this job?” she asked bluntly.
He flushed. His hand felt a little limp in hers, and he quickly removed it. “Uh, actually, you can thank me. Marc didn’t find out until it was too late. That is, he sort of wanted a blonde....”
“You don’t have to apologize, I’m just grateful for the work,” she said gently. So Marc hadn’t wanted her here. No doubt he wanted to forget her completely, since betraying her had gotten him so far in the world. Maybe his conscience still hurt him. She hoped it did.
He stuck his hands in his pockets and smiled shyly. “I hope you won’t hold the past against me,” he began. “Marc and I never got along real well, even back then. I’m sorry things didn’t work out between you, but that was a long time ago.”
The memories engulfed her all at once, and despite her twenty-six years and all of her acquired sophistication, she went beet red.
Her gaze held his, cool, quiet, green glades of solitude. “How is your brother?” She didn’t want to ask, but she had to know.
He shrugged. “Marc’s okay, I guess,” he said, as if he disliked discussing his older brother. “The business is his life.”
She let her gaze drop to his collar, noticing a tiny spot on it, like ketchup, and she almost smiled. He was boyish, and she liked his apparent lack of sophistication. She glanced back up again, studying him. “Marc isn’t married?”
“They try,” Joe offered, “but he always escapes the noose. Slippery fish, my brother.” He cocked his head. “You married?”
“I can’t stand men,” she volunteered, and grinned.
He burst out laughing. “Hey, that’s good. I like that.” His warm, dark eyes slid over her slender, well-proportioned body. “You sure look good,” he blurted out, and quickly cleared his throat before she could speak. “Uh, you thirsty?” he asked after a moment’s hesitation.
She smiled. “I feel like I’ve been in the desert for a month! These lights are hot!”
“Would you... I could buy you a soda or a martini or something,” he volunteered.
“Sure,” she said easily. “Give me a minute to get dressed.”
He took a deep breath. “Okay!”
She laughed as she went to get her clothes back on. He was a nice boy, she thought. A brotherly type, if ever there was one. So she owed the account to him. That was surprising. But he’d always seemed attracted to her, even in the days when she was dating Marc. She’d liked him the first time she ever saw him, in the apartment he shared with his older brother. He was a nice, unassuming boy with a reserve that she’d taken for coldness until she saw the lack of confidence it camouflaged. Then she began to talk to him. Like most people, he responded to her smiling cheerfulness and opened up. He’d been a lot of fun. Apparently the shyness hadn’t abated in all those years, but she wondered if he was still the mischievous boy underneath. Or had a lifetime of living in Marc’s shadow left him without joy?
Marc. She closed her eyes as she donned a pair of white slacks and a multicolored silk blouse. She’d deliberately kept busy so that she wouldn’t have to think about him, to remember. And now Joe was here and bringing it all back. But despite her pain and the years of wounded pride, she couldn’t resist the hunger for bits of information about him. Was he well, how did he look, was he happy, was there a special woman...so many questions that she shouldn’t have wanted to ask. But her heart would feast on just such tidbits. And she was like a puppet on a string. She had to know. She had to hear that he was satisfied with what he had, that giving her up had been worth the profit it had gained him.
Joe took her to an elegant little restaurant less than a block away and persuaded her to have lunch as well as something to drink.
“You must be hungry,” he coaxed, smiling. “Come on, have
