perfume and aftershave—not his style. But it was clear that rock-bottom bad had been achieved when the maid of honor walked up to him and said, “I want to defy death.”
The wedding had gone off without a hitch. And, really, Adam had nothing to complain about, considering that he’d tolerated far worse ordeals. Like three months in a hospital bed flat on his back. He’d been managing—aside from his stint as toastmaster general—to fly below the radar of most of the guests.
That is, until Julia Knox made her big pronouncement.
Adam nearly swallowed the toothpick from the little sugared grape and melting cheese thingamabob he’d just popped into his mouth. The Quimby Woodwind Trio was playing a reedy rendition of “Sunrise, Sunset,” which meant his slow torture was almost over. He was one round of goodbyes away from freedom.
First he’d have to deal with Julia. Of all the words he’d imagined she might say when they met again, “I want to defy death” weren’t among them.
Carefully he removed the frilled toothpick from his mouth. “Pardon?”
“I want to defy death.” She looked straight at him with serious hazel eyes. Julia was almost always serious. Which was why he couldn’t fathom—
“Teach me how,” she said. Forcefully. Without blinking. As if she weren’t wearing several hundred dollars worth of tulle and a floral headpiece that made her look like Heidi of the Alps.
Weddings did strange things to women’s heads, inside and out. After Adam’s one brush with the phenomenon had ended in catastrophe across the board, he’d renewed his policy to avoid contact with marriage-minded females whenever possible. The fact that his older brother, Zack, was today’s groom and that he’d played the best man had necessitated some pretty fancy footwork—especially for a gimp. Luckily Zack understood, having endured three solid months of his fiancée’s obsession with color matching, ribbon tying and invitation lists.
Plain and simple, weddings made women nuts.
Julia Knox, however…
She wasn’t the type.
Maybe she’d changed in the years since Adam had left Quimby, his small Midwestern hometown. Calm, reasonable Julia was the woman least likely to change, but, hey—anything was possible.
Adam tilted his head. In spite of his vow to stay detached, she’d aroused his curiosity.
“This might not be the ideal time to bring this up,” she said, “but it’s now or never. For such a prominent member of the wedding party, you’ve been rather elusive.”
He shrugged, remaining silent. She had to know why.
Her brows shot up. “I suppose you’ve been thrust under the Quimby microscope whenever you show your face?”
“It’s not my face they’re interested in.”
Not one for sidelong looks and whispers behind hands, Julia ran her gaze over his tuxedo-clad body, from the tightly knotted bow tie to the black satin cummerbund and all the way down to the rented patent leather wing tips that pinched his toes. She lingered openly over his troublesome legs. A majority of the wedding guests had done the same, particularly when he’d offered his arm to escort Julia down the aisle. He’d wondered if they were waiting for him to stumble.
Julia’s interest was concerned and kind, not speculative. Although his reaction—a hot flush of awareness—was disconcerting, he put it down to more of the same. Ergo, further humiliation. His aversion to being the object of curiosity and gossip was a large part of his dislike for the otherwise acceptable reception. He’d joined the wedding party at the last moment and had planned to duck out of the reception as soon as possible, until his sense of obligation had stopped him. He could be elusive. He couldn’t be rude, not at Zack’s wedding. He owed his brother his life.
Involuntarily, Adam shifted from foot to foot as the muscles in his lower back and left hip started to quiver and contract. It’s only tension, he thought, concentrating on relaxing the tightness before it became a spasm. He imagined a clear, cold river washing over him. Through him.
Relax. It’s only Julia.
Her forthright gaze returned to his face. She didn’t say anything about how “good, really good” he looked. She only blinked, let go of her concern and then reassumed the determined set of her mouth. No pity from Julia, he thought. Thanks, Goldie.
She took a breath. “You wouldn’t know it to look at me—” when she touched the beaded bodice of her wedding getup he obligingly looked at the me part of her that swelled in the scooped neckline “—but my life is dull. I need a few thrills and chills. A challenge to shake up the status quo. I figure you’re the guy to come to.” She gestured with one hand. A delicate pearl bracelet slid over her smooth forearm. His gaze shifted, catching on it, then on the fragile knob of her wrist bone, and just like that he couldn’t look away. He didn’t know why, except that suddenly there was a swirling in his gut, like a strong, sucking whirlpool.
“I need to take a few risks. Feel the rush.” She hesitated, putting her hands on her hips, her face infused with the drama of it all. “Teach me how to be a daredevil, Adam.”
Oh, no, he thought at once.
Not him. Not her. After all these years, definitely not her.
His silence would have been leaden if not for the clarinets. The song ended on a long, wobbly note, and he shrugged negligently, as if he really didn’t care about any of it. “Go eat a chunk of wedding cake, Goldie. The sugar high will cure you.” He turned away, trying to pretend he hadn’t seen the hurt that had lightning-flashed over her face.
She grasped his sleeve. “Just like old times, is it? You cuffing me on the shoulder and then running away? I know a brush-off when I get one, Adam Brody.”
“I’m not sure that you do.”
She looked at his sleeve. Deliberately unclenched her fingers as she said in a low voice, “No one calls me Goldie these days.”
“Too high school now that you’re a mature adult and upstanding citizen?”
She made a face at herself. “Seems like I’ve always been a mature adult, doesn’t it?”
No, he thought, remembering with a startling clarity the one time she’d been as reckless as he, Quimby’s notorious daredevil. It wasn’t something they talked about. For the past ten years, they’d been very good at avoiding the slightest mention of it. To Adam, Julia Knox was his brother’s girlfriend and she always would be. End of story.
“Zack is married,” she said, reading his face. “It’s official. Lock, stock and honeymoon.”
“That doesn’t change our—” Adam stopped. Or did it? With marriage, was the unspoken law that brothers don’t share the same girl no longer in effect? For a moment, he experienced a glorious relief. His longtime burden of guilt shifted—a boulder rocking at the first wedge of the crowbar. Then he thought of Laurel Barnard, who’d caused a rift between them so immense only a near tragedy had closed it, and the boulder rolled firmly back into place.
“It’s been years since Zack and I broke up.” Julia produced a rusty chuckle. “I think you and I are allowed to be…friends.” Her lashes
