A Fortune's Children's Wedding (17 page)

 

“I haven't heard from either you or Brandon in nearly two weeks, Flynt Corrigan.” Kate sounded perturbed. “I was beginning to wonder if the two of you were still in Birmingham or had taken off on a lark for parts unknown. No one has called me, and any time I've tried to reach either of you, you aren't in.”

“Kate, I—I am so sorry!” Flynt stammered, his face reddening.

He'd come back to his suite to change clothes for his date with Angelica tonight just in time for Kate's phone call from Minneapolis. “There is absolutely no excuse for not calling. It's, um, well—Brandon and I are seldom around the hotel, and when we come in at night, it's very late, too late to call you, and—”

“Gracious, listen to you!” Kate laughed, her sense of
humor reasserting itself. “You sound like my grandchildren back in their college days, when they would forget to call their parents for weeks on end. There were apologies and excuses, and if I'm not mistaken, next come the abject regrets and fervent promises to do better.”

“I really am sorry, Kate.” Flynt smiled ruefully. “Consider me abjectly regretful. And I fervently promise to phone you every day.”

“Heavens, no! I'm on the phone enough as it is, I don't need daily reports from you. But I have been dying to hear about my granddaughter. As you know, Brandon called me the first night he was in town and said things had gotten off to a shaky start between them. I'd like your impressions and opinions, Flynt. Tell me about Brandon and Angelica.”

Flynt sat down on the bed, cradling the phone between his shoulder and his ear as he fastened the buttons of his shirt. “You're going to be very proud of your granddaughter, Kate. Angelica is—” He paused.

How to describe Angelica to her grandmother?

It wasn't as if he didn't know her well enough to give a detailed description.

He and Angelica had spent every evening together since his arrival in Birmingham; sometimes they met for lunch in the hospital cafeteria, too.

Three nights ago, one of her patients had gone into labor and delivered the baby close to midnight. The late hour hadn't deterred Flynt from stopping by Angelica's apartment when she got home. He'd arrived with a pizza, knowing she had been in the labor-and-delivery suites for hours and missed dinner.

It was a quick visit. After eating, Angelica had been so tired he'd left so she could go to bed. But merely spending that short time with her buoyed him; letting a whole day pass without seeing her was unthinkable.

“Brandon said she was beautiful, that first night he called,” Kate prompted helpfully.

“Yes, but there's so much more to Angelica than looks,” Flynt countered, sounding slightly defensive. “I know how important physical appearances are to Brandon, but to simply rave on about Angelica's beauty is to, uh, to—” He broke off, aware that his heart was pounding and his entire body felt flushed with heat.

“To lessen the impact of her fine character?” Kate suggested. She smiled widely as Sterling, who was sitting in the room, chortled behind his newspaper.

“Exactly!” Flynt exclaimed, his tone almost reverential.

“Are you having any problems keeping up with your company while you're in Birmingham, Flynt?” asked Kate, ever the businesswoman.

“No, not at all. I've been on trips overseas that've lasted longer than this particular sojourn. I have an excellent staff. I call headquarters at least once a day and make good use of conference calls, e-mail and faxes, so it's been business as usual for SMS.”

“Good. I'm very glad to hear that, Flynt. Now tell me what I've been longing to know. How is Brandon's relationship with his daughter developing?”

“Brandon's relationship with Angelica,” Flynt repeated, stalling.

It was a tough question, because he wanted to give Kate the answer she so hoped for: that Brandon and
Angelica were getting to know each other, that they were making up for all their lost years apart.

But the truth was, Brandon's relationship with his daughter hadn't developed at all. How could it when they never saw each other?

Which was probably his fault, Flynt silently conceded, since he and Angelica were together every evening.

They'd sampled a little of everything that Birmingham had to offer. For nightlife, the clubs in the rejuvenated Southside, for culture, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute and historic Linn Park and for all-around fun, the Alabama Spots Hall of Fame and the Birmingham Zoo.

Last weekend Mara and TJ had accompanied them to Oak Mountain State Park, thirty miles south of the city, where they'd rented canoes and paddled around the lake and sunbathed on Oak Mountain Beach.

Flynt pictured Angelica in her demure, yet incredibly tantalizing, one-piece blue swimsuit and felt his mouth grow dry. He'd been both grateful and frustrated with the other couple's presence. They had served as an effective restraint against his increasingly powerful need to—

“Oh, dear, from your long silence, I'm going to assume that Brandon and Angelica haven't—what's the popular lingo?—bonded.” Kate's voice jarred Flynt from his reverie.

He cleared his throat. “No, they haven't, Kate. They haven't—er—bonded. Yet,” he dared to add, feeling like a fraud. He didn't want to lie, but would a little prevarication be such a bad thing?

Otherwise, Kate would be doomed to disappointment, because Angelica was more than happy to avoid Bran
don Fortune. She did not want her father in her life, she'd told Flynt too many times to count. She didn't want
any
of her mother's exes around, ever again, but especially not her own father.

After hearing some of the chilling tales about the men in Romina's past, as experienced by Angelica and her siblings, Flynt understood her opposition to fathers. She was equally opposed to the concept of husbands. She admitted she'd never seen a happy marriage firsthand—“no man ever bothered to marry Mama”—though some of the expectant couples whose babies she delivered seemed to “act” happy.

“But it's like you said, Flynt, the good times can't last forever,” she'd told him earnestly during a surprisingly frank conversation they'd had about relationships one evening. “And love is the first thing to go when the bad stuff happens.”

Something in Flynt urged him to recant his earlier pessimism, to argue that he'd seen people—his aunts and uncles, his grandparents, face adversity together and become stronger and closer. That his parents' particular tragedy and weaknesses weren't universal. But he hadn't contradicted Angelica because he didn't understand his own strange shift in perception.

“Do Brandon and Angelica have anything at all in common?” Kate asked a little plaintively, once again drawing Flynt out of his strange reverie.

It took a moment for him to reconnect. Yes, he was supposed to be facilitating the Fortune father-and-child reunion; the lucrative SMS contract with the Fortune Corporation depended on his efforts to at least try to establish a connection between them.

But when he was with Angelica, the last thing on his mind was Brandon—or the Fortunes or even SMS. His interest, his thoughts, were riveted to Angelica herself.

“Well, there's no common interests yet, but we'll keep looking for something, Kate,” he said, feeling like a fraud.

“Thank you for being honest with me, my dear,” Kate said wistfully. “And as long as you are able to remain there, I won't give up hope that somehow Brandon will…bond with his child. I know my great-nephew Jack's trying to do the same thing with his young daughter, Lilly, now that his ex-wife Sandra is dead.”

Now Flynt felt acutely guilty. “I'll try to get them together again tonight, Kate,” he promised. And grimaced.

How could he do that, when he didn't know where Brandon was going to be?

They seldom saw each other because, as Brandon put it, “Let's just continue doing our own thing, man.”

To Flynt's amazement, Brandon Fortune, known for quickly growing bored, had yet to tire of Birmingham. While Flynt conducted his company business from his suite during the day, Brandon went out—somewhere—without ever complaining about the limitations of a city that wasn't Los Angeles.

And while Flynt spend his evenings with Angelica, Brandon spent his with…

Flynt frowned thoughtfully and remembered hearing Brandon sing enthusiastically about “a girl crazy for me.” He hadn't given the lyrics much thought at the time. Brandon also sang about “little deuce coupes, funkytowns and superfreaks.”

But now that he took time to consider the situation, Flynt realized that Brandon must have a girlfriend here in Birmingham. Brandon viewed himself as quite the ladies' man; typically, he would not have lasted two weeks without female companionship. Would he have lasted here two weeks without any complaints unless he was occupied by a girl crazy for him?

Girl—that was the operative word. Flynt suppressed a groan. He fervently hoped Brandon's Birmingham “girl” was at least of legal age.

“Flynt, one last thing before we hang up,” said Kate. “Have there been any more threatening notes? We've been concerned that Brandon and Angelica are at risk and—”

“Angelica is safe, Kate,” Flynt hastened to assure her. “There haven't been any more threats and I've—kept a close eye on her.”

He actually blushed. If Kate only knew how close! But frustratingly, maddeningly, never close enough.

Flynt gulped with enough force to swallow a head of lettuce whole. His propensity for sexual implosion in Angelica's presence hadn't lessened one iota, nor had hers. Though they hadn't discussed his theory about emotional maelstrom-equals-loss-of-control since he'd outlined it that day in her office, both heeded it.

Neither was ready to risk implosion or to cede control to someone else, particularly not someone they'd known such a short time. He and Angelica were well matched when it came to caution, willpower and restraint, Flynt mused. Just as their desire and their need for each other was well matched.

And though they couldn't give in to their lust, they
couldn't ignore it, either. They had to kiss, they had to touch. The temptation, the necessity for it was too strong to be denied.

So they kissed good-night at the end of every evening; they held hands and lightly caressed each other's backs or necks or arms. That was titillating and exciting, yet safe, as long as they set very firm limits.

Which they did. They didn't spend time alone in cars, unless they were driving to and from a place; they avoided his hotel suite and her apartment unless Mara and TJ were there, too. Otherwise…

Flynt didn't dare speculate on
otherwise,
not with Angelica's grandmother on the other end of the line.

“I'm glad to hear you're so conscientious, Flynt,” said Kate, “though I never doubted it. I would love to fly down there and meet Angelica, but I don't want to barge in when she's just getting used to the idea of her father. I suppose we'll have to wait until she is ready to meet the rest of her family. Do you think it'll happen soon, Flynt?”

“I don't know, Kate,” replied Flynt.

Actually, he did know. It wasn't going to happen soon, if ever, because Angelica insisted she wanted nothing to do with either her father's or her mother's relatives.

Flynt guessed it was her way of proclaiming total loyalty to Romina, though whether or not Romina herself demanded such fealty, he did not know.

But he was unwilling to dash Kate's hopes with unbridled pessimism. “Maybe it'll be sooner than any of us think, Kate.”

T
wo days later, Flynt realized that the kind little white lie he'd told Kate actually had been uncannily prophetic.

Angelica was to meet the Fortune side of her family much sooner than any of them had anticipated. Especially Angelica and himself.

They were sitting at a coffeehouse when Angelica told him a reporter with the notorious and very popular
Globe Star Probe
had called her, claiming to be checking out an anonymous tip. Was Brandon Malone Fortune actually her father?

Even though Angelica had been aghast and muttered an unintelligible reply before hanging up, the reporter, Kieran Kaufman, had left repeated messages on her machine.

“Do you think Brandon has been blabbing the story in bars around the city and somebody phoned it in to
the
Globe Star Probe?
Or maybe…is it possible that Brandon himself is the anonymous tipster?”

“I truly doubt it,” replied Flynt.

“Because his paternal feelings are so strong he'd never expose me to a scandal rag?” Angelica took refuge in deadpan, gallows humor.

“As much as I'd like to believe it, what I really think is that Brandon operates from a position of self-interest.” Flynt was blunt. “And he has nothing to gain by calling the
Probe.
”

“Except publicity. Maybe he developed a taste for it when he was reunited with Kate. Maybe he wants to be in the spotlight again,” Angelica surmised darkly.

“Why is Brandon hanging around Birmingham, anyway?” Angelica cried, anxiety making her stomach somersault. “Haven't I made it clear that I don't want to know him? I don't even see him, except every once in a while by accident, if he happens to stop by your suite when I'm at the hotel.”

And always chaperoned by Mara and TJ, Flynt mused wryly.

“Somehow Brandon has managed to keep himself entertained while he's in town.” Flynt refrained from adding that it was likely a young female companion who was doing the entertaining. Why upset Angelica further?

“I bet I know why he hasn't left.” Angelica scowled. “His mother probably made some deal with him, that if he stays here for a set number of days or weeks, supposedly spending time with me, he'll get a nice cash payoff.”

She noticed that Flynt looked uncomfortable. “I'm
right, aren't I, Flynt? Kate Fortune is paying him to stay here on the pretext of playing daddy.”

Flynt thought of the terms of the deal he himself had struck with the Fortunes. If he were to tell her those details, she might assume he was staying because
he
was getting paid.

And nothing could be farther from the truth. The way he felt about her now, Flynt knew he would stick around even if Kate were to cancel their deal.

“Brandon's mother isn't paying him to stay here on the pretext of playing daddy, Angelica.” He felt compelled to clear Kate of that charge. He didn't want Angelica harboring hostility toward her grandmother, who was genuinely eager to accept her as a full-fledged member of the Fortune family.

“I'm listening to what you're
not
saying, Flynt.” Angelica stared intently at him. “That my grandmother isn't involved but one of the Fortunes, maybe one of Brandon's brothers or sisters, is paying him to stay here in Birmingham? And they don't care if he gets to know me or not, they're just glad he's not in Minneapolis stirring things up.”

Flynt couldn't help but smile. “It's safe to say that Brandon's sisters and brothers prefer him out of Minneapolis and out of their hair.”

He reached across the table and laid his hand over hers. “Do you know that you just referred to Kate as your grandmother? Not Brandon's mother, not Kate Fortune, but your grandmother.”

“Don't go reading anything into it, Flynt. It doesn't mean anything,” Angelica insisted.

“I think it does. I think you're beginning to adjust to
the idea of being related to the Fortunes, Angelica. To accepting Kate Fortune as your grandmother, rather than as some larger-than-life character who occupies a separate universe from you.”

“But she does. Which brings us back to all those calls from that nosy reporter, that Kieran Kaufman creep,” Angelica said grimly. “The press might be a part of the Fortune family's world but not mine. The
Globe Star Probe
wouldn't call plain old Angelica Carroll, nurse-midwife, unless maybe they wanted help concocting a story about delivering a Martian baby or something.”

“They wouldn't need help concocting a Martian baby story, they could bang it out in an hour themselves. And whether it's Carroll or Fortune, you are anything but plain old Angelica.”

“And you're a sweet-talking smooth operator.” She smiled flirtatiously at him, feeling better for no other reason except talking things over with him…made her feel better.

Suddenly the situation didn't seem so alarming, just merely annoying. And eminently manageable.

“If I screen all my calls and that reporter keeps getting my answering machine, I bet he'll give up and go away.” She shook some chocolate shavings into her cappuccino and took a sip. It was delicious.

“After all, Brandon and I are hardly a hot story that warrants a zealous pursuit. It's not like either one of us is a movie star or TV or sports star. Those are the tabloids' prime targets.”

“You would definitely be superceded if a movie star should get arrested or pregnant or if a TV star throws a tantrum and walks off a hit show,” Flynt agreed dryly.

“Some celebrity somewhere will be sure to fall in love or break up with another celebrity. Or get married or divorced or sick. Or die. Then awful Kieran Kaufman and the rest of the tabloid pack will be hot on that trail. Brandon and I will be forgotten.”

Angelica clinked her cup to Flynt's in a cheerfully irreverent little toast.

 

She shouldn't have been so quick to dismiss her apprehensions, Angelica lamented in the frenzied days that followed. Deluding herself into a state of misplaced optimism not only had been naive, but downright stupid.

The
Globe Star Probe
reporter did not leave Birmingham. And though Angelica continued to avoid all his calls, Kieran Kaufman reached Brandon, who admitted the truth of her parentage.

“I'm proud to have a daughter like Angelica, even though she doesn't want anything to do with her old man. And who can blame her? I've messed up my life, I'm a loser,” Brandon mournfully told the reporter, adding a hopeful, “I just hope it's not too late to change.”

The
Globe Star Probe
printed the quote and the story along with pictures, one of Angelica, snapped unawares as she left the hospital. The other photo was a glamorous retouched studio portrait of Brandon—perhaps supplied by him?

Angelica was upset but since the story was buried in the middle of the
Probe
and nobody she knew would admit to reading the tabloid, she anticipated little or no troublesome aftermath.

Once again she was to be proven wrong.

A singularly slow news week followed that particular
issue of the
Globe Star Probe.
No celebrity anywhere did anything at all to attract tabloid attention. In fact, nothing newsworthy seemed to be happening on any front. Quiet reigned in the entertainment industry and in politics. Not a single intriguing crime occurred. Even the weather remained calm, with no horrific storms to provide diverting tales of survival and loss.

The
Globe Star Probe
sought to correct the dearth of stories by nourishing the one they'd found in Birmingham. And as Kieran Kaufman explained to Brandon who then told Flynt, the TV tabloid shows weren't averse to bolstering their print counterpart by pumping up a promising story.

A TV crew for
Insider,
a popular but critically scorned tabloid news show, arrived in Birmingham to accompany Kaufman as he interviewed the loquacious Brandon and a wary, reluctant Romina. Angelica refused to deal with any reporters at all, and except for being occasionally ambushed by cameras, she was left alone.

And then Kieran Kaufman found Ike Searcy P.I., or maybe it was the other way around. But it was the revelation of Romina's connection to the Fortunes, as the mother of Brandon's child, that inspired Searcy's client Ted Carson to file a hundred-million-dollar civil suit against the Fortune Corporation.

The lawsuit accused the Fortunes of financially enabling Romina Carroll to aid and abet Darlene Carson's custody violation and flight with the Carson children.

Suddenly the mainstream media was interested in the story, sending reporters, camera and film crews to interview whatever Fortune they could corner in Minneapolis, as well as Brandon and Romina in Birmingham. The
top-rated network magazine shows expanded the story to include “secrets of the underground,” a look at the “hidden world of women and children on the run.”

The Fortune family was not pleased….

“We are being accused of subsidizing an underground network for fugitive mothers and their children in flagrant violation of custody laws?” Jake Fortune yelped during an urgent phone call to Flynt and Brandon. “What in the hell have you gotten us into now, Brandon?”

“Brandon hasn't done anything,” Kate, on the other line for this conference call, said, defending her youngest son to her oldest.

“If it's not too much trouble, perhaps Flynt Corrigan, our man on the scene, could explain what is going on down there and why the media jackals have been unleashed on us this time?” Jake was sarcastic.

Flynt tried to explain about Brandon's alleged connection to Nancy Portland's underground network. “Romina might be involved—well, she undoubtedly is—but there is no tangible proof linking her to it, only circumstantial evidence that will never stand up,” he added, quoting Weatherall the FBI agent.

“No one has been able to nail Romina for anything, though plenty have tried,” Brandon boasted proudly.

“And, of course, there is no proof that Romina has financial ties to the Fortunes or ever had. Searcy and Carson's lawsuit will be thrown out,” Flynt predicted.

Jake Fortune was not appeased. “But if a judge decides to throw the case to a jury, they just might decide all that lack of proof makes her look slippery and deceptive rather than not guilty. And if
she's
found guilty,
we're
guilty simply by association. It's the law of the jungle.”

“Even if the suit is thrown out, our team of lawyers will be tied up for weeks, filing motions and scheduling depositions,” growled his brother Nate, on another extension.

“Meanwhile, we're faced with a barrage of negative publicity, not to mention the possibility of inspiring a horde of paranoid greedy crackpots to file their own lawsuits against us for whatever absurd reasons,” Sterling Foster, on yet another extension, intoned glumly.

“So what should I do?” Brandon sounded downcast. “Come back to Minneapolis?”

“No!” Jake, Nate and Sterling all chorused so loudly that Flynt's ears rang.

“You stay down there with Angelica, Brandon, dear,” Kate interjected diplomatically. “Getting to know your daughter is the most important thing.”

 

“I didn't have the heart to tell your grandmother that Brandon isn't getting to know you at all,” Flynt told Angelica later that afternoon, after the fractious phone call.

They were strolling in the rose garden next to the city library, enjoying the warm May sunshine. Angelica had a break between patient appointments, and Flynt was always ready to rework his own business-by-proxy schedule to take the opportunity to see her.

“Brandon isn't, but
you're
getting to know me pretty well,” teased Angelica.

In spite of the media storm swirling, she felt almost
recklessly happy. Just being with Flynt affected her that way.

Besides, to her heartfelt relief, she seemingly had been relegated to footnote status in this latest Brandon saga.

“Yeah, I am,” Flynt said huskily. He took both Angelica's hands and drew her toward him. “But not well enough.”

He was feeling bold enough, hungry and desperate enough to kiss her right there, in a public place, in full view of anyone who happened to come along. He still wasn't sleeping very well, and when he finally did fall into a restless slumber, he experienced incredibly erotic dreams, all starring Angelica.

The risk of losing control and giving in to sexual implosion no longer seemed so threatening, so foolhardy. Flynt tried to remember why he'd thought holding back was the wise, safe course for them to follow.

He didn't want to be wise or safe, he wanted Angelica. More with every passing day.

Abandoning restraint, he touched his lips to hers, half expecting her to pull away. He knew she was uncomfortable with public displays of affection; she still blushed at any reference to their totally uninhibited PDA in Swank that first night.

To his surprise Angelica stretched up on tiptoe and leaned into him, letting her mouth linger lightly against his. Flynt's response was instantaneous. With a soft muffled groan, he crushed her to him, thrusting his tongue into the moist heat of her mouth.

She clung to him, her tongue meeting his stroke for stroke, wriggling to get closer. She couldn't seem to get close enough.

Flynt wove his fingers through her hair, pulling it away from her face to expose her neck. He began to nibble on the smooth, creamy skin.

“I want to be alone with you,” he said huskily,

“We are alone…sort of.” Angelica's heart was thundering in her ears. She touched the tingling spot on her neck. It felt moist and ultra-sensitive. She swayed a little, her legs weak and unsteady. “The park is practically deserted this time of day.”

“You know what I mean, Angelica.”

She knew. Shivering, she pulled away, turning her back to him.

Flynt closed his hands over her shoulders and kneaded. “I'm sorry, Angel. Not for kissing you, but for doing it here.”