What I Did for Love (21 page)

“You told me the ring was a fake. It’s a fake, right?”

“Define ‘fake.’” The wrench clanged against a pipe.

“As in, ‘Not genuine.’”

“Oh.”

“Bram?”

Another clang. “It’s not a fake.”

“It’s the
real thing
?”

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?”

“Why didn’t you tell me that from the beginning?”

“Because we have a relationship based on deceit.” He stretched out his hand. “Give me the bucket.”

“I don’t believe this!”

He fumbled for the bucket, his head still inside.

“I would have been more careful!” She thought of all the places she’d left the ring lying around, and she wanted to kick him. “I set it on the diving board when I went swimming yesterday!”

“That’s just stupid.” Water sloshed into the bucket. “Got it!” he said a moment later.

She sank down on the toilet lid and dropped her forehead into her hands. “I’m sick of having a marriage based on deceit.”

He emerged, bringing the bucket with him. “If you think about it, having a marriage based on deceit is all you know anything about. That should be a comfort.”

She leaped up. “I want a fake ring. I liked having a fake ring. Why don’t you ever do what you’re supposed to?”

“Because I can never figure out what that is.” He dropped the sink stopper and began washing off her not-fake ring. “When we
get back downstairs, I’m going to pull Rory away. Don’t let anybody interrupt us, okay?”

“Georgie!” Meg called from the bottom of the stairs. “Georgie, you need to come down here. You have a guest.”

How could she have a guest with a guard stationed at the gate?

Bram grabbed her hand and slipped the ring back on. “Let’s be a little more careful this time.”

She stared down at the big stone. “I paid for this, didn’t I?”

“Everybody should have a rich wife.”

She jerked past him and hurried along the hall. Halfway down she stopped.

Her ex-husband stood at the bottom of the stairs.

Meg
tugged nervously on an amber earring. “I told him he couldn’t come in.”

Lance looked as bad as someone so buff could possibly look. He was apparently growing both a beard and long hair for his next action film because he had an inch of unkempt black scrub sprouting from his jaw, and his dark hair hung unevenly around his square face, not an attractive look, although one that was certain to improve after his hair and makeup people got done with him. His coffee-stained T-shirt stretched over the bulging muscles he spent several hours a day maintaining. Narrow braided bracelets, similar to Meg’s headband, but more frayed, hung at his wrist, and he wore sandals made of rope and canvas. Skillful dentistry had shaped his strong white teeth, but he’d never let anyone touch his slightly crooked nose. His press kit said he’d broken it in a teenage street fight, but he’d really tripped on the front steps of his college frat house and been too frightened of surgery to have it fixed.

“Georgie, I’ve left half a dozen messages. When you didn’t call me back, I was afraid—Why wouldn’t you call me back?”

Her fingers curled around the railing. “I didn’t want to.”

Like most of Hollywood’s leading men, he wasn’t exceptionally tall, barely five feet nine, but his granite jaw, manly chin-cleft, soulful dark eyes, and pronounced musculature compensated for
his lack of height. “I needed to talk to you. I needed to hear your voice, to make sure you’re all right.”

More than anything, she wanted him to grovel. She wanted to hear him say he’d made the biggest mistake of his life, and he’d do anything to get her back, but that didn’t seem to be happening. She came down one step. “You look awful.”

“I drove here right from the airport. We just got in from the Philippines.”

She forced herself the rest of the way into the foyer. “You were in a private jet. How tough could the trip have been?”

“Two of our people got sick. It was—” He glanced over his shoulder at Meg standing guard behind him. She’d kicked off her orange boots, and the way her bare ankles emerged from her blue leopard-print leggings made her look as though she’d been dipped upside down into a tub of melted crayons. “Could we talk? Privately?”

“No. But Meg has always liked you. You can talk to her.”

“Not anymore,” Meg said. “I think you’re a creep.”

Lance hated not being adored, and distress flickered in his eyes. Good. “Send me an e-mail,” Georgie said. “I have guests, and I need to go back to the party.”

“Five minutes. That’s all.”

An alarming thought struck her. “Photographers are all over the place. If they spotted you driving in—”

“I’m not that stupid. I was driving my trainer’s car, and the windows are dark, so no one could see in. Somebody buzzed me through the gate.”

Georgie didn’t have any trouble figuring out whom. The kitchen had an intercom, and Chaz had to know how much Georgie would hate having Lance show up. Georgie slipped her thumb into the pocket of her chinos. “Does Jade know you’re here?”

“Of course. We tell each other everything, and she understands why I need to do this. She knows how I feel about you.”

“And exactly how is that?” Bram sauntered down the stairs. With his rumpled bronze hair, world-weary tanzanite eyes, and Gatsby whites, he looked like the jaded, overindulged, but potentially dangerous heir to a lost New England liquor fortune.

Lance moved closer to Georgie, as if he needed to protect her. “This is between Georgie and me.”

“Sorry, sport.” Bram ambled into the foyer. “You lost your opportunity for a private chat when you traded her in for Jade. You poor bastard.”

Lance took a menacing step forward. “Stop right there, Shepard. Don’t say another word about Jade.”

“Relax.” Bram rested an elbow on the newel post. “I have nothing but admiration for your wife, but that doesn’t mean I’d ever want to be married to her. Very high maintenance.”

“Nothing you need to worry about,” Lance said tightly.

Even though Bram was considerably taller than her ex-husband, Lance’s perfect physique should have made him a stronger presence. But somehow Bram’s lethal elegance gave him an edge in the macho wars. She couldn’t help wondering how a woman like herself had ended up married to two such impressive men.

She moved closer to Bram. “Say what you need to, Lance, and then leave me alone.”

“Could you…step outside for a minute?”

“Georgie and I don’t have secrets from each other.” Bram let his voice slip into an Eastwood whisper, circa 1973. “I don’t like secrets. I don’t like them at all.”

She considered rising above her baser instincts, but only for a moment. “He’s very possessive.
Mostly
in a good way.”

Bram curled his fingers around the back of her neck. “And let’s keep it like that.”

Her flash of amusement proved she’d spent too much time living with the devil. Still, this was her fight, not Bram’s, and as much
as she appreciated the support, she needed to handle it on her own. “Lance doesn’t seem like he’s leaving, so I might as well get this over with.”

“You don’t have to talk to him.” Bram dropped his hand from her neck. “I’d like nothing better than a good excuse to throw the son of a bitch out on his ass.”

“I know you would, sweetie, and I’m sorry to spoil your fun, but leave us alone for a few minutes, will you? I promise I’ll tell you everything. I know how much you love a good laugh.”

Meg shot Lance a glare and looped her arm through Bram’s. “Come on, pal. I’ll fix you another drink.”

Exactly what he didn’t need, but Meg’s intentions were good.

Bram gazed at Georgie, and she could see him trying to decide how long and how hard to kiss her. But he wisely underplayed the scene by merely touching her hand. “I’ll be nearby if you need me.”

She’d intended to stay in the foyer, but Lance had other ideas, and he walked ahead of her into the living room. His passion for clean surfaces and hard modern lines would make him contemptuous of this lovely room with its kumquat trees, Tibetan throws, and mirrored Indian pillows. And while Bram’s house was spacious, it could have fit inside one corner of the massive property she and Lance had shared.

She remembered something she should have thought of earlier. “I’m sorry about the baby. Truly.”

He stopped in front of the fireplace, so that the vine curling over the mantel looked as though it was growing from his head. “It’s been hard, but it was early, and Jade got pregnant so easy that we’re not letting ourselves get too upset. Everything happens for a reason.”

Georgie didn’t believe that. She believed things sometimes happened just because life could really suck. “Still, I’m sorry.”

His shrug made her suspect he was secretly relieved. She heard a distant rumble of thunder and wondered how she could ever have
loved this man with his shallow emotions and flexible passions. She’d given him tears and entreaties, but she’d never once unleashed her anger. No time like the present to fix that.

She moved toward him. “I’ll never forgive you for the lie you spread about me not wanting children. How could you do something so cowardly?”

He was taken aback by her attack, and he picked at the frayed bracelet on his wrist. “It…was an overzealous publicist.”

“That’s a lie.” Her anger erupted along with a flash of lightning. “You’re a liar and a cheat. You had dozens of chances to correct that story, and you never did.”

“Why are you being so hostile? What was I supposed to say?”

“The truth.” She closed the distance between them. They were nearly the same height, and she looked him squarely in the eye. “Except being honest would have made you look like even more of a jerk to the public, and you couldn’t stand that.”

He started to sputter. “Don’t talk to me about jerks? How could you marry that ass?”

“Easy. He’s hot and he worships me.” Truth and lie rolled up together.

“You’ve always hated him. I don’t understand how this could happen.”

“There’s a thin line between hating someone and finding the grand passion of your life.”

“Is that what this is about? Sex?”

“Definitely a big part of it. And I do mean big.”

That was just plain mean. The fact that Lance wasn’t super-endowed had never bothered her, but it bothered him, and she should be ashamed of herself. She wasn’t. “Bram’s insatiable. I’ve spent so much time naked lately, it’s a wonder I still remember how to wear clothes.”

He’d always refused to acknowledge any problems with their sex life, and he turned his back to examine the Moorish carving on
the mantel. “I don’t want to fight with you, Georgie. We’re not enemies.”

“Think again.”

“If you’d just called me back…I have enough guilt. I don’t know how he did it, but I know he coerced you, and I want to help. I have to help you get out of this.”

“Fascinating. Except I don’t need help.”

“The fact that you married him…” He turned to face her again. “Don’t you see? Not only is it bad for you, but it cheapens what we had together.”

At first she was too stunned to respond, and then she laughed.

He puffed up, all injured dignity. “It’s not funny. If he’d been someone decent…Our relationship was true and honest. Just because it didn’t last doesn’t mean it wasn’t right at the time.” He stepped away from the fireplace. “If you married Bram of your own free will—and I’m having a hard time believing that—but if you did, you’ve tainted our relationship and demeaned yourself.”

“Okay, you have officially overstayed your welcome.”

Lance plowed on. “He’s a player. He’s lazy, aimless. The guy’s a drunk and a drug addict, for god’s sake. He’s nothing but a bum.”

“Get out of here.”

“You’re not going to tell me the truth, are you? You’re still too angry. Then tell me this…What would you have done if you were me? What if you’d met the love of your life while you were married to someone else? What would you have done?”

“Easy. I’d never have married someone who wasn’t the love of my life in the first place.”

He flinched. “I know you think what I did was unforgivable, but I’m asking you to look at it a different way. Try to see that what happened with Jade and me could never have happened if you hadn’t shown me what it means to really love someone—with your whole heart.”

His audacity made her want to laugh—scream—she didn’t know
which. He pulled at his scruffy beard. “It’s hard to understand, I realize that, but without you, I wouldn’t have known what the heart is capable of.” He started to reach out for her, then must have seen something in her eyes that made him think better of it. “Georgie, you gave me the courage to love Jade the way she deserves to be loved. The way I deserve to love someone.”

A weird sort of fascination had taken hold of her. “Are you for real?”

“I’ve told you how sorry I am for hurting you. I never wanted to cause you so much pain.” She’d witnessed that same haunted expression when he watched television news, read a particularly moving book, or even visited an animal shelter. Lance had always felt things deeply. Once she’d seen him tear up at a beer commercial.

“You can’t imagine how much courage it took for me to leave you,” he said. “But my feelings for Jade…Jade’s feelings for me—they were bigger than both of us.”

“Did you just say ‘bigger than both of us’?”

“I don’t know how else to explain it. You showed me the way to love, and I owe you everything. You won’t tell me how you got trapped in this situation with Bram. That’s your choice. But I’ll help you anyway. Let me do that for you. Please, Georgie. Let me help you get out.”

“I don’t want out.” Another crash of lightning, closer this time, rattled the windows.

“Jade and I have talked about it. She has a house on Lanai. It’s completely private. Leave him, Georgie. Go there for a couple of weeks to relax and then…” He held up his hand, even though she hadn’t said a word. “Hear me out, will you? I know it’s going to seem strange at first, but promise you’ll listen.”

She stared at him. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

“I think we’ve found a way to turn what happened between the three of us into something good. Something really extraordinary that will put the polish back on your reputation.”

“I didn’t know my reputation needed polishing.”

“Let’s just say that it’ll make people forget you ever married Bram Shepard.” He tugged on the bracelet again. “You and Jade and I…We have a chance to do something good. Something that will…set an example for the whole world. Promise that you won’t say no until you’ve given it serious thought. That’s all I’m asking.”

“The suspense is killing me.”

“We—Jade and I—want you to come with us when we go back to Thailand.”

Thunder shook the house. “Come with you?”

“I know it sounds crazy. At first I thought so, too. But the more we talked about it, the more we both understood that we’ve been given a golden opportunity. We have the chance to show the world in a big way how people who are supposed to be enemies can live together in peace and harmony.”

Georgie didn’t know whether to throw up or grab a Coke.

Rain slashed at the windows. “The press will go crazy,” he said. “You’ll look like a saint—everyone will forget about your crazy marriage. The causes that Jade and I are fighting for—good causes—will get more attention. But best of all, people all over the world will be forced to examine their own personal feuds and religious vendettas. Maybe we can’t change the world, but we can make a start.”

“I’m…speechless.”

The doors flew open and everyone on the veranda spilled inside. Obviously Bram and Meg hadn’t shared the news of Lance’s appearance because, one by one, they all stopped talking and stared. Finally Rory broke the silence. “You guys throw one hell of an interesting party.”

“I’ll say.” Laura couldn’t take her eyes off Lance, who’d broken into a smile at the sight of Paul.

“Paul, it’s great to see you again.” He strode across the room, hand outstretched. “I’ve missed you.”

“Lance.”

Georgie found it shocking that Paul merely shook her ex’s hand instead of falling on his knees and begging Lance to take her back. But then, he’d probably already done that.