What a Woman Needs (19 page)

H
E
was definitely a glutton for punishment; he spent the entire next day working on the closets in Beth’s bedrooms. She’d left him a list of things to do—he refused to call it a Honey-Do list because that would imply he was her honey and he did
not
need those implications—and the most pressing seemed to be the loose clothes racks. He hadn’t counted on what, exactly, he’d be touching.

Or maybe he had.

There he was, shoulder to shoulder—and cheek to cheek—with her dresses, removing them, draping them over his arms, feeling the silky fabric slide against his skin, imagining it doing the same to hers. Imaging
her
sliding against him. Replaying the kiss in the gazebo over and over until his
dick
could have held all the clothes up. And her perfume . . . It lingered in the air of her closet, surrounding him, taunting him with something he had no right to want.

Thank God she was gone for the day. At least when he was walking around with a boner big enough to hang clothes on, no one was there to witness it.

“Dude, please tell me you’re not into ladies’ clothing.”

Except for Jason.

Shit. He’d forgotten that Jason was old enough not to go on every excursion Beth took.

Ah, well. Nothing deflated a boner quicker than the kid of the woman he had that boner for.

“I’m fixing your mom’s closet.”

“Actually, that’s my dad’s.”

Double shit. Boner gone; empathy ratcheting up six zillion degrees.

Silence. Jason glaring at him, daring him to say something.

So he did.

“Then maybe you ought to help me fix it.”

Jason blinked. Fast. A few times. He looked away briefly, too. But then he sucked it up, choked back the tears that Bryan could tell were brimming just below the surface, and nodded.

It was enough.

 • • • 

B
ETH
stared at the price tag. Again. She couldn’t even say how long she’d been staring at it or even what the price
was
because her mind was a million miles away. Well, four point two miles to be exact. That was exactly how far her front door was from this store. She drove here hundreds of times a year, but that wasn’t why she knew it was four point two miles from her home. No, that she knew because she’d watched the mileage tick up as she drove farther from her home this morning. Before Bryan had arrived.

She hadn’t wanted to be there. Well, that wasn’t quite true. She’d wanted nothing
more
than to be there, which was what was wrong. Bryan. Was. Leaving. She had to get it through the thick, charisma-induced fog that’d filtered into her brain cavity the day he’d shown up.

“Mommy, are you gonna get that one or not ’cause I’m gettin’ bored.” Maggie plopped her chin in her hand and looked up at Beth with Mike’s eyes.

Beth dropped the price tag and shook her head. “It’s not exactly what I want.” Because what she wanted couldn’t be bought off a rack.

Two more weeks
. The maid service had been the perfect gift, but the more Bryan worked around her house, the more he fixed her home aesthetically, the more he did it emotionally. Mentally. Spiritually.

It was nice having a man around her house. Nice seeing his broad shoulders reaching places she couldn’t, doing things she didn’t have time to do. Setting her home to rights. As if a sweep of testosterone was all they needed to put the house back to the way it was before Mike had taken off that morning.

Except that testosterone couldn’t be Bryan’s. Maybe she should go out and start trying to find someone. Someone for her. Maybe that’s what this was all about. The raw, blatant, knock-her-socks-off appeal of Bryan’s sexuality had woken her up. Made her want again. Made her ache again, and she’d forgotten what that was like. Forgotten what it was like to yearn for someone. To want to be physically and emotionally close to someone. No, Bryan couldn’t be that man, but he sure as hell was the best wake-up call there was. She owed it to her kids to find someone. To make the house a home again. And she owed it to herself to love and be loved. To find that companionship the whim of Mother Nature had ripped from her.

Happy hour tonight. There were several single guys in the area. Many of her friends invited their friends. Maybe she’d come out of her shell a bit and actually talk to some of them with an eye toward dating instead of hiding behind her widowhood. Maybe it was finally time to live again.

“Can we get hot dogs, Mom? Please?” asked Tommy.

“Yeah, I want mustard on mine. And kraut,” said Mark.

“You don’t like kraut.”

“Yes I do.”

“No you don’t.”

“I do too.”

“You do not.”

“Do too.”

“Do not.”

“Dorks!” Kelsey plopped a hand on the twins’ heads and swiveled them around to look at her. “Remember what Bryan said? You have to watch each other’s backs. You can’t do that if you’re fighting, so knock it off. You don’t like sauerkraut, Mark. You said it tastes like seasick worms and we don’t need you puking on the ride home.” Kelsey glanced up and shook her head at Beth.

Remember what Bryan said
 . . . Great. Now her children were quoting him. Living by his rules. By the example he’d set.

She was never going to be able to replace him in her life.

Then she showed up at happy hour and realized that, for tonight at least, she wasn’t going to have to.

D
ID
you
see
who’s here?”

“Oh my God, it’s Bryan Manley!”

“Bryan
Manley
is here!”

“A
movie
star
is on Kara’s
patio
!”

“I’m going to have an orgasm right this minute!”

Beth could relate to every comment. Especially that last one, though it was just wrong that it came from Jason’s math teacher. It was weird enough seeing Mrs. Shuman in her robe getting her newspaper on Sunday mornings in their neighborhood, but now this?

Someone sidled up next to her and slid an arm around her waist. “Beth! I’m so glad you decided to share him.”

Beth looked at the woman next to her. Bethany Cavanaugh. She lived four doors down, drove a Jag, and was single. Beth had spoken to her maybe six times in all the years the woman had lived here and now they were buddies? “I, uh—”

“Oh, it wasn’t Beth.” Kara slipped through the crowd with a sly smile on her face and handed Beth a glass of wine. “I invited him.”

“How’d you get his number?” Bethany asked the question Beth would’ve asked if she could speak.

“I have my ways.” Kara took smug to a whole new level.

Of course she did. And of course she’d use them to get him here. Beth should have seen that one coming. But what the hell did it mean? Kara was married. Happily, or at least Beth would have thought so, but then, you never could tell what went on in other people’s marriages. She sipped the wine.

“Well, aren’t you the hostess with the mostest?” Bethany sidled up to Kara.

Beth suddenly felt the need to take a shower.

Even more so—and in a totally different way—when Bryan looked up at that moment and caught her staring.

She wanted to shower with
him
. To get all sweaty and then soapy with him. Slide up against him in her sheets, then in the shower and, hell, maybe even on the bathroom rug.

“So you
didn’t
know he was coming?” smirked Bethany. Though their names were similar, Beth was
plain Beth
while Bethany
was as sleek and sexy as her Jag. “Honey,
I’d
sure know if he was
coming
.”

Oh, the innuendo. Beth so did not need it.

Bethany, apparently, did. She left her new
bestie
Kara to saunter over to Bryan.

Beth felt a slight moment of gratification to see Bryan glance at Bethany, take in her breezy summer dress that had slits in all the right places, then look back to
her
with a slight smile hovering on his lips that said he’d seen this before.

Was it wrong that it made her happy to know Bryan saw through the woman?

True to his graciousness and charm, however, when Bethany planted herself in front of him and held out her hand for him to take—back of it up as if she expected him to kiss it—Bryan did turn on the charm. Beth could have told him not to have bothered; Bethany was his for the taking, even if he wanted to run through his lines while she did him. It was almost laughable.

Almost.

“So how much longer do you get to enjoy him?” asked one of the other women.

“Has he done your drawers yet?”

“Cooked in your kitchen?”

“Changed your sheets?”

The innuendoes wouldn’t stop, and while Beth could appreciate the humor and good-natured teasing behind them, she was having a hard time holding on to her composure.

Then he appeared at her side. “Hey, Beth. Ladies.”

He’d singled her out. The envy in the other women’s eyes was almost palpable. Especially Bethany’s when he leaned in to whisper in her ear. “Your friend Kara invited me tonight.”

“So I heard.”

“It was nice of her.”

Nice
had nothing to do with why Kara had invited him.

“Thank you for fixing the bars in my closets. They were accidents waiting to happen.”

“Yeah, they were pretty loose. Jason helped me.”

“Jason?”

“You know, your son? Used to have a mop on his head but now you can see his face? Surly kid.”

God, the man was gorgeous when he teased her.

Focus on the conversation, not on his dimples.

She took a quick sip of her wine. “Oh. Him. Yeah, I think we’ve met. But the Jason I know had zero interest in helping me around the house.”

“Well he suddenly became interested. He helped with the rest of the clothesline project, too.” His fingers tapped her waist and Beth was suddenly interested in something also.

Well, no. That wasn’t true. She’d been interested in
that
since she’d laid eyes on him on her front porch.

She shoved the thought aside, took another sip of wine, and dragged her brain back into their conversation. After all, they were talking about her
son
for Pete’s sake. She ought to be able to keep lust-filled thoughts at bay while discussing her
child
. “He has a vested interest in the clothesline. He doesn’t want his boxers showing up in the neighbor’s hedges again.”

Bryan’s left eyebrow went up and, oh, was it a good look on him. “Again?”

Beth nodded. “Sherman’s an equal-opportunity humiliator.”

“Ah. That explains Jason’s enthusiasm then when we finally erected it.”

Did he have to use
that
word? It was all Beth could do not to glance at his groin.

Several of the women, however, weren’t so circumspect, and Beth was amazed to see Bryan blush.

“So, are there any more like you in Mac’s stable? If so, sign me up for a lifelong contract,” one of the woman said, earning a nice round of chuckles.

“Sorry, ladies. My brothers and I are taken for the month, but I’m sure Mac will be hiring more guys since there’s been a lot of interest.”

No,
he
was what caused the interest. Mac Manley had known what she was doing when she’d put her brothers to work.

Just like Kara had known what she was doing when she’d invited him to the party. It went on longer than any of the other happy hours had lasted before, to the point where kids were starting to drop like flies and Kara’s basement den became one big sleepover because none of the parents wanted to leave.

The thing was, Bryan charmed them all, not just the women. The men got over their initial animosity to talk about his movies and the stunts and what it was like to work with “hot babes,” and all the stars he’d worked with. Bryan was amazing about deflecting a lot of the attention, though. When the conversation would go on for a while about his life, he’d turn it around and ask other people what they did or where they were going on vacation or how their kids were doing in sports or school or boy scouts . . . The man really knew how to work a crowd and make it seem genuine.

But then, Bryan
was
genuine. Beth liked that the most about him. Sure, he was nice to look at and he could kiss her right out of her clothes if he tried hard enough, but in the end, he was a genuinely nice guy. There were no airs, no look-at-me-I’m-better-than-you, no false modesty, just a genuineness and self-effacing honesty that made him all that much more attractive.

“So, Beth, why don’t you bring Bryan along on Sunday?” Dena Reardon tucked the lone curl dangling from her updo behind her ear with a seductive tilt of her head.

Only in this crowd would an invite to an amusement park include a come-on.

“Sunday?” Bryan did his own head-tilting, but it was completely natural and devoid of invitation.

That didn’t stop Beth from wanting to run her lips along his jaw and kiss her way down his throat and run her fingers through his hair—

“Um, we’re going to Martinson’s Amusement Park. The kids have wanted to go since it opened in April, but with school it was too hard to schedule. I promised them we’d go at the beginning of summer and Sunday’s the only day it works until August.”

“I remember Martinson’s.” Bryan’s face lit up in a smile. If he hadn’t already been a movie star, that smile would seal the deal. “I could never get enough of that place growing up.”

“You should come,” said Dena, now twirling that lone curl.

Seriously?

Then she touched the corner of her mouth with the tip of her tongue. “I’m bringing my boys. They’re friends with Tommy and Mark.”

“And Alex,” interjected Beth. “You’re bringing Alex, right?” Alex was Dena’s husband. An important person to include.

Dena reluctantly dragged her gaze off Bryan. For about a minute. “Uh, yes. Of course Alex is coming. He loves to go on the rides with the boys. So, you should bring Bryan. That way Alex won’t be the only man.”

Nothing like being put on the spot. Both of them.

“Thanks for the invitation, Dena,” he said and Beth smiled. Here was her out.

“I’ll have to think about it.”

He’d
think
about it? Not
I already have plans because why would I want to do suburbia and five kids, not to mention a mom who can’t hold a candle to all the actresses I come in contact with on a daily basis
?

“You
should
take him, you know.” Kara tugged Beth back against the stone wall when someone got between her and Bryan.

“He doesn’t want to spend the day at the amusement park with my kids.”

“No, I’m guessing he wants to spend the day at the amusement park with
you
, and your kids come along as a package deal.”

Beth, apparently, was the only one grounded in reality around Bryan. “Not happening.”

“Pity.” Kara took a leisurely sip of her drink, but Beth wasn’t fooled. Kara might be staring at her, but her peripheral vision was all over Bryan, and the calculating gleam in her eye said she wasn’t about to put this matter to rest. “So . . . two more weeks, huh?”

Beth restrained herself from rolling her eyes. “Yup.”

“You
cannot
let him go.”

“Kara, I don’t have any hold over him.”

Kara
did
roll her eyes. “Oh, please. I see the way he looks at you.”

“You’re wrong.”

“No, I’m not. He keeps glancing back as if he’s making sure you’re still here. You should have asked him to come here tonight with you. You should ask him to go with you on Sunday. Stake your claim so every woman here isn’t trying to sink their claws into him.”

“You, too?”

“Hey, if I thought I had a chance, who knows?” she continued while Beth tried to close her mouth. “But I’m married, but you . . . you
do
have a chance. And you’re single. There’s nothing to stop you from taking the opportunity, Beth. Hell, if not for yourself, do it for the rest of us.”

“Don’t you mean, do
him
for the rest of you?” The sarcasm just rolled off her tongue.

“Hell yes I do.”

That sarcasm obviously rolled right off Kara’s back.

“I mean, why not? You’re young, single, and the man is drop-dead gorgeous. Oozes sex all over the place. This would truly be a case of taking one for the team because you know every woman here is going to go home tonight and imagine what it’s like to be with him. Imagine what it’s like to be you.”

They hadn’t wanted to be her two years ago. Some of them still didn’t—well, right up until the moment Bryan Manley had crossed her threshold.

“I am not sleeping with him to fulfill everyone’s fantasies.”

“Oh, sweetheart, just fulfill your own. That’ll be enough for the rest of us.”

“How did we get on this conversation?” What had happened to her normal, everyday life? That wind shear had tossed more than Mike’s plane around and Beth was still reeling from its effects, not the
least
of which was having Bryan Manley in her home.

“You still haven’t gotten it, have you? Jess and I didn’t hire Bryan to
clean
for you, Beth. We hired him for
you
. The minute I heard Mac say what she was planning and who she was planning to use, I knew we had to do this for you. Who is more perfect to break you out of your self-imposed widow’s weeds than one of the Manley brothers? And Bryan of all of them!”

Beth stopped her wine glass on its way to her mouth. She could
not
have heard what she thought she’d heard. “You were trying to
set me up
with him?”

“Well, duh. If we were going to spend that kind of money to cheer you up, it certainly wasn’t going to be for cleaning. Dust comes back after a few weeks; money down the drain. No, sweetie. We bought Bryan Manley for you.”

Beth was going to be sick. Her friends had just turned one of the nicest guys into a gigolo. Or at least, they were hoping to.

“Are you out of your mind, Kara?” Beth pulled Kara aside and lowered her voice to a stage whisper. “That’s prostitution.”

“Only if you sleep with him.” Kara smirked and waggled her eyebrows. “And even then,
you
aren’t paying him. And we’re paying whether he sleeps with you or not, so it’s not as if he’s getting paid specifically to have sex.”

Beth glanced back at Bryan, hoping the smile she flashed him didn’t say she was going to be sick, and all the while praying he—and everyone else—hadn’t heard Kara. “Oh my God. Do you hear yourself? How can you think this is okay?”

“Oh come on, Beth. You can’t tell me you haven’t thought about what it’d be like. Hell, every woman in this place has had that thought.
You
actually have the chance to find out. You’re the envy of every woman here. What’s holding you back? He’s certainly interested. You can’t tell me you’re not. Mike’s been gone for two years. A woman has needs, and who better to meet those than the Sexiest Man Alive?”