Not Another Bad Date (8 page)

Kendra wiped water from her eyes. “What time is it?”

“About a quarter to four.”

“The party ends at six.”

“I thought you said three.”

“No.” Kendra shook her head. “Six. We practiced new dances until three. Maybe you got confused.”

“Obviously.” And Zach hadn’t bothered correcting her. “I’ll come back in a few hours.”

“Okay.” Kendra smiled. “How’s Momma?”

The last thing Adele wanted was to wipe the smile from her niece’s face. “She’s fine. The baby’s fine.” She stood. “Have fun, and I’ll see you later.”

Kendra sank into the water, then pushed off and swam toward a group of girls on the other side of the pool.

The door opened, and Zach stepped inside, carrying a glass of red wine. “It’s time for y’all to get out of the pool,” he said in a loud, clear voice, and the noise in the pool house suddenly quieted. Then he started issuing orders like he was calling plays on the football field. “Get dressed. Dry your hair. You’ve got fifteen minutes. Go.”

Adele half expected him to yell a few hut huts, then drop back for a pass. Instead, he moved toward her, grabbed her hand, and pressed the glass into her palm.

“What’s this?” she asked, and glanced up from the wine and into his face.

“Wine,” he answered. “I thought you could use it.”

“I don’t suppose telling you I don’t want wine will make a difference.”

“Sure it will.” He shrugged one big shoulder. “Are you an alcoholic?”

“No.”

“Allergic?”

“No,” she answered, as the girls began to drag themselves out of the water and move toward the far end of the pool, where Tiffany handed out thick white towels.

“Cheap drunk?”

“No.”

“Mormon?”

“No.”

“One of those girls who gets drunk and wants to get naked?”

“No.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“That’s a shame.”

She smiled despite herself.

“Let’s get the hell out of here before these girls start with those ear-piercin’ screeches that they mistake for talkin.’” He placed his palm in the small of her back and steered her toward the door.

Through her sweatshirt, his touch pressed into her spine, light and heavy at the same time, spreading a warm, aware rush across her skin and bringing back visceral memories of his hand sliding to her waist and pulling her against his side. She took a drink of a very fine Merlot and was extremely grateful when he dropped his hand and opened the door. She stepped outside onto the walkway and felt she could breathe again. All that steam in the pool house had made her feel a little light-headed.

“If any of those girls get the sniffles, their mommas are goin’ to come after me,” he said, as they moved toward the courtyard.

Adele glanced at Genevieve and the other woman standing around the barbecue and wondered if they, too, had gotten the time wrong. “I thought I was late picking up Kendra. So, why didn’t you tell me I’m actually early?”

“My momma told me I shouldn’t ever correct a lady.”

Adele lifted a brow and looked up at him. “Uh-huh. Try again.”

“I knew you’d hop into your car and peel out on my driveway.”

He was right.

“And I don’t think it’s right that I have to suffer through this party by myself.”

“Isn’t that part of your job as a parent?”

“To suffer?” He nodded as they walked past the heaters in the courtyard. “Yeah, but what no one told me was that cleanin’ stinky drawers was goin’ to be the easy part.”

“You cleaned stinky drawers?”

“When I was home.” They stopped beside the grill, and Zach introduced her to Cindy Anne Baker. Next she met the guy in the cap, Joe Brunner, defensive coach for the Cedar Creek Cougars. “And you already met Genevieve,” Zach said as he grabbed the tray of burgers and dogs and lifted the huge barbecue lid.

Genevieve hardly acknowledged Adele with a breezy “Yes” before she turned her attention to Zach, and asked, “What can I do to help you?”

“Nothin,’” he answered as he picked up a spatula and placed patties on the grill. “You just relax.”

“Oh, you know I have to feel like I’m doing something useful.” Genevieve picked up a glass of Merlot and took a drink. She moved closer to Zach and spoke low so no one else could hear her.

“Which daughter is yours?” Cindy Anne asked Adele.

“It’s my niece, and she’s one of the new girls, Kendra.”

Cindy Anne looked like one of those stocky women who’d been a gymnast in a former life. Short, compact, perky. Hair cut into a blond wedge. “Do you have children?”

Through the white smoke rising up around Zach’s head, Adele caught his gaze and looked away. “No.”

“Married?” Cindy Ann asked.

“I came close once,” she fudged, and she figured if Dwayne hadn’t gone insane because of the curse, she might have married him.

“Boyfriend?”

She shook her head. “My pregnant sister is in the hospital with preeclampsia. I’m taking care of her and Kendra, so at the moment I only have time for my family.”

“Did you go to Cedar Creek High?” Joe asked as he looked straight at Adele.

“Yes.”

“We were in the same art class. I graduated a year after you.”

That finally got Genevieve’s attention. “You went to Cedar Creek?”

“Yep,” Adele answered, and told her the year she’d graduated.

Genevieve studied her face. “Oh. I remember you now.” She turned to Zach. “Did you get an invitation to the Night of a Million Stars benefit?”

“Yes.”

“You’re going, aren’t you? I know it will be painful without Devon. We still miss her horribly, of course.”

Zach placed hot dogs next to the patties, then set the tray down.

“We were best friends since our very first Little Miss Sparkle Pageant. We were close as sisters. Devon was just one of those special people, and the Junior League just isn’t the same without her.”

“So I’ve been told.”

“I know how much you loved her, we all did.” Genevieve shook her head, and her perfect bob brushed her chin. “Life just isn’t the same without Devon.”

“True.” Zach rearranged the hot dogs. “But somehow we manage to live on.”

Adele looked down in her glass of wine and almost felt sorry for Zach. He must have loved Devon a lot. For years she’d told herself that they were miserable together. That he’d only married Devon out of responsibilty. That they weren’t in love. Not really. Not the kind that lasted a lifetime. It made her feel better to believe it, but it wasn’t true. It had never been true.

She thought of the life-sized portrait in the living room. That scary freaky picture of a dead woman. Zach must have loved Devon. He must still love her a lot.

By the time he’d filed for divorce, he hadn’t loved his wife. He hadn’t even liked her much, and he’d wanted out before that growing dislike turned to something stronger. She’d been the mother of his only child, and the last thing he’d ever wanted was a court battle, but that’s exactly what she’d promised that morning he’d handed her the papers.

“You can’t do this to me, Zach. I won’t let you,” she’d vowed, just before she’d slammed the door and sped away to one of her meetings. As he’d watched her go, he hadn’t been surprised by her response. He’d known the day he’d contacted his lawyer that he was in for a shitstorm.

Zach closed the lid on the barbecue and looked up. Through the smoke he watched Adele swirl the wine in her glass. He couldn’t say that he knew her, but he was pretty sure that she wasn’t the type of woman who wouldn’t care what the hell her man did as long as it didn’t hit the news.

Adele glanced up and again he felt like he was back at UT, staring at her from across a classroom. Like there was something about her that he wanted to know better. Something that drew his gaze and attention. Something more than the heavy pull of desire. Back then he’d wondered what her hair would feel like tangled up in his fingers. Tonight he wondered how long it would take him to make those eyes of hers turn a deeper blue. A smile curved his lips as he remembered a night when he’d kissed a little fairy she had tattooed on the right side of her belly just above her panties.

As if she read his thoughts, her cheeks turned pink, and she turned and moved toward the table a few feet away.

“I’m sure you’ll be interested to know that the governor will be attending the benefit,” Genevieve said, interrupting Zach’s thoughts, which he figured needed to be interrupted before he got too carried away and embarrassed himself.

“Really? Huh.” Zach had met a lot of governors and a few presidents, too. He’d been to the Playboy mansion and partied with a lot of famous people. Some he’d liked. Others had been pompous tools. If Genevieve knew him at all, she’d know he wasn’t easily impressed. Especially by stuck-up society women who married old men for their money, then cheated behind the suckers’ backs.

Genevieve had invited herself to the party, and he wasn’t fooled by offers of help. Not that she was trying to fool him. He’d been around women like Genevieve all of his career and most of his life. Women who offered up their bodies, and while he’d sometimes taken what they’d wanted to give, he’d never screwed around with married women nor women he didn’t even like. He wasn’t desperate enough to start now.

“I’ll go check on the girls,” Cindy Ann volunteered, and took off toward the pool house.

“Thanks,” Zach said, and watched her go. Cindy Ann Baker was a perpetual volunteer mother, a former gymnast, and a woman who had it bad for Joe Brunner. Once Cindy Ann had seen Joe’s truck parked out front and noticed Genevieve, she’d quickly volunteered to “stay and help out, too.” Only Joe was so oblivious during football season, that he wouldn’t recognize an attractive woman if she tackled him. And while Cindy Ann wasn’t Zach’s sort of woman, she was cute and perky and athletic.

The barbecue sizzled and sent smoke into Zach’s face as he flipped a few more burgers. He waved the smoke away with one hand and glanced over at his defensive coach standing at the end of the table, chatting it up with Adele. The spatula paused in midflip, and a burger fell on its side on the grill. Maybe he’d been wrong about Joe. He watched Adele smile at his friend, then Joe leaned in and said something that turned her smile into soft, sexy laughter. Adele shook her head and patted Joe on the upper arm. Zach wondered if she’d be so friendly if she knew Joe had been married and divorced twice. If she’d be so touchy-feely?

Zach had invited the defensive coach over to help him out with the barbecue, not hit on women.

A frown pulled Zach’s brows together, and he righted the burger on the grill. Joe was a good guy and a great buddy who had a bad habit of dating and marrying the wrong kind of women. He needed someone who was as much into sports as Joe was. Someone like Cindy Ann. Not a woman like Adele, who could not care less. At least she hadn’t cared fourteen years ago.

Adele was beautiful, with a wonderland of a body, and Zach really couldn’t blame Joe for chatting her up. And really, why should he care who talked to Adele? He shouldn’t, and he didn’t.

Across the lawns, the door to the guesthouse opened, and twelve hungry thirteen-year-olds headed his way. Their hair was dried, and they all seemed subdued, whether from exhaustion or hunger, Zach wasn’t sure but was very grateful. They each grabbed a plate and loaded up on pasta salad, chips, hamburgers, and hot dogs.

“Did you burn mine black?” Tiffany asked as she moved next to the grill.

“You know it.” Zach speared the darkest hot dog on the grill and shoved it in a bun. Once the girls were all seated at tables beneath the heaters, he loaded Joe up with a double burger, Cindy Ann with a hot dog, and Genevieve just took pasta salad. “What’s your pleasure, Adele?” he asked. “Hot dog or hamburger?”

She looked up from the seat she’d taken a few feet away. “Neither thanks. I ate a huge lunch.” She stood and pointed to the side of the house. “Can I get to the driveway through that gate?”

“If I unlock it. Why?”

“I left my cell phone in the car and I have to call my sister and tell her we won’t be able to visit her until after six.”

Zach shoved a black hot dog in a bun and closed the lid to the grill. “Use the phone in my office. It’s closer.” He took a big bite and chewed. “It’s through the room with the big TV,” he continued, and pointed to a set of big glass doors. “Down the hall. Last door on the left.” As he watched her walk toward the house, his gaze moved from the top of her head, down her curly hair, to the angel wings and heart on the nicely rounded ass of her sweatpants.

Just before she disappeared inside, he lifted his gaze to the small of her back. He’d touched a lot of women there. It meant nothing. Just being a polite gentleman like his momma had taught him. But earlier, when he’d touched Adele, his thoughts had been anything but polite.

He took another bite of his hot dog and washed it down with Lone Star. Like Tiffany, he liked his dogs crispy on the outside, but unlike his daughter, he didn’t like ketchup. With his beer in one hand and hot dog in the other, he took a seat next to Joe and the two bullshitted about their Super Bowl picks. Joe was a die-hard Cowboys fan, but Zach liked the look of New England’s offensive line.

“I don’t care if they have Owens,” Zach argued. “You can’t build a team around one player.” He polished off his hot dog. “Especially a pain-in-the-butt whiner.” Most wide receivers complained about not enough ball time, but Owens took it to the media.

“You’re going to have a lot of free time on your hands once football season is over,” Genevieve said as she sat across from Zach and raised her wine to her lips. She looked at him over the brim of the glass, and her lids lowered a fraction. “What will you do?”

Zach recognized the invitation. He’d seen it a thousand times in the eyes of a thousand different women. If it had been anyone but Genevieve Brooks-Marshall staring back at him, he might have given it some thought.

“I’ll figure something out.” He stood and moved to a garbage can behind the grill. He tossed his empty beer bottle and walked into the house. He moved past the leather couches, chairs, and seventy-two-inch high-definition television and into the bathroom. Most of the house was exactly the way Devon had left it, except for the HDTV. Zach wasn’t the kind of guy who had to have the biggest rig or fastest car, but he did like a big TV. With over 2 million pixels, sometimes bigger really was better, he thought as he zipped up his pants.

As he opened the bathroom door and shut off the light, he heard soft laughter from down the hall. He followed it past the weight and sauna room and stopped in the doorway of his office. He shoved one shoulder into the frame and crossed his arms over his chest. Adele sat on one edge of his big desk, talking on the phone. “I didn’t leave him a prank call on his answering machine,” she said, as she looked down at the cord she twisted around one finger. “What a total loser. I called to tell him about what happened today with you and the baby, but at the last minute I decided he didn’t deserve to know. Maybe I should have just hung up, but I didn’t. I told him he should go fuck himself, and you’re right. It felt great.”

Adele had a potty mouth on her. Zach lowered his gaze to her lips. Not that he held that against a beautiful woman.

“Let him.” She made a scoffing sound and shook her head. “What judge is going to care? Compared to a man leaving his pregnant wife for his twentysomething dental assistant, a few messages are nothing.” She glanced up, and her gaze met Zach’s. Her hand stilled, and she stood “Listen, Sheri, I’ve gotta go, but we’ll come by on the way home. I know Kendra wants to tell you about her day.” She pulled her finger from the twisted cord. “I’ll see ya in a while,” she said, then hung up the phone.

“I thought you might’ve gotten lost.” He pushed away from the door and walked into the room.

“No.” She shook her head and brushed her hair from her face.

“How’s your sister?”

“Better.” She sucked in a tired breath and let it out slowly. “After Sheri has her baby, and everything is okay with them, I’m going home to my real life and sleep for about a year.”

“Where’s home?”

She dropped her hands to her sides and looked up at him. “Idaho.”

“Idaho?” He thought Tiffany had said Iowa. “Is that where you disappeared to when you left UT?”

Adele stared up into Zach’s handsome face, past his strong chin and firm mouth and into his eyes the color of warm coffee. She was tired and didn’t want to talk about the past. Especially with the man responsible for so much pain. “I didn’t disappear.” She pulled her gaze from his and moved to a built-in bookcase. “I went to stay with my grandmother in Boise. I liked it and never left.” She picked out an oversized
Sport’s Illustrated NFL Football’s All-Time Greatest Quarterbacks
and pulled it from the shelf. “Are you in here?” she asked, and looked over her shoulder.

“Somewhere.”

She cracked the cover and turned her attention to the glossy pages. “You don’t know where?”

“Page thirty-two.”

She chuckled and flipped through the book. The slick paper was cool to the touch, and she thumbed through until she came to a page filled with the image of Zach in a blue-and-orange jersey with the number twelve on the front and on the big padded shoulders. A pair of tight white pants fit him like a second skin, and a white towel was tucked into his waistband and hung over his laces like a loincloth. Zach’s intense brown eyes stared out from within the face mask of his blue helmet, and his lips were flattened against his teeth. His left hip turned downfield, his right arm extended behind him, the photographer snapped the picture just before he snapped the ball forward.

“You ranked number eleven,” she said, then read out loud, “Zemaitis played the game in his head. He had the ability to see each play before it happened. He played strong and smart ball and could kill with perfect spirals and long bombs.” She turned the page to another photograph of him, standing behind the center, knees bent, head turned to one side as he called the play and waited for the snap. She read the caption to the side of the photo. “‘Girls always wanted to know what it was like to have Zach’s hands all over my butt.’—Dave Gorlinski.” She looked up at him. “Who’s Dave Gorlinski?”

“Center at UT.” He grabbed the book and tried to take it from her.

She didn’t let go and read another caption. “‘Zach Zamaitis had the most skilled hands of anyone who’s ever lined up underneath me.’—Chuck Quincy.” Adele bit her top lip to keep from laughing. “Who’s Chuck?”

“Center for the Dolphins my first three seasons.” This time he succeeded in taking the book from her. “Try not to laugh too hard,” he said, and tossed it on his desk.

“Well, it does sound kinky.”

“Honey, that’s nothin’.” He tilted his head to one side and smiled. “I could tell you stories if you’re interested in kinky.”

“No. That’s okay.” She turned her attention to the big glass case filled with everything from trophies to signed footballs and a pair of cleats. On just about every inch of the walls hung his old football jerseys encased in Plexiglas as well as plaques and photographs of Zach at various stages in his career, starting as a kid wearing shoulder pads that looked too big for his body and ending with his retirement.

“Impressive.”

He shrugged. “Devon decorated this room a year or two before she died, and I’ve just left it. It’s too crowded, but what else am I going to do with all this stuff?”

“I think you should leave it.” Adele turned to face him. “It looks good, and you should be proud of yourself. And…I’m sure since Devon…you know.” She dropped her gaze to the Moose Drool Beer on his wide chest.
Think of something nice to say about Devon.
“I’m sure you miss her, and it must be a comfort to come in here and see something she decorated herself. Even if it is a bit crowded.” Well, that wasn’t exactly nice, but it wasn’t exactly rude.