Her Bachelor Challenge

Theresa brushed auburn tendrils off her face with the back of her hand. “It’s their day off.”

“Mom, you should have a day off,” Bridgett said, wishing her mother would listen to her and give up working as a domestic. Especially now that it was no longer necessary. Theresa could retire and live with Bridgett and never have to worry about money or putting a roof over their heads again.

Theresa frowned as she measured ingredients into the casserole dish and stirred them together briskly. “Then who would cook for Tom?”

“Maybe he could order takeout?” Bridgett suggested as her mother slid the crabmeat dip into the oven to bake. “Or eat at a restaurant.”

Theresa wiped her hands, then restored order to the bun on the top of her head. “I have all the time off I need whenever I need it.”

Bridgett sighed, knowing she was about as likely to talk her mother into taking early retirement at fifty as she was to get her to change her hairstyle or stop wearing the “uniform” that Tom and Grace Deveraux had both told her years ago she did not have to wear. “Except you never take any time off,” Bridgett reminded her mother gently.

“Honey, I don’t have time to argue with you.” Theresa went back to the refrigerator for salad fixings. “I’m trying to put together a dinner party for six on thirty minutes’ notice. And Tom said it was crucial that everything be very nice.”

Bridgett zeroed in on the concern in her mother’s voice, even as she did what she had done for years, as the daughter of a Deveraux domestic—pitched in to lend a hand. “Did something happen?” Bridgett asked as she rolled up her sleeves and helped her mother make a dinner salad on the fly.

“I’m not sure.” Her expression increasingly worried, Theresa got out the food processor and set it on the counter. “But he said Grace might be upset when she gets here and he wanted all the children to be in attendance so they could talk to them together.”

A feeling of foreboding came over Bridgett as she watched her mother fit the slicing disk into the machine. Bridgett hadn’t seen much of Grace Deveraux since Grace had gone to New York City to host the Rise and Shine, America! morning news program fifteen years ago, but she cared about her nonetheless. She cared about all the Deveraux, just as her mother did. “Grace isn’t ill, is she?”

Theresa shrugged. “I’m not sure Tom knows what this is all about, either. But you know how it’s been between the two of them since they divorced.”

“They can hardly stand to be in the same room with each other.”

“So if Grace called Tom and asked him to pick her up at the airport and bring her here, of all places…”

To the home the two of them had shared in happier times.

“It must be bad,” Bridgett concluded, reading her mother’s mind.

Theresa nodded.

And it was then, as she looked at her mother’s face, that Bridgett realized the real reason her mother had called her. Not because she needed help preparing dinner or carrying a tray of canapés. But because she needed moral support in dealing with whatever the fallout of Grace and Tom’s news. Theresa might insist on reminding herself daily in a million little ways that there was a huge class difference between the Owenses and the family Theresa had worked for since before Bridgett was born, but Theresa and Bridgett both loved all the Deveraux like family nevertheless. “How is Chase and everyone taking this?” Bridgett asked, knowing that Chase was likely to have a tough time with any calamity involving his parents. Maybe it was because he was the oldest, but he had taken his parents’ divorce thirteen years ago especially hard.

“I’m not sure,” Theresa said, jumping and grimacing at the big thud and shouting from the front of the house. Then the sound of glass breaking.

“Apparently,” Bridgett said, answering her own question, “not so well.”

There was another crash, even louder. Then the sound of Amy screaming.

“Oh, dear.” Theresa’s hand flew to her chest and she got a panicked look on her face.

“Sounds like another fight.” One of many, both before and after Tom and Grace’s divorce. Bridgett sighed. She put up a hand before her mother could exit the kitchen. “I’ll go, Mom.” She had experience breaking up fights. Why should this one be any different?

“DAMMIT, GABE, I don’t want to hurt you.” Ignoring the pain across his shoulder, where he’d caught the edge of the mantel, Chase staggered to his feet. He pressed one hand to the corner of his mouth, which seemed to be bleeding, and held Gabe at bay with the other palm upraised between them. “So back off!”

Gabe shook his head, his expression angry, intense, and continued coming, fists knotted at his side. “Not until you take back what you said about Maggie,” he stormed.

Chase smirked, not above taunting a self-righteous Gabe. “Right. Like you plan to take back sucking face with her?”

“That does it!” Gabe leaped over the back of the sofa, grabbed Chase by the shirt and swung again, his fist arcing straight for Chase’s jaw.

Chase ducked the blow and countered with a punch to Gabe’s gut. As he expected, it didn’t do much damage. Gabe had been ready for him, muscles tensed. Just as Chase was ready for the tumble over the upholstered Duncan Phyfe chair to the floor. Gabe landed on top of him, but not for long. Chase forced him over onto his back. He grabbed his brother by the front of his shirt, still seeing red. For the life of him, Chase didn’t understand why Gabe continued to defend—and apparently desire—the woman who had come as close to two-timing Chase as any woman ever would. Especially when Gabe had to know how hurt and humiliated Chase had been, both by the events and all the sordid speculation that had followed. Not that it had been any easier for Gabe and Maggie. Both their squeaky-clean reputations had been forever tarnished, too. And for what? It wasn’t as if the two of them had found any happiness, either. “Gonna give up now?” Chase demanded in frustration, wishing they could put this ugly episode behind them before it further destroyed their family.

“Not on your life.” Gabe scowled back, looking ready to do even more damage.

And that was when it happened. A shrill whistle split the air and two spectacular female legs glided into view. Sexy knees peeked out beneath a short silk skirt. His glance then took in slim sexy calves, trim feminine ankles and delicate feet clad in a pair of strappy sandals. Chase knew those legs. He knew her fragrance. And he especially knew that voice. It belonged to one of the most sought-after financial advisers in Charleston, South Carolina.

“One more punch, Chase Deveraux,” Bridgett Owens said sweetly, “and you’re going to be dealing with me.”

THE FIRST THING Chase thought was that Bridgett Owens hadn’t changed since he had last seen her. Unless it was to get even better-looking than she already was. Her long auburn hair had been all one length when she’d gone off on her phenomenally successful book tour three months ago. That soft-as-silk hair still fell several inches past her shoulders, but now it was layered in long sexy strands that framed her pretty oval face. She’d done something different to her eyes, too. He couldn’t say what it was exactly, though he figured it had something to do with her makeup, because her bittersweet-chocolate eyes had never looked so dark, mysterious or long-lashed. She was wearing a different color of lipstick, too. It made her lips look even more luscious against her wide, white orthodontics-perfect smile.

She was also dressing a little differently.

Maybe it was because she also ran a private financial-counseling service out of her home and hence felt the need to present a serious, businesslike image to the public that she’d worn suits that were so tailored and austere it was almost ridiculous. Today, however, she was wearing a silky pencil-slim skirt that was so soft and creamy it looked like it was made of raspberry-swirl ice cream. With it she wore a figure-hugging tank top in the palest of pinks and a matching cardigan sweater. The overall effect was sophisticated, feminine and sexy. Too sexy for Chase’s comfort.

“Honestly,” Bridgett continued, seeming to scold Chase a lot more than Gabe, “aren’t you two a little old for such nonsense?”

Chase scowled. The last thing he wanted—from anyone—was advice on how to handle the restoration of his pride. “This is none of your business,” he fumed, still holding tight to Gabe’s shirt.

“The heck it’s not!” Bridgett charged closer, inundating Chase with the intoxicating fragrance of her perfume. “When it’s gonna be my mother explaining to your parents what happened to all the priceless furniture here!”

“No explanation needed,” came a deep male voice from somewhere behind them.

Every head turned. There in the portal stood Tom Deveraux, dressed in a dark business suit, pale-blue shirt and conservative tie. Coming in right behind him was Chase’s mother, Grace. As the two of them stood frozen, looking at their two brawling sons, it was almost like going back in time for Chase—before his mother had moved to New York City. Before the estrangement between his mother and father, which neither he nor his siblings really understood to this day. To the time when they had been, for whatever it was worth, a family that was united, even in times of strife. Nowadays it seemed that all they had left was the strife. And the heartache of a once-loving family that had fallen apart.

“I suppose we don’t even have to ask what was the reason for this,” Grace said wearily, touching a hand to her short and fluffy white-blond hair.

Chase immediately noted the strain lines around his mom’s mouth, the shadows beneath her blue eyes, and his heart went out to her. Something had happened, he thought, and it was bad enough to bring his dad to her side again.

“If the two of you are fighting like this, Maggie Callaway has to have something to do with it,” Tom surmised frankly, clearly disappointed in both of them.

Neither Gabe nor Chase said anything.

Bridgett offered Chase her hand. Though hardly ready—or really even willing—to end the brawl with his woman-stealing brother, Chase took the assistance Bridgett offered. And, to his mounting discomfort, found his old pal Bridgett’s manicured hand just as delicate in shape, strong in grip and silky soft as it looked.

Tom continued shaking his head at everyone in the room, then settled on Mitch and Amy. “You couldn’t have stopped this before they broke half the vases in the room?” he asked them.

Amy made a face and brushed her long hair, a dark brown like Tom’s, from her eyes. “It’s sort of a long story, Dad.”

Mitch shrugged his broad shoulders. “Amy and I figured they were going to come to blows again, no matter what. Better it happen here. Where they’re unlikely to get arrested or otherwise bring dishonor to the Deveraux name.”

Tom looked at Chase and Gabe. His lips thinned in disapproval as he demanded, “What do you two have to say for yourselves?”

“Not a thing,” Chase muttered, resenting being questioned like this at his age, even if he and Gabe did deserve it.

Gabe grimaced, looking at that moment like anything but the good Samaritan he was. “Me, neither.”

Tom turned to Bridgett. “At least you were trying to break it up.”