Fire Brand

Bowie’s eyebrow went up in an expressive arch, not only at the implication, but at Ted’s frankly insulting way of putting it. His black eyes kindled as he stared at Ted.

“Stop embarrassing my friend,” Mary said with a nervous laugh, nudging Ted. “Come on in and have some champagne and canapés,” she added, taking Gaby away. “You’ll have to overlook Ted. He’s been sampling too much punch,” she added, with a cool smile in her fiancé’s direction.

“That’s what impending marriage does to a man,” Ted replied with just a little too much venom, despite his forced smile. “Why women think all the trimmings are necessary is beyond me. She’s got a house and a man and a good job, but she has to have a wedding ring.”

Mary flushed and got Gaby out onto the balcony. “He doesn’t want to go through with it,” she confessed miserably. “He says that marriage is just a social statement. But my parents don’t feel that way, and neither do his.” Mary fiddled with the soft ruffle at her bodice. “Plus, I’m pregnant,” she whispered.

“Mary!” Gaby said. “Congratulations...!”

“Ted says he doesn’t want the responsibility of a wife and child. But it will just kill my parents if the baby’s born out of wedlock,” she groaned, lifting her eyes to Gaby’s shocked ones.

“Ted will get used to the idea,” Gaby said gently. “And everything will work out just fine.”

Mary laughed coolly. “Will it?” she said. “He’s started talking about that new girl with long hair who’s working with the Sports Editor.” She looked resolute. “If he wants out, he can go and move in with her. My parents said that if I didn’t go through with the wedding, I could come home, and I think I will.” Her face tautened. “I’m going to let him go. I know that’s what he really wants.”

“If it’s what you really want, too,” Gaby replied.

“When you love someone, isn’t that the same thing?” Mary asked with a tired smile. She pressed Gaby’s arm. “Come and have some champagne. And don’t worry about me,” she added when she saw the concern on the other woman’s face. “I’m not going to do anything stupid.”

Gaby took a glass of champagne punch, but she didn’t touch it. She wandered around, talking halfheartedly to the other guests while her eyes searched for Bowie. She found him, finally, by the picture window, looking bored. Which was odd, because he’d been cornered by one of the prettiest women who worked at the office—Magda Lorne, the Society Editor.

Magda was small and dark and beautiful. Gaby secretly envied her that petite beauty and her success with men. Although there’d never been any friction between them, the sight of her long, red fingernails crawling on Bowie’s sleeves made something explosive stir in Gaby.

She moved toward the two of them, surprised by the expression on Bowie’s tanned face when he looked at her. She was afraid her irritation was showing, and she wasn’t sure she liked that faint pleasure in his smile.

“I wondered where you’d gone,” he murmured as she joined them.

“I was talking to Mary. Hello, Magda,” she said politely.

“Hello. I was just getting to know your stepbrother,” she sighed, her dark eyes flirting with Bowie’s.

“Bowie isn’t my stepbrother,” Gaby said politely, surprised at the anger that remark produced in her. “We aren’t related.”

“Really, dear?” Magda asked. “I didn’t realize. I’m sure you said something about having a big brother...”

“There’s Art,” Gaby said, nodding toward the reporter Magda was currently dangling from her string. “He’s looking this way.”

“Oh, brother,” Magda muttered. Then she forced a smile and glanced up at Bowie. “Perhaps I’ll see you again. I’d love a ride home...”

“I came with Gaby,” Bowie said, his eyes saying more than he did. “I’ll leave with her.”

He never dressed up his words, Gaby mused, watching Magda blush at the bluntness of the remark. She stammered something and beat a path over to Art, who beamed at the sight of her.

“Does she make a habit of that?” Bowie asked as he lit a cigarette.

“Of what?”

“Trying to steal men away from their escorts.”

“She’s very popular...” she began.

“Popular, the devil,” he said with a narrow, half-amused gaze. “She’s a born flirt with acquisitive eyes and an ego that probably has to be fed ten times a day. She’s the type who runs a mile at the first suggestion of intimacy.”

Her eyes studied his face inquisitively. “Magda?” She was surprised because she’d always thought of the other woman as being something of a femme fatale.

“Magda.” He blew out a thin cloud of smoke. “It’s an act, can’t you see? A facade to hide her lack of confidence.”

“Remind me never to try and hide anything from you,” she said with a laugh that hid nervousness. He saw deep.

“And this engagement won’t make it to the altar.” He lifted his cigarette to his mouth again, took a draw, and put it out while Gaby studied him with wide eyes. “He’s cutting at her already. Why? Is she pregnant?”

She gasped.

“I thought so,” he mused. “And he feels trapped and wants out. That’s what I mean about marriage, Gaby. People who are sure of what they feel for each other don’t need a trial run.”

“How do you do it?” she asked.

“Do what?”

“Read people like that.”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. It seems to come naturally.” He glanced down at her. “Except with you. Do you know, Gaby, I’ve never been able to read you. I’d hate like hell to play poker with you. You’ve got that kind of face.”

“Oh, I’m an open book,” she said offhandedly.

“No.” He glanced around half irritably. “Have you been here long enough? It’s been over half an hour since we got here.”

He hated parties and dressing up, she knew, and especially when most of the women present were trying to seduce him with their eyes. He had to be the only person in the room who didn’t know how devastatingly handsome he was.

“Yes, I’ve been here long enough,” she agreed. “And I’m rather tired.” It was all catching up with her—the shooting, the news about Aggie’s new man friend, the truth of Mary and Ted’s relationship. She’d never been so depressed.

They excused themselves, wished Ted and Mary happiness with forced smiles, and left.

Bowie parked the car in front of Gaby’s apartment complex and cut the engine. He leaned back in the seat, his hand loosening his tie and unbuttoning his jacket. His head went back with a hard sigh.

“I’ve got to get up in the morning and fly to Canada. Damn it, I hate these trips out of the country,” he said unexpectedly. “I’m getting too old to enjoy them anymore.”

“You aren’t old,” she protested.

“Thirty-six next birthday.” His head turned and his black eyes sought hers in the glaring light from the streetlamps overhead. “Twelve years older than you, cupcake.”

She laughed at the description. “I’m not a cupcake.”

“That’s better. You’ve been gloomy all night.”

“The man they shot was just a boy,” she replied. She leaned back, too, her eyes quiet as they looked through the windshield at the city lights and deserted street. “He had a big family and grew up in the kind of god-awful poverty you read about and wish somebody could do something about. He killed a man and died for twenty stupid dollars, Bowie.”

He stretched, drawing the fabric of his white shirt taut across the firm muscles of his broad chest and flat stomach. “People have died for less. It was his turn.”