Personal Relations

“YA GOTTA MEET HER, MAN,” Jeff insisted. “If she’s anything like Courtney, she’s hot.”

Chase Davenport gave his brother a long look, then flicked on his turn signal.

“I mean hot in a good way,” Jeff tried to explain. “A classy way. Yeah. Classical hot.” He dug in his backpack and withdrew a piece of crumpled notebook paper. “Here’s her phone number.”

“No thanks,” Chase said. “I can find my own women.”

“For a guy who drives a serious chick magnet like this, you aren’t doing such a good job.” Jeff picked up Chase’s cell phone.

“What are you doing?”

“Programing in Courtney’s number in case you change your mind.”

Chase didn’t bother to object. He could always erase it later. “I was surprised to hear that you were on the stage crew. I didn’t know you were interested in that kind of thing.” Chase supposed he should be thankful that Jeff was finally showing interest in something, but he never would have guessed it would be the school musical.

“Oh, yeah. It’s cool.”

“Is that how you met Courtney?”

“Everybody knows Courtney,” he said.

Chase was beginning to get the picture. Jeff was more interested in this Courtney than he was in the play. He thought back to the girl he’d just met. She was pretty, in a drama student way. She’d had on a bright red sweater and lips to match and long silver earrings that had brushed against her cheeks when she talked. No one could accuse her of being the mousy type, which Chase would have figured more as Jeff’s style.

Chase smiled to himself as Jeff went on about lights and computer programs and the sets he was going to help build. This Courtney had high-maintenance written all over her. Jeff might as well learn about high-maintenance women now when he had time for them, because he sure wouldn’t have time when he started college in the fall.

And, as Chase had discovered, he wouldn’t have time for them when he was trying to establish a career, either.

Chase, himself, didn’t even have time for low-maintenance women. But that was all right. Contrary to popular belief, he’d discovered there were actually no maintenance women out there—women who agreed that work took precedence for now.

Chase downshifted for the approaching traffic light. The problems started when casual became not-so-casual. That’s when the expectations started. And, Chase had to admit, he’d been guilty of changing the terms of a relationship a couple of times, himself. But no more. He had a plan. It was a beautifully simple plan—make a potful of money and semiretire so he could enter the ultimate high-maintenance relationship—a wife and family.

He glanced over at Jeff. They were a lot alike—both children of parents who’d had children before they’d worked through all their selfishness. Jeff’s mother still wasn’t ready for children, which was why Chase was getting a sneak preview of parenting a teenager. He didn’t mind. Jeff was basically a good kid and Chase was flattered that he’d considered fixing him up with Courtney’s sister.

But since he suspected high-maintenance ran in the family, he’d have to pass this time.

“JEFF? THIS ISN’T working. It’s been days and they won’t even wave hello to each other.”

“I know. And Chase said he’s not going to call your sister.”

“It’s really too bad, because I think they’d be good together. You know where we went wrong? We shouldn’t have tried to set them up. We should have had them accidentally meet somehow.”

“Yeah, but they’re not going to fall for it now.”

“Unless we give them a good enough reason to get together. And we’ll have to come up with something soon, because I have to have my film school application and deposit postmarked the day after Valentine’s Day.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“I’ll need the money! Brooke won’t approve it and without Brooke’s okay, my parents won’t fork over the cash.”

“I still don’t—”

“If we come up with something drastic, then film school will look good by comparison, and Chase will be thrilled to let you do what you want to do.”

“I don’t know what I want to do.”

“You’d better decide soon, because you’re going to be in a great bargaining position.”

“MARRIED? Don’t make me laugh.” But Brooke didn’t feel like laughing. Actually, she felt a little sick and was getting sicker by the moment. Watching her bowl of high-fiber, vitamin-fortified cereal swell into a gray mass as it soaked up the milk didn’t help.

“So you’d rather we just live together first?” Courtney smirked. “Mom and Dad will be interested to hear that, especially after their little dairy lecture.”

Brooke blinked.

“You know, why would a man buy the cow when he can get the milk for free?” Courtney took a bite of cereal. Hers still crunched.

“Well, if you want to consider yourself a cow, then I can’t stop you,” Brooke retorted, goaded by the I’ve-got-you look on Courtney’s face.

“And since I’m eighteen, you can’t stop me from getting married, either.”

True, true, horribly true. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to try.

Last night was Courtney’s third date this week with Jeff Ryan, a boy in every sense of the word. Courtney said he was a fellow senior at West Houston High, but Brooke had a hard time believing it.

Baby fat still padded his muscles and if he had to shave more than once a week, Brooke would be surprised. In fact, when Brooke had met him just last Monday, she’d been surprised that Courtney had been dating him.

He wasn’t Courtney’s type. Not that there was anything wrong with the boy. If he had another ten years’ seasoning, he’d be exactly the type of husband Brooke would want for her younger sister. But right now, he was just potential with hormones and a car.

Yeah, the hormones were there, in spite of the smooth cheeks. Brooke had seen the way he watched Courtney, had seen the way he’d touch her shoulder and arm, and the way he’d tuck her hair behind her ear when they sat next to each other. The car wasn’t the only thing with something under the hood.

Brooke studied her sister, realizing she’d taken the wrong tack. She’d been antagonistic and had immediately put Courtney on the defensive. At Courtney’s age, she would have hated that. So why couldn’t she remember what it felt like to be eighteen, with her whole life ahead of her?

Maybe because she’d never been eighteen with a bright future ahead of her. Maybe because she’d screwed everything up at age seventeen.

Nobody knew better than Brooke how one bad decision could have far-reaching consequences. She was lucky that her parents trusted her enough to keep an eye on Courtney while they worked overseas in El Bahar.

This time, Brooke wasn’t going to let them down.

“SHE’S SO CUTE. And you should see the way her eyes crinkle and her nose kind of scrunches up when she laughs.”

Chase Davenport threw away the shiny silk tie that exactly matched his shirt and reached for a tie with a raised pattern. One that he could manage to coerce into a knot, which he was finding hard to do when his hands were shaking with suppressed anger. He should have known that Courtney was trouble. “A wife needs a few more qualities than crinkly eyes and a…scrunchy nose.” Chase spoke with deceptive mildness, so deceptive that his stepbrother continued to list more of his girlfriend’s insipid qualities, oblivious to Chase’s disgust.

The boy was barely eighteen and already a gold digger had her hooks in him. Chase had hoped to shield Jeff from women of this type. Women like Jeff’s mother.

Of course. Why should Chase be surprised? Jeff no doubt felt comfortable around gold diggers. It ran in his blood. Chase tightened the knot on his tie, satisfied at last. What irony. The son of a gold digger caught by a gold digger.

Too bad it wasn’t in Chase to appreciate the irony. He’d long ago abandoned any thoughts of revenge against Zoe Colquitt Ryan Zukerman Brown Davenport el Haibik del Franco. It was his father’s business, not his, and Chase had already been out on his own during their brief marriage. Besides, for a while, he’d had a little brother.

Jeff wasn’t so little anymore, if he was talking about marriage. It was absurd. He interrupted Jeff’s blathering. “Have you actually proposed to the girl?”