One Last Chance

“Your…brother?”

“Yes,” she said rather acidly. “You remember, the guy you’ve been bashing off and on ever since I met you?”

“He’s…your brother?”

Her forehead creased. “What?”

Chance stared at her across the table, his jaw slack with astonishment. His dazed brain couldn’t take it in. He barely managed to make himself use the right name.

“Paul de Cortez is your brother?” He enunciated each word with careful precision, as if his life depended on perfect communication.

She nodded slowly. “What did you think he was?”

He took a deep breath, and his eyes flicked away from hers. He stared down at the table.

“I thought he…that you were…”

His voice trailed off, and at last he lifted his head to look at her. She was staring at him.

“Were what?”

“They said he put you ‘off-limits.’ I thought…”

One arched brow rose. “You thought we were…lovers?”

He nodded, still shaken.

An odd look came into her eyes. “That’s why you were down on him so hard?”

Slowly he nodded again. At the moment, with all else chased from his mind by this unexpected revelation, it was the truth, and he was too astounded to realize what he was revealing by that admission.

She sank onto the booth’s seat, two spots of color staining her cheeks.

“I suppose I should be flattered.”

Something in her voice, a kind of shy pleasure, caused a burst of heat inside him. He stared at her, at the becoming blush, at the innocent gray eyes. It was the innocence that brought him back to reality with a snap. And with that reality came a sinking realization. He sat down abruptly.

“Your name,” he said slowly, “they said it was Austin.” Was she married, he thought, to somebody else?

“It is. Paul is my half brother, really.”

“Then de Cortez is…?”

She sighed. “It’s kind of complicated. That’s our mother’s maiden name. She married my father after Paul’s father was…killed.”

He knew how de Cortez’s father had been killed, it had been in the files. He pushed the knowledge aside for the moment. “But he uses her name?”

“He does now.” A shadow darkened her eyes. “She died a few months ago. He did it in her memory.”

She believes it, he thought in bewilderment. She really believes the guy gives a damn. “I’m sorry,” he managed to say.

“So am I,” she said softly. “But she’d been very sad for a long time. She missed my father terribly.”

Chance’s head came up. “He’s…dead, too?”

“Twelve years ago.”

“That’s tough,” he said quietly. “You must have been just a kid.”

“Is that a tactful way of asking how old I am?”

He smiled slightly. “If it was, would you answer?”

“Twenty-six.”

“Your brother’s a lot older, then.” He couldn’t quite suppress the twinge of relief using that word gave him.

“Ten years,” she said, eyeing him curiously. “You seem to know an awful lot.”

“I don’t even know your first name.”

“That makes us even.” A look of surprise crossed her face. “On second thought, it doesn’t. I don’t even know your last name, let alone your first.”

“Chance.” If there was any significance to the fact that he never even thought of giving her a cover name, he didn’t dwell on it. Her brother hadn’t been here long enough to make him, anyway. “Chance Buckner.”

“Chance as in ‘not a’?”

He grinned. “Nope. As in ‘last chance.’ My mom had about given up on kids when I finally came along.”

“And how long ago was that?” she asked sweetly.

He laughed. “Okay, it’s only fair. Last birthday was the big three-oh.”

“You don’t look any the worse for it.”

He smiled, toying with the handle of his mug of cooling coffee. “Speaking of fair, you’re still one up on me.”

“What?”

“Your name.”

“Oh. It’s Shea. Shea de Cortez Austin.” She laughed. “Quite a mouthful, huh?”

“An interesting combination.”

He studied her as she sipped her coffee. They’d been way out in left field on her relationship to de Cortez, he thought, trying to contain the thankfulness that flooded him. Easy, Buckner. You’re not that much better off knowing that she’s his sister. She still more than likely knows what he’s up to. Unless…

“Do you live around here?”