The Highest Bidder. Maureen Child
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was, but she hadn’t been allowed to follow her own dreams, not when she was busy living her mother’s.
Now, she was at a crossroads, unsure where to turn.
She vowed she wouldn’t let it get her down.
Not while she was living at Wild River.
She was on vacation…from life.
After dinner, Carter left Macy to her own devices, needing to get something off his chest. Or at least, get an explanation from his cousin. At Brady’s house on the outskirts of town he climbed out of his Jeep, slamming the door closed. He glanced at the front entrance and drew a deep breath. Having to admit being rejected wasn’t easy, but under these circumstances, it really burned.
No one answered his knocking. But the scent of a fired-up grill drew him to the backyard. He found Brady on his deck cooking a steak. Smoke ruffled the heavy air as he met his cousin’s inquisitive stare.
“Hey, Carter. Didn’t expect to see you so soon. Thought maybe you’d be out making wedding plans.” He poked at his steak with a long-pronged fork and turned it over.
Carter’s mouth twisted. “That’s not happening. She turned me down.”
Brady set his barbecue fork onto the side of the grill and snapped up his head. “She did?”
Carter leveled him a direct look. “Thought maybe you’d know why.”
Brady’s brows gathered tight. “Me? How should I know? Didn’t she give you a reason?”
Carter paced behind Brady, carefully choosing his words. He’d always been close to Brady, and he trusted him. The man had scruples and had brought himself up from poverty to become quite successful in commercial real estate. Carter wasn’t accusing him of anything, but a man had a right to know what end was up. “She did. But I’d like to know what you’ve got to say about it.”
His cousin moved his steak to the side of the grill, taking it away from the heat, and turned to him. “You have dinner yet?”
“I have. And I’ll leave you in peace to eat yours once we talk about this.”
“Hey, I’m sorry Jocelyn turned you down, but I gotta say…”
Brady hesitated and Carter pressed him. “Say what?”
“Fine, I’ll tell you, since you’re intent on knowing the truth. I don’t care for the woman, but I kept my mouth shut after you two started dating. She visited Regina time and again and was always bad-mouthing the old lady. Like her grandmother was a burden or something. Regina loves that girl something fierce, and it pained me to see it. Don’t get me wrong—Jocelyn’s pretty and all, and I suppose she has some nice qualities. Obviously, you thought so. I believed it was just me thinking she was uppity. She was forever coming over here, asking me to help her with Regina. Not that I minded helping the old lady, but Jocelyn had a way about her that put me off.”
Relieved, Carter took it all in. “You didn’t tell me any of this.”
“I didn’t think it was getting serious between you. I mean, Jocelyn made it seem—”
“What?”
With a shake of his head, Brady refused him an answer. “Nothing. She doesn’t matter. How’re you doing with all this? You were fixed on marrying her and settling down. Man, I hate to say this, but you’re probably better off.”
Carter glared at him, hating to hear the truth.
“I’m sorry. But you asked.” Brady went inside the house and returned with two beers in his hands. “Here you go. Drown your sorrows.”
Carter’s mouth twisted. He grabbed the bottle. “According to you, I should be celebrating.”
Brady took a swig and nodded. “We’ve always been honest with each other.”
Carter lifted the bottle to his mouth, tilted his head way back and guzzled half of the beer in one huge gulp. “True. Man, this is tough, but I got to tell you why she broke it off with me.”
Brady began shaking his head. “No, you don’t. Not if it’s personal, you don’t.”
“It involves you, Brady. I have to so you and I will be square. I don’t want anything coming between us. Hell, you’re all the family I got.”
“Not true. You have Riley.”
Carter blew that notion off, swearing an oath.
“He’s your father,” Brady said.
“As I said, you’re all the family I got. Getting back to Jocelyn, it seems the whole time she was lying with me at night, she was thinking about you.”
A sharp intake of breath pulled Brady’s chest in. His voice elevated. “What?”
“She claims she’s in love with you.”
Brady began shaking his head. “That’s not possible.”
“It’s the reason she gave me, and she made no bones about it. She was clear as day. She was trying to make you jealous.” Carter waited a beat. “Were you?”
Brady set his beer down and looked him in the eye. “No. Never even occurred to me. I thought you were making a mistake, but if you two were happy, I was staying out of it.”
“Okay. I gotcha. Just had to know.”
“Man, I’m sorry.”
Carter finished the rest of his beer and cocked him a crooked smile. “For being irresistible?”
“For you getting hurt.”
He couldn’t deny he wasn’t feeling hurt, angry, betrayed and a mess of other emotions, but he’d learned his lesson. “It won’t happen again. I’m off the market for marriage now.”
Brady lowered his voice. “She really did a number on you.”
Carter’s lips twisted again. “I’ll get over it.”
It wasn’t just Jocelyn that he’d lost, but the possibility of a wife and family that, now, he wouldn’t allow to remotely enter his mind. He was through. Finished. Done. It was liberating, even through the pain.
“You can eat your supper.”
“Thanks, now that you’ve ruined my appetite.”
“Right,” Carter said without a hint of remorse. Brady’s appetite rivaled his own. That was at least a fourteen-ounce steak he was grilling up. Carter knew beef like nobody’s business.
He shook his cousin’s hand. “Stop by the house soon. I brought home a houseguest. I’d like you to meet her.”
Brady’s brows flew to his hairline. “Her? You brought a woman home from New York? Man, you don’t waste any time.”
Laughter rose up from his throat. “It’s not like that. Macy is—”
“Macy? Is she old? Fat? Ugly?”
Carter didn’t have to think twice. “Pretty, bordering on beautiful. Around twenty-six years old and shaped like a goddess—well, a slender goddess.”
“You’re kidding me, right?” Brady’s expression changed to disbelief. “This is a joke.”
“It’s no joke, but it’s not what it seems.”
Carter took the next few minutes explaining to his cousin about how he met Macy right after being dumped and the odd sort of kinship he felt toward her after seeing her being attacked by the paparazzi. She needed someone’s protection, and he’d been there. She’d been a vital distraction to his heartache, too, and he wasn’t sorry he’d asked her to stay at Wild River.
Brady scratched his head. “Okay, I’ll stop by sometime.”
“Good.