The Weekday Brides 04 - Single by Saturday (22 page)

Zach watched her run away.

First he’d found her pining over Eli like a woman with a ticking biological clock without a mate, and second he’d seen the vulnerability in her eyes when she noticed him watching her. He’d seen the unease in her eyes when it was only the two of them in the room, knew she felt the energy between them that would register on a Geiger counter.

Then she ran.

As if she didn’t trust herself.

Damn if he wasn’t willing to test her. As every hour ticked by with her in the same county, he felt the chemical draw.

He’d learned from his younger sisters on the way up the mountain that Mike had been sleeping on the couch, but neither sister saw one bit of animosity between the newlyweds.

In Zach’s brain, he’d contemplated one possibility. Could his brother be gay?

The first reaction was hell no. He was married, which proved he wasn’t gay.

Or did it? As much as the deception of it bothered him, Zach decided to watch the interaction between Karen and Mike with the thought of his brother not having any sexual interest in his wife.

There were differences between people who were attracted to each other and those who weren’t. Which were they? Close friends or lovers?

Zach jogged down the stairs and out the front door of the cabin and focused on his target. Karen walked alongside Hannah and Judy as they both made their way down to the water’s edge. Mike knelt down next to the little 50 on which they had both learned how to ride motorcycles when they were Eli’s age.

“Zach?” Mike waved him over. “I seem to remember there being some kind of trick to turning this thing over.”

The bike brought back a swarm of great memories. Sticky clutch and all. Zach fiddled with the clutch, went through a couple of attempts before the 50 roared to life. Eli came running with his little head stuffed into a helmet. Joe walked up behind his son with a huge smile.

With a little instruction to Joe about the clutch, Zach and Mike stepped back and watched Joe instruct his son to ride for the first time.

Rena stepped up to them while Joe jogged beside Eli as he puttered off. “I remember the first time you got on that thing,” she told Mike. “Zach was more excited for you to ride it than Dad was.”

“I can’t believe Dad still has that thing,” Mike told them.

“He’ll never get rid of it.”

Zach glanced behind them and noticed their parents holding Susie and watching the activity from the porch.

Rena slipped her arm through both Mike’s and his. “I’m so happy we’re all here. Maybe in a couple of years you can show your kids how to ride that bike,” Rena directed her comment to Mike.

Mike offered a playful nudge. “Why don’t you bother the older brother about kids?”

“Cuz you’re the one who’s married.”

“It wouldn’t be right for me to be a father right now,” he said. “My production schedule is booked for the next eighteen months.”

“That’s not forever,” Rena said.

Zach kept quiet and watched Mike as he squirmed around the conversation about having children of his own.

“I’ll have kids someday,” Mike assured their sister.

Funny how he said
I’ll have kids
and not
we will have kids
.

Zach dislodged his arm from his sister and nodded toward the bikes to Mike. “Do you still have it?”

Mike removed his sunglasses from the front of his shirt and pushed them onto his nose. “If there is one thing I don’t let stunt doubles do, it’s my bike shots.”

Like old times, Zach and Mike jumped on the backs of the bikes and skidded out of the drive and down the old trails they knew better than the backs of their hands.

“It’s called the ‘OR’ game,” Judy told them as they sat around a campfire two days into their vacation. Sawyer and Janice had turned in, and Hannah was up in the loft with a sleeping Eli and Susie, texting her friends.

The rest of them sat under a blanket of stars while sparks from the fire drifted into the sky. Their red cups had been full for a couple of hours and none of them could claim sobriety.

Zach had to admit, watching his baby sister tip back the margaritas felt strange, but he had to remind himself that she wasn’t a kid anymore.

“I remember that game,” Karen said from across the fire. “Played it in college all the time.”

Judy pointed her cup in Karen’s direction. “There is only one rule. You have to answer the question honestly…I’ll start…Rena, margaritas or martinis?”

“That’s easy. Margaritas.” Rena sipped her beverage and looked at Karen. “Karen, Coke or Pepsi?”

“Coke. Michael…the McLaren or the Ferrari?” Karen asked.

Mike shifted in his seat. “Oh, that’s hard. I have to go with my first love and say Ferrari.”

“I don’t know, Mike, that McLaren is an orgasm on wheels,” Zach told his brother.

“You have to drive the Ferrari next time you visit,” Mike told him. “OK, Joe…explore outer space or the deep ocean?”

Joe lifted his glossy eyes to the sky. “I’d be all over what’s up there.”

The questions kept rounding between them, most innocent until Karen decided it was time to up the stakes. “OK, Judy…hot college guys or hot college professors?”

Judy’s smile made Zach think maybe she’d attempted both. “Professors.”

Zach closed his eyes and tried not to picture his sister with an older man.

Joe nudged Mike’s arm. “All right Mike…kissing Marilyn Cohen or kissing Jennifer Ashton?”

Everyone in the group knew that Mike had the opportunity to kiss both women as they’d costarred in his films.

“Jennifer.”

“Really?” Joe asked. “I think Marilyn is more beautiful.”

Mike laughed. “She is…but Marilyn and I are friends. When I kissed her, her husband, Tom, was on set.”

Karen giggled. “Well let me know the next time you have to kiss her and I’ll come by and kiss Tom, make the whole ordeal even.”

“Tom is so hot!” Judy fanned herself while Mike and Joe shook their heads. “Karen,” Judy said. “Brazilian wax or total leg wax?”

The image of Karen having anything waxed shot Zach’s temperature to the sky. Good thing it was dark and no one would notice how Judy’s question affected him.

“What’s a Brazilian?” Rena asked.

Mike started to laugh. “It’s wrong on many levels that my baby sister knows something that my older sister doesn’t.”

Judy puffed out her chest. “That damn college education is sneaking in. A Brazilian is when a woman has all her hoochie hair removed.”

Rena blushed scarlet and giggled into her cup. “Sounds painful.”

“It is,” both Karen and Judy said at the same time.

Zach was equally mortified that his sister knew this…and turned on that Karen did as well. He poured straight tequila into his cup and took a swig while he waited for Karen’s answer.

“Well?” Mike nudged his wife.

Karen blushed. “I have to go with Brazilian, but for the record…it’s only because there’s more torture with a leg wax.”

“Yeah, sure,” Mike said, laughing.

Zach smiled into his cup and barely heard his name being called by Karen. “Zach…a hooker in Las Vegas, or a hooker in Bangkok?”

Joe and Mike tossed their heads back and Judy high fived Karen. “Good question,” Judy said.

Zach squeezed his eyes shut and tried to picture either one.

“What’s the matter…I think I’d go with the foreign woman,” Joe said.

Rena swatted his arm. “Eweh.”

Zach lifted a hand in the air. “No, wait…I’m thinking that Las Vegas has plenty of twenty-dollar tricks, where Bangkok probably gives ’em away for five bucks…I think there would be more chances of disease in Bangkok. I have to go with Las Vegas.”

Karen met Zach’s gaze across the fire and held. This little game of get to know you was more than he thought it would be. Seemed Karen might not be the complete saint after all.

“What about you, Mike…which would you pick?” Judy asked.

“I’m with Zach. I’d stick with Vegas.”

Karen fluttered her gaze away, and kept the questions going. “OK, Judy…broad shoulders or tight butts?”

Once again, Zach had to close his eyes.

“Oh, that’s hard…” Apparently, his baby sister had a preference for big shoulders. Zach just hoped that no one asked her about penis size or he’d have to excuse himself.

Chapter Seventeen

“No, Tony…he isn’t doing anything that might land him in the hospital.”

Karen stood several yards from the cabin where the cell reception was the best for talking. Seemed texting up in the mountains proved a better source of communication than actual phone conversations.

“I know he’s gotta be off-roading up there.”

“Nothing he doesn’t do when he’s shooting a movie.”

“Production starts in two weeks, Karen. Keep him whole.”

Karen shook her head. What she really wanted to tell Michael’s manager was that there was more to life than a production schedule. She’d not seen Michael smile as much as she had since they arrived in Hilton. Up here with the clean air and family memories, he was more at ease than ever.

Even after their divorce, she’d encourage him to visit his family as often as possible. They were good for him on many levels.

“He’ll come back to LA whole and ready to deliver the best movie ever. This really has been good for him, Tony. Trust me.”

A long-suffering sigh escaped Tony through the phone. “Tell him I called.”

“I will. And thanks for calling me and not him. I know it’s killing you.”

Tony chuckled. “Hey, it’s what he pays me for.”

“Talk soon,” Karen said before hanging up.

The sky was clear on their fourth day at the cabin. They’d eaten under the stars at night, and sat around a campfire roasting marshmallows playing word games. Karen couldn’t wait to do it all again.

Sawyer, with all his roughness when they’d first arrived, really was a softer man up in the mountains. He bounced his grandson on his knee, and when he thought others were watching him, he’d shout some order to keep his edge. In the end, Karen thought the man simply wanted his family around him all the time. Even if his desire wasn’t practical. She made a note to try to find a moment alone with the man before they left in order to encourage him to give his kids room to grow. That way when they all did come together it would be like this…loving and full of everything good, not resentment for having to stick within a mold he’d set up for them. Karen wasn’t sure why she always wanted to fix the relationships of those around her. Maybe it was a by-product of not having anyone step in for her as a child…she wasn’t sure. She simply knew it was in her blood to try to do something to make things right between parents and their children. Even if their children were adults.

The now familiar roar of a motorized off-road vehicle kicked up behind her. Back at the cabin, she noticed another person arriving. From the distance, she thought it was one of Michael’s old friends.

She started back toward the Gardner family but Michael headed her off and swung her around in the opposite direction.

“Would you mind if I took off for a few hours?” The grin on Michael’s face held mischief.

“Of course not. But…” She glanced over her shoulder, noticed his friend watching them. His single friend…“Oh, my God. You’re going to get laid!” she whispered with a playful smack to his arm.

Michael lifted his eyebrows a couple of times. “I just might.”

“You bitch!” Yet Karen understood the need. They’d both had nothing for so long and Michael had to be so careful with his lovers. “Go.”

“You sure? I was going to show you how to ride the motorcycle today.”

She rolled her eyes. “Go ride your own bike…I’ll have someone else teach me.”

Mike winked, gave her arm a little squeeze, and strode off.

She tapped the book she’d been reading before Tony’s call against her thigh and walked closer to the lake. After settling against a tree, she opened the book only to look up and wave as Michael and his friend rode by with a wave.

Brat.

But she was smiling and truly happy for Michael.

She let her mind slip into the pages of the story while the sun warmed her skin. The story wasn’t catching her, and her eyes slid closed. The nights had proved less than restful. Between the small bed, the unfamiliar room, and the overall restlessness of the others in the communal room, sleeping wasn’t easy.