Jennifer Greene - Nobody's Princess

He laughed, a sound that echoed in her mind long after Regan hung up the phone. He’d been so grave. Making him laugh and lighten up gave her a warm fuzzy from the inside out. She sat there a moment longer, her gaze wandering to the untouched mail, the dishwasher that needed emptying, then down to Scarlett, who was staring up at her with limpid eyes, surrounded by the whole brood of kittens.

“Did I actually just ask a man to dinner?” she asked Scarlett, and then shook her head and leapt down from the counter.

It would be okay. It wasn’t a date. It wasn’t like opening a door to some idiotic fool romance as she’d done too many times. It was just offering company to a man who seemed to need a friend. And Regan wasn’t short on friends, but her natural wariness kicked in around most men. Not Alex, though. Even if he weren’t still in love with his Gwen, he’d described his ex-fiancée as definitely demure and ladylike.

If his taste in women ran in that direction, she’d be safer with Alex than in a convent—because, heaven knew, she was neither.

Well, they’d either have fun, she thought, or the friendship would never develop beyond that casual dinner. Either way, she was risking nothing.

She was sure.

“You’re actually going to dinner with a woman? Who is she? How’d you meet her? Where are you going?”

“Yes, I’m going to dinner with a woman. And as you might expect, she was a hooker I picked up on a street corner, led me into this red velvet den of iniquity and forcibly seduced me. Naturally, when she called and offered to lead me astray again, I immediately succumbed to temptation—”

“Very funny.” Merle scowled at him from the doorway. Typically, his older brother was dressed in black jeans and bare feet and was squint-eyed from spending so many hours at the computer. “How come you didn’t mention this dinner before?”

“Well, if I’d known it was going to get your liver in this much of an uproar, I probably would have. My going out to a casual dinner didn’t really seem to be a world-shattering event worth mentioning.” Alex emerged from the closet, buttoning a blue oxford cloth shirt. No amount of teasing seemed to lighten his brother’s thundercloud frown.

“What does she look like?”

“She looks like a woman. Bumps where we don’t have bumps, no hair on her chin, that sort of thing...didn’t Dad give you the same lecture about the birds and the bees he gave me? Considering the extensive number of women you’ve paraded through here, somehow I thought you knew all this—”

Merle trailed him down the hall, as close as a bloodhound, taking the mahogany staircase two steps at a time to keep up. “You keep making jokes. But my experience with women is entirely different from yours. I suppose you think I’m coming across a little heavy-handed—”

“Try ‘as intrusive as a tick.’ I’ve never seen you pull this protective big brother routine before. To a point, it’s giving me a chuckle, but give yourself a whomp upside the head, would you? It’ll save me having to do it.”

“I can’t just say nothing—”

“Sure you can. Practice makes perfect. Give it a try.”

The subtle hint flew right over his brother’s head. “You’ve hardly been out of the house since Gwen left you, except for work. You think I don’t know how badly that damn woman hurt you? And the last thing you need is another woman to put you through the wringer right now.” Merle hounded him into the high-ceilinged white kitchen, where Alex picked up his wallet and car keys.

“As amazing as it may seem, I already know that. And she already knows I had a recent broken engagement. She isn’t looking for anyone, either.”

“They all say that,” Merle informed him. “I’m telling you, you can’t trust women. They’re all dangerous. You can never anticipate what they’re going to do. There isn’t a single one who thinks like a man.”

“Personally, I always thought that was the best part.” Alex glanced at his watch and opened the back door. “Relax, bro. I know you care, even if you are being a royal pain. But there’s nothing happening that you need to worry about. In fact, all I’ve done with the woman so far is fight with her.”

Merle’s dark eyes narrowed in alarm. “Fight with her? You never fight with a woman.”

Alex closed the door. Enough was enough. And there was no explaining to Merle that the “fight” factor was precisely why he felt both reassured and intrigued about this dinner with Regan. His brother was right. He’d never raised his voice with a lady, much less fought with one. But Regan was simply different. Her impossibly contrary views on heroes and life guaranteed they’d find something energizing to talk about. She was absolutely like no woman he’d ever been drawn to—and for damn sure, nothing like Gwen.

He pelted down the porch steps of the wide veranda. His ’47 Jaguar, gleaming black, was waiting for him in the curve of the circular drive. He had a practical enough Acura in the garage, but the antique Jag was his vice. The sports cars his brother loved had never been his style. The Jag’s design was low, sleek, powerful in a quiet way, a traditional symbol of quality that lasted—it pushed all his buttons, always had.

As he climbed in, a pale wind stirred the moss in the hundred-year-old oaks lining the long drive. From the century-old gardens to the sweeping lawns to the white-pillared Brennan plantation house, the whole property was a white elephant these days—and a monster for two men to rattle around in alone.

Alex loved the history, loved the whole style of a romantic era gone by. When his parents died in a car accident, he and Merle had been seventeen and nineteen respectively—damn young—but both too stubborn to give up their home and roots or see the place sold to strangers. Neither brother expected to turn into crotchety old bachelors, much less live there forever. They’d always agreed that the first one to get married had dibs and the other would move out.

Merle, though, was pushing thirty-seven this year... and getting more eccentric all the time. He was a night owl, inventing computer games by night and handling the Brennan family fortune by day—a good thing, since Alex hadn’t bothered to balance a checkbook in recent memory. God knew what women saw in him—Alex suspected he must have some appeal that eluded a brother’s comprehension—but Merle had sifted through the female population in three counties. They were always bright, always lookers. And a lot of them fell under Merle’s spell, but somehow the relationships didn’t last.

Merle didn’t believe in love—and for sure he didn’t believe in the wonder of a soul mate and a lifelong committed love the way Alex did.

Or the way he used to.

Thoughts of Gwen inevitably brought heartache. Chasing those dark thoughts away, Alex grabbed the directions to Regan’s from the front seat. He knew Silvertree like the back of his hand, but her house was on an unfamiliar street.

The drive led him through the Whitaker College campus, with its old brick buildings and manicured lawns. Sycamores shaded the walkways and bosomy roses climbed trellises in the traditional gardens. A few bodies were stretched out in the grass, but in the sultry heat before dusk, most students were out of sight and likely cuddled under air conditioners.

The meandering, winding campus roads were familiar, but like a surprise, Regan’s street led to a section of older homes, tall Victorian types all scrunched together. When Alex parked in front of her mailbox, he climbed out and shook his head.

Hers was a Victorian structure, too, but where her neighbors had gone for standard house colors—whites, reds, grays—Regan had gone for a freshly painted teal with a mustardy-hued trim. The roof sagged in one spot. The miniature front lawn was mowed, but a wild tangle of overgrown honeysuckle and myrtle clustered around the porch. A little red Mazda, old, with a battered fender, was parked cockeyed in the drive.