hung with dark oil paintings of sea captains who looked as though they were sneering, and uptight round-faced women, presumably their wives.
“Your ancestors?” I ask Spence, searching their faces for his familiar smirk.
“Bought at estate sales. It’s all for show, Castle, right? All about the look of the thing.”
A side door opened and an elderly man emerged, wearing a paisley dressing gown like someone in one of Grandpa Ben’s movies. His thinning hair was ruffled up around his pink ears and he was rubbing one eye like Emory when he’s tired.
“What’s all this noise?” he asked Spence.
“Party, Dads. Remember?”
This was Spence’s dad? He was like eighty— had to be his grandfather.
The man frowned. “I agreed to this?” he asked vaguely.
“You bought the booze,” Spence responded.
The man nodded wearily and disappeared back through the door he’d come out of. He didn’t shut it completely, and Spence reached out and gave it a shove with the flat of his hand until there was an audible click.
Then he cut his eyes at me, as though waiting for me to say something.
“Your father doesn’t mind you partying?”
“Dads? Nah. He doesn’t care. Though, strictly speaking, it was just his credit card that bought the goods, not the man himself.” He shrugged, gave a little laugh. “What? Don’t look at me like that, Castle.”
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it was with pity. Our house could practically fit in his foyer, but it never felt sad and empty like that, despite the distant party sounds. “I—”
“I’m sure you have crazy relatives locked in your attic too.
What family isn’t dysfunctional, right? Come on, let’s get you what you need.”
He poured me another daiquiri and one for himself, then led me back down the hallway. And I followed. That’s the thing, I trailed right after him into this big study, where he waved me to a big puffy couch, all swirly embroidered flowers on a white linen background, then sank into an equally puffy chair across from it, studying me over the rim of his glass. “You really are pretty as hell, Castle. Much hotter when you don’t wear the baggy clothes. Don’t stress about what happened with Sundance. How could he help himself? Besides, it’s just sex. No big deal.”
That’s exactly what it hadn’t felt like. Not just sex. Not no big deal. Not at all. Not to me.
But this was the last thing I was going to let Spence know.
I gulped my drink, shook my head, laughed in what I hoped was a carefree and dismissive way. “I’ve already forgotten the whole thing. Water under the dam.” Was that right? Bridge?
Dam? I should put this drink down now.
He whistled. “Don’t tell Cassidy that. Not in those words, anyway. We guys are touchy. Good to know there are no hard feelings, though.”
“I’m not planning on any heart-to-hearts with Cass Somers.”
“C’mon, Gwen. He’s a good guy. Don’t be mad at him.”
He examined my face more closely, then whistled again, lon-149
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ger and lower. “O-ho. You’re not mad. You’re hurt. Damn, I’m sorry.” He sounded as though he meant it, and to my horror, tears sprang to my eyes.
“Oh man. I didn’t think . . . You always seemed so . . . Don’t do this, okay?” Spence set his drink on the coffee table, swept my glass out of my hands, one smooth motion. Then did the most unexpected thing. He leaned forward to kiss the tears away, lifting my hair away from my face, tucking it behind my ears, whispering against my cheek. “Sobbing girls are my weakness. They slay me, every time. Shh. Secret. Word gets out and every girl at school will know how to get to me.”
“No more five chicks in the hot tub, then,” I said shakily.
“Six,” he murmured, still smoothing back my hair. There was a smudge of black on his lower lip from my mascara. “But who’s counting? You have dreamboat eyes, you know that?”
“Did you use that lame line on all six?”
“Nah. Didn’t bother. None of them were looking for a deep and meaningful relationship. Neither, of course, am I. And tonight, I’m betting you aren’t either. Right?”
He was right. I wasn’t. Not that night. Viv and Nic and the hotel—Cass—flashed into my head and then zoomed out as Spence bent toward me, moving forward to my lips this time.
On the drive home from the bridge, Nic keeps glancing over at me, shoulder muscles tense.
“Look,” he says finally. “I shouldn’t have brought it up. I just . . . I mean, you’re pretty, you’re cool, and you’ve never really dated, and . . .” He drums his thumbs on the steering wheel, his mouth open like he hopes the right words will 150
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just magically fly into it. Finally: “Did that ass Alex break your heart?”
“Please. Alex got nowhere near my heart. I thought he did back then, but it was nothing. He just hurt my feelings, the putz.”
“Then did Channing . . . ?” He trails off, clearly finding the thought completely impossible.
Hunching back in my seat, I kick my feet up on the glove compartment
“C’mon, Gwen. Talk. Tell me.”
I shake my head. “No, thanks.”
Nic reaches over and tries to pull my head to his shoulder but I’m stiff, edging him away. “I’m good,” I say. “Let’s just drive.”
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