One Night with the Boss. Teresa Southwick
while his niece crawled onto his thigh and threw a teddy bear out of her way to make room. When she was settled, he braced a hand on her back for stability.
“Are you going to have hamburgers?”
“Hadn’t considered it.” Maggie sat on the dark-colored sofa and thought for a moment. “Maybe veggie and turkey.”
“You don’t want it too girly. You want your marketing window open wide. Don’t turn off the guys with too much chick food.”
“Good point.” She smiled fondly at her daughter, who’d pulled a pink feather boa from the bottom of the toy basket and was doing her best to wrap it around Brady’s neck. “Speaking of girly...”
“Don’t you dare take a picture. No way this leaves your house,” he warned.
“Serves you right for buying it.”
“I couldn’t come home from that San Francisco trip empty-handed.”
“Danielle wouldn’t know the difference.”
“She’s smarter than you think. She would know Uncle Brady went away and didn’t bring her something.” He smiled at the solemn concentration on the little girl’s face. “Besides, I’m all about retail bribery to secure her affections.”
Maggie beamed at him. “You would be a terrific father, Brady.”
“Why? Because I spoil your child?”
“No. Although that’s important, too.” Her expression turned tender. “Just spending a lot of time with her like you do means so much. Every little girl needs a positive male role model in her life so she knows what to look for when she grows up.” Her eyes took on the familiar sadness. “You should have a bunch of kids to fill up that obscenely big house of yours.”
“Not likely,” he said.
“Surely you have women throwing themselves at you. You’re okay-looking if one can ignore those ears.”
Brady threw a foam-rubber pink ball in her direction. “Funny.”
“Seriously, you’re rich and handsome. A pretty good personality. And, quite frankly, you’re getting to the age where people are beginning to wonder and ask questions.”
Folks in Blackwater Lake gossiped about anything and everything anyway. But Maggie meant something more. “What are you talking about?”
“You’re not getting any younger, and inquiring minds want to know if you’re gay. Or if there’s some dark and twisted reason for you not getting married and having children.”
“I don’t need to explain. Let’s just call it highly unlikely.”
“But why?” Maggie persisted.
“It’s not complicated.” He watched his niece totter over to pick up the ball and then put it in her mouth. “I’m just not a falling-in-love kind of guy.”
And that was the primary reason to acknowledge his not-just-business awareness of Olivia Lawson all these years. Hurting her wasn’t an option—and that’s what would happen if he started something he had no intention of finishing.
Except a little while ago he had started something.
“You’re wrong,” Maggie said.
“About?”
“Being the falling-in-love sort.”
“Oh?” He grabbed his niece and lifted her onto his shoulders, where she squealed with delight and slapped the top of his head with her little hands. “Why do you say that?”
“Here’s my theory and worth what you paid for it. Feel free to blow me off.” She met his gaze. “You won’t let anyone close because you’re afraid of losing them. Because it hurts when you lose them.”
“Don’t quit your day job and take up psychoanalysis,” he teased, but there was a lot of truth in her words.
As if she hadn’t heard the taunt, Maggie continued. “We lost Dad that Christmas you came home from college.”
“Yeah.” A trauma like that stayed with a guy forever.
Brady and his father hadn’t always been close but then his dad changed jobs, allowing him to be home all the time. He’d coached Brady’s baseball team and never missed a high school football game whether or not his son was playing.
He would never forget how his father had collapsed and died in his arms. One minute life was normal and happy, the next it changed forever. And the absence of the man he’d grown to love and emulate was a gaping black hole. It did hurt. So sue him.
“Is there a point to bringing this up?” he asked irritably.
“Then Henry was killed in the accident.”
His best friend. The two incidents were a painful lesson that someone you love can suddenly be gone. The only way to keep from hurting was not to care.
Brady met his sister’s gaze. “Of all people, you should understand. You lost Dad, too. And then Danny. I know how hard that was on you.”
“Still is.” The words were spoken softly as she stared at her daughter. “She has his dimples and the shape of his face. Losing him was the worst thing I’ve ever gone through.”
“So you understand why it’s unlikely there will ever be anyone special for me.”
“No, I really don’t.” She was still looking at her little girl. “At least I had a great love and know what that feels like.”
“If it was so great, why don’t you do it again?” Brady countered. “Why aren’t you dating?”
She sighed. “For one thing, it’s not easy when you have a child. How many people want to start a relationship with someone who has a kid?”
“I think you’d be surprised. Look at Adam Stone and Jill Beck. He adopted C.J. after they got married.”
“Okay.” She thought for a minute. “But then there’s Cabot Dixon and Tyler.”
Cabot was a good friend of Brady’s. His wife had walked out right after Tyler was born and he remained happily single. “Maybe he’s not the falling-in-love sort, either.”
Maggie made an unladylike snorting noise. “We can trade examples all night, but that won’t change what’s going on with you.”
“And that is?”
“Your only excuse for refusing to open yourself up to love is that you’re chicken.”
“What is this? Pick-on-Brady day?”
“Did someone else tarnish your image?”
“No way I’m passing this one on. You know how rumors spread here in Blackwater Lake.”
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