My Front Page Scandal (18 page)

Maybe she’d scared him off with her instructions not to speak in her grandfather’s deaf ear or mention his motorcycle to Great Aunt Josephine. When she’d begged him to ride with her, he’d become stubborn as an old mule.

At the back of her mind, Brooke recognized that she was busying herself with lightweight concerns because she didn’t want to admit that she was afraid he’d stood her up. If you were in love with a man, you were supposed to have more faith in him than that.

The cell vibrated. She shifted the painting to her other arm and flipped open the phone. A text message from Meg Song. Did you see the Insider?

Yes, Brooke returned. Going to dinner. TTYL.

She snapped the phone shut and dropped it in the pocket of her Burberry trench.

The sound of the engine announced him first, but she waited until she saw the motorcycle turn past the brick pillars at the gate before letting out a sigh of relief.

David. Her heart was suddenly twice its normal size.

She ran to him. “I thought you were lost.”

He removed the helmet, and she was so glad to see him that she didn’t care that his hair had gone all messy again. “Sorry. I took a short detour.”

“That’s all?”

“I needed a moment to think.” He dismounted, unzipped his leather jacket and reached into the pocket. “You’ll be wanting these back. Unless you meant them for a souvenir?”

Blushing, she stuffed the thong into her purse. “I didn’t have any pockets,” she explained, then breathlessly tacked on, “What were you thinking about?” Her jumping nerves wouldn’t quiet, even though it had just taken seconds for her to see that David seemed more stolid and committed than he’d been twenty minutes ago.

“Whether I should be here or not,” he said plainly, and added, “I decided yes,” before she could reassure him that she wanted him nowhere else.

Without another word, he looped an arm around her and walked her toward the house. He whistled at the large brick Georgian that had been in her family since Massachusetts had become a state. “This isn’t a house, it’s a mansion.”

She nodded. The Winfield estate was impressive. The grounds were lush and manicured, complete with ancient chestnuts and elms, the rose garden that was her grandmother’s pride and joy, a Victorian greenhouse, indoor pool, stables turned four-stall garage, and the accompanying carriage house that had been converted into Joey’s apartment.

“Try not to be intimidated,” she said as they walked around the corner to the front door. The house was grand and formal, with rows of tall windows and a slate roof. The ivy that clung to the facade of weathered brick softened its appeal.

“Sure.” He dropped his arm away from her.

She sent him an apologetic look. “I admit it—this dinner will be excruciating.

They’ll quiz you mercilessly.”

“That’s why I drove my bike.” He winked, but with a tad less devilry than usual.

“In case I have to make a getaway when they don’t like my answers.”

The cell in her pocket buzzed again. Another message from Meg. U read it? Y so calm?

After a disquieting moment, Brooke typed in a message—It wasn’t that bad—and shut off her phone for good.

The front door opened as she was about to reach for the latch. Liam and Katie greeted them with a warm welcome. “Grandmother saw you through the window and sent us to hurry you along,” she hastily whispered to Brooke before turning to hug David.

First rule broken. Winfields are never tardy.

“The woman hugging you is my youngest sister, Katie,” Brooke told David as she propped the canvas up in a chair. “And this is her guy, Liam James, who used to be my guy before she stole him from me.” She laughed, still nervous, but pleased to realize that not even a shred of misgiving remained regarding the loss of Liam.

“Oh?” David said, shaking hands. “David Carerra.” His chin jutted. “Brooke’s new, and final, guy.”

Katie’s eyes got big. “I’d love to hear more about that, but you’d better follow me, kids. The Winfields await. It’s cocktail hour, and their curiosity is rampant. Brooke doesn’t bring many men around and never one who’s a total mystery.”

“Not total,” Liam said. “Some of us are members of the Red Sox Nation.” He surveyed David with interest, but no accusation. “Your notoriety precedes you.”

David tugged at the knot of his tie. “That’s what I was afraid of.”

“Don’t worry,” Katie said in her blithe, breezy way. “Winfields don’t read the scandal papers.”

Rule two, Brooke thought. Shattered.

Not only did they read them, they appeared in them.

THE DINNER conversation hummed, momentarily carrying on without David’s input.

He was concentrating on the food, following Brooke’s lead as she chose the right pieces of silver to deal with the many courses. They’d made it without incident to a salad of unidentified greens topped with slices of tropical fruit and paper-thin curls of a pungent cheese.

David risked a quick survey of the long mahogany dining table. Henry Winfield, the grandfather, sat at the head. He was withered like an old corn husk and dependent on a cane, but his spine remained unbowed. The family referred to him as the Admiral. While he didn’t speak often, his glowers said volumes. Liam, and especially David, were the recipients.

The suitors. Now he understood Brooke’s use of the word.

At the opposite end was the grandmother, Evelyn, a sprightly woman in her seventies. She controlled her end of the dinner table with a quick eye and a dry wit, while regarding Liam and David with a cautious approval. During cocktails, the mention of great-grandchildren had been raised.

An older pair of relatives and their doting middle-aged daughter sat on Brooke’s other side. To David’s right was the dreaded Great Aunt Josephine, a formidable woman who’d asked him many questions about his education, his prospects and his family, until Joey, who sat at Henry Winfield’s other elbow, had teasingly scolded the woman for conducting an interrogation.

David remembered Joey from the strip club. In between bites, he’d been watching her with interest. She did everything correctly, but she did it with a dash of spice. She’d also thrown a couple of brooding looks at her sisters when she thought no one was looking.

Beside Joey was a handsome but pallid man named Marcus Finch, a bank executive who’d apparently been placed there by default when Brooke had invited David along at the last minute. At first he’d thought the man was Joey’s date, but Katie had let it slip that Marcus was, in fact, Brooke’s former fiancé, apparently at hand to rekindle the relationship. Brooke had greeted Marcus with warmth, but shown no sign of affection.

Great Aunt Josephine cleared her throat as the maid cleared the salad plates.

“What business was your father in, Mr. Carerra? I’m not certain you ever said.”

“I didn’t.” He shot a look at the menacing grandfather, knowing he could go into a description of beet farming that would put everyone to sleep. “My father was a scoundrel and a scofflaw.”

The aunt’s face crimped.

Joey grinned. “A scoundrel, huh? How’s the pay in that?”

“Not much cash, but there were plenty of stolen cigarettes and counterfeit watches to go around.” He checked Brooke’s reaction. Her eyebrows were up, but in surprise, not mortification. “My family tree’s filled with crazy characters and good-for-nothing crooks.” He saved the battery and manslaughter for another time.

“We have some of those ourselves,” Katie said.

“Perhaps a few rather colorful ancestors,” Josephine retorted. “Many generations removed.”

“Not so far as you think,” Brooke murmured.

The aunt sent her a sharp look.

“The Winfields are an esteemed family,” Marcus Finch announced pompously. His eyes went to Brooke. “I had once looked forward to joining them.”

She shrugged. “That’s your Mercedes outside, Marcus?”

He seemed pleased that she’d noticed. “A recent purchase.”

“David drives a Honda Shadow. That’s a motorcycle.”

“Goodness,” Josephine said faintly.

“I have a car, too,” David said. A gently used Ferrari he’d bought with the proceeds of a commercial he’d done for a matchbook maker whose tag line had been “When you’re down to your last strike.” “But not in Boston.”

“Where do you live, Mr. Carerra?” the grandmother said from the far end of the table.

“A small town in Georgia. You wouldn’t have heard of it.”

“That means a long-distance relationship,” said a perky blonde sitting on the other side of Liam and Katie. She’d been giving him strange looks since he’d arrived—coyly gloating. Now she clicked her tongue. “Too bad those never work out. In some circles—” her slight pause indicated that she clearly didn’t mean the Winfields’ circle “—a baseball player would be considered a good catch.”

Brooke’s quick intake of breath sliced straight to David’s heart. “I’m sorry,”

he said to the blonde, rather mildly considering that he was shooting BB pellets at her in his mind. “I missed your name.”

“My cousin, Eve Browne,” Brooke provided.

The cousin patted her fluffy hair. “That would be Evelyn Winfield Parrish Browne.”

“Well, Eve.” He fixed her with his stare. “Thanks for your concern. Luckily, I’m mobile. I can move back to Boston anytime I want. I have a condo here, in fact.”

Brooke blinked. “You do?”

“Nothing fancy. It’s leased out.”

Eve looked back and forth between them with a prissy set to her lips. “Just how well are you two acquainted? Because I happen to know that—”

Katie interrupted. “Don’t be such a twit, Eve. Leave Brooke and David alone.”

“I could.” Eve took a sip of her wine.

Her tight little smile was far too smug to be trusted. As the maid set a poached pear in front of David, he felt dread building in the pit of his stomach. Too much rich food consumed. Too many cheap secrets revealed.

“I could,” Eve repeated, “but that wouldn’t be right. She needs guidance.”

“Guidance?” Brooke said at a high pitch. “From you?”

“Our elders. They should be told what’s going on with you so they can make you answer for it.”

Brooke shook her head, confused. “I am telling them. I brought David to dinner.”

Joey leaned forward to look down the table. “What the hell are you talking about, Eve?”

Eve fluffed her hair, drawing out the moment as she clearly enjoyed having the attention of every person at the table. “For goodness’ sake, don’t any of you read the newspapers?”

“Of course we do,” the grandmother said with a snap of her napkin.

“I’m talking about the Insider.”

“Is that all?” Brooke laughed. “If you want to shame me or David, you’ll have to dig up something more shocking than a stupid little gossip item.”

Beneath the tablecloth, he put his hand on hers. Challenging her catty cousin to dig up dirt wasn’t advisable.

“I take it you haven’t seen this morning’s edition.” Eve’s eyes almost popped out of her head. In a stagey gesture, she covered her mouth with her hand, rising up while she scanned the table. “None of you?”

There was a murmur of agreement that they hadn’t. Winfields don’t read scandal sheets, David remembered.

“Well, then. I must show you.” Eve scurried from the room, making excited noises at the back of her throat. She’d returned in seconds, pulling the folded tabloid out of her purse. She brandished it. “You see? It’s mortifying for us. All of us. A smirch on the family name.”

Katie grabbed the paper first. She gasped when she saw the front page. “Oh, my God. Brooke, I’m so sorry.”

Brooke shot up, reaching across the table to take the Insider from Katie’s limp fingers. Holding it taut at arm’s length, she sank into her chair with a leaden thump as she scanned the page. Her face went ashen.

David looked past her shoulder. A blurry photo took up most of the page, but it was the headline that screamed at him in bold print: SOX SEX SCANDAL!

She knew she was sitting, but she couldn’t feel her body. She knew people were talking, but she couldn’t hear a word. She knew she hadn’t gone blind, but even when she looked away from the tabloid, all that she could see was the photo they’d blown up and printed in lurid, graphic detail.

Her, naked from the waist up, garish and glittery in the spotlights.

David, lifting her into his arms so that her half-bare rear end mooned the viewer.

The only saving grace was that the tabloid had inked in two black stars over her nipples.

A half-groan, half-laugh bubbled from her lips.

David got into her narrowed field of vision, his face looming large like the reflection in a fun-house mirror. “Brooke? Are you all right?” He ripped the paper from her hands. “Listen, it’s not so bad. They haven’t identified you.

You’re only called Miss Rock Me All Night Long.”

She laughed wetly. Her nose was running and she rubbed it with her linen napkin.

Etiquette was the least of her concerns. “They’ll find it out if they try hard enough. The manager at Passionfruit got my real name when I signed up.”

“I’ll go there.” Why did David look so fierce? Didn’t he see the humor? “I’ll talk to him.”

She shook her head. That kind of talking would only make things worse. “I don’t want you getting into trouble with the law because of me.”

“This is Brooke?” quailed Great Aunt Josephine. She looked like she might faint.

The Admiral reached out a knobby hand. “Let me see.”

Josephine held the tabloid out of his reach. “No, Henry. It’s too much for your heart to take.”

“Nonsense!” he barked, and thumped his cane on the floor. “Give it to me.” The paper was surrendered. He took a long look, scanned the article, then let out one short heh.

He glared at Brooke. “This is you?”

She nodded.

The heh became a chuckle. “Never knew you had it in you.”

“But Grandfather—!” Eve was flushed with outrage. “It’s horrid. Everyone will know it’s her. She’ll be notorious, and take the family down with her.”

Joey and Marcus were examining the tabloid. He was dumbstruck. Joey looked at Brooke with her lip caught between her teeth, but she covered the apprehension well. “I don’t know how you can act like such a priss, Eve, when we all know that you’ve participated in your share of wild parties.”

“Nothing like that. It’s crude and disgusting.”

“Pardon me, but I would like to see this newspaper, please,” said Brooke’s grandmother in a quiet voice that nonetheless silenced the hubbub.

Katie sent Brooke an apologetic look as she passed the tabloid along. “Don’t be angry with Brooke, Grandmother. She did it as a dare. The, uh, nudity was a mistake.”

“I thought pasties could paste,” Brooke said in a small voice.

“Ma’am.” David cleared his throat. “I’m the one to blame. If I hadn’t gone up on stage and drawn attention to her, no one would have noticed Brooke. She definitely wouldn’t be on the front page. It’s all my fault. I’m the notorious one here, not your granddaughter.”

“No one would have noticed me?” Brooke might have laughed if her throat hadn’t closed up, strangling all the strength from her voice.

David squeezed her hand. “I would have.”

Grandmother studied the offending photo and article. When she was done, she folded the paper in half. “Brooke, I’m extremely disappointed in you. Winfields do not parade themselves in public, let alone on the pages of the scandal papers. It’s quite unseemly.”

Shame replaced Brooke’s sense of the absurd. Although part of her wanted to protest that she was a thirty-year-old adult who needn’t be scolded like a child, she also felt that she deserved the censure. She didn’t regret the striptease dare. She’d learned a lot about herself because of it. But she probably wouldn’t have done it if she hadn’t already had her legs knocked out from under her by the identity crisis.

The Insider’s front-page exposure would be forgotten, eventually. But the truth about her father?

That was the true scandal.

“Hmph.” Eve made a sound of triumph. She looked at Brooke with an evil little sneer.

“As for you, young lady.” Eve’s attention snapped back to their grandmother.

“Winfields do not bring such trash into the house.”

Evelyn rose from her chair, crossed to the brick hearth and tossed the newspaper into the firebox. She struck a match and lit the paper on fire. The maid rushed forward to open the flue as the tabloid was quickly consumed by flames.

Gone in a puff of smoke, Brooke thought. Strangely, she did not feel relieved.

“After dinner, I will speak with Brooke in private, but for now there will be no more public discussion of this unfortunate incident.” Evelyn seated herself and dusted off her hands with a napkin. Her placid countenance returned as she surveyed the silent dinner guests. “Now, then. Let’s all enjoy our dessert, shall we?”

Brooke picked up her spoon, then dropped it with a clatter. “No,” she said.

She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the curious stares, but even more the rising tide of her refusal to keep quiet as her mother had for so many years.

Thirty years of denying her true self. Even her own daughter. And for what?

The Winfields’ reputation?

They hadn’t even appreciated it. Daisy had been welcomed into the family in their usual reserved way, but she’d never quite fit in. Only with Reba Koldowski, and sometimes around her husband and daughters, could she be herself.

Brooke didn’t want to live that way. She didn’t want David to, either, but that was up to him.

“I think you should know.” She stood and looked from one grandparent to the other, and every face in between. Her sisters were alarmed. Marcus seemed dazed.

Eve fumed. “All of you.”

To steady herself, Brooke put her hand on David’s shoulder. He stared up at her with a mixture of support and wariness. Probably thought she’d gone loopy again and he’d have to sweep her into his arms to rescue her.

Not this time. She was saving herself.

“Even though it hasn’t been openly acknowledged, you already know that my mother gave a daughter up for adoption before she married Dad. Her name is Lindsay Beckham. She lives here in Boston. Joey, Katie and I intend to welcome her into our family as our sister. She should be at this dinner in fact, but I doubt she’s ready for that.” Brooke smiled at David. “The Winfields can be an intimidating lot.”

Grandmother inclined her head. “The dinner table is not the place to discuss your mother’s transgressions, Brooke. I realize you’ve gone through a trauma with Daisy’s passing, therefore, some allowance will be made. But be warned that there is a limit to my patience.”

Great Aunt Josephine nodded. “Even in trying times, standards must be kept.”

“I don’t believe that I meet those standards anymore. Nor do I care to.” Brooke took a breath, then the plunge. “Because I’m not really a Winfield.”

“Nonsense,” the Admiral huffed.

“I was raised as a Winfield. But my father—my biological father—was someone else. Mom’s friend Reba confirmed it. Dad knew, too, but he married Mom anyway.”

Suddenly Brooke felt lighter. Happier. Speaking the truth out loud had snapped the big picture into focus and finally she saw how lucky she’d been to have the security her mother had provided by keeping her secrets. “And he loved me as much as if I were his own blood. His own daughter.”

“Of course you were his daughter,” Katie said with tears shining in her eyes.

“Nothing can change that.”

Brooke nodded. She held herself very still, waiting for the others’ reaction.

Eve was gloating again, but that didn’t matter because she was a miserable brat.

“Not a Winfield?” the Admiral said. He frowned. “Daisy wouldn’t have done that.

She was a good egg.”

“She was a tramp.” That was Eve, of course, and Brooke turned on her, glaring.

“Mother said—”

“Eve,” Great Aunt Josephine snapped. “That’s enough.” Strangely, she seemed to have no more to say, which made Brooke wonder if her aunt had always harbored suspicions about Daisy’s pregnancy and the hasty marriage.

“I refuse to discuss this right now,” Grandmother said with an air of finality.

“Brooke, sit down. Finish your dinner. You’re embarrassing yourself in front of the guests.”

“I’m not embarrassed. Not anymore.”

“Damn straight,” Joey muttered.

“In fact…” Brooke hurried out of the room and snatched up the painting she’d left in the foyer. All heads turned toward her as she returned. “I’m not embarrassed about this, either.” She tore away the brown paper and held up the canvas for everyone to see. “It’s the painting I’m donating to the Ladies’ League art auction.”

Great Aunt Josephine gasped. “Brooke!”

“Holy cow,” Marcus said.

“Yikes, that’s hot.” Katie giggled and nudged Liam. “You didn’t pose for it, did you?”

David stood. “I did.” His announcement shocked even Brooke, but when she looked in the mirror over the fireplace and saw herself, proudly holding up the oil painting of a nude male with dark hair, she thought that there was no reason he wouldn’t be believed. The painting was actually one she’d done years ago and hidden away, a fantasy figure straight out of her imagination. Who did look a lot like David.

She met his eyes and mouthed, “Thanks.”

“Brooke,” her grandmother said. “Please put that lewd painting away at once.

It’s not appropriate.”

“Why not? There are nudes in museums all over the globe.”

The Admiral harrumphed. “Obey your grandmother.”

Brooke gritted her teeth. “Obey?”

“Quiet, girl.” He stamped the cane. “This is an honorable family. You will not disgrace us.”

Her face was on fire, but when she looked again at herself in the mirror, she saw only how bright her eyes were. How proud and defiant she looked. She was burning up inside and she liked it. “If that’s what you think, then maybe I don’t belong here, either. At least not until you accept me for what I am.”

“By damn, you’re still a Winfield and don’t you forget it.”

“I am. But I’m not.”

“Enough!” Grandfather roared.

“You’re right.” Brooke put the painting aside. “I’ve had enough of the Winfields for one day. David? Shall we go?”

He came around the table. “If that’s what you want.”

She laced their fingers. “I want to be with you.”

“You don’t have to leave your family to do that.”

“Right now, I do. Tomorrow can take care of itself.”

He nodded. “Lead the way.”

“Thanks for an illuminating dinner,” she said to her grandparents, with a special little scowl for Eve. “It’s been a blast.” She smiled at Joey and Katie so they could see she was all right, then tossed her head and strutted out of the room with her arm around David’s waist.

Outside, even though she felt as though they should have emerged into a brilliant burst of light, the sky was dark. Sunset had painted ribbons of gold and scarlet among the treetops.

“Let’s take your motorcycle,” Brooke said on impulse. “I want to ride off into the sunset.”

“Is this like the striptease?” he asked, hugging her close as they hurried to the parking court. “You’re on a high right now, but what happens when reality hits?”

She squeezed his face between her palms. “This is real, you goof. Right here, right now. You and me and our freedom to make up the rest of our lives as we go.”

He draped her coat around her shoulders. Then he kissed her. “Dang, girl, if you haven’t made me fall in love with you.”

Brooke’s elation was complete. “I love you, too, Jaden David Jackson Carerra, even if you have almost as many names as my cousin Evil-lyn.”

“But you, Brooke.” He kissed her again. “You’ll always be a Winfield.”

“Sure. Why not?” Her laughter was boundless. “I’ll be the scandalous Brooke Winfield and you can be the notorious David Carerra. Boston’s baddest!”

“I admit that the northern states gave the tabloids a good shot, but scandalous doesn’t really suit you,” he said, swinging her around so he could mount the bike. “Unless you’ve got a whole closet full of those paintings and a wild past to go with them.”

“Just the one,” she promised. “Unless you really want to pose.”

“You’ll have to chain me,” he said with a laugh.

The engine roared to life, outmatched only by Brooke’s exhilaration. She slung her leg over the saddle and settled in behind David, hugging him to her pounding heart. At the windows, Joey and Katie jumped and waved, their smiles as big as Brooke’s as they watched her and David speed away down the winding gravel drive.

“Maybe I’m not cut out to be a scandalous woman,” she yelled over the sound of the racing bike, not certain that he could hear her but knowing that it didn’t matter. They were together and that was good enough. “But we’re sure going to have a lot of fun finding out.