Four Men & A Lady Read online

  "I'll be sure and warn Ben," Quentin said too casually to be casual.

  Dang it. The air and the bluster whooshed from Heidi's sails. Again she tugged down her skirt, pulled up her shoulder strap, and put on her cool indifference to the subject of Ben Tannen. "Ben? He's here?"

  "I haven't seen him." Quentin glanced around the crowded bar. Stopped. Rubbed the bristly growth on his chin. Then his gaze slid back to Heidi's. Slowly he nodded, as if a lightbulb had dropped from the sky and shattered on impact with his thick male skull. "That's why you came, isn't it? For Ben."

  "What? Of course not," she lied. "I came to see old friends. You. And Jack and Randy." Her eye caught the mirrored image of the room as she made her point. Neither man appeared in her reflected field of vision. Yet a growing awareness of stares directed her way slid along her exposed skin like the cold sweat on the longneck in her hand.

  She shook off the weirdness and turned to face her friend. "I've looked for both of them. But so far I've only been able to place a couple of people." It felt strange admitting she'd had no close friends beyond Quentin and Jack and Randy and...Ben, until she realized she had even fewer close friendships now. There was Georgia. And then there was...well, Georgia.

  Funny that success and solitude were married in her mind, she thought, sipping the last of the one beer she'd allow herself tonight. Having lost touch with Quentin made her realize what a double-sided coin she'd chosen to flip when professional success become in her life.

  She sighed. "I guess I should've been more involved in high school, you know? But I spent so much time and energy making plans to get out that making friends didn't seem a priority." When Quentin didn't immediately respond, she glanced up into a face that must've broken a dozen female hearts by now. "What?"

  "I think I'm offended. Or insulted. Or both." His considering look certainly hinted at the one or the other. He decided. And nodded. "Yep. Definitely both."

  She frowned, not yet sure if he was serious. "Why do you say that? What I said about friends not being a priority? C'mon. That just came off the top of my I head. You know I didn't mean you."

  The break of pool balls clattered in the background.

  "That's good to hear."

  Heidi turned her stool in order to face him directly.

  "Quentin, I would've dropped out our freshman year if it hadn't been for your friendship."

  "You weren't old enough to drop out." He scolded her, flicking the end of her nose with his finger. Classic avoidance and change of subject.

  "And you think age would've stopped me?" She wrapped her fingers around his wrist. Her touch and her tone both demanded he listen. "You were what stopped me, you goof. You wouldn't let me quit."

  "Hell, no, I wouldn't let you quit. No one else was as honest with me as you were."

  "Ah, yes." Heidi smiled at the memories singing close to the surface. "About your songs?"

  Quentin grimaced and agreed. "They weren't songs. They were crap. You knew that. I knew that. But everyone else, my family, Randy, even Jack...no one else wanted to be honest. They wanted my crap to succeed."

  She'd been so in awe of his musical intuition then. And so proud of him now. "I knew what you did well. And you are why we won so many awards in band. You know how to put the songs together. Which I understand has earned you an award or two to hang on your wall."

  "Statuettes don't hang well on walls," he replied then raised a hand to order a drink of his own.

  "Arrogant beast."

  Amused, Quentin lifted his strong chin and looked down at Heidi. "I believe the industry rags are currently calling me Marks the Shark. I'm a firm believer in my own press."

  She rolled her eyes. "And how much did you have to pay for that one?"

  Leaning both elbows behind him on the bar, he inclined his head toward the crowded room. "Not as much as I'd pay for the type of attention you're getting."

  "I was wondering about that. The looks, that is. Not your ridiculous appraisal of my diversionary worth." Her chuckle was not convincingly delivered. But what she felt wasn't funny. She wasn't sure if she was uncomfortable. Or just out of time and place. "They're staring at me like they don't know who I am."

  "Think again, girl." Quentin shook his head. "They're staring because they didn't know you had legs. Or shoulders. Or—"

  "Stop right there. Of course I had legs, uh, have legs. And shoulders. And—" she waved a hand "—other things."

  "Like hair?"

  "Yes. Like hair. Which I'm sure has a lot to do with it. I wouldn't expect anyone to recognize me now when I was invisible then." She affected a shudder. "I was such a joke."

  Quentin laughed. "You never knew, did you?"

  "Knew what?"

  Mischief and devilment and charm turned up high, he reached for the flyaway strand of her hair again and let it slide through his fingers. "What I wouldn't pay to be a fly on your shoulder this weekend."

  She had no clue what he was talking about and wasn't even sure she wanted to know. "Arrogant beastly tease."

  Quentin laughed. "So fill me in. Tell me what the years have made of Mighty Heidi and I'll tell you about Marks the Shark."

  "You've got a deal. On one condition." She glanced at the closest pool table.

  Quentin followed her gaze. Looked back. Arched one Brad Pitt brow. "You're not serious."

  "Of course I'm serious. Why wouldn't I be?" She was all innocence when called for.

  And Quentin was all guilt. "You don't remember what happened last time we played pool?"

  "Of course I remember." It had been September of their junior year. The night had grown long. Tempers short. And teenage hormones ran high. She wasn't likely to forget the night that had been the beginning of the end of a very long nine academic months.

  She slipped from the bar stool, adjusted her dress from here to Sunday and hooked her arm through Quentin's. "Then let's go before Ben shows up to spoil my fun."

  "Your idea of fun is what I'm afraid of," Quentin said. "I don't think my heart can take a repeat."

  Heidi led the way, casting Quentin the smile of a vamp. "Don't worry. Since we played that last time? I haven't once stopped a game to take off my clothes."

  Junior year

  "I'M NOT GETTING OUT of the car." Heidi crossed her arms, drew up her knees and pouted. Coming here...here, of all places. Uh-uh. No way. Not after the day she'd had.

  Quentin draped a wrist over the Bug's steering wheel and glared across the dark interior of the car. "You know, Heidi, you can be such a stupid dork at times."

  Ha. That's what he thought. If anyone was stupid it was that slut, Maryann Stafford. No. If anyone was stupid it was Ben. Come to think of it, he was a slut, too.

  Heidi pushed her chin and her lip out farther. "I didn't know we were coming here to practice. I thought we were meeting at the band hall."

  "What's wrong with you? We practice at Ben's house all the time. Jeez." Quentin wrenched open his door, climbed out and slammed it hard enough to jar Heidi from her mope.

  So what if they practiced at Ben's house all the time? It didn't mean they had to tonight. And she wasn't going to. Not after spending the entire hour of gym class today listening to Maryann Stafford run her mouth about what happened when she lost the top of her two-piece in Ben's pool this summer.

  The passenger side door groaned as Quentin pulled it open. Heidi shoved her way out of the car, but left her horn in the back seat.

  "Will you get your butt in gear?" Quentin yelled. He took hold of her empty hand, realized it was empty, grumbled under his breath as he reached back into the car. Horn and Heidi in tow, he trudged up the long pebbled walk to the Tannens' front door. "You're being a real jerk, you know that?"

  "You call me one more name and you're history, Queenie Boy." Adding a tantrum to her sulk, Heidi fought Quentin's hold, pulling free as the door to the Tannen mansion opened. Quickly, she straightened her vest and T-shirt, but it wasn't Ben who greeted them.

  "Quentin. Heidi." Ben's
father—The Royal Tannen, as Heidi called him—acknowledged them both with a nod. He stood in the arched threshold surrounded by dark wood and white tile and light fixtures brighter than the bulbs glowing from inside. With a newspaper folded beneath one elbow, a drink gripped in one hand, he gestured toward the rear wing of the house. "The boys are up in the game room. Waiting."

  "Thank you, sir." Quentin started forward, his glare daring Heidi not to follow. She'd follow all right...

  "It's my fault we're late," she said airily, as The Royal Tannen shut the heavy door. She gestured with one careless hand. Too bad she didn't have a mouthful of bubble gum to pop for the full brainless effect.

  "See, my mom got fired today and was crying into the last beer of a six-pack when I got home from school. I couldn't leave her like that, ya know? So Quentin helped me get her to bed. Once she was asleep, we hurried right over."

  "I see," Ben's father said, though from the granite set of his features, Heidi was surprised he was able to squeeze out a word. "Well—" he cleared his throat "—I hope things...she...is feeling better tomorrow."

  "Thank you, sir. I'll be sure and give her your best." Heidi trotted after Quentin who'd made a hasty escape down the long hallway. Her footsteps made no sound on the plush carpet. She caught up with him at the staircase that wound to the game room above the three-car garage. "You could've waited."

  He whirled on her at the third step. "What's wrong with you? You got PMS or something?"

  She trudged past him, stomping her way up the circular ascent. What was wrong with her? Besides the ugly picture of Ben and Maryann that wouldn't go away? For one thing, she had an unemployed drunk for her only parent.

  Her mother's latest episode meant little chance of affording anything but community college—if even that—next fall. But even worse, it meant she wouldn't be leaving home any time soon. That she'd be stuck with the alcohol, the anger, the affairs and the attic for who knew how much longer.

  "I do not have PMS." She stopped at the top of the stairs and snarled down at Quentin. "What I have is a serious loathing for Ben Tannen...may he and all his money drown in his stupid swimming pool," she finished under her breath.

  Quentin reached her then and stood toe to toe, nearly nose to nose, certainly eye to eye. "What you have is a serious attitude problem. Get rid of it. Now. I'm not going to have my chance for a first place ensemble win next weekend blown away by whatever's eating at you."

  They stood fuming at one another there in a circle of yellow light. The paneled walls of the landing were dark, the ceiling high. The dangling chandelier gaudy and pretentious. Heidi wanted to puke. A chandelier. In a hallway. Her bedroom wasn't even this big.

  She was the first to look away because she knew she was being unfair. Her reactions to anything involving Ben, even the most bubble-brained gossip, had been two years in the making. Today just proved that she had a big problem on her hands. One she'd been avoiding. One due to come to a head by the end of this year. Certainly by the end of next. Their last year.

  That was the biggest part of what was wrong with her. Dealing with overwhelming feelings that she didn't want and would go nowhere because she and Ben were about as compatible as a gallon of gas and a Bic lighter. "Look, Quentin. You don't understand."

  "Then tell me," he pleaded, his voice low, insistent. "C'mon. That's what friends are for."

  But she couldn't for that very reason. Because as frustrated as she was over her home life and college funding and the top to Maryann Stafford's two-piece, she didn't want to bother Quentin with her problems. Not when he was staring a blue-ribbon weekend in the face. He needed this win to prove to himself that he had the musical talent to live his dream.

  Dreams meant a lot. Or so she'd heard.

  "Look," she began again, only to be cut short by a long rectangle of light thrown from the game room door. She looked up; Ben's silhouette—tall and broad-shouldered, that of a man—filled the frame as if backlit by a bright sun.

  Tension rolled from him in waves, in the rigid way he held his head, in the firm fixed grip he had on the door facing, in the no-nonsense way he stood there and waited wearing a designer logo T-shirt and stylishly ripped jeans.

  He'd never had Heidi's problem of control. She tended to bite her tongue way after the fact. Which made it easy for her to recognize that very struggle within him now.

  "Where the hell have y'all been?" he asked in that too-deep voice that had Heidi closing her eyes for strength. Why did he have to be so...so...dang it, she couldn't even narrow what she thought about him down to one word.

  "Hang on to your shorts, Ace," she yelled back, not bothering to spare Ben a direct eye-contact glance. Looking up, she gave Quentin a half smile, a lift of one shoulder and then she said, "I'm fine. And I'm sorry. Let's go practice."

  They did, for two hours without a break. To Heidi every second, every minute dragged. She wanted not to be here tonight more than any of the other times in her life when she'd wished she were someplace else.

  She had to be crazy to be so torn up inside. It wasn't like she expected Ben to be a virgin. But Maryann Stafford? Heidi grimaced, missed a note, caught Quentin's glare and shrugged an apology.

  And it wasn't like law school was forever out of her reach. But her future plans to educate women about their rights, to keep others such as her mother from becoming victims of the system, to ensure they received the benefits they deserved, had been moved another few years down the road.

  She tried so hard to let the music take her away. But every time she felt she'd conquered the emotional bombs of the day, a fierce pounding detonated behind her eyes, fired against her temples, exploded inside her skull.

  The headache couldn't be blamed on her internal battle. The source was clearly external: Ben was mad and his drums were loud. Instinctively, she knew the reason. He'd heard second- or third- or fourth-hand gossip of Maryann Stafford's tales.

  Heidi couldn't stand the tension a minute more. She opened her eyes and glanced his way; his gaze was fixed on her. He followed every move, his mouth set hard, his eyes flinty, sweat-drenched locks of his hair whipping about his face as he ripped into the rhythm of the song.

  This wasn't like Ben. To be this wild, his attention focused elsewhere while instinct drove the beat. She knew him well enough not to be frightened of whatever he had on his mind, but she was uneasy. Uneasy enough to call it quits. She set down her sax midnote. The rest of the song fizzled one player at a time. The drums were the last to cease.

  Crossing the room, she leaned a hip on the corner of the pool, er, billiard table. She'd found a distraction. "Let's play a game."

  Randy and Jack were quick to follow; Quentin and Ben reluctantly gave in. There were times she got her way because she was the girl. As a rule, she didn't take that advantage. Tonight was an exception.

  Heidi pulled the balls from the billiard pockets and settled them into the rack, rolling each until its position suited her mood. "Since it's my game, I'll rack 'em. Ben can break. He seems to be in a destructive mood tonight."

  Ben grabbed a cue from the custom-built rack. He pushed back the wet strands of hair that hung long past his brow. His eyes were green and glittered like shards of splintered anger. "At least I'm not self-destructive."

  Heidi bristled. Behind her, Quentin cleared his throat. The friendly warning lifted her hackles higher. "But just think. If you were, your daddy could pay to have you fixed." She lifted the rack, stepped back and waited.

  Randy guffawed and Jack snickered from where they'd perched expectantly on the cushions of the white leather game room sofa. Ben's icy glare had Randy studying the gold-and-brown patterned carpet between his spread feet, Jack slumping back to fiddle with the controls on the stereo system until Duran Duran rocked the room.

  Ben's break was clean and hard, but then practice gave perfect boys flawless skill. He'd had years of tutoring, pampering, silver-spoon feeding. Why shouldn't his break be as faultless as the crystal prisms of the chandelier lighti
ng the landing?

  Shot after expert shot stoked Heidi's temper. Irrational temper, her rational side knew. But Ben Tan-nen had everything. Everything, dang it. And one piece at a time, with the exact precision with which cue tip met cue ball, her future was dying before her eyes.

  She watched his stance, his concentration, the culmination of seventeen years of instruction in what society deemed proper, handed down from The Royal Tannen on high. Ben's way in the world had been bought and paid for with Tannen money. And all he'd had to earn was his father's respect, which he had.

  He was a perfect father's perfect son. But she hated him the most because he gave her no real reason to hate him at all. He must have sensed the burning in her chest. He finally looked up into her eyes...and missed the shot.

  She blinked hard against overwhelming emotions, against the feelings so close to the surface she felt as if her skin would burst. Right now, she wanted perfect Ben to feel as miserable as she did. "Whew. I was beginning to wonder if I was going to have to go home without taking a shot at your balls, Ben."

  "Jeez, Heidi." Quentin began to pace.

  She laughed, feeling strangely as if she were careening out of control. Shrugging out of her long crocheted vest, she took her position, called her first shot and expertly sent the ball zooming into the pocket. The next sailed perfectly. As did the one following.

  She sized up the table, visualized her next shot and made the biggest mistake of her life by taking her eyes off the ball. From beneath her lashes, she looked across the table at Ben who wasn't following the strategy of her game at all, but was staring at the thin white T-shirt stretched over her chest. He had fire in his eyes.

  The volcano erupted. Lava spewed, an inferno boiling up from the hell of a day she'd had. With a loud, "Arghhh," she slammed the cue to the felt, reached for her hem and jerked the T-shirt over her head.