"Your point?" she said, not breaking stride in her keyboard tapping.
"I'm asking you to be mature enough to recognize that we all need help from time to time. I think you could stand a little life coaching from the Glass Slipper people." He stuck his hands in the pockets of his jeans. "And yeah, maybe I do need a break for a little life coaching of my own."
That had her rolling to her back, eyes wide in surprise. "What is this? Saint Max admitting that maybe he's not perfect?"
Now it was Max's turn to snort. "I've never pretended to be perfect or a saint." He smiled. "In fact, I feel far from that most every minute of every day."
Surprising him, Gaby's quicksilver mood changed yet again and her expression immediately softened. She scooted off the bed, came over, and wrapped he
r
arms around him, putting her head on his shoulder. "God, I'm a horrible sister, aren't I?" she said, completely sincere in that sudden way only she could be. "I'm sorry I'm such a bitch."
Max's heart melted, as it always did when this side of Gaby— just as real as all the others, only making increasingly rarer appearances of late—surfaced. He smiled tiredly and pressed a kiss against her hair as he hugged her back. "Not horrible, no. But on the bitch thing? Totally," he said, in a teen-speak accent.
She laughed even as she half-jokingly sucker punched him. "You
so
do not do that right. Please don't try to impress younger women with your mad slang skills. They won't be able to reject you because they'll be laughing too hard, But they will reject you."
He rubbed his abs with one hand, but pulled her close with the other. "I think I'd figure it out, anyway. But thanks."
He hugged her with one arm, which she returned, before looking up and catching his eye. It was moments like this, when
her guard was down, and he saw all the love and fear and hope in her eyes—all thrust directly at him, trusting that he'd take care of it, take care of her, no matter what she did, what she said—that terrified him most. He hadn't been kidding a moment ago. Eight years into it, fully half of her life, and he felt more unqualified than ever to be responsible for her upbringing.
Max had been twenty-two and fresh out of college when his father and Gaby's mother had been killed in a car accident while touring Italy. Overwhelmed by the suddenness of it, and all the attendant details that had been left to him to resolve as Trenton Fontaine's only son, when it had come to Gabrielle, he'd done the only thing he could do. Take care of her.
Max's mother—Trenton Fontaine's first wife—hadn't been any help. Already on husband number four, she'd wanted nothing to do with the offspring of the woman her first husband had left her for. Through most of high school and all of college, Max had been largely estranged from his international financier father, and consequently knew next to nothing about his much younger half sister other than she was already something of a budding tennis prodigy even at such a young age.
Their first meeting had been at the funeral and it hadn't gone especially well. A little darling she was not, but then, she'd just lost the only family she'd ever known, so he hadn't expected much to begin with. Then he'd learned that Gaby's mother had no family, and as the only legal adult and next of kin in his father's family, Max either accepted taking on guardianship of his little sister
…
or allowed her to be shipped off into the state system. Which meant there was no other choice.
The only blessing—if there was one in all that mess—was that Trenton Fontaine had left the two of them quite well taken care of financially. So at least Max hadn't had to worry about
that while figuring out what the hell to do about his talented, snotty, eight-year-old precocious sister's welfare. His father's lawyer had suggested he enroll her in a private girls' boarding school, so Max could get on with his life. They'd only have to see each other during holidays and summer breaks.
Admittedly, it had been a tempting idea, for about two seconds. But it would have meant abandoning her all over again. Having been largely abandoned by his own father, and his mother, as well, seeing as she had always been more focused on finding her next husband than worrying too much about wha
t
ever Max was doing
…
he couldn't do that to Gabrielle.
For all that his father and his young second wife had traveled extensively, from what he could tell, they had doted on their only child. Perhaps too much. Private lessons, private tutors, private coaches. She was both an athlete and debutante-in-the-making. Part of Max was a bit jealous, but there was little use in nursing old grudges, and besides, it was hardly Gaby's fault.
Looking at her now, it was impossible to imagine what life would have been like without her. And he didn't want to. Come what may, they were family. It might not be the kind of family he
'
d yearned for growing up, but for better or worse, it was the one he'd been handed. And it was a damn sight better than having none at all. Which was probably why he was so protective of it, of her. He wanted to do right by her in the way he wished his parents had done right by him.
He pushed her dark, fringy bangs off her forehead. She was still too wise for her years. Her body, her brains, and her talent had all matured at a far-too-rapid pace. But sometimes those dark eyes were still the same ones staring up at him out of that eight-year-old's tearstained face. Defiant and terrified all at the same time, as she demanded to know what in the hell he was going to do with her.
In retrospect, he supposed he should have given up trying to get her not to swear right then.
"Humor me these next two weeks, 'kay?" he asked softly. "Worst case is you'll be pampered and get a little rest." A smile kicked up one corner of his mouth. "Best case is yo
u'll get a break from your pain-
in-the-ass brother."
Her own smile was dry. "That just might be worth being poked and prodded at." The smile faded and those gray eyes went old soul on him, but she kept her arms looped around his waist. "But I need to gear up for Wimbledon. I don't want a break right now."
She said it so earnestly, with such honest conviction, he wavered. But only for a second. "This is your first time. Not your last. And you have plenty of time to prepare. You'll get court time while you're gone, too. I know you can't take a complete break."
She sighed, but she didn't rebel again. "So what exactly are they going to do with me?
"
Max tried not to sink back against the door in relief. The battle was over. He didn't bother bullshitting her. "They specialize in helping people reach their potential. From personal changes to professional ones."
Gaby gave him a look of wary surprise. But he didn't miss the curiosity. Good. Max was banking on that last part being what got her to open up enough to let the ladies at Glass Slipper do their thing.
"Pro athletes, too?" she asked.
Max shrugged. "All walks. What sets them apart is that they focus in on the specific needs of their clients
…
and do whatever they need to in order to get them the exact help they need."
Gaby frowned now and Max felt her tense. "Just what kind of 'help' do you think I need? Because if you're hiring some kind of shrink to psychoanalyze my game—"
"Your biggest strength, outside that wicked slice serve to the outside, is that you have the most naturally focused mental game on the planet. So the last thing you need is anyone screwing with your head."
Gaby's mouth opened in automatic retort, then closed again as his words sank in. "Uh. Wow. Thanks," she said, favoring him with a sheepish smile.
He tapped a finger to her cheek. "You should do that more often."
"What, be humble?" she said, only half-teasing. "I know I can be a brat. And yes, maybe I have a teeny little problem with anger management, but it's part of what helps me stay focused on the court. If I vent as I go, I stay tuned in."
" '
Teeny little problem'?" Max just gave her a look. "But that wasn't what I was referring to." He framed her face with his hands and pushed his palms up so the corners of her mouth curved. "You need to smile more. Looks good on you."
"I smile all the time," she said through her contorted lips.
Max grinned. "I don't mean that bloodlust victory smile."
Gaby pulled away and gave him a shot of the very smile he was talking about.
"Yeah, that one," he said as she stuck her tongue out at him.
"So when am I being committed?" she asked, flopping back on the bed, all sixteen-year-old once again.
"Tomorrow morning. Oh-nine-hundred."
She groaned, but was already clacking away at her keyboard. "No boot-camp references. I'm already boycotting this whole thing, anyway."
"Gaby—"
"Oh, I'm going. But no one says I have to make it easy on them."
Max just groaned, but he knew better than to take the bait. She'd go, and she might pout about it, but he knew she
wouldn't intentionally make life a living hell for the Glass Slipper folks. At least, he hoped she wouldn't.
She tossed him a glance. "And just so you know, I'm only agreeing to do this on one condition."
"Which is?"
"That while I'm making a concerted effort to learn
…
whatever the hell it is they're supposed to be teaching me
…
you have to make a concerted effort to go out there and get some action."
"I'm not making some kind of sordid deal about my sex life with my sixteen-year-old sister."
"Um, ew?" she told him, making a face. "I'm not asking for details. Just promis
e me you'll get out there and…
you know." She lowered her chin and stared at him. "You do know, right? I mean, you went to college. Do I have to have 'the talk' with you?"
Now Max rolled his eyes. "I am not having this conversation with you." He backed out of the room to the sounds of Gaby's laughter.
"Just promise me you'll use protection," she called out.
"Not listening," he shouted back.
"And you wonder where I get it from!"
Ch
a
pter
3
C
omfortably ensconced in the Admiral's Lounge at Miami International Airport, Wade Hamilton leaned back in the padded leather chair and propped his ankle on his other knee. His immaculately tailored suit moved easily on his large, lean frame. A fact Tess knew he was well aware of and played to his advantage whenever possible. The prodigal son incarnate. Currently starring in the lifetime role of black sheep, Tess tried hard not to be bitter. Occasionally she was even successful.
"So, how's retired life treating you, Tess?" Wade asked, his I'm-harmless-really courtroom smile firmly in place. "Looking forward to the buzz of London, I bet. Make the rounds."
Many a jury had been fooled by that easygoing smile. Not that they should feel bad at being duped. It was the same smile that invited a person to share everything from insider stock tips to where the bodies were buried. And they often did. Much to the district attorney's dismay.
Tess, of course, knew better than to offer up any tidbit of her
life to him. Her shark of a defense attorney older brother had never respected her career choice. To him, playing tennis for a living was something along the lines of having a glorified hobby that happened to occasionally hit pay dirt. Of course, he realized their beloved mother had played professionally, too, but she'd al
so retired young and "done the r
ight thing" by marrying and starting a family. Now tha
t Tess had retired, with no hus
band waiting in the wings to settle down and procreate with, Wade was constantly on her to finally get a real job.
"Yes, Wade," she said, a patently false smile curving her lips. "What would us party girls do if we didn't have the nightlife to focus all our dreams and aspirations on
?
Not to mention a place to show off our latest Dooney
&
Bourke clutch."
"I wasn't aware that you had any left. Dreams or aspirations," he clarified. "We all know you have enough accessories to fill a small boutique of your own." He lifted his eyebrows in faux inspiration. "Perhaps that is something you could do with all your spare time. Lord knows you're as much a professional shopper as you were a tennis player. Surely women everywhere could use your expertise in selecting just the right shoes to go with their eye color."
Tess clasped her hands beneath her chin in equally faux excitement. "Why, Wade, darling, what a marvelous idea! It would be like getting to play dress up every day. Oh, goody!" She dropped her hands and her pretense. "I'll keep it in mind for when I get truly desperate."
He shrugged, his smile steady as he spread his hands in a pretend gesture of admiration. "I can't imagine what it must be like having fulfilled all of my goals before reaching thirty."
She didn't bother to respond. She knew he wasn't done with his cross yet. No point in feeding him any more ammo than she already had. As usual, she was right.
"No matter how many titles you collected, now you're staring
d
own the rest of your life and…
what is there?" he asked, seemingly all concerned about her well-being, but she knew better. He just liked one-upping her in front of their father. "You have to be asking yourself how fulfilling it really was, all that time spent trophy collecting," he continued.
Why didn't juries see just how smug and condescending he was? Infuriating, really. It was so obvious to her.
"What can you take from that into the rest of your life? And I'm not talking about the money, Tess. I'm talking about a sense of purpose. All you know is tennis. Where are those trophies going to take you now except on an occasional trip down memory lane? You know what I mean?" He folded his hands across his stomach and leaned back.
And
…
the defense rests. Slice backhand serve into her court.
She glanced across the table at her father, whose nose was still buried in his copy of
The New Yorker.
How convenient.
Thanks again, Dad,
she thought silently. And yes, she knew exactly what her lovely, oh-so-benevolent older brother meant, all right. Lord knows she'd heard it in one form or another from him for years. Of course, in the past, her healthy annual income had usually shut him up. They both knew that despite his amazing success as a tr
ial attorney, she'd still outearn
ed him for years. But Wade was smart enough not to try cases he couldn't win, especially with her. It was tempting to toss that in his face once again. But she wasn't quite sure even she had the moxie to pull off a bravura performance like that at the moment. And if, God forbid, he got even a whiff of a suspicion about the current state of her finances
…
well, it simply didn't bear contemplating.
Still, she wasn't about to start off several days of enforced close familial contact by letting him get an edge on her. She had other weapons she could use. Tess mentally wound up for the
r
etu
rn
passing shot, right down the line, but her father cut them both off.
"Now, now," their father said, not bothering to look up. "You two settle down." Like they were both twelve or something.
Which, come to think of it, probably wasn't that far off the mark. That had been one of the main reasons she'd left California to live and train three thousand miles away in Florida. But she wasn't going to let Wade get away with this. He was insufferable enough. He rarely underestimated his opponent, but he did it with her all the time. One thing earning those trophies had taught her was how to win at any cost. If she couldn't outserve or outhit her opponent, the occasional drop shot wasn't beneath her. She sent her brother a smile that to anyone else would have looked affectionate bordering on adoring. Wade, of all people, should have known better.
She waited until he reached for his drink, then turned her attention to their father, and said, "It's sort of hard to believe that Bobby is going to be the first one of us down the aisle, isn't it?"
Tess savored a very pleasurable moment or two, enjoying the sound of Wade trying not to choke on the sip he'd just taken. She didn't have to look at him to know he was shooting invisible daggers of death her way. She was well aware of the Pandora's box she'd just opened.
Open a boutique, my ass,
she thought, a tad smug now that she'd leveled the playing field.
Wade's continued eligible-bachelor status was his one Achilles' heel with their father. Who wasn't all that happy about her lack of spousal prospects, either, but the crucial difference was, she didn't care if their father lectured her until he was blue in the face about her inability to
settle down and pop out grand-
babies. Or red in the face, as was the more accurate description. Another bonus to living three thousand miles away. She didn't have to endure the Senator Hamilton parental filibusters except on holidays and the very occasional family event.
Wade, on the other hand, got an earful constantly. And smarted mightily over it. As the gifted, perfect oldest child, that
was one a
r
ea where he continually let his father down. Tess could have told Wade what his problem was, if he'd ever bothered to ask. Like that would
happen. Her brother was movie-
star good-looking, had a career that was on a track so upwardly mobile it would hit zero gravity any day now, and a bank account that reflected his enormous success as one of the best defense attorneys in Monterey County. Hell, the whole West Coast most likely.
The problem with Wade was, he was so busy being successful, building his golden portfolio, and becoming the shining beacon of litigation for one and all, that he'd forgotten to have a life. Sure, he played golf and racquetball and regularly attended social functions, but all of those were merely extensions of his office. He was as apt to be doing business on the sixteenth green or with a squash racket in his hand, as he was in his well-appointed offices in Carmel. Not only did the women in his life come in second to his job, it was a distant, poor second, at best. Wade wasn't attracted to doormats or gold diggers, which was a shame, really, because it would take a rare specimen of a successful, bright, attractive woman, to put up with being second. So rare, in fact, she'd yet to be discovered. And just like that, one of the state's most eligible bachelors was known around town as a rather undesirable catch.
Franklin Hamilton carefully folded the corner of the page he was reading, marking it for future perusing, before laying the magazine down on the table and gifting his two oldest children with his wisdom.
Tess tried not to smirk as she awaited his speech. She loved it when a game plan paid off. It had been her idea for her father and older brother to meet her in Miami so they could fly together to Heathrow. Not because she wanted to spend family time together, as they'd assumed, but because she'd known her
father would have his secretary book all three tickets and pick up the tab. Quite clever of her, really
.
And first-class airfare was well worth sitting through a lecture she'd heard many times before. He'd been all but chomping at the bit to deliver his little speech about their inadequacy when it came to providing him with a legacy. Or as most people called them, grandchildren. Ever the dutiful daughter—all right, all right, so that was an overstatement of epic proportions, but she did give back when she could—she was quite happy to give him an opening.
Tess picked up her dry martini and settled back in her chair. Frank Hamilton never gave short speeches. Just ask his constituents and fellow politicians. Or his children. She crossed one leg over the other, mirroring her brother, even if her faded low-riders and beat-up Nikes didn't provide quite the same picture of aplomb and success his Armani suit and Bruno Magli loafers did. Something Wade would have definitely made a comment on at any other time, and about which she'd have enjoyed badgering him right back. But neither of them dared, not when the Esteemed Gentleman from California had the floor.
"You know, Tess," her father began, turning his craggy, tanned face to her, his eyes still a laser-sharp, icy blue.
She could feel Wade's smug smile next to her, as he basked in the glow of not being the one singled out fi
rs
t. That was okay, she'd make sure he got his.
"It's been a while now, going on two years, in fact—"
"I didn't decide to retire for certain until just this past September," she corrected him, knowing better, but saying it anyway. "You can't count the first year. I was rehabbing my shoulder."
There was a long pause where he censured her with nothing more than an extended stare. She held her own, knowing that,
to some degree, he expected this of her. As always, she did her best not to disappoint. The dutiful daughter, indeed. Just like she'd been the dutiful enfante terrible on tour. Giving the fans and her opponents exactly what they expected. They could say what they wanted to about her on-court theatrics, and often did, but one thing they were all in agreem
ent on: she rarely dis
appointed. She rarely lost, either.
As her father continued to perfect his guilt trip via laser-beam glare, Tess found herself absently wondering what would happen if she just stopped. Stopped doing what people expected of her. Stopped behaving according to pattern, for pattern's sake. Hmm. But then her father was talking and the rather bold idea faded without taking any real shape.
"Long enough," he said, "for you to have found your new direction."
This was the exact moment she'd been preparing for since Bobby had called her a week before. It was imperative she pull this off. London was her last chance to get something going and pull her financial hide out of the fire. It was bad enough that her father thought she was lazy. If he knew she was broke, too? Well, as with Wade, it simply didn't bear contemplating. But if all went well, neither one of them would eve
r
have to know. By the time Wimbledon was over, she would have everything in place. She firmly believed that.
She kind of had to.
"What are your plans?" he asked her directly.
She smiled. It was her brigh
t and shiny facing-a-throng-of-
medi
a-when-they-all-knew-she'd-just-
screwed-up smile. Needless to say, she nailed it. "I'm fielding offers," she said. Okay, lied. She wasn't proud of it, of course, but she was in a bind here. "You've always told me not to jump into something before examining all the angles. I want to make sure I choose wisely."
"What sort of offers? Perhaps I can give you some guidance."
She had to fight to keep her mouth from dropping open. Beside her, Wade took another leisurely sip of his drink. Probably to hide his smile. Jerkface. She hadn't expected this particular turn of events. Apparently some of her surprise must have shown, because her father cleared his throat and sat forward.
"I realize you feel very strongly about making your own way, and I've respected that. As much as I may have wanted to over the years, you know I don't get involved in those kinds of decisions."
Privately Tess fought not to snort. It was true that he'd left her alone to manage her own life as she'd requested, but he'd hardly done so silently. Yet there was a thread of something in his voice that was unfamiliar to her. He'd almost sounded like, well, a regular dad there for a moment. She took another careful sip of her drink, trying to decide if her father was really grappling with child-rearing worries, or playing some political angle to get her to do what he wanted her to do.