Bravo Unwrapped by Christine Rimmer Page B

and laughing and loudly discussing how“little B.J.” had got her elk. Little B.J., who had gone to bed early, lay awake in the open sleeping loft upstairs, counting the knots in the paneling, thinking that she really hadn’t meant to shoot that bull, and wishing the men would just shut up about it.
    â€œYou’re too quiet,” Buck said.
    She blinked and focused on him. “Sorry. Just thinking.”
    â€œAbout?”
    Nadine reappeared, saving B.J. the trouble of coming up with an answer. The waitress set their drinks in front of them, along with a bread basket, bread plates and their flatware rolled in white cloth napkins. “You two ready to order?”
    â€œI am,” said B.J. She rattled off what she wanted and Buck did the same. Nadine scribbled it all down and hustled off again.
    â€œSo,” said Buck.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œWhat was on your mind, just then?”
    â€œWhen?”
    He gave her a look—kind of weary and put-upon.
    Oh, what the hell? “I was just thinking that I hate knotty pine. Knotty pine is depressing. Every damn knot is like a big, sad, reproachful brown eye—an eye that watches your every move.”
    â€œNever thought of it that way.”
    â€œThis is probably not a good place to be on medication.”
    â€œI kind of like it myself.” He tipped his head to the side and looked toward the center of the room. Admiring the knots in the tables and chairs? Apparently. The light from the hurricane lamp on their table shone on his dark hair. So silky, his hair.
    And thick. Very thick…
    â€œMy dad brought us here once,” he said, turning to her again, smiling slowly when he caught her eye, causing certain responses, certain small, shivery feelings she instantly denied.
    She cleared her throat. “How old were you?”
    â€œPretty little. Maybe five. It’s one of my few memories of him. He was gone so much. He would show up out of nowhere, now and then, for a week or two, and then disappear again. That was the last time he came to town, when he brought us to dinner here. It was before Bowie was born—nine months before, if you know what I mean.”
    She did. Blake had gotten Chastity pregnant, gone away, and never come back. “What a guy.”
    Buck said, “That was pretty much his M.O. He’d show up, get my mother pregnant and leave. He’d come back in a year or so, get her pregnant again. Leave again. None of us ever got to know him or anything. He was the stranger who happened to be our father.”
    Her editor’s brain kicked in. The stranger who happened to be our father. That might make the cutline under a photo of the notorious Blake. They’d need to dig up an old picture….
    And she should be getting this down. Any revelations about Blake Bravo could definitely be usable.
    She grabbed her bag, dug out the mini-recorder, turned it on and set it on the table, down toward the hurricane lamp—out of the way, but close enough to pick up everything they said. “So Bowie never even met his father?”
    Buck eyed the recorder. “Always on the job, right?”
    â€œThat’s what I’m here for.”
    He looked at her. A long look. “I keep hoping for more.”
    â€œWell, don’t—about Bowie and Blake…”
    He said nothing, just looked at her some more.
    And if she’d didn’t watch it, she’d be looking right back, going ga-ga over his eyelashes and the sexy curve of his mouth. “Talk,” she commanded.
    He made a low sound—something between a grunt and a chuckle. And at last, he got down to it. “Bowie, as the youngest, never met our father. And Brand, Brett and I never knew him. Not really. He hardly ever came around, and we were mostly too little to have a clue who he was.” Buck glanced down into his drink and then back up at her. “He had the weirdest, scariest light-colored eyes. Wolf eyes…but I