BB Dalton Page 2

  “We’ve got a tight schedule. I hope you’re up for it.”

  She really had no clue what his life was normally like, did she? He didn’t bother to explain and just nodded.

  Katie watched BB as she outlined what she considered an aggressive schedule of appointments, press interviews, photo shoots, and live appearances. He didn’t bat an eye. Any other model would have been ranting, raving and calling their agent by now to demand ‘down time’. Not BB.

  She wondered when he would finally stop surprising her. “So, what do you think?” she asked when he didn’t offer any comment besides a nod during her entire run-down.

  He shrugged. “Fine.”

  She huffed out a breath. He wasn’t complaining, but she could tell he sure wasn’t happy, either. “Are you really fine?”

  “No, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to take it out on you.”

  “What’s the problem here, BB? Why are you so against doing this? Talk to me.”

  “I don’t like attention.”

  “Then why did you become a model in the first place?”

  “Because I’m the youngest of nine kids and I couldn’t afford college otherwise. I wasn’t super smart, so I couldn’t get an academic scholarship. I was a good athlete, but not good enough to get a free ride. What I was, was pretty.”

  She watched him give this very enlightening speech. He’d said the word pretty like it made him ill. She guessed being pretty didn’t get you any favors in the Navy. “Wouldn’t the Navy have paid for college for you?”

  “I didn’t know I wanted to join up back then.”

  “And what made you realize you did want to join?”

  She was getting personal, but she was too fascinated to stop.

  “I was in the city for a photo shoot on September eleventh. I watched the North Tower fall. I enlisted the day after.”

  Wow. “You joined up, knowing almost for certain we’d be heading into a war?” she asked.

  He nodded again.

  Still waters did run deep. “That was very brave of you.”

  This time he shrugged and rolled his eyes.

  Damn. Modest, brave, gorgeous, sexy as hell—and too damn young for her to be thinking of him like that. He had to be what? Twenty-six. Twenty-seven if she were lucky. And she was hanging on to thirty-nine just by the skin of her teeth. Sure, she wasn’t old enough to have birthed him, thank god for that, but still, she couldn’t forget how he’d called her ma’am when they’d met.

  He turned more fully toward her now. “What about you?”

  She raised a brow. “What about me?”

  He smiled, the kind of smile that probably made women fall into his bed without a second thought. “Tell me about yourself. You don’t wear a wedding ring, so I’m guessing you’re not married.”

  He didn’t pull any punches, did he? Was this payback for her prying into his past?

  She felt she had no other choice but to answer him.

  “There’s not much to tell. I’m divorced, no kids, no pets, not even a houseplant. My job is my life. That’s it.”

  He looked a little surprised at her brutally honest answer. But only for a moment, then he smiled again. “So then you’re available.” He said it as a statement, not a question.

  She laughed. “Why, you want to fix me up with your father or something?”

  “Well, first of all, my mother would definitely object to that. But on top of that, a date with you would probably kill my father.”

  That could be the most intriguing compliment she’d ever received. Then he continued with a confident smile.

  “So, where do you want to eat dinner tonight after we land?”

  Why did it seem like their professional relationship had just taken a sharp left turn toward personal? And, dammit, why was her heart suddenly beating faster?

  Katie considered this all the way from the airport to the hotel, where she checked herself and BB into adjoining rooms. That had seemed like a good idea when she’d booked earlier, in case they needed to get work done in the room. It was seeming less so now as she glanced guiltily at the locked door separating them and wondered what BB was doing over there.

  The ringing of her cell phone saved her from picturing him in the shower, for too long, anyhow. “Katie Jorgenson.”

  “It’s me.” She heard the voice of her assistant come through the line.

  She had been so flustered; she’d forgotten to look at the caller ID. She hadn’t been around this kid for even a full day yet, and she was acting like an adolescent.

  “Hi, Emily. I was just about to call you.” Yeah, sure she was.

  “So? Tell me. Is he as gorgeous in person as he is in those pictures you showed me? Is he a stuck-up asshole?

  Does he wear actual dog tags? Is he wearing camouflage?”

  Katie laughed. “Yes, no, I don’t know and lastly, no.”

  There was a brief pause as her overly energetic personal assistant digested her answers. “Wait, I confused myself. Tell me again.”

  Emily was loyal and organized, but she was also twenty-three with far too much joie de vie. Sometimes just speaking with her made Katie tired.

  She stifled a sigh. “He’s absolutely perfect for the campaign. He’s very good looking and not an asshole, as you put it, at all. He wore jeans and a t-shirt on the plane, and the flight attendants, both male and female, were all drooling over him. And I don’t know if he’s wearing dog tags or not, I haven’t seen him without his shirt yet.”

  “Yet? Woo hoo! You go for it, girl.” Emily whooped.

  Katie laughed. “I mean we have the photo shoot tomorrow.”

  “Oh. Too bad. I got excited there for you for a minute. I thought you were making your move. I did book you those adjoining rooms.”

  As if she needed reminding. “Well, don’t get excited. He’s way too young for me.” Katie considered that Emily, as painfully young as she seemed, was much more BB’s dating demographic than herself. Talk about painful.

  “What are you talking about? All the Hollywood actresses are dating, even marrying, younger guys. It’s the new in thing.”

  “Yeah, well, they can. I’m a marketing exec, not some star in Hollywood. My boobs are real and they sag, and my face has never seen Botox and it shows.”

  “You’re crazy. You look great and you know it. And it’s been way too long since your last date. So I am going to make you promise me that you’re not going to close yourself off to the idea of letting something develop with him.”

  Katie sighed.

  “Promise…” Emily prompted.

  Katie closed her eyes and sighed. Sometimes it was just easier to give in to her. “Promise.”

  Taking a deep breath, she pictured the hoards of beautiful young women who would be drooling over him after the ad campaign hit. She might as well go stand on the tracks and wait for the next train. That would be just as stupid as falling for BB. It would probably hurt less, too.

  Chapter Three

  “Relax.” Suddenly Katie’s voice was beside his ear.

  He jumped, not because he was nervous about the photo shoot, but because he wasn’t prepared for how her breath against his ear would run right through him. And considering he was standing in a roomful of people in not much more than cotton briefs, it was no time to be reacting to her closeness.

  They’d had dinner together the night before, and sat at the bar and talked much longer than they should have considering they had an early call for the shoot this morning. But he hadn’t wanted to leave her. Besides, no one could see if there were shadows under his eyes with all the makeup they’d slapped on him.

  “I am relaxed.” He took one step away from her and her sexy whispers.

  He was happy he’d put some distance between them so he couldn’t smell her shampoo and picture her in the shower anymore.

  She laughed. “You don’t look it.”

  Well, he sure couldn’t tell her it wasn’t the photo shoot that was making him nervous. He’d fa
llen right back into modeling like he’d never left it. It was that he’d had one hell of a dream about her just before waking this morning that had left him alone in bed, red-faced and with a raging hard-on. He’d thrown himself quickly into the shower to deal with the physical aspect, but the mental anguish remained.

  Of all mornings to have an underwear shoot.

  He backed away another pace and said, “I’m really fine.” He needed to get far away from her. “Do you think I could maybe get a bottle of water?”

  “Of course.” She rushed off and he breathed a sigh of relief. The feeling, however, was short lived. No sooner had she returned than the photographer started discussing the shot with her, and what BB heard Katie say next nearly made him run in the other direction.

  “You’ve gotten great shots of him alone, Pierre. It’s exactly what I imagined when I planned the campaign. The dog tags on his bare chest, the camouflage pants open to show his abs and just the edge of the briefs. But I just thought of something. What if we got a few with a woman standing behind him, while he’s facing the camera? You don’t see her at all except for her hands wrapping around him and kind of groping.”

  Pierre nodded. “Do it. Let me see.”

  Suddenly, the discussion became very hands-on and quick as a wink, Katie was pressed up behind him, groping. The photographer grabbed his camera and started shooting. BB set his jaw and tried to think of something else as Katie’s manicured nail traced the line of hair on his abdomen that led down to his…

  “Perfect! I love the facial expression, BB. Look mean and tough,” the diminutive Frenchman demanded.

  Great. BB was so glad Pierre was happy. Meanwhile, since the studio was so hot because of all the lights, Katie had taken off her winter overcoat and suit jacket and was now down to just a sleeveless top. So her flesh was pretty much adhered to his. In fact, they’d been just like this, only reversed and naked, in his dream.

  “Katie. Try slipping one of your hands into the elastic of the briefs,” Pierre instructed.

  The minute BB heard that, he knew he was in trouble. His mind went to bad, bad places and his body followed.

  He grabbed her hand in his and jumped away from her. “I need a break.”

  Katie immediately came around to stand in front of him.

  “What’s wrong? Are you OK? Are the lights too hot?” Then her eyes dropped for barely a second and she blushed. “Oh.”

  Katie was looking everywhere except at him when he said, “I’m sorry. That was totally unprofessional and shouldn’t have happened.” He was so appalled, the situation had pretty much remedied itself already.

  “Don’t be silly. It’s my fault. My hands were all over you. I’m sorry.” A little furrow appeared in-between Katie’s brows when she finally made eye contact again.

  Even her frown was starting to look cute to him. He was in sorry shape, and over one stupid dream. But actually, he hadn’t dreamed like that in a long time, and it had been one hell of a dream.

  Pierre threw his hands in he air. “He’s sorry. She’s sorry. But I’m going to be sorry if I don’t get these shots done. The schedule you’ve set up is nearly impossible. Transit ads up in twenty-four hours. I’ve never heard of such a thing. Come, Katie. Look and see if we’ve got something you can use so soldier boy can change for the next shot.”

  With a final glance at him, Katie followed the photographer to his computer while BB looked longingly at the ice in the bucket across the room and considered a cold shower.

  The remainder of the day was filled with activity and people. He changed clothes more times than he could count. He posed for some holiday shots where Pierre had him in nothing but white briefs with Christmas garland wrapped around his neck.

  Katie had enjoyed that. She was calling out suggestions of what the ad could read while he posed. She was torn between “What will be in your stockings this holiday?” and “Some packages just can’t wait to be opened.” Humiliating. He remembered very vividly why he’d quit this to crawl around in the mud instead.

  And speaking of crawling in the mud, he posed for shots to be used for the recruitment campaign, too. He went from wet suit to camouflage pants and shirtless, smeared with greasepaint. Every shot was taken in front of a blue screen and the various backgrounds would be added later with a computer.

  Katie spent the morning choosing the shots to be used, working with the graphic designers, and giving final approval to the proofs before sending them to the printer.

  It was hard to believe the Milano holiday ad, the embarrassing garland-wearing one, would be rush printed overnight and hanging in every subway car and even on the sides of a few buses by morning.

  Katie sure did move fast. The only problem was, as much as he respected her business capabilities, he couldn’t help thinking he’d like them to be moving fast in another direction.

  They ate dinner with some execs from Andre Milano who spent the evening being corporate idiots with who he had nothing in common. But at least it gave him a chance to observe Katie unnoticed as they talked demographics or whatever.

  And now, looking exhausted but pretending she wasn’t, Katie was still all business, briefing him for the TV talk show interviews the next morning. The last thing he wanted to do was talk about work, but she looked too tired to do what else he had in mind, anyway. And he definitely wanted her as an active participant if and when that happened.

  “Katie. Let’s go to bed.” He let the suggestive sentence hang in the air, just to see how she reacted. It sure shut her up.

  She raised a brow and hesitated. Unfortunately, her business-half overtook her feminine-half and she protested. “But you have to be at The Today Show by seven for makeup, then over to Live with Regis and Kelly before nine. And then to The View for an eleven o’clock show.

  We won’t have time to go over this in the morning.” She held up a list of questions.

  “Katie, I wake up at five every morning because that’s what I’m used to doing. Give me your questions and I’ll go over them then. We can review them together while I’m in the makeup chair tomorrow morning.” He was sure the guys on the team would just love to jab fun at him sitting here talking about being in makeup.

  Hopefully, they’d never find out.

  “You’re okay with that? You’re not nervous?”

  He was, actually. Modeling was one thing, but live television interviews quite another. Besides that, he was concerned about what he should and shouldn’t say. He’d spent his entire career with the task force avoiding telling people what he did. Now he was supposed to get up and talk about being a special operative without spilling any state secrets. On top of it all, he had to remember to plug their sponsor, Andre Milano. This was probably going to be his most difficult assignment to date.

  But Katie looked ready to drop so he shrugged. “Worrying about tomorrow won’t help any. Come on. Go to bed.”

  He got up and took her elbow to make her do the same. And the look that blazed in her tired eyes when he touched her made him think she might actually say yes if he did ask her to join him in his bed. Or hers. He wasn’t picky.

  BB was amazing. Katie stood off-stage and watched with awe, and something that felt an awfully lot like lust perhaps.

  She’d been a little worried. After all, he was a model.

  It was the rare specimen of that breed that could string two sentences together coherently, forget about carry on witty banter and field questions thrown at them by morning talk show hosts. But BB had held his own with The Today Show team. Even though she could tell he had been a bit nervous that morning, he’d gotten quickly over it. He was a natural.

  And now, on the set of Live with Regis and Kelly, Katie watched as BB stripped off his shirt and dropped down for a push-up contest against Regis Philbin. The crowd cheered wildly while Kelly Ripa counted the repetitions.

  The audience loved it. Hell, even the producer Michael Gelman loved it. They’d be replaying clips of this on every ABC affiliate all day long, Kat
ie was sure of it.

  She laughed as Kelly sat on BB’s back to even the odds, and he good-naturedly accepted the handicap and still went on to win the contest. He graciously complimented Regis on giving him a run for his money, presented him with a gift package of briefs and the segment was over.

  He was back beside her, pulling his knit US Navy shirt back over his head as an associate producer led them to the green room to retrieve her briefcase.

  When they were deposited there and alone, Katie was so happy with how things were turning out, she threw her arms around his neck. “You were so great!”

  He wrapped his arms around her waist. “Really?”

  Shy and modest to the end. “Yeah, really.”

  He smiled. “Thanks.”

  Then he leaned down slowly. Katie watched his mouth move closer. He hovered near her lips, watching her. His arms around her tightened, just a bit.

  She swallowed. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t close that small gap between them. She didn’t have the guts.

  Her insecurities overcame her. She was too old, he was too young. They had a professional relationship that would be jeopardized if they crossed this line.

  Every thought must have shown on her face, because he leaned closer, brushed just the corner of her mouth chastely with his and pulled away.

  “On to the next show?” he asked as if nothing had happened.

  She managed a nod.

  Chapter Four

  A one-hour talk show later and they’d checked out of the hotel and started the two-hour drive north to BB’s hometown. He was behind the wheel of the rental car, half listening to the Christmas carol being played on the radio while Katie read emails on some tiny computer thing the size of a wallet while speaking on her cell phone. BB was once again glad that the equipment for his job usually entailed guns and/or oxygen tanks. This poor woman couldn’t get away from her assistant’s phone calls day or night.

  BB glanced at the winter-brown scenery around him. He hadn’t been home for nearly a year. It had been too long and he was looking forward to his holiday leave.