and almost missed his cue. Then Nora shoved him hard from behind and he had no choice but to stumble out onstage.
“This is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever done in my life. I don’t know how I let you talk me into this.”
Annie Malone stared at her older sister, wondering how on earth Sophie always managed to get her to do things she normally wouldn’t even dream of doing. A bachelor auction. Honestly. Even if it was for charity, Annie had a million other things she should be doing tonight.
“Shh,” Sophie told her, glancing down at her program. “Look, this guy is perfect for you. He loves horses and Byron, and he knows how to cook.” She threw her sister a look of censure. “And seeing as how your idea of boiling water is putting it in the oven and setting the temperature at two-hundred-and-twelve degrees, this could be the beginning of a beautiful relationship.”
“I don’t want a relationship,” Annie told her petulantly, “beautiful or otherwise. Mark was—”
“I know,” Sophie cut her off. “Mark Malone was the man of your dreams, the heart of your heart, and you’ll never find another love like him again. But Mark’s been dead for five years, Annie. It’s time to get on with your life.”
Annie flinched at her sister’s matter-of-fact mention of her dead husband. Yes, Mark had been gone for a long time now. But she couldn’t possibly forget about him as quickly as Sophie evidently had. Nevertheless, she countered, “I have gotten on with my life. Quite nicely, in fact. I don’t want or need a man in it.”
“Yes, you do,” Sophie assured her with another quick scan over the new bachelor’s vital statistics. “And I’m going to buy you one. It’s the whole reason I insisted you come with me tonight. It’s the only reason I came myself.”
“I thought it was because you think St. Bernadette’s Children’s Hospital is a deserving charity.”
Sophie waved her hand at her as if Annie had just made a quaint little joke. “Silly. Come on, get an eyeful of this guy. He’s exactly the kind of man you need. You want him and you know it. And I think you should have him.”
Before Annie could say a word in protest, Sophie lifted her hand at the auctioneer’s request for three hundred dollars. She lifted it again when the bidding went to five hundred. And again when it went to seven hundred. And then to one thousand. And two thousand. Annie didn’t try to stop her sister, simply because she couldn’t believe Sophie was going to go through with it. Then she reminded herself that her sister was everything she wasn’t—assertive, confident and married to lots and lots of money. If Sophie got it into her head that she was going to buy a man for Annie, then she would and could sit here and bid all night.
When Sophie started to raise her hand in agreement to a bid of three thousand dollars, Annie grabbed her wrist in an effort to stop her. But Sophie only raised her other hand instead, and shouted out, “Five thousand dollars!”
“Five thousand!” the auctioneer repeated on a gasp. “My goodness, Mr. Guthrie, you are greatly desired.” She tittered prettily at her double entendre.
For the first time, Annie took a moment to consider the man her sister seemed determined to buy for her. She glanced up onto the stage to find that the bachelor in question was very tall, very blond, very well groomed, very good-looking, and, as all the other bachelors up for bids had been that evening, doubtless very wealthy. In other words, he was everything she didn’t want in a man. As she opened her mouth to warn Sophie to knock it off right now, Annie noticed that the bachelor onstage was also staring back at her sister without even trying to mask his unmistakably sexual interest in her.
And that was when Annie really got mad.
Okay, she couldn’t fault a man for looking at Sophie like…like…like that, but this guy was about to burn down the building with his incandescent gaze. So what if Sophie’s henna-stained auburn hair and pale green eyes caught the edge of the spotlight as if born to it? So what if her sapphire evening gown was virtually cut down to her navel and nearly every body part sparkled with gems? So what if her bright red smile suggested any number of unearthly delights? So what?
So why couldn’t the man onstage look at Annie that way, too?
The question exploded in her brain before she even knew what hit her, and for the life of her, she could understand none of it. Helplessly, she looked down at her own modest, long-sleeved, black cocktail dress, and at the simple, sandy-colored braid that fell over one shoulder nearly to her breast. Almost unconsciously, she brushed a hand over the pale freckles on her nose and cheeks that had survived her adolescence along with her well-scrubbed, gee-whiz complexion. And although she did have green eyes like Sophie’s, Annie’s were rounder and less remarkable without the added enhancement of shadow.
All in all, she knew she looked like the wholesome, sensitive kind of woman a man would want to talk to about the other women in his life. Other women who could very easily include her own sister. Annie had been through that scenario often enough, after all.
Of course the man onstage would be looking at Sophie, she told herself without an ounce of envy. What man wouldn’t? Who cared if he was ignoring Annie and focusing on her sister as if Sophie were the answer to a prayer? Annie wasn’t interested in him anyway. If it wasn’t for the fact that Sophie was already happily married, she would. wish her sister and the bachelor the best. Unfortunately, Sophie’s five grand wasn’t paying for a man for Sophie. It was paying for a man for Annie. And maybe that was what was really making her angry.
“Sophie, you don’t have to buy me a man,” Annie told her sister in a grim whisper. “I can find one for myself. I mean, I could find one, if I wanted one. Which I don’t.”
“Not like this one, you couldn’t,” Sophie countered. “Not working with the kind of people you work with.”
“Underprivileged children,” Annie reminded her sister, trying to tamp down her irritation. “I work with underprivileged children.”
“Exactly. Which means you couldn’t meet a decent man to save your life. The men you meet are all social workers and family counselors and public servants and the like.”
“In other words, decent men.”
“That’s not the kind of decent I mean and you know it. You don’t need a decent man, Annie. You’ve got all the decency you can handle in that overgrown, do-gooder heart of yours. What you need is an indecent man.” She smiled mischievously. “The more indecent the better.” She nodded toward the bachelor onstage. “Just look at that guy’s nether regions. He’s going to be perfect for you.”
Annie declined her sister’s instructions and looked at the man’s eyes instead. They were cool, distant and still fixed on Sophie. “Even if he likes Byron?” she asked absently.
“Especially if he likes Byron. Byron was pretty indecent himself, you know.”
“Yeah, I know. I minored in English, remember?”
Instead of answering, Sophie nodded with satisfaction at the auctioneer’s announcement of “Going…going… gone for five thousand dollars!”
“Come on,” she said as she tugged on Annie’s sleeve. “Let’s go get your man.”
“He’s not my man,” Annie said, remaining seated steadfastly in place. “You bought him. He’s yours.”
Sophie smiled wryly, “And what am I supposed to tell Philip?”
Annie shrugged. “Tell him you’re going to lovely, romantic Cape May for the weekend with one of Philadelphia’s most prominent architects and indecent bachelors.”
Her sister gazed at her mildly. “And then Philip will divorce me. Is that what you want?”
She shrugged again. “You’re the one who bought Mr. Wonderful up there, not me. I’m not going anywhere with him.”
Sophie