The Bachelor Pact (11 page)

An hour later, he'd made very little headway when he heard the phone peal through the open window of his duplex. He checked his watch and realized it was past midnight. Who the hell would be calling this late?

Rolling out from beneath the car, he jumped up and ran inside, snatching the receiver on the fifth ring. "Hello."

"It's Lance. You don't know where Maddie is, do you?"

Chase leaned against the kitchen counter and wiped the dirt and sweat from his forehead, frowning at his friend's tone. "No, why should I?"

"Blast it to hell. I was hoping maybe you did." Lance breathed heavily into the phone. "She hasn't been home all night."

Chase winced at the obvious. "It's Friday night, Lance, maybe she had a date."

"She broke up with Oglethorpe, remember?"

"Yeah, well, maybe she found someone else."
After she kissed me.

"Reid said she might be going out with that Sophie Lane woman."

"That Sophie Lane woman?" Chase stared at the phone, confused even more. "What do you have against Sophie Lane?"

Lance muttered a curse. "I just don't think she's a good influence. She's nothing but a gossip. For cripes' sakes, she may be trying to get the scoop on the family right now."

"What scoop?"

Silence descended on the line.

"What scoop, Lance? I've known you guys most of my life. Is there some dark secret about the Summers family I don't know about?"

"Hell, no," Lance bellowed. "I just don't trust the woman, that's all."

"So, no one's forcing you to spend time with her."

"You're damn right they aren't. And they couldn't even if they wanted to."

"I didn't know anyone wanted you to."

"They don't."

"Then what's the problem?"

"The problem is that Maddie is missing."

"Maddie is not missing, Lance, she's simply not home yet. Maybe she went to dinner with a friend or to a movie." Chase shook his head at his friend's exasperated sigh. "Lance, where are you?"

"Sitting in front of Maddie's house."

"Do you think that's a good idea?" Chase closed his eyes and pictured Maddie going ballistic when she saw him, especially after Chase had given her a big-brother lecture today when she'd kissed him. Was her late night somehow his fault? By chastising her about the kiss, had he set the wheels in motion and sent Maddie out on some wild night to prove a point?

Lance whistled between his teeth. "I know. But I was worried about her."

"Look, I understand, man. But if you don't want to get your butt kicked, leave her a note to call you and go home."

After several minutes of arguing, Lance finally agreed and hung up. Chase ran some tap water, washed his hands and face, then filled a glass and drank deeply as he contemplated Lance's odd behavior.

He stalked outside, grabbed the hammer again and went back to pounding the Camaro, irritated that Maddie might be out with another guy—one of those twenty or thirty men she wanted to meet. He could see her at a bar, a dozen men ogling her, a half-dozen getting up the nerve to approach her, one or two crossing the line, becoming overly friendly—

He cursed and slammed the hammer down so hard, a piece of metal broke off and went flying across the yard.

Other images followed, each more tawdry and painful: Maddie kissing another man, a tangle of arms and legs, his hands touching her in places Chase could only dream of touching... He slammed the hammer down again as anger churned through him.

Anger that had nothing to do with being brotherly.

* * *

Exhausted, Maddie crawled into the hotel bed late Friday night, although the party outside remained in full swing. She turned on the bedside lamp and cuddled beneath the covers, feeling satisfied and elated. The shower kicked on and she heard her roomie singing. With a few minutes to herself, Maddie grabbed her new journal, glad that after its recent purchase she had accidentally left it in her car. She had decided to record all of her dates so she could look back and compare them. She especially didn't want to forget this evening with Sophie and Marco and Antonio. Her brothers would have a fit if they knew about her date. It would serve them right if they did find out. Chase Holloway, too. But she didn't want them to worry, so she grabbed her cell phone. Unfortunately her battery was low and the bars showed no service. Resigned, she used the room phone and punched Lance's number to let them know she'd gone away for the weekend. The last thing she needed was for her brothers to come searching for her. Lance didn't answer, so she simply left a message, saying she'd be home on Sunday, that she was sleeping over with a friend, then hung up with a grin. There, the phone call should satisfy her brothers that she was safe. And they'd never know about Marco and Antonio.

Marco's too-wet kiss sprang to mind, and she shivered.

An unbidden memory of Chase's less-than-chaste kiss followed, mind-boggling in comparison. The mere memory sent a tingle through her. Would Chase Holloway still call her a kid if he'd seen her at the nudist colony?

Chapter 7

"I can't believe I let you talk me into coming to this... this
nudist
resort." Chase shielded his privates with splayed hands and peeked from behind a bush near the party deck, irritated he'd allowed his buddies to persuade him to walk into this place butt naked to search for Maddie. Saturday morning Lance had found the message from Maddie and seen the number on his caller ID. He'd completely freaked out, yelling that he couldn't believe his baby sister had actually gone to the Open Arms Resort, a nudist colony! They'd forced Lance to calm down and he'd waited all day, praying Maddie would come home. When she hadn't, Lance had decided to drive up and drag her little butt home.

Of course, that meant Reid and Chase had to go with him.

Now they were hiding in the bushes with nothing on but their birthday suits, planning their strategy and becoming dinner for the bugs. And while they were swatting, other guests were partying, having a grand old time. It was almost midnight. Nude people were everywhere, dancing on the deck, strolling in the moonlight, cuddling in the gazebo. Of course, right now, Maddie might be tucked in bed with another naked man and they'd never find her.

Chase's stomach churned at the thought.

A weed clawed at his bare leg and Chase scratched his calf, wishing he could at least have kept his socks and boots! Poor Lance had almost decked the guard when he'd explained that they couldn't enter without taking off their clothes. But Reid had spotted a pretty blonde, shucked his clothes without an argument and followed her onto the party deck. An older man, obviously her husband, had joined her, and Reid had suddenly run for the bushes, claiming he'd simply been asking directions!

Lance plucked a leaf from a nearby bush and placed it strategically over his lower extremities. "I can't believe Maddie let her date bring her here. What was she thinking?"

"She said she wanted to have fun," Chase said. He spotted a grove of trees bordering the trail that led from the party deck and wondered if they could find cover between them.

"She's not old enough to have fun like this," Reid muttered.

"You don't know for sure if Maddie is here." Chase made a run for it and dove behind the red tips just as a group of guests strolled by, laughing and talking as they headed toward the lake.

Reid and Lance trotted behind him, ducking down low. Still, with the three of them being more than six feet, their heads protruded from the tops of the shrubbery like turtles. "Well, if we see her—" Lance whispered, his face turning red, "You'd better keep your eyes on her
face
, Chase."

Chase glared at him. "I didn't come here to leer."

Reid's gaze followed another buxom blonde who perched herself on a flat rock on the grassy embankment, propped a guitar on her hip and began to strum. "Hey, guys, maybe this place isn't so bad."

"We're here to find our little sister, not enjoy ourselves," Lance snapped.

"Who says we can't do both?" Reid squared his shoulders and stood upright as if to leave the safety of their hiding spot. "I'm not afraid to show myself. I've been working out."

Lance gave him a warning look. "Stay put. We have to find Maddie and get her out of here."

"I doubt Maddie will be too thrilled with your plan," Chase said, scanning the crowd. A middle-aged man with a potbelly, an elderly woman with sagging breasts and wrinkled knees and an overweight couple with dimpled buttocks caught his attention. He shuddered. Now he knew why clothes were invented—some people looked better with them.

"Who cares what Maddie wants," Lance said. "This guy's probably a pervert."

"You don't have to be perverted to enjoy nudity," Reid pointed out.

He obviously hadn't seen the people Chase had spotted.

"We're talking about
Maddie,"
Lance said. "What if he tied her up and forced her to come along—"

"Stop it, Lance. You said she came with Sophie, so she's probably safe."

Quiet voices in the distance drifted to them with the faint breeze. A long trail through the woods loomed ahead. Chase parted the shrubbery enough to peer in the other direction.

"That's
supposed to make me feel better?" Lance growled. "That woman's the root of all evil. She's going to totally corrupt Maddie. Just look where she brought her!"

Reid pointed to a half-dozen people of varying ages and sizes, playing volleyball. "Whoa, look at that redhead. She's a natural, too."

Chase gave her a sideways glance, unimpressed. "Do you see Sophie?"

Lance scowled. "No, do
you?"

"No." Chase frowned, wondering why Sophie Lane set his friend off so badly.

"I haven't seen Maddie either," Reid said, his face flushing. "Not that I want to see my own sister—"

"This was a bad idea." Chase ducked his head as a young couple walked by, hand in hand. How the heck was he supposed to handle the situation? If Maddie was here, he didn't want to see her—yet, he did. Only he didn't want everyone else seeing her.

Besides what would they do when they found her? The whole situation would be awkward—would they walk up to her in their birthday suits and tell her to leave?

Chase remembered Maddie's reaction to her big brothers' overprotectiveness and to his big-brother routine—and they'd all been dressed. His stomach quivered. "Maddie is going to kill us if we crash her date."

A muscle ticked in Lance's jaw. "I don't call a night at a nudist resort a date. I call it a-a—"

"A crime," Reid supplied. "She's barely old enough to drive, let alone spend the night with a man in a place like this."

"She's twenty-six," Chase pointed out. And you'd call it a lucky night, if it were you.

But it wasn't one of them—they were talking about Maddie. Maddie with the pigtails and braces and knobby knees who used to ride piggyback on his shoulders...

Who the hell was he kidding? Maddie no longer fit that description at all. She was... gorgeous and desirable, and she'd been coming apart in his arms. Only he'd turned her away, right into the arms of another man. Just the thought of seeing her here nude with some lust-struck Romeo made his blood boil. "Shit."

"What? Do you see her?" Lance yanked off a chunk of leaves as he pivoted to search the area behind them.

"No." He hadn't realized he'd spoken out loud. Suddenly Chase felt a tap on the back. He whirled around, hoping to see Maddie and hoping not to.

Instead the security guard stood glaring at them, his arms folded across his chest. "I think you guys had better leave. We don't like Peeping Toms around here." He gestured toward the clump of leaves in Lance's hand. "And we don't appreciate folks destroying private property."

Chase's stomach did a U-turn against his ribs. How dare the man call them Peeping Toms.

Lance opened his mouth to explain, but the guard pointed over his shoulder to the entrance. "Out, now."

Reid lowered himself to hide behind a tree. Chase thought he saw a head of wild, curly russet hair coming near and panicked. Maddie! What if she saw them getting thrown out?

He lunged forward, trying to shield himself in the overgrown bushes. Maybe he should make a run for it. But a tree branch flew up and smacked him in the eye, and he fell on a pine cone. "Oww!" He grabbed his face with one hand and covered his crotch with the other as the guard yanked him up and pushed them toward the exit.

"But what about our clothes?" Lance asked, reaching for another leaf.

The guard slapped his hand away from the bush. "Maybe it'll teach you guys a lesson if you have to go home without them."

* * *

Maddie steered the convertible into Sophie's apartment complex Sunday evening and turned off the engine. "Thanks for forcing me to go out Friday night."

"It was fun, wasn't it?"

"It did me a world of good."

Sophie gathered her purse. "Are you going to see Marco again?"

Maddie sighed. All weekend she'd compared him to Chase. "I doubt it."

"I don't know about Antonio either." Sophie opened the car door. "Hey, did you hear about those guys in the woods Saturday night?"