“You're never safe once you get involved,” Charlie said with a worried frown. “I just don't want you to get hurt.” But he had tipped his hand about how he felt about relationships. It wasn't just about the fatal flaws he found in his debutantes, it was about the pain he had been trying to avoid ever since his entire family died. Charlie was terrified to take a risk. Gray no longer was. It was a major milestone for him. And the fact that he was doing so was a huge threat to Charlie. It was as though an alarm bell had gone off somewhere. One of the members of the Bachelors' Army had defected. Gray saw everything in Charlie's eyes that Sylvia had feared, not only distrust and disapproval, but total panic. She was smarter than Gray knew, about people anyway, and she had Charlie pegged. Maybe Adam too. What Gray didn't like about it was that Charlie's reaction to his situation with Sylvia made him feel not only disloyal to him, but as though he was a total fool for feeling as he did. It was an unpleasant feeling, and put a pall on things, as Charlie signed the check. From Gray's perspective, it hadn't been an easy lunch, to say the least.

“Sylvia and I were hoping that you would come down to the loft for dinner one night.” Charlie put the pen down and stared at him.

“Do you realize what you sound like?” Charlie said with a grim look, as Gray shook his head. He wasn't sure he wanted to hear. “A married man, for God's sake. And don't forget you're not.”

“Is that the worst thing that could happen to me?” Gray finally snapped back. He was disappointed by Charlie's reaction. Severely so, in fact. He hadn't wanted Sylvia to be right. And she was. Dead on. “Somehow, I think colon cancer would be worse.”

“Sometimes it's hard to tell the difference,” Charlie said cynically. “Committing yourself to that extent can be a very insidious thing. You have to give up who you are to do it, and become someone no sane man would ever want to be.” He said it with total conviction, as Gray sighed and looked at him. Who had they become in all these years? How high a price had they paid for the freedom they were hanging on to so desperately? Maybe too high a price. In the end, after defending their independence for a lifetime, they were all going to wind up alone. And suddenly since he'd met Sylvia, it had occurred to Gray that that might not be such a worthy goal. He had said it to her only days before. He had finally realized that one day, when it came to that, he didn't want to die alone. One day the crazy, needy women, and the debutantes and Adam's bimbos, would stop hanging on, or even coming around. They would be at home with someone else. The paradise of freedom wasn't looking quite so good to Gray as it had till then.

“Do you really want to spend your old age with me?” Gray asked Charlie, looking him dead in the eye. “Is that what you want? Or would you like a better-looking pair of legs than mine across the table from you when you're floating around on the Blue Moon? Because if you don't think about that one of these days, I'm what you're going to wind up with. I love you a lot, you're my best friend, but when I get old and sick and tired and lonely one day, much as I'd like to see your face across the lunch table, it could just be that I'll want to crawl into bed with someone else who'll hold my hand. And unless you want to end up with Adam or me, maybe you'd better start thinking about it too.”

“What's happening to you? What's she feeding you? Ecstasy? Why the hell are you worrying about your old age now? You're fifty years old. You don't have to worry about that for another thirty years, and God knows what'll happen to us between now and then.”

“Maybe that is the point. I'm fifty years old. You're forty-six. Maybe it's time for us to grow up one of these days. Adam can still get away with it, he's a lot younger than we are. I just don't know if I want to live my life this way anymore. How many more women can I rescue? How many more restraining orders can I help them get? How many more boob jobs does Adam want to pay for? And how many more debutantes do you want to find something wrong with? If they're not good enough for you, Charlie, then to hell with them. But maybe it's time for you to find someone who is.”

“Spoken like a true traitor,” Charlie said, toasting him with the last of his wine. He emptied the glass and set it down. “I don't know about you, but I find this a very depressing conversation. You may be feeling Father Time nipping at your heels, which seems ridiculous to me, if you want to know what I think. But I'm not. And I'm not about to settle for some half-assed relationship with just any woman, because I'm afraid to die alone. I'd rather kill myself tonight. I'm not settling down, or even thinking about it, until I find the right one.”

“You never will,” Gray said sadly. The conversation had depressed him too. He had hoped that Charlie would share his joy, but instead he acted as though Gray had betrayed the cause. And in Charlie's eyes, he had.

“Why would you say a thing like that?” Charlie asked him, sounding annoyed.

“Because you don't want to. And as long as you don't, no one will ever measure up. You won't let them. You don't want to find the right one. Neither did I. And then suddenly Sylvia walked into my life and everything got turned around.”

“Sounds to me like your head got turned around. Maybe you should be on antidepressants and take another look at the relationship then.”

“Sylvia is the best antidepressant I've ever had. The woman is a total dynamo, and a joy to be around.”

“I'm happy for you if that's the case, and I hope it lasts. But until you figure that out, at least don't try to convert the rest of us, till you know if the theory works. I'm not convinced it does.”

“I'll let you know,” Gray said quietly as they both stood up. Gray followed Charlie out of the Yacht Club, and they stood looking at each other on the sidewalk for a long moment. It had been a tough lunch for both of them, and a disappointing one for Gray. He had wanted more from his friend—celebration, support, excitement. Anything but the cynicism and harsh comments they had traded over lunch.

“Take care of yourself,” Charlie said, patting him on the shoulder, as he hailed a cab with his other hand. He couldn't wait to get away. “I'll call you … and congratulations on the gallery!” he shouted as he got into the cab.

Gray stood on the sidewalk, watching him, waved, put his head down, and walked away. He had decided to walk back to his apartment. He needed some air, and time to think. He had never heard Charlie be as blunt and cynical as that, and he knew he was right in his own assessment of his friend's situation. Charlie didn't want to find “the right one.” Gray had never seen it quite that way before. But it was clear to him now. And contrary to what Charlie believed, Sylvia hadn't brainwashed him, she had opened his mind and filled his life with sunlight. Standing next to her, he could see what he had always wanted, and never dared to find. She made him brave enough to be the man he wanted to be, but had been too frightened to be before. Charlie was still afraid, and had been for a long time. Ever since Ellen and his parents died. No matter how much therapy he had had, and Gray knew he'd had a lot of it, Charlie was still terrified. And he was still running. Maybe he always would. It saddened Gray to think that that could happen. It seemed like a terrible waste to him. He had only known Sylvia for six weeks, but now that he knew her, and was opening his heart to her, his whole life had changed. It had cut him to the quick when, instead of celebrating with him, Charlie had called him a traitor. Gray had felt it like a physical blow, and the words were echoing in his head when his cell phone rang.

“Hi. How did it go?” It was Sylvia, sounding cheerful and bright, calling him from the office. She had finally convinced herself that Gray knew Charlie better than she did, and her assessment of his reaction to their romance was probably all wrong. She told herself Gray was right, and she was just being paranoid. “Did you tell him? What did he say?”

“It was terrible,” he said honestly. “It sucked. Among other things, he called me a traitor. The poor guy is scared shitless of any kind of commitment or relationship. I never saw it quite that clearly before. I hate to say it, but you were right. It was a very depressing lunch.”

“Shit. I'm sorry. You finally convinced me I was wrong.”

“You weren't.” He was learning that she seldom was. She had a good sense about people and their reactions, and she was remarkably tolerant of their quirks.

“I'm sorry. That must have been really upsetting for you. You're not a traitor, Gray. I know you still love them. There's no reason why you can't have a relationship, and them in your life too.” She wasn't trying to pull him away from them. But he had a strong sense that Charlie would, if Gray allowed him to.

“If they'll still let me play. I was pretty candid about what I said.”

“About us?”

“About him, too. I told him he's wasting his life, and he's going to die alone.”

“You could be right,” she said gently, “but he has to figure that out for himself. And maybe that's what he wants. He has that right. From what you've said, he's had some pretty major abandonment issues since his family died. That's hard to get over. Everyone he ever loved as a kid died. It's hard to convince someone like that that the next person he loves won't abandon him and die too. So he dumps them first.”

“That's pretty much what I said.” They both knew it was true. And beyond all his defenses, Charlie did too. He just wasn't prepared to admit it, even to his best friend. It was a lot easier to say that there was something wrong with the women in his life, to justify his rejecting them.