Ross looked blank. "At the circus?"
She nodded. "Down in the Los Angeles area, you can always find the circus playing somewhere. And we did. He just loved the circus. He would sit on the edge of his seat until the clowns came out, and then he would roar with laughter at everything they did." She grinned. "The poor guy didn't want to be a stockbroker at all. He wanted to be a circus clown. Only he couldn't really admit it to anyone, and the closest he could come was by marrying me."
"You?" Ross put down his glass with a thump as if the very idea offended him. "Don't be absurd."
Charity was beyond resenting it. She'd accepted certain things about her life, which was why her success with her restaurant was so important to her. It told her she really could stand on her own, that she didn't need a man in her life to survive. Despite her kooky background, she could make it in the serious world.
"It's true," she told Ross, smiling a little. "There's something unconventional deep down inside me, and cer tain people sense it. They don't dare do unconventional things themselves, but dating me makes them feel as though they're living dangerously."
Her smile broadened and her soft eyes shone. He almost hooted to think that she could be dangerous to anyone.
"I know you don't believe me, but it's true. It took me years to figure this out."
He shook his head, pretending to glare at her. "I hate to break this to you, Charity Ames," he said with a quaver in his voice. "But you're just not that weird."
He waved his hand dismissively.
"Lovely, yes. A little wild, perhaps. Unconventional. Impetuous. Okay."
He shrugged.
"But you're not a kook. You're not crazy. And you're certainly not scary."
Charity threw back her head and laughed. "See what a good job I'm doing of hiding it?" she chortled.
For reasons he himself couldn't fathom, Ross didn't find it at all amusing. In fact, the strongest urge he felt was the need to defend her-even to herself.
"You seem like a mature woman to me," he went on gruffly. "You run your own life, your own restaurant-"
"And that's important." She shook a finger at him. "My restaurant. My symbol of independence. My saving grace."
She took another long sip of wine and frowned.
"Have you ever heard of a man named Ross Carrington?" she asked.
He looked at her quickly, but her eyes were guileless. There was no sign that she'd made the connection. He took a deep breath and tried to decide how he wanted to play this.