Seeing Red Page 9

  “You know how the moms feel about junk food,” Chloe said.

  “Are you telling me you never have junk?”

  “I’m telling you I do what every self-respecting daughter of a health nut does. I sneak them. So if you’re going, I’ll take an old-fashioned glazed. Two.” She smoothed down her short, short skirt. “I’m going in to see if I can catch Braden’s attention.”

  Summer eyed Chloe’s wild outfit before she headed across the street. “That shouldn’t be a problem.”

  When she got back a few minutes later, Bill was in the lot, buried under the hood of Tina’s car.

  “The woman never checks her oil,” he said with exasperation. He wore baggy painter pants, splattered with clay from the last decade, and a Dead Head T-shirt.

  “Doughnut?” Summer opened the box.

  “Aren’t these against Tina’s and Camille’s code of food ethics?”

  “I won’t tell if you won’t.”

  “You know they can smell this sort of thing from a mile away, right? I got caught with McDonald’s once and Tina was mad at me for a week.”

  “Well, if you’re not interested…”

  “Hey, I never said I wasn’t interested.” He grinned and took a jelly-filled.

  “You doing ceramics today?” she asked.

  “For a bit. Then I’ve got stuff to do.”

  He often had “stuff to do,” which was code for picking horses at Del Mar, or playing cards at one of two local gaming houses. He and Tina actually met at one of them, though they no longer played together. This was because Tina mostly lost, and Bill didn’t. Tina would come by and pull from his winnings, which was the only thing that ever made his temper surface. Tina thought it was funny; the man had helped her raise her three girls without a rise in his blood pressure, but she couldn’t mess with his winnings until he got up from the gaming table, or he’d lose it.

  “You’re going to want to hurry,” he said, with a nod of his chin toward inside. “Staff meeting’s going to start before they split up to handle both stores.”

  Summer looked at the new building. It seemed so big and roomy in the light of day, and she couldn’t figure out what had panicked her so much last night. “What’s the mood like?”

  “Excited. Tense too.”

  “Wish me luck.” She went inside and opened the box of doughnuts on the employee table. Everyone promptly ditched Camille’s offering of herbal iced tea and dove into the box to grab their favorite sugar rush.

  Camille refrained from the box with a worried little frown as Socks wound through her legs, purring loudly. “Too much sugar in the morning isn’t good for—” She sighed when everyone practically inhaled theirs. “Well. Okay, fine. Kill your arteries.”

  Summer surreptitiously wiped the sugar off her fingers.

  Camille noticed anyway, and just rolled her eyes. “As I was saying, make sure you all familiarize yourself with the new stock. We’ve just received quite an impressive shipment from Tina and Bill’s spring shopping trips, so that will help with what we lost at the warehouse. More stock is stuffed in every corner of the storage rooms of each of the two stores, in my house, and also Tina’s, so if people are looking for something specific, make sure you check the list.”

  Diana was pretending to take notes but was really reading a manila file-covered Cosmo. Madeline was making little smiley faces on a pad of paper, completely lost to the group. Stella and Gregg sat together, silent but attentive.

  “Call Braden to verify a product hasn’t been sold,” Camille continued. “Or to get a price.”

  Braden hoisted his laptop. His eyes were dark and unreadable as he looked around with a cool, brooding calm.

  Chloe was staring at him dreamily as she stuffed herself with an old-fashioned chocolate glaze. “He’s hot,” she mouthed to Summer.

  That happened to be true, but Summer was thinking hot wouldn’t necessarily feed the soul. And since when had she ever cared about feeding the soul—she had no idea.

  When the meeting was over, Stella, Gregg, and the twins moved toward the door to get themselves downtown to the original Creative Interiors, but Camille stopped them. “I should mention, the fire marshals’ll be stopping by both shops today for any final questions they have for their report. Please cooperate with them fully.”

  Chloe turned to Summer and raised a suggestive brow.

  Summer ignored her but had two conflicting emotions barrel through her at the news she’d be seeing Joe today. Anticipation and trepidation.

  But mostly anticipation.

  Madeline scooted close and showed them Diana’s magazine, opened to the horoscope page. She pointed to Chloe’s, and read, “Your moons are lined up.”

  “So full speed ahead,” Diana said to her older sister.

  Chloe snagged the magazine and greedily soaked up her horoscope. “What does Summer’s say?”

  “That she shouldn’t have gotten out of bed,” Diana read.

  Summer sighed but she couldn’t work up any real irritation because she was still stuck on having to see Joe today. She needed more time to process the embarrassment of his rejection, and to distance herself from the fact that Chloe had been wrong—she wasn’t so irresistible after all.

  Damn, he’d wanted her. She’d tasted that want, she’d felt it. And still, he’d walked away.

  As she’d once done to him.

  Well, damn it, she hoped they were even now.

  She caught up with her mom behind the counter. “Where do you want me to work today?”

  “Oh.” Camille looked around. In her long, flowing flowery sundress and natural makeup, she looked serene and elegant. Socks meowed at her feet and got scooped up, making him look quite pleased with himself. “You know you don’t have to,” Camille said.

  “I want to.”

  “You want to deal with beach cushions and pictures and lighthouses and grumpy toddlers and bossy shoppers, oh my?”

  Teasing sarcasm. The gesture felt like a hug, and Summer grinned. “You know it.”

  “It’s going to be too tame for you.”

  Maybe she was ready for a little tame, ready to belong here. She reached for her mom’s hand and squeezed it with hers twice. In the old days that had been their code for “love you.” In keeping with the code, Camille would squeeze back three times, meaning “love you too.”

  With a distracted smile, Camille squeezed back. One squeeze.

  What the hell did that mean?

  Camille hesitated and then said, “Honey, I’m grateful you’re here, but I just don’t think you should force yourself to stay. That’s all.”

  “I’m not. I want to do this. I want to be with you.”

  Camille looked down at their joined hands. “You haven’t always.”

  The words sat in the air like two thick, black storm clouds for a beat before Camille shook her head. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do this now. I…need some more tea.”

  “Is that what you think?” Summer asked hoarsely, having to follow her mom back to the small employee back room. She couldn’t believe it. “That I don’t want to be with you?”

  “I’m sorry.” Camille said again and closed her eyes, a trick Summer recognized all too well as she did the same when she felt the most. “I know being here is getting to you.”

  “Mom.” She let out a mirthless laugh. “We’ve got to stop tiptoeing around this. Around everything. Let’s just say what we feel, okay? Yes, it’s hard to be here, but I want to stay.” Now you, she thought. Now you tell me you want me to stay too.

  “Camille!” Tina poked her head in, waved her sister over. “This you have to see.”

  “What is it?”

  “Guess who just executed a slow drive-by to put her nose into our opening day business?”

  “Not Ally,” Camille said, shocked.

  “I swear it’s her, wearing a big straw hat and dark glasses, the sneaky bitch.”

  “I’ll be right there.” Camille looked at Summer.

  �
��Honey, I’m glad you’re here, so glad. But it’s been so long since we’ve done this, spent time…I want to give you want you need, but quite frankly, I’m not sure what that is.”

  “You. My mom. My family.”

  Camille smiled, but it seemed shaky. “Well that’s easy enough then, since that’s what I am.” Leaning in, she kissed Summer on the cheek, then left.

  Summer looked at Socks. “So what do you think of this mess?”

  “Mew.”

  “Yeah.” Camille’s hesitation made sense. Summer had run. Only once, but she’d kept going, and though she’d been back over the years, she’d never really put her heart into it. Which meant it wasn’t just Camille’s fault that they weren’t close, or any of them for that matter.

  Summer’d had a hand in this, in driving the wedge between herself and her mother.

  If only it was as easy to undo.

  A large crowd showed up for the official opening of Creative Interiors II, which kept everyone on their toes.

  Joe and Kenny showed up midmorning. Joe wore washed-out, faded Levi’s, Kenny dark blue trousers. Each man had on their white uniform shirts with the badges on them, though only Joe’s looked like it’d never met an iron it liked. He also wore aviator sunglasses, shoved to the top of his head, nearly lost in the mop of wild summer-kissed waves falling over his forehead. Kenny’s blond hair was firefighter short, and he had on his Harry Potter glasses.

  Each man was armed, and each looked quite official in his own way.

  Summer was ringing up a customer at the time, an athletic woman in her thirties who had a younger sister Summer had gone to school with. They were talking about which hiking trails were the best to take this time of year. The morning out there had rejuvenated Summer, and she couldn’t wait to get out again, right in her own backyard.

  Funny, but this hadn’t been her own backyard in a very long time, and yet there was something comforting about claiming it again as hers, something unsettlingly promising.

  But then Joe stepped inside, with his see-all eyes and watchful ways, with his gun and the baffling new confidence, bringing the heat of the day and the heat from something else entirely, and she lost her ability to concentrate. She couldn’t help it, she just stood there for a moment, her tongue glued to the roof of her mouth, every thought escaping right out of her head.

  Then he turned his head and unerringly found her in one sweeping glance.

  The customer touched her arm, bringing her back. “You really brought the trails to life for me, thanks so much. Is it okay to go up there alone, do you think?”

  “If you can read a map.”

  “Oh.” Her face fell. “I could get lost finding my way out of a paper bag.”

  “I could call you next time I go.”

  “Really?” She lit up, and searched her purse for a piece of paper to write down her number. “That would be so nice of you!”

  Kenny moved into the back rooms. Joe didn’t. Summer couldn’t tear her eyes off him.

  “Are you sure that wouldn’t be any trouble?” the customer asked, handing Summer the paper.

  “Not at all.”

  The customer thanked her again, petted Socks who was sprawled on the counter like a fat, stuffed animal, and left.

  Joe stepped close. His gaze searched Summer’s face, his own expression a little tight. “You’re here.”

  Had he thought she’d leave because things had gotten tough? Of course he’d think that. Only she was the tough one now and was going to prove it. “You look kinda tired,” she said, and blinked innocently. “Long night?”

  “Not too bad.”

  “Liar.”

  That made his dimple flash, and he laughed, and she had to admit, she loved the sound.

  Another customer walked in, the hanging bells over the door tinkering merrily. “That’s me,” she said, but neither of them moved. For Summer, staring up at him, she didn’t know what was happening to her, to them, but it seemed to her as if time stopped.

  But Joe didn’t say a word, and with no choice, she dropped her gaze and began to move away.

  Then he caught her wrist.

  He hadn’t shaved again, and those light russet eyes danced with some emotion she didn’t have a name for. There was heat there, too, a carefully banked fire that stoked her own. “Red,” he said. Low. Gruff.

  An odd feeling swept through her chest. She would have sworn it was hope.

  “Hello?” the new customer called out and waved to her. He was an elderly gentleman with a sweet, kindly smile. “I need some help picking out a birthday gift for my wife.”

  “Yes, of course.” She looked at Joe.

  He let go of her wrist, then began to walk away. His long legs ate up the distance of the shop, then suddenly he stopped. Muttered to himself. Eyes fierce and hot, he strode back and nudged her around a wall partition. Actually, not so much nudged as shoved. “What—” she started, but he put both hands on her arms, hauled her up and kissed her.

  When he pulled back, he was breathing hard. “Jesus.” He let go of her and rubbed a hand over his eyes. “You’re screwing with my head.”

  Her own head was spinning, her body throbbing, and she stood there wobbling on her feet. “What was that?”

  “I don’t know but it’s your fault.” He plowed his fingers in his hair, leaving it standing straight up. “You gave me that taste last night, and now I can’t stop thinking about it.”

  “Excuse me?” The customer was apparently looking for her. “Miss?”

  Summer’s knees wobbled through the sale. By the time she’d rung up the man’s purchase, Joe was busy interviewing Braden and Chloe, both of whom had been at the warehouse in the past month.

  An interview with Summer wasn’t necessary, seeing as she hadn’t been in town at the time of the fire, and that she hadn’t been in or around the property for twelve solid years.

  Unneeded. Unwanted…

  When Joe and Kenny were done with their interviews, Joe came back into the main room and shot her one long look that seemed to scorch her from the inside out, leaving her achy and needy all over again.

  “Meow,” Socks said from the counter.

  “No kidding,” Summer murmured as Joe left without another word, needing a fan for her hot face.

  Or a kiss.

  Chapter 9

  Summer waited with bated breath for Joe to show up at her cottage that night. He didn’t.

  Then she decided that waiting for him was ridiculous, and over the next few days dedicated herself to becoming part of her family again. She had dinner with her mother. Lunch with Tina. She dragged Chloe a quarter of the way up the mountain before Chloe cried uncle and begged off.

  For Diana and Madeline, Summer lowered her expectations and took them into the wilds of the local mall, where they tried on five-hundred-dollar Nordstrom shoes for the fun of it and ate pizza at the food court.

  She had another dinner with her mother, and had Camille laughing out loud at the story of Diana and Madeline arguing over a pair of heavenly velvet five-inch Manolos, of which neither could even afford the ankle buckle.

  It felt wonderful.

  As for Joe, he stayed away, and she knew why. He didn’t want to be tempted.

  Inspiration in that regard struck her midweek. She drove downtown to the Fire Department, and the MAST offices. “It’s not the lunch special,” she said wryly when she found him at his desk looking tired, frustrated, and sexy as hell with his hair all wild and his sleeves shoved up to his elbows. “But you’ll like it.”

  He caught the jumbo bag of potato chips in midair. Turning it over in his hands like a prized Christmas gift, he finally tossed it back to her. “I had to give up chips. Even those half-assed baked ones that taste like sandpaper.”

  As he’d once practically lived off chips, she was shocked. “You’re kidding.”

  “Nope.” Joe’s gaze never left the bag in her hand. She’d have sworn he started to drool as he patted his now flat belly. “And bel
ieve me, it was a huge sacrifice—Damn it, don’t even think about opening—”

  She ripped open the bag and came around his desk, wafting the bag beneath his nose.

  “You are evil,” he said, gaze still locked on the bag.

  “Finally my secret is out.”

  “Oh my God.” He grabbed her arm to hold the bag beneath his nose and inhaled deeply. “Those even smell fattening. Stop. I’m begging you.”

  “Okay, you’re right,” she murmured, wanting to kiss him at the look of tortured misery on his face. “I’m being cruel.” But before she could move away, he tightened his grip.

  Holding her gaze, he tugged slowly, inexorably, until she stood between his sprawled legs. “Give. Me. The. Bag.”

  “I don’t want to bring you to the dark side.”

  “Too late.”

  “I won’t be responsible for—”

  “I have a gun,” he said. “And I know how to use it.”

  She laughed.

  He dove into the bag and came out with a fistful. At his first bite, he leaned back, closed his eyes and let out a throaty moan. Then his eyes whipped open. “You’ll leave these with me.”

  She dropped the bag in his lap. “All yours, big boy.”

  Munching, he smiled. It was his first, and it was contagious. “Thanks. You give great lunch special.”

  “You should try my bedtime special sometime.”

  “Oh, no. That would be waaaay too fattening for sure.” Playfully, he tugged at her hair. An old gesture.

  And an entirely new meaning.

  He was enjoying her company. Affection burst through her, and relief. But she didn’t want to push. She’d have to do this in layers with him, so she dipped into the bag for a few chips, then moved to the door. “Don’t work too hard.”

  “Whoa there, Tiger. Hold up.”

  Slowly, she turned back. His hair was still wild, his sleeves still shoved up, but he no longer looked so frustrated.

  Still sexy though. Still very sexy.

  “That’s it?” he asked. “You came just to corrupt me with food?”

  “What else would you like?” she asked very softly.

  He let out a low breath and pushed to his feet. Stopping a hairbreadth away, he shook his head. “Actually, I don’t have a clue.”