Kissed Blind (A Hot Pursuit Novel Book 2) (28 page)

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I took my time the next day and went through my spiel, polishing my words. But morning had somehow faded into late afternoon. I had to stop dragging my feet or I’d never do what I needed to do. It was now or never, and I had to at least see if Vance and I would ever have a chance. I was a nervous wreck.

I took the gift I’d gotten Vance and sealed the check in an envelope. It was nearing dinner time when I finally left my house. Becca had texted me throughout the day and gave me more than one pep talk. I was as ready as I was ever going to be.

I pulled in behind Vance’s car and gathered my things from the back seat, taking a moment to catch my breath; my lunch wanted to come up. I walked to his door in slow motion and knocked. My heart threatened to jump out of my chest, and I almost ran back to my car, but by the time I heard his footsteps, it was too late.

The familiar air inside his house brushed my face when he opened the door. He looked at me, confused.

“Hi,” I said.

“Hey.” He looked over my shoulder for the reason I was standing on his porch. “What’s up?”

“I have some things I need to say to you. Can I come in?”

He hesitated. For a moment I thought he might say no, but then he held his door open wide. I picked up the bag at my feet and walked in.

“What’s that?”

“I’ll get to it in a second. Come sit down with me.” I walked into his family room and sat on the couch.

He sat in his chair across from me and leaned back. “So what’s up?”

Everything I’d prepared to say disappeared from my head. “How’s your dad?”

“Good.”

“And your mom?”

“Good.” He sighed. “What do you want? We covered this yesterday.”

I tried to swallow, but the well had run dry. “I… um… I wanted to tell you to your face that I’m sorry.”

He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “Is that right? For what exactly?”

“For everything. The way I’ve treated you in the past and cast you aside whenever Gabe came along. I’m sorry for the fight we had in the hotel mostly and for all the awful things I said and did.” I cleared my throat. “It’s just when you pushed me aside—”

“Damn it! I did not.”

I held up my hand. “Just wait and let me finish. I felt like you did, but it was only because I was jealous.”

“Jealous? Of what? Cici?”

“Yes, and I know that makes me a total hypocrite.”

His eyes opened wide. “Yeah, it does.”

“I know. And I wish I’d known all those years ago, before we started working at B&B, that you were interested in me. I really didn’t think you were.”

“Uh huh…”

“Because if I had.” Air filled my lungs, but I felt like I was suffocating. “I might never have gone out with Gabe.”

He slumped back and tilted his head. “Really?”

“Really.” I reached into my bag and pulled out the envelope. “Over the years, I’ve thought of you as my best friend, and I’ve thought of your family as my family, and when your family needs help, I want to help them.” I walked next to him and handed him the envelope. “I want you to have this and use it where it can help the most.”

He opened the envelope and stared blankly at the check I’d written, giving him all of Camille’s money. “I can’t take this.”

“Yes, you can. Besides, I did it for you anyway. And knowing the circumstances behind this money, it should be used for something good. Save their house, pay some bills, make their life easier.”

He stood and pulled me into his arms. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Say you’ll forgive me?” I tried to hold back the tears welling in my eyes.

He released me and held me in his gaze. “I thought you said I’d never make you cry.”

“I’m not crying.”

He wiped the tear rolling down my cheek and gave me a crooked grin. “How could I stay mad at you?”

“I make it kind of easy sometimes.”

“No argument there.”

I punched his arm. “Watch it.” I glanced over my shoulder at the bag on the floor. “I have one other thing for you too.”

“I can’t take anything else. I almost got us fired. It isn’t right. This is more than enough.”

I handed it to him. “Just shut up and open it. The money is to help your mom and dad, but this is for you.”

He sat back down with the bag between his feet, reached inside, and pulled her out. He ran his hand over the plastic window. “Annabelle Lee?”

“I know it’s probably stupid, but I saw your face when your sisters gave you a hard time about this doll, and I had to find her for you. It made me sad that you lost something so special. I thought you could save her and give her to your daughter one day.”

He stared at her, the pretty Annabelle Lee, the
Cabbage Patch
doll with long, dark brown hair, and said nothing. Doubt weaseled its way into my head. He probably thought it was the dumbest thing ever and was going to laugh at me.

“Say something. You think it’s stupid, don’t you?” I tried to take it from his hands.

He snatched it back. “No. This is, without a doubt, the sweetest thing anyone has ever given me. Thank you.”

I tipped one shoulder to my ear. “You like it? Really?”

He rose to his feet and held my arms. “I love it.”

“Okay good, because there’s one more thing I have to say and I have to get it out before I lose my nerve.”

He set Annabelle Lee down. “All right.”

“I’ve come to a conclusion that I’ve been afraid to say out loud because it might screw some things up.” I gathered up the courage to look in his eyes. “Vance DeLuca, you are the most arrogant man I’ve ever known. You frustrate me to no end and no one on this earth knows how to irritate me more than you.”

He pursed his lips. “You’re really sweet talkin’ me here.”

“Shush and let me finish.” I took one more deep breath, and the last line of my prepared speech came back to me. “You are my past, the meaning to my present, and I can’t imagine my future without you. I… I think I love you.”

He held a blank stare.

My heart pounded. “Please say something.”

He took a step toward me and held my face in his hands. “Say it again.”

I smiled. “I think I love you.”

He shook his head slightly and blinked like he’d seen something he couldn’t believe. “I—”

The doorbell rang, and he grunted. “Damn it.” He let go of me. “Don’t move.”

“Expecting someone?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

He opened his front door, and when I heard her voice, I could have died.

“I did it! I’m choosing to live the life I want to live, and that life includes you.”

I stepped into the foyer, and Cici stood on Vance’s porch with two suitcases at her feet. He glanced back to me and then to her with a look I couldn’t describe.

“Uh, come in.”

THE END…

Page forward for an excerpt from Acts of Desperation

Excerpt from Acts of Desperation

Chapter One

Sarah slumped back on the park bench next to me with a sigh. “So what’s new? How’s the studying going?”

Sarah and I had sought shelter from the oppressive Midwestern heat under a towering oak. In the shade it was five degrees cooler, but when comparing ninety-five to a hundred, five degrees didn’t make much of a difference on how it felt. Anyway I sliced it, it was hot.

A warm gust of wind blew, teasing us, but instead of lending relief, it was as if I’d stuck my head inside a preheated oven; it took my breath away. The wind whipped Sarah’s wavy, light brown hair against her cheek and she reached up, tucking it behind her ear. Mine was pulled back so it wasn’t a nuisance; I knew better than to wear it down in weather like this and have it stick to my skin.

It was odd admiring her thick locks now. Growing up, people always mistook us for twins, even though Sarah had spent her time getting perms and trying to get the waves I had had naturally. But as I grew up, my hair straightened and Sarah’s magically got wavier and wavier.

Hair, makeup, clothes, everything about her was as it should have been, and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something was different about her. After a few fleeting thoughts, I figured she was probably just tired; she did have two little boys to run after all day long. That could wear anyone out. I turned and smiled out as we kept a watchful eye over my nephews.

“Really well,” I said. I was in the middle of law school, and every waking hour of my life was spent with my nose buried in a book. “But, I have some exciting news.” I was practically bursting out of my skin—nothing ever felt real until I shared it with my big sister.

“Yeah.” She sighed.

“I met someone.” I smiled.

“You did? That’s great.” She smiled back, but it lacked sincerity. I waited for the follow-up questions she would normally ask, but when they didn’t come, I offered up the details.

“Yep. I went with my study group to a bar a couple of weeks ago. This guy walked right up and asked me to dance. His name’s John—he’s in advertising. We’ve gone out a couple of times already and he’s been calling me a lot. I’ve got a feeling about him.”

“Oh, yeah? That’s great,” she said, forcing another weak smile.

I looked directly at her. “All right, that’s two ‘that’s greats’
and two fake smiles. What’s up with that? I just told you about a new guy and this is all you’re giving me? Come on!” I gave her my wide-eyed grin, but that was when I noticed tears welling in her tawny eyes. “Umm…I’m just teasing you.”

“Sember, I think something’s wrong,” she said.

“What?” I asked.

“I think he’s cheating on me,” she said.

“
Who
? Anders?” I said, wide-eyed.

Sarah and Anders had met on the night of Sarah’s twenty first birthday. He wasn’t handsome in the traditional sense, but what he lacked in looks he made up for with charisma. It had been a whirlwind romance and after dating for three years, he’d proposed. They’d been together for thirteen years. The thought of him cheating was completely absurd.

“No way. Why would you think that?” I squinted.

“I don’t know...something’s going on, and I don’t know what else it could be. He’s being so mean to me and he’s never home anymore.”

“Well.” I paused. “He has been laying the foundation for his business.” Anders had invested many years in college trying to nail down his specialty. He’d spent his career working for other people, but after graduating law school he’d finally started his own business law practice. “He’s worked his whole life to get where he is. I’m sure it’s stressful and he just doesn’t want to fail.”

“Maybe. He has gotten all kinds of new clients and the money is rolling in.” She shrugged.

We sat silently for a couple of minutes, watching the boys playing in the mulch around the swings.

“And,” she said, “he has been really busy—he even tried to get me to quit teaching and to come work for him.”

“He did?” I tilted my head to the side. “But you love your job.”

“I really do which is why I’m not doing it,” she said. “And besides, I’m not interested in working in a law office, or for my husband for that matter. I love teaching and molding all those little first grade minds. I’d miss it too much.”

“I’m sure he could understand that.”

“No.” She laughed. “We actually got into a huge fight and he said I wasn’t supporting him and then he insulted my job. He said I only worked part
effing
time anyway. He couldn’t understand why it would be such a big deal.”

“Part time?” My mouth fell open.

“I get my summers off so he sees that as part time. I got upset and started to cry so he stormed off and locked himself in his office. But when he came out later, he acted like the fight never happened. It was bizarre. I just don’t know what’s going on with him.”

“He probably realized he was being an ass and let the subject drop. You know how guys can be. They recover from things a lot quicker than we do. And, it sounds like a classic case of stress to me. It can make people do crazy things.” I tried to breathe away the heavy feeling weighing down my chest. “I cry a lot when I get overwhelmed. Maybe this is his way of coping.”

“Maybe.” She huffed. “But then I made him his favorite dinner later that night to try to smooth things over and he said he wasn’t hungry. He went off about looking for a bigger house.” She stared out blankly, confused. “He pounded on the kitchen cabinets and yelled at me. He said I’d be happy living in our ‘crappy little house’ on our ‘crappy little street’ for the rest of my life. I had no idea where any of it was coming from.”

I gasped. “That doesn’t sound like him at all. I thought you both loved that house.”

“
I
do. And we’ve put so much work into it. Dad spent two years building all those cabinets in the kitchen. It was our first place together and where the kids were born. It would break my heart to leave. But he said we need to ‘live near people of our status’...whatever that means.”

“That does sound a little weird, but I still can’t see him cheating on you. Sounds like his business is really taking off so it has to be stress…or a mid-life crisis maybe? His dad just died and they were really close. He just turned forty. It’s a lot of stuff to process.”

“I don’t know.” She sighed. “At least he’s only gone travelling three days this week. He’s supposed to be home tonight, but he’s usually gone five to six days in a row now. He’s being really secretive about where he’s staying, too. Sometimes he doesn’t even call home to talk to the kids, let alone me.”

“That’s gotta be hard on you not having any help with the kids.”

“With all the activities he keeps signing the kids up for and with me teaching, I’m running around like a chicken with its head cut off. When he’s not here it’s really tough.”

“I bet.”

“He started taking French lessons, too.” She scrunched her brows together. “He said it’s so he can communicate with one of his new clients.” She looked down and swallowed hard, blinking back tears as her oldest son, Will, came running across the yard.

“Mommy! Did you see me! I made it all the way across the monkey bars without letting go. I did it!” He giggled. 

She forced a smiled. “Darn it! I missed it.” Her voice shook. “Show me again and I’ll keep my eyes on you the whole time. Make sure your brother isn’t eating the mulch, okay?” He nodded and ran back off. She looked out in his direction but with vacant eyes.

“Sarah, he’s got a lot going on and marriages have ups and downs. Remember the fights Mom and Dad had when we were growing up. Dad bought a motorcycle during his mid-life crisis. Mom practically lost her mind every time he drove off on it, but when he came to his senses a year later, he sold the bike and life got back to normal. I’m sure it’s the same thing—just a little rough patch. Give it some time and I’m sure it’ll blow over.”

“I hope you’re right,” she whispered. “I’m hoping we can talk tonight when he comes home.”

A ding came from her pocket. She reached in and grabbed her phone. When she read the screen, her eyes filled with tears again.

“What’s wrong?”

“He said he’s not coming home tonight.”