To Catch a Camden (9 page)

They’d arrived at the ice cream shop by then and were lucky not to find a line out the door.

As they went up to the display freezers, Derek said, “Chocolate, right? It’s just a matter of how dark or what extras might be in it.”

“Actually, I like vanilla ice cream.”

He laughed. “You’re kidding?”

“Really rich, creamy vanilla. With little specks of vanilla bean in it and nothing else. On a wafer cone, not a sugar cone—they’re too sweet for me.”

“Okay,” he said with another laugh, conceding to the unexpected. “When it comes to ice cream, I
do
like chocolate.”

“Then there’s hope for you yet,” Gia teased him.

He laughed once more, as if he hadn’t expected that, either. “I’m not sure what that means—was there no hope for me before?” Just then, the girl behind the counter came to take their order, freeing Gia from having to answer that.

When they had their ice cream cones, Gia and Derek sat down at the one unoccupied café table outside.

“So what happened after your father left?” Derek asked when they were sitting contentedly eating ice cream. “Were you and your mom okay? Was there
only
you and your mom, or have you lost siblings along the way, too?”

“I was an only child. And things were rough after my father left. My mom had a lot of health problems—a bad valve in her heart, some immune-system things, bad digestive issues—so she hadn’t been working, and the stress of my father leaving made her sicker. We had to move in with my grandparents, who really did more of the parenting than my mom did because she was just too sick. She died when I was eleven, and I just went on with Gramma and Grampa.”

“So you were raised by grandparents, too.”

“I was. And they were great. They spoiled me rotten, but who’s going to complain about that? I loved them dearly.”

“But they’re not around anymore?” he asked cautiously.

“They were killed in a car accident caused by a drunk driver just before I graduated from college....” Another lump in her throat paused what she was saying and kept her from eating ice cream for a moment. Then she blinked back the tears that came with the memory and went on.

“I didn’t go through the graduation ceremony because they weren’t there to see it—it felt so bad to finish the education they’d paid for and not have them around for the grand finale.” And then she’d leaped into marriage to fill the gap—not only with Elliot and the possibility of a family of her own, but also thinking that the big, close-knit Grant family would embrace her and take the place of her grandparents.

Grief-clouded reasoning...

“Wow, I’m doing a lot of talking about myself tonight,” she said in a lighter vein.

But he must not have minded, because he stuck to the topic. “So it seems like the Bronsons are replacement grandparents for you. But you didn’t have them until three years ago, when you were going through
another
tough time....”

“Divorce that round. My marriage came out of losing my grandparents and finding myself with no one—except Tyson, but you know, no family—and Larry and Marion came out of the divorce. They’re a much better deal,” she joked.

Looking perplexed by that, he part smiled, part frowned. “Two eighty-plus-year-olds in hard times are a better deal than your marriage was?”

“Believe it or not,” she said with a laugh of her own. But she didn’t offer more than that because she really did feel as if she’d been talking about herself for too long.

And since they’d finished their ice cream, she also didn’t think she should draw out her time with Derek more than she already had, because it worried her how much she wanted to.

“I should get home,” she said then. “I’m harvesting in Broomfield all day tomorrow, so I have to leave here a lot earlier in the morning.”

He gave her a slow, victorious smile. “The Tuscan Grill is in Cherry Creek—that’s a long way from Broomfield,” he said, calling her on her subterfuge.

Gia made a face and laughed at the same time. “Oh, yeah...”

“What are you going to do, order the takeout on your way back from Broomfield and pick it up before you go home?”

She merely shrugged as they stood and started back toward her house. “Shh...don’t give away my secrets.”

“Will the salmon be cooled off enough to cover your tracks?”

“I’ll come home, put it in my fridge while I shower and then bring it to them.”

“So you’re a little sneaky,” he teased.

“Only when I have to be, and for a good cause.”

“I’ll bet,” he said as if she were predictable that way.

And somehow that made her feel a little boring....

“Is there anything I can do for Saturday’s yard sale besides bring stuff over in the morning and work it with you?” he asked then. “Do you need help tagging things or setting up or—”

“Thanks, but I have it under control.” She wished she could say the same about her responses to him.

Because she’d been overly aware of every tiny detail since watching him get out of his car earlier.

Because each and every time she so much as glanced at him something tingly went off inside her.

Because there was a part of her that kept willing him to take her hand or her arm, to touch her some way, any way.

Because just walking along the sidewalk with him was so nice that she was keeping her pace ultraslow in order to prolong it.

And all of that was out of control....

“Minna left Sunday for Reno to visit her parents and didn’t get back until today, so Tyson and I have been going over to the church in the evenings to mark and organize things,” she added. “We have almost everything ready, so Friday night I’ll just be directing traffic when the church group gets it all here,” she explained, sticking to her resolution to resist having him come then.

“You and Tyson...” Derek said then. “You’re just friends, huh?”

Even the faintest suspicion that they were more than that made her laugh. “Just friends,” she confirmed. “Since we were both seven—”

“When your dad left.”

“And when Mom and I moved in with my grandparents. Tyson and his family had just moved into the house behind theirs.”

“Did you go to school together?”

“We did.”

“But you never hooked up as boyfriend and girlfriend?”

Gia laughed again. “We were
seven
when we met. I’ve seen him do yucky, disgusting kid things. We had chicken pox together, we’ve gone through bad skin, braces, the worst of puberty, getting drunk at thirteen on stolen liquor at a wedding and throwing up in matching trash cans. I think we’ve just never had enough illusions about each other to be anything
but
friends.”

“You think people need to have some illusions to be something other than friends?”

Gia shrugged again as they reached her house and she stopped by his car. “I just think people
do
have illusions about the people they get involved with as more than friends. They probably
shouldn’t,
but attraction seems to put on blinders and narrow your vision.”

“Are we talking about your marriage again?” he asked.

Rather than answer that, Gia said, “Were your eyes wide-open right from the start with Tyson’s cousin, Sharon-the-wannabe-psychic?”

He smiled a slow smile, conceding her point. “Attraction makes you overlook anything
except
what you’re attracted to. Then, later on, what you overlooked—or missed altogether because of the blinders—is what makes the relationship not work....”

“Exactly,” she said.

He nodded toward her house. “Can I walk you up?” he offered.

“No, I’m fine—the porch light is on, you can see no one is lurking in the bushes waiting for me....”

He actually took a glance around to make sure, but he didn’t insist.

He also didn’t make any move to go around to the driver’s side of his car, staying where he was and looking down at her much the way he had when he’d left on Saturday night.

Just before he’d given her that friendly kiss that had been sooo disappointing....

“I guess I have fewer illusions about you after tonight,” he joked then, returning to their conversation. “Chocolate everything except ice cream—very strange. Sneaky when it’s called for and for a good cause. And you wore braces and got drunk at thirteen....”

“And I talk too much if you let me,” she added.

“You only answered my questions. Most of them...” he said, likely referring to what she hadn’t said about her marriage.

But the way he was looking at her and the small smile that curved just the corners of his mouth made her think that there wasn’t anything about what he’d learned tonight that he didn’t like.

And no matter how much she wished she would have discovered something about him that
she
didn’t like, she hadn’t yet....

Then, just when she was looking up into that handsome face and those shockingly blue eyes and starting to think about kissing again, he must have read her mind, because he said, “How about kissing—did you and Tyson try that out together the first time just for the sake of experimentation or for practice?”

“No,” she said as if that was unimaginable. “I wouldn’t have kissed a brother if I’d had one, and Tyson is like that to me.”

Derek’s smile grew. “I don’t know why I’m so glad to hear that,” he said, his eyes staying on hers.

And staying and staying...

While something seemed to swirl in the air around them, making Gia wonder if they’d been standing that close together the whole time or if they’d somehow moved closer.

Close enough so that he didn’t even have to touch her. He just leaned over enough to kiss her—this time not on the cheek like any friend might, but on the lips.

And oh, but that was so, so much better than the kiss on the cheek!

Because he was so, so good at it!

His lips were warm and just right—parted just the right amount, not too dry, not too wet, just a little sweet. And he let the kiss go on long enough for her to kiss him back, all with that indescribable something in the atmosphere around them, making where they were, who they were and everything else feel as if they were somewhere outside of time, protected from it all....

But just when she was drifting away on that kiss, it ended.

Long before she wanted it to....

And he went back to looking down into her eyes for a moment until he said, “I’ll see you Saturday morning.”

Gia nodded, working to find her voice. “I’ll be putting things out by seven and there’ll be coffee.”

“I’ll need a lot of it at seven. See, one less illusion about me—I’m not a morning person.”

“Me, neither,” she confessed.

“Good,” he said, as he turned and went around his car to unlock his door, adding with a second nod at her house, “Go on. If you won’t let me walk you up, I at least need to see from here that you’re inside.”

Following orders, she went up the walkway to her porch, slipping her house key out of her pocket so she could unlock her door when she reached it.

Then she went inside, turned, waved and called, “Safe!”

He smiled, waved back and got behind the wheel.

Leaving Gia to wonder what in the world was going on between them.

And knowing that she shouldn’t be letting it....

Chapter Seven

“T
hanks for the help,” Derek said to Louie Haliburton.

It was late Friday night and Derek and Louie had just finished loading Louie’s truck with items for Gia’s yard sale on Saturday. They were in the garage of the Camden family home, where the truck would stay until Derek picked it up in the morning.

Louie accepted the open beer Derek had gone into the house for and sat on a stack of boxes to drink it. “Thanks,” he said.

Derek sat on the steps that led to the kitchen. “No, thank you for the help,” he countered, taking a long pull of his own beer before leaning forward to brace his elbows on his knees, holding the bottle between them.

“This is all for somebody’s yard sale?” Louie asked, even though he knew the answer because Derek had told him. “You’re helping out some old couple with problems?”

“Yeah. There were donation jars around for the same cause—you probably saw them.... Couple’s name is Bronson...”

“Yeah, I did see those. That what got you involved?”

“That and they’re members of a church that one of GiGi’s friends belongs to, so she wanted us to help out,” Derek said, telling a partial truth to cover the real reason.

“And this Gia you’ve been talking about all night is behind it?”

“Have I been talking about her all night?” Derek was aware of always thinking about her—that had been going on since he’d met her and he couldn’t seem to stop it. But he’d mentioned her to Louie, too? Without even realizing it? And a noteworthy amount?

Strange.

“Her name’s been about every other word you’ve said tonight,” Louie went on. “Gia this. Gia that. Gia says this, does that, thinks this or that. You’ll ask Gia about some natural remedy for Margaret’s allergies and for the wart on my finger because she’s some kind of plant scientist or something.”

Derek chuckled. “A botanist. For a company that makes supplements and natural remedies for things,” he clarified, before adding, “Sorry, I didn’t realize how much I was talking about her.”

“She sounds like a nice girl. I’m surprised you like her.”

“Who said I like her?”

Louie merely gave him a look over his beer bottle as the older man took a drink.

“I don’t...you know...
like
her like I’m interested in her,” Derek protested.

“Sound pretty interested to me...”

Hard to deny when he’d apparently talked about her all night. When he knew how she was on his mind constantly. When twice he had ignored every warning in his head and kissed her....

“I’m trying to take a breather from women,” Derek said.

Trying
to...

Before he’d met Gia he’d been
determined
to....

“After Vegas, you know...” he added, not eager to say more than that.

“Turning point,” Louie summed up. “Should have been.”

A man of few words that still managed to pack a punch.

“Yeah...I know,” Derek agreed. And he
did
agree with Louie. And the rest of his family, who all held the same opinion. “I’m just not sure I
can
turn over a new leaf with women,” he confided in the man he’d been going to for advice since he was a boy. “You’re attracted to who you’re attracted to, you know?”

“I know that if you keep doing what you’ve always done, you’re going to keep getting what you’ve got—”

“Nothing. But trouble.” And a whole heaping of embarrassment this time around.

“You’re always saying that the regular girls don’t keep your interest, but seems to me like the strange ones don’t, either...” Louie observed as he raised his bottle to take another drink.

“I never thought of it that way,” Derek admitted.

“You haven’t ended up with any of them.”

“Because either strange gets annoying or
too
strange, or because I’m not weird enough to keep
their
interest.”

“Seems like a flawed system.”

Derek laughed. “Yeah, so far. But you have to admit,” he defended himself, “a little wild is fun. It keeps you guessing.”

“You just guessed wrong in Vegas?” Louie said before he took another drink of his beer.

Derek flinched.

“Wild is one thing,” the older man went on then. “You can put a little wild in anything. Weird is something else. And conniving and devious and scheming that come out of the weird—those are just bad.”

“I can’t argue with that,” Derek muttered. Then he gave the older man a look out of the corner of his eye and an insinuating smile. “So that’s the secret of marriages that last—you just add a little wild?”

Louie merely smiled, not taking the bait to tell stories out of school, and finishing his beer instead.

Then he stood and went to the recycle bin. “If you find the right person, it all works out. Everything you need, everything you want is there. But like I said, keep doing what you’ve been doing, you’ll keep getting what you’ve got.”

The challenge came with the clink of the bottle going into the bin, and Derek was reasonably sure that was meant to reinforce the message.

Then Louie headed to where Derek was sitting, patting him on the shoulder to soften the exchange as he climbed the steps past Derek and went into the kitchen, leaving Derek in the garage alone.

And thinking about Gia again.

The way he always seemed to be lately.

Gia was definitely a veer from the norm for him, that was for sure. She was a Girl Scout through and through, someone without any edge at all that he’d been able to find.

But he still liked her. He was still interested in her.

He wasn’t sure why, but he was, and after kissing her on Wednesday night it was pretty clear that he was failing at laying low for a while when it came to women.

But since she
was
a Girl Scout and he hadn’t yet lost
interest in her, maybe he should ride this out and see where it went, he thought. Explore it a little.

Carefully, though.

He didn’t want to hurt her.

He wouldn’t hurt her for anything in the world. It would be a crime with someone like her.

So he had to be careful in case his attraction to her was only a subconscious overcompensation for the fiasco of Vegas—a sharp recoil from that to someone who was the exact opposite.

Because if that was the case, when the fog had lifted, he might not be so infatuated with Gia. He might return to his old pattern and lose interest.

But the fact was, he
had
found some appeal in Gia, and he couldn’t deny it.

Hell, he couldn’t resist it.

No matter how hard he tried.

* * *

Gia’s yard sale was a success. There was virtually nothing left by the end of it.

But after marking and organizing everything until well after midnight on Friday night and then getting out of bed at 5:00 a.m. Saturday morning to set up, when it was finally time to call it a day, Gia was dragging.

Seeing her exhaustion, Derek insisted that she come to his house for a pampering dinner as a reward for all her hard work.

Well, maybe he hadn’t
insisted.
He’d invited and coaxed. But as Gia showered and got ready, she told herself that he’d insisted and that she was too worn-out to put up much of a fight. So she’d accepted the offer for those reasons, not because an entire day with him hadn’t seemed like enough or because she just couldn’t deny herself the chance to see his place and spend a little more time with him.

Besides, she argued with herself after showering, shampooing, scrunching her hair, applying makeup and agonizing over what to wear, today was the last of the fund-raising efforts on the Bronsons’ behalf. From here on, she wasn’t sure what Derek’s involvement might or might not include. A phone call here and there just to check on the Bronsons’ evolving situation? An occasional drop by?

One way or another, she was reasonably sure she wouldn’t be spending entire days with him the way she had been. And while that thought did not sit well, she didn’t want to analyze why, so instead she merely decided that one more evening with him couldn’t do any harm.

So, dressed in a pair of black cigarette pants and a flowy white lace top over a tank that fitted her like a second skin, she drove the short distance from her house to his in the heart of one of Cherry Creek’s most coveted gated communities.

His house was a sprawling gray-brick ranch built in an L shape around a stone drive that led to a four-car garage.

“Wow! This is
not
what I expected,” Gia said as he let her in the oversize front door and she stepped into a traditionally furnished space that was homey despite its size.

“What did you expect?”

“Fraternity house chic?
Playboy
mansion? Snake aquariums—”

“Snake aquariums?”

“You sort of have a reputation.... Tyson says one of Sharon’s friends who you dated after her was big on snakes, so I thought maybe—”

“No, no snake aquariums for me. I like snakes, but not when you wake up in the middle of the night and find that one has gotten out and into bed with you—”

“Eww!” Gia said in horror.

He laughed. “Yeah, can’t say I was thrilled. So no, no snakes. You can relax.”

But as he led her through the expansive entrance to a great room and very impressive kitchen she continued to find the house surprisingly cozy. It had the air of a place that was built for a large family.

“No snakes, but are you sure your wife and half dozen kids aren’t coming out any minute?” she said, taking in the sight of the kitchen with its six-burner gas stove and built-in grill, the double ovens, more cupboards than she would know what to do with, the island with its eight bar stools and the dining table not far from it with seats for twelve.

“
Annulled,
remember? So no wife. And no kids anywhere, either,” he assured her.

“You just rattle around this big place by yourself?”

“I do. I was looking for a house when it came on the market and it was such a good buy—almost fully furnished, and I even liked the furniture—so I decided to go for it even if it is more house than I need right now. I figure someday I won’t be the only one here. And I come from a big family—having poker night or a movie night or a dinner calls for—” he waved a hand negligently in the air “—all this.”

Right...

Big family.

Big, close-knit family.

With a history of doing things that weren’t nice.

It was a reminder for her.

A warning that she needed to not be distracted by the fact that he looked fabulous freshly showered, wearing jeans that perfectly skimmed a fantastic derriere and thick thighs, and a gray mock-neck T-shirt that caressed every muscle of impressive shoulders, pecs and biceps.

And he smelled good, too....

“It’s beautiful,” she said about the house, wishing he was less attractive himself.

“Thanks. I thought we’d eat French tonight—there’s a new bistro that I heard was good and they deliver. Deliver
ed
—about ten minutes ago. I set us up outside. I’m trying to get every last minute I can on the patio before the weather turns and it gets too cold. There’s French wine waiting out there for us, too.”

He leaned close and confided, “And for dessert they have what I’m told is a remarkably dark chocolate cake with twelve thin layers of cake separated by ganache—I’m not quite sure how that’s different from frosting, but I guess it is.”

“Frosting has confectioner’s sugar. Ganache is just chocolate and cream,” she explained.

“And your eyes get a special sparkle just saying it,” he observed, laughing. “I also got a crème brûlée—maybe we can share. Although I promise not to eat a full half of your cake, maybe just a bite or two.”

“Good, because crème brûlée does nothing for me,” she joked.

“The patio is out this way,” he directed, ushering her past an entertainment center with a nearly theater-size television at its heart and through sliding doors to his backyard.

Unlike the rest of the house, the yard was not massive. In fact, it was smaller than Gia’s and taken up primarily with a stone-paved patio surrounded by a tiered rock garden.

It was equally as beautiful as the house, though, and she told him so. “You just need some greenery and some flowers planted around the rocks for color—all you have is moss.”

“Maybe I can be your next project...” he said in a way she didn’t take seriously.

There was a waterfall within the rocks, and one of the three patio tables he had was positioned right in front of it. The table was set for two, complete with plates, napkins, silverware, wine and wineglasses. Sitting on another table not far away was a paper bag with the bistro’s logo stamped on it.

As he held out a chair for her and she took it, he said, “We have two steaks au poivre, asparagus, baby fingerling parsley-butter potatoes and bread to tear and smear with whipped butter before we can get to dessert—sound okay?”

“It sounds like heaven—I’m starving!”

“You should be,” he said, retrieving the bag from the other table once she was seated. “I don’t think you took more than two bites of your lunch between customers today.”

Customers who had mostly been people Gia and the Bronsons knew, so they’d wanted to chat, too. So no, Gia hadn’t had more than a scant taste of lunch.

“The Bronsons seemed to enjoy it all,” he said as he poured wine. “I don’t think either of them went inside or sat down for five minutes today, they were so busy talking to people. They had to be worn-out.”

“They were. By the time I left them they had TV trays set up, and were eating the pizza I talked them into having delivered so Marion wouldn’t need to cook. They also had popcorn and their movie ready to watch.”

“Good for them,” Derek said as he took food from containers and arranged it on each of their plates like a pro.

He sat down then and raised his glass. “To you—for all the work you did for them.”

Gia laughed uncomfortably. “Oh, dear. I don’t think anyone has ever toasted me before. I’m not exactly sure what to say to that.”

“How about you just have a sip of wine and we eat?” he suggested.

She agreed to that and sipped the red wine, which was smooth and dry. “Oh, those French!” she said when she’d also tasted her food. “They know their stuff!”