When You Are Mine(6)

"Calm down." Kerris used the Zen voice she reserved for her friend's  high-strung nature, nothing she couldn't handle. "We have a great  concept. We have our business loan. And today, we'll get our space. I  have a good feeling about it."

"We'd better." Meredith ran a trembling hand down her face. "I want my parents off my back."

Meredith's parents wished their first-generation Japanese-American  daughter had pursued one of the industries her siblings had obediently  entered-computer programming, physics, or biochemistry. Meredith, to  their dismay, had shown more interest in Vogue than the periodic table.

Freshman year, Kerris had been seeking work to pay her way through  college when she'd seen the ad for hardworking, responsible students  willing to clean. She'd been shocked to discover the owner of the  cleaning business, Maid 4 U, was only two years her senior, and just as  driven as she was. Now, between working together and sharing a small  apartment not too far from campus, they were nearly inseparable.

"This will work, Mer. Your parents will be proud of you. I guarantee it."

"Like I care about that." Meredith rolled her eyes at Kerris's knowing look. "Okay, so maybe I care a little about that."

"Right. Just a little. Where's the agent? I was late and I still beat him here."

"Why were you late?" Meredith peered up the road, searching for the agent and rationing only half her attention for Kerris.

"Oh, I um, I had to go by the hospital, remember?"

Meredith's radar was infallible. She always knew when Kerris was not  being completely forthcoming. With a childhood haunted by dark, shadowy  corners, there were lots of things Kerris didn't want to discuss.  Meredith had learned when to press and when to back away. Kerris's  expression must have led her to press.

"Something held you up there?" Meredith tilted her head, studying Kerris  with telescopic intensity. Kerris always felt like the edges of her  soul had been peeled back under that look.

"No, there was just this new little girl from Kenya." Kerris forced  herself to stand still on the bungalow porch. Maybe she could slide past  without piquing Meredith's interest further. "She's the sweetest thing,  but she has a brain tumor. She was in the crafts class, and I spent  some extra time with her. Sorry I was late."                       
       
           



       

"Kenya?" Meredith bit her bottom lip, a dangerous sign that she was  working out a problem in her head. "How'd she end up here from Kenya?"

"Oh, Walsh brought her from the foundation's orphanage." Kerris leaned against a post, keeping her tone casual.

"Walsh? As in Walsh Bennett?" Meredith pounced, her dark, exotically  tilted eyes lit with speculation. She twirled a lock of the plum-colored  hair she had dyed and hacked into a stylish, blunt bob. "You didn't  tell me you were meeting him at the hospital."

"Well, I didn't go to meet him-"

"But he was there."

"Well, yeah." Kerris felt like a mouse lured into a trap by fake cheese. "He just happened to be there."

"Hmmm, I've never met him in all the years he's been coming to Rivermont."

Kerris narrowed her eyes at her friend, unresponsive to her fishing.

"He's hot, though." Meredith dropped the words between them, curiosity etched on her pretty face.

"Really?" Kerris stripped her voice of all intonation, feigning interest in the still-empty road. "I hadn't noticed."

"Oh, come on. You'd have to be dead from the neck down not to notice him."

That sounded about right. Dead from the neck down included the heart and  all her arouseable girly parts, which had remained stubbornly  unresponsive over the years.

"He's Cam's best friend. That's all I need to know." Kerris peered over  Meredith's shoulder at a car approaching, a Realtor logo on the side.  "Hey, I think this is the agent. Ready?"

With one last assessing glance and a glint in her eye warning she wasn't  done digging, Meredith nodded. Her features set into the familiar mask  of consummate professional and driven businesswoman that Kerris had come  to know and love.

* * *



The smell of vanilla lured Walsh from the warm cocoon of much-needed  sleep. That perfectly sweet scent shimmied up his nostrils and brought  him around. He rolled over without opening his eyes, surprised to  encounter something soft and warm. His eyes popped open, widening at the  sight of Kerris, asleep on his blanket.

She'd pulled her knees up to her chest, and her small hands curled under  her cheek. He studied the woman, wishing she wasn't as spectacular as  he'd remembered. He knew he should let her sleep. She'd been flagging  even in the elevator this morning, leaning up against the wall dozing.  But he couldn't resist.

"Kerris."

She blinked drowsily a few times before jumping when her eyes set on him, leaning over her.

"Walsh," she said, eyes still languid. "Hope you don't mind me plopping  down here to wait for everybody to get back. I wasn't sure where they'd  gone, and I was so tired."

"It's fine. You were obviously as done as I was. How'd it go?"

"Go?" She blinked, sitting up and taking the elastic bands from the  ponytails at her nape. Running her fingers through the heavy fall of  hair, she let out a relieved breath. "Sorry. Those were tight. How'd  what go?"

Walsh watched the thick hair tumbling over Kerris's shoulders and down  her back, forgetting that she'd asked a question. Her eyes slid away as  she licked at that plump, raspberry-colored bottom lip, clearing her  throat and squeezing her lips against her teeth. It finally sank in for  Walsh that his extended silence was making her uncomfortable.

Idiot!

"Sorry. Um, how'd your appointment go?" Maybe his casual tone would  distract her from the fact that he'd practically gobbled her up with one  look. "Weren't you considering some space for your thrift store?"

Enthusiasm for the venture lit her up. She talked about the property,  sketching pictures in the air with her hands, bringing the retail space  to life with her slim fingers.

Cam's girl.

She stretched her pretty mouth into a wide smile, laughing through her  description of the Realtor, who'd been late and eccentric.

Cam's girl.

She bit the corner of her lip, pleating her brows with her calculations of what it would take to whip the space into shape.
                       
       
           



       
Cam's girl.

The reminder beat a guilty rhythm in his head, but he couldn't stop  watching, couldn't stop wishing, couldn't stop wanting to know  everything about her … for himself. Not for Cam.

He felt like a cryptologist facing a magnificent strip of code,  determined to crack it and understand the secret language he read in her  guarded eyes.

"So, let me get this straight," he said when she paused to draw a  breath. "Instead of having professionals come in and do the remodeling  work for your thrift shop-you said it's called Déjà Vu, right? You're  asking for the money so you can do it yourselves?"

"They wouldn't stretch the allowance like Meredith and I will." Kerris's  hands finally stilled, clasping around her denim-clad knees. "And the  money that's going toward labor, we can use on our space. You know?"

"Can't say I do. I like professionals doing the things they're supposed to do, and me paying them to do it."

"Only one of the many differences between us, I'm sure." A wry smile tugged up one side of her mouth.

"What's that supposed to mean?" He sat up straighter on the shared blanket.

"No offense. It's just the kind of response I'd expect from someone who doesn't have to save money."

"Not that again. You do realize this is reverse snobbism, right?"

"Wait, you're calling me a snob?" She threw back her head and laughed,  locking eyes with him. The sound of her laughter, raw and free, punched  him in the gut.

The intensity simmering between them had knocked him over from that  first glance. It was still there, right below the surface, coiled like a  whip poised to crack at any moment. He felt it now, and knew the moment  she felt it, too. The laughter withered on her face, replaced by the  guard she'd probably never meant to let down.

"What's wrong?" Walsh knew. It was wrong for him, too, but he still had to ask.

"Nothing." She didn't look up from the simple floral pattern on the  blanket. Apparently daisies fascinated her. "Just wondering if Cam said  how long they'd be gone?"

Walsh looked up the riverbank, squinting against the sunlight. Their  friends were walking toward them, laughing, with a few canoes hoisted on  their shoulders.