My cousin. She worked for you for about six months, oh, a year ago? And she said … never mind, it’s moot now.”
“Dana,” C.J. said, a pained look on his face, “trust me, it’s better this way.”
Their gazes skirmished for a second or two before she finally said, “Yes, you’re probably right,” then got into her sweltering car and drove off, repeating “No isn’t fatal” to herself over and over until, by the time she got home and called Cass with the good news about the store, she was almost tempted to believe it.
Way to go, dumb ass, C.J. thought as he sat at a stoplight, palming his temple. In less than a century, man had invented cell phones, the Internet and microwave pizza. And yet after fifty thousand years, give or take, no one had yet to figure out how to let a woman down without hurting her.
But what else could he have said? That, yeah, actually he would have killed for the privilege of spending a little more time in her company? To see that dimpled smile, to hear her laugh? To simply enjoy being with a woman without an agenda?
Except … she did have one, didn’t she? Maybe a bit more soft-edged than most, but no less threatening. Or sincere. And how fair would it have been, to accept her offer, to give her hope, when he knew it wouldn’t go any further? That selfish, he wasn’t.
And then there was the little sidebar revelation about Trish being her cousin. Uh, boy … he could just imagine what would hit the fan if Dana knew everything about that little side trip to insanity.
C.J.’s brow knotted. So why didn’t Dana know? Then he released a breath, realizing that whatever Trish’s reasons for keeping certain things to herself, if she hadn’t told Dana by now, she probably wouldn’t. And there was no reason for her to ever find out, was there?
A car horn honked behind him: while he’d been on Planet Clueless, the light had changed.
And even if she did, he thought as he stepped on the gas, what difference would it make? Once this deal was finalized, he’d have no reason to see or talk to Dana Malone ever again.
Which was a good thing, right?
In a bathroom flooded with far too much morning sunshine, Dana blearily stared at herself in the mirror. She pulled down a lower lid—yeah, the bloodshot eyes were a nice touch. Not to mention the still slightly visible keyboard impression in her right cheek. Charming.
She shakily applied toothpaste to brush, only to realize she wasn’t sure she had the oomph to lift the brush to her mouth. From the living room, her pair of finches chirped away, merrily greeting the new day, momentarily tempting her to go find a hungry cat. But if she’d been up until nearly 4:00 a.m., at least she hadn’t spent it brooding. Much. Since here she was, still alive (sort of), she guessed her “No isn’t fatal” mantra had worked. And anyway, she’d only have to see C.J. once, maybe twice more, right? If that. So. Over, done, let’s move on.
She shoved the brush into her mouth. And naturally, right at the pinnacle of sudsiness, the phone rang.
Dimly, from some tiny, marginally awake corner of her brain, it registered how early it was. She spit and flew back into her bedroom, fumbling the phone before finally getting it to her ear.
“Hel—”
“Dana?”
A few more brain cells jerked awake. “Trish?” She glanced at the caller ID. Blocked call. Shoot. “Where are you—?”
“I just wanted to make sure you were going to be at the shop at nine. That’s what you said, right? Nine? I mean, are you going to be there any earlier?”
As usual, she sounded borderline crazed, but in a controlled sort of way.
“I usually get there around ten ‘til. Trish what’s going on—?”
Click.
The girl really needed to get herself some phone manners. Sheesh.
An hour or so and a half bottle of Visine later, Dana pulled into the far side of the empty parking lot in front of the shop. It was her day to open up, a good thing since she wasn’t yet ready to face humanity. Or Mercy’s inevitable squinty assessment of Dana’s putty-knife makeup application. She was, however, supposed to be facing Trish, who was nowhere in sight. But then, reliability had never been her cousin’s strong suit.
Bracing herself, Dana took a deep breath and swung open the car door. Instant oven. Already. Yech. And it always took an hour for the store to cool off after being closed up all night. Double yech.
Her purse gathered, she slammed shut her door and crossed the parking lot, noticing the drooping petunias in the oversized planters by the front door. If they didn’t get water soon, she thought as she shoved her key into the lock, they’d turn into twigs. Lord, her slip was already fused to her skin. Knowing she had thirty seconds to deactivate the alarm before it went off, she shoved open the door—
Behind her, something sneezed.
The key still in the lock, the door swung open as whatever it was sneezed a second time. She turned, letting out a half-shrieked, “Ohmigod!”
The baby peered at her from underneath the nylon hood of the car seat, its face tinted blue from the reflection. It stared at Dana for a long moment, then offered a big, basically toothless, drooly grin.
Dana was far too stunned to grin back. But not too stunned to immediately scour the neighboring parking lots, her hand shielding her eyes from the morning sun glinting off the top of a beige sedan as it disappeared down the street. She stepped off the sidewalk—
Brrrrannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnggggggg!
Dana yelped and the baby started to yowl like a banshee as the alarm blared loud enough to wake the dead. On Mars. She grabbed the car seat and roared into the store, thunking the seat onto the counter so she could dump out her purse to find the key to deactivate the alarm. Ten seconds later, she’d killed it, but not before nearly wetting her pants.
In the ensuing silence the baby’s howls seemed even louder. Dana unlatched the ridiculously complicated harness and hauled the little thing into her arms, then paced the jammed sales floor, almost more to calm herself than the infant. After a bit, the wails had softened to exhausted sobs, and Dana no longer felt as though her heart was going to pound out of her chest. She dropped into a rocking chair, the infant clutching the front of her dress, now adorned with baby tears and drool.
“No …” she breathed. “No, God, no … this can’t be happening….”
Trish surfaces out of the blue, asks when Dana’s going to be at the shop; lo and behold, a blond baby appears, smelling of cheap perfume and cigarettes. As she assumed the baby didn’t wear cheap perfume or smoke, it didn’t take a real big leap of faith to figure out who did.
She got up, deposited the baby—dressed in a miniature football outfit, so she was guessing boy—into a nearby playpen and stormed back outside, startling a couple of pigeons.
“Well, Patricia Elizabeth Lovett,” she muttered to the air, “you’ve outdone yourself this time.”
Since said Patricia Elizabeth obviously wasn’t going to jump out from
