Almost Like Being in Love (23 page)

What was his normal? He had two ways to answer that—the life hidden in the darkness of his parents' house or the life he lived outside. Jessica might as well have showed up at his front door, knocked, and invited herself in.

“Hello? Did I lose you?”

“Oh, sorry.”
He picked up a voltmeter. “Double-checking something here. I have a small family. Father. Mother. One younger brother, Shawn, who . . . um, who died when I was ten.”

“Oh, Alex . . .”

“That was a long time ago. I've learned to live with it.”

“What happened? I mean, if you don't mind me asking—”

“Car accident. He was six. He loved riding his bike. After dinner one night, he went back outside and no one noticed. Shawn went through the intersection at the end of our cul-de-sac without stopping—”

“How tragic.”

“Yeah.” Alex shifted his attention back to the air conditioner. “I need to get this finished if I'm going to get to my next appointment on time.”

“Sure. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have—”

“It's okay. Not a problem.”

The rest of his work was done in silence. No Scotty asking questions a mile a minute. No Jessica wanting to know what his “normal” was.

He had a split-personality life. Out of control at home. Manageable at work. His relationship with Caron balanced on the tightrope between two lives. She was the one who kept his secrets. The one who offered him an escape from his secrets.

Y
ou weren't dozing off, were you?”

Caron's head jerked upright, her eyes opening. Her hands rested on her keyboard and several long lines of vowels and consonants—gibberish—strolled across her open Word document. Proof positive that she'd fallen asleep at her desk. No sense in denying the obvious, even if Kade Webster was the one who had caught her asleep at work.

So much for impressing the boss.

“I have no excuse.” She shut down the offending document before Kade could see that, too. “I was up so late—”

“Thinking about Kingston's house. I get it. And then I had to cancel our earlier meeting. I apologize.” Kade's half smile disarmed her. “Do you have time to talk now?”

“Absolutely.” Caron resisted the urge to run her fingers through her hair. Pat the corner of her mouth, checking for drool. “I'm ready when you are. I wasn't doing anything.”

Except napping.

“Meet me in the conference room in ten?”

“Sure.”

Caron fast-timed it to the break room and filled a tumbler with an abundance of ice and sweet tea, dropping it off in the conference room first. Then she went back to her office and gathered her iPad and her leather folder, stopping to organize her papers into a more orderly pile. A quick brush of her hair, a refresh of her lip color, and she was ready to go.

Wait.
She backtracked and grabbed a few Hot Tamales from her candy dish on the corner of her desk. Brain food. Get the creativity flowing again. And just as good as a breath mint.

She still didn't know why Kade hadn't shown up for their meeting this morning. She'd arrived at eight o'clock to find Miriam at her desk, but no Kade in sight. And then Miriam delivered a brief “Kade can't make it and apologizes” message. Not that Kade had to provide her with an explanation. And this reality was a reminder of her employee status.

Kade positioned himself at the head of the table, a bottle of water paired with his own glass of tea.

“I see we think alike. I'd forgotten how good your sweet tea was.” He loosened his tie. “I know these things are part of the business, but sometimes I wish I could wear jeans and a T-shirt to work.”

“I've always been glad I can skip the tie.” She arranged her papers on the table. “You ready?”

“The question is: Are you ready?” His dark eyes glinted with a challenge.

“More than ready.”

And just like that, an echo from the past tripped her up. How many times had she and Kade challenged each other by tossing the “ ‘You ready?' ‘The question is: Are you ready?' ” taunts back and forth when they both worked for her father? They'd always enjoyed challenging each other to try harder to achieve the monthly business goals.

“Caron?”

Her attention jerked back to the present. “Sorry. I just have to decide where to start. I'm not sure how to set this up so you can see everything—”

He stood, moving his chair around the edge of the table and positioning it next to hers, and then sitting back down. “This should do it.” He rested his elbows on the glass tabletop. “Go ahead. I'm all yours.”

And that comment was just a turn of phrase. Nothing more. Kade probably wasn't even aware of what he'd said.

Boss. Employee. Boss
.

She pulled out her numbered list. “I know that not all homebuilders stage every room in their homes for the tour, but we're going to.”

“We are?”

“Of course. You want to give Kingston your best, so that's what we're going to do. We're going to decorate every room. A full-court press.” She used her purple gel pen to tick down her handwritten list. “The nice thing is, we don't have to worry about decluttering like I have to when I stage a home that goes on the market.”

“True.”

“Okay. The kitchen is minimal, except for accents. Same with the bathrooms—rolled towels, baskets, candles—a spa feel for them. The focus is on the three bedrooms, the family room, and the dining room. And I'm trying to decide whether I want to make the small den an office or a workout room.”

“Okay. You planning on outfitting the laundry room, too?”

“It's not my major concern, even though people are crazy over the laundry room these days. Eddie's built a nice-sized room with good shelving and I'll accent that with baskets.”

“What's wrong with sitting in the living room and folding laundry while watching sports?” With nothing but a numbered list to look at, Kade's
attention never wavered from Caron. “What about outside?”

“Curb appeal—and we have to think about the access ramps. We have to be extra attentive to make the outside of the house look good while we work around those.”

“Agreed.”

“I know the house will be sodded by the time the Tour of Homes starts—” Caron stumbled over even the slightest reference to the landscaper. “—but do you know if Eddie is working with Austin beyond that and the flowers I saw the other day?”

“I didn't think to ask.”

“Okay.” Caron scribbled another note on her list. “I'll check with him . . . with Eddie, I mean.”

“What else have you got for me?”

She hesitated over the one question Kade hadn't answered yet—and she hadn't broached. “I haven't asked you what our budget is for this project.”

“What our budget is.” Kade tapped his fingertips against his lips. “Interesting question. What if I told you that my usual stager gives me a deep discount because her husband and I are friends?”

“So you're saying our budget is small.”

“Yes.”

“I'd rather you'd told me that we had an unlimited budget. A girl can dream, right? Your stager didn't leave you access to her storage unit, by any chance?”

“She called in crisis mode. It never occurred to me to ask—”

“Okay, then, we'll go with plan B.”

“Which is?”

“You telling me how much money you want to put toward staging the home. And then I start contacting furniture stores and asking if they'd like to take part in the upcoming Tour of
Homes for strategic advertising. It's too late to get their names in the tour booklet, but we can print up our own flyers. Miriam can work on that, if you're okay with her helping me. We'll have them available during the tour. And we can see if we can borrow any pieces—”

“Borrow furniture? What are you planning on doing, going door to door?”

“No. But Margo's parents have this beautiful dining room table—”

“And you think they'll loan you something for a week—”

“It doesn't hurt to ask, Kade. Providing someone with, say, four tickets to the tour is a lot less expensive than buying dining room furniture.” She held her hand up. “If you plan on staging homes in the future, you might want to consider purchasing some key pieces of your own.”

“What else?”

“Depending on the budget, I'd like to go antiquing and visit a flea market or two to see if I can find anything. Maybe purchase a couple of pieces of art for the walls.”

“You're going to start filling up that nonexistent storage unit for me, is that it?”

“Yes, I guess I am.” Kade couldn't fault her for thinking long-term. “And we need fresh flowers during the week. And—”

“There's more?”

Caron couldn't help laughing. When Kade joined in, the boyish, natural sound was a tempting invitation to go back in time. Kade's laughter had disrupted the seriousness of a Monday-morning staff meeting at Hollister Realty more than once—their glances meeting across the table and him tossing her a quick, conspiratorial wink as her father called the meeting back to order.

Boss. Employee.

“Of course there's more.”
She shifted in her seat. How had she moved close enough to Kade that their arms brushed up against each other's? And why was she just now noticing the faint eucalyptus scent of his shampoo?

Boss.

“We're going to need to rent a U-Haul to get the furniture over there. And we'll need to have some help loading and unloading the stuff, as well as arranging it.”

Kade leaned forward, turning the paper scrawled with her notes so he could scan it. “You've obviously got a plan to accomplish all this.”

“I'm making a plan. It's quite the undertaking, but I'm excited to see it all come together.”

“If anyone can pull this off, you can do it, hotshot.”

Hotshot
—the nickname he'd first tossed at her across the conference table in her father's office after she'd closed a difficult deal.

“I won't let you down, Kade.”

Her words dimmed the tenuous camaraderie that had built between them. He couldn't say “I know you won't”—because she had once before.

But she'd see this job through. She owed him that.

“Do you want to hear about any of my preliminary decorating ideas? I want things streamlined, with some bold punches of color. I've even put a call in to Eddie and asked for an accent wall in the living room—”

“I think we're good for today.” Kade rose to his feet. “As far as the budget goes, I will need some specific numbers from you. I'm not ready to write you a blank check, but I can give you some initial funds.”

“No blank check?” Caron remained seated as Kade backed away, her question a feeble attempt to infuse humor back into the situation.

“Sorry, nope.”
Kade shoved the chair back into place. “I'll see about rounding up some people to help get the stuff loaded and unloaded and put in its proper place in the house. Sound good?”

She put Kade's initials by one item on the list. “Perfect. One less thing on my list. But I will check back with you about what you find out.”

“Of course you will.” Kade rubbed the palms of his hands together. “So we're good here?”

“Yes.”

“Great.” He readjusted his tie. “Time to go join the fray again.”

“I'm going to sit here and see if I can come up with a preliminary budget. Is that okay? You don't need the room right now, do you?”

“It's all yours.” He paused. “You've got my number, right?”

“Yes, from when you called me. Why?”

“I realized we probably need a way to get in touch with each other until we get through the tour. Just text or call me if you have a question, and I'll do the same, okay?”

“Sure, that's fine.” Caron fought to keep her voice casual. There was a time when Kade's number was at the top of her favorites list. “You've got my number, too, right?”

“Never forgot it.” He flashed her his trademark smile, the one that was all professional Kade Webster—nothing personal—as he strolled out of the conference room.

That had gone well.

So long as she concentrated on things like lamps and chairs and beds for Eddie Kingston's home . . . and insisted that her untrustworthy mind keep the past in the past . . . she'd survive the next few weeks just fine.

•  •  •

He needed to find a reason to get angry with Caron Hollister again. To get really angry—and stay that way.

Kade's combat boots pounded the ground, the backpack weighted down with fifty pounds of bricks pressing against his shoulders, as he tried to outrun his thoughts. His desires.

He'd offered the woman a job, knowing he could do it because he'd dealt with his emotions—the tangled mess of hurt, disappointment, longing, anger—years ago when she broke up with him.