Until We Touch (Fool's Gold #15)

Taryn looked away from her reflection and studied the dresses. “You got the ones I mentioned to you?”


“Yes, and a few others. I also have two couture dresses. They are literally one of a kind, so I practically had to give them a kidney to get them. You will notice a significant charge on your credit card for the privilege of trying them on.” Isabel grinned. “The charge will be refunded if you don’t want the dresses, of course.”

“You know you don’t have to pay a deposit when you buy retail, like a normal person,” Larissa teased.

Madeline walked over and sat next to her. “It was really tough to get them.” She lowered her voice. “I didn’t know credit cards could have a limit that high.”

“Taryn has a unique relationship with clothes,” Larissa said. “I think it’s fun to look at it like a show or something. You know—Broadway. But without the singing.”

Taryn walked over to the dresses and touched the first one. Her mouth twisted and Larissa knew her friend was fighting tears. Because weddings were always complicated, she thought. She’d been through two with her sisters.

Always a bridesmaid, she thought as she sipped her champagne.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to get married, she thought wistfully. Of course she did. And have a family and all that went with it. It was just there wasn’t anyone who made her believe that forever was possible.

She had a feeling Taryn would tell her that was because she didn’t put herself out there. She was too busy saving the world to save herself.

Her friend might have a point, Larissa admitted to herself. Her causes were a distraction and sometimes that was a good thing.

Taryn dropped her robe, revealing a perfectly toned body in a flesh-colored thong and strapless bra. “Let’s do this,” she said.

Madeline stood and walked over to the rack. Together she and Isabel removed the dress from its hanger and carried it over to the platform.

“For some of them, stepping in is easier than trying to pull it over your head,” Isabel told Taryn.

The pile of lace and silk pooled on the carpeted platform. Taryn carefully stepped into the middle and the two women drew it up around her.

Larissa hadn’t gone dress shopping with her sisters. She’d shown up for her fittings and had been in both weddings. But the whole bride-marriage thing hadn’t been that interesting to her. Now she wondered if she’d missed out on more than she’d realized. If her mother were here, the woman would be crying. It wouldn’t matter that Taryn wasn’t her daughter. Nancy Owens loved a wedding.

Probably because she hadn’t had a big one of her own, Larissa thought, feeling the familiar guilt. At least not the first time. Larissa’s mother had gotten pregnant and then married in haste. Larissa had been born five months later.

She knew that she wasn’t responsible for what had happened to her parents. That they’d made the decision to sleep together and then had suffered the consequences. But she also knew that if her mother hadn’t gotten pregnant, her parents wouldn’t have married each other. They wouldn’t have suffered through a failing relationship for years before finally admitting what everyone else already knew. That they would be better off apart.

Their subsequent remarriages were happy ones. The extended family often spent holidays together. Some of Larissa’s friends in high school had lamented how their own parents were so mean during their divorces. That Larissa was lucky with what she’d been through.

She understood how they’d meant the comments and had never admitted that in her heart, she felt responsible. She was the reason her parents had to get married. And although they never blamed her, she couldn’t escape the sense of having messed up both of their lives.

* * *

PERCY STRUTTED INTO Jack’s office. Jack took one look at him and groaned. Once Larissa saw what had happened, there would be hell to pay.

“Quit being so happy,” he grumbled.

Percy grinned. “We won.”

“Yeah, like that’s going to matter when Larissa kills us both.”

“She’s only going to kill you. And maybe Consuelo.”

Jack didn’t think Larissa could take on Consuelo and win, but if Percy’s words were true, he wouldn’t be around to see it, anyway.

He studied the teen, taking in the swollen right eye and the growing bruise.

Their morning basketball sessions could be intense. Percy had been telling the truth—he had game. But he was also young and easily distracted. He’d made the mistake of watching Consuelo’s ass instead of the rest of her and had ended up with an elbow in the face. Of course, each of them had suffered the same fate at one time or another in the past six or eight months, but that was little consolation when the pain exploded in your face. Still, Percy had reacted well and play had continued.

He stood and walked toward the door. “Come on,” he told the kid.

“Where are we going?” Percy asked, following him.