13
BARE ESSENTIALS opened with the hoopla of a cocktail party attended by nearly everyone in town. Kate was ecstatic. Cassie pretended to be.
Oh, she was beyond thrilled that the store had done well, and continued to do so the week following the opening. It had given her summer purpose while she waited out Crazy Pete. But she’d also done it in good part due to her yearning to hurt Pleasantville. She’d done it for revenge.
But where was the revenge exactly? What had happened? Somehow instead of fulfilling her list and making everyone sorry, she was the sorry one. Sorry in love with the life she’d made here.
Thinking about that life made her want more of it. Thinking about that life made her smile.
Smile, for God’s sake.
But thinking about Tag made that smile fade. What did she feel for him? Hell if she knew, but she sure felt something. She felt it all the time; when she was sleeping, when she was driving—okay, speeding, with a half-hopeful glance in the rearview mirror.
Only Tag never pulled her over.
Kate had told her rumors were running rampant in town. Supposedly he’d been sullen and serious, so much so that people thought he’d turned into his father. People wished she’d sleep with him again so he’d cheer up.
Well, big surprise, she thought as she got into her car one morning. She did want to sleep with him again, wanted that more than she wanted anything, even her old life back.
Because when it came right down to it, she actually didn’t want her old life back. How scary was that?
Suddenly she realized she’d stopped in front of the police station. Parked. Gotten out of the car and walked inside.
And asked for the sheriff.
She had no answers for him, had nothing to say at all, she just…wanted to see him. Oh, God, that was stupid, she shouldn’t have come—
Before she could turn tail and run, he came out of his office, tall, dark and attitude-ridden.
“Cassie.” That was all he said. Just her name in that terrifyingly distant tone.
How could he look so damn calm? Her heart was in her throat, her palms damp. She forced a smile and hoped she looked half as cool as he did. “Hi. I just…”
“Yes?”
“Um…” She’d regressed into the village idiot. Damn him for not helping her. “I wanted to see how you were.”
He lifted his hands and shrugged. “I’m fine.”
“Yeah.” Well, hadn’t this been one big, fat mistake? “Okay, good. You’re fine. All righty then, I’ve got work…” She moved to the door, furious and sad and embarrassed and needing to kick her own butt all at the same time. “Goodbye, Tag.”
He watched her stalk to her car in leather pants and a see-through blouse that had made his body quiver hopefully.
“She looks like she’s got steam coming out of her fine ears,” Annie said conversationally from behind him.
Steam? He hadn’t been able to get past the flash of hurt he’d seen in her eyes. The hurt he’d put there.
“Why are all men jackasses whenever they’re hurting anyway?” Annie asked. “Is it because they need to share the wealth, do you suppose?”
He was a jackass. Worse. What the hell had he just done, besides let his pride take over? She’d come to see him, something that spoke volumes, and she deserved much more than his cool “I’m fine” crap. All she’d ever asked of him was to give her time. He hadn’t bothered to even try.
Well she deserved that time, and his patience, too, and she was going to get it. Even if it killed him. She was worth the wait, and with a little of that patience, she would come around. Because he was worth it, too.
Or so he hoped.
“You going after her, Romeo?”
“I have an hour left on my shift.”
“And then?”
“If I tell you, are you going to broadcast it on the five o’clock news?”
“Of course.”
Tag sighed. “Yeah. I’m going after her.”
“Let’s hope she’ll have you, boss. Let’s hope she’ll have you.”
* * *
CASSIE TOOK HERSELF to work as if nothing was the matter. She sat on the front counter preparing the receipts for bookkeeping.
Bookkeeping meaning Kate, of course, who, as the entire accounting department, not only had a head for such things, but was also so completely anal she squeaked when she walked.
Cassie worked steadily, refusing to think about the little visit she’d made on the way over here. “Men suck.”
Miss Priss, who sat at Cassie’s elbow, occasionally batting an important piece of paper to the floor, looked up with what Cassie would have sworn was complete agreement on her feline face.
Then she batted yet another receipt to the floor.
“Stop that.” Cassie hopped down to get the piece of paper. “Or I’ll put you out and let animal control take you away.”
Miss Priss yawned, and Cassie had to laugh, but it faded when suddenly she couldn’t imagine her life without the damn fleabag. “So what do you think of New York, cat? Think we should blow this pop stand? I do,” she said. “Screw living in fear.”
But the scarier truth was…she didn’t really want to go. “Hey, you know what? I’m not letting any man chase me from where I want to be. Not ever again. And you know what else?”
Miss Priss blinked.
“This is where I want to be. So…stay with me? Here? Forever? What do you say—we can be old maids together.”
Another yawn as the cat craned her head and looked at the phone when it rang.
“Baby!”
Cassie pulled the phone away from her ear to stare at it. “Mom?”
“Who else! How’s that town treating you?”
“Decently,” Cassie had to admit. “I thought you were on a cruise. How’s the boyfriend?”
“He’s been upgraded to the husband. We got married on a Greek island today.”
“What?” Cassie screeched.
Miss Priss fell off the counter.
Cassie just stared into space. “But…but…”
“I know.” Flo sighed. “But it’s wonderful. Love is wonderful.”
“Mom! How could you? You always told me to get what I could from a man and then walk away!”
“Of course I didn’t!”
“Yes, you did. You always told me to get out, to leave them hanging.” If she hadn’t said that, then what had she said?
Flo sighed on the other end of the line. “I said you get what you can, honey, and walk away if it suits you. If what you’re getting is love though, I’d grab it and hold on tight.”
Holy shit, how had Cassie gotten it so wrong all these years? “Mom?”
“Yes?”
“I’m happy for you.”
“Thanks, hon. I’m happy for me, too. He’s wonderful. You’ll have to meet him sometime. Hey, our sailboat is ready. Love you!”
Click.
Cassie stared out the window, lost in thought about her mother’s revelation until she realized Stacie had pulled up and was headed toward the doors of the shop. She knocked on the glass, waving and smiling at Cassie who, still in shock, unlocked the door for her. “We’re not open yet. I’ve got another half hour to get an hour’s worth of work done.”
“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.” Stacie moved in uninvited, grabbing the sign taped to the glass as she went. Turning it around, she grinned. “You won’t be needing this anymore.”
Cassie looked at the Help Wanted sign she and Kate had put in the window. “Why not?”
“Because help has arrived.” Stacie tore it in two and, tossing the pieces in the air, she clapped her hands. “My mom said she’d baby-sit for me when I’m on shift. Oh, Cassie, please say yes. I want to work here, in the coolest store ever, with you.”
Cassie shook her head helplessly, laughing a little in the face of such pure enthusiasm. “But it’s a salesclerk position. Have you ever—”
“I’ve worked at Taco Bell, Dr. Bean’s office, Farmer’s Insurance and, most recently, the five-and-dime. Plus, I’m a mom, was a wife and therefore also a cook, maid and baby-sitter. Trust me, I can handle this. I can handle anything.”
“Can you handle cleaning up the paper you just dumped on the floor?”
Stacie beamed. “Yep.”
“Can you then handle sorting the new silk pyjamas that just came in?”
“Double yep.”
“Okay, then.” Cassie nodded. “You’re hired.”
“Oh, thank you!”
Cassie braced herself but not in time. She was hauled into a bear hug that went on and on and on.
“You’re supposed to hug me back,” Stacie said in her ear.
“Oh. Yeah.” So Cassie lifted her arms and hugged Stacie back.
“This is nice. You being my friend.” Stacie pulled back to smile in Cassie’s face. “And maybe someday soon, you’ll let me be your friend back.”
Cassie opened her mouth, then shut it. Because wasn’t that the cold, hard truth? “Stacie, I’m—”
“No.” She shook her head. “I’m sorry. That was rude of me. You’re not ready to open up and I had no right to say—”
“Yes, you did.” Cassie had to marvel at the truth that had just smacked her in the face. “You know, before you got here, I was sitting right there on that counter feeling a little bit sorry for myself. Thinking poor me, I actually like it here, I actually like that stupid cat, I like you, I like this life. Now, it just sounds silly. It’s okay to like what I’ve found here.”
Stacie’s smile was slow and genuine. “So you like me back?”
Cassie smiled back and felt her heart warm. “Yeah.”
“Can I have a raise?”
“Aren’t you a riot?”
“I do try. You have some forms for me? I want to make this official.”
Cassie moved toward the back office. “I’ll have to dig for them. Might take me a few. Just start over there with those boxes on the floor by the second shelving unit. Don’t open the front door yet.”
“Got it.”
Cassie, followed by Miss Priss, walked down the hallway past two disastrous closets she and Kate hadn’t gotten to yet, past the bathroom, to the small cubicle they’d claimed as their office. With a sigh she divided a look between Kate’s spotless desk to her own cluttered, dusty, overloaded one.
Miss Priss leapt up to Cassie’s and plopped her big, fat body down on a pile. Not wanting to admit how much that silly little gesture meant, she said, “One of these days I’m going to get myself organized.”
“Really? Will you return my calls and letters then?” came a sardonic male voice she instantly recognized for the shiver it put down her spine.
Pete had found her.