A Kiss Is Just a Kiss

by Melinda Curtis

  “That’s why I asked her to prom.”

  Dotty waved her hand. “Don’t humor me. I could kick the bucket any day.”

  “You’re too tough and stubborn to kick the bucket.” He wasn’t about to give her sympathy, whether she was clear-headed or not. “Even Big Al didn’t want to eat you.”

  That earned him a wry smile. “Why is it that men are so logical? Love isn’t about logic. It doesn’t tally up a score you can double check your answer against.”

  He was used to Dotty’s abrupt conversation changes, but a jump from buckets to the mysteries of men?

  Dotty met his gaze. Her hair had dried into a white frizzy cloud. Her nose was sunburned. And despite the possibility of a concussion, she looked rational. “You don’t know why you’re here, do you?”

  Beck felt like a witness under cross-examination and decided to take the fifth.

  “I thought not.” Dotty’s eyes narrowed. “Kitty told me you were leaving us to get to Maggie.”

  “I couldn’t leave you.” Not either one.

  “Why?” Her question was as cold and sharp as an icicle, very un-Dotty-like.

  Beck hesitated. How was he supposed to answer when he didn’t know himself? “It’s the way I was raised.”

  “By those parents you don’t think love you enough?” She waved a hand when he would’ve asked how she knew that. “Kitty told me about them. Well, probably not all about them. She’s quite good at keeping secrets.” Dotty’s sigh had an unhealthy rattle to it, as if she’d swallowed swamp water. “She’ll hold a grudge, but eventually she’ll come around.”

  Kitty hadn’t told her grandmother everything. Not by any means. “There’ll be no grudge. Kitty and I understand each other.”

  “I’m not talking about Kitty.” Dotty’s voice wound up high and tight. “I’m talking about Maggie. She’ll be hurt when you realize you love her sister.”

  “I don’t–”

  “Of course, you love Kitty,” Dotty snapped, making the L-word ricochet around Beck’s head like a loose ball bearing in a front wheel. “Why else did you come? Because of a false sense of honor? Please. I told you. Men think too much and rely on logic when they should follow their heart.”

  Kitty opened the door. She should have looked like something the cat dragged in–ratty hair, no make-up, a too-large T-shirt with a tacky gator on it. She didn’t. She looked like someone Beck could spend the rest of his life with. Someone who’d answer the phone even if she was mad at him. Someone who’d stick beside him during good times and bad, during disagreements and rough patches. In sickness and in health.

  He leaned forward in his chair and cradles his head in his hands, suddenly light-headed.

  Chapter 9

  “I can’t believe Grandma didn’t want me to spend the night with her at the hospital.” Kitty couldn’t keep nerves from cracking her voice.

  Something had happened to Beck between the time she’d left him at the gator place and the time he’d shown up at the hospital. He was treating her differently. Not like an adversary.

  She was afraid that meant he’d decided not to ask for Maggie’s forgiveness. She was afraid her actions had taken away a choice better left to Maggie. She was afraid she’d never see Beck again.

  She shivered, despite the heat, and stared at her untouched salad.

  They sat at a small table on an outdoor patio at their hotel. It was a little after nine. Their hotel wasn’t very popular and they almost had the patio to themselves. A family of four sat at a table near the fountain.

  “Your grandmother thinks company means she has to talk.” Beck wasn’t doing his food any justice either. “She’ll get more rest if she’s alone.”

  “I know. I just worry about her.” Given the opportunity, Dotty would walk the halls and try to make friends, unconcerned that the back of her gown wasn’t tied.

  “It strikes me,” Beck said carefully, pushing broccoli across his plate. “That had your roles been reversed–yours and Maggie’s–you would’ve taken my calls.”

  Kitty’s fork fell to her plate. “She’s hurt.”

  Beck placed his utensils on his plate with barely a sound. “I don’t make her happy.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “I do.” He tapped his chest. “I feel it here. Things haven’t felt right between us for a long time.”

  Kitty put her hands on the table. “Don’t make this decision without Maggie. You’ve had a couple of frustrating days.”

  He clasped her fingers, holding tight when she would’ve pulled away. “I’ve had a cool down period. I’ve had my assumptions about love broken down to their bare bones, picked clean, and exposed to the elements.” He edged his chair closer to hers, leaned closer to her, came close enough she could almost feel the essence of his pain. “If I loved Maggie…If I loved her deep down to the core of my being, I would’ve bought a plane ticket or rented a car yesterday. I would’ve driven all night and stood out in a thunderstorm for her.”

  “You did run out in a thunderstorm.” At the airport.

  “And then I gave up.” Pain threaded his voice like a sharp needle with barbed thread. “I took my foot off the accelerator–”

  “I wouldn’t go that far.” Kitty tried for levity. “You’ve driven like a bat out of hell.”

  “You were right all along.” His gaze pinned hers and tried to convey a message she couldn’t decipher. “I love Maggie, and I always will, but I don’t love her the way I should or the way she deserves.”

  “What brought on this revelation?” She spoke the question so softly, she almost didn’t hear it herself.

  “I had second thoughts leading up to the wedding. I told myself it was because the ceremony was such a big production.” Beck’s gaze dropped to their hands. He stroked a thumb over the back of hers. “But last night…when I was griping about you ruining my life–”

  “Which I kind-of did,” she allowed.

  “–you told me you’d ruined everything except my heart.” He lifted his gaze. It was heavy with remorse and that indecipherable something. “My heart wasn’t broken when Maggie left me. But when you left me today, I felt hollow inside.”

  No.

  Everything Kitty believed about sisterly love and loyalty slammed into her chest. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He wasn’t supposed to be like this. And she sure-as-sugar shouldn’t be opening her mouth and asking, “Why?”

  He didn’t say anything for a moment. And in that moment, Kitty felt redemption. If he couldn’t say it to Maggie’s voicemail, he couldn’t possibly say it to Kitty’s face.

  “I’m falling in love with you.” Oh, he said it all right. And it wasn’t in a furtive whisper in case someone was listening. “I said,” he raised his voice when she sat as motionless and tense as a mature child awaiting a booster shot. “I’m falling in love with you.”

  The world spun, but not enough for Kitty to feint and Beck to disappear, not enough for the gut-wrenching pain from her betrayal of Maggie’s trust to ease, or the foolish beat of her heart to calm. What was she going to do? Kitty tugged her hand free. “You can’t be…be…”

  “I can.” And there it was. The look in his eyes that she hadn’t been able to read before. It was love. For her.

  The world spun faster than the blades on the airboat engine. Still, Kitty didn’t pass out.

  “You can’t do this to me.” Kitty struggled to stand, struggled to hold in the cold well of sorrow and reject the warm rays of joy. “She’s my sister.” She stumbled in her too-big Big Al flip-flops.

  Beck stood, reaching out to steady her, and she pushed him away. Her chair fell over and her pink cloth napkin fluttered to the ground. The well-behaved family of four eating pizza by the patio fountain turned to stare.

  “You haven’t said you don’t have feelings for me.” There was his heart–right there in his words, on his sleeve, in his eyes.

  He didn’t realize she couldn’t give him her heart in return. Not ever.
/>   When Kitty didn’t answer, Beck took a step toward her. “Why were you near tears when we said goodbye earlier?”

  “Because…” Kitty choked, horrified. Where was her composed bedside manner? She’d sat with women who knew they were going to deliver a still-born child without so much as a sob of grief. She’d performed emergency C-sections and held it together. And now…

  Their waiter hurried out, righted the chair, took one look at them and hurried back inside.

  Beck brushed the backs of his fingers across Kitty’s cheek. That touch promised there was more between them than a spark ignited by an unexpected kiss. It promised winter nights at home in front of the fire, and gentle laughter around the dinner table. It promised to be there with coffee when she was called to the hospital in the middle of the night and have breakfast ready when she returned in the morning.

  Longing welled up inside of her, rising from her chest, squeezing up her throat, stinging her nose and watering her eyes. Everything had seemed so straightforward yesterday. Kiss the groom. Save Maggie.

  “Kitty,” he said softly. “We could’ve been eaten by Big Al today. Your life must have flashed before your eyes. You must have noticed there was something missing.”

  It hadn’t flashed before her eyes. It had struck her in the chest. In her heart. At the worst time–after he’d jumped into the alligator infested water at the same time she did. She’d realized that Beck was more than good enough for her sister.

  The feeling that he was more than good enough for Kitty had come later.

  And now, staring into blue eyes that seemed to shine only for her, she wanted to kiss the groom again. She wanted to forget Maggie. She wanted to do something just for herself.

  “Kiss me,” she demanded in a whisper. Kiss me goodbye.

  With a groan, he gathered her close. “I can’t kiss you. Technically, I’m still Maggie’s.”

  Kitty clung to him. He’d known the moment he cheated on Maggie he’d be just as loathsome to Kitty as her father was.

  He nestled his cheek to hers. “You won’t regret loving me, Kitty.”

  She already did.

  Chapter 10

  Kitty had walked away.

  The look on her face…That was a bad sign. One that tied his gut in a backwards buckaroo knot.

  And he’d let her go. He had no right to kiss her, no right to tell her his feelings, not when he was still entangled with Maggie. But he’d been unable to hold his feelings inside. And there was that moment after he’d told her, after the shock of what he’d said wore off, when he could see longing in her deep brown eyes.

  Beck knew his place in Kitty’s world. Her sisters came first.

  And so, he didn’t press her. He didn’t talk about his declaration or what the future might bring. They met up at the agreed time in the morning and drove to the hospital without speaking. They broke Dotty out of the hospital around lunchtime and headed toward Atlanta, with Dotty filling in the conversational gap.

  “I want to do so many things with you two when we get to Atlanta. High tea at Astor Court. The Botanical Gardens. They are lovely this time of year. The heat is bearable as long as you get there early. Oh, and we have to eat at The Hungry Peach.” Dotty had a long list of must-dos. “They have a peach cobbler cupcake that’s to die for.”

  “We aren’t going to stay in town.” Kitty sounded reluctant to put an end to her grandmother’s wish list. “Beck needs to talk to Maggie.”

  “But you’ll come back afterward,” Dotty insisted.

  “No,” Kitty said gently. “Once I get my cell phone and purse back, I’m returning to New York.”

  Dotty tsked. “You should never go anywhere without your purse.”

  Kitty made a non-comital noise.

  “By the way,” Dotty said, glancing around the truck. “Where is my purse?”

  *

  “This is it.” Kitty pointed to a gated driveway on Tybee Island, proud of the fact her hand didn’t shake. That didn’t mean her heart wasn’t trying to chisel a way out of her chest. There was so much she wanted to say to Beck, so much she wanted to know about him. And the details about how he’d met her father, who’d introduced him to Maggie.

  But any relationship with him, even if Maggie dumped him, was out of the question.

  The large, two story colonial was set back from the road behind dense trees and shrubbery. Further down the road was the Robertson enclave. Thankfully, it wasn’t July. Most likely, the only people inside the Summer house would be Summers.

  They’d left Dotty with Great Aunt Rebecca in Atlanta and driven to Tybee Island in silence. Kitty had plenty of time to come up with a strategy. That didn’t mean she had any idea what awaited them.

  Kitty rattled off a code that Beck entered into the keypad and the gate swung open.

  “They didn’t lock us out,” Kitty said, unable to contain her relief.

  Beck stopped the truck inside the gate. “You don’t have to come inside. I’ll talk to Maggie alone.” It was dark, but the dashboard illuminated the determined set to his jaw.

  “Not happening.” Kitty met his gaze for the first time that day. “I’ll go in first. You wait in the truck for fifteen minutes, then go around the house and to the boat dock. I’ll have Maggie meet you there.”

  “I’m not going to hide from your family.” Whatever soft words he’d spoken to her last night had stayed at the hotel in Florida. Jilted-at-the-altar Beck was back.

  “I’m not worried about what my family will say to you. I’m worried that Maggie will have to listen to it.”

  After a moment, he nodded and drove to the house.

  “Fifteen minutes.” Kitty pushed the passenger door open when he’d parked. She drew a breath past the stabbing pain in her heart and said the words she should have said last night. “I want you to think about the commitment you made to her. People have doubts in relationships all the time, but they reassess and they move forward, stronger than before.”

  “What are you saying?” His question had an edge.

  “That I can’t let you love me, Beck.” Her chest contracted, making it hard to draw enough breath to finish this. “That whatever you think you saw in me is just a reflection of the kind, beautiful person my sister is. And that those feelings you think you have for me? They’re really for Maggie.” She blinked back tears, hoping he couldn’t see them in the dark. “Maybe you won’t love each other with the passion that sweeps two people off their feet, but you can be good together.”

  “Kitty–”

  “You promised to marry her, Beck.” Kitty made to swing the door shut.

  “I’m not a candy bar someone called dibs on.” Beck had more steel in his voice than patients with Harrington rods in their spines. “For the love of Mike, Kitty. Why do you always have to put yourself second?”

  “Ask yourself what your grandfather would do.” Kitty took a half-step back. “Think really hard about that over the next fifteen minutes.” She slammed the door.

  It sounded like he pounded the dashboard.

  Good. Mission accomplished. Beck was angry with her.

  Kitty pushed through the door to the house. It opened on silent hinges to white pine floors and a white paneled hallway. The soft blue and sand colors were meant to soothe. They had no effect on Kitty.

  “Oh, honey.” Kitty’s mother must have heard the car door slam. Her brown hair was in a limp bob. She wore white leggings and a white cable-knit sweater that reached mid-thigh. She hurried to hug her daughter. “We were so worried about you. How is Mama Summer?”

  “She’s with Great Aunt Rebecca and under concussion watch for another few days.” Although Kitty suspected she’d be fine. “You aren’t mad at me.”

  “I could never be mad at one of my girls.” Her smile was dreamy and her eyes dilated. Mr. Anti-Anxiety had come to call.

  “The fallen daughter returns.” Tim Summer leaned against the doorframe to his study and stared at Kitty before taking a sip of red wine. “I’m almost
glad you ruined your sister’s life.”

  Mom drifted to the living room across the hall.

  For once, Kitty was glad her mother had no fight in her. Kitty had enough fight for two people. It raced around her veins and put barbs in her demand. “When did you offer Beck the horse?”

  “What does it matter? He won’t get it now.” Dad retreated to his office and sat behind a massive walnut desk.

  Kitty followed him inside and leaned on the back of a leather chair. “Did you dangle it in front of him as a way to get him to date Maggie?” It had occurred to her on the drive up today that Maggie would never have met Beck on her own. She hadn’t wanted to challenge Beck on this point. But Dad? Oh, yeah.

  On his blotter, his cell phone lit up with a photo. A redhead with pouty lips who didn’t look to be older than Kitty. Her father paused to look at the screen before raising his smiling face back to her. “They made sense, you know. A horse breeder and a vet.” He rested his thumb and forefinger on the phone.

  Hurt threatened to take over. Make her shout. Make her take his cell phone and fling it across the room. His women were his toys. She wouldn’t let his daughters be his toys. “They made sense like you and Mom made sense? A pretty accountant and a millionaire?”

  “He made it known he was looking for an investor and a mare.” He sat back in his chair, but not far enough that he couldn’t see his phone display if it lit up again. “I invited him to a party. You have to admit, for a while there Maggie was really turning out to be normal.”

  “Maggie…” Kitty choked on her sister’s name. “Why can’t you love us for who we are?”

  He narrowed his eyes and downed the rest of his wine. “It used to gall me that our friends thought you were perfect. I never had to bail you out of jail. I never had to forbid you from seeing the wrong sort of boy. You never needed me.”

  “Mom needed you,” she said softly. “She still does.”

  He waved a hand. “I’m a businessman. I don’t deal in lost causes. I’m assuming you got rid of the horseman?”