Begrudgingly Catherine stepped into the diner, leading the way. She took a seat at an open table near the front window, eyeing Drew as she followed suit. She really was a stunning beauty. Catherine played with the sugar packets and waited for Drew’s move.
“I have got to have my coffee first thing or I’ll go nuts on the geriatric customers at the pharmacy. There is a pill for everything these days, so that means nonstop action.” While she spoke, she motioned to Mel. “You want anything?” Drew asked. “My treat.”
Catherine waved her off, but as Mel turned the mugs and filled them with brew, her taste buds started awakening, as did her desire to get a little bit even. Nothing wrong with a free breakfast. “Actually, I would love a Danish—apple if you have it,” pausing for a half beat before adding, “and some scrambled eggs and bacon and toast—plain white sandwich bread would be lovely.” She caught the tail end of a smile on Mel’s face but her first Nekoyan nemesis kept her focus trained on her receipt pad.
“Ooh, that sounds great; make that two of everything,” Drew said wickedly. “I hardly ever eat in the morning,” she qualified, “but I can’t say no to a diner breakfast. Probably why I try to stay out of here most of the time.”
Catherine looked at her with wonder. Drew seemed to have no compunction about what had happened less than twelve hours ago. No judgment to pass. No laughing at the ridiculousness of the attempted burglary. No hysterics over her thinking they were married. It was like it was all choppy water under the bridge and they were back into smooth sailing.
“So, about my brother,” Drew said, as if reading her thoughts. “He can be a total ass. I used to run around apologizing for him but it isn’t worth my breath. I’d be at it all the time—with everyone—if I were to keep up.”
“Why didn’t you tell me he was your brother?” Catherine asked simply, while she prepared her coffee with sugar.
“Why did you assume he was my husband?” Drew shivered with the grossness of the thought. “I mean, we’re not that bass-ackwords around here,” she chuckled.
“But he’s really your brother?” she asked again, scratching at her ribs and a spot on her neck, and then digging at her ankles. It just didn’t seem possible that this gregarious and likeable person was from the same gene pool as him.
“Would you claim him if he were yours?”
“I have a brother—believe me, I know.” Catherine’s original frustration started to melt away in the realization that siblings could be a bitch to deal with. You have no control over them and yet their actions tend to get pinned to you as well.
“Just so you know, I don’t make a habit out of sending people along to my brother unaware. It wasn’t a social experiment or anything. It wasn’t about you at all. It was about him.”
Catherine looked at her, the unasked question in the tilt of her head, while her hands kept busily scratching the same spots.
“Honestly, he is just so closed off these days. He used to be more outgoing—heck, maybe that’s not the right word…. He used to be more social and involved beyond himself. He used to have friends—girlfriends even, believe it or not. But when he came here he just sort of holed up. He came to be near me after our parents died because we are the only family we have left, so I guess I felt guilty that I facilitated it. I don’t want to watch him withdraw from life. He says he likes where he is, and I know I shouldn’t push him, but I worry that he’s missing out—no wife, no kids, no dates…. I’m his big sister; I feel like I should look after him…. I guess when you came along looking for him, I kind of thought you were part of his old life come to reclaim him.”
“I didn’t even know him.”
“I figured that out pretty quick. As soon as you didn’t recognize him as Fynn, actually. But I was already setting the ball in motion—”
“Did you ever think about what it would do to me?” she interjected.
Drew lowered her head shamefully.
“All I wanted was to ask him to sell me a toy that used to be mine a long time ago. One that was given away after my sister—” But Catherine stopped, losing her nerve.
“Soon enough everything is going to change for him, and I just wanted to spark him out of himself before he forgets everything beyond his little life completely. I shouldn’t have used you to do it,” Drew said, by way of apology.
“What do you mean everything is going to change?” She was annoyed by the cryptic explanation and the itching, burning feeling in her skin.
“Priorities—Life—Everything.”
“Well I have priorities,” Catherine said forcefully. “I have a life and a job to get back to. You know I was only supposed to be in Minnesota for two days? Fly in Monday; fly out Tuesday. Now here it is Thursday and I still haven’t gotten what I came for. I can’t put life on hold forever.”
Drew looked to Catherine’s hands, and she covered her left with her right self-consciously. She knew what the woman was conveying. But just because she wasn’t married didn’t mean she didn’t have a life. Who was Drew to judge? She could have a boyfriend back at home for all this woman knew.
“Hey,” she said, leaning in closer, reaching toward her. “That spot you’re scratching looks an awful lot like poison ivy.”
“I know,” Catherine grumbled, thinking of Fynn’s excellent advice that hadn’t done squat for her. Her feet were on fire—her boots were the only thing keeping her from peeling the skin off of them just to get some relief.
“You should come with me over to the pharmacy after breakfast. I’ll doctor you up with some calamine.”
“Great.” Catherine half-smiled, imagining herself covered in pink.
Two steaming plates of breakfast perfection arrived at the table, a welcome distraction from the sudden barrage of thoughts about her sorry life she was trying to get back home to—thanks, Drew. She liberally salted and peppered her eggs and then had to hold herself back from exclaiming in oohs and aahs of delight with each bite.
“So the beginning of the May-gnificent festival is tonight. Why don’t you come and hang out and enjoy what Nekoyah has to offer?” Drew dabbed at her mouth with a napkin.
“Actually, I’m not much in the mood for celebrating. And I was hoping there was still a chance I would be on a plane later today,” she said between bites.
“Are you telling me you’re leaving without what you came for?” Her tone was surprised disappointment.
“Oh, no,” Catherine said quickly, her hands occupied with building a breakfast sandwich out of eggs, bacon, and triangular slices of toast. “I have one last plan of attack. I’ll be leaving with it all right—it might be against his will, but your brother is coughing it up. I don’t know who he thinks he’s messing with, but I have ways to get what I want.”
“I’m sure you do. Good luck,” she said genuinely. “And consider flying out tomorrow. The festival is really a nice time—a little Nekoyah to remember us by.
Fat chance.
-32-
His face fell when he saw her, stoking the fires of Catherine’s annoyance. What the hell were the chances, although considering the week she was having, when it came to Joel Trager her chances were excellent—better than 80-20 at any point…. And to think that he would be frustrated about running into her right now, when she was the one being double-teamed this morning, first his sister and now him. Plus she had gotten here first, parked her car before he had even pulled into the lot, so as far as the universe was concerned, The Home Depot—this one in Nekoyah, Minnesota—was hers. She had every right to be the one put out by his presence, so she fought the urge to duck and hide behind a parked car or slip into the forest of five-gallon trees for sale. She was not a child—unlike him. Her pride in that one thing alone fueled her fire to outlast him no matter what and gave her the balls to stay on her feet and in his way as he tried to enter the store.
“Is no place sacred?” he scoffed, brushing past her.
But she fell in step next to him, walking fast to keep up. “I left a tracking
device on Magnus,” she said, pointing back toward the truck where she could just see Magnus’s giant head poked out of the passenger window. She was trying to be nonchalant, friendly even, attempting to squelch the animosity that seemed to bubble to the surface every time she spoke to him. “By the way, I miss the sidecar action.”
“I need supplies. It’s not really a motorcycle job,” Fynn said derisively, like she was the idiot, when he was the one who couldn’t decipher friendly banter.
“Well, I need supplies too,” she humphed, thinking about the lightbulbs for the vanity light in the bathroom, and the towels she still needed to pick up. All so she didn’t have to bother Mr. Stilman for any more favors. She didn’t want to admit what had happened to her last towel. Or that she now had two more occupants in residence at the cabin—not that he wouldn’t have already noticed the comings and goings of another car.
“Perhaps you’re planning to build a catapult to launch yourself into my life and snatch the sundae?” he asked.
“Maybe,” she said grimly, aggravated that even though she found him excruciatingly obnoxious she still felt his raw sexuality threatening the strength in her knees, making her feel like she was wobbling on Jell-O joints, while he was entirely immune to her.
“It’s pretty overcast, you know. Did you have a long night?” He motioned at her sunglasses.
“My eyes are sensitive to the glare.”
“Oh.” He nodded his head knowingly.
“Sometimes it’s actually worse in cloudy conditions,” she noted—partly true, although today it was definitely the vodka and beer talking.
“So you weren’t drunk last night?”
“No,” she gulped. Not until after….
He shook his head with disappointment—like a drunken attempt at burgling his joint could have been laughed off, but a serious one?
Fynn stopped for a second to look her up and down. “Is this the walk of shame?”
“Very funny. This—” She motioned at her rumpled, used clothes. “—is all because of you.”
He looked up toward the sky for a moment as if he was deep in thought. “Nope, I didn’t have the benefit of a one-night stand last night.”
“You know what I mean,” Catherine spat, feeling a flush of something bordering on rage—like he would even have to take one moment to remember a night with her. I’m unforgettable. At least she used to pretty well know what she was doing back when she was actually doing it.
“No, I don’t know what you mean.”
“I was only supposed to be here for two days. I brought one change of clothes—”
“Sounds like you need a little lesson in preparation.”
It was like she was suddenly talking to her mother; so just like she did with her mother, she absorbed the judgment and moved on. “I could have been in and out of your life like that.” She snapped her fingers. “But instead you have me trapped here against my will and I have nothing—”
“I’ve trapped you? That’s rich. A stakeout last night and attempted burglary, and now you corner me in the parking lot, but I’ve trapped you? You’re stalking me. You can stop anytime you want. If you want your precious things and your precious life back to normal, then go home. I know I’d sure like my life back. So leave. You don’t have to stick around here. You won’t be missed.”
He started walking again and she grabbed his arm, shocked by the tightness of the muscle. She knew how it looked, but to hold it was a better story altogether.
“I just wanted to talk to you about a simple deal and you wouldn’t listen to me.”
“I did listen. I just refused. And now you won’t take no for an answer. No means no.”
“But it doesn’t make any sense.”
“Just for a minute, think back to when you were little and your parents wouldn’t let you have what you wanted…. I believe the answer was—because I said so.”
“But I—”
“It doesn’t matter whether it makes sense, or why I refused. It’s my property and I won’t—I repeat, won’t sell.”
“Just wait. Please. I’m not asking for much. It’s nothing really. I know we got off on the wrong foot but hear me out.”
He stopped tugging against her. “Give me your best shot. No more stories.”
“Okay…” she said uncertainly, wondering if it was a trap. But he just stood there waiting, and she swore she heard the Jeopardy! theme counting her down. She rushed the words out before he could change his mind. “I want the toy because it used to be mine. That exact one.”
“Oh come on.”
“I’m totally serious. It was mine. The scratch ’n sniff sticker on the bottom, the one that smells like popcorn… or at least it used to—probably smells like paper now—I put it there so I could tell it apart from my friend Suzy’s.”
Fynn cocked his head slightly, weighing her words.
She ventured a hopeful look into those blue eyes.
“It’s a sweet story and all…. But I can’t.”
“You can’t what? .... You still don’t believe me?” she demanded, wondering how on earth that could be. He was the liar—at least the worse liar. She had fibbed; he had made up a daughter and a dead wife. You couldn’t even compare a bitchy boss and her dog Winston to a little girl and her dead mother. They weren’t in the same league of lie-dom. And now she was telling the truth, while he was still evading!
“No. I can’t sell it to you.” He dropped his refusal in front of her, letting gravity do all the work.
“But why? You’re a grown man! What do you need with a little girl’s toy?”
“By the way,” he said, ignoring her comment, “you’ve got a little pink schmutz right there.” He pointed to his own neck in mirror image.
“No thanks to you,” she seethed, touching it and starting the itching process all over again.
“What do you mean me?”
“You told me to take a shower to stop it from even starting.”
“Oh… right.” He didn’t even try to stifle a laugh; just let the chuckle roll out with his words.
“Well it didn’t work.”
“It all depends on your body chemistry, but believe me, getting it off your skin was still smart to do; it could have been much worse. So you got a little touch right there—big deal.” He motioned toward her neck.
“And my feet are four sizes larger. They’re covered in it.”
“Yeah, I kind of figured.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
“What good would it have done? Were you going to buy bigger shoes?”
“That’s so funny I forgot to laugh,” she said, whipping out a prime retort that used to kill on the playground. She turned on her heel and started back toward the car at a duck-like pace, courtesy of her swollen feet. She could get lightbulbs somewhere else.
-33-
Georgia’s rental car was out front when Catherine finally made it back to the cabin—no ticking engine and the hood wasn’t warm to the touch. At least her friends hadn’t gotten it into their minds to “fix things” while she was gone. The cabin by the lake seemed to be totally at peace. One could almost imagine that this was actually a vacation, especially as the sun was now beginning to poke through the clouds.
Catherine opened the door, a creaking alarm announcing her presence, just as Tara was coming around the corner from the shower, her mouth open in a question. “How am I supposed to grab a shower with this for a towel?” She held up a washcloth accusingly and fixed her attention on her hostess as if she’d expected to find her in the doorway.
“Good day to you too,” Catherine said, closing the door behind her and marveling at the fact that she had been greeted better by total strangers in town this morning.
“Seriously, Cat, I already have the water running. Where’s housekeeping?”
“This place is closed,” she reminded her. “We just have to make do.” She watched Tara head back toward the bathroom in bewildered disgust—obviously not a “roughing i
t” kind of gal. She reached in the Kohl’s bag she held and flung a plush new towel at the back of her friend’s head.
“What the—” Tara whirled around ready to fight, until she noticed what hit her. She tossed the useless washcloth on the bed and picked up the towel. “You’re the best! You got another?”
“Don’t get greedy,” Catherine cautioned. “I got one for each of us.”
“But I always use separate ones for my hair and my body—don’t want to get ass-head,” she blanched.
Catherine picked up the washcloth. “Head or body—your choice,” she said, shoving the tiny cloth at her.
“Way to cheap out. I take back my compliment,” Tara grumbled.
“When you’re buying you can get whatever you want.”
Tara stuck her tongue out in five-year-old fashion.
“Where’s Georgia?” Catherine asked, ignoring her immaturity and instead taking in the otherwise empty cabin.
“How should I know? I wasn’t watching her. She is supposed to be watching me, remember? And now it seems the babysitter’s gone and run off.”
“Gosh, you’re testy. You celebrating a failed heist or something?” Catherine joked.
“You said testy.” Tara giggled all the way to the shower.
Catherine looked around the empty room, at a complete loss. She hoped Georgia hadn’t gotten it in her mind to go to the owner of the cabin and start asking about amenities. She had never come clean to him about the strays she was keeping. But what was the worst that could come of that? Getting kicked out? They had reached a tipping point anyway—the choice now, to go back to New York, or register for legal citizenship and become a Nekoyan.
2 Days 'Til Sundae (2 'Til Series Book 1) Page 22