Exclusively Yours

by Shannon Stacey

  Kevin, who was riding drag, pulled up alongside them and stopped. “You want me to hang back?”

  “No, we’re just gonna take it slow.” When his brother gave him a yeah right look, obviously not referring to their speedometer, Joe ignored him. “See you back there.”

  He gave the rest of the family a good head start, mostly to let the dust settle, then set about trying to guide her through driving while maintaining as little physical contact as possible.

  She got the hang of it pretty quickly, though, and once the fear of injury passed, his mind was free to take their proximity, add the fact they were alone, and come up with the sum total of trouble.

  Ever since that impromptu, very public kiss, he’d been thinking about doing it again. Maybe with a little more finesse and a lot fewer spectators. The question was whether or not Keri would let him. The first time had been a sneak attack, but she hadn’t slapped his face or cursed him out afterward.

  When they came to a well-shaded intersection, Keri pulled the machine to the side of the trail and shut it off. “My thumb hurts.”

  He laughed while she climbed off and removed her goggles. “That’s normal. Everybody’s does at first, but then you get used to it.”

  When she slipped off her helmet, he could see how much she’d enjoyed herself.

  He hadn’t been exaggerating in the restaurant when he told her time had been pretty damn good to her. Decked out in that little black dress with killer heels and her make-up just so, she’d been a hot number. But out here in the woods with trail dust smudging her face and helmet hair and a big-ass grin, she was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

  It was dangerous, looking for the young Keri who’d loved him in her eyes, but he could see her. Inside the polished stranger lurked the girl he’d wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

  “Can I drive all the way back?” she asked, and he stifled a groan.

  All the way back to the campground with her shifting her weight between his legs? Oh, hell no. He’d never make it without coming in his pants like a teenager. “Sure.”

  Since the cooler packed with water bottles had gone on ahead with the family, they stood around for a couple of minutes while Joe thought about working up the nerve to kiss her again.

  “Why did you kiss me?” she asked suddenly, her gaze like an interrogator’s spotlight on his face.

  “Glitch in the space-time continuum, I guess. Old habits die hard and all that.” Chickenshit.

  “Okay.” She nodded, but he didn’t think she looked as relieved as she was going for. “Because, you know, we’re not teenagers anymore. And we’re practically strangers.”

  “Sure.” He was practically a stranger who knew just where to touch her to make her squirm and beg for him to… Dammit. “You ready to head back?”

  He had to get away from her, even for a few minutes. There was no way in hell he was going to survive two weeks of this.

  Chapter Five

  Keri barely managed to catch her breath after the ride before she found herself roped into lifeguard duty. Something to do with Joe making a promise to Lisa in exchange for Mike going out with his brothers.

  Of all the Kowalski activities Joe would no doubt coerce her into, she anticipated enjoying this one the most. Back home the landscape was littered with swimming pools, but Tina didn’t pay her to lounge poolside.She was pretty sure she had everything. A folding chair lifted from Lisa’s campsite. A flimsy yet festive wrap to accent her black tank suit. Towel, water bottle, and the paperback legal thriller she’d picked up at LAX. With her hair pulled back in an elastic band and sunscreen liberally applied, she was ready.

  Joe stood and gave her a low wolf whistle when she stepped out onto the porch. “Damn, babe.”

  “Save it, Kowalski.” But she still felt the blush. Recovering from the day’s close contact was taking longer than she’d thought. “And stop calling me babe. We’re not teenagers anymore.”

  “Can’t help it. I see you and think babe. Always have.”

  Sure, he’d always called her babe, but that was back before she was trying—and failing—to keep some kind of professional distance between them. “Can you at least not call me that in front of your family?”

  “Can I call you babe when we’re alone?”

  “Can I stop you?”

  He shrugged. “Probably not.”

  It was the best deal she was going to get and, truth be told, she didn’t mind it quite as much as she let on. “Fine.”

  “If you want to head down, the kids will be waiting at the pool’s gate because they’re not allowed to go in until an adult shows up. I’ll be down after I get changed. You might want to rethink the book, though.”

  “I’m going to sit by the pool, relax, read my book and watch the kids swim.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Fifteen minutes later, the paperback had swelled to War and Peace proportions, her chair was upside down, she was involuntarily in the pool, and Steph was using Keri’s sopping wet wrap to snap the back of Danny’s thighs.

  She’d given up trying to keep track of who wasn’t supposed to be running, who wasn’t supposed to be diving and who wasn’t supposed to be drowning whom.

  There was shouting, shoving, splashing, screeching and it was impossible to keep all five of them in her line of vision at one time.

  Keri hauled herself onto the side of the pool just in time to hear, “Fore!” The shout was followed by a splash and mini-tidal wave.

  “No diving!” she shouted. “No running, no screaming and, for God’s sake, Brian, let your brother come up for air!”

  She heard Joe’s laugh before she saw him, and turned to see him and his brothers coming toward the gate. While normally she might take a second to appreciate the sight of three tall, rugged Kowalski men in nothing but swim trunks, her libido was as frazzled as the rest of her.

  “I thought you weren’t going in,” Joe called.

  “I wasn’t. But then Joey tried to drag Brian into something called the tandem cannonball of doom, which didn’t sound good. So I went over to break it up and one of the other demon spawn—no offense, Mike—ran by and bumped into me. I tripped and ended up in something called the triple cannonball of doom, which is not as fun as it sounds.” She paused to take a breath. “And that was after my book got wet.”

  Joe was laughing so hard she was surprised he could breathe, but Mike put two fingers in his mouth and gave a shrill whistle.

  In the blink of an eye, all five kids were sitting on the edge of the poll, innocence blanketing their devious little faces.

  “Two through six,” he called to the kids. “Go.”

  It took Keri a few seconds to realize they were mumbling the multiplication table. “Does that really work?”

  “You bet. Two through six is a warning. Seven through ten’s pretty serious. Rarely do we need eleven and twelve.”

  “If this is their usual punishment, they must be great at math.”

  Mike grinned. “Straight A’s across the board, every one of them. Well, not Bobby yet, but he got all E’s in kindergarten.”

  “You’re kidding.” Keri used her hand to wipe water from her face since her towel had already been doused. “Evil and smart. Scary.”

  She took advantage of the lull to right her chair and hang her wrap and towel over the fence. Her book she set in a sunny spot to dry. She’d just reached a good part, dammit.

  “Six times twelve is seventy-two!” the kids yelled in unison.

  “Take it easy on Keri,” Joe warned. “She’s soft.”

  Without thinking, she planted her feet and shoved him in the pool. The shouting, shoving, splashing and screeching resumed. It wasn’t quite as bad until Kevin tried to get her into a tandem cannonball of doom. The ensuing underwater wrestling match between Joe and his brother got the kids really wound up, until Mike had to resort to whistling again.

  Finally, wet and exhausted and with a tinge of sunburn, it was time
for Keri to drag her worse-for-wear belongings back up the dirt road. She made it as far as Lisa’s site before she unfolded her chair and dropped into it.

  “You have my undying respect and admiration,” she told the boys’ mother, who only rolled her eyes and opened the grill. “Seriously. I don’t know how you do it.”

  “They were loving, adorable babies. Sucked me in while they were young.”

  Keri smiled and let her eyes drift closed. She should get up and head to the cabin. Take a shower and get dressed. Find some bottled water. But it was cool in the shade and Lisa was humming and she couldn’t bring herself to move. Just a few more minutes.

  The last thing Terry wanted to see when she came around the corner of Lisa’s RV was Keri Daniels, bathing suit-clad, eyes closed and gracefully draped in a folding chair.

  She knew from countless childhood sleepovers Keri snored like crazy, so she didn’t think she was asleep. Then again, maybe they fixed those kinds of flaws out there in California. Adenoid removal or something. She managed—barely—to refrain from kicking the chair on her way by. Rational or not, Keri had become the face of all the crap screwing up Terry’s life. She couldn’t take her frustrations out on her family and Evan was too far away, but she could channel that discontent into her feelings about the woman who was playing her brother for a fool. Again.Letting the princess rest, Terry threw herself into helping Lisa make supper for the crowd. Family members trickled in and at some point she looked up to find Keri in deep conversation with Danny. Mike’s twelve-year-old was nodding solemnly at every word she said, as though she were some kind of damn oracle.

  “Think you can help with salads, Keri, or you afraid you’ll break a nail?” Everybody turned to look at her, and she wasn’t surprised. That had come across a little bitchier than she’d intended. “They’re in Ma’s fridge.”

  “All you had to do was tell me you needed a hand,” Keri said calmly, which, of course, made Terry look even more irrational. “I was getting ready to offer, anyway. Just wanted to finish my conversation with Danny.”

  “Won’t be long, then, since you ditch friendships like dirty socks.”

  Keri froze for a second, and then her eyes narrowed. “Oh, that’s it! I call bullsh…crap, Theresa Kowalski.”

  “Porter,” Steph chimed.

  “Don’t even try to deny it, Keri Daniels. Once Whatsherface with the blonde hair and big boobs let you sit at her lunch table, that was the end of our friendship.”

  “That was Keri,” Kevin interrupted.

  “What?” they asked together.

  “Keri had the blonde hair and big boobs. Whatsherface was a brunette.”

  “Whatever,” Terry snapped before turning back to Keri. “The point is, you dropped me like a flaming bag of dog shit for a girl whose name we can’t even remember.”

  “Courtney Carlson,” Kevin said.

  “That’s right.” Keri frowned at him. “How do you remember that? You were behind us in school.”

  “Her yearbook photos, especially the cheerleading candids. Sometimes I’d—” he paused, obviously remembering Steph’s presence, “—have them nearby while checking myself for ticks.”

  Terry gave him a quelling look of death before turning back to the blonde in question.

  “I tried,” Keri said. “I’d call you to invite you somewhere and you always got bitchy. Said you were busy and I should have fun with my new friends. Eventually I quit trying.”

  Heat climbed Terry’s neck and knowing they could see it pissed her off even more. “You chose them over me.”

  “They were fun and you had a hair across your ass so at some point, yeah, hanging out with them instead of you was inevitable, don’t you think?”

  “Girls! Enough.”

  Once Mary Kowalski said something was enough, that something was over, so everybody went back to doing what they were doing, except Keri, who managed to surreptitiously flip her the bird before heading off to Ma’s camper.

  The laugh that bubbled up surprised Terry, and she squashed it the best she could. She could remember back when they were young, Terry had been the first to dare the gesture. Privately, of course. Just practicing. It took a while for Keri to work up the courage, and she’d had the misfortune to be near a mirror. Joe caught sight of Keri’s finger and yelled for Ma, who let them know unequivocally that was enough of that.

  They’d had so many good times together. Most of her childhood memories included Keri, the two of them giggling and playing with Barbie dolls and tormenting Joe.

  But she could also remember how much it hurt seeing Keri hanging out with new friends. And, yes, maybe she’d driven her away before she could dump her, thinking it would hurt less. Or maybe the friendship had simply run its natural course.

  Terry was shy, though, and losing her best friend had hurt, no matter whose fault it was. Keri sitting with the in-crowd at lunch, with her awesome hair and clothes that hadn’t come from K-mart had seemed like an unforgivable sin.

  Almost twenty years ago. Even she had to admit Keri hadn’t done anything to merit being treated like crap since she’d arrived. Joe had told Terry that she was upfront about what she was looking for, and that she’d agreed to every one of his stipulations. As for the kiss, Joe was the one doing the pursuing. Her brother was an attractive guy and she couldn’t really blame Keri for not trying too hard to get away, past history or no.

  Which meant, crap, she owed Keri an apology.

  Maybe later, when she didn’t have an audience. Of course, if it had been Stephanie, she would have made her apologize in front of everybody. You do the crime in public, you do the time in public.

  But one of the few benefits to being the adult was the freedom to break your own rules.

  Terry managed to keep her mouth shut through supper, even once Stephanie did the math and came up with Keri Daniels plus Spotlight Magazine equaled first-hand knowledge of celebrity gossip. Have you ever met “fill in the blank” became the question of the evening, and the number of yeses turned her daughter into as big a fan of Keri as Joe was.

  “Ohmigod, Mom, did you hear that?” Steph exclaimed when Keri was done telling her the story of having wine spilled on her by one of the hottest leading men in Hollywood.

  “Yup. That’s funny. And at least he could afford the dry cleaning bill,” she said lightly, and she could almost feel the tension pop like a balloon. Her mother’s look of maternal approval took care of any doubt they’d been expecting her to say something nasty.

  It hadn’t been easy, though. Stephanie had been a bundle of preteen angst and attitude lately and seeing her drinking up Keri’s company made her feel like she was sitting alone at the wrong lunch table again.

  Keri launched into another tale of celebrity embarrassment and Terry tuned her out, as well as Stephanie’s totally enraptured responses.

  She turned her attention instead to Mike and Lisa, who were barely managing to hide the fact they weren’t really speaking to each other a whole lot. If possible, there seemed to be even more tension between them than between her and Keri.

  The family grapevine had clued her in to the fact Lisa had responded to Mike’s suggestion he was ready to face a vasectomy with the suggestion they think about having another baby first. Not surprisingly, Mike hadn’t reacted well.

  Depression settled over Terry like a fog. They all seemed to be falling apart. Even Kevin was nursing the heartbreak of a divorce, though he refused to talk about it. Now Mike and Lisa, the seemingly perfect couple, had hit a rocky patch, and there was nothing Terry could do to help them through it.

  Hell, she couldn’t even save her own marriage. What made her think she had a chance in hell of helping anybody else?

  Keri threw herself diagonally across the big bed with a satisfied sigh. No foam slab for her tonight. No creaking plywood. And no fear of jerking upright out of a sound sleep and knocking herself out on the top bunk should that raccoon figure out the deadbolt.

  Pajama-clad and fresh from a run
to the bathhouse, she was ready to crash for the night.She grabbed a T-shirt and comb Joe’d left on the bed and tossed them over to the bottom bunk. Then she stretched out on her back, managing to take up the entire bed.

  “Comfy?”

  Joe didn’t sound nearly as thrilled about the new sleeping arrangement as she was. “Very, thank you.”

  “Gonna take your shoes off?”

  “Maybe.” Later. She was exhausted and, for right now, she wasn’t moving.

  The plywood groaned as Joe tested his weight on it. “I should have left you at the bottom of the hill and made you walk up.”

  “Be quiet. I’m trying to go to sleep before I have to pee again.”

  “You haven’t asked me a question yet.”

  “What are you—oh!” Shit! How could she have forgotten the interview? She blamed the marinated steak tips. And Mary’s potato salad. And the best corn on the cob ever. She was in a food stupor even her killer ambition couldn’t penetrate, and it was a good thing Tina couldn’t see her.

  Cursing her boss and that second helping of potato salad, Keri rolled herself to her side and sat up on the edge of the bed. Joe was stretched out on the bunk, his hands tucked behind his head and his feet flat against the footboard. He was a tight fit and she wondered whether or not she should feel guilty, but payback went both ways.

  Just to get it over with so she could sleep, Keri grabbed a bottle of water and her steno pad. She wouldn’t drink a lot because that could lead to a middle of the night sprint through the dark, but it was dry in the cabin.

  Sitting on the side of the big, comfy bed, she opened the notebook to her first question. “So how did a nice guy like you end up writing sick, twisted thrillers?”

  He turned his head to frown at her. “What the hell kind of question is that?”

  “A legitimate one.”

  “You called me sick and twisted.”

  “No, I called your books sick and twisted.”

  “But I write them.”

  “Hence the question. What kind of demented muse comes up with stories like that?”