Careful What You Kiss For

by Jane Lynne Daniels

  She ran out of breath long enough for Gemini to voice his impatience and Kate to interrupt with, “You saw Max?”

  Tensley stopped pacing. “I saw Max.”

  “I didn’t know he was back in town, either. Was this the first time you’d seen him since — everything happened?”

  “Yes.” She hugged herself tight.

  “Are you okay?” Kate’s voice softened. “That had to be tough.”

  “I can’t even begin to describe it.” Tough, amazing, infuriating, incredible. The biggest turn-on she’d felt in forever.

  “If it was anything like high school, I get it. I think I was electrocuted once when I accidentally walked between the two of you.” Kate looked at Gemini and then at Tensley. “Speaking of which, I hope your hair didn’t look like … you know … that when you saw him.” She pointed.

  “My hair is that cat’s fault.”

  The cat in question yowled, right on cue.

  “I’ll translate. He says that’s bullshit.”

  “Really.” Tensley jammed her hands on her hips and leaned down, searing her gaze into Gemini’s. “You tell him that — ” She broke off when she saw Kate’s expression. “I cannot believe I’m arguing with a cat. Now I know I’m losing my mind.”

  “In this place, it just means you’re normal.”

  The laughter bubbled up in the back of Tensley’s throat until it came careening out of her mouth, picking up steam as it rolled over Kate and she joined in. Once Tensley started, she couldn’t quit. It felt as though she hadn’t laughed for months, maybe years.

  A few minutes later, her eyes were damp and her stomach hurt, but she felt better than she had all day. “It was so hard to get that demon cat here.” She sucked in a breath. “And out of all that I just told you, the being on stage with no clothes on, all of that, the only thing you heard was that I saw Max. Really.”

  “I sort of knew about the other.”

  “You have got to be kidding me.”

  “People talk.” Kate managed to look both chastened and miserable at the same time. “It was hard to believe at first, but then — ” She lifted a shoulder. “Considering everything that happened to you … .”

  Tensley jammed her hands on her hips. “You know what? None of it would have happened if you hadn’t made me go see that woman.”

  Kate froze. “What woman?”

  “The psychic. Madame Claire.”

  Tensley watched as her best friend’s face turned several shades of white. Now Kate was the one to grab and hold onto the exam table. Gemini leaped out of her arms. “You went to — Madame — why?”

  “Because you made the appointment and told me I had to. Two days ago.”

  “Two days ago. That’s impossible. I haven’t even seen you since … hold on.” Kate wobbled toward the sink, grabbed a paper cup and took a drink of water. She kept her back turned. “Why in the hell would I do that?”

  The question was whispered so quietly, Tensley wasn’t sure if her friend meant it to be heard. She decided to answer, anyway. “Bryan-with-a-y-not-an-i?”

  No response. She tried again. “You said I had to stop trying to find happily-ever-afters with losers. Like Bryan. Remember? I quit my job and flew to Canada to be with him. It was supposed to be a big, romantic surprise. The one spontaneous moment in my life.” Tensley paused and then kept going, desperate to spark her friend’s memory. “Except I was the one who got the big surprise. He forgot to tell me he’s already married. With a kid.”

  Something like a whimper came from Kate. Alarmed, Tensley crossed the small room. “Are you okay?”

  Kate turned an agonized expression on her. “While you were there,” she croaked, “at Madame Claire’s. Did she ask if you wanted to erase a mistake from your past?”

  Tensley closed her eyes and shook her head. Saying it aloud would make it real and if a part of her couldn’t cling to the hope that this whole thing was just one giant misinterpretation, she wasn’t sure what she would do.

  “Thank God.” Kate grabbed her wrist. Her breath came in short gasps. “Are you sure?”

  Again Tensley shook her head.

  Kate straightened, looking less relieved. “You’re not sure?”

  “Even if she did … .” Uh-oh. Kate might have stopped breathing entirely. “That would just be crazy.”

  “Tell me.” Her fingers closed tighter on Tensley’s wrist. “You have to.”

  “Ow. Fine. She said I could have a do-over.”

  “And?” Kate pressed. “What was the do-over?”

  “I told you. Crazy. It’s not as though I believed her.”

  “The do-over. What was it?”

  Tensley winced. “Not punching Rhonda when I had the chance.”

  She had never heard anything like the sound that came out of her best friend. It was a combination of a moan and a screech so high that every dog in the back kennels began barking. Gemini sailed from the table to the floor right as Marla threw open the door to yell, “Dr. O’Brien!”

  Kate let go of Tensley’s wrist to sink into the chair, head in her hands. Gemini shot past Marla’s legs as the barking chorus rose and swelled.

  “What happened?” the tech shouted.

  Given the events of the last forty-eight hours, Tensley decided, the better question was what the hell hadn’t happened?

  Yet.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “I’ll bet if there was a national poll, most women would say they made their biggest mistakes when they were teenagers.”

  Tensley took a bite from the apple she’d found in the clinic’s break room and considered Kate’s words as she crunched. “I think you’re right.”

  “So why is that?”

  “It’s the one time we’re sure we know everything.” Tensley tipped her head, thinking. The apple gleamed up at her, red, crunchy, satisfying. “Well that, and the temptation of hot teenage boys.” One in particular.

  Kate stood, brushing dog hair from her white coat. Tensley was relieved to see color begin returning to her friend’s face.

  The clinic was finally quiet. Marla and Kate had soothed each of the wound-up, barking dogs while Tensley climbed atop a stack of kennels to apologize to Gemini, who had been so enraged by the whole incident, he shook from ear to paw. He’d refused to even look at her, but after she’d groveled enough for ten sorry humans, he’d agreed to come down. Or maybe it was the bribe of a plate of Kate’s most expensive cat food.

  If she came back in another life, Tensley decided, she would like to be a cat. No one questioned a cat’s demands for a world that made sense.

  But on to the larger crisis. She had just opened her mouth to ask why Kate had gone to Madame Claire in the first place when her best friend spoke again, gazing at a calendar advertising the seven unique and savory flavors of a particular dog food. As if a dog cared whether there was more than one. “Mitch Sexton,” Kate mused. “He was my mistake.”

  Tensley aimed a skeptical look at her. “Mitch Sexton. The guy who read the Wall Street Journal every day. He was cute and I’m sure he’s made tons of money by now, but your babies would have been born carrying a briefcase.” Tensley shook her head. “Think how much that would have hurt. I know he liked you, but you were right not to go out with him.”

  Her best friend turned slowly, her clear gray-eyed gaze meeting Tensley’s. “Actually, I did go out with him.”

  “That’s — crazy. You would have told me.”

  “I did.”

  Alice down the rabbit hole again. “No. I would have remembered — ”

  “Senior prom.”

  Tensley rifled through the file drawers in her brain. She remembered helping Kate pick out a dress, couldn’t remember who her friend’s date had been. And why couldn’t she think what she herself had worn … oh. Tensley hadn’t gone. That had been the night she and Max first made love. And it had been so much better than any prom ever could have been … .

  She had to shove the memory aside before everything began t
o hurt again. “Okay. So you went to the senior prom with Mitch.”

  Kate dropped her chin, drumming her fingers lightly on the counter. Her voice softened and a sad smile teased at the corners of her mouth. “For a guy who read the Wall Street Journal for fun, he knew how to rock a kiss.”

  “Really.” Her mental picture of Mitch was changing by the second. “And how well he kissed didn’t depend on whether his stocks were up or down?”

  Kate’s smile became bigger, and sadder, at the same time. “I don’t know what his stocks were doing that night, but he was definitely up.”

  “Mitch. Mitch Sexton. And you.”

  “He got us a gorgeous hotel suite. Paid for it with his own American Express card.” Any humor in Kate’s small near-laugh was canceled out by the pain in her eyes. “Remember how much trouble we had with the zipper of that dress when I tried it on?”

  Tensley thought for a minute and shook her head. This was just weird.

  “It practically melted off me as soon as I stepped inside that suite. And Mitch was either a teenage prodigy at mind-blowing sex or the Wall Street Journal gives tips on more than the stock market.”

  “You slept with Mitch.”

  Kate didn’t seem to hear. “Maybe they printed a different edition for premium subscribers.”

  “And did he wear a tie while you were having this mind-blowing sex?”

  This time, Kate almost laughed. “No. He didn’t. And he didn’t stop once to check his stocks.”

  The apple hit the counter with a thump. “How could I not have known about this?” Best friendship carried certain unwritten rules. This was clearly a breach.

  Kate blinked and straightened, tugging her white coat into place. “Because it didn’t happen.”

  She wanted to scream. Instead, Tensley kept her voice low and even. “You just told me it did.”

  “When I went to Madame Claire, she erased the biggest mistake of my life.” Kate paused. “That night with Mitch Sexton.”

  Tensley tipped her head, looking at her friend. Kate was the level-headed one of the two of them. If anyone was given to flights of drama, it was Tensley. “So you had fun with a cute, geeky guy. That’s not such a bad thing.”

  “As it turned out, it was.”

  Her friend’s bottom lip quivered. “Why?” Tensley asked carefully.

  “I shouldn’t be talking about all this.” Kate put her hand up, backing away. “It’s crazy. We haven’t even seen each other in years and all of a sudden, I’m telling you things I haven’t told anyone — ”

  “Stop,” Tensley ordered.

  She did, letting her hand fall back down.

  “Two days ago, you tried to fire Mary Sue for, I don’t know, the tenth time in the last year? And you couldn’t do it. Just like you couldn’t do it the other nine times. Even though she misplaced the supply order and didn’t submit it. Again.”

  Kate stared.

  “Who did you call to beat yourself up for being weak? Me. Your best friend. And I reminded you what kind of a person you are. The kind that is a very good vet, but has a hard time firing people.”

  “Oh.”

  “You need an office manager. I told you that then, for … hmm … I guess the tenth time. And I’m telling you it again now.”

  Kate crinkled her forehead. “I do need an office manager.”

  “And you need to remember, no matter what else you might think happened, that we have never stopped being best friends.”

  “If anybody should know things aren’t what they seem, I guess it’s me.”

  “Damn right. Now tell me what happened with you and who-knew-he-had-it-in-him Mitch.”

  Kate looked away. When she spoke again, her voice was small. “It was all so fast. We were dancing at the prom, then we were in the suite drinking champagne, then more champagne, then we were in bed … .”

  “Oh. My God.” This time, Tensley was the one to drop into a chair. Her friend wouldn’t look at her. “You mean — ” She lowered her voice. “Did you get pregnant?”

  In the several minutes it took for Kate to respond, Tensley flew through emotions at a dizzying speed — from concern for her friend to regret that Tensley must not have been there for her and then to anger that Kate hadn’t shared something so monumental — before finally landing on empathy for the upheaval one night of teenage hormones must have caused.

  “I got married,” Kate said.

  “You — what? When?”

  “That night. We’d just graduated, the whole world was open to us and it felt exciting and grown up, but so scary. We didn’t think anything would change. We’d still go to college, but we would have each other and somehow getting married felt like being adults. When we weren’t sure we could be adults.” She took a deep breath. “Plus, it felt so good to have someone love me. And to love him back.”

  “Wow,” Tensley whispered in disbelief.

  Kate’s gaze took on a faraway look. “Remember when we were little, how we would plan our weddings? The dresses, the flowers. The gorgeous groom. The houses we would live in, the cars we would drive? We always started with ‘once upon a time.’”

  “And ended with ‘they lived happily ever after,’” Tensley said gently. “I remember.”

  “Fairy tales should be banned.”

  “Maybe.” Beads of worry began to form around her heart, ready to roll.

  “Little girls turn into big girls who still believe in them.”

  Madame Claire’s powers apparently didn’t extend to erasing the remembered pain of a mistake. Tensley stood, putting her hand on her friend’s arm. “Kate — ”

  From the back of the clinic, a dog began barking, diverting the vet’s attention. She turned toward the door. “I have to go.”

  Tensley kept hold of her arm, not letting her leave just yet. “What happened? With Mitch. Before you went to Madame Claire.”

  “Early in the morning. Justice of the Peace. We had both just turned eighteen so we didn’t need anyone’s permission.” If Kate’s lip hadn’t been trembling, she might have been able to pull off the playful lift of her brows. “And you were there, as my maid of honor. Wearing your best jeans. You looked great, if that helps. You brought Max with you.”

  It didn’t. Tensley felt as though her brain, which had been sprinting to keep up with processing all of this, stopped with a wheeze and a go-on-without-me wave of the hand. “But I wasn’t. There. Neither was he.”

  “Not after Madame Claire made it all go away.”

  Another dog joined in the barking.

  “How long were you married?”

  “Oh, let me think,” Kate said. Her tone was casual, but laden with bitterness. “Right about nine days, three hours and thirty-one minutes. Mitch’s father had the marriage annulled and Mitch didn’t say a word. He just … ” Kate turned her palms up, lifting a shoulder, “ … left early for Yale. And his father told everyone that I’d tricked his son into marrying me because he never would have ended up with someone like me otherwise. It was humiliating. I started wondering if his father was right.”

  “Like you would ever do something like that.” Tensley pressed her lips together.

  “That’s what you said then.” A small, sad smile. “But then everything happened with you and Max and I lost my best friend. Started drinking way too much and hanging out with people I shouldn’t have. A few weeks later, I’d totaled a car and been arrested for drugs. The university couldn’t pull my scholarship fast enough.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Never graduated. Never became a vet. Never got over Mitch and his father making me feel like dirt.”

  “I had no idea.”

  “I shouldn’t have had any idea, either.” Anger surged through Kate’s voice, building in intensity as she went on. “Madame Claire was supposed to be able to erase all of the memories, along with the mistake. That’s what she told me. That’s what I believed.” Kate sucked in a breath. “But she got it wrong with me and now with you.”

/>   Kate’s expression changed. “You have to believe me,” she pleaded. “I don’t remember sending you to Madame Claire. Until you came in today, I didn’t even know we were still in touch, still friends. As far as I knew, you moved away after the whole thing with Rhonda and I’d never heard from you again.”

  “Which,” Tensley felt compelled to point out, “didn’t actually happen until I went to see Madame Claire.”

  “Right.” Kate nodded her head and then shook it. “God, this is so complicated.”

  Understatement of the year.

  “But obviously, we were friends and I did send you to Madame Claire.”

  “Best friends.”

  “Some best friend I am. I can only hope the reason I sent you to her was because she swore she’d figured out what she did wrong the first time. I’m sorry. I really am.”

  Tensley met the anguished gaze of her best friend. “Hey, you were trying to help. And you must have believed her when she said it wouldn’t happen again.” She tried her best and brightest smile, figuring she might at least be able to manage one that was semi-good and only slightly dim. “And you’re a great best friend, by the way. Except for this one slip-up.”

  She watched as cautious relief crossed Kate’s face. Then the barking dog chorus began hitting high notes.

  “I have to see what’s going on.”

  “No!” Tensley stepped in front of her, blocking the way. “I can guarantee it has to do with that cat I ended up with. Marla will take care of it.”

  “But it’s my clinic. I have to — ”

  “No, you don’t.” Tensley shook a finger in her friend’s face. “You, Kathleen Margaret O’Brien, have to figure out how we’re going to me get out of this mess you got me into.”

  Kate’s shoulders sagged. “If there is a way out of it.”

  “Of course there is.” Tensley drew her own shoulders up and back.