Discover Me & You, A Devil's Kettle Romance: Book 2

by Susan Sey

  “So I’ll be damned,” Georgie went on, “if I’ll let Willa spoil my appetite with this train wreck she calls a wardrobe.”

  Willa’s phone dinged in her hand with an incoming text, and she suppressed a jump by force of sheer habit. Georgie might not be overly bright but she was shrewd and she was mean, which made her dangerous. A display of nerves would be like blood in the water.

  “Who is it?” Georgie asked, all big innocent eyes. “Or should I say what is it? Wait, don’t tell me. Is there a muskrat in the basement? A skunk in the garage? A bear in the liquor store? You lead such an interesting life, Willa.” She said interesting in exactly the same tone another woman might say contagious. Willa had to smile. Georgie was a lot of things, many of them deeply unappealing, but she gave good spite. Kept you on your toes.

  “I did a snake in a toilet the other night,” she offered.

  Georgie’s perfect face went momentarily blank and Addy said, “That’s a real thing? I thought that was just on the internet.”

  “It’s a real thing,” Willa informed her and checked the phone.

  Not a favorite what? Because nobody actually eats eggplant, do they? I meant food, Willa. Is there a food you don’t like?

  Her lips twitched. Eli Walker had himself a sense of humor.

  Omnivorous, she texted back. She considered the women in front of her and added, I also drink.

  “A snake in the toilet,” Addy mused, frowning into the middle distance. “My imagination is never going to unsee that.”

  “Just like I’m never going to unsee the abomination of this underwear drawer.” Georgie gave the drawer in question a look of the purest dislike, then turned that gaze on Willa. In spite of the heat, goosebumps broke out on Willa’s arms. Because that wasn’t dislike in Georgie’s eyes now. It was speculation. Perhaps even ambition. “You know what? I take it back. I’m glad she’s naked.”

  “What?” Willa yelped but Georgie was still talking to Addy.

  “I’m even gladder she’s just showered. I love you and all, Addy, but I have my limits and I know what she does for a living.”

  “You have no idea what Willa does for a living,” Addy said fondly.

  “And I’d like to keep it that way,” Georgie returned, seemingly unperturbed by the gaping holes in her own logic. She turned her attention back to Willa and said, “Lose the robe.”

  Willa was three steps down the stairs before Addy managed to hook a warm little hand in her elbow.

  “Willa, wait!” And because Addy was a lot stronger than she looked, Willa did. “Georgie didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

  “I absolutely did.” Now there was another hand in her elbow — a cool, expensive one this time — and Willa found herself being hauled back up the stairs. It was either that or risk losing the robe, something Willa had no intention of allowing. “I have a damn good eye but I’m not psychic. If I’m supposed to dress you, I need to know what I’m working with.”

  “You already put your hands all over my underwear,” Willa pointed out. “What else do you need to know?”

  “Measurements.”

  Willa opened her mouth but Georgie threw up a stop-sign hand.

  “Which I can’t get through a bathrobe. That travesty you call an underwear drawer isn’t going to give me any worthwhile information either.”

  “Well, I don’t have anything else so—”

  Georgie shot a manicured finger toward a small mountain of shopping bags on the bed. “We guessed.” She smiled, slow and evil. “Why don’t you try a few things on?”

  Willa opened her mouth to tell Georgie exactly where she could stuff her rich-girl pity-buys then happened to catch a glimpse of Addison behind Georgie’s skinny shoulder. She was all but wringing her hands and sidling from foot to exquisitely unhappy foot. Georgie would exploit any excuse to heap shame on Willa’s head but Addy actually liked Willa, and didn’t have a problem telling her sister-in-law (-in-law?) where to step off when she was misbehaving.

  But Addy wasn’t telling Georgie to stuff it. She was just standing there, throwing off big, fat waves of…what? Empathy, Willa thought. Understanding. Solidarity. She knew exactly what it was to be in a situation that stung but couldn’t be helped. That’s where she saw Willa now, fighting the good fight but waging an ultimately losing battle. Like a toddler resisting nap time.

  Fuck.

  She tossed her phone onto the bed and said, “I have to be somewhere by seven.”

  “Christ,” Georgie said. She snatched a bag out of the pile and threw it at Willa. “Start with these.”

  CHAPTER 11

  GEORGIE LISTENED TO Willa stomp down the stairs — presumably to some room in this godforsaken hovel that had a door on it — then turned back to her dearest friend and sister-in-law. And gasped in horror.

  “Jesus, Addison! You’re sitting on its bed!” The one person outside of blood whom Georgie had ever known to be completely and sincerely loyal was sitting cross-legged on Willa’s quilt, gnawing on her lip, staring at the empty stairs. “Get off there. You’ll catch something.”

  Addy ignored that and continued to chew on her lip. “Her dad is staying here.” She shifted that clear green gaze to Georgie. “Do you think she’s safe?”

  Something uncomfortable stirred in Georgie’s gut and she rolled an irritable shoulder. “Why wouldn’t she be?”

  Addy dropped her voice. “Even I’ve heard the rumors about Brett Zinc. People think he killed his wife!” She hopped off the bed and came to Georgie, grabbed her hands urgently. “I know you don’t like her but think about that, would you? What if your dad did something awful while he wasn’t himself, while he was too drunk to know better? What if it cost you your mom?”

  That stirring in her gut edged toward actual cramping and Georgie filled her lungs with cool, calming air. She released the air on a deep sigh that was gratifyingly languid and unconcerned, then commanded her wonky innards to settle the fuck down. “My dad died less than a year before Matty was born, Addison. I know what losing a parent is.”

  “So you should know how awful it would be to have to cut off the other one. That maybe you couldn’t do it, even if you ought to. Not even to keep yourself safe. He’s her family, Georgie.”

  And here came the cramping. Lovely. Georgie drifted to the bed Addy had abandoned, made a show of smacking clean a space on the quilt and sank gracefully onto the edge.

  “Believe me, Willa doesn’t have any particular reverence for family.” She smiled but her voice was as hard as her words. “I dated her brother for two years and never saw them exchange so much as a Christmas card.”

  “But you hate Willa, and Peter wanted to marry you.”

  “He wanted to marry my money,” Georgie pointed out and breathed through the fading cramp.

  “Which is exactly why you can’t depend on anything he told you.”

  Georgie smiled tightly. “Yes, thank you. I’ve come to understand that.”

  Addy sighed and sat next to Georgie. Wrapped a warm, strong arm around her and tipped her curly head onto Georgie’s shoulder. She smelled like sunshine and mint shampoo, and Georgie felt her plastic smile melt away and the last of the pain drain from her stomach. “I’m sorry, honey. I really am. For what it’s worth, I think you’re right. There’s no love lost between Willa and Peter.”

  “Thank you.”

  “But that means the night Davis Place burned, the night Matty burned it down?”

  “The night my fiancé blackmailed my baby brother into burning it down so he could commit insurance fraud, you mean?”

  “Exactly.” Addy gripped Georgie’s hands and leaned back to look her square in the face. “Willa heard everything that night. She knows exactly what really happened, and she didn’t say a word. She’s never said a word. Not to anybody.”

  “No, I know,” Georgie murmured, and a warning twinge fluttered in her stomach again. “Believe me, I know.”

  “And if we accept that she’s not protecting Peter, w
hich I propose we do—”

  “Agreed,” Georgie said reluctantly.

  “—and if we accept that the hatred between her and your family remains intact, for whatever impossible reason nobody’s seen fit to reveal to me?”

  “We definitely do.”

  “Then we have to accept that Willa’s protecting Matty, the beloved baby of the family she hates and that hates her right back.”

  “It sure looks that way, doesn’t it?” Georgie said, frowning blindly at Willa’s horrible dresser.

  “Why would she do that?”

  “I have no idea,” Georgie said. And it wasn’t for lack of thinking it over, either. The question chewed endlessly at her gut while she pushed uneaten food around her plate, while she stared fruitlessly at submissions to the gallery, while she passed countless sleepless hours in her bed. It sat there in her stomach even now, Willa’s refusal to hurt them through Matty, a foreign idea she could neither digest nor throw up. It just sat there, wrong and stubborn, eating at her like an ulcer. “But I’ll tell you one thing I do know.”

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s not respect for family — even a family she hates — driving her.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I just know.”

  “So what is driving her?”

  “That I don’t know.” Georgie pressed her lips together. “But I’m going to find out.”

  Addy frowned. “How?”

  A muffled ding sounded in the pile of shopping bags behind them and Georgie smiled. “I’m going to start by reading her texts.”

  “What?” Addy leapt to her feet. “You can’t!”

  “Of course I can.” Georgie told herself not to think about rabies and shoved a hand into the closest mountain of bags. Came up with Willa’s phone and prayed it hadn’t been asleep long enough to require a passcode.

  She swiped the screen and the text message program opened cooperatively. She smiled and read the most recent thread.

  “Oh good heavens.” She stared at the screen, dumbfounded.

  “What?” Addy danced from foot to foot in an agony of nerves. “What?”

  “Willa the Skunk Girl has a date.”

  Addy grinned hugely. “Really?”

  The stairs creaked but Georgie didn’t put down the phone. She made a decision instead. She knew what people thought when they looked at her — rich, spoiled, lazy, entitled, beautiful, stupid. Some of those titles she’d earned, some of them had come with her name. The rest were misperceptions she’d either cultivated on purpose or allowed to stand because she didn’t care. People could think what they wanted; she knew who she was. She knew she wasn’t stupid, nor was she pointlessly vindictive. She had principles and she lived by them, that was all.

  The most important one was family. Family came before everything and everybody else. Being a Davis was a privilege and a responsibility, and she’d been brought up to give thanks for the one and to honor the other.

  Willa Zinc, on the other hand, had no concept of loyalty, no sense of honor and no commitment to responsibility. She didn’t understand family on any level, but somehow fate — in its infinite bitchiness — had connected her indelibly to Georgie’s family. Georgie could hate her for that alone, for sticking her dirty fingers into something that Georgie held precious, for trying to take for her own something she didn’t deserve. But she didn’t. No, what Georgie really hated Willa for was letting go. She’d had the balls to reach. She should’ve had the balls to hang on. If she knew what love was, what loyalty was, what family was, she wouldn’t have been able to let go. Not for any amount of money.

  But she’d let go. And Georgie wasn’t about to let her grab on again.

  But Willa — so predictable for so long — was suddenly making moves that Georgie didn’t understand and that made her deeply uncomfortable. The game had changed and Georgie was by God going to understand why. And that would mean shifting stances on one of the other guiding principles of her life — hating Willa Zinc. At least in public.

  “You wanted me to be nicer to Willa, didn’t you?” she said now to Addy, who was still grinning at the idea of Willa’s date.

  “You know I did.”

  “I’m going to do it.”

  Addy blinked, startled back to the present. “You are?”

  “I am.” She smiled and rose as Willa hit the top of the stairs, smoothly tucking the phone into the clever side pocket of her skirt. “There you are, Willa. How did everything fit?”

  Willa only frowned, her hands going protectively to the belt of her bathrobe, her wet hair starting to wave around that small, suspicious face.

  “Addy and I had a good talk while you were changing,” Georgie went on conversationally. She pulled her hand from her pocket and brought out a seamstress’s tape measure.

  “Did you?” Willa’s eyes fixed warily on the measuring tape.

  “We did. Worked out a few things.” Georgie flicked a hand toward the center of the room. “Stand over there.”

  Willa didn’t move. “Talk first, measure second.”

  “Fine.” Georgie gave a theatrical sigh. “So here’s the deal, Willa. I don’t like you and you don’t like me, and I don’t see that changing. But I decided that I love Addy more than I hate you.”

  Willa’s gaze flicked to Addy. “She loves you a whole awful lot.”

  “You have no idea.” Georgie shook back her hair with a long-suffering sigh. “So I’m going to give her a gift. A wedding gift.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You.” Georgie smiled, sleek and brilliant and just a little bit sharp. Sharp enough that Willa would recognize the cutting edge and relax, thinking everything was de rigueur. “Only better. A you that won’t embarrass her on the most important day of her life.”

  “I would never be embarrassed of Willa,” Addy said stoutly.

  “Of course not,” Georgie murmured. “And I’m going to make sure of it. Which means you and I, Willa, are going to work very closely together these next few months. When it comes to your face, hair and body, you’re going to do exactly what I tell you.”

  “I own power tools, Georgie. I’m not afraid to use them.”

  “And that complete cooperation,” Georgie went on as if Willa hadn’t spoken, “is going to be your wedding present to Addison.”

  Willa clamped her jaw shut and descended into fuming silence.

  “Agreed?” Georgie unfurled a length of the tape measure and snapped it between her fists like a strop.

  Willa looked to Addison, who clasped her hands together under her chin and said, “Please? I don’t care what you look like but an honest cease-fire between my bridesmaids would be the best present in the world.”

  “Ah, hell.” Willa stalked to the center of the room.

  Georgie said, “Drop the robe.”

  “I hate you.”

  “Back at you, sister.”

  Willa dropped the robe.

  “Holy Moses,” Addy breathed, “everything fits exactly. You’re good, Georgie. You’re very, very good. How on earth did you guess the sizes so well?”

  “It’s a gift.” Georgie narrowed her eyes and considered Willa standing there in the bra and panties Georgie had purchased for her. She’d gone with combed cotton in a gun-metal gray that matched her eyes, the eyes people rarely saw under the brim of that stupid ball cap but that Georgie saw every day looking out of her baby brother’s face. Georgie might hold her fire for the next few months but she would never forget what Willa had done to Matty. Would never let Willa forget either. “But I’m going to measure anyway. Arms out, Willa.”

  Willa stood there, all but naked, while her bitterest enemy wrapped a measuring tape around every conceivable body part with shocking competence. And she knew she was making a terrible mistake. She didn’t know how letting Georgie take her measurements was dangerous, only that it was. Nearly as dangerous as wearing the bra and panty set Georgie had picked out to match her eyes. Hers and Matty’s. That was no acciden
t, and neither was this unexpected truce.

  Now Willa just had to figure out what the hell Georgie was playing at.

  “You don’t have a bad figure, you know,” Georgie said. “I would’ve been less generous with the cup size but Mom says you gave her quite a show at the gallery the other day.”

  “There was a situation with a chipmunk,” Willa muttered, her cheeks burning. “It got in my shirt.”

  “And you got out of it, which is why you’re wearing a bra right now that actually fits quite nicely. Those sports bras you wear don’t do you any favors, you know.”

  Of course Willa knew. That was the point of sports bras — to flatten those attention-seeking curves into complete overlook-ability. It wasn’t something a Davis would ever understand, so Willa didn’t bother to explain. Georgie didn’t seem to require a response. She just dropped to her knees and jammed the business end of the tape measurer into the business end of Willa.

  “Jesus, Georgie!”

  “Inseam,” she muttered, entirely unconcerned, and shot the other end of the tape to the floor. “Okay, all done. You can get dressed.”

  “Finally.” Willa bolted for her dresser, found herself nose to sternum with Georgie.

  “What did I say about wearing anything from that toxic waste site?”

  “What else do you propose I wear?”

  Georgie tucked the tape measurer into her pocket and drew out Willa’s phone. “I’m so glad you asked. Whoever you’re meeting at seven is going to be even gladder.” Georgie arched a brow. “Why didn’t you tell us you had a date?”

  “It’s not a date,” Willa muttered and snatched her phone back.

  “There’s a person on the other end of this text thread who might disagree. I’m sure she’s very nice, too.”

  “Lesbian jokes,” Willa said evenly. “So clever.”

  “Almost as clever as anorexia jokes.”

  Willa eyed her consideringly. “You’re not as dumb as you let people think, are you, Georgie?”