Love Me if You Dare

by Toni Blake

  Polly lifted both hands again, once more revealing the cat’s furry yellow head. “You can take this cat.” Then she lowered it back down.

  Camille felt her eyes go wide. “Take him where?”

  Polly gave her head a brisk shake. “Anywhere. Your room.” Then she began nodding. “Yep, your room. Take him to your room.”

  “But . . . won’t he do things like pee and poo?” Her mind flashed back to the fortuitous conversation she’d had with Riley about cats just a little while ago. “I was told cats are a no-no in the guest rooms.”

  Polly nodded profusely, looking worried. “That’s true, that’s very true. Reece has had problems with that. But he doesn’t need to know about this. And it’ll only be for a little while, until the inspection is over.”

  “But what about the peeing and pooing?” Camille insisted.

  Polly’s eyes shifted anxiously back and forth as she appeared to search her mind for an answer. “You can run up to Albertson’s and get some kitty litter and a pan. I’ll give ya some money from the cash drawer.”

  But Camille shook her head. “That’s okay—I can cover it. I’m just not . . .” Not really a cat person. I haven’t spent time with cats. I’m not the girl for this particular job.

  “Not able to say no?” Polly finished for her hopefully, then rushed onward. “You got no idea how much I appreciate it. Tiger and me both. You’re savin’ both our hides for sure.” Polly looked around then, to make sure the coast was clear, then spoke through clenched teeth. “Now are you ready for me to pass you the cat?”

  “Um . . .”

  “When I pass you this cat,” Polly went on in the same tone a secret agent might use, “you’re to turn around and head straight out the door. This cat was never here. Got it?”

  “Um . . .”

  “Good,” Polly said. Then thrust the striped cat across the counter.

  Camille had no choice but to take it—it was out of hiding now, after all, and she had to get it out of there. She was already going to be responsible for the closing of one business in Coral Cove; she couldn’t risk being the cause of another. So she took the cat into her arms and did as Polly had instructed—turned around and walked out the door as swiftly as possible.

  She’d begun to cross the parking lot before it totally hit her that she was carrying a cat to her room. But she kept moving.

  Thankfully, the cat wasn’t hefty—he was more the sleek, lean variety and blessedly docile, too, so it was easy to shift him into one arm as she wrestled her key from her purse. Maneuvering them both inside, she then lowered him to the bed.

  “Meow,” he said, looking up at her.

  “Um, yes, hi,” she said uncertainly. When the cat didn’t reply, she added, “Looks like you and I will be hanging out together.” Though at this point, the whole situation still felt a little surreal. How had she ended up a cat sitter? Why had she allowed Polly to pawn the cat off on her so easily? Usually, she was the manipulator in situations. Well, at least in her job anyway.

  “Meow,” the cat said again.

  “I need to go get you some kitty litter,” she told him. “So I’m going to trust you to be good while I’m gone and not hurt anything. Promise?”

  “Meow,” he said yet one more time.

  And that was good enough for her. Since she knew it was all she could get out of him.

  As she left, shutting the cat up in the room, it dawned on her that maybe she’d taken the cat because . . . Polly had entrusted her with it. Polly knew why she was here—she knew Camille was trying to buy the Happy Crab against Reece’s will—but she’d treated Camille nicely anyway, and with trust. So maybe Camille had wanted to show Polly she was nice, and that she could be trusted, that she wasn’t the bad guy here.

  And she really wasn’t. And maybe she appreciated Polly seeing that.

  Next stop: the grocery store for kitty litter.

  Her stay in Coral Cove just kept getting stranger and stranger.

  UPON her return from the store, Camille set up the litter box and was pleased to find that Tiger hadn’t done any apparent damage while she’d been away. She waited through the afternoon to hear from Polly that it was okay to send him back, but time passed—and no Polly.

  Mostly, the cat napped on the bed while Camille worked on her computer at the table. So far so good. But a few hours into their association, the cat silently bounded down from the bed and onto the floor and over to where she worked. He looked up at her. “Meow.”

  “Hi,” she said just as uncertainly as when she’d first brought him to her room. She just didn’t know what to do with a cat. What did he want?

  He meowed again and this time stepped closer to her ankles and the leg of her chair.

  She backed the chair out a little and—sheesh!—the cat pounced up onto her lap like he belonged there. “Oh!” she said, leaning back slightly, arms to her sides.

  The cat stepped about a little on her thighs, seeming to try to get acclimated, then eventually curled into a ball, lying down. Like she was a pillow.

  But . . . she discovered she kind of didn’t mind. The cat was sort of warm against her. And clearly this meant he liked her and wanted to be near her. She wasn’t sure why the cat felt that way, but she couldn’t deny growing fonder of him in that moment. It felt a bit like when Polly had trusted her to help with a problem and to care for the cat. It was like Tiger trusted her, too.

  Reaching down, she gently experimented with petting him, enjoying the feel of his thick fur. Growing up, she hadn’t had pets. Her parents had been older, having had her late in life—she’d been an only child—and they just hadn’t been animal people.

  In fact, they hadn’t been into much of anything—pets, their daughter, you name it. They were practical. To a fault. She supposed being poor could do that to you. And for them, life hadn’t been about fun and games—something like a pet, or a birthday party, would have seemed downright frivolous compared to the business of living and dying, paying the bills, and watching the evening news so that they could complain about the general state of the world. They thought life was hard. And they made it hard. Harder than she’d ever thought it needed to be.

  Before she knew it, a strange, low, motor-like sound began to echo from the cat, and after a few seconds of confusion over it she then understood he was purring! He liked being petted by her. She smiled, pleased to know she was making the cat happy. Just sitting there, petting him, staring out the window at the rapidly brightening day as she sun shone down on the big Happy Crab sign, something came over her, something . . . peaceful. Hmm. That was new. And kind of nice.

  But soon a glance at the clock revealed that it was almost time for the snorkeling trip to commence. She hated to end Tiger’s contentment, but she carefully picked him up, got to her feet, and lowered him to the bed. “Sorry,” she said, “but I have a hot snorkeling date. Or . . . work. Or both.” She gave her head a short shake. “I’m not sure what it is anymore.” Then went to find her bikini.

  Tink was not all bad: or rather,

  she was all bad just now,

  but on the other hand, sometimes she was all good.

  J. M. Barrie, Peter and Wendy

  Chapter 10

  THE WEIRDNESS of suddenly “being a couple” with Cami weighed on Reece as he steered the catamaran out into open waters, leaving the bay. The three women on the trip lay stretched out on beach towels on the bow while Jack and Mike got drinks from the cooler Reece had packed. And he knew they weren’t really a couple—but the other couples thought they were¸ so it still felt weird.

  Even their conversation about being a couple had felt weird.

  Oh hell, who was he kidding?—everything about his relationship with Cami was weird. How had he ended up in this situation, taking her snorkeling as his date? Her primary goal in life at the moment was getting her hot little hands on his property—no matter how much she tried to camouflage that behind “taking a vacation” and “making him a wealthy man”—and he was act
ually taking her on a date? Standing behind the captain’s wheel near the stern, he gave his head a short shake, trying to clear it. And why did she have to look so damn hot in a bikini on top of it all?

  There were moments when she seemed . . . not at all unreasonable. Even bordering on kind. Watching her now—because yes, there were three attractive scantily clad blondes stretched out before him, but only the lady in coral drew his eye—he wondered if there was any possibility she could be reasoned with. She was clearly business-minded and committed to her job—but maybe if he tried, really tried, going beyond the banter and sarcasm, he could make her understand why he wouldn’t, couldn’t, sell. Ever.

  Maybe he could make her see that money wasn’t what made someone wealthy, that it went far beyond that. Maybe he could make her understand that, at least for some people, being rich was about home, family, community—that those were the things that mattered. He didn’t talk about that stuff often, but he carried it around inside him twenty-four seven.

  And he didn’t like to talk about it—just because something mattered to you didn’t mean it was easy to talk about—but he wondered now . . . if he did, with her, would it be enough to make her give up and go away?

  You don’t want her to go away.

  Damn. He didn’t know where that little voice inside his head had just come from, but he supposed those kinds of little voices usually spoke the truth, or at least some measure of it.

  On one level, hell yeah, he wanted her gone. He wanted to be left alone to run his business as best he could, whether it was crawling with a hundred guests—or none. He wanted to quit feeling hounded by Vanderhook. He wanted life to get back to normal—or at least to what had come to feel almost normal over time. Maybe things could never get completely back to normal again, but they could at least return to feeling relaxed.

  But then there was that other level—the level that couldn’t help enjoying her presence. He couldn’t have dreamed that would be the case a few days ago, but life was full of surprises—some good, some bad. So far, the surprise he called Cami had held some of both, and that made it tricky. But he’d be lying to himself to deny that he’d had fun with her last night, and the night before that. He’d be lying to deny the chemistry between them, too.

  Of course, he wasn’t sure chemistry and fun were good enough reasons to have suddenly ended up in the happy world of coupledom with her. And he wasn’t sure where things would go from here.

  But maybe the thing to do was to just take the day for what it was worth—another beautiful day in paradise. The sun had come bursting out a few hours ago, he was with friends, and he knew they’d all have a nice afternoon together.

  Jack and Mike had taken seats on one of the boat’s built-in benches now, chatting—though Reece didn’t hear their conversation because music from the radio spilled from the catamaran’s speakers, Taylor Swift singing about knowing someone was trouble.

  “You can say that again,” he murmured under his breath with another glance at Cami. Getting close to her was like slow-dancing with a shark. Closing your eyes to danger didn’t make it go away. And yet . . . she was a lot nicer to dance with than a shark. Or at least a whole lot nicer to put sunscreen on.

  Just then, Christy got up from her towel and walked back to the captain’s wheel. “Hey there,” she said with her usual friendly smile.

  “Hey,” he replied.

  “So . . .” She cast him a weird and sort of expectant look that made him think he was supposed to know what it was about.

  But he didn’t. “So . . . what?” he asked.

  “So, Camille. Or Cami. Whatever her name is.” She gave her head a short shake, understandably confused. But then her smile returned. “Is this something serious?”

  Oh brother. This is what comes of getting too close to people. Because in the time since Christy and Jack had moved to Coral Cove last fall, he’d become good friends with both of them. But his friendship with Christy was different than with anyone else he knew. Because it turned out they had things in common. Losses in their past that were similar. Some of that stuff he didn’t like talking about. But for some reason he’d talked about it to her one night after a bonfire on the beach near Sea Shell Lane, after everyone else—even Jack—had headed in for the evening. And they’d kind of bonded.

  But unfortunately, it was just that kind of thing that made a female friend think it was okay to come around being nosy. So he was quick to correct her. “No, not serious at all,” he informed her.

  She flinched—perhaps because he’d said it so vehemently.

  But he went on. “We just met a few days ago. And the fact is, she works for the company that keeps trying to buy the Crab from me.”

  Christy’s eyes went predictably wide. “Really?”

  He nodded. “Really.”

  She lowered her chin slightly. More understandable confusion. “But . . . then . . . why . . .”

  “After I turned down their newest offer, she decided to stick around, take a beach vacation. Which I know really means she’s trying to wait me out, or just keep pressuring me to sell. But . . .”

  Christy tilted her head, looked curious, maybe even hopeful. “But . . . ?”

  “But . . . I guess there’s an attraction between us.” He narrowed his gaze on her. “Not that it’s going anywhere—because it really can’t. She’s the enemy, after all.”

  Christy blinked. “Then why did you bring her today?”

  “The truth?” He sighed as the catamaran bounced across low ocean waves. “Because Mike and Rachel assumed I would and said so right in front of her when we ran into them on the beach last night.”

  “The beach,” she repeated. “Where you were walking. With her. Willingly.”

  He let out another tired breath—even though he wasn’t very tired. Except maybe of thinking about all this. “I guess . . . we enjoy each other. Or enjoy fighting with each other anyway. But it was only a way to pass an evening, that’s all. And a chance to maybe make her see that Coral Cove is fine the way it is, without her big, fancy resort. Another couple of days and she’ll be gone. So don’t go getting attached to her or anything.”

  She gave him a speculative look. “It’s not me I’m worried about. Don’t you go getting attached.”

  Now it was Reece who balked. “Me?” He shook his head. “No worries there. I don’t get attached to women.”

  “Hmm,” Christy said.

  “Hmm what?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” she said with a light shrug of her shoulders. “I guess I just thought you seemed . . . really into her. Not in an obvious way. Just in a way I was seeing in your eyes.”

  He made sure their gazes connected as he said, “You weren’t seeing anything in my eyes. Look,” he said, pointing at them. “Nothing new there—just the same old stuff. Problem with you people in couples is that you want everyone to be a couple. You want everyone to be in love the same way you are.”

  A soft smile unfurled. “Is that so wrong?”

  Now he shrugged. “Guess not. But that doesn’t make it true.”

  “Whatever you say,” she concluded with a playful and very disbelieving tilt of her head.

  And then she sauntered away, back to her towel, before he could defend himself further.

  CAMILLE liked Reece’s friends. She liked them so much that it caught her off guard. She wasn’t used to other women being so friendly to her, so welcoming.

  But then it hit her why. The majority of her relationships were professional. And she was a higher-up who wore a hard shell most of the time. Which boiled down to a pretty sad notion: You don’t have many friends.

  She’d chosen to make Vanderhook her home, her family. She’d felt secure there, always, and appreciated—much more than she’d been in the home where she grew up. So while she kept in touch with a few girlfriends from college in a loose way, mostly she didn’t have friends like Christy and Rachel, girls to laugh with and just hang out with. The closest she came to that most of
the time was her relationship with Phil’s wife, Karen, and a couple of women in the accounting department who she sometimes had drinks with.

  You haven’t made that a high priority. Because work was her priority. Success was her priority. So she just wasn’t that used to feeling . . . liked. At least not outside of who she was professionally. But Christy and Rachel made her feel part of their circle without even trying. As if they liked her just for her personality.

  How long has it been since anyone really liked me just for who I am?

  She wasn’t sure. But as she sat on the beach towel she’d borrowed from Reece, in between the two women, she decided that was just too maudlin of a thought to even examine. So she pushed it aside and tried to focus on the unlikely fun afternoon she’d found herself in the middle of. So this is what people do. For fun and recreation. This is what the rest of the world comes to the seaside for.

  She’d definitely once known this, experienced it, back in college, but maybe she’d forgotten. Forgotten how to have fun. How sad was that? But again, she shook it off and tried to just be grateful she was remembering.

  When the boat ceased its forward motion through the vast expanse of the gulf, she watched as Reece—with Jack’s help—lowered a sizable iron anchor into the water. The town of Coral Cove on the shore in the distance appeared tiny now, the resorts up the way the only buildings she could recognize, because they were taller than the rest.

  “Here we are,” Christy announced. “Is everybody ready to snorkel?”

  After a general chorus of yeses, Rachel asked Reece, “So how did you choose where to bring us?” And Camille liked being reminded that Rachel, although married to Mike, wasn’t a resident of Coral Cove, either, or a longtime visitor like Mike was. It made her feel less “new.”

  “We’re beside the bed of coral that gives the town its name,” he said. “Great snorkeling, and the water should still be clear enough—I don’t think this morning’s rain was enough to cloud things up.”