Alice gave him a strange look. “From the bookstore.”
Well, duh. He probably could have figured that out. “So why aren’t you in the book business? You obviously love to read.”
She lifted a shoulder, making her blonde hair slide down her arm. It was a fascinating sight, and Adam almost didn’t hear what she said next because his attention was elsewhere. “We’ve been selling shoes for a long, long time. Books are a hobby for me.”
“Hobby,” Adam repeated absently. “No wonder I saw you that day with Lewis. Do you go there often?” He winced at the last words. They sounded like a really, really bad pick-up line.
But Alice just laughed. “Is that what you say to all the girls you meet?”
“Only the pretty ones.”
Alice flushed, and Adam leaned back even further into the cushions. Between the scent of old books and chocolate, he might very well have died and gone to heaven. He wondered idly if Alice would mind another roommate.
“So what’s your hobby?”
Adam’s eyes snapped to hers, and he stared at her, uncomprehending for a second. “What?”
“Your hobby,” Alice repeated, her eyes dancing with amusement across from him. “What is it?”
“Oh. I’m too busy to have a hobby.” He tried to sit up straight, but the couch had somehow taken a hold of his spine and wouldn’t let go.
If Mother could only see me now, he thought ruefully. I’m in a woman’s home with my shirtsleeves rolled up, slouching on her couch like a bum. She’d box my ears for sure.
He was slightly surprised to find that, if he were allowed to stay exactly where he was, with Alice smiling at him, he wouldn’t mind having his ears boxed.
Alice’s voice broke into his thoughts. “Everyone has a hobby, Adam.” She pulled her feet underneath her and rested her head against the side of the couch. “Even people who are too busy to realize it.”
That made him think. What was his hobby? Ever since he’d landed in Michigan all he’d done was sit in meetings and observe his tenants. And inspect one Alice Riverton. Was Alice his hobby?
The idea was perplexing. He’d never focused on one girl, ever–not even when he’d had steady girlfriends. They’d usually been the ones to focus on him. He rather liked being on the other end for a change. Alice was looking expectantly at him, so he shrugged uncomfortably and said, “I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it,” knowing that this was the worst sort of lie he could possibly tell.
But really, how did a guy tell a girl that she was his new hobby? It would look creepy and weird, and that was not the impression he wanted to give her. Even if he was.
“I used to like to read,” he offered, forcing his body out of the couch’s pernicious clutches so he could make his way to her over-stuffed bookshelves. “Do you have a favorite author?”
Alice tried to muffle a yawn. “I like the classics. Bronte, Dickens, Tolstoy, all of those old dead authors they make you read when you’re younger. But I like more recent ones, too.”
“Like who?”
She thought about this for a minute before listing him a few modern authors. She yawned again. “I’m sorry,” she mumbled. “I haven’t been getting a lot of sleep.”
Adam leaned against the bookshelf he’d been inspecting and watched as her eyes slowly closed. Seconds later, her breaths were slow and regular. Adam didn’t dare move, but when his foot started to fall asleep, he shifted slightly to his left.
He knocked over a stack of books that, he was sure, were piled up alphabetically, waiting to be re-shelved.
He froze, not daring to look in Alice’s direction in case he’d woken her up. When there was no sound from the couch, he leaned over, shoved the books into an untidy pile, and heaved a sigh of relief.
Either she was really tired, or he was the world’s worst conversationalist and she was pretending to be asleep in order to escape his inane mutterings.
He was still crouched on the floor when Whitney and Lewis came back in. Lewis rounded the corner, took one look at Adam, and burst out laughing. “What are you doing down there, Wentworth?” he asked, pretending to wipe the tears from his dry eyes. “You look like you’ve just been caught robbing the house.”
“Shut up,” Adam hissed. “You’ll wake her up.”
Lewis snorted once and sobered up. “The only time Alice is tired enough to fall asleep with company in the house is when she’s so tired she can’t possibly keep her eyes open another second. You could yell gibberish in her ear and she wouldn’t budge.” He sighed. “I guess we’d better drag her to bed and get going. I don’t know about you, Wentworth, but some of us have to go to work in the morning.”
Adam stood swiftly and smoothed his hair down. “I work,” he said in a rather stiff voice. “Tell me where Alice’s room is, and I’ll take her in for you.” He eyed Lewis critically. “I don’t think you could make it very far carrying her.”
Lewis bristled until Whitney smiled hesitantly in his direction, distracting him long enough for Adam to bend over and pick Alice off the couch. “Follow me,” Whitney told him, and led the way down the hall.
***
Adam and Lewis walked down the front steps together a few minutes later, their steps slow. “Tell me something,” Lewis said, just as they reached their cars. “Have you ever been the inspiration for a romance novel?”
Adam’s eyebrows shot up so fast he was surprised they’d remained on his forehead. “What kind of question is that?” he demanded.
Looking irritated, Lewis shook his head. “Never mind.”
They both turned to watch as the lights shining through the windows above them turned off. “Well, that was a very enlightening evening,” Lewis finally said.
“That it was.” Adam thought about the way Alice’s head had fit into the crook of his shoulder when he carried her down the hall. It had been a rather intoxicating sensation.
Lewis shook himself and leaned against his hideous car. “How’s your quest coming along?”
Adam’s mind was filled with the scent of Alice’s shampoo, so it took him a second to gather his wits. “What are you talking about?”
“Your quest. You know, to convince Alice that you’re her one true love and all that fairy tale yak.”
“Oh, you mean Mission Alice.”
Lewis let out another snort. He should probably see a medical professional about that, Adam noted. “You have a name for your quest?”
Adam felt a little defensive. He hadn’t meant to mention that. It was hardly his fault that he liked to label things. It kept his brain organized. “It’s going fine,” he said shortly, and unlocked his door. The interior lights flickered on, illuminating his rental car.
To Adam’s annoyance, Lewis remained where he was, staring up at the house in front of them. “Get a move on, Hughes. In case you hadn’t noticed, I can’t get out until you move your sorry excuse for a car out of the way. Some of us have to work tomorrow, you know.” Adam grinned at Lewis’s scowl. It felt good to use Lewis’s words against him.
Lewis cast a derisive glance toward Adam’s rental car. “Afraid some of Tang’s charm and personality will rub off on your cookie cutter?”
What was he talking about now? Did he have some sort of nasty fruit drink hidden somewhere? “I have all the charm I need,” Adam muttered, watching as the lights in his car dimmed. “It’s the convincing power that I seem to be lacking.”
His scowl turning thoughtful, Lewis eyed Adam. “How would you feel about a repeat of this evening’s activities?” he asked, overly casual.
Lewis was either his mother in disguise or mental. “I don’t know,” he said cautiously, not sure where this was headed. “Why? Are you asking me out?”
Lewis gave a grimace of disgust. “No, Mr. Tall, Dark and Suspicious. I’m hinting that we may be more effective if we work together. As in, a double date. With Alice and Whitney,” he added, completely unnecessarily.
Adam’s mind flew yet again to Alice. “I’m listeni
ng.”
“Well,” Lewis said, “as much as I hate to admit it, you and I appear to have a common goal now. I was thinking that it would be easier, and more useful, if we helped each other out.”
Ah, Adam thought. Lewis is after Whitney. He’d seen the way the poor guy had looked after Whitney had started singing. “That’s not a bad idea,” he replied slowly. “Did you have anything particular in mind?”
Grinning, Lewis beckoned Adam over to his car. “I know this great little restaurant…”
Adam was feeling decidedly optimistic on his way back to the hotel. Mission Alice–or Quest Whitney, depending on who was speaking–had just entered a whole new galaxy.
If they were good, and he’d eat his right foot if they weren’t, those two girls would never know what hit them.
Chapter Eight
Alice woke up the next morning when Whitney’s voice drifted into her bedroom. She was singing that song from Snow White again, and Alice wondered idly if rabbits and squirrels with big eyes would start popping out of the kitchen cabinets. Or, if Prince Charming from the movie would magically appear under Whitney’s window. As far as princes went, he was all right, she supposed, but she preferred her princes to be more… human. Maybe even a little sarcastic.
An image of Adam popped unbidden into her head, and she scowled fiercely at the ceiling. Adam was not her Prince Charming. She tried to banish Adam from her mind, but it wouldn’t obey.
He’d looked very comfortable the night before as he leaned against her bookshelves. She could almost imagine him with a pair of glasses perched on his nose, thumbing studiously through a book, shooting that grin of his in her direction…
This was going to have to stop.
It wasn’t until she’d rolled out of bed that she realized she was still in the clothes she’d been wearing the night before. “Whitney?” she called down the hall. “Do you know why I went to sleep in my dress?”
Whitney’s singing stopped abruptly, and the next second she was standing in Alice’s doorway. “Don’t you remember?” she asked, her eyes serious.
Alice tugged at her neckline and grimaced. This was not very comfortable. “Not a thing.”
Whitney sank down on the bed and patted the space next to her. “You fell asleep on the couch.”
“With guests in the house?” Alice buried her face in her hands. Some hostess she’d been; it’d be a wonder if Adam ever spoke to her again. She pressed her fingers into her eyes, feeling very hypocritical. She’d been the one to tell Adam that under no circumstances would she even think about being more than his friend, and now she was obsessing about his reaction to a little rudeness. She must have lost half her brain on the way home from that dratted choir concert.
“Lewis offered to drag you to your room when we got back, but Adam pretty much told him he wasn’t strong enough and carried you to bed himself. It was very sweet,” she added when Alice’s head shot up.
She blinked at Whitney a few times, wishing that she could remember. Whitney just smiled at her innocently and nudged her with her shoulder. “He was very cute with you,” she told Alice. “He looked like he was carrying the most precious thing in the world.”
“Oh, please,” Alice groaned, and flopped back to lie on the bed. “I think you’ve been reading too many fairy tales.”
A guilty look crossed Whitney’s face. “What’s wrong with a little happily-ever-after?” she asked defensively. “I like to dream as much as the next girl.”
Alice’s hand rubbed Whitney’s back. “I’m sorry. I guess I’m just… I don’t know.”
“In denial?” Whitney looked over her shoulder with a sympathetic smile. “It must stink to be in love with the only man in the world that my mother wants to get her daughter’s claws into. It’ll all work out, though. It always does.”
“I’m not in love with Adam, or anyone else.”
Whitney just looked at her for a long second before she walked back to the kitchen. Alice was still muttering about fairy tales again when they drove to the mall an hour later. Whitney hummed to herself and pretended not to hear.
Over the next few days Alice watched Adam. Well, she watched him walk in and out of Lewis’s dress shop several times a day. Each time he walked in front of her store, he’d flash her a smile and wink, and then he’d hurry past without a word.
It was rather irritating.
When she and Whitney rolled into her parking space Thursday morning, she was almost ready to corner him and demand to know what was going on. The last time she’d checked he and Lewis weren’t exactly friends. To have them now joined at the hip with no obvious explanation was a little perplexing.
Unfortunately, Mimi was sitting behind the cash register when the young women came through the door, and Alice’s heart dropped slightly. She’d been hoping for at least two more Mimi-free days. Things went so much smoother when she was on one of her sabbaticals.
“Where have you been?” Mimi barked, her gaze focused on Whitney. “Brittany says you haven’t been home all week.”
“I’ve…” Whitney stood in the doorway, one arm still in her jacket. She looked frantically toward Alice.
“You’ve what?”
Whitney took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and looked her mother in the eye. The effect was ruined slightly by the jacket that was still half-on her, but she didn’t back down. “I moved in with Alice.”
Mimi sucked in a breath harsh enough to rival a dementor’s and slowly turned her face toward Alice, who sighed inaudibly.
“I should have known it would be you, Alice Riverton.” Mimi’s voice was as quiet as Alice had ever heard it, and the sound made her shiver. “I don’t know what makes you think you can corrupt my daughter and assume you can get away with it.”
“I didn’t corrupt anyone!” Alice cried.
Mimi leaned toward her slightly, her eyes narrowing. “My child belongs with me, in my house, not in some slapped-together excuse for a–”
“You obviously haven’t seen Alice’s house.” Whitney finally shrugged out of her jacket and glared at her mother. “And I don’t belong in your house. I’m an adult; I can do whatever I please. Alice has been kind enough to take me in, and I’m staying.”
Mimi completely ignored her daughter, and her eyes flashed with something scary in them as she slowly rose to her feet. Alice took an involuntary step backward. To her surprise, Mimi didn’t say a word about Whitney’s current living arrangements. “I’ve purchased another shoe store,” she proclaimed, watching Alice intently. “Since you did such an excellent job in cleaning the last property, you might as well work on this one tonight after the mall closes.”
Alice stared back at Mimi defiantly and had opened her mouth to tell her that cleaning was her favorite thing in the world when someone cleared his throat loudly from the still-closed gate.
Adam’s jaw flexed tightly, but his voice was calm when he spoke to Mimi through the bars. “Excuse me, Ms. Walker. May I have a word?”
A huge, fake smile spread across Mimi’s face, and she hissed at Alice out of the corner of her mouth. “Open the gate, Alice Riverton.” She rearranged her blouse as Alice passed, fortunately not seeing Whitney roll her eyes.
Adam waited until Alice had unlocked the gate, then he bent down and helped her lift it into the ceiling. He smiled at her tightly and walked behind her to where Mimi stood impatiently.
“I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation with Miss Riverton as I passed your store,” he said smoothly. His tone was cool, and Alice was reminded of the first time she’d met him. “Am I correct in assuming that you asked her to stay after closing to clean another property?”
Mimi’s smile faltered a little. “She volunteered,” she said, a little too quickly.
“I see.” His jaw tightened again, like he was grinding his teeth together. Alice made a mental note to give him the name of her dentist. She’d hate for him to waste all the money she was sure his parents had spent on dental work.
“It’s really too bad Brittany’s not here,” Mimi said sorrowfully in a vain attempt to change the subject. “I know she’s been looking forward to seeing you again.”
Adam looked pained, and his eyes drifted to Alice’s. She edged a little closer to him before she realized what she was doing, and the faintest of smiles ghosted across his face. “I’m sure she’ll survive.”
Alice coughed into her hand to mask her snicker. “Are you all right, Miss Riverton?” Adam sounded concerned, but Alice could see the twinkle in his eyes as he gazed down at her. “Perhaps you should go home and rest. I’d hate for one of Ms. Walker’s invaluable employees to catch a cold.”
“Oh, don’t bother worrying about her.” Mimi waved dismissively in Alice’s direction. “She never gets sick. She’s so healthy she never even needs to take a lunch break.”
She must have known immediately what she’d said because she giggled nervously and flapped her hands in the air. “What I mean is–”
All the humor was gone from Adam’s eyes, and he took another step toward Mimi. “Did you just say that your employees never get their breaks? I’ve noticed that you usually only have two people working in the shop at a time, but I assumed you were following the law. Perhaps I should have my lawyer check into this.”
Mimi visibly blanched. “Alice can take a break whenever she wants,” she squeaked. Her voice was even higher than usual. “I’m not breaking any laws.”
Adam nodded once. “Then I expect to see all your employees, including Miss Walker,” he nodded in Whitney’s direction, “take full advantage of that. I’m assuming they don’t work every day. When is their next day off?”
Alice watched in delight as Mimi floundered. “Day off? Um… well… not today, obviously.” She giggled again, but this time it sounded strained, like she was forcing the air out of her lungs.
Adam crossed his arms over his chest and waited expectantly.
“Tomorrow,” Mimi finally said. Her shoulders drooped in defeat. “They have the entire day off tomorrow.”
Alice in Glass Slippers Page 13
