Читать книгу First Came Baby - Kris Fletcher - Страница 15

CHAPTER FIVE

KATE HAD PLANNED to spend the morning prepping the bedroom beside Boone’s. She sent him off with lists, directions and a hand-drawn map. Then she carried Jamie and her supplies up the stairs and down the hall, steadfastly resisting the temptation to peek in Boone’s room. Nope. Not looking. Even though the door was wide-open and the ladder-back chair was right there and his jacket was tossed over it and...

Okay. So she peeked for a second. But she didn’t stick her head into the room and inhale, no matter how much she wanted to.

Just as she finished getting Jamie settled and her equipment set up, Kate heard a car outside. Huh. She wasn’t expecting anyone, and Boone hadn’t been gone long enough to get through his list.

“Think Daddy forgot something?” she asked Jamie, but he was too busy trying to pull off his socks to answer. She peeked out the window and spied not her own little red Mazda but a sporty hatchback painted with the familiar logo of Allie’s restaurant, Bits and Pizzas.

“Woo-hoo, Jamie! Aunt Allie is here!” Kate put her mouth to the window she’d cracked open just enough to let in a hint of spring warmth. “Come on in! We’re upstairs!”

Soon enough, Allie was in the room, cuddling Jamie and offering explanations.

“I saw Boone walking around downtown while I was running errands. So I thought, well, this might be my only chance. You know.” Allie winked. “To find out how well that whole separate bedrooms thing is working.”

Heaven save her from her sister. “Very well, thank you. Now keep your nephew happy. I have wallpaper to scrape.”

“I thought you were a fan of the paint-over-it school.”

“Sometimes you have to. But this room has only two layers, and it’s been coming off pretty easy so far.”

“Plus it’s great exercise. Especially if you have to, oh—” Allie batted her eyes rapidly. “—work off some frustration.”

Kate leveled the scraper in Allie’s direction. “Don’t you give me the innocent puppy-dog look. You’re not getting a rise out of me.”

“Ah, but the question is, are you getting one out of Boone?”

Kate sagged against the wall, her energy spent. “Al...”

Thank goodness, the message seemed to sink in. “Sorry. None of my business. I’ll shut up now.”

“You don’t have to shut up. Just—”

“Don’t harass you about your love life. Got it. Cash wants me to move in with him.”

Whoa.

“He wants what?” Kate shook her head, trying to clear the onslaught of questions. “Um, did he forget that you guys have only been together together for a couple of months?”

“No. He knows, and not just because it’s the first thing I said when he came out with this.” Allie’s ponytail swung out behind her as she whirled Jamie in slow circles. “But my lease is up at the end of May, and my landlady is pushing me to sign up for another two years. She said if I do it, she won’t raise the rent at all and she’ll let me get a cat, even though I’m not supposed to have pets, because she hates hunting for new tenants and she wants me to stay, basically forever.”

“Oh, that’s not fair. I mean, it is, but—”

“I know.” Allie giggled along with Jamie as they dipped and turned. “I love living there. It’s a great apartment, walking distance to work, with parking, which doesn’t matter most of the time but hello, when tourist season rolls around I start singing glory hallelujah. Also, all the stained glass? And the funky stairs? It’s like I’m back at Mom’s place, but without the upkeep.”

“Or Mom.”

“You nailed it. But...”

“But Cash?”

“But Cash.” She sighed and shifted Jamie to her shoulder. “I love him, Katie, okay? No second thoughts about that. I can’t believe how wonderful life is with him. And when I think about how close I came to missing out on this, I get the shakes. I want to be with him. In so many ways it would make sense to jump in right now and say, sure, why wait when we both know this is where we’re headed? But on the other hand...”

Kate was pretty sure she knew exactly what was bothering Allie, but the words needed to come straight from the source. So she shoved her scraper under a particularly stubborn piece of wallpaper and forced herself to wait.

“It’s a big step. A major step. And the past few months have been such a whirlwind that I don’t... I need time to catch my breath. Luke and I... That all happened so fast. In less than a year I’ve gone from having two guys as best friends to having one tell me he loved me, to getting engaged, to planning the wedding, to having the Mounties crash the wedding—”

“Because they always have to get their man.”

A hint of a smile. “Right. And then, boom. Now I’m with my other best friend. Very happily so, I remind you, without any of the doubts I kept telling myself were just wedding jitters. But I... No one else knows this, okay? And you can’t tell anyone because it sounds so stupid and ridiculous, but the thing is, I figured out I loved Cash that night.”

“Which night?” Kate pushed the scraper and hit a ridge. “Not the night of your wedding?”

“The night of my nonwedding. Yes.” Allie grimaced. “It makes me sound like such a flake.”

“Yeah, not gonna lie, I can see why you want to keep that one close to your chest.”

“I know, right? It’s bad enough that people have already figured out I’m with Cash now. You wouldn’t believe some of the comments I get at work. And I know that will all fade. And it’s not like I really care about what people say, because it’s nobody else’s business. On the other hand, I think I’m entitled to some adjustment time.”

“You just don’t know if you want two years’ worth.”

“Exactly.”

Out of nowhere, a totally unexpected sense of jealousy surged through Kate. What must it be like to be so wanted, so loved, that a man would be ready to turn his entire life around after just a few short months?

Stop it, Kate. Allie needs you. You’re fine.

“Could you sublet?”

“It’s not allowed now. And yeah, if I needed to I could probably buy my way out of the lease, or whatever, but I’m still paying off the wedding that didn’t happen.”

And probably trying to save for one that would take place, Kate suspected. But there was no way she was going to say that at this point.

“What about selling the lot that Nana left you?”

Allie was shaking her head almost before the question was finished. “That would be the very last resort. I have plans for that space.”

“Oh?” Kate pictured the wooded chunk of riverfront. “I don’t suppose those plans include a house and a mini Cash or two.”

“Log cabin. Complete with a front porch and matching rocking chairs. So cute it’ll make you hurl.”

The churning in Kate’s stomach had nothing to do with anticipated cuteness.

“Well,” she said briskly as she attacked the wall with her scraper. “How long do you have before you need to... Whoa, what’s this?”