Without thinking, she grabbed hold of his steely biceps. “We need to stay calm. We’ll figure this out. It just might not be today. Are you with me?”
Clouds that had been lingering in his eyes seemed to clear. “That’s my line.”
“What is?”
“‘Are you with me?’ That’s what I say when someone is verging on hysterical, like the woman who sprained her ankle.”
Neve released her hold. “Then I guess I’m borrowing a page out of your book because you usually do this so well.”
“Usually,” he deadpanned. Without another word, he loped to his room and began packing.
She peeked through the open doorway. “Did you, uh, ever remember what we did to mess up your bed?”
His back was to her, and he paused and looked to one side. “I sort of remember jumping up and down, like when we were kids and we’d try to see who could jump the highest. I used to beat you then, and I’m pretty sure I beat you last night too.”
“Yeah, because you have nearly a foot on me.”
A small smile quirked his lips. “Do you remember that one time? My mom came in and yelled at us. You cried, and she felt so bad she gave us cookies.”
“It figures you’d remember. Cookies were involved.”
He wheeled toward her. “Are you saying I’m cookie-motivated?”
“You were back then, that’s for sure.”
With a chuckle, he turned back to his task. Crossing her arms, she leaned against the doorframe and watched him, like she’d done countless times before. She knew so much about this man, yet so very little.
A looming suspicion told her she would soon know him in ways she never would have dreamed.
The flight home wasshort and uneventful. Of the six of them, she was the only one who stayed awake, her mind churning through next steps and creating list after list. She dreaded two eventualities the most: one, facing Leo and telling him what she had done; two, facing her fellow townies.
She ran through a list of excuses. “We thought it was a great idea at the time,” or, “We got drunk and had no clue what we were doing.” While the latter was the truth, it wasn’t going to put her in the best light. “Trust me with your pets! I’m responsible” would no longer ring true. How wouldthis escapade affect her bottom line? People were judgmental and reacted in unpredictable ways, so she could totally imagine them making the trek to Dr. Bunting’s. Just when it felt as though Neve was climbing out of a hole too.
Damn it! If Leo was her clinic’s benefactor, and she was still convinced he was, he was going to pull that funding right out from under her! Was she a mercenary for letting her mind go there?
And if Leo wasn’t the guy who’d been depositing money into her account, then it was probably an anonymous client who would also withdraw their generosity.
She was hosed. No doubt about it.
“What?” came Reece’s soft voice from beside her. He leaned his arm against hers, as if he was trying to prop her up.
“I thought you were asleep.”
“I was, but your grinding brain woke me up.” His gorgeous mouth twitched with a smile. Why couldn’t she remember that kiss?
His brows rammed together. “Do I have something on my lip?”
His question snapped her out of her dazed state, where she’d been staring at his mouth, her mind wandering down inappropriate paths. “Um, no. Sorry. I was just thinking. I know I have to face the music when I see Leo, but what do we tell everyone else? They’re going to want details. Dixie? Shane? Oh my God, I forgot about your folks!”
“Why do we have to tell them anything?”
“Hello, this is Fall River we’re dealing with. And we have four witnesses who aren’t going to keep it to themselves forever.”
He stretched a muscular arm above his head and yawned. “But we asked them to. They’ll keep it quiet.”
“Not forever. They think we’re deliriously happy with this whole charade.”
“Then we set them straight and let them know we made a mistake, that we’re deliriouslyunhappy, and that we’d appreciate them keeping our unplanned trek into married life to themselves until we can sort it out. In the meantime, we go back to the separate lives we were leading before this trip, with none the wiser. Easy-peasy.”
