Kaydee smiled, enjoying the exchange between the women. It wasn’t a far stretch to imagine her and Fiona carrying on like this when they were older. The fact that she’d have to stick around a long time to grow old with Fiona made her question why she even had the thought.
Leo’s smiling face flashed through her mind.Hewas why she’d had a thought about the future here. His eyes held so much warmth her heart threatened to leave her chest.
Yeah, her new outlook was definitely his fault. Ever since they started dating, the incredible man had tipped her world on its axis, and now her view had changed. It had altered.
Like her.
This wasn’t a bad thing, either. Just different. But still good. Great even.
Ida lifted her chin. “Only need to be in it once to know. The best way to tell if you’re in love is this: If you close your eyes, can you picture your life without him?”
It was crazy. She didn’t even need to close her eyes to answer that. It was as plain as the pain in her chest when she tried to breathe. “No,” she said. “My answer’s no. I don’t even want to try to picture my life without him.”
Once again, for someone who didn’t do long term, this was certainly a new path. Analteredone.
Ida slapped the counter…pretty hard for a frail hand. “Then you’re in love with him.” The woman’s gaze grew misty, and she placed her hand over Kaydee’s. “Just don’t make the mistake I did. Don’t let him get away. Tell him how you feel. I should’ve told my Tommy, but I was young, and he was a white man. I listened to my parents when I should’ve listened to my heart.”
By this time, Olivia had moved closer and put her arm around her sister. “I remember that. Is he the reason you never married?”
“Yes.” Ida sighed. “He was my true love. And I let him slip through my fingers. No one could ever take his place.”
Kaydee’s heart squeezed for the poor woman, and the conversation stayed with her long after the sisters’ hair had been set and they’d left. She didn’t want to let Leo slip through her fingers.
God, no. She wanted to hold on to him with both hands. Tight. This new path she was on was just that…new. She had no idea how to keep Leo in her life. Did she just keep doing what she’d been doing? Letting happen what was going to happen seemed to be working out just fine. Perhaps that was all there was to it?
She yawned again. Lordy, she hoped she didn’t fall asleep on the guy later. Tonight, when he visited, she was going to take a chance and bare her heart like never before. Like everything depended on it. In a sense it did. He was her everything.
Instead of that sounding corny, it sounded right. Truthful.
The phone rang. That sounded like work.
She snorted at her poor joke, and because Fiona had a last-minute walk-in in her chair, Kaydee walked over to the desk and answered the phone. Someone called to schedule a cut and color for next week. She wrote it the book and frowned when she took note of the date.
Alarm bells went off in her head.
Trying not to panic, she walked as calmly as possible to the office to retrieve her pocket calendar from her purse. She was probably mistaken. Life was a bit crazy, what with all the showings, and working on the house, and here at the salon, and seeing Leo. All of which was great. She probably had the wrong date stuck in her head. The wrong week.
Opening the bottom drawer in the desk, she bit her lower lip and reached past Fiona’s purse to yank hers out. Yeah. She was forever remembering the wrong week, hence the reason she always marked a bigXon the day of her period.
Instead of digging in her purse, Kaydee turned it upside down and dumped the contents on the desk. Her hand was shaking too much to bother with fishing for it. Inhaling slow and steady…twice, she reached for the small calendar, flipped to last month, and gasped.
Of all times not to be wrong…
Still staring at the calendar, she sank into the chair behind the desk and blinked. Maybe she had today’s date wrong. No. She recounted the weeks sinceXday.
Shit.
Has it been that long?She’d lost track. Hadn’t even realized she was late. She was never late. Ever.
“Hey, Kaydee, last client left, so I locked the door. Are you…” Her friend’s voice trailed off. She must’ve seen the panic on Kaydee’s face, because she rushed close to peer at what she was clutching.
The pocket calendar.
Realization entered Fi’s eyes and lifted her brow. “Are you?” she asked in a hushed tone, despite the fact that she’d just stated the customers were gone.
Remembering to breathe, she lifted a shoulder. “I don’t know. Maybe? I-I’m a little late.”
“How late?”
