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Darren nodded. “We dated for a while, during senior year. She was my prom date.”
Prom night. The night, if he wasn’t mistaken, when his kid sister had gotten pregnant by this little prick, who’d walked out on her as soon as she’d miscarried their baby. Jack’s teeth clenched. “I thought Angela was your prom date.”
“Oh, no, we just left together afterward…” Darren seemed to realize who he was speaking to, because his face went redder. “I mean, well, Angela and I had dated the year before. And we kind of got back together that night at prom.”
“What about Kate? You know, your date?”
Darren stood there looking hopeless, helpless and regretful. He finally shrugged. “High school, man. I was a kid.”
Jack shook his head. “Some people don’t have to wait till they grow up to become dickless assholes.” He prepared to walk away, but paused. “Darren?”
Darren finally looked him full in the face.
“If you like breathing, you’ll stay away from Kate.” Not waiting for an answer, he turned to follow Kate into her shop.
The doorknob didn’t jiggle in his hand, she’d obviously flicked the lock when she went inside. He knocked, figuring she wouldn’t answer. To his surprise, the door moved. Pushing at it, he watched as it swung open. The lock was apparently broken, lucky for him.
After he got inside, and closed the door firmly behind him, Jack noticed the smell of paint and new carpet. The overhead lights in the shop were off, but recessed ones above the shelves cast illumination throughout the shadowy store. A bit of late-afternoon sunlight peeked in through the sheers on the windows.
He didn’t see Kate. He did hear a voice, however. Following the sound of a radio, he walked through the sales area and back to the offices and storage rooms. He found Kate sitting in the center of a cement-floored room, surrounded by boxes, staring mindlessly into the air.
“Kate,” he said softly. “Are you okay?”
She slowly nodded. “How’d you get in? I locked the door.”
“Something’s obviously wrong with the lock. You should have someone look at that. Are you all right?”
A small smile widened her lips, and surprisingly, no tears marred her cheeks. “I’m fine, Jack. Just wondering…”
“Wondering what?”
She hesitated, and he thought for a moment she wouldn’t answer. Finally she admitted, “Wondering whether it’s right to go on resenting someone for doing only what you yourself have done for much of your life.”
He waited but she didn’t explain. He somehow suspected she had no intention of talking about whatever it was she was thinking. “So you’re really okay?”
She nodded. Rising, she brushed some dust from the floor off her butt, calling his attention to the miniscule white shorts she wore. He closed his eyes briefly. No wonder Darren had been unable to stop staring. Kate looked amazing. “I see you got all the paint washed off.”
She nodded. “For now. Though I promised to go back and help some more tomorrow at the Rialto.”
“Me, too,” he admitted. “Now, you want to tell me what grand opening you were talking about.” He glanced around the storage room at all the boxes. “Are you going into business here?”
“Yep,” she replied as she grabbed a box and moved past him, exiting the storage room.
He followed her through a short hallway, into the store area. She continued, through an arched doorway toward the dressing rooms and a mirrored alcove. She dropped the box near several others already lined up beneath rows of shelves.
“Your kind of business?” he asked, repeating his question from Saturday.
She tilted her head and gave him an arched glance out of the corner of her eye. “What do you think?”
When she bent and retrieved a filmy white bra from one box, then what appeared to be a black leather bustier from another, his eyes narrowed. “I think you’ve decided to play Clint Eastwood.”
He’d nailed it. He saw by the shock in her eyes, and the way she gasped as she dropped the two pieces of sexy lingerie, that he’d hit the truth dead-on.
“You’re out for a little revenge.”
