Hero For the Asking (Reed Sisters: Holding out for a Hero 2) - Page 41

"Spring." He took her forearms in his large hands and looked down at her. "I just want you to know that I think you and Clay are being a couple of first-class idiots. I know when two people are in love, and you and Clay are. Don't let pride stand between you."

She winced. "Derek, I know you're only trying to help, but you're wrong. Clay and I just don't work together. We're not right for each other. I'm not what he needs, and he's not— He's..." But that was one lie she couldn't voice. "Please, Derek," she said finally on a sigh.

"All right." He kissed her fondly on the cheek. "You keep in touch."

"I will. And I'll see you when you bring Summer home for Christmas. Remember, you promised."

"Right. See you then. If not before," he added somewhat mysteriously.

Spring turned for one last, lingering look around the crowded terminal before boarding her plane, ostensibly as a last glance at San Francisco. If she'd secretly hoped to spot a shaggy blond head or a man dressed in outrageous style, she tried not to acknowledge it, even to herself.

Chapter Nine

"Don't drop the pizza!" Kelsey Rayford, Spring's office manager and best friend, cried out in teasing warning as Spring balanced the enormous white box while unlocking the door to her apartment.

"I've got the pizza, you hang on to the wine," Spring returned with a grin, triumphantly swinging open the door to her roomy west Little Rock town-house apartment. Offering a cheerful greeting to the small yellow-and-white cat that had dashed to greet her, she crossed immediately to a round oak table and deposited the fragrant, still warm box on it, then dropped her purse on a chair and turned to her friend.

Tiny, black-haired, brown-eyed Kelsey laughed as she juggled a large bottle of wine, an enormous handbag and a sizable, gaily wrapped package. "I'm losing the wine. Grab it!"

Spring grabbed, catching the bottle just as it would have plunged to the floor. "If you wouldn't insist on carrying a purse that would hold half the contents of our office filing cabinets, you wouldn't have this problem," she lectured primly.

"Oh, stuff it," her friend replied inelegantly, dropping the maligned purse to the floor. "Just because you're older than me doesn't mean you can start giving lectures."

"Hey, I'm not that much older! Three days doesn't count."

Grinning at Spring's protest, Kelsey shook her head. "Sorry. For the next three days you're twenty-seven and I'm a mere twenty-six. I intend to point that out at every opportunity."

"Somehow I knew you would," Spring retorted, rummaging in her cabinets for plates and wineglasses.

The doorbell chimed and Spring turned over the duty of setting the table to Kelsey. Her neighbor, Mrs. English, stood on the doorstep, arms loaded with packages. "You had a few deliveries today, Spring."

"I can see that." Spring smiled and took the load. "Would you like to come in for a while, Mrs. English?"

"No, thanks, hon. Tom will be home for his dinner shortly. Hope you have a happy birthday."

"Thank you."

"Oh, goody, presents," Kelsey crooned when Mrs. English had gone. "And such nice big ones."

"I can't believe they all arrived on my birthday." Spring eyed the three brown-paper-wrapped parcels with interest. Trust her family to make sure she had birthday presents, she thought fondly.

"Well, are you going to open them?" Kelsey demanded impatiently. Kelsey was always impatient.

Spring shook her head. "After dinner. Our pizza will get cold if we don't eat it now."

Sighing, Kelsey reached for a plate. "I don't know how you can stand it. I'd have ripped into them the minute I got them."

"Yes, but you've never understood the pleasure to be found in deferred gratification," Spring pointed out indulgently, seating herself across the table from her friend.

"Oh, God, now you're talking like my shrink." The animated brunette stared soulfully over a half-eaten triangle of pizza. "You'd think you were a psychologist rather than an optometrist."

Psychologist. Even the word made Spring wince. "Eat your pizza, Kelsey."

Spring chatted gaily during the casual dinner—but then, she'd become an expert on hiding her feelings behind airy chatter during the past two months. She and Kelsey talked about the office, about the volunteer work that Spring had recently taken on at a local resident treatment home for troubled young people, about the gorgeous-but-just-not-real-bright man that Kelsey had dated a couple of times recently. And though Spring mentioned her sisters frequently and occasionally referred to her trip to California, she never once spoke of a tall, golden-haired man with blue-green eyes and a brilliant white smile. She had not spoken Clay's name since she'd returned to Little Rock.

"I don't know how you do it," Kelsey murmured as they finished the pizza and lingered over a last glass of wine.

"Do what?" Spring asked lazily, feeding a tiny bite of pizza crust to Missy, her cat.

Tags: Gina Wilkins Reed Sisters: Holding out for a Hero Romance
Source: readsnovelonline.net
readsnovelonline.net Copyright 2016 - 2024