Page 30 of Welcome to Forever
She smiled softly. Had he really just agreed to her request? So easily? Maybe one date wouldn’t kill her, as long as she kept her feelings in check and did her best to pretend that he wasn’t an incredibly hot, and nice, guy. Hotter and nicer every time she saw him.
“So, is it a deal, then?” he asked. “Ben and I help you with the after-school gang and you attend the Marine Corps ball with me?”
Her head pushed forward. “The Marine Corps ball? That’s your function?”
“Yeah.” He smiled, uncertainty playing in his eyes and at the corners of his mouth.
Kat started shaking her head. She couldn’t surround herself with hundreds of men in uniforms. One man in uniform was too many. “I’m sorry.” Her throat was tight and she suddenly needed air, and lots of it. “I’m sorry. I can’t be your date, Micah. The answer is no.”
Holding her gaze, he didn’t look mad, but he wasn’t smiling any longer, either. “All right,” he said easily, the tone of his voice not quite matching his rigid posture. “My loss, I guess.”
Her gaze traveled back to Ben, who looked devastated. Then, for the second time that afternoon, she lied and told Micah that she had to go, gesturing back toward the empty school. “See you tomorrow, Ben.” She waved, and did her best to walk, not limp, away as quickly as she could.
—
An hour later, Julie met Kat at the door when she got home. “Do you always work this late?” her sister asked with a slight huff.
Kat set her briefcase down and breathed in the aroma of a home-cooked meal. “You cooked?”
“Of course I did. And worked like hell to keep it warm because I expected you home over an hour ago.”
Kat inspected her sister, dressed in a tank top and yoga pants. Her hair was pulled back neatly in a ponytail. “Sorry. You didn’t have to—”
Her sister held up a hand. “No time for chitchat.” She pointed to a chair at the table. “Sit.”
Kat didn’t argue. A meal cooked on the stove beat a microwave dinner any day. If her sister kept this up, she might not mind her staying indefinitely. Which wasn’t true. They’d shared a bedroom growing up and their constant bickering had tended to escalate until they fought every night instead of having a bedtime story from their mother. “Thanks, by the way. This is nice.” And exactly what she needed after the afternoon she’d had.
Julie shrugged her thin shoulders. “Someone has to take care of you. And what else was I supposed to do while I waited for you?”
“You don’t have to stay here. You can go home, you know?” Kat’s stomach rumbled in response to the smells that swirled together in front of her. “As you can see, I’m fine.”
Her sister sat quietly and picked up her fork.
“I’m sure your job and that boyfriend of yours need you more than I do,” Kat continued, her hand nearly shaking with anticipation as she sawed the knife through the tender meat on her plate. She’d been too busy to eat lunch. And after her near run-in with the vandals, and then Micah, her insides had been too twisted to notice how hungry she was. Until now.
Julie cut her steak with all the focus and precision of a surgeon.
Watching her, warning bells began to ring in Kat’s head. “Julie?”
“We can discuss this later. I don’t want the food to get cold.”
The bells grew louder. “Discuss what?” Kat asked.
Her sister shook her head. “I might be staying a little longer than I expected, that’s all.”
“How long?” Kat steeled herself as the bells shrieked in her ear. A week? A month? Longer? How on earth would they survive living in the same house for an extended amount of time?
“I lost my job,” Julie said flatly. “And my boyfriend. Which means I also lost my apartment.Hisapartment,” she corrected. “So, you see, I have nowhere else to go.” She looked up and extended a wobbly smile.
“I see.” Kat’s appetite took a step off a very high building and plummeted to its demise. She loved her sister, but she didn’t want to live with her. She’d just gotten used to living alone, and it suited her. But she wasn’t about to kick her sister out on the streets, either.
Reaching across the table, she laid her hand over Julie’s. “You can stay here as long as you need to.”
