A Perfect Fit (19 page)

Blake’s gaze was steady on him. “Because I care. And because
their father asked me to watch out for them.”

Vince lifted his brows. It was a very nice answer, but he
thought it was only half accurate. “You have nothing to worry about, as I don’t
want to see any of them hurt. Least of all Cami.” He hooked his thumbs in his
pockets, hoping he wasn’t projecting the irritation he felt at Blake’s third
degree and decided to turn some of it around. “And if I asked you about your
intentions towards Lana?”

Blake’s eyes flashed and his face hardened, his voice
growing cold. “What’s between Lana and I stays between us. I’m not going to
hurt her and neither is anyone else.”

Vince figured he was supposed to be scared, but it didn’t
come close. The response definitely intrigued him, though. “I feel the same
responsibility to watch out for them that you do. So we understand each other.”

Blake studied Vince for a long moment. “Perfectly.” He put
out his hand, offering it to Vince, who grinned and accepted it.

“So,” Vince said as he grabbed a shovel, glad to have it
over. “Did George make it clear he picked you out to be a son-in-law too?”

A slow smile crossed Blake’s face. “Something like that.”

“You play poker?”

“Not well.”

“All the better,” Vince flashed him a grin. “Though we don’t
exactly play high stakes. Let me know when you’re going to be around some
Thursday, and you can join Gage, Jeremy, and me. We’ve been looking for a
fourth since Jeremy’s brother moved.”

“I think I’d like that.”

~*~

Cami burst into the house, trembling with excitement. “Mrs.
Grady,” she called out. The woman’s car was parked out front, so Cami knew she
was here. She clutched the printout as she hurried through the house, finally
finding Mrs. Grady in Delphi’s bedroom, washing the window.

“What is it?” Mrs. Grady turned to Cami.

Cami waved the paper in her hands.  “I think I’ve found you
some hope. A little, anyway. I just spoke with a friend of a friend in Chicago.
They’re working on this new database of people willing to do live organ
donation. He said he could get your husband’s information in the database. All
he needs to do is sign the HIPAA waver and request the relevant records be sent
over. It’s not a sure thing, but maybe.”

Tears welled up in Mrs. Grady’s eyes and she sat heavily in
the gray office chair at the desk. “Are you serious?”

“It’s still a small database, totally run by volunteers, but
it’s growing all the time. If your husband is a match, the donor will be
contacted to verify that they’re still willing, then there will be testing and
whatever—I’m sure you’re familiar with the process.”

“Yes.” The woman sobbed and covered her face with her hands.
“I can’t believe you did this.”

“I haven’t done much of anything yet. It was only a couple
of calls.” Cami had sent out a dozen emails and made two or three times that
many calls, but it had been fun to have a good challenge. Managing the
impossible had been her favorite part of being a concierge.

“Still, I can’t believe you did this.” Mrs. Grady looked up
at her with wet eyes. “Why would you? I barely know you.”

“Do I have to know you well to want to help? You’ve been so
good to us. You deserve to have your husband around for a long, long time.”
Cami gave the woman’s arm a squeeze.

Sobs tore out again and Mrs. Grady stood, moving toward the
door. “Do you mind? I need to . . .”

“That’s fine.” Cami laughed, never happier than she was
right now. “You take care of the paperwork. We’ll see you tomorrow. “

Before she headed back to the office, Cami double-checked
the locks, then practically danced out to her car.

~*~

Cami was ready when Vince arrived to pick her up that
evening. She had no idea what he had in mind, so she’d worn stone colored dress
pants, a dark red blouse with capped sleeves, and a pair of loafers, dressing
it all up with some gaudy costume jewelry she’d bought two years earlier and
never had the guts to wear.

Vince wore his usual T-shirt and jeans and his hair was
still slightly damp. He brought her a small bouquet of pink Peruvian lilies. “Do
you like them?” he asked when she accepted the flowers.

“They’re perfect. Thanks.” She brushed a kiss across his
lips, then turned to the kitchen to find a vase.

“That’s all the thanks I get?” he asked, stepping in behind
her and reaching over her head to grab the vase, which was a bit too high up
for her to reach comfortably.

 “Well, I might be able to do better,” she teased as she
turned into his arms.

“That’s what I thought.” He tipped his head as he sampled
her lips. “Take care of those so we can go.”

She slid out of his reach, her heart pounding a lot faster
than normal, as she found the kitchen shears and snipped at the stems,
resettling them in fresh water. “They are beautiful. Delicate, classy, but
simple.”

He reached out, snagged a lock of her hair and gave it a
light tug. “I hadn’t planned on flowers, but they reminded me of you.”

She didn’t know what to do with him when he was like this.
She’d had other boyfriends say sweet things, but usually the comments were too
planned, maybe even on the insincere side. Not Vince, though. When she saw the
look in his eyes, she believed his words.

“Done?” he asked, taking her hand.

“Yes.” She followed him to the door, picking up her purse on
their way out. The kitchen and great room were miraculously empty as they
passed through. “So where are we going?”

He didn’t answer right away, taking her around the nose of
his car and settling her inside. “My place.”

Vince shut the door and circled to his side without giving
her a chance to respond. After the long day he’d had at work, they were going
to his place? Maybe he planned to get take out.

When he pulled onto the street, she asked, “Your place? Are we
stopping for burgers along the way?”

He grinned. “I am capable of cooking. Sometimes. I thought
it might make a nice change. A little spaghetti, some puppy love, and uninterrupted
time together.”

“Sounds nice.” And it did. When he reached for her hand, she
threaded their fingers together, sat back, and enjoyed the ride as Jason Aldean
crooned a country ballad.

The drive to his place was peppered with conversation about
the day. When they pulled in front of a huge log cabin that stood two stories
with a big bank of windows and a wrap-around porch, Cami thought the man had
great taste in homes. She’d been too preoccupied to notice the first time she’d
been there. “This is lovely.”

The home was snuggled into the woods, but with a little
grass for a yard, and swaths of native bushes and flowers. She could tell he’d
made an effort to ensure the landscaping blended with nature. “It’s like it
grew there.”

He grinned at her and stole a kiss before releasing her hand
to exit the car. “I’m glad you approve.”

How could she not, she wondered as she waited for him to get
her door. Most of the homes she’d seen had either ruthlessly cut back the
forest to impose out-of-place landscaping, or had let their yards grow wild. This
was a perfect fusion of the two schools of thought.

After helping her out of the car, Vince reached into the back
for a bag of groceries. “I stopped at the store for supplies before picking you
up.”

The dogs went crazy in the backyard, barking like they were
under attack and jumping so their doggie noses appeared over the top of the
fence for a blink. Cami looked forward to seeing them again.

The inside was as bright as outside, all clean,
clear-varnished pine on walls and floors. The furniture was minimal, but cozy
with warm fabrics and soft cushions. It wasn’t so overtly masculine a woman
would be uncomfortable, but held Vince’s taste through everything.

“Look around if you’d like. You didn’t last time. I’ll go
start dinner,” Vince said.

Though a thought niggled that she ought to help, she decided
to take him up on the offer to explore first. “All right. I’ll join you in a
few minutes.”

The rest of the house fit the same mold. It could use a
woman’s touch: a bowl of flowers here or there, something hanging on the walls
that wasn’t wrought iron, or made of animal antlers—though there were no actual
heads mounted, for which she was grateful.

Everything was clutter free, put where it belonged—but she
supposed he probably wouldn’t have invited her over if it had been a mess. When
she stopped at his bedroom door, she noticed the balcony on the other side. She
crossed to step out, look over the backyard, and saw him loving on the dogs.
She couldn’t hear what he said to them, but his voice was playful.

“Are you harassing those dogs again?” she called down to
him.

He turned to see her on the balcony and grinned. Their eyes
caught as the smile slid from his face. For a long moment time seemed to stop
as the air backed out of Cami’s lungs and something moved in her chest. Needing
a chance to center herself, she waved and walked back into the house, rubbing
her chest at the sudden ache. What had that been all about? Cami had never felt
anything like it. She checked out the last two rooms upstairs, both of which
held boxes, but no furniture, then felt centered enough to speak with him
again.

She found Vince in the kitchen, standing over a pan of
hamburger browning with chunks of onion in it. “Your place is nice. Clean—way
cleaner than I expected.” She tried to keep her voice light as she walked over.
Michael Bublé’s voice crooned from speakers tucked into the room corners,
surprising her yet again.  

“Thanks. I’m not much for clutter. Would you slice some
mushrooms for the sauce?”

“Sure.” Grateful to have something to do with her hands, she
picked up the knife from the marble-topped island and went to work. The theme
of the kitchen, like the rest of the house, was
space
. There was ample
room between cabinets—and plenty of those to go around. A dining area between
the kitchen and back patio held an undersized table and chairs for the space,
and the back wall was almost all windows, bringing the fenced yard into the
house. “This must be a spectacular place to sit in the winter.”

“It is. And the fall when the leaves are all turning gold
and red. And in the spring when the first hint of green becomes a haze across
the mountain.”

“So, pretty much year round,” she said.

He chuckled. “Yeah, pretty much.”

She sliced green peppers for the sauce and the salad, more
mushrooms, some pretty tomatoes, which were obviously locally grown, and tossed
them all into a bowl after dumping a package of field greens into it.

“I didn’t picture you cooking much,” Cami said when the
salad was done and Vince slid garlic bread into the oven.

“You have a lot to learn about me.” Vince glanced over his
shoulder at her and grinned. “Okay, time to fess up. This is my best dish, by
far. I eat a lot of fast food, TV dinners and cereal.”

“And yet you built a kitchen like this one. Rosemary would
go crazy seeing it go to waste.”

“You tell her she’s welcome to cook in it anytime she wants,
if it bothers her so much.” He looked over at Cami after setting the timer. “Or
you can come use it sometime.” He slid his hands onto her waist and pulled her
close. “I like seeing you here.”

Cami melted a little more as Vince kissed her, soft and
gentle. He released her to check on the pasta.

When they were seated at the table, twirling spaghetti on
their forks Vince finished talking about one of his high school exploits. “Let’s
just say my mom was less than pleased. I was doing extra chores for a month.”

“You deserved it.” Cami looked down at her plate. “My mom definitely
would’ve had a fit.” She felt a lump of pain rise to her throat when she
thought of her mom, so vibrant and young. “She was also really good at creative
punishments.”

Vince’s hand slid over hers. “Your father said she died
several years back, but he didn’t say how.”

Cami flipped her hand over and entwined their fingers. She rarely
talked about it, but after everything they’d been through, she felt safe
telling him. “Six years ago she started to act odd. She developed memory loss
and dementia almost overnight. At first we wondered if it was a brain tumor or
something. Then the doctor diagnosed it as Creuzfeldt-Jakob Disease.”

Vince ran his thumb over her knuckles, his full attention on
her. “What’s that?”

“It’s a neurological disorder that causes holes in the
brain, makes it like a sponge. Her whole personality changed in a matter of
weeks. Dad cancelled everything he was doing, passed along his work to someone
else and stayed home with her.” Her eyes stung with the memories she usually
tried to ignore. She much preferred to think of her mother as healthy and vibrantly
alive. “It was all so fast. One day she was normal, and practically overnight Dad
had to hire a full-time nurse.”

“How long did it take?” Vince asked.

“To kill her? Less than four months.”

“Fast, too fast,” he said, giving her hand a squeeze. “And
agonizingly slow all at the same time.”

“Yeah. It was awful.” The ache in her chest grew. “I miss
her every day.”

A moment of silence passed between them, then he leaned in
and brushed his lips against her temple. The gentleness of his touch reassured
her and she leaned against him.

After dinner they played with the dogs, then enjoyed the
cannoli he’d picked up at a restaurant in town.

When the dishes were all piled in the dishwasher or drying
on the counter, Vince pulled her into his arms and twirled her around the room,
making her laugh. “I have the sudden desire for a dance.” He slid into rhythm
with the music. “You don’t mind, do you?”

She snuggled closer to him and inhaled his cologne. “Definitely
not.”