Barefoot in Lace (Barefoot Bay Brides Book 2) (3 page)

“Shit.” Shoving his hair back and sighing hard, Tom went into the kitchen and stared out the window at the miniature backyard, noticing Ruthie’s drooping, brown-tipped plants that he supposed someone should water.

But he’d never had a plant. Or a tract home. Or full responsibility for a kid who erected walls made of blank stares and noisy video games.

What the
hell
had Ruthie been thinking? She’d been thinking what most people who live in a state of denial, never dreaming something like an aneurysm or a car accident or a…
hemorrhage
could end their life in an instant.

But Tom knew better. And Ruthie
should
have known better, considering their childhood history. But apparently she hadn’t, because she’d never bothered to change a twelve-year-old document that left Thomas Jefferson DeMille, least qualified person on earth, responsible for his niece.

What the hell was he supposed to do now?

Since he’d received the news that his sister had died and he’d dropped his camera on a shoot in Bora-Bora to get on a plane to a much less glamorous island off the Gulf Coast of Florida, he’d asked himself that question a thousand times. He was Alex’s closest living relative, if you didn’t count her father, who had been MIA for more than a decade and had already legally rejected his own daughter.

There was no answer to what he should do, only questions. How could he take care of a child when his career was one endless road trip? How would Alex fit into his lifestyle? Was it possible to incorporate a twelve-year-old girl into his crazy, chaotic world? Did he have a choice?

The questions were silenced by his buzzing cell phone with a reminder alarm.

Flight 615 to Majorca. Leaves in three hours.

Maybe it would, but he wouldn’t be on the plane. He’d canceled the flight, the shoot, and the whole European trip weeks ago, but he’d forgotten to take some of the dates off his calendar. Or maybe he’d secretly hoped that he’d find a solution to this insurmountable problem and be able to make the trip anyway. He squeezed the phone, staring at the notification, unable to resist tapping the month view to see all the things he’d canceled in those hazy days when he’d arrived, bearing his own grief for the loss of one more person he’d cared about.

The city names blurred, like his old travel days, one into another.

Barcelona after Majorca. And then Nice and Monaco. Son of a bitch, he wanted to do that campaign for LaVie on the French Riviera. But he’d had his agent cancel it along with everything else for July and August.

And
then what?

He smacked the counter so hard it stung his palm. “What the hell am I going to do?”

“You could find my dad.”

He closed his eyes at the soft whisper, biting back the truth. Some lawyer had already found Steve Whitman, who lived in Oregon, had another family, and had done nothing but wave the legal papers that released him of any responsibility for the one he’d had twelve years ago with Ruthie.

Tom certainly didn’t have the heart to tell this broken girl that her father didn’t want her even though her mother was dead.

“That’s not what your mom would have wanted,” he said, choosing his words carefully.

“She wanted me to be happy.”

“Of course,” he said vaguely. And Ruthie had always been a little ditzy, and too trusting, and forgetful. Amusing as hell, but had she forgotten that Tom had already sacrificed a few years of his life to raise a young girl without parents? Otherwise, why would she let history repeat itself?

The front doorbell rang with a singsong interruption. More neighbors with casseroles? More of the colorful troupe of amateur actors from Ruthie’s community theater? The visitors had slowed to a trickle in the past two weeks. Nice enough characters with good intentions and tons of offers of sympathy and prayers, but no one had any idea what to do with Alex, and none seemed close enough to suggest they take care of her while Tom lived his life. Or at least while he went to the south of France for a few weeks.

“Can you get that?” he asked, not eager to make small talk with strangers right then. Or ever.

She barely nodded before walking out of the kitchen. Tom stayed exactly where he was, breathing slow and steady, his mind back to the original and only problem he had. Not that he wanted to think of Alex as a “problem” at all. She was a kid, broken and beaten by life’s cruel circumstances. He knew
exactly
how she felt. But what was he going to do?

He couldn’t leave her, even for a few weeks. And what about long term? Maybe he could put her in a boarding school, or find a live-in nanny willing to stay while he traveled, or take her with him when she wasn’t in school. Maybe that was a possibility.

“Um, she wants to see you.” Alex stood in the kitchen doorway again.

“Who?”

She lifted a bony shoulder. “I thought she was from the theater group with that pink hair, but I’ve never seen her before.”

Pink hair? A little shot of adrenaline rushed through him at the memory of the charming young woman from the convenience store. How had she found him? Without a word, he brushed by Alex into the living room, and sure enough, there she was, as pink and pretty as he remembered.

She smiled, showing small, straight teeth that fit pixie-like features. Still, she was more striking than classically “cute” and surprisingly intriguing. Not at all his usual taste in women, but purely attractive anyway.

“Hi.” She bit her lower lip, her eyes bright and as wildly green as he remembered from the parking lot. Instantly, he imagined those sparkly eyes aimed directly at his camera, slightly shuttered, with a yellow-tinged light to accent the green. “Charity told me how to find you,” she said.

He pulled himself out of the imaginary shot. “Charity?”

“That nice lady who owns the Super Min.”

Behind him, Alex snorted softly. “Nice as a python.”

The comment surprised him so much he turned to her, startled by one of the first emotive things he’d heard his niece say. “Um, Alex, this is Gussie, who swooped in and saved me from that python. Gussie, this is my niece, Alex Whitman.”

“Gussie?” Alex asked, eyeing their guest with more interest than she’d shown in anything except a video game in the month he’d been there.

“It’s short for Augusta,” Gussie explained, with the tone of a person who’d offered the information a thousand or more times in her life. “I was born one minute after midnight on August first, so my mom named me Augusta. I was supposed to be Julia, for July.”

“Do you have sisters named April, May, and June?” Alex asked.

She laughed easily. “Just a brother, Luke.” Gussie turned to Tom, leveling him with those grass-green eyes. “I bet you’re curious why I’m here.”

As hell. “And how that woman came up with this address, that wasn’t on my
expired
driver’s license.”

“Don’t underestimate the nosiness of Charity Grambling,” Gussie said.

Alex laughed, a sound so out of place that Tom had to look at her again, spying the faintest glint in eyes that had been nothing but dull for a month. “That’s what my mom used to say. She called her Chump Charity.”

Gussie snapped her fingers and pointed to Alex. “A Mario Kart fan?”

“Yeah. Are you?” Alex asked, her voice rising a bit.

“A fan and champion.” She gave up an endearing smile, flipping her colorful hair with playful smugness. “I’m kind of unbeatable at anything with Mario’s name on it.”

“Do you play Mario Kart?” Alex asked with a note of rising excitement.

Gussie held up her hands as if on a steering wheel. “Princess Peach rules the road.”

Alex let out a soft shriek. “I’m Rosalina.”

Tom looked from one to the other, the conversation volley throwing him on so many levels. Not only did he not know what the hell they were talking about, he couldn’t even wrap his head around the change in Alex. It was like someone had turned a light on inside her.

“Would you, um, want to play?” Alex asked. “Just one game, right now?”

“Well, I…I…”

“Maybe later, Alex,” he said, trying not to throw too much cold water on the ideas. As much as he knew the spark in Alex had been lit by their unexpected guest, he took pity on the woman who probably hadn’t hunted him down to play video games.

The light in Alex’s eyes dimmed, gone as fast as it had arrived. “My mom liked to play it with me,” she said on a sad whisper.

He bit back a grunt of frustration, furious at himself for killing the first sign of life.

But Gussie stepped forward and reached out a hand to Alex, sincere sympathy oozing from her. “Charity told me about your mother. I’m so sorry.”

Alex swallowed and nodded. “Yeah, thanks. And sorry I asked.”

“No, don’t be sorry. I’d love to play sometime.”

But Alex backed away, slinking into the hallway.

Damn it.
Damn
it.

“Oh,” Gussie breathed a sigh of sorrow that reflected exactly how he felt. “I shouldn’t have—”

“It’s not your fault,” he assured her. “I should thank you. I have no clue who Princess Whatever and Rosalina are, but you made her smile for the first time in weeks.”

“The poor kid. And…you. I’m sorry for your loss. Her mother was your sister?”

He nodded and murmured, “Thanks.”

She reached toward him, then pulled her hand back as if she realized she shouldn’t touch him. “That has to be horrible. Family is everything.”

Or it’s nothing, depending on the cards you’ve been dealt.
“Is that why you’re here? A sympathy call?”

“Actually, no.” She gave a self-conscious smile and shuffled a little on bright red heels. “I came to ask you for that favor you said you owed me.”

A favor? He eyed the pink wig, the artfully applied makeup, the flirty skirt, and wanted to know more about her. Like, what was she hiding under that rainbow of color? “Sure,” he said. “What do you need?”

“A wedding photographer.”

He frowned, not following. “You want me to recommend someone?”

“I want you to shoot a wedding. This weekend.”

He stared at her, then smiled, slowly. And that grew to a real laugh, because that was about the funniest thing he’d ever heard. Except by the look on her face, she was dead serious.

And something told him this unusual young woman was not about to take no for an answer.

“I know that’s like asking Picasso to fill in a coloring book,” she said. “But is there any chance you would consider it just this once?”

“A wedding?” Was she on crack?

“I know this is a really hard time for you and your niece, and I don’t mean to intrude on your time together, but maybe a fun wedding on the beach would help take your mind off the grief?”

Not enough to get him to strap on a camera and shoot the receiving line. He’d rather shoot himself. He was vaguely aware of the whirring sounds of the video game from the den, the noise filling in an awkward beat of silence.

“I’m sorry,” he said simply. “I’m sure you can find another photographer.”

Raspberry-glossed lips tilted in disappointment, and he hated the splash of guilt in his gut. But TJ DeMille was
not
a wedding photographer. It was bad enough he’d been turned into a permanent babysitter, but he wouldn’t make his currently crappy situation worse by shooting a wedding.

“Okay,” she said, the sadness in her acceptance still not wiping out the sparkling light in her bottle-green eyes. “I knew it was an outrageous request, but if you don’t ask, you don’t know.”

“I like fearlessness in a woman,” he admitted. “I like someone who knows what they want and goes after it.”

Her expression grew hopeful.

“But I draw the line at wedding photography.”

She let out a slow exhale. “Of course you do. Well, it was great to meet you. I didn’t tell you this, but I’m a fashion blogger and stylist and a huge fan of your work.”

“Really?” Then she should have known he didn’t do happy brides and grooms. “Thanks.”

“Well, I…” She glanced toward the hall. “Can I say good-bye to Alex?”

“Of course.” He gestured for her to go first, a little surprised by the request. Was she still trying to get into his good graces so he’d say yes, or did she really care about a girl she’d just met?

Behind her, his gaze was drawn to the skirt that flipped around her thighs, showing long legs and a shapely backside. It was the first time he’d really gotten a good look at her body, which was slender and strong, but quite feminine. Her face had been captivating enough. If only she didn’t cover it all up with the wig and makeup, even though both were applied with the hand of an expert.

She paused at the den door, leaning in. “Sounds like somebody’s at the mall,” she said lightly.

Instantly, the sounds stopped as Alex paused the game. Even that was a rarity, Tom thought.

“It’s an easy course,” Alex said.

“If you know how to find the escalator,” Gussie replied.

Alex laughed, the sound still so out of the norm in this house that Tom couldn’t believe he heard it. “Can you play now?” she asked Gussie.

“I…” Gussie turned to him, a question in her eyes, then suddenly she shook her head. “No, I can’t,” she said to Alex. “I have to go.”

To find a photographer, even though there was one standing in front of her. Guilt kicked him in the chest, but he ignored it.

“Aww.” Real disappointment echoed from the den, adding power to that guilt kick.

“Another time,” Gussie said brightly.

But they both knew there wouldn’t be another time. Unless…

“I hope so.” The thin strand of desperation in Alex’s voice added a knife slice to his already bruised chest.

Gussie stepped back into the hall and tipped her head, a sad frown pulling. “She’s so sweet,” she mouthed, slipping past him to return to the living room.

This time as he followed her, his gaze wasn’t on her shapely backside or legs. Instead, he stared at the tile floor and gave into the certainty of what he had to do.

How hard would it be to take a few pictures at a wedding?

She moved quickly, getting to the front door a few seconds before he did. She opened it and then paused. “Thanks, any—”