Kiss in the Dark (2 page)

Boston sighed. Steph was a good girl—and as good a friend as she knew how to be. Yet Boston didn’t quite understand why thoughts of Steph caused such anxiety to rise in her. Still, they did, and it seemed the feelings were accelerating. In fact, Boston had been considering getting her own apartment, but she knew that would make Steph angry and hurt.

Scraping the remaining hard candy and Tootsie Roll center off the stick with her front teeth, she deposited the empty stick in the cupholder in the center console of the car—where it would linger for who knew how long with the twenty or thirty other discarded lollipop sticks. Boston shook her head and bit into the now-softened Tootsie Pop. She decided she wouldn’t nest on dismal thoughts—not when a fun night at Danielle’s was just around the corner. Still, she frowned a moment. It was fun to go to Danielle’s nearly every Friday, but secretly Boston wished for something a little more—something a lot more, actually. She dearly loved her friends, but she was beginning to feel stagnant, as if life had begun to pass her by. She hoped then that Max had found the courage to ask Kara to marry him. At least then someone would be stepping into a new adventure—the adventure she secretly yearned to live for herself, the adventure of owning a loving husband and children.

Again she shook her head. She wouldn’t think about it. She had a great job—hopefully soon a great career! She would be happy with that, with that and her good friends—Santa’s elves or not.



“Do you think I need to have Sylvia put a few more highlights in my hair this time?” Steph asked as Boston pulled into a parking space just in front of Danielle’s apartment.

Boston forced a smile and looked to Steph. Green-eyed and brown-haired, Stephanie Crittendon was a pretty girl—at least outwardly. She was tall with a perfectly slender figure and more self-confidence than Boston could ever imagine owning. Yet she was often pretty shallow—very often. Steph had done nothing but talk about her hair all the way to Danielle’s. Boston wasn’t really just tired of offering reassurance that Steph’s hair was perfect; rather, she was more irritated because Steph had answered Boston’s cell while she’d been in the bathroom before they’d left the apartment. Logan West had called while Boston had been brushing her teeth, and when Steph had seen the name on Boston’s caller ID, she’d taken the liberty of answering instead of just letting the call go to voicemail.

Boston had stepped out of the bathroom just in time to hear Steph flirting with Logan as she promised to give Boston the message he’d called.

“He says he’s still at work so he’ll call you later…if he gets another chance,” Steph had explained. “I didn’t want you to miss the call entirely, Boston.”

Boston had been inwardly furious! She couldn’t count how many times she’d kindly asked Steph not to answer her phone. Further, she knew Steph had answered exactly because it was Logan West. She wouldn’t have answered if it had been anybody else.

Logan West was simply the most attractive man Boston had ever known. He’d worked at Channel 7 News until he’d landed a head scriptwriter’s job with a competitor. She’d secreted a crush on him simply forever and had been ecstatic when he’d called and asked her out the week before. He’d taken her to the zoo, and they’d had a wonderful time—at least Boston had a wonderful time. Yet she figured Logan had too since he said he’d call again. He had called, and it irked Boston to the tips of her toes that Steph intercepted it. If there was one thing about Steph that she couldn’t tolerate (yet still did for the sake of keeping the peace in their apartment), it was Steph’s attempts to infiltrate every relationship Boston had. She knew Steph would love nothing more than to steal Logan West’s attention—and it was boiling Boston’s blood.

Yet as Steph repeated her question, Boston simply bit her tongue, hoping Logan would call back—soon.

“Well? Do I or don’t I?” Steph asked.

“I think you have plenty of highlights, Steph,” Boston said, forcing a smile. “Maybe you need a few lowlights. Maybe that’s what you’re thinking is missing.”

“Hmm. That could be it,” Steph said, pulling down the sun visor, lifting the lighted courtesy mirror flap, and studying herself again. “I’ll ask Danielle.”

Boston exhaled a heavy sigh. She didn’t even know why Steph asked her opinion on anything. She never took it to heart—always had to ask someone else instead.

Boston pulled down the sun visor on the driver’s side. She wiped a fleck of dry mascara from underneath one eye—thinking how grateful she was that her own auburn hair held natural gold highlights—closed the mirror, and opened the car door.

“Will you grab the chocolate milk mix, Steph?” she asked.

“Sure,” Steph agreed, retrieving the mix from the backseat before getting out of the car herself.

As they started up the sidewalk toward Danielle’s house, however, Boston felt her phone buzzing. Quickly she plunged one hand into the depths of her purse, rummaged around a moment, and retrieved the device. She smiled as she looked at the caller ID—Logan West!

“Go on in, Steph,” Boston said. “I’ve gotta get this.”

“Okay,” Steph said, continuing up the sidewalk while Boston remained still and turned her back to the direction of Danielle’s door.

She pushed send, put the phone to her ear, and said, “Hello?”

“Hey, Boston,” Logan responded. Boston smiled, delighted by the way his deep voice spoke her name. “This
is
Boston, right?” Logan asked.

“Yep! This time it’s really me,” she said. Her smile was so broad it hurt. “How are you, Logan?”

“I’m well,” he said. “Just wondering if you have time to go out with me tomorrow.”

“Of course!” she exclaimed. She worried her excitement was perhaps a little too obvious. “What were you thinking?” she asked, trying to tone down the excitement in her voice.

She gasped slightly, startled as Steph stepped directly in front of her and said, “First come, first served. I saw him first. Just remember that, Boston.”

“What?” Boston breathed. The determination and warning flame in Steph’s eyes confused Boston as much as the threatening tone of her words.

“What the heck, Boston?” Halle asked, rather pushing Steph out of the way and embracing her in a friendly greeting. “What has you all wound up?”

Her friends—they were so important to her. She realized in that moment, consciously realized, how stifling Steph was to her mood—to her very soul. When Boston was in the company of her good friends, she was able to be herself—say and do the things her character and personality naturally did. But when she was sequestered at home with just Steph for company, she was self-conscious, often frustrated, and unhappy. As she gazed into the smiling faces of her true friends, she sighed. Yep, it was time to get an apartment—an apartment of her own.

“Logan West! Mmm! Maybe tomorrow will bring on the first kiss,” Halle teased.

“Don’t even say that! You know it wigs me out. I get all nervous. The anticipatory anxiety freaks me out!” Boston scolded, smiling.

“But golf is a long game. You have to do
something
while you’re walking to the next hole,” Danielle said.

“I know!” Boston giggled. She sighed as she thought of Logan’s dazzling smile, tawny hair, and broad shoulders. How had she rated a date with him? How had she rated a second date?

“Excuse me.”

Boston’s smile faded—but only slightly—as a tall, muscular guy pushed his way through her friends and to the door. She recognized him at once from the family photos Danielle had around her apartment—Vance Nathaniel, Danielle’s older brother. He was dressed in a pair of swim trunks, a rather ragged white T-shirt, and sandals, and he boasted dark hair, smoldering green eyes, and a rugged five o’clock–shadowed jaw. Vance Nathaniel was even more handsome in real life than he was in photographs. Boston couldn’t help but find her smile suddenly broadening again. Danielle’s brother resembled his sister so perfectly—as perfect an example of gorgeous, iconic masculinity as Danielle was the ideal representation of flawless femininity.

“Oh, Vance,” Danielle began, “this is Boston.”

“Hey,” he greeted almost warily it seemed.

“Boston, this is my big, bratty brother, Vance,” Danielle said. “And don’t let him fool you. Tall, dark, and handsome he may be…but he’s a total brat.”

Boston nearly laughed out loud. So Danielle’s brother was what Steph had been talking about when she’d nearly growled to Boston,
I saw him first
.

“It’s okay,” Vance said, shaking his head. “I’m going down to the pool. And besides, nothing messes up a chick party like a ratty, old rooster.” He smiled a little, and as Steph sighed with obvious admiration, Boston fought to keep from rolling her eyes with disgust.

“Looks like Steph has chosen her next victim,” Halle whispered.

Boston giggled, feeling only sympathy for Danielle’s brother. No doubt Steph would pursue him like a rabid pit bull. The guy didn’t have a chance.

“You ladies have fun with your chili dogs and girl movies,” Vance said. “It was nice to meet you all.”

He left the apartment. As soon as Vance had closed the door behind himself, Kara said, “I thought he wasn’t coming until next week, Danielle.”

Danielle nodded. “He wasn’t going to…but his landlord was pressuring him to get out of the apartment so the new renters could move in.”

Boston sighed. It was so obvious that Steph was already planning her wedding to Danielle’s brother, wondering how she could time the nuptials just right so she and Vance could move into his house and have a month or two of marital bliss before he started his new curator job.

“Whatever, you guys. He’s my brother…so to me he’s just the brat who used to drop toads in the tub when I was taking a bath and is way too overprotective of me now,” Danielle laughed. “A Viking?” she giggled, looking at Halle. “Maybe a Vulcan?”

Halle frowned. “Like in Star Trek? He doesn’t look anything like—”

Steph laughed out loud, shaking her head at Halle’s innocent assumption. “Halle,” Steph began, “I swear…you’re so stupid sometimes. A Vulcan…like in Roman mythology, not Star Trek. Vulcan was the Roman god of fire and metalwork, and he was ugly. Vance is far from ugly. Sheesh, Halle! Can you at least pretend to have a brain?”

Boston felt sick. She hated when Steph belittled people! She could be so cruel. How had they all put up with her for so long? But the answer was simple: they didn’t know what else to do. What could they do, show her the same cruelty she often showed others? Of course not! That kind of cruelty wasn’t in any of them—especially Boston. Still, what she’d said to Halle was so unkind.