Jennifer Greene - Blame It On Paris

"Kel. Don't try that kind of ultimatum thing. Not with me."

She said softly, "I'd never do the ultimatum thing. With anyone but you. Because I love you, Will."

"Now's a hell of a time to tell me. Hundred people around here, most of whom are watching every step I take, hoping I trip."

She cocked her head. Until that moment, she hadn't thought he was aware of how intensely he'd been scrutinized. "I don't know how to tell you this, but you've been passing every test."

"Only because I haven't tripped yet."

"No. Because you're a good guy and you keep showing it."

He put down the brownies and the cookies. Right on the ground. Walked her into the shade of her mother's young maple. "You love these people," he said.

"I do. They've been part of my life forever. They're full of faults. And sometimes they're intrusive and annoying. But they've watched out for me. I've babysat their kids, had a bleacher seat to the rise and fall of some marriages and divorces. They're good people. Will."

"Yeah. I can see that."

"And I hate to tell you this," she murmured, "but you had a great time this afternoon."

"Picking up trash? Carrying stuff in the sun? Hauling your ex-fiancé under a tree? Being grilled and sniffed at and pried into by complete strangers?"

"Yeah, all that. You liked it all."

He opened his mouth and then said, "Well, hell. So I did."

She laughed. So did he.

But she was thinking her heart was feeling so full that it could pop like an overfilled balloon if she wasn't careful. To lose Will now would hurt more than she could bear.

But they really weren't in Paris anymore. And somehow, as hard and fast as they were both moving, trying to change things, trying to fix things, they weren't finding the answers that would enable them to be together.

And they were running out of time.

WILL STOPPED by Kelly's house Wednesday at lunch. She had left a phone message, asking him to make some decisions before she pushed ahead on some renovation projects. He couldn't carve out more than an hour, but he'd shucked his suit coat and was carrying a fast-food hamburger as he waded through the sea of vehicles on the street.

He charged up the walk and poked his head in the door. "Kel?"

He could hear a buzz saw upstairs, the sound of hammering and sanding coming from the kitchen, but Kelly must have heard him above the general din. because she came bounding out of the kitchen area, looking very happy. "You're here! I'm so glad you could make the time. I've got a bunch of stuff to show you."

"I'm okay with your judgment, you know. Told you that already. Your taste's better than mine."

"Well, yes," she teased. "But it's your money, hotshot, and I don't want to waste it."

Mentally he'd been holding his breath when he charged through the door. The whole party for her mom on Saturday was still fresh in his memory. He'd wanted to come through for her. And he thought he had. After all, he hadn't punched out Jason and he seemed to have been grudgingly accepted by her wild clan of friends and family.

That was what he'd hoped for.

But he wasn't a man with any tolerance for ultimatums, especially regarding his father. He'd wanted to hear that she'd come back with him to Paris, but not with strings attached. And hell and a half, but the string that frustrated him wasn't her ultimatum business. It was seeing how happy Kel was here.

She loved the damn place. She was loved.

Kidnapping her to Paris sounded romantic and wonderful and perfect. What the hell did they need anyone else for? They had each other.

One look at her and he knew that was true. She was what he needed, all he needed.

"Hey," she fussed, "are you listening?"

"Of course I'm listening." She was herding him from project to project at the speed of sound.

First, she'd shown him the hardwood floors-newly sanded, ready for a choice of finish. She'd chosen a finish, wanted him to approve. It wasn't the cheapest, but she'd done research and believed it was the sturdiest. That was a yes.

Then she'd picked out models for a new fridge and dishwasher-more easy yeses. Then to the bathroom. She was showing him samples of tile colors.

"So pick," she said.

"One of those blues," he said. "Whatever you think."

"They're all blue, Will. You're not going to be any help to me at all, are you?" It was a rhetorical question, he figured, since Kelly was already moving on to a new subject. "I can't tell you how thrilled my mom was with the present you picked out for her. When did you get so brilliant?"

"She liked it, huh?"

"Are you kidding?" The present had been a gift certificate to a florist, where two coral rosebushes were being saved for her. "My mother was beside herself. You won fifty million brownie points with the neighborhood, besides." She frowned when she heard a noisy engine sound outside. "UPS, it sounds like, I'd better-"

"Of course, go…"

Actually it was FedEx, and when she came back in moments later, he started with another subject they had to cover. "Kelly, I'm stuck on Sunday for my mother's birthday party."

"Well, of course you are, I'm going. All three of your sisters called me. I'm picking you up before church."

"Um, problem there, because I'm not going to church. Which the family knows perfectly well." He could smell his sisters interference. Kelly would have no reason to know his family had set up her '"picking him up" as a maneuver to get him to church. Kelly undoubtedly believed she was helping in some way. He would have explained the situation, but he suddenly caught her expression.

She'd opened an official-looking envelope, looked at the contents and suddenly her face lost color.

"What's in there?" he asked.

"Nothing. Just the lab results." She tossed the paper into a patchwork basket of other toss-out mail by the door.

"What lab results?"

"The DNA test. I had it done when I got back from Paris. I told you about it. I told the lab to send the results to my father's address, not to me. I didn't want or need to see it. I couldn't care less," she said swiftly.

"Whoa." She'd dismissed the report as if it were nothing, which it most certainly wasn't, emotionally or legally, for her. But she moved on as if determined to stick to her conversational agenda.

"Anyway, what if I pick you up. say around quarter to ten on Sunday…because if you're at your mom's that night, then you wouldn't have to drive me'home later. Besides, I don't know if you want me to stay through the whole day."

"It's white tie." Will lifted his voice to be certain she heard this devastating news.

She only lifted a brow. "I've never worn ties. I'm guessing they'll let me in in a dress."

Then he remembered that she wouldn't likely be allergic to dressing up the way he was. "I'll pick you up," he said.

"But it'd be inconvenient for you," she argued.

He was suddenly aware they were arguing about who was doing the driving, and somehow the fact that he wasn't about to attend a mass had gotten lost in the scuffle. So had everything else. And someone had just turned on a noisy power drill upstairs. "Wait a minute. This lab report you just got-that means your dad now knows for sure that you're his daughter?"

"Will, I told you I've been e-mailing my dad ever since I got back from Paris. He hasn't returned a single note. Not a word. He either doesn't want a daughter or he doesn't want me. If he actually needed DNA as proof, then as far as I'm concerned, he can jump in the pond…and I mean that big pond between the continents. Now about the electricity-"

"Kel. No one was talking about electricity."

"But we should have been." She motioned vaguely toward the kitchen. "The guys blew a fuse when they first started working. I just put in another one, but it kept blowing, and the house is of an age, you know, so I called an electrician, asked him to check out the electrical system. Now, I can't imagine you wanting to spend any money you don't have to. but if this were my house. I do believe you should-"