Maureen Child - Californian Kings

It had been three days since she’d seen Jesse. Three days and he hadn’t made an effort to talk to her. Not a phone call. Not one of his annoying drop-ins at her store. Not even a brief sighting on the street. Not that she had been hoping for any of that, but she couldn’t help feeling frustrated.

He’d seemed…excited to find out that she was the woman he’d been with three years ago on the beach. So much so that he’d been avoiding her ever since. Bella groaned internally. For heaven’s sake, she was angry when he was around and even angrier when he wasn’t. “Clearly, he’s making me insane.”

“Nothing wrong with a little insanity,” Kevin told her.

“Easy enough to say when you’re not the babbling idiot,” Bella muttered and leaned over a glass display case to examine a new pair of earrings Kevin had stocked. “Is this turquoise?”

“God, you’re plebian,” he said with a laugh. “No, my little peasant, that’s lapis lazuli. Antique. That stone—well, not that one in particular—was really popular back in the day with emperors and pharaohs.”

“You know,” Bella told him, tipping her head to one side and smiling up at him, “if I hadn’t met your girlfriend, I’d swear you were gay.”

“Straight men know good jewelry, too. Your surfer guy bought that great emerald piece from me, remember?”

Bella felt a twinge. Who had he bought it for? One of his celebrity dates? She had to be important to him. You didn’t just buy emeralds for a casual fling. Of course, maybe Jesse did.

“Ah, yes, Mr. Thoughtful. Wonder which one of the slavering crowd gets the emeralds,” Bella mused, stopping in front of a display case of sterling silver.

“Honey, you sound like a jealous wife.”

Her head snapped up and she pinned him with a hard look. “I do not.”

Kevin shrugged. “Yeah, you do.”

Oh God, did she really? That was lowering. She wasn’t jealous of Jesse’s women. She was…heck, she didn’t even know what she was anymore. Still…“I’m not jealous. I’m irritated.”

“And hiding it nicely.” Kevin bent over the glass case and looked into her eyes. “So he knows about three years ago.”

“Yes, and had the nerve to tell me I should have told him who I was sooner.”

“What an idiot,” Kevin said chuckling. “Using logic.”

“Oh, that’s very funny,” Bella said. “This has nothing to do with logic, anyway. He was completely insulting.”

“Insulting?” Kevin shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and rocked back on his heels. “Jeez, Bella. Cut the guy a break.”

Bella scowled. “He doesn’t need a break from me. He makes his own breaks.”

“He told you he remembered that night. Remembered you. How is that insulting?” Kevin demanded before adding, “And speak slowly, because I’m working with a Y chromosome here.”

“It’s insulting because he remembered the sex. He didn’t remember me.” Then there was the fact that he hadn’t bothered to even talk to her once since his memory had been jogged. Oh, yes, being “remembered” by Jesse King was so-o-o flattering.

“Sure he did.” Kevin gave a long-suffering sigh. “Women make this so much harder than it has to be. The guy remembered the sex because of you. So therefore he remembered you.”

“Is it a genetic imperative that guys have to stick together?”

“Against women, hell, yes,” Kevin admitted. “I love women, don’t get me wrong, but you guys are enough to make a man old before his time.”

“I don’t know why,” Bella said with a sniff. “We make perfect sense to each other.”

“Exactly.”

“Kevin, could you just be my best friend for a minute and not Jesse’s brother-in-arms? Don’t you get it? I could have been anyone as far as he knew,” Bella argued.

“I am your best friend, and that’s why I’m telling you the truth even though you don’t want to hear it. You weren’t just anyone to him. You’re you. And he remembered. So cut him some slack.”

“I can’t believe you’re still on his side,” Bella said, eyes wide.

“The question is, why are you so against him?” Kevin leaned on the display case and grinned at her. “Seems to me you’re awfully obsessed with Jesse.”

“I’m not obsessed, I’m…focused,” she finished lamely.

“Uh-huh.”

Bella scowled at him. “We used to be together on this. Aren’t you the one who helped me organize the protest march against corporate takeovers in Morgan Beach?”

He grinned. “You’re the only one who’s got a problem with him anymore.”

“Fine. Lone wolf,” she muttered. “That’s me.”

The bell over the door jangled and he gave her a quick grin. “Be back in a sec, Ms. Wolf, I’ve got a customer. Take a look at the new sterling earrings. Mrs. Latimer,” he called out, hustling over to the tall, richly dressed woman entering the shop. “I’ve got some new jade you’re going to love.”

“Things are pretty darn sad when even your best friend isn’t on your side,” Bella muttered, strolling down the length of the counter again. Her gaze flicked past the gemstones, the twisted gold and the heavier sterling silver.

Kevin’s shop sold jewelry made by local artisans. Here you could find everything from exquisite, highpriced jewels to skull rings and pentagrams. Eclectic, she thought. Like the town used to be. She ran her finger over the cool glass. “Jade. Emeralds. Diamonds.”

“Which do you prefer?”

Bella felt her jaw drop. “What are you doing here?”

Jesse grinned at her, and carefully closed her mouth with the tip of one finger under her chin. “Came back to see if Kevin got in the matching earrings to a necklace I picked up here a couple of weeks ago.”

“Ah, yes, the emeralds.” Did she sound wistful? She didn’t want to sound wistful.

“You have something against them?”

“Not a thing,” Bella said, forcing a smile. “I just hope the woman you’re buying them for appreciates the gesture. Hmm,” she added, tipping her head to one side as she looked up at him, “I wonder. Do you remember her name?”

His eyes flashed and a muscle in his jaw ticked, but that was the only sign her barb had hit home.

“I do,” he said. “But now I’m wondering why you care. Jealous?”

“Please.” She glanced across the room at Kevin, who wasn’t paying the slightest bit of attention to them, focused as he was on his customer. Great. No reprieves headed her way.

She wasn’t jealous. She was pissy. Bella stared up into Jesse’s beautiful eyes and told herself to remember that she was nothing to him. A blurry memory of one night that he hadn’t even been able to recall the morning after.

Okay, that thought helped her weakened knees to strengthen a bit. He was charm personified. He knew just how to break down a woman’s defenses. And Bella, despite knowing all that, was just as susceptible as the next woman. Dammit. But how was she supposed to react when she slept with him and was forgotten and some other nameless woman did the same thing and received emeralds?

“Who you buy jewelry for is none of my business,” she said. “I just hope the poor woman knows what she’s letting herself in for.”

“Oh, I think she knows,” he said, smiling now.

“Amazing to me how many women are sucked into your orbit,” she said.

“As I recall, you liked my orbit just fine.”

She scowled at him. “I thought you said you didn’t recall much at all.”

“Oh, the memories are hazy, but they’re there.” He leaned in toward her and lowered his voice even further until it was no more than a sexy rumble that rolled along her spine. “Lightly tanned skin in the moonlight. The buzz of something electrical when we touched. The sigh of your breath.”