Page 20 of Canvas of Lies (Spruce Hill #3)

Chapter Fifteen

Nico

F reshly showered back at home, I was seated at my kitchen table when a text from Kat popped up on my phone. I grinned—before turning over the new device, I’d programmed myself into her contacts.

This is quite an upgrade. Hope you’re not expecting to be paid in sexual favors.

I laughed aloud. Well shit, there goes my afternoon. Much better camera on this one, perfect for sending appreciative, scantily clad selfies. Or so I’ve heard, anyway.

She sent back a selfie, but she was fully dressed and making a peace sign with her fingers. I studied it for a moment, appreciating the reluctant smile on her lips. It was cute and silly and the realization that this was what I’d been missing in my life pierced me like a knife between the ribs .

I didn’t have it in me to joke at the moment, so I replied with a simple, You are so beautiful, I can barely stand it.

It was a few minutes before the bouncing dots indicated she was typing. So are we, like, dating now?

Tentative was not generally a word I associated with Kat—she lived her life with gusto, with boundless enthusiasm. I figured she was teasing me and was tempted to reply in a similar tone, but I wanted too badly to be on the same page about the answer.

You are every dream I ever had come true, so yes.

Her response came through almost immediately. Sappy, but same.

When a new picture of Kat with a lollipop in her mouth appeared on my screen, I decided that dating Katherine Willoughby was exactly what I needed.

I studied the image, noting the familiar sparkle of humor in her eyes, the slight tinge of pink in her cheeks, those sweet, full lips that always tasted faintly of some kind of fruity lip gloss, the thick honey curls that tumbled halfway down her back.

I wanted her more fiercely than I’d ever wanted anything, even the damn painting.

It was a physical ache centered in my chest, a sense of longing that flowed through me as surely as the blood in my veins.

This was a dangerous, tangled web I was plunging myself into, but I could no sooner walk away from Kat than I could the painting .

With a sigh, I rubbed at my temples, then picked up the phone again to text her. If we’re officially dating, can I take you to dinner tonight?

Her reply was swift and satisfying. As long as you’ll come home with me after.

It’s a date. Pick you up at six.

W hen I pulled up in front of Kat’s apartment a few minutes ahead of schedule, she was seated on the front steps wearing a short, ruffly white dress with her leather jacket and boots.

This look was like one of my teenage fantasies come to life.

Her hair was twisted up with little silver clips, a few curling locks falling artfully free.

A dark gray cat wove back and forth in front of her bare legs, purring so loudly I heard it from three yards away.

“Is it wrong to be jealous of a cat?” I asked, shoving my hands into the pockets of my jeans.

I’d traded my usual tee and sneakers for a nice shirt and leather dress shoes; the appreciative feminine gaze that traveled over me from head to toe made me glad to have put forth the effort.

“Well, if it makes you feel any better, I paid to have Tempest’s balls chopped off last month,” she replied, rising to her feet and brushing cat hair from her skirt .

I gave an exaggerated grimace as I held out a hand, curling my fingers around hers when she took it.

“You look extraordinarily beautiful,” I said quietly.

She paused on the bottom step. “You clean up pretty nice, too. It’s a good thing you weren’t dressed like this when you came to the Keeper earlier, or Erin would’ve thrown herself at you then and there.”

“Oh, really?” I mused, then leaned in to kiss her.

Whatever she had on her lips, it tasted different today, more like vanilla. Only Kat could be so addicted to routine in some ways and so unpredictable in others.

“You should tell your assistant I’m into this hot blonde, really hoping she’ll let me stick around awhile.”

With a mischievous grin, Kat said, “I guess we’ll have to see how an actual date goes first, won’t we?”

I slid an arm around her waist, lifted her from the step, and twirled her around before setting her to her feet on the sidewalk. “Challenge accepted. Excellent date starts now.”

“Where are we going for dinner?”

“The Mermaid,” I answered, laughing when she squealed in delight.

It was a nice, family-owned restaurant in the middle of Spruce Hill’s main drag, but Aidan Willoughby wouldn’t be caught dead in a place without Michelin stars to its name.

Back in my teens, Kat and I had been there together a few times with mutual friends, including the current owners, Jake and Sam.

The twins took it over from their father several years ago .

For me, a trip to The Mermaid meant a tasty meal in cool surroundings, maybe a chat with Jake if he was tending bar or working on his ledgers at an unoccupied table.

For Kat, it was something else entirely: another jab at her father’s snobbery, another experience he’d denied her, another memory made in spite of his neglect.

Being the one to give that to her made me feel like less of a failure despite my plan for the painting crumbling to dust.

“I’m still working on getting into my dear, departed phone,” Kat said as I paid the bill. “I have a college friend I could ask for Evelyn’s number, but I feel like the fewer people involved, the better.”

I nodded. “If you can’t get your contacts from the old phone, I can do some digging.”

“You mean hacking?” she asked, arching a brow.

“I’m not a hacker, Kitten.”

“Shame.” She scooted out of the booth and looped her arm through mine. “I was hoping for a chance to yell, ‘Hack the planet!’ at you.”

“You’re a goofball,” I told her, but I couldn’t hold back a grin. She'd always had a soft spot for nineties movies.

“Give me one more day, then you can hack to your heart’s content. The sooner we get Evelyn on the case, the better.”

She was right. I debated doing a little digging before that day was up, but then she jabbed me in the side with her pointer finger.

“Give me another day, Nicolas.”

I frowned down at her as I rubbed my sore ribs. “Fine, fine. I’m just eager for this to be done.”

“It will be. I promise.”

After dinner, we wandered a few blocks from the restaurant to peek in the windows of cute little shops lining Main Street, then picked up dessert from Caboose Creamery, an old train car that had been converted into an ice cream parlor.

Watching Kat savor her cone of Brake Line Bubblegum, an impossibly bright pink ice cream with blue and purple gumballs mixed into it, was both torture and bliss.

If the sly grin on her face as we strolled back toward my car was any indication, she knew exactly what she was doing.

“Are you spending the night?” she asked, unbuckling her seatbelt when I parked in front of her apartment.

I raised a brow. “I am ever hopeful, so I brought a change of clothes, but it’s entirely up to you.”

She hummed thoughtfully before shooting me a grin. “Better bring them in, just in case.”

As Kat locked the door behind us, I silently applauded my decision to invite her out on a real date, and not only because she’d gotten dressed up.

The evening had been filled with laughter and the familiarity of our old friendship, along with that new, sharp undercurrent of desire.

It felt like redemption, like a second chance at everything I’d ever dreamed might be possible between us.

Whatever happened with the painting, I was determined not to lose my hold on her, not this time .

“You’re looking very serious,” Kat teased, unlacing her boots so she could kick them off beside the door.

I leaned against the wide archway leading into the kitchen. “What’s on your socks?”

An actual giggle bubbled out of her. While I stared at her in shock, Kat lifted her leg and propped her foot on the wall beside me.

“Read it and weep, handsome.”

“They’re actual kittens. And rainbows. You have rainbow kitten socks.”

She fluttered her lashes at me. “I do. Regret asking out a nerd like me yet?”

“Not even a little.”

My hand wrapped around her ankle and a wicked grin curved my lips. Before she could lose her balance, I caught her behind the knees and swept her into my arms.

“What’s it going to take to get you naked?” I asked.

This time, it wasn’t a giggle, but a throaty laugh that rocketed straight through me. “To start with, the bedroom is that door at the back left. Then I’m going to need a few minutes to get these stupid clips out of my hair so I don’t shred my scalp while we roll in the hay.”

“Fair enough,” I said, depositing her at the foot of the bed. “I’ll go brush my teeth and put on my footie pajamas for beddy-bye.”

She snorted. “If you don’t actually have footie pajamas, I know exactly what you’ll be getting for your next birthday. ”

I winked and left the room, whistling cheerfully as I grabbed my backpack and located the bathroom.

When I came back into the bedroom, Kat was on her hands and knees, peering under the dresser.

Her leather jacket hung on a hook by the door, her pretty silver hair clips lying on the dresser above her.

I had a perfect view of the lush, round globes of her ass as the ruffled hemline of her skirt crept upward.

“Not that I’m complaining about the view, but what exactly are you doing?”

“Trying to find the back to my stupid earring. This is the third one I’ve lost and it was the last of the replacement pack.”

She didn’t bother to glance at me, not until the silence stretched as a series of progressively dirtier fantasies paraded through my head.

When she pulled her arm out from beneath the dresser to look over her shoulder, I was still at the doorway, staring at her with a burning intensity that she read immediately in my expression.

Kat licked her lips and looked at me in question.

“You have an absolutely magnificent ass,” I said softly.