If The Shoe Fits (18 page)

God, he’d love to tell that woman a thing or
two. Not that it’d work. He’d actually tried to buy her off years
ago, something Bella knew nothing about. He’d been surprised when
Madeleine had turned him down. A gold digger like her, he’d thought
for sure the two mil would be a reasonable price tag.

But she hadn’t even bargained. Just gotten a
smirk on her face, raised her nose a little higher, and turned her
back on him. It’d been the last time he’d spoken to her.

He could see now that he’d been wrong to walk
away. Oh, he’d always been ready to listen to Bella. Ready to help
out financially, but he should have been here, keeping an eye on
things. On Madeleine.

He’d underestimated her. The woman from the
wrong side of the tracks had a huge chip on her shoulder—and was
taking it out on the two people who didn’t deserve it.

And there wasn’t a damn thing he could do
about it. He’d made inquiries into getting custody, but his lawyer
had told him the same thing he’d told Bella. Madeleine had more
support in the court’s eyes than a single waitress who only owned a
third of a business. Madeleine’s two thirds percent control gave
her everything.

But if Bella weren’t single…

Reese would look good in the court’s eyes.
Young, successful and the two of them married: together, they had a
shot.

And the guy was interested. He’d seen it in
Reese’s gaze. The one that had rested anywhere but on Bella. Well,
most of the time. But there’d been those few lingering
glances…

He’d laugh if it weren’t such a touchy
situation. Bella was right; Madeleine liked controlling her own
little kingdom and would never allow Reese to enter.

Chapter
Seventeen

By eleven o’clock Thursday morning Bella had a
headache that wouldn’t quit.

The only reason she hadn’t had one earlier was
because Staci hadn’t decided to come in until ten fifty-eight. And
after three days of working with her, two minutes was all it took
for a headache to show up.

“
So, what do you think?’ Staci
twirled around in yet another new “non-Staci” outfit, doing a
little “ta-da” dance at the end, almost clipping little Michael
Spaccone again with her designer bag. Poor kid would probably have
flashbacks for the rest of his life any time Casteleoni’s was
mentioned. “Is it me, or what?”

Depended on which Staci she was talking
about.

Her black skirt didn’t hug her curves like a
mummy’s wrappings, the frilly beige top camouflaged the silicone
torpedoes into a silhouette fit for polite company, and her hair
was tamed to a manageable mane.

“
You can’t wait tables in that,
Staci.”

Staci’s sank back on her heels and Bella
inexplicably felt as if she’d hurt a puppy. “I know that, Bella. I
wasn’t planning to. This is what I’m wearing Friday
night.”

“
Oh. Well, it’s nice.” It also
meant that Staci wasn’t here to work. Which was also
nice.

Though Madeleine had said she wanted Staci to
learn all aspects of the business and Bella was actually looking
forward to seeing Staci try to wait tables. That’d be a kind of
karmic retribution.

“
What are you going to
wear?”

“
Probably my blue
suit.”

“
A suit?” Staci’s mouth fell open.
“You can’t wear a suit to dinner on a Friday night. We’re going on
a boat, not some museum. Where’s your sense of fun? Of adventure?”
She put her hands on her hips. “Of
dating
?”

Bella wiped off another table, her ponytail
slipping over her shoulder. Impatiently, she flicked it behind her.
“Staci, this isn’t a date. It’s a business meeting. We’re going
over the set-up and checking out the site, remember? That’s all it
is.”

“
And after all that boring stuff?”
Staci leaned against the edge of the booth and then apparently
remembered what exactly it was she was leaning against. She stood
up, checked her sleeve for sticky finger residue, and crossed her
arms in front of her instead.

Bella tucked the dish towel into her apron
pocket and brushed her hair off her forehead. “
Afterwards
, I
intend to come home, make some notes, and get a good night’s rest.
I’m taking Sophia to the zoo on Saturday and I’ll need to get up
early.”

“
Please tell me you’re kidding.”
Staci’s mouth dropped again. “After a night out with two of the
hottest guys in this godforsaken town, you’re going to call it
quits and go out with your baby sister?” Her hands jammed back down
on her hips. “Are you out of your mind? No wonder you’re still
single.”

The headache went nuclear. Bella had had
enough. Ten years of insults, threats, snide remarks, and slurs
ruptured through her carefully composed shell. She threw the dish
towel onto the just-cleaned table. “For your information,
one
of the reasons I’m still single is because of
your
mother. She always seems to come up with some event or
other after I make plans to go out, and ends up threatening to send
Sophia away if I don’t stay home to take care of her. Enough of
that and guys decide dating me isn’t worth the trouble, especially
if they could end up with a stepmother-in-law like her.”

Staci opened her mouth to say something, but
Bella was having none of it. She shoved her finger into Staci’s
brand new shirt. “And you and Drew have been no help. Any time you
don’t get your way, off you go, running to your mother.”

She poked the shirt again. “None of you seem
to realize that there is a blameless little girl at the bottom of
your self-centered plots. And not one of you seems to care. Sophia
has lost both parents. She doesn’t even remember them.”
Poke
. “And the closest thing she’s got to compare to a
loving parent is a manipulative woman bent on furthering her own
ends at the expense of a child. What a wonderful role model. What a
wonderful way to grow up.” Another jab. “So if I focus all my free
time on Sophia, that’s my business, Staci, not yours.” Bella poked
Staci’s shirt one last time, slowly becoming aware that every voice
in the restaurant had gone silent, every mouth had dropped open.
Mrs. Angelelli didn’t even seem to notice that her dentures had
gone askew.

Giac and Gus, however, were smiling. Giac
raised his arms and began clapping. Gus quickly joined in. Within
two seconds, not one pair of hands remained still in the
place.

Her finger still in its position, Bella looked
around. Staci did, too. They glanced back at each other, then
looked down at Bella’s finger.

Bella yanked it—and herself—away. Oh, God.
What had she done?

She closed her eyes. Bad enough she’d told
Staci off, but in public? No matter that it was long overdue;
Sophia was going to be the one who paid for her lack of
control.

“
Well.” Staci’s voice was a little
higher pitched once the applause died down, but it was a far cry
from shrill. Definitely not threatening. Which was utterly
surprising.

As was the fact that Staci didn’t storm
out.

Instead, she brushed off the spot where Bella
had poked her, then looked at Bella.

A dropped pin would make more noise than there
was in the restaurant at that moment and Bella cringed inwardly.
She should probably start packing Sophia’s bags—to be followed by
her own.

“
I guess that’s been building up a
while.” Staci said into the silence with a tentative…
smile
?

Okay, who’d taken Anastasia Fontaine and
replaced her with this new model?

Half afraid the attitude was a trick, Bella
nodded slowly.

Staci flipped her hair back, straightened her
blouse, smiled a weak little smile, raised her chin, and walked
toward the door. No eye contact with anyone, no running, no
slinking, no storming. She just walked out the door with her back
straight, her shoulders squared, and zero ounce of her normal
wiggle.

And Bella had no idea what she was planning to
do.

Everyone erupted once the door closed,
congratulations and “atta-girl”s abounding, but Bella couldn’t
celebrate with them. She shouldn’t have lost her temper and now
that the adrenaline rush of telling Staci off was subsiding, all
she could think about was, God, what had she done?

***

Jonathan scurried out through the cat door
Giac had created in one of the windows and followed Staci. This was
unprecedented. None of the charts he’d studied had showed this
possibility. He had no idea what to do now. All he knew was that he
had to follow Staci and if she tried to cause trouble he had to
stop her somehow.

He looked down at his little gray paws. He
wasn’t quite sure how he would do that in his present form, but it
was safer to tail her in this form than in the human
one.

His mind raced as he dodged the foot traffic.
Boy, stilettos took on a whole new meaning when one was ankle high
to them.

He couldn’t believe Bella had finally stood up
for herself. He
really
couldn’t believe it and not because
he didn’t believe she had it in her—The Boss knew she did, but He
also knew that she tempered it with common sense, something Staci
had none of.

Yet the girl hadn’t gone off on Bella. And
that worried Jonathan. When mortals didn’t follow prescribed
patterns, they became loose cannons.

The light changed and Jonathan had to stop.
Dodging stilettos was a whole lot less riskier than dodging
automobiles.

Up ahead, Staci turned a corner.

He was going to lose her.

Looking around, he didn’t see the proverbial
phone booth to make his transformation in. He couldn’t just
materialize out of thin air with all these people
around.

Which meant he’d just have to materialize
into
thin air.

Scooting beneath a mail box on the off chance
that someone would notice a cat
poofing
out of existence,
Jonathan took a calming breath—a necessity to get this
transformation to work properly—and willed himself to become a wisp
of his former self.

He had to do something to save his Charge from
herself.

***

Staci tried to muster her dignity as she
turned onto Pine Street. She couldn’t believe Bella had said those
things to her like that. In public.

Staci cringed. All those people looking at her
as if she were…

Mother.

Her foot slipped out from under her and she
landed hard. In a gob of something. Great. All over her new skirt.
Mother would kill her.

Staci tried to get up, but one of her new
Manolos slipped off and went sliding away on something black and
slimy. Ugh. Oil. That would never come out. Mother was really going
to be pissed.

Staci couldn’t prevent a shiver. Mother had a
very determined nasty streak. The woman could flay the skin off
your back with her tongue from across the room, and do it so damn
quietly that no one would ever know.

But Staci… she’d know.

She stopped trying to get up. Was this what
Bella felt all the time around Mother? Like walking on coals, never
sure which one would burn her?

And all those people, staring at her as if she
were just like her mother…

She dropped her hands into her lap. She’d
never really thought about what life was like for Bella. Especially
since Sal had gone into the hospital.

Those few months after Mother had married him
had been good ones. For the first time, Staci had hoped that they’d
found a true home. Sal had treated both her and Drew as if they
were his own. But then he’d gone into the hospital and life had
gone back to the way it’d been before with Mother, though this time
there’d been more money so it’d made Mother’s demands less
annoying. Plus, Bella had been there to take the brunt of it
all.

Something slithered beneath Staci’s calf and
she scrambled to her feet. The skirt was a goner. Hopefully, Mother
wouldn’t notice.

Fat chance. Mother noticed
everything
.
She’d blame Bella; she always did.

And she and Drew had always gone along with
it.

Guilt slithered up Staci’s spine like the oil
along her leg. Maybe they hadn’t treated Bella all that nicely.
After all, Bella’s life
had
completely changed and not for
the better in the space of a year. And as for Sophia… Bella was
right. The little girl didn’t have a clue what a normal life was
like and it wasn’t fair of them to threaten the life she
did
have just to keep Bella as their servant. The poor kid had lost
enough.
Both
of them had.

“
Hey, Stace!”

Drew. Staci tried not to groan. Her sister was
cut from such different cloth. Polyester to Staci’s silk. Staci
fingered her skirt and for the first time felt pity for her sister
instead of derision. “What’s up, Drew?”

“
What happened to you?”

Staci grimaced. “I slipped on some oil.” She
schlepped over to the missing Manolo.