Loyalty.

I didn’t want my mom to have bad feelings toward him. Somehow the guy had managed to climb out of the box full of people I had already labeled off-limits with a permanent marker and he’d become different. And now, much to my irritation, I feel some form of loyalty to Xander Spence.

I had to change this immediately.

Chapter 10

Monday morning I wave good-bye to my mom and open the front door to the shop. As I walk toward school, I notice a sports car that looks just like Xander’s parked a few doors down. I bend over to look inside, and when I straighten up again Xander is on my opposite side. I jump. He hands me a cup of hot chocolate and takes a sip from his cup.

I look at the cup—the same as yesterday’s. “I only want this if you drank out of it first,” I say, refusing to say, “What are you doing here?” That might give away that I care.

He grabs the cup from me, takes a drink then hands it back.

It surprises me so much that he acted on my sarcasm that I can’t help but laugh. “I believe there’s a meeting Thursday nights at Luigi’s for those addicted to Eddie’s muffins. If that doesn’t work, I hear there’s a pill you can take.”

“I’m afraid my addiction is not one I’m willing to give up yet,” he says.

I give him a sideways glance. We were still talking about muffins, right? “I’m sorry.”

“So whose turn is it for a question?” he asks.

“Mine,” I say, even though I really don’t remember. But I’d rather ask than answer.

“Okay, what’s it gonna be?”

“Do you have any brothers?” I know he doesn’t have any sisters because his grandma said she has only one granddaughter and he already told me that is his cousin.

“Yes, I have two older brothers. Samuel is twenty-three, just graduated from law school.”

“Which law school?”

“Harvard.”

Of course.

“My other brother, Lucas, is twenty and away at college.”

“Those are pretty normal names.”

“Normal?”

“No Chets or Wellingtons or anything.”

He raises one eyebrow. “Do you know any Wellingtons?”

“Of course not, but you probably do.”

“No, actually I don’t.”

“Hmm,” I say.

“Okay, my turn.”

I smile but am nervous at the same time. I really wish I got to control all the questions asked. Then I could steer clear of the ones I don’t want to answer.

“Are you wearing contacts?”

“What? That’s your question?”

“Yes.”

“No, I’m not. Why?”

“I’ve just never seen eyes as green as yours. I thought maybe they were colored contacts.”

I turn my head so he doesn’t see my smile and secretly curse him for making me feel special. “Are you?”

“Of course I’m not wearing contacts. You think I would purposefully make my eyes boring brown?”

“Those gold flecks make them look more amber.” I want to kick myself for admitting I’ve noticed, especially when his smile widens.

“Well, this is me.” I point to the old high school on my right. It was built seventy-five years ago, and although its architecture is pretty and not seen much anymore, it could definitely use some upgrades.

He takes in my school. I shift uncomfortably, wondering what he thinks of it. Wondering why I care what he thinks of it. He probably goes to one of the two private schools in town. Yes, that is how many rich people live here—enough to require two private high schools in a small beach town.

His eyes are back on me. “See you later.”

“Later as in you’re going to be here at twelve o’clock to walk me home? Because I don’t know if I can handle you twice a day.”

He sighs heavily. “And my grandmother thinks you’re sweet.” Then his brow furrows a little. “Your school gets out at noon?”

“Well, not the whole school, but yes, I get out at noon.”

“Why?”

“Um . . .” I gesture toward the shop. “Work release.”

His eyes widen. “You miss half your school day to work in the shop?”

“It’s not a big deal. . . . It was my idea. . . . It really doesn’t bother me at all to help out.” I know I’m rambling because deep down it does bother me—a lot—so I cut off my list of excuses and finish with “I better go.”

“Okay. Bye, Caymen.” He turns around and walks back toward his car without even a backward glance.

“Caymen,” Mr. Brown says as I walk into science class a few minutes late.

“Sorry, I got caught in a thorny vine and had to untangle myself from its clutches.” Which is actually sort of true.

“Although your excuses are by far the most creative, that’s not why I addressed you.”

The rest of the class had already started on a lab and I want to be doing it. It looks like there are actual chemicals involved.

Mr. Brown must’ve noted my gaze because he says, “It will only take a minute.”

I reluctantly walk to his desk.

He slides several papers across to me. “This is that college I was telling you about. It specializes in math and science.”

I grab the papers. “Oh yeah, thanks.” I learned at the beginning of the year that it’s better to just play along with teachers about college than to try to explain to them that you’re not going for a while. I shove the papers in my backpack and take a seat at my station. At the beginning of the year we had an odd number of people in class. Mr. Brown asked for a volunteer to be alone. I raised my hand. I’d much rather do lab work alone so no one else can screw it up. It’s so much easier not to have to depend on anyone else.

The next morning Xander’s waiting outside the shop again, casually leaning against a light post, like we’ve been walking to school together our whole lives. He takes a sip of my hot chocolate then hands it to me as we start walking.

I take a drink. It scalds my throat going down. This isn’t working. I need him to disappear so I can get back to my normal life of mocking people like him. So he can stop making me look forward to every morning. “So, Mr. Spence, your first brother is a lawyer; your second is going to some fancy college. What does your future hold?”

“I’m kind of like you.”

“In what universe?”

He seems to think this is a joke and laughs. “I’m expected to take over the family business.”

“What makes you think that’s the same as me?”

“You work there, you live there, you help run the place. . . . I’m pretty sure your mom thinks of you as her eventual replacement.”

I had resigned myself to the fact long ago, but hearing someone else acknowledge it triggers something in me. “I’m not going to run the doll store forever.”

“Then you better start sending different signals. Stat.”

“It’s more complicated than that.” I can’t just walk away and do something else. She depends on me.

“I completely understand.”

Now it’s my turn to laugh. He can’t completely understand anything about my situation. It’s more than obvious by his lifestyle that if he walks away from whatever his “family business” is it will survive. His family’s bills will still get paid. He has a future of limitless possibilities.

“What will you do instead?” he asks.

“I don’t know yet. I like science, I guess, but what am I supposed to do with that?” Knowing that would’ve required me growing up thinking I had a choice in the matter. “So why you?”

“Why me?”

“Yes, why are you expected to take over the business? Why not your brothers?”

“Because I haven’t done anything. I haven’t declared my strength. So my dad has declared it for me. He says I’m good in many areas so that must mean I’m supposed to be the face of the business. So they send me out into the world.”

“What is the family business?”

He tilts his head like he’s trying to decide if I’m serious. “The Road’s End.”

I try to make sense of that statement. “You own a hotel?”

“Something like that.”

“What do you mean ‘something like that’? You either do or you don’t.”

“There are five hundred of them.”

“Okay.”

“All together.”

“Oh.” Realization dawns. “You own all of them. . . .” Holy crap. This guy isn’t just rich; he’s RICH. My entire body tenses.

“Yes. And I’m getting groomed to take over one day. Just like you.”

Just like me. “We’re practically twins.” By this time we’re in front of my school. So is this why he started hanging out with me? I want to tell him that if he thinks he has found some sort of connection with me through our “similar” situations he should think again. But I can’t bring myself to say it, and I’m not sure if it’s to spare his feelings or mine. “I’ll see you. . . .” This time I walk away first and don’t look back.

Chapter 11

For the first time in as long as I can remember there are two customers in the store. As in two groups that didn’t arrive together and both need assistance.

I’m not so good with kids—perhaps the real reason I’m banished to the “eye painting area” during parties. So without any kind of collaboration with me, my mom heads for the mom and little girl while I walk over to the middle-aged woman. “Hi. Can I help you find anything?”

“Yes. A few months ago I was in here—maybe it was more like six; I’m not even sure anymore—and there was this doll.”

When she doesn’t continue I say, “I’ll have to look into that. We don’t like dolls coming into the store.”

She gives a halfhearted laugh. Maybe more of a nervous chuckle. “I know I’ll have to be more specific.” She walks along the back wall, intently looking at each and every one.

I trail after her. “If you can describe it, I can start a lineup of suspects.”

“Dark curly hair, one dimple on her left cheek.”

The woman is describing herself. A lot of people fall in love with dolls that look like them. So I study the woman a little closer and try to think of any dolls we might have that look like her. “Tina,” I finally say. “Was she a sitting doll?”

“Yes.” The woman gets a large smile. “Yes, I think her name was Tina.”

“She should be out here. Let me look.” I go to the corner of the store where Tina last was, but she isn’t there. “Let me look in the back.” We almost always order the same doll after it’s proven itself a good seller.

The side wall in the stockroom is lined with shelves and those shelves house boxes big enough to hold a single doll. On the end of each box a name is written. It’s like our very own porcelain-doll Crypt. About midway up I see the name Tina. I drag the ladder over and pull down her box, which feels very light.

On the floor, after digging through the packing peanuts, I find out why. There is no doll. Weird. I stand there confused for a moment, not sure what to do, before I go back out to the sales floor and interrupt my mother mid-sentence.

“Sorry, Mom, can I talk to you for a minute?”

She holds up a finger to me, and when she’s finished talking to her customer, walks with me behind the register. “What’s going on?”

“I just went to get Tina out of her box, only it seems Tina has been abducted.”

“Oh yes, sorry. I sold her a while back. I must’ve forgotten to put her name placard in the drawer.”