Page 25 of California Love Songs
Crystal nodded. It was admirable and just like Damien to think about how others had helped him on the road to success. How to create balance in the universe. But something still nagged at her. “Did you invite her to stay at your house?”
“Yeah. She’s young and kind of broke. She can stay in the guest cottage and be right there to get to work in the morning.”
Crystal frowned. “She might get the wrong impression. She’ll think you want a relationship.”
Damien chuckled. “I don’t think so. In her eyes, I’m seriously old. She treats me like her dad.”
Crystal must have looked uncertain, because Damien said, “Trust me, Opal is not interested in me. Anyway, she’ll stay in the guest cottage, far away from me.”
Crystal tried to smile, but she felt shaken. Even the briefest moment of imagining that Damien had a new girlfriend had made her feel as though her world were crashing down. It was all too easy to see him with a younger, hotter girl. And it made sense that he would be with another musician, someone who really got his world.
She had to curb this stubborn high-school crush immediately. It was destructive. Instead, she should accept Damien’s dare and their decades-long friendship, and focus on channeling her energy into her girlhood dream.
The rest of their descent was quiet, and Crystal couldn’t help but feel that Opal’s call had broken the spell between them. She slipped into the passenger seat of his car, tired and grateful to be going home.
Damien seemed to sense that she was distracted, so instead of trying to get her to talk, he put on one of his favorite playlists, from a rock album he’d played endlessly when they were kids. Crystal smiled and looked out of the window as the familiar chords crashed into the car. The opening track sounded so good through Damien’s state-of-the-art player. She still knew all the words and soon found herself singing along and laughing as Damien did his falsetto.
By the time they arrived at her house, all the tension had dissolved.
Damien switched off the engine. “What are your plans this evening? Got a wild Saturday night ahead?” Despite the mischievous look in his eye, he knew that Crystal was not a wild child. Something of which she was actually pretty proud.
“I’m going to Ray’s,” she said, naming one of the small clubs in town. “Saturday night is salsa night. I’m there most weeks.” It was her recreation and her release and she cherished having a place to dance with other people that felt like a second home.
Damien nodded. “Of course. I remember how often you used to go to Ray’s. It’s so cool you still do that.” There was a pause. “Would you mind if I joined you? Dancing this morning in my folks’ backyard reminded me how much I love salsa.”
In all the years she’d known Damien, he’d never once gone to a salsa night. Then again, maybe he’d been to hundreds—she just didn’t know because he’d been on the road so much. She smiled. “Everyone’s welcome.”
Suddenly, there was a rap at the passenger window and Crystal almost jumped out of her seat. Mila!
Damien lowered her window and his sister leaned into the car with a grin. “Hello, you two.”
“Hey, sis,” Damien said casually. “I’m just dropping Crystal off.”
Mila’s ring winked in the sunlight. “So I see.”
Crystal hurriedly unbuckled her seatbelt, feeling like she’d just been caught doing something illicit. She turned to Damien and said, “See, I told you Mila would want to start planning right away.”
Mila laughed. “It’s true, I can’t wait.” She paused and looked at the two of them a little quizzically. “But we can meet later in the week.”
Damien said to Crystal, “At least you got a good hike in before my sister makes you sit poring over wedding dress designs for hours. I’ll leave you guys to it.”
Crystal stepped out of the car and with a quick, “See you later,” closed the door and Damien drove off.
Mila put her hands on her slender hips and watched the car disappear down the road. She turned to Crystal with a look of pure glee. “Do you want to wait until we’re sitting down before you tell me where you’ve been with my brother this afternoon? By the color in your cheeks, it sure looks like you’ve had fun.”
Crystal was mortified. “We just went for a hike at Garland Ranch. Like we used to when Damien was around more.” She tried to deflect any more attention by making a big show of looking for her keys.
As soon as they were indoors, Mila made herself at home in the kitchen. “So come on, Crys. What’s the deal with you and my little brother?”
Crystal was fixing them a batch of peach iced tea. She was glad she had her back to Mila, because she was pretty sure she’d flushed an embarrassing shade of fuchsia. Gathering her composure, she took the jug of iced tea and two glasses to the table and insisted that there was only friendship between them. “You know how close we’ve been since high school,” Crystal said, carefully pouring from the iced-filled jug, conveniently avoiding Mila’s gaze.
When she glanced up, Mila seemed unconvinced. She had also set out a stack of wedding magazines Crystal had been too distracted to even notice. “I can feel it in the air,” she said. “There’s something much more than friendship between you and Damien.”
Crystal shook her head. “It’s because you’re head over heels in love that you see love everywhere. I’ve watched it happen dozens of times with happy brides. They’re always trying to set me up with someone they think would be perfect for me—even when I’ve got a boyfriend.” She laughed. “It’s like you’ve got the love bug and you want to infect everyone with it.”
Now it was Mila’s turn to laugh. “I’m sure there’s truth in that. I do love Hersch more than anything and I want everyone I love to be as happy as we are. But I know chemistry when I see it. And as much as it grosses me out to speak about my bro like that, you have it with him.”
Crystal drew a big breath. She hated to admit it to herself, but hearing Mila confirm something she was secretly thinking felt good. Seriously good. She wasn’t just imagining this new intensity between her and Damien; it was visible to other people, too. But then she remembered how she’d felt on the mountain when Damien took that call from Opal Dahlberg. She needed to protect herself and the crush she’d so stubbornly and hopelessly had on her friend all these years. And that meant keeping it buried. Way, way down.
