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“Come on,” he said impatiently. “I know a back way out.”
Jill shook her head, not sure what he thought he was doing here. “But … I can’t just leave.”
Connor looked down at her and suddenly grinned, startling her. She’d forgotten how endearing he could be and she stared up at him. It was like finding a beloved forgotten toy in the attic. Affection for him trembled on the edge of her mood, but she batted it back.
“Why not?” he said. “Do you want to spend the next two hours with the guy?”
She tried to appear stern. She wanted to deny what he was implying. How could she go? What would she say to her friends? What would she tell Mary Ellen?
But in the end, his familiar grin did her in. “I’d rather eat dirt,” she admitted, crumbling before him.
“There you go.” He led her gently across the dance floor, only hesitating while she scooped up her sparkly little purse. They headed for the exit and he winked at a waiter who was holding the door for them, obviously primed to help with the escape. He paused only long enough to hand the man some folded money and then they were out the door.
“But what about his car?” Jill asked, worrying a bit. She knew the sense of guilt would linger long after the evening was gone. “He loves that car.”
“Don’t give it a second thought,” he advised, steering her toward his own souped-up, twenty-year-old Camaro, a car she remembered from the past, and pulling open the passenger door.
“His car isn’t really on fire, is it?” she asked as she plunked down into the leather seat.
“No.” He sank into the driver’s seat and grinned at her again. “Look, I’ll do a lot for an old friend, but setting a guy’s car on fire … no, that’s a step too far.”
She watched him start the engine and turn toward the back exit.
“But you will lie to him about it,” she noted.
“Oh, yeah.”
She sighed and settled back into the seat. All in all, at least she didn’t have a naked foot exploring her leg at the moment. That alone was worth its weight in gold.
“Rickey’s on the Bay?” he asked in the shorthand they both remembered from earlier years.
“Of course,” she responded without thinking. That was where everyone always went when the night was still young enough to make the last ferry to the island. She turned and looked at the lights of Seattle in the distance. If only you could go back in time as easily as you could go back to the places where you hung out in your youth.
“I can’t believe I’m letting you do this,” she said with a sigh.
“I can’t believe you needed me to do it.”
She laughed. “Touché,” she muttered. So much for the great date that was supposed to bring her out of her shell and into the social whirl.
She pulled her cell phone out of her purse and checked it.
“What are you doing?” Connor asked with just a hint of suspicion in his tone.
She glanced up at him and smiled impishly. “Waiting for Karl to call. I’ve got to explain this to him somehow.”
He shuddered. “Is Karl the mambo king?” he asked.
She gave him a baleful look.
“Don’t worry. I gave the waiter a little money to tell old Karl what the score was.”
She raised an eyebrow. “And just what is the score, pray tell?”
He hesitated, then shrugged. “I told him to tell Karl I was a made guy from the mob and we didn’t take kindly to outsiders poaching on our women.”
“What?”
He looked a little embarrassed. “Yeah, I know. Definitely corny. But it was the best I could think of on the spur of the moment.”
She had to hold back her laughter. He didn’t deserve it.
“I didn’t even know you were Italian.”
“There are a lot of things you don’t know about me.” He gave her a mocking wink. “A lot of things you don’t want to know.”
“Obviously.”
She frowned, thinking the situation over. “So now you’ve single-handedly destroyed my chances of dating anyone ever again in this town. Thanks a lot.”
“I’m just looking out for you, sweetheart.”
She rolled her eyes, but she was biting back a grin.
Rickey’s was as flamboyant as a fifties retro diner should be, with bright turquoise upholstery and jukeboxes at every table. They walked in as though they ought to see a lot of old friends there, but no one looked the least bit familiar.
“We’re old,” he whispered in her ear as he led her to a booth along the side with windows on the marina. “Everyone we used to hang out with is gone.”
“So why are we still here?” she asked, a bit grumpy about it. This was where so much of her life had played out in the old days. And now, the waitresses didn’t know her and the faces all looked unfamiliar.
“Lost souls, searching for the meaning of life,” he said, smiling at her across the linoleum-covered table. His smile looked wistful this time, unlike the cheerful grin from before.
“The meaning of life is clear enough,” she protested. After all, hadn’t everyone been lecturing her on it for months? “Get on with things. Make the world a better place. Face reality and deal with it. Or something along those lines.”
He shrugged. “Sounds nice, until you start analyzing definitions. What exactly does ‘better’ mean? Better for whom? How do you get the whole world involved, anyway?”
She made a face at him. “You always were the great contrarian,” she said accusingly. “And now I’ve let you kidnap me. Someone should call the police.”
The waitress, a pretty young girl in a poodle skirt who’d just arrived at their table blanched and took a step backward.
“No, no,” Jill told her quickly. “I’m only joking. Please don’t take me seriously. Ever.”
The waitress blinked rapidly, but risked a step closer in to take their order. She didn’t hang around to chat, however.
“You scared her,” Connor suggested as she hurried away.
“I scare everyone lately,” Jill admitted. “What do you think? Am I too intense? Are my eyes a little wild?”
He looked at her uncertainly, not sure if the truth would be accepted in the spirit he would mean it. His gaze skimmed over her pretty face. She had new lines between the brows, a new hint of worry in her eyes. Her hands were clenched around her water glass, as though she were holding on to a life preserver. Tense was hardly a strong enough word. His heart broke just a little bit. What had happened to his carefree girl?
But that was just it. She wasn’t “his,” never had been.
He knew she’d been through a lot since Brad had left her. She had a right to a few ragged edges. But when you came right down to it, she was as beautiful as she’d ever been. Her golden hair sprang into curls in an untamed mass all around her head. Her dark eyes were still warm, her lips were still full and sexy. Still gorgeous after all these years.
And looking at her still sent him over the moon. It happened every time. She was like a substance he had to be careful he didn’t mess with, knowing it would be too dangerous to overdose.
But he could see a difference in her and silently he swore at himself. Why had he stayed away so long? She probably could have used a friend. She’d lost her young girl sparkle and he regretted it. He loved that sparkle.
But now he frowned, studying her face as though he was worried about what he found there. “How are you doing, Jill?” he asked her quietly. “I mean really. How’ve you been?”
She sat back and really looked at him for the first time, a quiver of fear in her heart. This was what she really wanted to avoid. Silly banter was so much safer than going for truth.
She studied his handsome face, his crystal-blue eyes sparking diamond-like radiant light from between those inky black eyelashes that seemed too impossibly long. It had been over a year since she’d seen him last and he didn’t seem quite so much like a kid living in a frat house anymore.
He’d always been such a contrast to Brad, like a younger brother who didn’t want to grow up. Brad was the serious one, the ambitious one, the idea man who had the drive to follow through. Connor was more likely to be trying to make a flight to catch a party in Malibu or volunteering to crew on a sailing trip to Tahiti. Brad was a man you could count on. Connor—not so much.
Only that had turned out to be a lie, hadn’t it? It was hard to trust anything much anymore once the man you’d considered your rock had melted away and wasn’t there for you anymore.
She closed her eyes for a moment, then gave him a dazzling smile. “I’ve been great,” she said breezily. “Life is good. The twins are healthy and my business is actually starting to make a profit, so we’re good.”
He didn’t believe her. He’d known her too long to accept the changed woman she’d become. She’d always been careful—the responsible sort—but she’d also had a sense of fun, of carefree abandon. Instead, her eyes, her tone, her nervous movements, all displayed a wary tension, as though she was always looking over her shoulder to see what disaster might be gaining on her now.
“So good that you felt it was time to venture out into the dating world again, huh?” he noted, being careful to smile as he said it.
“Why not? I need to move on. I need to … to …” She couldn’t remember exactly what the argument was, though she’d heard it enough from her friends lately. Something about broadening her horizons. Something about reigniting her womanly instincts. She looked at Connor as though she might read the words in his eyes, but they just weren’t there.
“So who talked you into that fiasco tonight?” he asked her.
She frowned at him. “It was a blind date.”
“No kidding. Even you wouldn’t be nutty enough to go out with that guy voluntarily.”
“Even me?” His words stung. What did he think of her, anyway? Her eyes flashed. “Just how nutty am I, Connor?”
He reached out and grabbed her hand, gazing at her earnestly. “Will you stop? Please?”
She glanced back, her bottom lip trembling. Deep breaths. That was what she needed. And no matter what, she wasn’t going to cry.
“So where have you been all this time?” she asked, wishing it didn’t sound quite so petulant.
“All what time?” he said evasively.
“The year and a half since I last saw you.”
Her gaze met his and skittered away again. She knew he was thinking about exactly what she was thinking about—that last time had been the day Brad left her. Neither one of them wanted to remember that day, much less talk about it. She grimaced and played with her spoon. The waitress brought their order so it was a moment or two before they spoke again.
“So you said your business is doing okay?” he noted as he spread his napkin on his lap.
“Yes.” She stared down at the small dish of ice cream she’d ordered and realized she wasn’t going to be able to eat any of it. Her throat felt raw and tight. Too bad. It looked creamy and delicious.
He nodded, reaching for a fork. It was pretty clear he wasn’t going to have any problem at all. “What business?”
She blinked at him. “Didn’t you know? Didn’t Brad tell you?”
He shook his head and avoided saying anything about Brad.
She waited a moment, then sighed. “Okay. When Brad left, he took the electronics business we had developed together. And told me I might as well go out and get a job once the babies were born.”
He cringed. That was enough to set your teeth on edge, no matter who you were.
She met his gaze with a touch of defiance in her own. “But I gave birth to two little boys and looked at them and knew there was no way I was handing them over to someone else to raise for me. So I racked my brain, trying to find something I could do at home and still take care of them.”
He nodded. That seemed the resourceful thing to do. Good for her. “So what did you decide on?”
She shrugged. “The only thing I was ever really good at. I started a Bundt Cake Bakery.”
He nodded, waiting. There had to be more. Who could make a living baking Bundt cakes? “And?”
“And that’s what I’m doing.”
“Oh.” He frowned, puzzled. “Great.”
“It is great,” she said defensively. She could hear the skepticism in his voice. “It was touch and go for a long time, but now I think I’m finally hitting my stride.”
He nodded again, wishing he could rustle up some enthusiasm, but failing on all fronts. “Okay.”
The product Jill and Brad had developed together had been a bit different from baked goods and he was having a hard time understanding the connection. Jill had done the bookkeeping and the marketing for the business. Brad had been the electronic genius. And Connor had done some work with them, too. They’d been successful from the first.
With that kind of background, he couldn’t imagine how the profits from cakes could compare to what they’d made on the GPS device for hikers to be used as a map App. It had been new and fresh and sold very well. He wasn’t sure what he could say.
He looked up across the restaurant, caught sight of someone coming in the door and he sighed. “You know how legend has it that everyone stops in at Rickey’s on a Saturday night?”
Her eyes widened warily. “Sure.”
“I guess it’s true.” He made a gesture with his head. “Look who just walked in. Mr. Mambo himself.”
She gasped and whirled in her seat. Sure enough, there was Karl starting in their direction. He was coming through the restaurant as though he thought he owned the place, giving all the girls the eye. He caught sight of her and his eyes lit up.
Her heart fell. “Oh, no!”
CHAPTER TWO
AND THEN, KARL’S jaunty gaze fell on Connor and he stopped dead, visibly paling. Shaking his head, he raised his hands and he seemed to be muttering, “no, no,” over and over again, as though to tell Connor he really didn’t mean it. Turning on his heel, he left so quickly, Jill could almost believe she’d been imagining things.
“Wow.” She turned back slowly and looked at Connor accusingly. “I guess he believed your cockeyed story.” She put a hand to her forehead as though tragedy had struck. “Once he spreads the word, my dating days are done.”
“Good,” Connor said, beginning to attack his huge piece of cherry pie à la mode. “No point wasting your time on losers like that.”
She made a face and leaned toward him sadly. “Are they all like that? Is it really hopeless?”
