He wished she’d say something. When she did speak, her voice was timid and small. “Then there was the kiss.”
“Kisses,” he corrected. “They were pretty great and we both know it,” he said with confidence. He knew what his own reaction had been, and she hadn’t fooled him with hers.
“Yes,” she said softly.
“Especially the one on the motorcycle,” he said, prompting her to continue.
“Especially the one on the motorcycle,” she mimicked. “Honestly, Steve, you must’ve known.”
His smile was full blown. “I did.”
“I … I didn’t do a very good job of disguising what I was feeling.”
She hadn’t, but he was in a gracious mood.
“How about dinner?” he suggested. He was eager to have the real Meg Remington back. Eager to experiment with a few more kisses—see if they were anything close to what his memory kept insisting they’d been.
She hesitated. “I want to, but I can’t,” she eventually said.
He bristled and turned in the driver’s seat to face her. “Why not?”
“I promised Lindsey I’d be home by seven and it’s nearly that now.”
“Call her and tell her you’re going out to dinner with me.”
She dragged in a deep breath and seemed to hold it. “I can’t do that, either.”
“Why not?”
“After meeting you, I promised her we’d talk. She wanted to last evening, and we didn’t …. That was my fault. You kissed me,” she said, “and I didn’t feel like a heart-to-heart with my daughter after that.”
“And it’s all my fault?”
“Yes,” she insisted.
“Do you know what Lindsey wants to discuss?”
“Of course, I know. You. She doesn’t want me seeing you again, which is exactly the point of the entire charade. Remember?”
“Yeah,” Steve said, scowling.
“Are … are you telling me you’ve changed your mind?” she asked.
“Yes.” He hated to be the one to say it first, but one of them had to. “What about you?”
“I think so.”
Steve flattened his hand against the steering wheel. “I swear you’re about the worst thing that’s ever happened to my ego.”
She laughed and rested her hand on his shoulder. The wig she had on tilted sideways and she righted it. “That does sound terrible, doesn’t it?”
He smiled. “Yeah. The least you could do is show some enthusiasm.”
“I haven’t dated much in the last ten years. But if I was going to choose any man, it would be you.”
“That’s better,” he said. He wanted to kiss her. He’d been thinking about it from the moment he’d picked her up.
“Only …” Meg said sadly.
“Only what?” he repeated, lowering his mouth to hers.
Their lips met and it was heaven, just the way he’d known it would be. By the time the kiss ended, Steve was leaning his head against the window of the car door, his eyes closed. It was even more wonderful than he’d remembered, and that seemed impossible.
Meg’s head was on his chest, tucked beneath his chin.
“It’s too late,” she whispered.
“What’s too late?”
“We’ve gone to all this trouble to convince Lindsey that you’re all wrong for me.”
“I know, but … “
“Do you think Nancy will believe this was all a silly joke?”
“No.”
“I think we should end everything right here and now, don’t you?” she asked.
Steve stiffened. “If that’s what you want.”
She moved away from him. “I guess it is,” she said, with just a hint of regret.
Five
Lindsey was pacing the living room, waiting for Meg when she walked in the front door.
“Hi, honey,” Meg said, trying to sound cheerful yet exhausted—since she’d led Lindsey to believe she was taking inventory at the bookstore and that was why she’d come home so late.
“It’s way after seven!” her daughter cried, rushing toward her. “You weren’t with Steve, were you?”
“Ah …” Meg wasn’t willing to lie outright. Half truths and innuendos were about as far as she wanted to stretch this.
Lindsey closed her eyes and waved her hands vaguely. “Forget it. Don’t answer that.”
“Honey, what’s wrong?” Meg asked as calmly as she could. Unfortunately, she didn’t think she sounded all that reassuring. She’d left Steve only moments earlier and was already feeling some regret. After following through with this ridiculous charade, Steve wanted to change his mind and continue seeing Meg. She’d quickly put an end to that idea. Now she wasn’t sure she’d made the right decision.
“Mom,” Lindsey said, her dark eyes challenging, “we need to talk.”
“Of course.” Meg walked into the kitchen and took the china teapot from the hutch. “My mother always made tea when we had something to discuss.” Somehow, the ritual of drinking tea together put everything in perspective. Meg missed those times with her mother.
Lindsey helped her assemble everything they needed and carried it into the dining room. Meg poured them each a cup, once the tea had steeped, and they sat across from each other at the polished mahogany table.
Meg waited, and when Lindsey wasn’t immediately forthcoming she decided to get the conversation started. “You wanted to talk to me about Steve, right?”
Lindsey clasped the delicate china cup with one hand and lowered her gaze. “Do you really, really like him?” she asked anxiously.
Meg answered before she took time to censor the question. “Yes.”
“But why? I mean, he’s nothing like what I thought he’d be.” She hesitated. “I suppose this is what Brenda and I get for pretending we were you,” she mumbled. “Maybe if you’d read his stuff, you would’ve been able to tell what kind of guy he really is.”
“Steve is actually a fine person.” And he was. Or at least the Steve Meg knew.
Lindsey risked a glance at her. “You’ve said hundreds of times that you don’t want me to judge others by outward appearances, but sometimes that’s all there is.”
“You’re worried about me and Steve, aren’t you?” Meg said gently.
Lindsey rubbed her finger along the edge of the teacup. “I realize now that what Brenda and I did was really stupid. We linked you up with a guy who has a prison record. We sure were easy to fool,” Lindsey said with a scowl. “We’re only fifteen years old!”
“But I like Steve,” Meg felt obliged to tell her.
Lindsey looked as if she didn’t know how to account for that. “I’m afraid he’s going to hurt you.”
“Steve wouldn’t do that,” Meg assured her, “but I understand your concern, honey, and I promise you I won’t let the situation get out of hand.”
Lindsey frowned, stiffened her shoulders and blurted out, “I don’t want you to see him again.”
“But … “
“I mean it, Mom. This guy is trouble.”
Talk about role reversal!
“I want you to promise me you won’t see Steve Conlan again.”
“Lindsey … “
“This is important. You may not understand it now, but I promise you will in the future. There are plenty of other men, law-abiding citizens, who’d give their right arms to meet a woman like you.”
Meg stared. She couldn’t be hearing this. This sounded exactly like something her mother had said back when Meg was in high school.
The intense look in Lindsey’s eyes softened and she gestured weakly. “The time will come when you’ll thank me for this.”
“Really?” Meg couldn’t resist raising her eyebrows.
“There’ll be a boy in my life that you’ll disapprove of and I won’t understand why,” Lindsey went on. “When that happens, I want you to remind me of now.”
Meg shook her head—in bafflement and disbelief. “Are you telling me you’d
break up with a boy simply because I didn’t like him?”
“No,” Lindsey said carefully. “But I’d consider it because I know how I feel about you seeing Steve, and I’d understand how you might feel about someone I was dating. Don’t get me wrong,” she hurried to add, “I don’t dislike Steve …. He’s kind of cute. It’s just that I feel you could do a whole lot better.”
“I’ll think about it,” Meg promised.
Lindsey nodded. “I can’t ask for more than that.”
Her daughter had behaved just as Meg had predicted. This had gone precisely according to plan. But Meg didn’t feel good about it. If anything, she felt more depressed following their conversation than before.
She didn’t have any talent when it came to relationships, Meg decided, as she finished putting away the dinner dishes later that evening. Steve had come right out and told her he’d had a change of heart, and she’d bungled everything. Instead of admitting that she felt the same way he did, she’d trampled all over his ego.
Meg turned to the kitchen phone, tempted to call him. It couldn’t end like this, with such confusion, such uncertainty about what she really wanted. What they wanted.
Never had an evening passed more slowly. It seemed to take Lindsey hours to go to bed, and by then Meg was yawning herself.
As soon as Meg could be reasonably sure that her daughter was asleep, she tiptoed toward the kitchen phone and dialed Steve’s number, her heart pounding. Finally she heard his groggy voice.
“Steve?” she whispered. “Thank goodness it’s you. I didn’t know what I was going to do if Nancy answered.”
“Meg? Is that you?” He sounded surprised to hear from her, and none too pleased.
She bristled. “How many other women do you have phoning you at eleven o’clock at night?”
He didn’t respond right away, and when he spoke his voice definitely lacked welcome. “I thought you said it wasn’t a good idea for us to see each other.”
“I … I don’t know what I want.”
“Do you expect me to make your decisions for you?”
“Of course not.” This wasn’t going well. In fact, it was going very badly. She probably should’ve waited until she’d had time to figure this out a little more clearly.
“Is there a reason you called?” he asked gruffly.
“Yes,” she said, sorry now that she’d phoned him. “I wanted to apologize for being abrupt earlier. I … can see now that I shouldn’t have called.”
Having said that, she carefully replaced the receiver. For a long moment she stared at the phone, feeling like an idiot.
She’d turned away to head up the stairs when the phone rang, jolting her. Quickly she grabbed it before the noise could wake Lindsey.
“Hello,” she whispered.
“Meet me.” It was Steve.
“I can’t leave Lindsey.”
“Why not? She’s in bed, isn’t she?”
“Yes, but … “
“Write her a note. Tell her you’re going to the grocery store.”
How reasonable he made it sound—as if she usually did her shopping in the middle of the night.
“She won’t even know you’re gone,” Steve said.
Meg closed her eyes. They’d been together only a few hours earlier, and yet it felt as if they’d been apart for weeks.
Her stomach twisted. Then—before she could change her mind—she blurted out, “All right, but I can’t stay long.”
“Fair enough.”
They agreed to meet in the Albertson’s parking lot. The huge store was open twenty-four hours a day. Meg had been shopping there for years. The note she left Lindsey said she’d gone to pick up some milk—that classic excuse—but it was exactly what she intended to do.
She sat in her car until she saw Steve pull into the nearly empty lot. Uncertain she was doing the right thing, she got out and waited for him.
Steve parked in the spot next to hers. They stood facing each other for a moment, neither speaking.
“I can’t believe we’re doing this,” she said.
It appeared she wasn’t the only one with doubts. Steve’s face was blank, emotionless. “Me neither.”
They walked into the store together and reached for grocery carts. Meg’s had a squeaky wheel. The sound echoed through the cavernous store.
The deli was closed, but Steve was able to get them each a cup of coffee from the friendly night manager. They parked their empty carts and sat at a small white table in the deli section. Neither seemed inclined to speak.
She felt encouraged that Steve had phoned her back, but she suspected he regretted it now.
“You know what you said earlier?” she began.
“I said lots of things earlier. Which particular thing are you referring to?”
Meg guessed his sarcasm was warranted. After all, she’d wounded his ego, and he wasn’t giving her the chance to do it again. “About the two of us, you know, dating.”
“You said Lindsey wouldn’t like it.”
“She doesn’t,” Meg said. “She asked me not to see you again.”
His gaze pinned hers. “Did you agree?”
“Not … entirely.”
His eyes narrowed with a frown. “You’d better explain.”
“Well, as you’ve already surmised, Lindsey isn’t keen on me seeing you. Which is exactly the reason you stopped by the house and did your biker routine, right? Well, it worked. She’s worried that you’re the wrong man for me.” It would’ve helped if he hadn’t bragged about his prison record and mentioned his parole officer’s name. But now didn’t seem to be the time to bring that up.
“Did you or did you not promise her you wouldn’t see me again?”
“Neither.” Meg sipped from the disposable cup and grimaced at the taste of burned coffee.
“Then what did you say to her?”
Meg lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “That I’d think about it.”
“Have you?”
Propping her elbows on the table’s edge, Meg swirled the black liquid around the cup and avoided looking at Steve. “I called you, didn’t I?”
“I still haven’t figured out why.”
That was the problem: she hadn’t, either. Not really. “I guess it’s because you have a point about seeing each other again.”
“Oh, yeah?” He gave her a cocky grin.
Her anger flared. “Would you stop it?”
“Stop what?” he asked innocently.
“The next thing I know, you’re going to ask me how much I enjoyed kissing you.”
Steve smiled for the first time. “It wouldn’t hurt to know.”
“All right, since it means so much to you, I’ll admit it. No man’s ever kissed me the way you do. It scares me—but at the same time I wish it could go on forever.” Having admitted this much, she supposed she might as well say it all. “My marriage left me wondering if I was … if I was capable of those kinds of feelings ….” She paused and lowered her eyes. “I was afraid I was, you know, frigid,” she said in a choked whisper.
She stared down at her coffee, then took a sip, followed by several more, as if the vile stuff were the antidote to some dreaded illness.
The last thing she expected her small confession to provoke in Steve was a laugh. “You’re joking!”
She shook her head forcefully. “Don’t laugh. Please.”
His hand reached for hers and their fingers entwined. “I wasn’t laughing at you, Meg,” he said gently. “You’re one of the most sensual women I’ve ever met. Trust me, if you’re frigid—and there’s a word I haven’t heard in years—then I’m a monk.”
Meg looked up and offered him a fragile smile. It astonished her that this man who’d known her for only a few days could chase away the doubts that had hounded her through the years after her divorce.
He cleared his throat. “I, uh, don’t think you should look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you want me to kis
s you.”
Her eyes drifted shut. “Maybe I do …. That’s what makes everything so complicated. I’m really attracted to you. I haven’t felt like this before—not ever, not even with my ex-husband, and like I said, that scares me.”
He stood up, still holding Meg’s hand, and tugged her to her feet.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
“Someplace private,” he said, scanning the store. He led her through the frozen food section, past the bakery and into a small alcove where the wine was kept. With her back to the domestic beer, he brought her into his arms and covered her mouth with his.
Their kiss was rough with need, but she wasn’t sure whose need was greater. Meg could feel Steve’s heart racing as hard as her own. She supposed she should’ve pulled away, ended the kiss, stepped out of his arms. But Meg didn’t want that.
Steve yawned. He was so tired. With good reason. It’d been almost three before he’d gone to bed and four before he’d been able to fall asleep. His alarm had gone off at six.
He arrived at the shop and made a pot of coffee. He mumbled a greeting when Gary got in.
“I hope you’re in a better mood than you were yesterday,” his foreman told him. “What’s wrong with you, anyway?”
Steve checked over the job orders for the day. “Women,” he muttered in explanation and apology.
“I should’ve guessed. What’s going on?”
“You don’t want to hear this,” he said and headed for the garage.
“Sure I do,” Gary said, following him. “I don’t suppose this has anything to do with Nancy, does it?”
Steve glared at him. “What do you know about my sister?”
“Not much,” Gary said and held up both hands. “Just what you said about her fixing you up with some woman. It’s none of my business, but you and this woman seem to be hitting it off just fine.”
Steve continued to glare at him. “What makes you say that?”
Gary laughed. “I haven’t seen you this miserable in years. Which probably means you’ve fallen for her. Why don’t you put yourself out of your misery? Shoot yourself and be done with it.”
Frowning, Steve turned away. The kid was a smartass, although now that Steve thought about it, Gary might have come up with the perfect solution.
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