by Sarah Morgan
“I grew up in a town in Connecticut and skied twice a year if I was lucky. Tyler grew up in Vermont and skied every hour of every day when there was snow. I had to rethink my dream.” He leaned forward, his hands wrapped around the mug. “I grew up assuming I’d be a doctor. I remember once asking my mother if there were any other jobs a person could do, because everyone I knew were doctors.”
“Debra is the only one in your family who isn’t a doctor?”
“She bucked the trend, but she’s shared in enough conversations that she could probably run the emergency room single-handed.” He put his mug down. “Returning to our original conversation, don’t you think you’re a little young to be done with dating?”
“I’m definitely done with the online version. Obviously if I happen to bump into someone gorgeous while I’m walking one of the dogs who turns out to be wonderfully easy to talk to, then that’s different.”
“Does that happen?”
“Not usually, but it’s how my brother, Daniel, met Molly.” She laughed. “In fact that’s not strictly true. Daniel saw Molly walking her dog in the park and decided he wanted to meet her, so he borrowed a dog from us. So although they met while walking dogs, it wasn’t strictly Daniel’s dog.”
Ethan was laughing. “I think I like your brother.”
“I like him too, although there are times when I could strangle him. But to be fair he now owns that dog and Molly is the best thing that has ever happened to him, so I’ve forgiven him for being manipulative.”
“So happy endings all round.”
“Yes. They’re getting married.” And she wasn’t used to the idea yet. “So is Fliss.” She imagined holidays together where everyone was a couple except her. And soon the children would start arriving. She’d be Aunty Harriet.
Envy, she decided, was a truly uncomfortable emotion. It said things about you that you didn’t want to hear. She didn’t want to be someone who was envious of the people she loved most.
“And that feels strange?”
“I’m thrilled for them. I really want them to be happy.”
“Of course you do.” He watched her steadily. “But you can be thrilled and happy for someone and still feel disappointed for yourself. And that’s harder to cope with, because you don’t feel that you’re allowed to feel that way.”
She sighed and finished her chocolate. “How do you know so much?”
“I spend my day around people in trouble.” His gaze held hers. “You’re going through a difficult transition. A major life change. And you’re not happy.”
Was it that obvious? “I have no reason to not be happy. It’s not as if I’ve lost my job or had my heart broken.”
“But in a way you have. You’ve suffered a loss. Loss of a sister you’d lived with for almost all your life. Loss of a lifestyle you loved. And loss of comfort, because everything you’re doing right now feels uncomfortable and that’s stressful. Constantly pushing ourselves out of our comfort zone means we’re in a constant place of fight or flight.”
“The irony is that of the three of us, I was the only one who wanted the whole home and family thing. I guess life is weird that way. I feel pathetic,” she confessed, “because I haven’t really lost her. I can call her anytime.”
“But that’s not the same, is it?” He hadn’t moved. Hadn’t touched her. And yet the tone of his voice was so comforting it felt as if he had. She wouldn’t have thought the man who had shouted at her on that first evening could have been capable of such sensitivity.
“No, it’s not the same.” Her throat thickened. “It’s all the small things. We used to talk about everything all the time. I was the person closest to her. Now that’s Seth. I feel—” She swallowed. “Replaced.”
“Even though you know you’re not.”
“Even though I know that.” She was acutely conscious of his solid presence across the table from her. He sat still, listening, his arms resting on the cool granite of the countertop. His eyes were tired and he had a serious five o’clock shadow, but she’d never seen a sexier man in her life. Something stirred to life inside her. Feelings fluttered and bloomed. Feelings that shouldn’t have been there because this wasn’t a date.
Her gaze met his and she felt an almost electric chemistry. It buzzed across her skin and settled in her chest.
She was glad he was the one talking because right at that moment she wasn’t sure she’d be able to find her voice.
“The life you loved has changed, and it wasn’t your choice. It’s okay to feel upset about that. It’s natural. You’re going through a period of adjustment. What I don’t understand is why you make that harder with ‘Challenge Harriet’?” Why not wait until things feel a little easier?”
“Because I always want life to be easier and that isn’t how it is. My natural instinct is to stay inside and watch back-to-back episodes of Gilmore Girls. If I let myself, then I would walk the dogs and then come home every night and be alone. Fliss was my social life for almost all my life. All my friends are connected with my family. I love Molly, but now she’s marrying Daniel. My friend Matilda has a new baby and she’s spending very little time in New York. I need to get out there and grow a new life. That’s what I’m doing. But the world isn’t set up for shy people.”
“There are advantages to being shy.”
She glanced up again. “Name one.”
“Shy people often have much more sophisticated observational skills. They watch and listen more than the average person, which gives them greater insight into human behavior.”
“But there’s not much point in having insight if you’re too scared to talk to the human on the other end of the behavior. There are days when I’d like to be able to walk through a door and own the room.”
“Are you opening the door first?” His eyes gleamed. “Owning the room isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. And it’s not how much you talk, it’s about what you say.”
“You make it sound great, but when I was at dinner with those guys I said almost nothing. They talked the whole time.”
“About themselves presumably.”
“Pretty much.”
“Insecurity. Trying to convince you what great guys they were. And I think you’re being hard on yourself. If they talked the whole time about themselves, how were you supposed to contribute? From your description the whole evening sounds like the equivalent of—” he fished for an appropriate analogy “—conversational masturbation.”
She burst out laughing. “Glenys thinks it’s the equivalent of taking a two-hour selfie. I guess that’s the cleaner version.”
“Who is Glenys?”
“A friend. A client really, but I think of her more as a friend. Speaking of Glenys, if you don’t mind I’m going to use your kitchen tomorrow to cook some meals for her. And I’ll need to leave Madi with you for a few hours while I take them to her. Normally I’d take her with me, but I want to make sure Glenys goes for a walk and Madi is too bouncy.”
“You walk your clients as well as your dogs?”
The idea of it made her smile. “Glenys had her hip done in the summer and she is supposed to be moving more than she is. She’s scared to go out in the snow and ice, so I take her with me and we hold on to each other.”
“That’s—” He paused, as if he couldn’t quite find the words he needed. “Kind of you. And you cook for her. Sounds like you’re a little more than a dog walker, Harriet Knight.”
“I only do it for Glenys, so don’t spread the word. She lives alone since her husband died and she’s losing weight. I like to take her the occasional meal.”
“Who cooks for you?”
“No one. But I have had dinner out three times in the past couple of weeks and the great thing about conversational masturbation is that you get to focus on the food. I had the most delicious risotto in the first place, a heavenly chocolate dessert in the second—I asked them for the recipe—and a yummy shrimp salad in the third.”
“That was the one where you climbed out
the window.”
“That’s right.”
He reached for her empty mug and stood up. “My sister is back on Monday, and I’m working over the weekend, which means Friday is our last night together.”
He made it sound as if their living arrangements weren’t simply for the convenience of the dog.
“Oh.” There was no reasonable explanation for the disappointment that thudded through her. None at all. She should be pleased to be able to get her life back to normal. “I’m pleased your niece is well enough to travel.”
“I’m taking you out to dinner.”
Dinner? Her heart sped forward and her stomach felt fluttery. Had that just happened? Had she misheard? No. Definitely not. He’d asked her to dinner.
So it wasn’t just her who was feeling the chemistry. He was too.
She couldn’t believe this was happening. He’d actually asked her out. On a date. A proper date. Not one randomly assigned by some app.
A man she really liked, who liked her back and wanted to spend time with her.
She had a feeling that a date with him would be unlike any of her other dates. No sitting across from him trying to haul up her sinking heart while she pinned a fake smile on her face and tried to pretend she was interested in a monologue.
Ethan was a great listener. And she felt relaxed with him.
It promised to be an amazing evening. Possibly the first truly excellent first date of her life.
“Thanks,” she croaked. “I’d like that.”
He smiled. “It’s the least I can do after you moved in here to help.”
She went from elation to disappointment in less time than it took Madi to devour a dog treat. So it wasn’t a proper date.
It was a thank-you.
Why was she such a ridiculous optimist? She needed to keep hope locked in a cupboard somewhere instead of letting it soar uncontrolled into the stratosphere.
In the meantime, she needed to hope that all her fantasies hadn’t played out across her face.
“You’re paying me for that. Big-time.”
“I know, but you and I both know it’s not about the money.” He slid the mugs into the dishwasher. “We are going to dinner, and you are going to relax and talk and build your confidence. And if you stammer, who cares?”
She would care. She would care a great deal.
“So what you’re suggesting is a kind of dating master class.” Not even a thank-you. It was more of a training session. Great. It was becoming harder and harder to keep the smile on her face.
“If you want to call it that. You helped me out. I want to help you out.”
Hope shriveled and died, probably never to be resurrected.
The chemistry she’d imagined had been on her side alone. It wasn’t that he was overwhelmed by the sight of her in her butterfly pajamas. It wasn’t that he wanted to rip them off and have wild sex with her on every available surface. She wasn’t that sort of woman. No, she was the sort of woman men wanted to help. Not the sort they wanted to help themselves to.
Ethan was a doctor. He wanted to fix her.
Her confidence deflated like a giant balloon.
“I don’t need training,” she said, “because I’m not going on any more dates for a while.”
“But you never know when you might need those skills. And I’d like to buy you dinner. As a thank-you.”
A thank-you. She would have rather he’d sent her a card.
“I don’t need thanks.”
“I’m working tomorrow, so it will have to be Friday.”
“We can’t leave Madi.”
“There’s a great Italian place a block away. We’ll be gone for two hours. Three at most.”
Three hours. Three hours of sitting across from Ethan, knowing he was doing her a favor.
It sounded like a nightmare to her.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“SO HOW IS your live-in relationship?”
“It’s good.” Harriet wedged the phone between her ear and her shoulder as she tugged Madi’s leash to coax her to lift her nose out of the snowdrift. They’d done this same walk every day for a week and both of them knew every inch of it. “She’s settled down and behaving herself. She felt insecure, that’s all.” And she had sympathy with that.
Fliss laughed. “I wasn’t asking about the dog. I was asking about the man.”
“The man? What does he have to do with anything? I’m here because I’m dog sitting.”
“Yes, but the owner is there with you. It’s a unique situation and one which I’m hoping you will exploit.”
“For me, it’s all about the dog.”
“Sadly, I believe you. So how is Doctor Hot-but-Disapproving?”
Harriet thought about the time she’d spent with Ethan. The way he listened and paid attention. “He’s not really disapproving.”
“So now he’s just hot? Interesting.”
Harriet shook her head in exasperation, but she was smiling too. She realized how much she missed talking to her sister. Not even about the big things, but the small things too. How pretty Manhattan looked in the snow. How Madi had learned to sit without moving while Harriet was preparing her dinner. How she’d found the best Christmas present for Daniel—
Cramming the small details of life into a phone call wasn’t the same.
“I barely see him. He’s mostly at the hospital.”
“He can’t be at the hospital the whole time. I mean he has to come home and eat and sleep at some point surely?”
“He does, but we don’t spend time together.” Apart from the three hours they’d spent talking over dinner the night before, and two the night before that. Would Fliss notice the change in her tone? Probably. Harriet knew she was a hopeless liar. She needed lie training, as well as date training.
Her “date” with Ethan was hours away and after tomorrow she was probably never going to see him again. Unless she jumped out of another window and sprained her ankle. Or transformed herself into the type of woman who inspired lust instead of pity. A woman who could seduce a man with one slow blink of her eyelashes.
Dinner? Sure. Just wait while I change into my little black dress.
She was desperate to ask Fliss what she should wear on a date that wasn’t a date but if she did that she knew she’d never be able to wriggle out of the inevitable questions. And frankly it was more than a little humiliating that he was taking her out in order to help her. She was almost thirty. She shouldn’t need help with dating. Why couldn’t he have asked her out like a normal woman?
That would have been the best thing he could have done for her confidence.
But whatever the sentiment driving the invitation, she planned to head back to the apartment soon and spend the next hour trying really hard to make it look as if she hadn’t tried hard.
Fliss was still talking. “So he hasn’t put his healing hands all over you yet? Shame. Have you seen him naked?”
“How are we twins? We are so different.” And she hadn’t seen him naked, but she’d started imagining it whenever he walked into the room, which was unsettling. The longer she spent with him, the more she was wishing that tonight was a proper date.
Why couldn’t she meet someone like Ethan in the normal course of her life?
“You should pretend to be me for a few days. Throw off your shy self and drag him into the bedroom for some fun.”
She wondered how Ethan would react if she walked into his bedroom minus the butterfly pajamas.
But she’d never do that, would she? And even if she did, it wouldn’t work. You needed the personality to go with the actions and she’d never been the sort of woman to confidently strip off her clothes in front of a man without at least small signs of encouragement. “No way.”
“Harriet, he is perfect for you.”
“You’ve never met him and I’ve barely told you a thing about him.”
“Which tells me everything I need to know. If there was nothing to tell, you’d be telling me everything.
”
“That makes no sense.” It felt strange keeping something this big from her twin. If they’d still been sharing an apartment they would have talked about it. But things had changed, and not just because Fliss wasn’t living with her anymore. Harriet bent to tug Madi’s nose out of another snowdrift and reminded herself she was capable of making a decision without her sister. If they were walking to a restaurant a block away, she’d wear jeans and boots. Casual. Then he wouldn’t think she was getting the wrong idea. “To answer your question, he has not put his healing hands all over me and no, I haven’t seen him naked.” She straightened and saw Ethan standing next to her.
Oh holy crap.
How long had he been standing there?
Her face flamed so hot she expected the snow around them to melt and turn to floodwater. Where had he appeared from? Had he heard? If he’d heard, she was doomed. “I have to go.”
“Why? We’ve only been talking five minutes. Don’t go. I promise to stop teasing you. If you don’t want to talk about Dr. Sexy, we won’t talk about him.”
At least she hadn’t put her sister on speaker.
“I’m freezing. Need to get inside. I’ll call you later.” She tucked the phone in her pocket and braved it out with a smile, although she didn’t quite meet his eyes. “Hi. You’re early.” And now she sounded like a wife. How was your day, dear? Can I fetch your slippers? “I mean, no accidents today? Everyone in New York City is happy and healthy?”
“I wouldn’t go that far.” He took Madi’s leash from her. “That was your sister on the phone?”
“Yes, we were catching up.” Had he heard? He must have heard. Should she apologize or ignore it and pretend it hadn’t happened? Ignore it. Definitely. “I haven’t seen her in weeks. We have business to discuss.” And sex, and all the other topics Fliss always insisted on covering.
Ethan brushed snow out of her hair, his touch gentle. “You couldn’t have found somewhere a little warmer for your business discussions?”
No, but they could have found somewhere a lot more private.
“I’m well wrapped up.” No silky lingerie for her. When she was walking around the city in winter she wore layers that wouldn’t have let her down in the Arctic. “I wasn’t expecting you home for a while.” Still sounding like a wife, Harriet. Like she’d been watching the time and the window, waiting for him to come home. To his home. It wasn’t her home, even though she felt more comfortable in his apartment than she did in her own right now. “I meant home as in your apartment, obviously.” Finally she looked at him and realized he was unusually pale. “Are you all right?”
