She’d also said she wanted to “kill two birds” by taking them together to listings, since they were essentially looking for the same thing in their next home. But Tessa had the feeling Lorna wanted tomatebirds, not kill them.
The woman hadn’t bothered to correct the listing agent at the first house when he’d assumed Tessa and Dustin were a married couple.
She whispered that “it was just easier” than trying to explain the truth, which didn’t seemthatcomplicated to Tessa. What she wanted, Tessa suspected, was for her friend Dusty to get a new romance in his life.
Did Lorna know what Dusty really wanted?
“You’ve heard of the first pancake theory, right?” Dusty said, pulling her from her thoughts.
“Must have chocolate chips and blueberries?”
He laughed. “You gotta burn the first one.”
“That’s the waffle theory, and yeah, I guess. But now we’ve burned three. That’s officially a failed breakfast.”
He threw her a look. “I didn’t take you for a pessimist, Tess.”
She sighed. “I hate compromising, and I have a feeling I’m about to. Anyway, here’s the address.” She read the numbers and glanced at the listing. “Oh, wait. This one actually says ‘water view.’ Fingers crossed.”
“Don’t cross—hold.” He reached out his hand for hers. “Maybe my bar is really low, but…don’t you think this is fun?”
She slid her hand into his, aware of a rough palm and strong fingers and a good, solid feel. “And fun is what you wanted,” she reminded him.
He chuckled. “You didn’t answer my question—do you think this is fun?”
“I guess it depends on how you define fun,” she said on a laugh, because it was easy to play along.
Did “fun” mean good times and lots of drinks and easy, meaningless conversation? Or did fun mean inside jokes and quick looks that communicated plenty—because even after only seeing three houses together, they had quite a few of those, too.
“And shestilldoesn’t answer.”
She laughed. “You’re such a therapist. You think everyone has to answer every question and reveal their inner workings.”
“Don’t you want to?”
She considered the question and all the ways to respond. Of course she wanted to share her innermost thoughts and learn his, but that would just lead her deeper into feelings and she was already drowning in them.
“I’ve never been to therapy,” she admitted.
His brows flicked in surprise. “You’re absolutely next level at avoiding a question, you know that?”
She laughed and shrugged. “I’ll answer when I’m good and ready.”
“When will that be?”
“Umm, when one of us finds a house we think is perfect?”
“So, never,” he said with a side-eye. “I don’t want to wait that long. Let’s do a free therapy session tonight.”
“Is that what the kids are calling it now?”
He laughed. “Come on. One more date. We’ll make it special. What would you like to do?”
“I’m supposed to go to the marina and check on my boat. It had some service done on the engine and I need to run it.”
He took his eyes from the road to turn his whole head and give her a surprised look. “You have aboat?”
“I do. And you’ll love the name—Good Time Girl. I got it as payment for an event I handled for a rich guy renting down the street.”
