“So we’re at an impasse.”
She gave him a mock serious look. “So what do we do now that we’re at an impasse?”
“Go for a walk?” He needed to get up and move. If he sat here any longer he would say something stupid.
He paid the bill, refusing to let her split it even though she protested that she’d asked him. “Next time’s on me, then,” she said.
His heart sang. Apparently, there would be a next time.
They strolled through the downtown, which had mostly closed up for the night. A couple of restaurants were still open, but the stores were dark. Any night of the week, Laurelton was pretty much done by nine.
“A little quieter than New York,” he said. Laurelton was a backwater. Pricey, but a backwater. No wonder she couldn’t wait to get back to the city.
“Way quieter, but nice. We probably would have been run over by a taxi by now in New York.”
“Do you miss it?”
She was quiet for a moment. “Believe it or not, I miss going to the office. And the coffee shop down the street. I miss that a lot. And my friends, there’s a group I run with every week. I don’t miss the traffic and how expensive everything is.”
He had a sudden, ridiculous hope she would give up on New York all together. Stay here and take over her father’s house. It would be the perfect solution, except she’d probably go insane.They stopped at the corner and looked both ways, but no cars were coming.
“Anyway,” she said, “I have to get my dad sorted out first.”
They passed the bakery and the real estate office, then meandered off the main drag onto a side street that sloped downhill past a frame shop and a consignment store, petering out to a dry cleaner at the bottom. The utilitarian side of downtown. The evening had cooled and she’d forgotten a jacket. He put an arm around her and she leaned into him. “This is nice,” she murmured.
“Itisnice.” He breathed in the scent of her hair, her skin. She used something lemony, which he liked. She felt intoxicatingly good. They stopped to look in the window of the consignment store, and he trailed a hand lightly down her shoulder. She moved closer with a small intake of breath that made his heart skip.
She looked up at him. “So now’s the time to tell me if you’re seeing anyone.”
He laughed in surprise. “Does it look like I’m seeing anyone?”
“My ex said he wasn’t, but he managed to find someone new in record time. So I suspect he was.” Her voice was light, but the hurt was plain underneath.
He turned to face her. “I’m not seeing anyone. Just Lilah and Charlie.”
She looked perplexed for a moment then broke into a smile. “Oh Charlie.” She gave him that teasing smile he found so irresistible. “I don’t know why you didn’t want to let him out of the car that day.”
She was standing close, and he didn’t want to talk about Charlie. “Because I hadn’t been there before, and I didn’t know you.”
She looked at him in a way that made him forget everything else except how much he wanted to kiss her. “What about now?” she said, toying with his shirt right above his wrist. She was touching his skin, and he was having trouble breathing.
“Whataboutnow?” he repeated dumbly.
“Do you know me now?”
He ran his hands up her arms. Her sweater was buttery, but her arms were firm underneath. His heart banged around his chest. “Not as well as I’d like.” He dipped his head and brushed his lips against hers, and the jolt that went through him just about brought him to his knees.
He kissed her then, for real, in front of the consignment shop, and even in her heels she stood on tiptoe, which made him even more crazy for her. That she couldn’t get enough of him either. They kissed for a long time and his hands were in her hair, and when they finally pulled apart they were both out of breath, but smiling.
She took a look around and straightened her sweater. “We probably look like a couple of kids.”
He laced his fingers through hers. “That was way better than anything I did when I was a kid.”
She leaned into him. “Me too.”
They walked holding hands back to her car and he kissed her again, more chastely this time since there were people walking by.
“When can I see you?” he said.
