Walking side by side, we fell in step with the crowd, when she tried to veer off to the left.
“Where are you going?” I asked, grabbing her hand and keeping her from wandering off. It wasn’t until I’d done it that I realized I’d treated Charlotte like she was Isla. I hadn’t thought twice. I’d just reached for her. It was something I’d been doing for so long it was second nature to me.
“Get tickets? We’re not going to get in without them.” Charlotte shrugged.
Without letting go of her hand, I reached for my back pocket and pulled out two tickets. “Already got ‘em.”
“Oh.” Charlotte looked disappointed. It wasn’t what I wanted to see so early into our afternoon. It could make for a very rough couple of hours. But before I could attempt to make it right, not that I really had any idea on how to, she kept going. “Fine. But I’m buying beer and hot dogs then.”
Putting away her pout, Charlotte looked over at me hopefully and I knew there was no way I could say no. “Deal,” I agreed before leading her toward the entrance.
After grabbing a couple of beers, we climbed the stairs, well Charlotte climbed the stairs, and I spent the whole time staring at her ass in those shorts and the way her legs … and found our seats. We didn’t have the best seats in the house, but we had a good enough view and an afternoon in the sunshine could never be considered a bad way to waste time.
“It’s such a nice day,” Charlotte commented, propping her feet up on the empty seats in front of us.
“It really is. So, you’re a White Sox fan, right?” I asked dumbly.
“Nope.”
“What? How could you not be?”
“Because I’m a Cubs girl all the way,” Charlotte replied sassily, adding a wink for good measure.
“Well, this isn’t going to work.”
“What’s not going to work?”
“And just when I was starting to like you, you go and ruin it by being a Cubs supporter.”
“Oh. You were starting to like me, were you? And here I was just thinking you liked my legs.”
Oh shit! I’d been busted. How the hell was I supposed to talk my way out of this one? “Um, I’m not sure what you’re talking about,” I dodged as expertly as I could, which was terrible really.
“Uh-huh. Sure you don’t, Luke.”
I needed to change the subject and change it quickly. Since I had nothing else, I started on much safer topics. “How’s work been? Been to any more balls lately?”
Charlotte smiled a wide smile, and I would’ve given anything to pull her glasses away from her eyes just to see if they lit up. With a smile like that, how could they not? “Sadly, no. No balls lately. No Prince Charmings. Not even a kiss from a single frog. Just busy. But it’s probably like your job. From the moment you’re on the clock, you don’t stop.”
“Sounds about right.”
“But I wouldn't have it any other way. I love what I do. Sure, some days it’s hard and I mean really hard, but others … I’m blessed to be there. To be able to help those kids when they need me the most. It makes it all worthwhile, you know.”
And I did know. Charlotte was one hundred percent right. “Absolutely. It’s not a job you do for the money.”
“Or the hours.”
“Or the benefits.”
“Or for the cafeteria lunches.”
“Or the uniform.”
“Exactly.”
“We do it because it’s who we are. Without it we’d be …”
When we said ‘lost’ at the same time I almost dropped to my knee and proposed right then and there. Meeting someone like Charlotte was rare. Someone I clicked with so easily. Someone who got it. Many women I’d met over the years liked the idea of a man in uniform but when they found out what that meant, what it really meant they headed for the hills.
