Charlotte did not look enchanting in the rain outside of her home, and the little smile on her face was not cute or sexy and?—
“Is Auntie Regan here?!” Lucy’s excited squeal as she ran around the corner to see down the front hallway seemed to bring Sutton back into the moment.
Regan was speaking from her phone, asking—no, demanding—to know what was going on; her daughter’s hands were, of course, covered in what looked like paint and glitter, with some of it on her cheek, too; and Sutton had dinner just ready to serve, as the insistent timer from the kitchen reminded her.
Sutton shook her head, first quickly looking at Regan, who seemed about ready to fall over herself on the phone. “Oh my god, is that?—”
“I have to go,” Sutton said. “I’ll call you later.”
“Don’t you d—” was all Regan got in before Sutton ended the call.
“Who are you?” Lucy asked, blue eyes crinkling up at Charlotte from the end of the hall, tilting her head as she lightly mashed her fingers, sticking them together with… god, whatever was all over her hands.
“What were you playing with, Lucy Katherine?” Sutton arched an eyebrow.
Her daughter bit her lip before she quickly put her hands behind her back. Classic Lucy move.
Sutton fought against a smile.
“Nothing, Mama!”
“Mm-hmm, well only little girls who have clean hands are allowed to have a brownie for dessert…” It was all she had to say before her daughter’s feet moved like little bolts of lightning on the floor.
“I’m a little girl with clean hands!” echoed behind Lucy as she made a dash for the bathroom.
With a deep breath, Sutton turned back toward… yes, Charlotte was still in her doorway. Smiling even wider now.
“What are you doing here?”
Charlotte tapped the folder she held in one hand against the opposite hand’s palm. “Well, I did tell you I would have this paperwork back to you tonight.”
Sutton blinked for a few moments, before… “Don’t you have two personal assistants?”
“Maya had requested some time off this week months ago, and Autumn went home early with a migraine,” Charlotte easily returned.
“I can only imagine that in your profession you know of a wonderful courier service?”
The smile on Charlotte’s face faltered. Just a little, just enough for Sutton to notice in a way that she truly didn’t think most people would. Instantly, she felt badly about causing it.
Even though she shouldn’t.
But she did notice these things, little slips in Charlotte’s nearly unreadable mask, that she was certain other people might not see. Sutton shouldn’t have seen them either; it had been so long without them seeing one another, and they weren’t even really engaged in any sort of personal relationship now. Back when they had been, she’d been so, so incorrect about how much she thought she knew about Charlotte, anyway.
So she did what she had gotten in the habit of doing when this cropped up in her mind over the last few weeks and pushed it all away. No. Nope. Not going there.
It was just too confusing, with things the way they were. Their arrangement was strictly professional, and when it was done, they would be, too.
“I do know of a few wonderful delivery services, yes,” Charlotte conceded, “but I thought we could benefit by going over a few of the anecdotes and notes I added in.” She paused, looking into Sutton’s eyes with a solemnity that wanted to steal Sutton’s breath. “And, I would really enjoy if things like this, seeing one another when unplanned, could be simple. Easy. Friendly, even.”
The correction back to keeping things professional stuck right in Sutton’s throat.
It had come out repeatedly. She’d repeated it in her mind since the first day they’d reconnected.
But… what was the harm in being friendly?
Especially because, for Sutton, it was very difficult to not be friendly, and—she steadied herself, taking in the smile on Charlotte’s perfect lips—it was admittedly even harder to hold back friendliness from Charlotte Thompson.
“I think that’s a, a decent idea. Do you…” She hesitated for only a moment before mentally kicking herself. They were adults. She was nearly forty. She could do this. “Do you want to come in for dinner? It’s just a roast and vegetabl?—”
