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Fourteen
“Any chance I can interrupt you with dinner?”
The two women at my counter both turned toward Nolan’s voice at the same time. The smell of a KC’s chicken cheesesteak made me glad I’d only eaten a salad for lunch, knowing he was bringing over an early dinner.
Both of their heads followed my boyfriend as he came behind the counter and planted a kiss on my head.
“Running in the back for a soda. Want one?”
I lifted my water bottle. “Trying to quit.”
He made a sound that told me Nolan knew better. I’d been quitting soda, and trying to drink more water, for the better part of ten years.
“Sorry,” the young woman who’d just bought Dead Guy Next Door, one of my favorite Lucy Score books. “I didn’t mean to stare at your boyfriend. But he really looks like he might have stepped out of the pages of this,” she held up the bag I just handed her.
“Trust me, you’re going to love Nick.” I said, having read that book more than once. “But yeah, my boyfriend really is romance book material.”
In more ways than one.
He could be Riven one night, and Rowan the next. But my favorite version of him was somewhere in between the “headboard” hero and the swoony “Rowan” for another time.
“Now this one is interesting,” I said, picking up the book her friend was buying. “I actually met the author at a book event in St. Pete, Florida.”
“Get out?” she said as I rang her up. “I’m a sucker for thrillers, although I can’t say I’ve read a coastal thriller before. The cover caught my eye.”
“Yep,” I also rang up her bookmark. I loved these old-school girlies with paperbacks and bookmarks. My out-of-control book collection was one reason I wanted to open a bookstore with a combination of new and used books. “He’s a pilot himself. Super cool guy.” She looked impressed. I was about to blow her friend out of the water. “Met Lucy too. Actually, I had dinner with her.”
The woman’s eyes widened. “No way?”
For book lovers, these were our celebrities.
“Yep. Same convention. Long story, but she’s as funny in real life as her romcoms.” I handed both women my card. “Keep in touch and let me know what you think.”
“Thanks,” they said simultaneously just as Nolan emerged from the back room, two sodas in hand. When the bell above my door rang, he pulled me into his arms.
“Thought they’d never leave.”
Kissing him never got old. Real-life romance might look a little different than it did in the books, but there were bits of truth in those relationships too. Nolan was living proof.
“I love when you do that,” I said, knowing how much he liked me to tell him exactly what I wanted.
“Do what. Kiss you?”
“That too. But I meant grabbing the back of my neck and pulling me into you.”
His fingers massaged my scalp, Nolan’s hand still tangled in my hair. “Good to know,” he said with a grin. “Hungry?”
“For,” I teased.
“Mmm, don’t tempt me to drag you into that back room again. I told Freddie I’d be back by five.”
Reluctantly, I let him go, but only because Freddie was the owner of one of my favorite restaurants, and The Dock was currently closed for renovations. We ate at the counter, interrupted only once by a local looking for a gift for his girlfriend.
“Oh yeah,” I jumped up, remembering. “I have something for you.”
“I have something for you too,” he quipped with a wink. Swatting him on the shoulders, I jumped up and said, “Be right back.”
Heading into the back room, I navigated toward the fridge where a single piece of carrot cake waited. I’d noticed one of our favorite restaurants down the street had carrot cake as one of their specials today. Personally, I couldn’t imagine eating a vegetable in a cake, but Nolan loved it. Taking it out, I headed back when one particular isle caught my eye.
