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“Honey.” She patted my hand again. “He’s not coming in here every other day for the pancakes. Now, I’ll take a slice of pecan pie and a chocolate milkshake,” she ordered like she hadn’t just seen right through me.

“Chocolate milkshake?”

“Yes. Why? Just because I don’t wear my hair in pigtails and skip down the street, I can’t order a milkshake?” she called me out.

“No! Absolutely not. You can order anything you want. I’m just surprised, that’s all,” I admitted, trying to backtrack.

“Well, I like to keep people on their toes. At my age, it’s the most fun I can have,” she declared, reaching for a napkin and spreading it out across her lap.

I went to make her milkshake, watching as the sexy stranger took his seat. He didn’t even bother to pick up the menu. Not that he needed to. He’d been in here almost every day. I’m sure he had it memorized by now.

“You gonna go serve him?” Emmy asked, elbowing me in the ribs and making me wince.

“He’s in your section,” I pointed out, reaching for the milk.

“I’m sure he’d move. It’s not my ass he’s staring at,” Emmy added, and I scoffed. She was the tall, skinny one with perky boobs and a dazzling personality. Everything I had sagged the moment I became a mother.

“I’m busy. You go serve him,” I bossed, adding a couple of big scoops of ice cream to the cup.

“You’re gonna regret that,” Emmy singsonged as she stepped out from behind the counter. The mischievous smirk on her face had my stomach filling with butterflies. I had a sinking feeling she was right.

I watched from the corner of my eye as Emmy approached him. I couldn’t hear what she was saying, but when she looked back over her shoulder at me, I turned on the milkshake machine, and the loud buzz drowned out the thoughts in my head.

I finished getting the pie and milkshake and dropped them off before clearing a couple of tables and delivering the bill to another.

“Til-Rosie?” Emmy called across the diner, almost tripping over my name.

I know it was silly to have two names, but I wanted the diner to be Rosie’s. Rosie was my grandmother, the most amazing woman I’d ever known. She was strong, determined, and sweet, and everything I wished I could be. After my grandpa passed, we were worried that she wouldn’t be far behind him. He was her world and her best friend. But that wouldn’t have been her. After a time, she picked herself up, dusted herself off, and set out to take on the world. And take on the world she did. If she wasn’t off traveling somewhere, she was out exploring or trying new cafes for lunch dates with her girlfriends.

When I lost her, I lost myself. I didn’t know how to be as strong as she was. So when my life imploded and the rug was ripped out from under my feet, I asked myself what Rosie would’ve done. She wouldn’t have sat in the dark waiting for someone to rescue her. With nothing more than a crazy idea and a random spot picked on a map, I packed up River and the life we had left and moved to Wattle Creek. Within a month, Rosie’s was a reality, and now here I was.

“What’s up?” I replied, with an arm full of dishes.

“Can you come over here for a second?”

I wanted to roll my eyes, but everyone seemed to have stopped what they were doing and were staring straight at me.

“Give me a second,” I grumbled, carrying the plates into the kitchen, debating whether dropping them on the floor would be enough of an excuse to avoid whatever Emmy was up to.

I rinsed the plates before loading them into the dishwasher, then I tugged down my top. I yanked the hair tie from my ponytail and retied it tightly. Knowing the longer I stalled, the more likely it was that Emmy would commit me to doing something I shouldn’t, I headed out to face the music.

I walked right over to the table, only for him to look up at me with the most beautiful slate gray eyes I’d ever seen.

“Hi,” I choked out.

“Hi,” he replied with a cocky grin.

“How can I help?” I asked, sliding my hands in my pockets in a pathetic attempt to hide the way my body was reacting to his hungry look.

“You can let me take you out,” he replied confidently, never looking away, never blinking.

“I don’t—”

“She’d love to,” Emmy interrupted, clamping her hand down over my mouth.

“Are you sure?” His baritone wavered, and somehow it made him sound even sexier.

“She’s sure. Are you free this afternoon?” Emmy pushed while I felt my cheeks burn.