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What was it with men thinking she couldn’t take care of herself? “Well, yes. I guess I am, but that doesn’t bother me.”
“What time do you get off work?”
“Around nine. Walter flips the closed sign at eight, but then we have to clean and reset for the next day.”
“I’ll be here at nine to drive you home.”
“Oh, that’s not necessary. I don’t mind walking.”
“This may be a small town, but bad things still happen here. It’s not a good idea for you to walk alone at night.”
She bit her lip to keep from smiling. His marshmallowy-ness was showing again. She probably would have caved and asked her security for a ride. She wasn’t stupid, though. She’d take the ride he offered.
Walter didn’t take the news well that Rica wasn’t available to help out anymore. She assured him she could handle everything. Except she wasn’t as confident as she sounded when she said it.
They were in the middle of the lunch rush and she didn’t know if she was coming or going. One good thing, she hadn’t mixed up any orders so there was that. She hadn’t been as quick to clean the tables after someone left, and a couple of customers had bussed their own tables. She’d given them a free slice of pie for the inconvenience, even with the stink eye Walter had leveled at her for giving away food.
Things slowed down around three in the afternoon and that gave her time to do a good cleaning of the tables and refill anything that had run out or was running low. She heard the bell above the door ring, and when she turned to greet the new customer, her smile froze on her face.
It’s him.
Her pulse raced and her hands shook as she tried to breathe.
James.
She blinked trying to clear an image she knew wasn’t there. No. Not James. When she opened her eyes again, he was still there and that’s when she noticed the differences. James would have been her age, twenty-eight. This man was mid-thirties maybe even close to forty. This man had on a very expensive blue suit that she recognized as bespoke, tailored to his unordinary height and width of his shoulders to taper in at the waist. James was happy in casual clothes as often as possible. He’d dress up with her if she had to “play princess”—his term, not hers, but he really hated wearing a suit.
Those weren’t the only differences. This man had deep stress lines evident beside his eyes and forehead. James had laugh lines because he was always finding something to laugh about. James saw the good in everyone and the possibilities in every situation. There hadn’t been a single stress line anywhere on his face. Not like the hard lifelines on this man’s face. Something niggled at the back of her mind, just out of grasp.
He noticed her staring.
“I’m sorry. I thought… I mean…” Nothing she could say would explain her spacing out. You look like my dead fiancé would make her sound like she had a few screws loose.
She pasted on her princess smile. “Right this way. What can I get you to drink?” she asked as she led him to a booth she’d already cleaned and restocked.
“Coffee. Black.”
Even the tone of his voice sent a shiver of memories down her spine. With a nod, she escaped to the kitchen, away from his view. As soon as she walked through the door, she leaned against the wall, holding her chest and counting her breaths. She had to get herself together.
“I knew you couldn’t do it by yourself,” Walter groused from where he was cleaning the grill top.
His cranky and negative comment was just the hit she needed to snap out of her near panic attack. She hadn’t had one of those in years and she refused to go backward. Her chin tipped in defiance. “I can handle everything just fine, but you need to give the fries three more minutes in the fryer they’ve been coming out floppy and not crispy.”
He glared at her and harrumphed before turning back to running the scraper over the grill top. That’s what she thought. He knew they were undercooked.
Filling a mug with coffee, she placed it on a tray and delivered it to the new customer. “Here you go. Have you had time to look at the menu?”
“I have. Are the pork chops any good?”
“They are, if you’d been here an hour ago.”
“Meaning if I order them now, I’d get leftovers from lunch,” he remarked with a grin that reminded her too much of another man who joked with a sparkle in his eyes and a smirk on his face.
Janel felt her eyes begin to sting and she blinked the unwanted tears away.
“Are you okay?” the man asked and Janel was touched by his caring.
She had to look away from him to get herself back under control. “I’m sorry. What you must think of me.”
