AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“See you then,” she says as I reach for the car door handle.
“See you,” I repeat and I wave as she turns around and heads back to town.
I stand next to my car and watch her go, wondering where the hell I’m going to take her tonight.
Maybe Ledger will have some ideas…
FOUR
Mabel
This is my first ever date and I have to say, I am nailing it.
“I hope that you like Italian,” Jonah says as he turns into Margherite’s. “Ledger said that the food here was really good.”
“I’ve heard that too but I haven’t been here before. It looks cool though,” I say as he parks.
He unbuckles and I grin as he hurries around the car to open my door for me. Jonah is dressed up tonight in a black button-down shirt and black dress pants. The material of both cling to his muscles and have my mouth watering for something besides food.
“Thanks,” I say, taking his hand as he helps me out of his car.
I smooth my hands over the dark purple of my skirt, trying to smooth out the wrinkles. I had to dig in the back of my closet to find something to wear tonight. I tried to iron it but I couldn’t find my iron.
Now that I think of it, I’m actually not even sure if I own one…
“You look beautiful,” he says, taking my hand as I fuss with my clothes.
“Thanks. You clean up pretty well yourself.”
He smiles at me and we make our way toward the restaurant entrance.
“Excuse me,” an older woman says as she approaches us, and I can feel Jonah tense. “Are you Jonah Schultz?”
“Yes,” he says, and I notice that his cheeks are starting to turn a slight shade of red.
“Thank you for your service,” she says and her husband nods in agreement.
Jonah has to let go of my hand to shake theirs and I watch as he does it robotically. It’s obvious that he doesn’t like all of the attention. I remember the way that he had frowned when I called him “that war hero” the night that we met. He hadn’t been happy about it then either.
I wonder why?
“Thanks,” Jonah says as they continue to thank him and the relaxed guy who picked me up fifteen minutes ago with a bouquet of flowers is long gone.
I glance over to the entrance and I can see a small group gathered there. They’re going to stop him and thank him too. I must realize it at the same time as Jonah because he tenses even more, his breathing starting to come out shallow.
He really doesn’t want to deal with all of this and honestly, I don’t want our first date to keep getting interrupted.
“Hey, Charming?” I say, tugging on his shirt sleeve until he looks at me. “I’ve got somewhere a little more private in mind. You game?”
He stares at me for a beat and then nods and I can see how grateful he is that I’m not asking him to go in there.
“Come on,” I say, tugging on his arm.
He opens the car door for me again and I scramble to come up with something else for us to do tonight. I was bluffing when I said that I had somewhere else in mind. I only just moved here and I don’t really know the area. It can’t be that hard to find someplace a little less crowded though, right?
“Take a left,” I tell him and he turns out of the parking lot onto Main Street.
We drive for a few minutes and when we’re almost to the road that leads down the mountain, I know that I need to figure something out.
