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At last, Wynn noticed her standing in the doorway. “I was about to send out a search party,” he said, his tone light. “Did you get lost?”
“No.”
His gaze settled on her shopping bags. “Retail therapy?”
“A bit.” Why was it that when Wynn dressed casually, her thoughts immediately dived into the past? Tonight, he looked younger, more like the boy she had crushed on when she was sixteen. They had started dating on her seventeenth birthday. By her eighteenth, she knew she was in love with him.
Had it been puppy love? By definition?
She didn’t think so. Because she and Wynn had suffered through unorthodox childhoods, they had been mature for their years. They knew what they wanted. It was a short list: to see the world, and to have each other.
Wynn cocked his head, perhaps wondering why she still stood there, packages in arms. “You hungry?”
“Not really.” To get out of the wind at lunchtime, she had popped into her favorite Cuban restaurant and ordered a huge meal. She filled her stomach with fabulous food and killed an hour and a half at the same time.
Eventually, she’d had no choice but to go out into the cold.
“There’s plenty of leftover sushi in the fridge,” he said. “If you want it later.”
“Okay. Thanks. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go change.”
He sat up, shifting Ayla to the floor. “Are you okay, Fliss? Did something happen today?”
She dumped her bags and purse in the nearest chair. “Do you realize this week is Thanksgiving?”
From his expression, it was clear he hadn’t put that together. “Oh. I guess with the funeral and moving Ayla here to New York, the calendar got away from me.”
“What do you usually do for the holiday?”
He shrugged. “Watch football and drink beer.”
Felicity wrinkled her nose. “Don’t you think you should make an effort now that you’re a father?”
“Ayla won’t remember.” He set the girl on the rug and stood, stretching.
For a moment, Felicity caught a glimpse of his flat belly before he lowered his arms, and the shirt came back down. She sighed inwardly. “But you will. Traditions are important.”
He picked up a purple stacking cup that had rolled out of Ayla’s reach and gave it to the little girl. “What are you trying to say? I assumed you would want the long weekend off.”
“Well...” She felt her face heat. “Ordinarily, I would be working a chunk of the holiday...biggest travel day of the whole year and all that. But since I’m on hiatus, I’d be happy to help pull a meal together. Only if you want me to,” she said hastily.
His eyes warmed as a smile kicked up the corners of his sexy mouth. “That sound great, Fliss. There’s a gourmet shop around the corner that sells whole turkeys fully baked. Maybe you and I could wrangle the sides.”
“Oh, good,” she said, making a face. “The thought of tackling a turkey for the first time scared me.”
He chuckled. “Yeah. Me, too. I’m not a fan of food poisoning.”
When she went to pick up her bags, he stopped her. “Don’t disappear when I put the baby to bed, Fliss. Let’s have a glass of wine and kick back. Please.”
Her heart raced. She measured her words. “Sure,” she said. “That would be nice.”
His slow smile warmed her body in places that should be ice-cold. She and Wynn were not dating. They were barely even friends. She was doing him a favor out of the goodness of her heart. Or more honestly because she felt she owed him something for the past. They had both been hurt, but she hadn’t been able to see his pain for her own. She’d had to juggle more grief when he left.
No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t forget the memory of that hungry, driven adolescent who had made her the center of his world for a brief time.
She escaped, and in her bedroom, spread her purchases on the bed. It was Saturday night. She and Wynn weren’t trying to impress each other. It was perfectly acceptable for Felicity to choose comfort over vanity.
At an upscale vintage shop on a side street today, she had bought a pair of soft, stonewashed denim jeans. In some places, the pale blue cloth was almost white. She could almost imagine a teenage girl with a flower in her hair wearing the jeans to Woodstock.
