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“It wasn’t the best, no. My dad was…is…a pretty terrible guy. But I had books. They never let me down.”
“No, they never do.”
I put together our plates and then asked him to pour us more wine. I’d completely forgotten about the project proposal. That could wait until after wine and pasta. Priorities.
7
DARBY
Icouldn’t stop eating the pasta and homemade sauce. Afraid I’d have to unbutton my pants if I ate any more, I finally pushed away my plate. “That was truly amazing. How did you learn to cook like this?”
“It’s a passion of mine.” She picked up my plate and then hers and headed toward the sink. “But I’m not a professional or anything, just a foodie.” I reached to turn on the sink’s faucet for the dishes. These old apartments didn’t have dishwashers.
“No, you don’t. The cook shouldn’t have to do dishes too.”
She smiled and sank back into her chair. “You know what, I’ll take you up on that. My feet hurt this time of day.”
I’d have liked to offer a foot rub but figured that would come off way creepy. Plus, I didn’t want to ruin what was turning out to be a pretty awesome evening. We had an easy way between us. We’d had it that night several years back when I’d met her in Cliffside Bay. It had occasionally occurred to me in the years since that there might have been something between us if we’d been in different places in our lives. I’d just gotten dumped. She was focused on saving and planning for her inn. Was now a better time for both of us? An inkling of excitement tickled the back of my neck as she opened a cabinet to fetch us water glasses, exposing her tanned, lean stomach. Not that I needed the reminder about her fitness level. I’d often seen her running in the mornings and knew she attended a Pilates class at the YMCA during the same time I did a Spin class. Forcing myself to look away, I got busy on our dishes.
I washed the plates and scrubbed the saucepan, then set them in the drying rack. When I was done, I poured us each a little more wine. “You want to go over the proposal in the living room where you can put your feet up?”
“You’re speaking my love language.” She got up and followed me out of the kitchen. We settled on the couch and I pulled out my estimate, going through each point, including fees and delivery dates.
“Looks good to me,” she said. “I’ll send the numbers over to the bride right now and make sure she’s willing to pay what you’ve asked.”
Jamie texted rapidly into her phone. It often amazed me how fast some women could type into those things. I didn’t use mine enough to get that fast.
“Well, there we go. Let’s see what she says.” I caught a whiff of her jasmine and vanilla perfume as she leaned back into the corner of the couch and spread her legs out on the coffee table. “This is nice. I haven’t felt this relaxed in ages.”
I didn’t know if she was referring to our evening or resting her legs, but I kept the question to myself. “It’s interesting, isn’t it?”
“What’s that?” She turned her head to look at me, pressing one cheek into the back cushion.
“This rich bride and her need to recreate her parents’ wedding,” I said. “What drives us to do things like that? I mean, humans, not us specifically.”
“Loss, for one,” Jamie said. “She wants to feel close to her mother. Do you ever feel that way about your mom?”
“Sure. I wish she would have lived to at least see me grow up. Not a day goes by I don’t wish for that. She was a teacher when my dad met her, so what does that tell you?” I was surprised at how easily the conversation flowed tonight. My guardedness seemed to have retired for the evening.
She made a clucking sound with her tongue. “It tells me a lot. What happened to her?”
“Car accident. I don’t know that many details.” That was a lie. I knew she had left the house in a rush to escape another beating from my father.
“Again, Darby, I’m so sorry.”
“I’m good now. There, now you know everything about me.”
“I have a feeling there’s a few more layers or secrets inside that head of yours,” Jamie said.
I grinned before lifting my glass to my mouth.
“You know what, Darby Devillier? There’s something I want to know.”
“Shoot,” I said.
“Why did we agree to never see each other again? After our night together, that is.”
“I’d just gotten dumped. I don’t know what your reasons were, but I suspected you were not in the space for a relationship,” I said, answering honestly. “I was pretty shattered. For months after that, I was in bad shape and wouldn’t have been emotionally ready for anything to start up between us.” I held up a hand. “Not that you would have been interested, I just mean it’s the only time in my life I ever had a casual night like that with a virtual stranger.”
