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“Something like that,” he said, really not caring how tall his brother was. That certainly wasn’t what Matt wanted to talk to Jubilee about.
“So what’s this about you and me? What did you tell Miss Heather?”
Jubilee blew out a breath, her eyes scanning the crowd until they landed on her daughters who were with Matt’s mom. Some tension drained out of her; he could feel it under his hand which still rested on the small of her back.
He didn’t want to take it away.
Her look was sheepish as she glanced up at him. “I want to say that I was helping Kristin. You know how Miss Heather is. She was scanning the crowd, trying to find men to push on her granddaughter. She landed on you, and... I want to say that I was trying to take the pressure off of Kristin by saying that you were taken, but —”
She looked away. Her shoulders went up, like she was straightening them to do something hard. “But I hated the way the idea of Miss Heather pushing Kristin on you felt. I... Didn’t want that.”
Matt’s chest expanded. He was pretty sure that Jubilee was telling him that she was jealous. That she didn’t want some other woman to have him. That she couldn’t stand to see Miss Heather trying to get Kristin and him together.
“I think that means you like me.”
“Of course I like you. How could I not?” Jubilee said, turning and looking at him. Her cheeks were still pink, and her eyes shone in the glow of the setting sun.
How could he have thought she wasn’t beautiful? She was more beautiful to him than anyone he had ever seen.
“You’ve been so kind to me. You helped me any time I’ve needed it. Yet you don’t make me feel like I’m a charity case. You make me laugh, and... There’s just something about you.”
“Are you trying to say you’re attracted to me?” He shouldn’t be teasing her. She was telling him how she felt, but she had just made him so happy, he wanted to laugh.
“Is that what it is?” She tilted her head and looked at him, and he might’ve thought with another woman that she was being coy. But he thought Jubilee probably really didn’t know.
“That’s what I would term it. That’s how I feel about you anyway. That’s a physical thing, but I admire your grit and your determination and your caring concern with the girls. I... I was with someone who really didn’t have that kind of care and concern.”
“Yeah.” She bit her lip.
“What?” He didn’t mean to bring Eva into the conversation if that bothered her.
“I don’t mean to change the subject.” She gave him an apologetic smile. “But talking about Eva reminded me that I needed to say something to her. She and I are both responsible for the entertainment for the strawberry festival in two weeks. I have been working on getting everything set up on my end, but I haven’t had a chance to talk to her. I think she’s going to do what she said, but I just thought we’d communicate a little more.”
“Eva can be a little slippery at times. She says that she’s going to do things, and then she doesn’t.”
He hated to say that, because he didn’t want Jubilee to worry, and he actually wanted to talk more about what they were already talking about. How she felt about him for one.
But this was important to her, and if he was truly...falling in love with her as he suspected he was, what was important to her should be important to him as well. It was one of those things that even if he didn’t feel it, he would act it, just because that was what a man did for the woman...he loved.
“If you hear anything from her, I can... Do what she is supposed to do if she’s not.” He didn’t know what else to offer.
That made Jubilee’s lips pull back, and she looked up at him like he was her hero. He loved that look, wanted to stare into her eyes all night while she looked at him like that. He couldn’t even describe the way it made him feel.
“Thank you so much. You did ease some of my burden. Not that I feel responsible for Eva’s jobs, exactly, it’s just that if it doesn’t get done, it’s not just her. Since both of us are on the committee.”
“I know. It’s your name on the line too. Kind of the way it is in college when you’re doing a paper together. There might be five people on your team, but you end up doing all the work so you get a good grade.”
She laughed. “I guess that’s the way it is anytime there’s more than one person doing something.”
Her voice trailed off a little, and then she said, “That’s the way marriage could be, right? One person puts all the effort into keeping it together, and it’s not really a relationship, it’s just that one person holding on, unwilling to quit.”
“Sometimes that’s what you have to do in order to make a life for your children.”
She nodded. He had the feeling that if her husband hadn’t left her, she would still be with him, just for the children. Because what child wants to be shuffled between two homes and remember that as their childhood? They wanted a home that grounded them. A mom and a dad. A child was programmed to have and need both. In the same home.
He hated that wasn’t the childhood Nora had. He wished he could do something about it.
If he had the chance to go back and do it over, would he have married Eva just to try to give Nora that stable childhood?
