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He’d never expected her to be knowledgeable about wines but wisely abstained from commenting. Nothing about Lillian surprised him tonight.
The waiter came to take their orders. “Our plat du jour is a combo of ribs and shrimp, although our favorite is always a platter of ribs.” The Montgomery Inn was famous for its baby ribs.
“I’ll have the combo,” Lillian decided
“I’ll have the same,” Steve said. After the sommelier poured the wine, he raised his glass and clinked it against hers. “To our first da…huh…dinner together.” The worddatealmost slipped from his lips.
“To our first dinner,” she repeated. Peering at him over the rim, she sipped her wine, set down her glass, and entwined her fingers on the table. “You’re probably wondering why I wanted to go out for dinner.”
“Well… Yes, I’m curious.”
“I haven’t been out to a restaurant in ages. I mean, out in the evening with a man. Not since my husband died.”
He swallowed the wrong way. “You’re… You were married?” Bummer, she’d worked with him for so long and had forgotten to mention that little detail.
“Joe and I started dating in high school. We married when I was a sophomore in college. He graduated in aeronautical engineering and was a marine. Five years later, he was killed in Baghdad by a suicide bomber. I was devastated.”
“I can imagine. I never knew.”
“I couldn’t function and quit working.”
Fascinated, he listened to her sharing these confidences with him after being overly discrete for ages.
“At the time, I had a four-year old son who missed his father badly. My mother came to live with us and helped, and I went into therapy. Finally, for my son’s sake, I pulled myself together and went back to work.”
What a story! Far from being a plain spinster, Lillian was revealing herself to be a passionate woman who’d had trouble recovering from the tragic loss of her husband. Such a sad love story.
He reached for her hand and squeezed it. “I’m sorry for your loss. I wished you’d told us.”
“At therapy, I learned to stop complaining if I wanted to function again. I decided to keep my personal life and my work completely separate, but Heidi knew. My mother took care of Greg while I was working. Besides, by the time I started at the clinic, I’d been on my own for six years.”
“Still, we would have tried to help. You and Heidi were so supportive when I lost Heather.”
“I understood how much it hurt to lose the love of your life.” She nodded, a sweet smile on her lips. “I didn’t want you to go through the same ordeal that I had.”
“I was lucky to have you around, Lillian.”
The love of her life?Was that why she’d never dated all these years? He did the math. She’d been a widow since she was twenty-seven. Too young to lock herself away from men and happiness.
“So yesterday, you finally decided you wanted to go out for dinner,” he mused aloud.
She shrugged. “You insisted on a way to repay me, and you’ll be leaving soon.”
He frowned, not sure he understood her reasoning. Did she consider him of no consequence because he was leaving? She’d asked for one dinner; he was the one who’d offered ten instead.
Piqued by the unspoken challenge, he squinted. She was a beautiful, interesting woman, a passionate one, starved for male attention, at least according to his personal knowledge of female psychology. Did she expect him to accompany her to dinner ten times in three weeks, and just say,“Thank you and goodnight”at the end of each dinner?
After a year of mourning, he’d dated a few women, none of them particularly interesting, but he’d done the expected thing according to his male book of good manners. He’d kissed them goodnight, and sometimes, he’d even taken them to bed.
The waiter set the plates in front of them. “Careful, it’s very hot. Bon appétit.”
“Thank you,” they answered together.
“Dr. Winston, I have a question.”
