dinner. Okay? That’s all I’m asking for right now.” His breath caressed her face. “Say yes.”
“Yes.”
“Thank God.” His hand slid down her neck, across her shoulder, and away. When he smiled, his eyes lit up and glowed with warmth. “Let’s go someplace quiet where we can talk.”
“Why don’t you come to my place, and I’ll fix dinner?” The moment the words escaped her lips, she couldn’t believe she’d suggested it. What was she thinking? Worse, what might he think?
“Perfect. What time?”
Short of withdrawing the invitation, what could she say now? “Six thirty?”
He opened her car door. “I’ll be there.”
She made it to her appointment on time. When she drove out to pick up May Flower Dawn, Mom asked if she wanted a cup of tea before going home. Her mother looked surprised and pleased when she said yes. Carolyn had always had trouble talking with her mother, but today she felt like giving it a try. They sat in the living room while May Flower Dawn picked up her Barbies and put them back in her room. She never touched the dolls Carolyn bought.
“Have you heard from Mitch?” Mom sipped her tea.
“He called the office and asked to see a house.”
“Is he planning to move back to Paxtown?”
“No. It was a hijacking.”
Her mother laughed. “I guess he’s not a man to take no for an answer.” A frown flickered across her face, and Carolyn wondered what she might be thinking. She didn’t want to give her mother any wrong ideas.
“We talked a lot about Charlie. I asked him over for dinner this evening.”
“Why don’t you let Dawn spend the night here?”
“I wouldn’t want to give Mitch the wrong idea.”
Setting her cup down, her mother looked at her. “I’m sure his intentions are honorable, Carolyn. If not, you
Carolyn couldn’t help but laugh. “
Her mother frowned, clearly troubled. “He was Charlie’s best friend, Carolyn. He misses your brother. He probably just wants a quiet evening to talk with someone who loved him as much as he did.”
If only that was all there was to it. She didn’t want to say too much and have her mother speculating on what they might do, other than talk about Charlie.
Mom chuckled as she sipped her tea again. “Dawn was just telling me a while ago she’d like to ride the bus to school just once. If she stayed overnight, she could ride to school tomorrow.”
“I don’t know, Mom.”
“Please!” May Flower Dawn spoke up from the foyer.
Her daughter seldom asked for anything from her. How could Carolyn say no?
Home and alone, Carolyn decided to call the whole evening off. She phoned the Paxtown Hotel and asked to be put through to Mitch’s room. The telephone rang ten times before the clerk came back on the line and said he was sorry, but Mr. Hastings seemed to be out for the afternoon. In a panic, Carolyn rummaged through her refrigerator, wondering what to fix for dinner. She threw together a meat loaf, put two potatoes in to bake, and made a tossed salad. She’d just finished setting the table when she heard a motorcycle out front. Her pulse rocketed. Her heart would have gone into orbit if it hadn’t been encased in her chest.
The doorbell rang. Swiping the perspiration from her palms, Carolyn fixed a smile on her face and opened the door. “Hi, Mitch. Come on in.” Her voice sounded so chipper, so high school. Mitch looked entirely too handsome in a black leather bomber jacket, casual blue henley shirt, black leather belt, Levi’s, and boots. He held a bottle of red wine in one hand and a bouquet of lilies in the other. Swallowing hard, she opened the door wider and waved him in. “Can I take your coat?”
“Better take the wine and flowers first.”
She blushed. “Of course.”
As soon as his hands were free, Mitch stripped off his jacket, tossed it on the sofa, and followed her into the kitchen. “Something smells good.”
“Does it?” She rattled off the menu. “Sorry. Nothing fancy.”
“Got a corkscrew? I’ll open the wine.”
She fingered through her utensil drawer until she found a can opener that included one. “Here you go.” His fingers brushed hers, and she dropped it. “Sorry.” She stooped to pick it up and put it on the counter. Did he have to watch her like that? Her heart kept knocking wildly. She arranged the lilies in a vase and took it back into the dining room. She took a wineglass from the built-in china cabinet and put it on the table.
“Only one glass?”
“I’m a recovering alcoholic. An ex-pothead.”
He grimaced. “Sorry.”
“I’ll try not to drool while you enjoy it.” She tried to make it sound like a joke, but the words came out flat. “Dinner won’t be ready for another forty-five minutes. Why don’t we sit in the living room?” She waved toward the sofa, where he’d tossed his jacket. Mitch sat and watched her. Tense, she picked up his leather jacket and then wondered what to do with it. She should hang it up, but she didn’t have a hall tree. She thought of her bedroom and discarded that idea. Giving up, she folded it over the sofa again.
She sat in one of the wing chairs, back stiff, hands clasped in her lap. “So. What shall we talk about?”
“You want to tell me why you’re so nervous?”
“I’ve never invited a man over for dinner before.” She smoothed her skirt over her knees. “You want to talk about Charlie?”
“Is May Flower Dawn going to join us?”
“Nope. She’s spending the night with my parents.” She felt her face flame up to her hairline as she considered how he might take that news. “It wasn’t my idea.”
His mouth tipped ruefully. “I’m sure it wasn’t. I’ll bet it was you calling my room this afternoon, trying to call the whole evening off.”
So he had been there. “Why didn’t you answer?”
“Why do you think?”
The look in his eyes didn’t give her any room for speculation. Her mind flashed images of other men who had wanted her. Dock popped into her head, first. As she fled thoughts of him, Ash emerged from the pit, beautiful, charismatic, and on a power trip. More pain. More shame. How many others had she slept with who wanted her body, but cared as little about her as they did about the weather? She’d become the wasteland after the hurricane, the refuse washed up onshore, the broken trees, the crushed houses. And now, Mitch Hastings, Charlie’s best friend, sat on a secondhand sofa in her living room, eyes full of a consuming fire, asking her what she thought.
She put her hands on the arms of the chair and pushed herself up. “I’m not much of a hostess. I didn’t even think to offer you something to drink. I have Coke, 7UP, iced tea, lemonade, well water. Or you can start on the wine you brought.”
“Nothing, thanks.”
She sank into the chair again. Now what? She sought desperately for something to say. She dredged down into the darkness and came up empty. Thankfully, Mitch came to her rescue.
“You mentioned Charlie. We wrote letters back and forth after we left high school, kept up the correspondence when he went into the military. He wrote about you.”
“I’ll bet.”
“He loved you, Carolyn. He worried about you.”
She pressed her back against the chair and lifted one shoulder. “His dumb, screwed-up sister gone hippy.” More cause for grief. “Mom and Dad said I made him ashamed.”
“He never told me he was ashamed of you. He said you were trying to stop the war. He said you wanted to be his savior. He worried about your relationship with Rachel Altman. She seemed to have a lot of influence on
