hearts, they just aren’t effusive. Or welcoming in the traditional outgoing sense. Even Natalie, who’s known them forever, still calls them Mr. and Mrs.-Oh, shoot. I stubbed my toe.”
He shot her a look of pure skepticism, but she wasn’t meeting his eyes at the moment. Chloe was not cut out for lying. She was too artless and straightforward. When was she going to realize that she couldn’t keep this up and just come clean?
She took a shaky breath. “So…your mom tells me you might be interviewing for a coaching job at the school?”
“I don’t know, maybe. But if I did get a job at Mistletoe High, we could finally have that dinner out I keep offering.” Seeing the anxiety creeping into her gaze, he pressed further. “Unless, of course, you wouldn’t be interested in seeing me socially? You’ve shot me down more than once. A man could get a complex.”
“I’m interested,” she murmured.
“Really? Sometimes it seems that you want to get away from me. Like in the grocery store parking lot, when I had to talk you into lunch. Or when you fled the reunion.”
“That had nothing to do with you! There were extenuating circumstances.”
“Such as?”
Chloe bit her bottom lip-hard from the looks of it. He wanted to rub his finger over the spot, soothe away the tiny hurt.
“It’s a long story,” she finally said. “I’m not sure this is the time or the place.”
“I see.”
“Dinner’s about to be served, your mom’s just a few yards…I’m sorry.”
So was he. It was crazy that she could make him feel in the wrong, but he hated that she’d lost that alluring, unconscious confidence. She was stiff now, uncomfortable, and probably regretting that she’d accepted the dinner invitation. He’d been pushing, but he didn’t want to alienate her.
Luckily, between Barb’s presence and the natural mellowing properties of food, Chloe had relaxed again midway through dinner. She offered Dylan a slow, appreciative smile; there was a sleepy quality to her expression that made it all too easy to imagine waking up to that face, kissing her good-morning.
“A man who can cook like this,” Chloe proclaimed, “definitely deserves a better kitchen than yours. Something warmer, more interesting, vibrant.”
Warm, interesting and vibrant. Did she realize
Barb set down her fork. “That’s right. Dylan mentioned you were going to help him redecorate.”
Chloe nodded. “I went and saw the condo last week, made some notes after our meeting. There are some very cool virtual-designer sites where you can check out what different options would look like online.”
“Your generation and those computers!” Barb shook her head ruefully. “I can barely check my e-mail. I must have done something wrong, because people say they’re sending me stuff I’m not getting.”
“Do you want me to look at it for you?” Chloe volunteered. “It could be a simple fix, like your spam filter settings.”
“Thank you, that’s very kind,” Barb said. “Your parents obviously raised you right. Are they still in Mistletoe?”
Chloe started coughing so hard that Barb half rose. Dylan reached around to pat Chloe firmly on the back before his mother panicked and administered the Heimlich.
“Th-thanks.” She reached for her drink, her voice scratchy. “Went down the wrong pipe.”
Barb resituated herself in her chair. “I remember once when Dylan was a kid, I thought he was going to choke to death. Some older boy in the neighborhood dared him to see how many marbles he could put in his mouth, and one accidentally lodged in his throat. Scared ten years off my life.”
“Sorry,” he told his mother. He looked back to Chloe. “It was a stupid thing to do, but sometimes we just lose our common sense temporarily.”
He’d meant it as a subliminal invitation, a way to let Chloe know that he understood making mistakes and could forgive. A key difference between him and Michael Echols. It wasn’t Chloe who felt motivated to share but Barb. She began expounding on some of his less proud moments, stories that were funny twenty years later for an outsider but served as a reminder to Dylan of the vicious cycle he’d created for himself.
He’d been so angry with his impossible-to-please father that he’d acted out-accepting reckless dares, taking needless chances on the playgrounds, going for the laugh in class instead of focusing on difficult-to-process reading assignments. Naturally, all of these actions had led to his father labeling him an even bigger loser.
Dylan’s appetite disappeared, but since he felt it would look bad for the chef not to eat his own cooking, he continued to pick at his food while the ladies finished their dinners. The three of them worked together to clear the table and agreed to wait a little while before dessert. As his mom fired up the coffeemaker, Dylan and Chloe loaded the dishwasher.
“Were you serious about helping with the e-mail?” Barb asked hesitantly.
Chloe smiled. “Lead the way.”
The PC sat on a desk at the back of the living room. Dylan turned the television on low volume and checked scores while the two women behind him discussed different e-mail tools. He liked the way Chloe spoke to his mother. Barb was so far behind the Internet age, it would be easy for a person to sound condescending when answering her questions. It would be equally easy for someone who was an expert in computer technology to unintentionally give too much information, confusing his mother more than she had been in the first place.
Chloe handled everything just right, encouraging the other woman with easy-to-understand, but not dumbed- down, explanations and liberal amounts of praise. Barb blossomed under the friendly tutelage, grasping terms quickly and asking even more questions as they went through drop-down menus and various settings.
Barb laughed at the explanation of “signatures.” “Althea Webb ends each e-mail with the oh-so-smug reminder that she won the cake cook-off this year and the year before. Do you know I used to think she typed it every single time?”
Chloe was in the middle of changing the display settings so that everything was larger and easier for Barb to read when his mom gasped. “Heavens, is that the time already? Oh, dear, I’ve monopolized your whole night! And poor Dylan has to get back to Atlanta in the morning.”
His broadcasts weren’t until evening, but he did have a station meeting at noon.
“Did you bring your notes and ideas with you?” he asked Chloe.
“Of course.” She stood, and he couldn’t help watching the line of her body as she stretched. “Is it too late to get started on those?”
“Why don’t you leave them with me. We can meet for breakfast on my way out of town to talk about what I might like.” This was becoming a habit of his, wanting to know exactly when he could see her again whenever they parted ways.
Unlike other guys in college or even at the high school, he’d veered far away from alcohol, nicotine and any kind of drugs. Not because of parental lectures, but because he wanted to protect himself physically, stay in top condition. Now the man college dorm mates had declared Mr. Squeaky Clean finally had a vice: Chloe Malcolm.
After a brief hesitation, she flashed a genuine smile. “I’d like that.”
They all adjourned to the kitchen for coffee and dessert, but his mom had barely filled three mugs before kicking them out of the house.
“It’s such a pretty night, the two of you should take your pie out on the porch,” she suggested, being about as subtle as Natalie had been when she left him alone with Chloe in the lobby of the reunion hotel.
He remembered the hint of desperation in Chloe’s eyes that night. If Natalie had stayed and the three of them had started chatting, would Chloe have relaxed? Would the situation have evolved differently? Or would she have faded into the background while he and Natalie conversed? Maybe her friend had done her a favor, throwing her in the proverbial water and challenging her to come up swimming. Looking at Chloe now, he couldn’t imagine this woman panicking over a brief drink with a guy. She was charming.
As it turned out, his mother was right about it being a gorgeous night. He leaned against the porch railing while Chloe took the rocker.
“Don’t get stars like this in downtown Atlanta,” he admitted.
