Chapter Three.
WAYNE
In the time it took to drop off the donations and taking her to her apartment to change clothes, Wayne had decided against a score of restaurants or more. It wasn’t that the restaurants weren’t good. They were all amazing. He just didn’t want to set the wrong tone.
The last time he’d taken someone to dinner for a date had been... years ago.
At first, because he was in the NFL, he lacked time or the interest in dealing with public speculation into his life.
Now, he was still recognized from time to time out and about without his Carvers Polo, so the last thing he wanted to do was have people coming up to the table and making Avery uncomfortable.
Avery.
Her name made him smile. Why? He had no idea. It just did.
Waiting outside of Avery’s apartment building, a structure which had a style that she called ‘former mid-century sanatorium chic,’ he was staring at his phone looking for a restaurant with the right atmosphere for dinner.
Mama Antonio’s caught his eye. So did the picture up on Yelp. The warm colors and candlelight looked like the right place to go. A quick perusal of the menu and photos from other diners made him smile. Yes. This was the right place to take Avery.
His phone screen lit up with a text, and he looked down at the screen.
AVERY: Changed! Looking halfway decent. If you’re still interested in dinner, I’m on my way down.
He shook his head and smiled at her words.
She struck him as a woman who was pretty confident, but a lot of people put different faces forward when meeting people.
When he’d met her, she was a steadfast supporter of her son’s.
She wasn’t blind to his challenges, but she was also someone who looked for solutions.
That didn’t mean that she was the same as a person.
When she was by herself. He just knew that what he’d seen so far interested him.
A lot. He looked down to put his phone on the console and stepped out to greet her and open the passenger door for her.
That’s when he realized he was still wearing the shirt he’d had on to go to the Central Food Bank.
It was a perfectly nice shirt, but for a dinner date?
Especially if he didn’t want people to take one look at him and see the Carvers logo over his left breast or his sleeve, he’d need to change his shirt at least. Grumbling at how he’d overlooked something like that, he pushed open the door and closed it behind him.
He dropped his keys into his back pants pocket and moved around to the passenger side of the Gladiator.
He had a suit jacket and a button down hanging on a hook.
He didn’t reach for the jacket, that would look a little stuffy, he decided.
He reached for the navy-blue button down that he liked to wear under the dark charcoal grey suit jacket.
Undoing the top button, which was the only button he’d closed when he’d put it on the hanger, he slid the shirt off and draped it over the arm of the seat and reached for the hem of his polo shirt.
He made fairly quick work of stripping it off, even though his sleeves caught on his muscles.
It wasn’t really difficult normally, but he was trying to rush and do it before Avery got down to the parking lot.
Which meant that his arms were moving and his muscles were flexing which was making things a little problematic. The feel of the air against his back was refreshing and helped cool his skin. Dropping the shirt onto the back seat, he reached for his button down and put one arm into a sleeve.
“Hey, you’re still here. I-”
He turned and stared. She was wearing a dress that had his attention.
With the door open in the car there was light enough for him to see that it was more of a dark wine color. There weren’t any decorations on it, just fabric that looked like it would be slick and soft under his hands.
And the simple design showed off the fit figure he’d known she would have.
He was careful to keep the focus of his gaze above the neckline of her dress, but there was no way to completely ignore the graceful drape of the fabric across the tops of her breasts.
Wayne was glad for the darkness around them because he was hoping she wouldn’t notice just how good she looked in that dress.
She smiled at him and he smiled back. She rubbed her lips together and that’s when he noticed that she was wearing color on her lips.
“You look... beautiful.” He meant it and more. There was just something about Avery that made every part of him stand up and take notice. Every part of him.
She swept her tongue across her bottom lip and her smile deepened. “You look... like one of those Magic Mike dancers and I’m,” she lowered her gaze for a moment and then met his gaze again, “not complaining.”
He hadn’t blushed since...
Hell, he didn’t remember ever blushing, but there he was, standing in the dark evening air, his shirt only on one arm.
Wayne shrugged on the rest of his shirt, making the decision not to turn his back to Avery.
There was a look in her eyes that said she was enjoying the view, and he was enjoying the view, too.
“I was looking online for a place to take you, and I forgot to change.”
He worked quickly on the buttons up the front of his shirt, looking up every few moments to see her watching him. It felt good. It felt damn good.
He’d spent years being a football player. A team leader both as a player and now as a coach. He liked being a man. The looks he was getting from Avery fueled that feeling.
He was almost to the top button when he felt her hand touch his. Wayne paused and looked up at her face.
“Leave it.” A corner of her mouth quirked up higher, making her smile look more like a smirk. “I like it like that.”
He thought about it for a moment and then nodded slowly. “Is this something you like... all the time?”
Her smile softened a little and she lowered her hand slowly to her side. “Just on you.”
He blew out a breath from barely parted lips. There were a lot of things he liked. But the thought of her on him was at the top of his mind.
“So,” she smiled again, showing him a little teeth, “where are we going?”
Good, he thought, very good.
He closed the back door and opened the front door for her. He held out a hand and when she took it, her grip on him was strong. He liked holding her hand, even if it was just to help her into the car.
She got in and he caught a quick flash of leg as she settled her dress around her legs. Damn. Avery had legs that made him appreciate both her beauty and her fitness. She was pretty much everything he admired in a woman, and he’d only started to get to know her.
He heard her laugh and lifted his head.
Avery was smiling at him, her shoulders shaking. “You can keep looking at the restaurant, too.”
His eyebrows lifted at that and he smiled, knowing he was showing her rows of teeth. He hadn’t smiled like this in a long, long time. “I like the way you think.”
“Then get your butt in the car, Coach.” She turned to look out of the windshield, her chin lifted and smiling. “I’m starving.”
He took one last, longing look at her profile and his gaze moved down over her body, taking in her toned arms, incredible ass, and legs that... whoa, made him more than a little hungry himself.
“Let’s go.”
He closed the door and jogged around to the driver’s seat.
That gave him precious moments to blow off a little steam and settle himself down.
He’d come a long way from his teenage years, but being around Avery made him remember the way just the sight of a beautiful woman could make his heart pound like crazy in his chest. But Avery wasn’t just beautiful.
He started the Gladiator and took one last look at her sitting beside him before he put it in gear and headed out. It was going to be a good night.
*****
AVERY
The restaurant was a converted house. There were a bunch of businesses on the street that were the same, but Mama Antonio’s was painted red with white trim. The lights on the sign up front were pointed up from a planter filled with rosemary bushes.
The smell was heavenly.
Wayne took her hand in his as they walked up to the porch. He had a comfortable grip on her and she liked the warmth of his skin against hers. He didn’t say a word, but neither did she as she took in the view.
There were planters situated around the porch, all of them included kitchen herbs and flowering plants as well. Two porch swings, also painted white like the house trim were hung and there were red and white checked gingham pillows on both.
“I like the glass in the door.”
She looked up and nodded. “It’s really beautiful.” The window was composed of different shapes of faceted glass like stained glass windows in church, but all clear. The only color was the metallic outlines in the design. “There’s a real atmosphere here.”
Avery started to search for the door, but Wayne beat her to it and opened it for her to step in first.
It took some doing to regulate the speed of her steps, so she didn’t drag him through the door with her, but she did it and smiled at the subtle warmth of the room around them.
The woman who met them inside reminded her of June Cleaver in ‘Leave it to Beaver,’ a show she’d watch with her grandmother when Judge Judy wasn’t on TV.
She had a delicate strand of pearls around her neck and a pair of cute kitten heels on her feet. The dress she wore was a cheery red that had wide white collars and a thin belt around her waist.
“Good evening, you two!”
The older woman reached out, and Avery felt her hand on her arm. “Don’t you look lovely!”
Avery had heard many women give her disingenuous compliments in her time, but she didn’t hear that tone in the other woman’s voice. Instead, her words made Avery stand a little taller. “I love your hair.”
The woman, who had menus in one hand lifted her free hand to her hair and gently gave her hairdo a pat. It was a miracle of hairspray and curlers, truly complimenting her features.
“They say gray is the new black these days.” Then she followed it up with. “We’re happy to have you two here tonight. We have a nice quiet table in the back if that’s okay with the two of you.”
Avery opened her mouth to reply, but Wayne beat her to it.
“Perfect.”
She turned her head to smile at him and saw him smiling at her.
Avery nodded. “I agree. Perfect.”