Chapter 12
CHAPTER
TWELVE
Adam could not believe where he stood and what he was doing. Joey wore a black, witchy dress that felt soft under his hands. He moved them into her hair, which felt like silk gliding along his fingers, and his whole body sighed as he finally relaxed in a way that he never had before.
He couldn’t believe he’d kissed her, and now he couldn’t stop. He’d been pulled under, and yet somehow, he could still breathe.
A noise sounded behind him—it could have been a mug breaking or a chair squeaking—and Adam became aware of it. That got him to pull away. He dropped his hands back to his side and backed up a step, his chest impossibly tight.
He drew in a breath and then another, trying to find the center of himself again—the man who didn’t panic in a snowstorm, who hadn’t walked into his non-girlfriend’s mother’s house and kissed her within the first ten seconds.
Joey reached up and touched her fingertips to her lips gently. Then, someone said, “Joey,” from behind her.
Adam turned toward the woman’s voice, hoping with everything he had that Joey hadn’t been wearing lip gloss. If she had, he certainly would be. He met a similar pair of blue eyes as hers, instant recognition flashing through him.
“You must be Joey’s mother,” he said, striding toward her. In a small space, it only took two steps, and he reached out and grabbed her hand. “Thank you so much for letting me stay here. It is crazy out there.”
Joey moved to his side. “Momma, this is Adam Harmon,” she said. “He’s Daddy’s band manager.” She looked up at Adam, and he glanced down at her superficially.
“Oh, sure,” her mother said. “I heard your daddy was getting a new manager.” She smiled at Adam and gestured at him to follow her into the kitchen. “Do you want something to drink? Coffee, tea, hot chocolate?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Adam said. “It’s freezing out there.” He followed her into the kitchen, putting more distance between him and Joey, somehow needing it.
“Lauren, come sit down,” another woman said.
“This is my mother,” Lauren said. She sighed as she sank into a recliner in the dining room.
“I’m afraid I have worn myself to the bone today, but you can make yourself anything you want in the kitchen.
” She indicated the kettle sitting on the stovetop, as well as the coffee pot, which had brew in it.
“I’ll help Joey make up the couch,” her mother said, and she flashed a smile at Adam as she left the kitchen.
He watched Joey go down the hall after her grandmother, and part of him really wanted her to come back.
He felt somewhat thrown to the wolves, and he didn’t even know why.
He’d walked away from her only a moment ago.
“I’ll just have coffee.” He started opening cupboards to find the mugs, thankfully locating them on the third try.
“Sugar is in the cupboard next to the microwave,” Lauren said. “And there’s cream in the fridge.”
“Thank you.” Adam calmed as he spooned in two tablespoons of sugar and stirred everything together. The dining room table only held two chairs, and the remnants of dinner sat on the stovetop, and he took a sip of his coffee and smiled over to Lauren. “How long have you lived here?”
“I moved here right after Otis and I got divorced,” she said thoughtfully. “So about fifteen years now.”
Adam nodded, a lump in his throat that the half coffee did not push down. “I can clean this up,” he said, and he turned around to start putting aluminum foil over the chicken pot pies on the stove.
“Oh, Joey will do it,” Lauren said, and that only made Adam press his teeth together tighter.
“What about you?” she asked. “Where do you live?”
“I’ve got a place in Coral Canyon right now.” He ripped off a piece of aluminum foil. “But I’m looking for new houses. That’s why I was up here in Dog Valley.”
“I imagine you’ll be in town for a while, then,” Lauren said. “Now that you’re managing Country Quad.”
“Yes,” Adam said. “At least a few years.”
And if he bought the house he wanted, he’d only live a few blocks away from Joey’s mother. He wondered if that would be a strike against him, and his face flushed as he remembered the kissing incident from only moments ago.
He heard Joey and her grandmother talking in quiet voices in the other room, so when he finished up with putting away their dinner, he took his mug and went to see what he could do to help.
“This will have to do,” Joey said when she saw him. He took in the twin sheet she’d fitted around the couch cushions, the four pillows, and the enormously puffy blanket.
“This looks like plenty,” he said. “I’m probably gonna sweat to death out here.”
“Oh, you won’t.” She patted his arm as she moved past him to take a pillow back down the hall. “My mom keeps the house really cold.”
“We’ll be lucky if we keep the power for much longer,” her grandmother said.
“I’m Adam,” he said. “I didn’t catch your name.”
“Oh, I’m Gloria,” she said, and she gave him a firm handshake. “In fact, I’m gonna go turn the furnace up right now while it’s still on.” She bustled halfway down the hall to do that, and Joey snuck past her and came back into the living room.
“Have you eaten?” Joey asked, and Adam whipped his attention back to her.
“No.” He gestured toward the kitchen. “But I just put all the food away.”
She grinned at him, a ray of sunshine in Adam’s life during this awful storm. “Why’d you do that, silly?” She squeezed his hand, and then ducked around him to re-enter the kitchen. “You like chicken pot pie, don’t you? Being from the South, I would think so.”
“I like chicken pot pie,” Adam said. “But really—” He cut off when Joey threw him a severe look. He blinked and put a smile on his face, all in the same second. “Will you heat it up for me, please?”
A small smile touched her face before she ducked into the fridge, and Adam moved to the edge of the kitchen. He threw a look over to her mother and found that Lauren had closed her eyes and seemed to be asleep.
Joey didn’t try to be quiet at all, but after she’d slammed the microwave and slid his pot pie into a bowl, she came toward him. “You can eat dinner in your bed.” She handed him the bowl, and the scent of creamy sauce and roasted chicken rose to meet his nose.
Then he stepped over to the couch and sat down on the bedsheet-covered cushion. Joey joined him, and he cast a look down the hall where her grandmother had gone. He didn’t see Gloria anywhere, and he figured that hallway held a couple of bedrooms and bathrooms.
He dug into the pot pie with his spoon, the crackling of the crust music to his ears. “Did you learn to cook from your grandmother?” he asked.
Joey nodded and looped her arm through his. She didn’t seem to want to talk, and Adam took the steamy bite of food as her nerves pranced through him again. He didn’t have to stuff the silence with sound either, and he ate his whole dinner before Joey asked, “Good? You liked it?”
“Yes.” He reached across her and set the bowl on the end table. “I’m fed, I’m warm, and I have somewhere to sleep.” Adam grinned at her and lifted his arm around her shoulders. “Thank you so much for letting me come here.”
Joey searched his face, something vulnerable swimming across hers. “We really might lose power, but my mom has a generator that should kick on within a couple of minutes.”
He nodded and reached up to tuck her hair behind her ear, a soft smile accompanying the gesture. Everything about her made him want to be softer, kinder, better. “Okay.”
“My mom goes to bed really early,” she said next. “We can put a movie on after they do.”
“All right,” he said. “Whatever is fine with me. I have headphones in my car, and I can listen to a podcast or an audiobook without disturbing anyone.”
She smiled and shook her head, sending her silky hair swinging. “You can’t go get anything out of your car.”
He frowned. “Why not?”
“I bet the doors are frozen shut.”
“You’re kidding.”
Joey giggled and shook her head. “I’ll go get your coffee.”
“You don’t have to,” he said, but she’d already pushed to her feet. Adam watched her go, his throat tight. When she returned, he took the mug and tracked her as she sat down again.
“What?” she asked.
“You don’t have to take care of me,” he said. “I’m capable of heating up food and getting my own coffee.”
Joey blinked at him, and it looked like she might fire back at him. Then her chin dipped, and her shoulders sunk in. “Okay,” she said. “I’m just used to helping while I’m here.”
“You don’t have to do that for me.” He threaded his fingers through hers. “In fact, if you want anything tonight, you let me know, and I’ll get it for you.” He leaned over and pressed his lips to her temple.
“Are we going to talk about…us?” she asked.
“What about us?”
“You kissed me before our first date.”
He drew in a deep breath. “First, you closed your eyes, so yeah, I kissed you.”
“So you just lock lips with every woman who closes her eyes?” she teased.
“When they do it the way you did, yes,” he said back without missing a beat. He could still feel the ghosts of her hands on the sides of his face, see the needful way she’d gazed at him, picture the way her eyes had drifted closed and her mouth had opened slightly.
Yes, she’d been begging him to kiss her, and Adam had wanted to. So he had.
She smiled at him. “I’ve never been kissed before the first date.”
“We can count the coffee and cowboy hat as a date, if that makes things better for you.” He smiled at her. “Because I don’t feel bad about kissing you. I’d do it again and again in the same situation.”
Her blue eyes sparkled. “Again and again?”
“Yes,” Adam said simply. “I haven’t had a girlfriend in a while. Maybe the kissing was bad? If so, I can accept that. We don’t have to get brunch this weekend.”
“I want to get brunch this weekend.”
“So the kissing wasn’t bad,” he stated.