Chapter 22
JACK
She looked incredible. Seriously. The dress clung to her in all the right places, revealing her long, toned legs, arms and shoulders.
Her hair was loose and side parted, old-Hollywood style.
I couldn’t believe I was lucky enough to be the guy taking her out.
She seemed way out of my league. It was hard to keep my eyes off her, and I couldn’t help sneaking little sideways glances as we drove in my truck to town. I didn’t think she’d noticed.
‘Can you please keep your eyes on the road,’ she said, with a smile tugging at her lips.
‘Sorry. It’s just, you look incredible.’
‘You already said that.’
‘No, I said you looked beautiful.’
‘Same thing.’
‘Oh, here we go with the synonym conversation again.’
‘Eyes on the road.’
‘I’m just saying, you look incredible. Incredibly incredible. Magnificent. In fact, all the adjectives, all the good ones. That’s how you look.’
‘You’re very kind.’
‘I’m not being kind, I’m just stating the truth. That dress is…’
‘My mother’s.’
I stared at her. ‘You’re kidding. It is?’
‘Eyes on the road, please, and yes, it is. I found it in her wardrobe.’
‘Whoa,’ I mused. ‘Go, Moira.’
She pulled a face. ‘Can we not? I really don’t want to imagine her wearing this.’
‘I can’t imagine her wearing it. It fits you like it was made for you.’
‘You don’t look so bad yourself,’ she said.
‘Thanks.’ I was wearing a long-sleeved light-blue shirt. Top buttons undone, sleeves slightly rolled up, and a pair of black dress pants. I was glad I’d gone with the pants instead of jeans, considering how much effort she had gone to.
I parked outside the restaurant. She moved to open her door.
‘Wait,’ I said loudly. ‘I want to do this properly.’
I hurried around to her side of my truck and opened her door with a flourish.
‘I thought this wasn’t a date,’ she said, carefully dismounting, swinging her long legs around together and placing her heeled feet on the pavement.
‘It’s not,’ I said. ‘Just two people who happen to be dressed up nice, going out for a meal.’
Inside, I guided her towards the back corner of the restaurant with my hand in the small of her back, towards the table I’d called ahead and had Fiona set up just for us.
She’d outdone herself, with flowers in a vase and fairy lights stuffed inside a jar to create a romantic ambience.
Taylor’s eyebrows arched when she saw it.
‘Still not a date?’ she asked.
‘Still not a date,’ I confirmed, pulling out her chair.
Fiona appeared beside the table. ‘Good evening,’ she said, grinning in an entirely unsubtle way. She was always on at me about my lack of a social life, so I knew she’d be loving this. ‘I’m Fiona, and I’ll be your waitress tonight. Can I get you both some drinks while you look over the menus?’
‘Fiona,’ I said, willing her with my eyes to calm the hell down. ‘This is Taylor.’
Fiona’s hand shot out in greeting. ‘It’s so nice to meet you.
I’ve never met a friend of Jack’s before.
Well, apart from Hannah, but she doesn’t count because she’s a friend friend, you know, not a…
whatever this is…’ She trailed off when saw me cringe.
‘I’ve just gone and put my foot in it, haven’t I? ’
‘It’s nice to meet you too.’ Taylor smiled.
‘I know I’ve said too much already,’ Fiona continued. ‘But can I just add, that dress is gorgeous on you. I’ve never seen anyone in this town look so glamorous.’
In one of those moments that the universe likes to create just for fun, right at that second a woman ventured past our table on her way to the bathroom. She was a wearing a tiny, butt-skimming denim skirt, a tight T-shirt that said MINNESOTA ROCKS and Ugg boots.
‘Thanks,’ Taylor said. ‘But I think I might be a tad overdressed.’
‘Not at all,’ Fiona protested. ‘If anything, everyone else in this place is underdressed. At least you guys have made an effort for your date. That’s more than most people in this town bother with.’
‘It’s not a date,’ Taylor and I said at exactly the same time.
‘Sure it’s not.’ Fiona smiled smugly.
I changed the subject. ‘What do you feel like?’ I asked Taylor. ‘Wine or cocktails?’
‘Oh definitely cocktails,’ she replied emphatically.
‘In that case, I’ll have a Nor’easter, please,’ I informed Fiona, passing her the menu.
‘What’s in that?’ Taylor asked.
‘Bourbon, maple syrup and ginger beer.’
She looked skeptical. ‘Maple syrup?’
I nodded. ‘The good stuff. Direct from Quebec.’
‘Sounds sweet, but interesting. What the hell, I’ll have the same, thanks, Fiona.’
‘Coming right up.’
Taylor rested her elbows on the table and leaned forward. I tried really hard not to notice how her breasts swelled out of the top of her dress when she did so. ‘Is this the point of the evening when we make small talk and get to know each other better?’
‘You tell me. I’m a little rusty at this.’
Her eyebrows arched. ‘Really? Someone like you? I would have thought you’d have dates lined up every Friday and Saturday night.’
I smirked. ‘Someone like me?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Meaning?’
‘You’re not too horrible to look at, I suppose.’
I laughed. ‘And also ridiculously buff, don’t forget.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘How could I forget when you remind me every three seconds?’
‘Well excuse me for not wanting to let go of the best compliment anyone has paid me in years.’
‘I find that hard to believe.’
‘Why?’
‘Don’t make me say it.’
I focused on the little dimple on her cheek, beside her mouth. It curled into a cute little comma shape when she smiled. ‘Don’t make you say what?’
Her head tilted. ‘Jack.’
‘What?’ I asked innocently, well aware that I was fishing for compliments. Usually, I couldn’t care less what people thought of me. I was who I was, and you either liked me or you didn’t. But with her, I cared. I cared a hell of a lot.
‘You know you’re good-looking, Jack. You don’t need me to say it.’
‘Maybe I want to hear you say it.’
‘You’re very needy.’
‘Not normally,’ I protested. ‘It’s all your fault.’
She looked outraged. ‘How do you figure that?’
‘I was doing just fine until you came along, now I’m…
’ I trailed off, unsure how to explain what I was feeling.
That since I’d met her, I’d started thinking about things that I hadn’t thought for quite a while.
Things like the future, and sharing that with someone.
Over the last few years, I hadn’t thought more beyond taking each day at a time.
It had been a self-preservation thing, I realized now.
Her eyes softened, as if she sensed my inner turmoil. She reached out a hand and touched my arm lightly. ‘It’s OK. You don’t have to explain.’
‘It’s not that I don’t want to.’ I smiled ruefully. ‘I just don’t know how. It sounds crazy, but meeting you has been like an ice-cold bucket of water thrown over my life.’
She looked understandably confused. ‘OK. That’s not an effect I usually have on people. Well, not one that anyone has ever mentioned before anyway.’
‘Told you I couldn’t explain it very well.’
‘Just tell me whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing?’
‘Good. Definitely good.’
‘That’s OK then.’
She smiled, so beautiful in the glow of the fairy lights that I couldn’t stop staring at her.
I knew then what I wanted to say. I wanted to tell her that I hadn’t met anyone like her before.
That ever since that first night in the tidal pool, she’d fascinated the hell out of me, with her motorbike and career choice and the way she was so smart-ass in her interactions with her uncle, but so incredibly kind and caring towards Casey.
I loved the banter we had going on, the way she’d been so insecure when I’d picked her up for our non-date date, and yet so confident when she’d stood up at the meeting in front of half the town.
‘I—’
‘Jack?’
I turned my head to see Hannah hovering, her eyes uncertain as they flicked between Taylor, the flowers and fairy lights.
‘Hey.’ I smiled. ‘Going for a walk?’
She held up a brown paper bag. ‘Just picked up some takeout.’ She stared at Taylor. ‘It’s Taylor, right?’
Taylor nodded. ‘It is. Nice to see you again.’
‘Are you two… is this a date?’ Hannah asked.
‘It’s dinner,’ I replied briskly.
‘Just dinner?’ She looked Taylor up and down. ‘Dressed up like that, you look like you should be heading out to the opera, or a gala,’ she said, smiling sweetly. ‘Definitely somewhere a hell of a lot more glamorous than this place.’
‘What, this old thing?’ Taylor replied, smoothing down the fabric of her dress over her stomach. ‘It’s just something I threw on.’
‘Was there something you wanted?’ I asked curtly.
Hannah pouted. ‘You wouldn’t mind if I joined you, would you? It gets a bit lonely eating by myself upstairs.’
‘I think Taylor and—’
She cut me off. ‘I mean you said it wasn’t a date, right? And I get so bored of my own conversation. Plus there’s nothing new on Netflix.’
‘Actually,’ I said. ‘We’re—’
‘Great!’ Without waiting for me to finish again, she reached for an empty chair from a nearby table and placed it next to mine. ‘Have you guys ordered yet?’
‘Just drinks,’ I replied, as Fiona arrived. She looked understandably confused when she realized that Hannah had joined us. She wasn’t the only one. I tried to convey my apologies to Taylor with my eyes.
‘They look good,’ Hannah said, as Fiona placed the drinks down in front of us. ‘I’ll have one of those too, thanks, Fiona. Oh…’ She picked up the brown paper bag and held it out. ‘And can you give this to the chef and ask him to keep it warm until Jack and Taylor’s food is ready too?’
‘Oh. Uh…’ Fiona gave me a questioning look.
‘Hannah,’ I said smoothly. ‘If you don’t mind, Taylor and I were actually just getting to know each other better.’
She frowned. ‘I thought you said this wasn’t a date.’
I nodded. ‘I did say that, yes. But still, labels aside, we’d prefer to be alone.’