Chapter Nine #2
She nodded. “I made a reservation for six at the hotel restaurant. The event coordinator said it was better to do that than just show up. No wait that way.”
“I’ll be ready.” He flung the towel over his shoulders and went back toward his side of the house.
Realizing she was now cold, Charity rose and covered herself with her towel as she slid down onto the chaise. All notions of working flew from her mind as the sensation of being wrapped in Kolby’s embrace and pressed against his fortress of a body eclipsed every other thought.
With the towel cocooning her body, she reclined back on the chaise and sighed. Lifting her chin up to the sun, she pleaded, “Dear Jesus and all the saints, please help me get through this weekend.”
***
“If the food is this good at the reception and rehearsal dinner,” Kolby said, as he lifted a speared coconut shrimp from his plate, “This wedding is gonna be a hit.”
“No lie,” she said around her own delicious crustacean. “Open bar, sixteen appetizers at the cocktail hour and four choices for dinner service. The Carruthers spared no expense for their little princess.”
“And thank goodness for that, because it includes our fee, too.”
Charity nodded, then glanced down at her cell screen when an incoming text ran across it.
Tom’s name glowed up at her. They’d each had their post-coffee meeting with Liv and both had expressed a desire to see one another again.
Since that first meet, they’d gone on two dates, one a dinner in Concord, and the other a quick Sunday afternoon movie in Heaven.
With her busy weekend schedule, they’d had limited chances to see one another, but they texted or talked every day.
On the third date, he’d leaned in for a kiss that she’d been nervously anticipating. It was...nice. Sweet. Nothing like starbursts and fireworks, but nonetheless something she wanted to explore again.
How’s tropical life? He wrote.
She sent off a quick reply.
Humid and beautiful.
Send me some pics of the place. Aruba is a bucket list destination for me.
She wrote herself a mental note to take some pictures of the location in the morning.
You’d like it. Working?
Got a project due so I’m burning the midnight oil tonight.
I’ll let you get back to it.
Talk 2mrw?
She sent off a nodding head emoji then put her phone back down on the table.
So engrossed was she in texting, she forgot where she was and specifically, who she was with.
“Something’s put a smile on your face,” Kolby said, reclining back in his chair.
Charity cursed herself for blushing.
“Or someone?” he guessed, wagging his eyebrows suggestively. “Charity Quinlan, were you sexting someone?”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake! Why does your mind always go to the dirty side of everything?”
He grinned and speared another shrimp. Shrugging, he replied, “I’m a guy. It’s the way we’re wired.”
“Not all guys are wired to constantly think of sex.”
“If you believe that you don’t know enough men.”
“I know more than my fair share of men. I grew up with five older brothers and believe me, they never talked or thought about sex like you seem to think everyone in your gender does.”
His grin turned lopsided. “It’s so cute that you think that.”
Her eyes narrowed at the hated term.
“Next time you’re home,” he said, “ask them. Prove me wrong if you don’t believe me.”
“I don’t have to because I know I’m right.”
She tossed back the water in her glass, then poured it full again with the pitcher provided on the table.
“So, if you weren’t sexting someone”—she glared at him across the table—“who were you texting so vigorously? Was it wedding related?”
She took another gulp of water and said, “If you have to be so nosy—"
“I do.”
"—it was a guy I’ve been seeing.”
His expression changed from amusement to something akin to suspicion? Worry? She couldn’t quite make out what was behind the narrowed eyes, flat mouth, and head tilt.
“I didn’t know you were seeing anyone.”
“Why would you?” She shrugged. “Like I’ve said a million times before, we’re not besties. Don’t braid one another’s hair, talk about personal things including our love lives. Although yours is an open book,” she added, sotto voce.
Something hard passed in his gaze. In a heartbeat it was gone, but she’d seen it and it looked an awful lot like hurt.
“Who is he? Where’d'ya meet?” he asked.
“Is this really any of your business?”
She watched him drag in an exasperated breath, hold it, and then let it go again. Placing his hands, folded, on top of the table, the delicious shrimp forgotten, he leaned forward and captured her gaze.
“Despite what you think,” he began, “I do consider us a little more than work colleagues. We’ve known each other for years, Charity, and while our relationship hasn’t always been harmonious, I do care about you.”
If she hadn’t been sitting, she would have fallen flat on her backside. He sounded sincere, with none of the cocky sarcasm she was used to falling from his lips.
“And I do consider you a friend, so I’m asking as such.”
They stared at one another for a few moments, Charity indecisive about how much to divulge. If anything. She didn’t want him laughing at her because she’d resorted to using Liv Joyner to find her a man. That would be too much, and something she knew her brothers would ride her for mercilessly.
She could hear them in her head, loud and annoying.
Can’t find a fella on your own, Baby-girl? they’d tease. Need third party involvement?
In the next breath they’d threaten to pummel anyone she did go out with.
Connor, her oldest brother and the Chief of Police of their tiny hometown, would, undoubtedly run a background check on the guy.
Zeke, the next in line and one of the town’s firefighters would follow her on her dates, just as he’d done when she'd lived at home, and make himself conspicuous to the guy so he’d know Charity was being protected.
Her three younger brothers would find some way to insinuate themselves into her relationship and make sure the guy knew that if he hurt her, in any way, they were right there to exact revenge in her name.
Of the purely physical kind.
Honestly, all that hard masculinity and those Y-chromosome displays, while done with love, were suffocating. And unnecessary. Especially since her parents had invested thousands of dollars in teaching her how to defend herself.
She’d seen Kolby’s protective side during the drunken frat boy scene and she didn’t want that kind of overbearing behavior intruding into this new relationship.
Cautiously, she said, “I met him through Liv Joyner.”
His eyebrows lifted. “Really? Did you...? You...hired her?”
She detected no derision in the tone, just surprise, so she nodded.
“Wow. That’s...wow.”
Kolby O’Brian, speechless and shocked. That was something you didn’t see every day.
“What made you decide to use a matchmaker?”
Because I hate the bar scene, dating apps make me think of serial killers hunting for new prey, and Heaven isn’t exactly overflowing with available guys who want more than a few hours of bedroom exercise.
“With my work schedule,” she said after clearing her throat, “it’s been hard to meet new people."
A truth, just not the only reason.
Kolby considered this a moment, then nodded as he lifted a shrimp to his mouth.
“Makes sense. Well, if she introduced you to this guy, he must be okay because I know she vets everyone she works for.”
Now she was the one surprised. In that moment, she understood he wasn’t like her brothers as much as she’d thought he was.
He really was a friend. Despite the clash of their personalities, Kolby was the person she spent the most time with in Heaven.
Granted, it was work time, but since that took up so much of their daily lives, they were joined at the proverbial hip more than not.
“Tell me about him.”
It was her turn to tilt her head. “Why?”
He shrugged. “I’m nosy?”
“Was that a question?”
Another shrug.
She really could use someone in her life to talk to.
Since Colleen was out on maternity leave, and Charity hadn’t really made any girlfriends since coming to town, she needed a sounding board.
While Kolby was the wrong sex and she’d never consider telling him any intimate details, she recognized he was being sincere, and that went a long way toward getting her to open up.
After clearing her throat again, she said, “His name’s Tom...”
***
“Wanna stop at the pool bar? We haven’t seen it yet and that brochure you gave me says it’s a hot spot at night.
Live band. Dancing. Wanna check it out?” Kolby asked once they’d finished dinner.
Their waiter had told them the meal was on the hotel when Charity pulled out her business credit card.
Kolby left a tip on the table in cash, knowing from experience that while the hotel paid for their meal, they wouldn’t be as generous to their staff.
“Sure.” Charity slung her purse over her shoulder. “If it’s that good, we can recommend it to the wedding guests as an after-reception spot.”
Following close behind her, he led them out of the restaurant and down the flower-laden winding path to the spot.
Along the way, Charity inhaled. Deeply.
“Doesn’t it smell beautiful here? All these floral scents melding together? My Granny Quinlan calls that God’s perfume.”
He noted her voice changed a bit, the Southern drawl she tried so well to hide, and did, slipping out.
He had to admit; he liked this Charity. Calm. Relaxed. Smiling.
He could also admit to himself that when she’d told him about retaining Liv Joyner as her matchmaker that he’d had a reaction not unlike panic flood through him.
Why panic? Damned if he knew. But accompanying it was an aching stab of jealousy when she’d begun telling him about the new guy in her life.
That emotion was easier to explain than the panic. Just as uncomfortable, but understandable.