“Yes.” Sierra looked from her to Lisa, clearly not even sure where the fitting rooms were.
“I’ll hold your purse,” Lisa said, taking it from the teen. “You go with Rilla.” She followed, because there were comfortable armchairs in front of the dressing rooms, and she needed to be able to take pictures for Cal.
She’d already snapped a few on the sly, and she texted them to him while she waited.
“Uh, Lisa?” Sierra’s voice came from the room where she’d gone.
“Yeah?”
“I need some help.” She pulled back the curtain, and she was practically falling out of her dress.
Lisa launched herself out of the armchair and over to Sierra. “Turn and let me see.” Sierra did, and sure enough, the sleeve was all bunched and twisted from how she’d put it on. “Okay, this needs to go here….” She fixed it and finished zipping up the dress.
Sierra looked up and at herself in the mirror, and Lisa’s whole heart melted. “What are you going to do with your hair?” she managed to ask without sounding like she was emotional.
“My friend is going to curl it and pin it all up.”
Lisa gently gathered Sierra’s hair and lifted it so she could see the dress without her hair covering her shoulders. “It’s really pretty.”
“I don’t know if I like the skirt,” she said, brushing at the blue fabric. “It doesn’t lay right or something.”
“Let’s take a picture and show your father.”
Sierra smiled and gave the peace sign; Lisa clicked and texted. Cal must’ve been glued to his phone, because his response was instant.
WOW.
“All caps,” Lisa said with a smile. “Wow.”
Sierra turned and twisted, looking at herself, and finally said, “Let’s try the black one.”
She put it on, and the huge billowy skirt required a second skirt to be worn underneath. Lisa stepped out to get one, and she helped Sierra put it on underneath the dress.
“Oh,” Lisa said, because this dress took her breath away.
“It has straps,” Sierra said, staring at herself in wonder.
“Smile,” Lisa said, and she took another picture. She sent that one to Cal, noticing that Sierra wasn’t doing the self-examination this time. Lisa knew why. She’d seen that look on her bride’s faces too.
“The red one?” she asked anyway, because they were here, and she might as well try on as many dresses as she wanted until she was convinced that silky, flowy, wide-skirted dress was “the one.”
Four dresses later, and many texts with Cal, Sierra came out of the dressing room back in her regular clothes.
“So?” Lisa asked, her eyebrows raised. She was beyond ready to get out of these wedges, but she would never show it. She needed to stop by Riley’s place to make sure everything was still standing and working and all of that, but she’d never tell Sierra that either.
“I think the black one,” she said slowly, hurrying to add, “But it’s so much, and I need that second set of skirts, and I still need shoes….”
“Did your father give you a budget?” Lisa asked.
“Well, kind of.” Sierra bit her fingernail, and Lisa simply couldn’t have her worried about this.
“Sierra, this is your first prom. Let me give you a little advice when it comes to men and shopping.”
The girl looked up at her, keen interest in her eyes. “Yeah?”
“You ask forgiveness, not permission.” She grinned at her. “So let’s tell Rilla we want the black one. And I trust you will find the perfect pair of red heels to wear with that dress.”
“Red heels? Really?”
“Uh, yeah.” Lisa nodded at her and turned as Rilla approached. “She wants the black one.”
“Oh, that’s the one I was hoping you’d get.” Rilla clapped her hands a couple of times, and Lisa would’ve never known if Rilla actually liked the black one the best or not. “Whoever your date is, he’s the luckiest guy on the island.”
Sierra ducked her head, her smile filling her whole face. It took several minutes to get the discount worked out, buy the dress, and get it into the back of Lisa’s car. She sighed like she’d just climbed to the top of the volcano on the northeast side of the island.
“Well,” she said. “That was fun. Thanks for asking me to help you.” She started the quick drive back to Cal’s.
“It was fun,” Sierra finally said. “You know, you’re not as fake as I thought you were.”
Lisa felt like someone had reached right into her lungs and snuffed the air out of them. “Oh…okay.”
“My dad didn’t tell you?”
Lisa shot her a quick glance, her chest barely able to expand. “Tell me that you thought I was fake? No, he didn’t mention it.”
Sierra’s face colored again. “I just…it’s…my mom—you can’t tell my dad I said that. He’ll take the dress away.”
Lisa swallowed through a very narrow throat. “I won’t mention it.” After all, he hadn’t mentioned what his daughter had said. She wore the professional clothes to be professional. And it wasn’t a crime to like cute shoes. Was it? So she liked having manicured nails and wearing jewelry. Also not worth calling the police over.
She pulled into the driveway, and Cal came down the front steps while Sierra was still wrestling with the dress in the backseat.
“How’d it go?” he asked, and Lisa had no choice but to get out of the car. Well, she could’ve run him over, but she didn’t think that would end well.
“Fine,” she said, folding her arms across her stomach. She hadn’t eaten dinner, and her feet hurt, and she decided on the spot to check Riley’s house another time. It had survived the tsunami just fine because it was situated at a higher elevation, up in the rain forested hills.
“Hey, nugget.” He gave his daughter a quick kiss on the forehead. “I’ll be right in and you can model for me, okay?”
“Dad.”
“No arguing,” he said. “Fashion show!”
Sierra rolled her eyes, but Cal turned back to Lisa, all smiles. “Thank you. Really. I kinda have no idea what I’m doing when it comes to stuff like this.”
“It was fun,” she said.
Cal cocked his head, those eyes searching for something she didn’t want him to find.
“I have to go,” she said.
“Why are you talking in that voice?”
“What voice?”
“It was fun,” he repeated, his voice a few pitches higher. “That one. What happened?”
Lisa glanced toward the house, because she suddenly felt trapped between a rock and a hard place. She wanted to be honest with Cal. She liked him more than any other man she’d been out with in a long time.
The guy she’d dated last year—Richard—had broken up with her a couple of weeks before her family’s holiday parties, claiming he didn’t want to go because then they’d “be serious.”
And Cal was serious, and Lisa didn’t want to find out he thought she was fake too.
“Lisa?” He put his hand on her arm, and Lisa looked at it. Analyzed the way heat spread up her arm toward her shoulder, like someone had rubbed warm honey over her skin.
“She thinks I’m fake,” she finally said, looking right into Cal’s concerned eyes.
His widened, and a dangerous, hard glint entered them. “She said that?”
“She actually said I’m not as fake as she thought I was.” Lisa watched him, and he was definitely not happy. “Did she tell you I was fake?”
When he didn’t immediately deny it, Lisa’s hopes—and the self-confidence she’d worked so hard to get back—plummeted.
Chapter Fourteen
Cal had no idea what to say. Why had his daughter told Lisa that? Did she not have any tact whatsoever?
“She mentioned it after the outdoor cinema,” he said very slowly. “I didn’t know what to think of it, because I don’t think you’re fake.”
“You don’t?” She cocked eyebrow at one him, those arm
s still folded across her midsection.
“No,” he said. “I mean, I didn’t.”
“You do now?”
“No.” He sighed, frustrated. “I just—I guess I thought about it for a few seconds. I didn’t see what she’d seen. That’s all.” He had a vision of this woman walking right out of his life, and he didn’t want that to happen.
Surprising as that was, he really didn’t want to be alone again. You’re not alone, he thought. You have Sierra.
But in reality, he did sleep alone. Went to bed alone. Shouldered all adult responsibilities alone. And he was tired.
“All right,” Lisa finally said. “What are you doing for lunch tomorrow?”
“I have no idea. Probably eating the sandwich I make for myself every day.”
“Maybe we could have lunch.”
“Aren’t you slammed with that wedding?”
Lisa sighed, her shoulders moving up and down very noticeably. “Yeah, I am. I’ll have to check my schedule.” She inched forward and took his hand in hers. “I just want to see you.” She glanced toward the house. “Alone.”
Cal wasn’t sure he could sneak away from his job, as he had a deadline to meet. His crew could probably cover him for an hour. “I’ll try,” he said. “Text me.” He drew her fully into his arms and bent his head close to hers. “I’m sorry she said you were fake. You’re not, you know.”
Lisa curled her hands around the back of his neck. “What am I then?”
“Gorgeous,” he whispered. “Smart. Witty. Well-connected when it comes to shopping.”
She giggled, and Cal could only hope that meant she’d forgiven him for whatever she’d thought he’d said or done about her being fake.
“I sure do like you, Lisa,” he said, deciding he could bring back some of his old dating techniques. He kissed her before she could respond, and she kissed him back like she sure did like him too.
As she got in her car and backed out, Cal lifted his hand in a good-bye gesture, wondering how he’d ever lived without her in his life. The thought terrified him, because he didn’t want to think he couldn’t survive alone.
He’d gone through months of those debilitating feelings in the months following Jolene’s death. Somehow, he and Sierra had come out the other side of that dark time, and they were both still alive. But Cal honestly had stretches of time he couldn’t even remember.
“We’re okay, right, Jo?” He gazed up into the sky, finding it several different shades of red, orange, yellow, and pink. The Hawaiian sunsets couldn’t be beat, but tonight, the glorious sky didn’t bring him much peace.
“I can’t hear your voice anymore,” he whispered. “I don’t know how you smell.” He missed his wife so much, and Cal didn’t want to be disloyal to her, or her memory.
He should also probably stop talking to her if he really wanted to be serious with Lisa. So he turned around and went inside the house, wishing there was a manual for how to date after the death of a spouse.
“Okay,” he said upon closing the door and finding Sierra on the couch, her nose buried in her phone. “First, the fashion show. And second, you’re going to tell me what in the world possessed you to tell Lisa you thought she was fake.”
The next day, Cal did manage to sneak away from the job site for lunch. Lisa had not texted, even when he had, asking what time would work for her. He told himself her silence was nothing. She was busy. She couldn’t text him back the moment she got a message.
Never mind that she had before, even during busy times. Or maybe Cal didn’t know what a busy time for Lisa was. They had only been dating for a few weeks.
His argument with Sierra last night had been a bit on the epic side, and in the end, they’d left it alone so they could each cool off. She’d been mad Lisa had told him, because she’d said she wouldn’t. He was mad his daughter was so tactless as to tell a woman she was fake, even if she’d thought it one time and didn’t anymore.
He’d asked her flat out if Sierra had a problem with him dating, and she’d said no. “So it’s just me dating her,” he’d said, trying to understand.
“I don’t know, Dad,” Sierra said, and Cal had been able to feel her frustration. Keenly. Because he didn’t know either.
Maybe things between him and Lisa were moving too fast. That thought felt like one of the truest ones he’d had in a while, and he seized onto it.
He drove through a salad shop he knew Lisa liked and headed over to Your Tidal Forever. He felt very boyfriend-like as he walked in, carrying food for the two of them.
“Hello,” a woman said with a bright voice and perfectly styled hair. She reminded him of Lisa, and yes, he found this woman a little fake. Maybe it was the ultra-white teeth. Who had teeth that color?
“Sir?”
He shook himself out of his thoughts. “Yes, I’m here for Lisa Ashford?”
“She’s on a conference call,” the woman said. “I’ll let her know you’re here.” She gestured to a white couch. “You can wait right there if you’d like.”
“Thanks,” Cal said, moving over to the furniture. The sofa barely looked like it would hold him up, and it was also blindingly white, as if no one had ever waited here before.
“Cal,” someone said, but it wasn’t the feminine voice he wanted to hear.
He glanced up to find Hope Sorenson standing there, smiling at him. “Hey,” he said, quickly standing to greet her. She gave him a side-hug, and Cal returned her smile.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, glancing at the bags of food he’d put on the floor.
“Oh, I’m dating Lisa,” he said. “I brought her lunch, hoping she’d have a few minutes.”
Hope’s eyebrows shot toward the stars. “You’re seeing Lisa?” Why she’d said it with so much surprise in her tone, Cal wasn’t sure.
“Yes.”
“Good for you,” she said. “Finally getting out to date.”
Before Cal could answer—and honestly, he didn’t even know how—the woman went back down the hall. “Oh, Sunny,” Hope said, and Cal couldn’t think of a better name for the blonde woman with the quick smile. “I need the Carmichael file.”
“Sure thing, Miss Sorenson,” Sunny said, turning to the row of filing cabinets behind her.
Hope took the file and turned back to Cal. “Good to see you, Cal.”
“You too, Hope,” he said, no “Miss Sorenson” in sight. He watched her go, wondering when he’d have time to work on another custom project for the wedding planning service.
“You’re Cal?” Sunny asked, and Cal’s idea to flop back onto the couch dissipated.
“Yes,” he said slowly.
“That driftwood piece was exquisite,” she said, her face shining. “I showed it to Riley. You know Riley, right? The girl who used to do my job? Anyway, I showed it to her, and she said she had to have it for her wedding.”
Cal did indeed know who Riley Randall was, but he didn’t know she was getting married. When he mentioned that, Sunny said, “Oh, they don’t have a date yet. You know she’s dating Evan Garfield, right? He’s in Georgia Panic, and he is so dreamy.” She continued talking, and Cal got the impression she could carry on a conversation with a post.
She finally stopped talking, and Cal did sit back down on the white couch. The minutes ticked by, and his impatience grew with each one. After about twenty minutes, he got up and said, “I’m just going to take this back.”
He didn’t wait for Sunny’s permission, though she tried to protest. Her words fell on deaf ears as he went down the hall. He’d never been here as Lisa’s boyfriend before, but he knew where her office was. He’d sat in meetings in her office before, and in that moment, Cal wondered why he’d never asked her out.
Of course, he’d never asked anyone out before her. His thoughts started to spiral, and he started second-guessing everything that had happened since the company’s spring party.
Lisa’s door was closed, but he knocked as he entered. She was on the phone, looking down
at something on her desk. He could just leave the salad and go. He wouldn’t have time to eat, and salad was particularly hard to eat in the car.
She glanced up as he approached, and he shook his head. Holding up the bag, he finished the walk to her desk and set it down. A smile came across her face, and she said, “Right, yes. We need the number nineteen stain for that…yes, I’ll make sure we order enough.” She rolled her eyes, and Cal could only smile back at her.
He set her bag of food down and turned to go, waving at her as he went.
“Can you hold on a sec, Ginger?” she asked. “I just need two minutes with my carpenter.”
Cal turned back to her, and Lisa had risen. “You got me the nuts and berries,” she said, fondness in her voice.
“I know you like that one,” he said. “Sorry, I’ve been waiting for a while, and I have to get back to work too.”
“I know.” She groaned. “Sorry.” She really looked like she was too.
“It’s okay,” he said. “Look, I know you only have a minute, but I wanted to talk to you about something.” He pressed his fingertips together, trying to get his brain to slow down a little.
Slow down.
That was what he wanted to do. Slow down.
“I feel like maybe we’re moving really fast,” he said, suddenly too much saliva in his mouth. He swallowed. “I…need to go a little slower.”
Lisa’s eyebrows went up. “You think we’re moving too fast?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I—this is my first time dating in a long time.”
She nodded, her expression guarded now. “I understand.”
Cal wasn’t sure, but she seemed like she actually didn’t understand. And what was there to understand anyway?
“Thank you for the food,” she said, and she went back around her desk. “All right, Ginger. I’m back.”
Cal watched her for another few seconds, because he had the very distinct feeling that he’d just done something very wrong.
But he did need to go slow. He had to consider his daughter’s feelings. He had to make sure he was ready to take the next step before he just went ahead and did it. And most of all, he had to decide if he was ready to be in a serious, committed relationship with another woman. Another woman who wasn’t Jo.
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