by Lori Wilde
He wanted to eat fast and escape his mother’s interrogation. At least the waitress served the meal quicker than she’d taken their order. He concentrated on his food and kept his mother talking about Nick and the family business.
“Tell me,” she said after they ran out of routine chitchat. “Who did you take to your high school senior prom?”
“Who did I take or who did I take home?”
“You’re not funny,” she said with a chill in her voice.
He probably wasn’t, but she was making him feel like a ten-year-old about to be banished to his room. She rarely meddled in his life and never tried to pull rank anymore. What was she up to?
“I took a girl who’d just moved here from South Carolina. Beth Ann something...Beth Ann Hardy. Why dredge up ancient history?”
“I always thought you might ask Tess.”
“She was my tutor, not my girlfriend.” He’d never had to justify his choice of dates to her before, and he didn’t like it.
“She did you a big favor just to be nice. I offered to pay her, but she refused. Somehow, she pulled off a miracle and actually got you interested in reading. Good thing. You needed the British lit credit to graduate.”
“She did make reading fun,” he admitted.
He couldn’t help wondering if even then he’d had a soft spot for her.
“I suppose you never noticed she had a terrible crush on you.”
“Tess? Nah, I don’t believe that.” He shook his head. “Really?”
“Just because she didn’t have enough confidence to show you how she felt doesn’t mean she didn’t care. She spent a lot of time drumming Dickens into your head.”
“Did Tess tell you this? Did she say she wanted to go out with me? Did she want to go to the prom with me?”
“She didn’t need to tell me. I could read it on her face every time she looked at you.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No?”
“Indeed.”
He blinked at his mom, blindsided by the paradigm shift.
“Don’t be so dense, son. The woman is in love with you. She loved you then, and she loves you still.”
Tess had never been a clock-watcher, but her Saturday stint at the store seemed to drag on forever. Ordinarily she didn’t work Saturday evenings, but she was training one of her clerks to close up. Madge, her assistant manager, would’ve done it, but Tess had given her the night off to babysit her grandchildren.
Anyway, working was better than moping about Cole, she thought as she watched Wanda shut down the register. All that remained to be done was set the alarm, dim the lights, and lock the door.
“Hey, Tess, I was supposed to deliver this just before you closed.” Russ, the florist who ran the shop at the south end of the shopping center, hurried into Tikes just as she switched on the nighttime security lighting. He handed her a box with his logo embossed in gold.
“This is a corsage,” she said, puzzled by his delivery.
“Take a look. I made it myself.”
She carefully lifted the lid and stared at a lovely corsage of yellow roses, baby’s breath, and delicate greenery.
“It’s lovely.” There was no card.
“Big date?” Russ asked.
“No, no date at all.”
“Well, enjoy.” He started to leave.
“Wait, who sent this?”
“Customer confidentiality,” he said as he walked away.
When the store was secure for the evening, Wanda hurried off to meet her boyfriend who was leaning against his Harley parked outside. Tess said good night automatically, still bemused by the flowers she was juggling along with her purse and raincoat.
“Do you like it?” A man stepped from the shadows.
Tess startled. “Oh.”
She could only stare at Cole and wonder if he was a mirage she’d conjured up because she so badly wanted to see him. He looked more handsome than ever, his dark hair brushed to the side of his forehead and his height emphasized by a smartly tailored charcoal suit and gleaming white shirt. He was wearing highly polished black wing tips and a striped gray-and-gold tie.
“I seem to remember you like yellow,” he said.
“Yes, but...” She stared from him to the corsage box. “You sent this?”
He nodded, his expression unreadable.
“But why?”
“Come for a ride with me, and you’ll find out.”
“I have my car here.”
“Just another abandoned car in our checkered relationship. It’ll be fine.”
“We don’t have a relationship.”
He took the corsage out of the box and slid his hand under the V-neck of her moss-green cotton swing dress, his fingers resting on top of her collarbone as he pinned on the flowers. The gesture was so intimate she could practically feel his fingers searing her skin.
“What is this?” she asked.
“A corsage.”
He was gorgeous when he grinned, but she wanted answers, not charm.
“I know that, but...”
He stepped so close she thought he was going to sniff the tiny rosebuds.
“Are you ready to go?”
He helped her into her rainy weather navy trench coat, careful to keep it from crushing the corsage, then put his arm around her shoulders and propelled her toward the exit.
All this chivalry was terribly confusing. What was he up to?
“Thank you for the corsage,” she belatedly said, “but I don’t understand why you sent it.”
“You will.”
He squeezed her against his side, momentarily distracting her.
The rain had stopped, but the pavement on the dark, nearly deserted lot glistened under the pinkish safety lights. It had been unseasonably cool all day. She inhaled a deep breath of fresh, damp air, and her nose tingled from the intoxicating scent of Cole’s spicy aftershave.
She looked around for his truck but spotted Zack’s vintage Mustang instead.
“You borrowed your brother’s car. Why?”
“To take you to a dance.”
“How do you know I don’t have something better to do? I could have a date or—”
“Do you?”
“No, but—”
“Please, will you let me surprise you?”
“I’m not dressed to go anyplace.”
“You look beautiful in that dress, but you’re always gorgeous to me. It doesn’t matter what you’re wearing.” She couldn’t glow with happiness and be surly and suspicious at the same time. The choice was a no-brainer.
“All right, you can surprise me, but I still don’t understand.”
She looked at the arrangement of flowers on her left breast. Touching the velvety softness of one tiny bud with the tip of her little finger reminded her of the bandage Cole was still wearing.
“How’s your hand?” she asked when they were inside the small car.
“Not a pretty sight, but it’s healing.” He held up the freshly bandaged digit. “Thank you for asking.”
She couldn’t read his expression in the dark interior of the car, but his tone was even more puzzling than his gift of the corsage. She’d never heard his voice so mellow, so soothing, so—truth to tell—downright sensual.
“If this trip involves Candy,” she said, still afraid to let herself believe that Cole was focusing on her like a man who really cared.
“Absolutely not. Our second date was not wildly successful.”
“Oh, didn’t you have fun?” She tried to hide her elation.
“She wasn’t thrilled by my main topic of conversation—you.”
“Me?” Her voice squeaked in disbelief.
He didn’t answer, instead torturing her with silence, a sneaky grin on his face. Or so it seemed from what she could see of his profile in the dark.
He drove through neighborhoods of neat brick homes, weaving his way across town in a shortcut she was too agitated to follow.
“Wher
e are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
Soon she did see familiar landmarks—a church with a white steeple, the entrance to a medical clinic, a sign for the hospital.
By the time he pulled into the school’s staff parking area, she knew where they were, but not why.
“Our old high school?” she quizzed him. “Why on earth come here?”
“Did you know it’s been converted to a middle school? Zack and I did some work on the science labs when we were just starting out our business.”
Cole Bailey could write a manual on how to avoid answering questions. He got out of the car and came around to help her out.
“What are we doing here?”
“Just a little breaking and entering.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“No, the custodian will let us in.”
“Why?”
“He has to be here when the gym is rented for the evening. It’s our lucky night—nothing else on the schedule.”
“You rented the old gym?”
“Yeah, and I’m pretty proud of it. Had to rouse out school board members and get my grandfather to call in favors to arrange this in twenty-four hours.”
He walked to a side entrance that led directly to the wing with the gym and knocked on the small glass panel in the door.
“This must be how it felt to go to a speakeasy in the old days,” she quipped to cover her nervousness.
Just when she thought this was all a joke, a burly man with gray bristles on his square face opened the door. “Cole Bailey. I have the use of the gym tonight.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll go ahead and switch on the lights.”
“No overheads, thanks. Just put the footlights on the stage on dim.”
“Whatever you say.”
They followed his shambling form down a familiar corridor lined on either side with military-green lockers. The students might be younger these days, but nothing else seemed to have changed.
The place smelled the same as it always had, a nostalgic and not unpleasant blend coming from lockers crammed with everything from sweaty gym shorts and socks to wadded paper. She could even conjure up the aroma of hot lunches served in the cafeteria. How she’d loved the macaroni and cheese, always served with carrot sticks and Jell-O.
It wasn’t much of a stretch to imagine a group of her friends in a circle by the lockers, exchanging lipsticks and gossiping about most girls’ favorite subject—boys. She had a tiny tinge of regret that they couldn’t see her come in with Cole Bailey now.
“Cole, this is crazy,” she whispered as they watched the custodian walk to the far end of the darkened gym.
He mounted steps to the stage, now devoid of a curtain, and in a moment the footlights glowed upward, giving off just enough light to make the cavernous room seem spooky and romantic. Cole squeezed her hand, and she didn’t want to let go of his.
In the center of the room, a rectangular cafeteria table was draped with a white cloth and festooned with yellow and green streamers and a centerpiece of bright yellow mums. A punch bowl was surrounded by plastic cups, fancy cocktail napkins, and a platter of petit fours. Cole had even thought of little paper cups with mints and nuts.
She scarcely noticed when he helped her out of her coat and walked to the edge of the stage. He started a laptop that was sitting there waiting to be turned on, and soft, dreamy music drifted through the gym.
“What on earth...” Her eyes were misting, and she didn’t recognize her own voice.
“We should have done this ten years ago, sweetheart.”
Before she could digest his term of endearment, she was in his arms, moving to music that gave an illusion of a real band playing just for the two of them.
“Cole...”
“We’ve lost a lot of time because I couldn’t recognize the right woman for me when she was right under my nose.”
He held her close, taking steps so small they were scarcely moving.
She was genuinely speechless for the first time in her life.
“I missed my chance at the senior prom,” he said in a voice that radiated warmth. “This is our prom night together.”
“Cole, I can’t believe we’re doing this.”
She’d never danced with anyone who made her feel this special. She was wholly aware of his body, so close they melded together. When his lips brushed her forehead, she started hoping this was the most important night of her life in spite of lingering puzzlement and doubts. Could this really be happening to her? Was Cole doing this because he...
She didn’t dare let herself hope that all her dreams might be realized.
Then he was holding her, not pretending to dance. She heard him breathe deeply, then their lips met, gently and sweetly, in a kiss that was incredibly intense.
“Will you forgive me?” he murmured.
She couldn’t remember anything to forgive, not with his hands locked below her waist and his lips wandering over her face, brushing her brow, her eyelids, her cheek and chin, teasing the tip of her nose.
“I guess,” she gasped, meaning yes, definitely yes.
His knee parted her knees until she was practically riding his thigh, riveted by the materialization of all her most secret dreams.
This couldn’t be happening. Cole was seducing her in the very building where she’d longed for him with all her heart so many years ago.
“I don’t want to crush your corsage,” he said, putting the thickness of a rosebud between them.
Crush the flowers, crush me, she wanted to cry. She reached up to caress his lips with the tip of her finger. He drew it between his teeth and gently suckled, making her feel all shivery and strange.
“What made you think of a prom?” she asked, afraid of what was happening to her in his arms. After this, she’d never again be able to deny her feelings for him, especially not to herself.
“It doesn’t matter, as long as you like it,” he said.
“I love it.”
He was right—it didn’t matter. Nothing did but what was happening between them.
He kissed her long and hard, his fingers stroking her hair as his lips made hers swell with passion.
The music stopped, and so did their pretense of dancing. She pressed against him, feeling what she’d only imagined before—the firmness of his chest, the concave fitness of his tummy, the erotic swell at his groin. She’d known him so long and yet so little. She wanted him so badly, but her fear of disappointment was like the specter of her teenage hopeless yearnings.
“Let me get you some punch,” he said in a voice so husky she barely recognized it.
She was already drunk on sheer elation, but she drank the punch he handed her.
“This is delicious. Did you make it?”
“I had a little help. And I didn’t need to spike it to feel high tonight.”
A sheepish Cole was a man she didn’t know but very much liked.
“Aren’t you going to have any?”
She put down her cup and dipped a serving for him in another, holding it to his lips.
They sipped and smiled, and words seemed superfluous.
“We’ve hardly begun to dance,” he said in a softly enticing voice.
She didn’t need any coaxing to put the cup down and hold out her hands.
“Don’t you want music?” he asked with a bemused smile.
She was already hearing an enchanted melody, bewitched by the love pouring through her. She didn’t need real notes but was glad when he started a playlist of the world’s most wonderful dancing music, or so it seemed to her.
He whirled her around the gym, and she never once missed overhead streamers, the press of other dancers, or the chattering of spectators. He gave new meaning to the word prom.
Tess didn’t know if they danced for minutes or hours. She scarcely noticed the custodian watching them from the doorway when it was time to go. She was only vaguely aware when Cole spoke to the man and handed him a wad of bills for his troubl
e in cleaning up.
She left the nearly deserted building with the glow of a real prom in her heart.
“Did you enjoy yourself?” he asked needlessly when they were in the car.
“It was lovely. Thank you, Cole. I still can’t believe you did all that for me.”
“I only did what I should have done ten years ago— taken the one woman in the world for me to the prom.”
He leaned over and kissed her again...and again and again.
“I keep expecting Principal Royce to knock on the window and make us stop,” he admitted with a soft, shivery laugh.
“Me, too.” Not that he’d ever had to knock on a car window with her inside.
“I guess it’s time we act like grown-ups again,” he said in a teasing tone.
“How do grown-ups act?”
“Let’s find out.”
Cole drove without talking, and his silence made her crazy. Was this some kind of compensation he thought he owed her for not telling her about his grandfather’s manipulations? Or something he’d concocted to thank her for the matchmaking? Her mind worried, but her heart was rejoicing. He was everything she’d ever imagined and more. When he really tried, he could make her insides melt.
She had an unsettling flashback of Cole hanging out by a blonde girl’s locker and making her squeal with excitement because a Bailey twin was paying attention to her. Tess quickly tried to suppress it.
That was a memory from ten years ago. Tonight, instead of sighing over him from the sidelines, she’d been the girl in his arms. Her lips were still tingling from his kisses. She fairly ached to have him hold her again.
She loved him, but her doubts would not go away. Gradually, a cold sensation crept up her back as if her spine were changing into a steel rod. She was in love with Cole, but she’d rather never see him again than be a conquest, a one-night stand, another notch on his infamous bedpost.
They stopped at a red light, and he reached over and stroked her thigh. It was a long light. He slid his hand under the hem of her dress. She couldn’t seem to take a deep breath.
“The light is green,” she whispered, not liking the husky tremor in her voice.
Why didn’t he say something? She wasn’t totally naïve. She knew what he might want when they got to her apartment. But why with her? Why set up a pretend prom just for the two of them? Was he so desperate to find someone—anyone—that he was ready to settle for good old Tess?