“Thanks.” Ali felt her own eyes twinkling. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d flirted with anyone. Unless she counted the night before in the hallway with Kade, which she didn’t since he’d jumped away from her like he’d just touched the stove. “You clean up real nice yourself.”
Ali had only seen Keaton in his gi and jeans and a T-shirt. But tonight he was wearing black slacks and a crisp white button up. She almost did a double take when she first saw him earlier.
“Well, I guess we should order and then start with the budget from last year.” He turned in his chair and raised his arm to get Stacy’s attention. His shirt was rolled up and Ali couldn’t help but notice how strong his forearm looked.
The sight caused a small army of butterflies to flutter in her belly and a lightning bolt realization struck her. It was an Oprah “aha” moment on steroids.
“I know what this is!” She slapped her hands on the table.
He looked back at her. “What, what is?”
“This.” She waved her hand between them as a satisfied grin lifted on her face. “This is a set up.”
“Are you guys ready to order?” Stacy approached the table with an eager lilt in her voice.
“I’m…,” Keaton glanced between the two women, “…not sure.”
“We need another minute, Stace.” Ali held up her pointer finger and when she saw that Stacey was getting justifiably irritated, she added, “Sorry.”
Once again, Stacey walked away and Ali leaned closer to Keaton. “Okay, you know Mrs. D and her friends—”
“—The Needlepoint Mafia.” He interrupted, nodding.
“Right. Well, they fancy themselves matchmakers. Every few months they like to choose an unsuspecting victim that they’ve decided should no longer be single and designate themselves, without knowledge or consent from the mark, as said individual’s personal cupid. And I think their bow and arrow is pointed at you.”
“Me?” His brows rose. “Why do you think they’re pointed at me and not you?”
“I’m twenty-eight.”
“Okay…,” he responded, confused.
“They never choose anyone under thirty.”
“Are you…,” he hesitated before continuing, “are you being serious?”
“I am,” Ali answered.
“So there’s no meeting?”
“Nope. And I’m actually a little embarrassed that I didn’t figure it out sooner.” Ali motioned around the room. “I mean look at this place. Dim lighting. Floating candle centerpieces. Linen tablecloths. Live music.” Ali pointed to where Mason Hathaway was sitting at a grand piano playing and singing classic love songs softly adding to the romantic ambiance. “This has date written all over it.”
Keaton scanned the restaurant, taking it all in before turning back to Ali and nodding slowly. “You’re right.”
“I’d love to tell you that this is going to be an isolated incident, but you’re basically about to star in your own season of The Bachelor.”
“For how long?” he asked apprehensively.
Ali nodded. “Until you give out your final rose.”
“My what?”
“Your final rose.”
His expression remained blank.
“Wait.” She lifted her hands. “Have you never seen The Bachelor?”
The left side of his mouth tilted up in a grin. “No. I never got around to checking it out.”
“And you call yourself an American?” she teased.
His smile grew wider revealing a row of perfectly straight white teeth. It was a nice smile. One that made her feel…comfortable. Calm. Not like Kade’s smile which made her feel all kinds of antsy and agitated. In a purely sexual way, but still.
Just thinking about Kade made Ali’s newly diagnosed arousal claustrophobia return. She needed some air.
She stood and grabbed her purse, and said, “Well, I guess since there’s no meeting—”
“Wait.” Keaton reached out and his fingertips grazed her elbow.
They were nice fingertips, but they didn’t send a zip of electricity flowing through her body the way the roughened pads of Kade’s fingers had.
She turned back, hoping her disappointment wasn’t written on her face.
“We’re here,” Keaton pointed out. “We’re hungry. We might as well eat.”
Ali stared at him. The boys were spending the night at Ryder’s tonight, so she didn’t need to go home. So the only thing waiting for her there was…a man that jumped away from her when she commented on the size of his raging erection.
Perhaps sensing her hesitancy, Keaton added, “To be honest, I’ve been wanting to ask you out for a while now.”
“Really?” Even though Jess had mentioned it, it was still a little surprising.
He nodded. “I just didn’t know…with everything you’ve been through…I didn’t want to be insensitive.”
“Yeah, I’m not really in a place to start a relationship.” She wanted to be upfront and honest with him. Her priorities were the boys and the business. In that order. But then she thought about “little” Stacy and how fast the twins would be off to college, (hopefully), and living their own lives. Maybe she should make plans to eventually live her own life as well. “But, we’re here. We’re hungry. We might as well eat.”
“Great.” Keaton’s face lit up and he motioned once more for Stacy.
“Are we ready?” she asked hopefully.
“Umm,” Ali cringed as she smiled. “I haven’t actually looked at the menu. I’m sorry.”
Keaton chuckled.
“Two minutes,” Ali held up two fingers to emphasize. “I promise.”
As Stacy left, most likely to beg a different server to take them, Ali browsed the menu and tried not to get ahead of herself on this situation.
What if KJ found out? Would he be upset?
What if the entire town found out they were on a date? Did she want to “date” in the public eye?
What if the Needlepoint Mafia tried set them up again? Would they give up after one failed attempt or would they go even harder?
What about Kade? If he found out, would he even care?
That last one snapped her out of her what-if spiral. She wasn’t doing anything wrong. She didn’t owe anyone, especially not Kade, anything. She deserved dinner with a nice guy whose smile made her feel calm. And she was going to enjoy it.
CHAPTER 15
“Hey, where are you goin’?” Kade paused at the top of the stairs when he saw KJ in his room, throwing clothes in his backpack.
“We’re spending the night at Ryder’s.”
“On a school night?”
“Yeah.” KJ gave him the same look he’d seen the kid give Ali. It was a look that said, you’re an idiot.
“And you’re leaving your room looking like that?” It looked like a bomb had gone off in there.
“Aunt Ali doesn’t care,” KJ shot back defensively.
“Why should she care? It’s not her room. She’s not the one living in a hazardous waste dump.” Kade moved to the doorway and surveyed the damage. “My room was always clean when I was your age, wanna know why?”
KJ’s eyes narrowed skeptically. “Why?”
“Because no girl’s gonna want to be snuck into it if it looks and smells like that.”
With a look equal parts disgust and pity, Kade left KJ to the disaster area he called a bedroom and continued down the stairs.
He’d lied. His room had been clean because he’d never known what mood his dad would be in when he walked through the door or what would set him off. Of course, that had been when he was drinking.
His father was sober now.
He was still having a hard time reconciling that truth.
Kade couldn’t remember a time when his dad had been sober for more than a week. Even before his mom left them when Kade was five his dad perpetually had a glass of whiskey in his hand. Hell, Kade’s middle name was Jameson, after his dad’s favorite brand. But the memo
ries he had of him drunk then had been different. He wasn’t a happy drunk but he wasn’t mean or violent.
But after his mom left, he’d changed. He always wondered what had caused her to leave so abruptly. The last memory Kade had of her was her kissing him on his forehead and telling him to be good for Mrs. Lyons, their next-door neighbor that babysat him, before she went to work.
Then the next morning he’d woken up to his father sitting at the dining room table crying. To this day it was the only time he’d ever seen his father cry. He remembered being scared and he asked for his mom. His dad told him she left. He asked when she was coming back and his dad said she wasn’t. That was the last time his father spoke of her.
A couple years later, his dad moved them to Whisper Lake and Kade remembered being so scared that his mom wouldn’t be able to find them. For a long time he’d believed that one day she’d come back.
He used to count the days until he turned eighteen so he could go find her, but by his eighteenth birthday he was too angry at her to care.
What kind of a mother walks out on a kid?
It still stung. And that sting was much worse now that he’d stopped drinking. During his therapy in rehab he’d learned that what he’d been doing for years was self-medicating so he wouldn’t have to face the pain of her abandonment or the abuse he suffered at the hands of his alcoholic father.
His father that was now sober.
That was such a strange reality for Kade to face. The conversation he’d had with Nancy was haunting him. It shouldn’t matter to him that his dad had finally cleaned up his act. He shouldn’t care that he’d done it at the same time he’d been given six months to live. But for some fucked up reason, it did matter to him and he did care.
Kade didn’t want to feel anything for the man that raised him. He wanted to be numb. But that was the thinking that had led him away from the only real family he’d ever had, right when they needed him the most.
Trying to shake off the dark cloud that felt like it was hovering over him he headed to the kitchen to empty the dishwasher. Idle hands were not a good thing for him right now.
Ricky was at the kitchen table and looked up when he saw him. Kade had been around the kid for the past three days and he’d thought he was getting used to the fact that he was the spitting image of Patrick. But for some reason—Kade didn’t know if it was the light or what—seeing their likeness this time struck him with more intensity than usual and it caught him by surprise and he froze.
“What’s wrong?” Ricky’s brows pulled together.
“Nothing.” Kade hadn’t even realized he’d been staring at the kid. “Sorry, you just…you look a lot like your dad.”
“I know.” Ricky sighed as he set his book down.
“It’s not a bad thing. Your dad was good looking enough to keep up with me,” Kade joked.
“It’s not that. It’s just…I miss him.” A single tear slid down Ricky’s cheek and Kade’s heart shattered. “And sometimes when I look at myself in the mirror or in a picture I see him. I know Aunt Ali does, too. And KJ. I see it when they look at me. I know that they see him, too.”
Fuck. Kade hadn’t thought about it like that. That must be a heavy burden to bear. Kade pulled out the seat across from him and sat down. “That sucks. Everything about your dad being gone just…fucking sucks.”
Ricky’s eyes widened as he stared blankly at Kade for several beats before a smile spread across his face and he started laughing. Several more tears fell down his cheeks as he continued cracking up.
Shit. Panic gripped Kade. Had he just broke the kid? Had Ali left for one night and he’d caused Ricky to have a nervous breakdown?
“It does suck!” Ricky wiped his cheeks as his laughter died down. “No one has said that, but it does. When I told my therapist she told me that I was my own person. I had my own identity. She gave me breathing exercises to do when I felt sad. But, none of that helped. I know I’m my own person. I know that I have my own identity. I know how to breathe, even when I’m sad.” Ricky sniffed. “But the truth is, it just sucks. That’s it.”
“Yeah. It does.” Kade felt his own eyes swelling with emotion. “But hey, at least your dad looked like Chris Hemsworth and not Chris Farley.”
“Chris who?”
Being around the twins made him feel every single one of his thirty-two years.
“Never mind.”
“Let’s go!” KJ called out as he ran down the stairs.
Ricky put his book in his backpack, stood up, and wrapped his arms around Kade’s shoulders and hugged him tightly. “Thanks.”
“Any time.” Kade squeezed him back, trying his best not to cry like a baby.
Kade heard the door open and KJ yelled impatiently, “Come on!”
Ricky took a deep breath before dropping his arms and straightening. “See you tomorrow. Make sure Aunt Ali eats something. She forgets sometimes.”
“Will do,” Kade assured him as the kid walked out of the kitchen.
He might not be able to bring Patrick back, or make up for not being here the past year and a half, but he could make sure that Ali ate. That he could do.
Of course, tonight he was sure that she was eating. She was eating with Keaton Mills.
He knew he should be happy for her. He should be glad that she was with a good guy that KJ loved. He should be relieved that she’d found someone that she could have a future with.
But he wasn’t happy, glad, or relieved. He wanted Ali for himself. He wanted to be with her, to raise the boys with her, to start a family with her. Not some other guy. Him.
And he didn’t know what in the hell he was going to do about it. He might not have an answer for that, but he did have one for draining some of the frustrated energy that was consuming him. There was a speed bag in the basement and it was calling his name.
CHAPTER 16
“You don’t have to do this. I can manage.” Ali wobbled as she got out of Keaton’s car.
He placed his arm around her for support. Support she needed thanks to her not-so-graceful tumble outside the restaurant. They were saying goodbye and she’d hugged him, turned, and tripped over her own feet, landing face-first on the sidewalk. On impact, she thought that her palm and knee had taken the brunt of the fall, but when she attempted to stand up she realized very quickly that she’d twisted her ankle on the way down.
She didn’t have her car since she’d walked to work that morning and had gone directly from work to Santino’s, so Keaton had insisted on driving her home.
As she hobbled up the path to the house and leaned into Keaton’s strength, she waited to feel something. Anything. A spark of attraction. A tingle of excitement. A shudder of arousal. But there was nothing.
His smile made her feel calm and his support made her feel nothing.
Not that she’d want to date Keaton even if that wasn’t the case. It would be complicated with KJ being his student. But, her body obviously didn’t discern between what was complicated or not. If it did, she’d feel the same way about Kade that she felt about Keaton.
“Thanks, again.” She balanced on one foot as she dug in her bag for her keys.
“Are you sure you don’t want to go and get that checked out?” Keaton asked for the dozenth time.
“I’m good. I’m going to ice it and it’ll be good as new.” She hoped.
She hadn’t heard a snap or pop when she fell, so she was fairly certain that she hadn’t broken it. But it was hurting like a sonofabitch.
As she jangled her purse hoping to hear her keys, the door opened. Kade stood before them looking like a modern-day warrior ready for battle. His hands were taped, and his sweats were hanging low on his waist. His T-shirt was damp, clinging to his skin.
“Hey.” She managed to croak past the tightness in her throat. “I was just lookin—”
“What happened?” he cut her off, his voice was low and menacing.
The intensity in both his stare and question felt like a physical bl
ow. It knocked the wind out of her and her answer came in a breathy exhale. “I fell.”
Kade reached out and gently held her hand so he could see her palm. His touch was featherlight. As the roughened pads of his fingers brushed her sensitive skin tingles spread from head to toe. Her heart pounded wildly as she watched him study her scrapes and tenderly turn her wrist. A moment ago all she could think about was her throbbing ankle; now another part of her body was throbbing and demanding her attention.
“Okay, well. It looks like you’re in good hands.” Keaton slowly dropped his arm from her waist, giving her time to gain her balance.
“Thanks, again,” she said as she clutched Kade’s forearm. “For everything.”
“No problem. See you guys later.” He smiled and she saw the disappointment in his eyes as he left Kade and Ali on the porch.
She watched him leave and wished things were different. He was a good guy. He was smart, funny, attractive, successful, and in ridiculous shape. He was going to make some woman very happy one day. She just wasn’t that woman and today wasn’t that day.
Before she’d even turned around, she was being lifted off the ground as Kade swooped her up in his arms.
“What are you doing?” she gasped as her arms wrapped around his neck.
He didn’t answer her, just stalked into the house. He shut the door behind them and carried her into the kitchen. Her breaths were coming in shallow pants as she clung to his neck. Being in his arms, smelling the musky scent, feeling his heart pounding against her ribs, seized her with overwhelming stimulation. Every cell in Ali’s body came to life with awareness. She felt more alive than she had in a very long time.
Warning bells sounded in her head. A caution sign flashed. Danger: Falling Deeper In Love Ahead.
Without a word, he sat her on the counter and turned on the faucet. Even through the cotton of her dress, the tile counter top was cold beneath her thighs and a shiver ran through her. He tested the water before placing her hand beneath it.
This entire scene was playing out like one of her McKnight-in-Shining-Armor fantasies. In one he rescued her from drowning and gave her mouth to mouth on the shore which leads to them making love beneath a blanket of stars. In another he saves her from a burning building, risking his own life to bring her to safety where they make passionate love on a blanket of soft grass.
Whisper of Love Page 12