by Nadia S. Lee
It was almost embarrassing that some consultant had actually charged money for something this easy to crack. He let out a disgusted snort.
“What?” Molly said, looking up from her phone.
“This so-called security. A three-legged donkey dropped on its head could’ve done a better job.”
She giggled. “Maybe they should fire their guy and hire you.”
“Too cheap to pay my fee. They honestly believe if I was any good, I’d be out on the West Coast, not here in Silver Springs.”
Her smile dimmed noticeably. “Oh.”
He started to reach for her, then stopped. Not a good move, but he wanted to offer some comfort. Molly loved her hometown and didn’t take kindly to ignorant stereotypes. So instead of cradling her jaw like he wanted to, he said, “They’re idiots for even thinking that. This town has a lot of talented people. These guys don’t seem to realize I didn’t go back to Caltech because I was bored.”
“So now what happens? Are they going to hire you to actually fix the problem, rather than just find it?”
“Doubtful. I’m going to type up a report highlighting all the issues, along with some screenshots. If I had my way, I’d send something totally inappropriate and risqué using the CEO’s email account to show them…but that would be immature.”
She chuckled. “Definitely immature.”
“Satisfying, though. Oh so satisfying.” He sighed. “So what have you been working on?”
“Some designs for a client who wants a set for his wife. He said it’s their thirtieth anniversary. Isn’t that amazing?”
“Wow. That is a big deal.”
“So I want to make sure it’s perfect.” She flipped her sketchbook and showed him some drawings, moving closer so he could see better.
Charlie whistled, surprised at how talented she was. He knew nothing about jewelry, but he knew beauty when he saw it. The lines were fluid, and the way the multicolored metals merged and looped was simple but elegant. “All of them look awesome.”
“Thanks. I hope the client likes at least one. We talked about it a bit, but I’m still a little unsure about what exactly he wants. He said I should ‘let my muse free.’”
He raised both eyebrows. “That’s not bad advice.”
“Nope. I want to do something real special for his wife.” She smiled, her eyes bright.
Air thickened in his throat as he felt the sheer happiness radiating from her. She was close enough that he could smell the fresh shampoo and soap over that subtle but mesmerizing scent that was uniquely hers. She was so warm, so soft, like all the best things in life—the first breezes of spring and the first ripe peaches of summer.
With his eyes, he traced the elegant curves of her beautiful face and lips. His tongue grew big and clumsy, and he wished he had just the right words for a moment like this so he could tell her what he was thinking without appearing like a blabbering idiot. Because right now? People might call him a genius, but the only stuff his sluggish brain could come up with was I know you’re my best friend’s sister and Steve’s daughter, but I really like you. I’ve liked you for a long time now and I want to be more than just the guy who helped out with homework when you were little. So, what do you say?
He shook himself mentally. That was so clumsy, he might as well just brace himself for failure. Unlike in coding, he couldn’t start over if he messed it up with Molly. And unlike cybersecurity, which made perfect sense, women were complicated and contradictory creatures. Molly was no exception.
He cleared his throat. “I’m sure your client’s going to be thrilled with whatever you come up with.” He gave her an encouraging smile. “If I ever need jewelry, you’ll be the first person I call.”
She nodded, but the happy expression on her face faded. “Thanks.” She pulled back, taking the sketch with her.
What had he said? Suddenly wanting to fix things—surely they weren’t beyond repair—he said, “I wasn’t just humoring you, Molly. I mean it. People will go to you for very special items, and you really are talented.”
The corners of her lips turned upward, although something in her face told him she was not at all fine. “I know you meant it, Charlie. You aren’t the type to lie just to make someone feel better. Like I said, thanks.” She gestured at her sketchbook. “I need to get more concepts done.”
“Sure,” he said, even though a warning went off in the back of his mind that he’d made everything worse by trying to fix it.
The heck of it was…he had no idea what he’d done wrong.
Chapter Eight
After mailing all the orders that had come in over the opening weekend, Molly stopped by Sondra’s house. She’d told herself she deserved the break after having packaged jewelry until her fingers and shoulders ached.
Since it was ten thirty, Sondra’s house was empty except for the lady herself—Kenny was at work, Donna in kindergarten and Junior in preschool.
Sondra set out a tray of cookies and coffee and sat with Molly in the homey living room. The floor was littered with toys. “You look positively morose. The store launch didn’t go the way you wanted?”
Molly shook her head. “No. It kicked butt, and I’m happy.” And she was thrilled with the success of her store. She’d sold more than half the pre-made jewelry pieces, and she’d have to make more soon or she’d be out of inventory. It was just hard to stay excited at the moment.
“Then why do you look like you just lost an arm?”
Her lips twitched. Leave it up to Sondra to say it like it was. “I just feel like I got kicked in the stomach.”
“Oh no. What happened?”
“It’s sort of silly.”
“You know you can tell me anything. Have I ever yapped about your secrets?”
“No.” Her brothers might consider Sondra an unrepentant gossip, but she’d never spread malicious rumors or broken someone’s confidence. “It’s Charlie.” Molly sighed. “It’s so stupid because I shouldn’t feel this way, but I do.”
“What did he do?”
“He complimented me on my designs for my first custom jewelry customer.”
“Okay… But that’s good, right? Or was he condescending?”
“No, no. He isn’t like that. But he didn’t end with just compliments. He said if he ever needed a piece, he’d make sure to commission it from me.”
“Uh… I gotta tell you, I’m not seeing the problem.”
Molly dug a hand into her unbound hair. “Why would he need jewelry except to give it to some woman? He doesn’t wear any.”
“Oh. Wow. Okay. That sucks.” Sondra pushed an extra-chocolatey cookie Molly’s way. “Here, take this. You look like you need it.”
Molly took the cookie. “Thanks. I try to tell myself I shouldn’t feel down. I mean, he has the right to date whoever he wants and…you know, give the woman nice things. Right? But it kills me to think that one day I’ll be designing an engagement ring for his girlfriend.”
Sondra made a face. “That’s just not cool.”
“I know, but I can’t exactly blame him for wanting me to do it because my designs are good. At the same time…the idea of him marrying somebody else… Why can’t I find true love the way my brother did? Or Bri and Bekah? Or Spike or any number of my cousins? It’s like I’m the sole loser around here.”
“Chase hasn’t found anybody,” Sondra said, referring to Molly’s marine brother.
Molly gave her best friend an “are you kidding me” look. “He’s in the Marines. Until his recent injury, he was deployed overseas, surrounded by his platoon buddies.”
“All right, fine. But hey, if Charlie marries somebody else…it might hurt for a while, but it won’t matter in the grand scheme of things. It just wasn’t meant to be. There’s a man for you out there, if not in Silver Springs, then someplace else. Don’t let this get to you. You should be celebrating your big success, girlfriend. You aren’t even thirty, but you have your own business and an incredible talent that people are willing t
o pay for. You have an awesome family and amazing friends—like me! So you’ll get through this. You just need to give yourself a chance to explore other, you know, opportunities. You haven’t even dated anybody seriously since high school when you decided Charlie was the man for you.”
“So?”
“So how can you be so sure?”
“You never dated anybody but Kenny, but you knew.”
“Yeah, but Kenny wanted to date me too. This is different. Maybe there is somebody, but you don’t know because you’ve never given yourself a chance to find him. Like your customer…the one who’s spending a lot of money to get you to design something cool… I bet you he didn’t just go to the first website that popped up when he Googled. He probably looked at a bunch and decided that you were the right one for the job. It’s the same thing.”
Molly sighed. “Think so?”
“Yeah. Just look around and explore your options. I hate seeing you down like this over a guy, even if you do think he’s perfect. You deserve to be happy.” Sondra pulled a tablet out from under the couch. “You know what? I’m going to help you set up an online dating profile.”
“What, now?”
“Why wait?”
“But it’s November. The holiday season…”
“You opened your store during the holiday season, and apparently it’s done fine. True love waits for no one, and doesn’t discriminate based on the time of year. Besides, every month has a holiday or two.” She tapped on her tablet a few times and pulled up a popular dating site. “See? Perfect. Now put in your email address and a password.” She handed it to Molly.
Molly wasn’t so sure about this, but why not? Sondra had a point. She entered her email address and chose a password. The site sent her to another page, instructing her to upload a photo.
“I’m skipping the photo,” Molly said.
“You can’t skip the photo. Men are going to think you’re a cross between Jabba the Hutt and Ursula from The Little Mermaid.”
“Oh.” Molly made a face. “Seriously? You think?”
Sondra cocked an eyebrow. “Why else would you not have a photo on a dating site profile?”
“Okay, fine.” Molly dug through until she found a decent selfie from Sam’s wedding. She thought she’d looked great there, but Charlie, Sam’s best man, hadn’t even noticed. A totally wasted effort. Her lips tight, she sent it to Sondra’s device and used it as her profile picture.
Together they set up the rest. Molly mentioned her interest in jewelry, helping people out because she believed lending a hand to her neighbors was a way she could contribute to making the world a better place and her love of her family and hometown. Once she was done, she hit SUBMIT and verified her email address.
“Now you just wait and see who fate pairs you up with.” Sondra grinned, munching on a cookie. “I bet you’ll be surprised at what happens.”
Chapter Nine
Oh boy, was Sondra ever right. Because the responses Molly got “surprised” her until she thought the top of her head would blow.
She had no idea what had happened since the good ol’ days, but apparently the modern way to woo women involved sending pictures of a “not safe for work” variety involving the other party’s dangly bits.
After three days, she tried to disable her profile. But the stupid website glitched over and over again, which meant that the horrible men there kept harassing her by repeatedly pinging her profile with disgusting photos and ridiculous innuendo. And since the site wouldn’t let her disable the alerts either—more glitches!—her phone kept buzzing every time she got one of the obnoxious things.
Just what had happened to an old-fashioned “Hi, how are you?” or “Do you want to meet for coffee”? At this rate, she’d be better off swearing off men—except Charlie, but he was totally out of her league.
When her phone notification went off yet again while she was making a new piece for her online store, Emilia chortled. At least the baby thought it was hilarious. But her amusement wasn’t enough to stop Molly from muttering to herself.
Charlie looked up from his laptop. “What’s wrong?”
“These…incessant notifications!”
“I thought that was good. You made a sale, right?”
“No,” she said, burying her face in her hands. She probably deserved this for listening to Sondra. She should’ve stayed strong and gone for real, face-to-face interactions. Or something. At least that way men couldn’t send her inappropriate pictures.
Or was whipping one out of a back pocket part of dating etiquette now? She wouldn’t be surprised…
“What’s going on?” He set aside his laptop on the coffee table and came closer. “Molly, come on. You can tell me.”
“I signed up for a dating website, and now I can’t delete my profile.”
He stared at her, his moss-green eyes hawkish behind his glasses. “Why would you want to do that?”
“Which one? Signing up part or wanting to delete the profile part?”
“Both.”
She bit her lower lip. “I thought it was about time I started dating more seriously. I’m not getting any younger, and I want what Sam and Lina have.”
His gaze stayed intent on hers, and she felt like she’d been pulled over by the sheriff for speeding…which had, in fact, happened to her. Twice.
But unlike those two unfortunate times, this moment with Charlie was making her skin prickle and tingle in a pleasantly warm way.
Suddenly awkward, she dropped her gaze. She didn’t want him to notice her feelings for him. “But instead of wanting to find my one true love, it’s actually making me want to be a nun.”
Charlie blinked. “Well, don’t do that. You aren’t even Catholic. Here, lemme see.” He held out a hand.
She gave him the phone, unlocked. He started scrolling through, then suddenly choked. “Agh! Good God!”
“I know…”
“Nobody should ever be asked to look at that. Ahh, my eyes!” He turned to her. “How many of these have you gotten?”
“Too many, believe me.”
“Surely you aren’t willing to suffer this…visual assault to get a date.”
“No.”
A determined gleam entered his eyes. “Okay. I’ll fix it.”
“It’s the site. It’s glitchy and won’t let me delete my profile. I already sent them a support ticket.” To which they’d responded with an automated message without doing anything. Just thinking about it annoyed her. Again.
“Not to worry. I’ll take care of it.”
She flushed. “It’s okay.”
“Maybe okay to you, but not okay to me.” He raised a hand. “Just so we’re clear, I’m not doing this for you, Molly. I’m doing this for me.”
She tilted her head. “You are?”
He nodded. “Obviously these troglodytes are subhuman, and I’m not letting them get away after making me see that.”
His words were saying one thing, but his tone was so protective that for a moment she couldn’t help but think maybe he was feeling something more for her. Then she shook herself. Charlie was always protective and nice. She shouldn’t read too much into it.
* * *
Molly had no idea how true what he’d said was, even though the look she’d given him when he told her he was doing it for himself was priceless. She’d told him again he didn’t have to do anything about it before she left, apparently still under a misguided assumption that he really was doing it for her.
But he’d meant what he said.
Charlie was already upset she wanted to date. Yeah, okay, if he wasn’t going to do anything about his attraction to her, she was bound to go for some other guy…even though he objected to the idea with a ferocity he reserved for debating people spouting fake science. The online jerks harassing her had just turbocharged his outrage.
Technically, those nasty pieces of work being true to themselves wasn’t a tragedy, since he didn’t want her giggling and mooning over another
guy. But no woman should be forced to tolerate that kind of bad behavior.
After a few more keystrokes to finish what he’d started, Charlie sat back, took a long swig of his energy drink and laughed. Emilia cooed and laughed in response. He leaned over. “Pretty cool, huh?”
She looked up at him, her eyes bright and clear.
“I know. I think they deserve it, too. You’re the best baby there is, Emilia. When you’re all grown up and some jerk bothers you, you just tell me and I’ll make sure he never gets near another piece of electronics again.”
She reached out and clutched his finger. He went still at the connection, the way she looked up at him with such trust and openness. Then he realized what he’d said, and a tight lump formed in his throat. He couldn’t believe how easily he’d spoken of a future together when she was old enough to date. But somehow it was natural to think about what it would be like to be her guardian forever.
He kissed the soft skin of her hand around his finger. “It’s a promise. No matter what happens, Emilia.” He straightened. “Want something to eat? It’s dinnertime.”
She chortled, then made a smacking sound with her lips.
“Yeah. Me too.” He went to the kitchen and made her a fresh bottle of formula with practiced ease. It was amazing how comfortable he was taking care of Emilia now, all due to Molly’s help and advice.
A couple of quick knocks and Sam walked in carrying a pizza box. Charlie stared at his best friend, dressed casually in a sweater and jeans. “What are you doing here?” He looked behind Sam. “Where’s Lina?”
“Out with the girls. So I thought I’d come over and see how you’re doing with Emilia.”
“As you can see, we’re doing great.” He handed her the bottle, and she clutched it greedily, sucking down the warm formula.
“I see that. She is adorable.” Sam plopped down in front of the coffee table and placed the pizza on it. “Come on, I come bearing food.” Then he leaned over and looked at the laptop screen. “What the heck? You trying to find a girl online?”