by Gail Sattler
“Going to model it for me?”
“Model it?” she stammered. “Why?”
“Isn’t this the time a man is supposed to tell a woman how beautiful she looks when she buys something new?”
She didn’t want him to tell her anything of the sort. She didn’t want to get too familiar with him as a man. As it was, she had enjoyed holding clothes up to each other and the resulting playful banter far too much. “No, I’m not going to model it. Go sit down somewhere.”
After she paid for her purchase, Lionel insisted on carrying both bags. “That wasn’t too painful,” he said, holding the bags up as if they were some kind of conquest. “We still have lots of time left before supper.”
“We’re not done. We have to buy shoes.”
“Shoes?”
“I only brought my old beat-up sneakers. Did you bring anything else to wear on your feet?”
“Yes. I always have a pair of black rubber boots in the truck.”
She didn’t want to give him the dignity of a response. “Let’s go in here, they have a sale.”
It took them longer to select shoes than the clothing, but finally they managed to choose something relatively inexpensive yet comfortable.
Again, Lionel insisted on carrying all the bags. “I didn’t realize buying clothes would be such a major undertaking. After all this, I keep thinking I’m supposed to buy you jewelry or something.”
“I don’t wear jewelry. I only wear a watch and earrings. You’re safe.”
Without warning, his hand wrapped around hers and he stopped dead in his tracks, forcing Gwen to stop as well. She turned to him to see if something was wrong when he stepped closer, leaving only a few inches between them. His voice dropped to a low, gravelly rumble. “Maybe I don’t want to be safe.”
Her heart pounded. Such strange things had happened to her heart in the past few hours, she wondered if she should see a doctor.
He pointed to a bench a few feet away. “Wait here.”
Lionel strode into a jewelry store before she had a chance to protest.
Rather than stand in front of the store with her mouth hanging open, she demurely sat on the bench, looking anywhere other than the jewelry store. He returned in a few minutes, empty-handed. “Let’s go back to the truck to change.”
Gwen nodded, grateful he hadn’t bought anything, and they walked back to the truck. “How are we going to do this?”
“Flip a coin to see who goes first?”
Gwen won the flip, so she told Lionel to change first because she didn’t want to wait outside alone all dressed up.
Lionel took only a few minutes, but those few minutes transformed him. Compared to the usual T-shirt and jeans, he was a different man in cotton shirt and pleated slacks. She tried to imagine what he would look like with the finishing touch of adding a tie, but he didn’t need one. He’d changed from attractively rugged to dashingly handsome. Apparently clothes did make the man. He’d even touched up the gel in his hair.
He ran his hand along his jaw. “I wish I could have shaved, and I need a haircut. But this is as good as it gets away from home. Your turn.”
Gwen hopped inside and pulled the curtain closed. She’d only remembered at the last minute to buy pantyhose and a slip, and considered it quite unfair that women had to dress in so many layers. She drew the line at buying a new purse when she already had another good purse at home. To make it worse, she hadn’t brought any makeup, nor had she brought a curling iron. Even if she would have had the time to use the curling iron or apply the makeup, she refused to buy anything more for one dinner date, especially when this really wasn’t a date. It was only Lionel. Her temporary driving partner. They were only doing something different than the usual routine for dinner. Nothing more.
Getting dressed in the back of the truck was nothing like any other time she’d prepared herself to go out to dinner with a man. The only mirror inside the truck was the rearview mirror, so she didn’t get a full look at herself when she was ready. But she didn’t need to look. Without makeup and not being able to touch up her hair, she felt plain.
When she emerged from the truck, Lionel held out one hand to help her down.
His smile made her foolish heart flutter. “You look lovely, Gwen.”
She didn’t think so, but didn’t want to be impolite and contradict him. Instead, she concentrated on how good Lionel looked. She grinned. “You don’t look too bad yourself.”
He reached into his pocket. “There’s only one thing missing.”
“You’re not missing anything. You look great.”
“Not me. You.” He reached into his pants pocket and gave her a small box.
She stared at the small blue velvet box. It was from the jewelry store. “I can’t accept this.”
He stepped closer and twined the fingers of one hand in her hair. His emerald green eyes bored into her, and his familiar touch seared her to her soul. She had to remind herself that it was only Lionel. “My poor heart will break in two if you turn me down.”
She thought he was laying it on a bit thick, but opened the box anyway.
It was a pair of gold earrings, made of a gemstone the same color as the blue of her skirt. She suspected they were sapphires, surrounded by ribbons of gold dangling down. They were gorgeous, and they looked expensive.
“Thank you,” she choked out. No man had ever given her a gift like this before. She’d never had a serious enough relationship with a man where such a gift would have been appropriate. “I don’t know what to say.”
His fingers brushed her cheek. “You’ve already said thank you. That’s enough.” And then his lips brushed hers.
She tried not to enjoy it, but before she had a chance to think about it, he backed up, and it was over. “Going to put them on?”
Rather than climb back up into the truck with him standing behind her, Gwen stepped up on her tiptoes and used the side mirrors on the truck to change earrings. The simple task had never been more difficult because she couldn’t stop her hands from shaking. Finally, after a number of failed attempts, Lionel removed the earrings from her trembling fingers and slid them in for her.
Very gently he brushed the earrings with his knuckles, then rested his fingers under her chin. All she could do was stare into his gorgeous green eyes. If he tried again to kiss her, he wouldn’t have to bend down at all. With the shoes on instead of her sneakers, they were exactly the same height.
Her eyes drifted shut, but instead of the kiss she expected, his thumb caressed her lips, then he stepped away.
“They look good on you. Now let’s eat. All that shopping made me hungry.”
She didn’t resist when he grasped her hand and they began walking. “It’s a block north and two blocks east. We drove by it on the way to the mall. Looks like a nice place.”
“I guess,” she mumbled.
The restaurant turned out to be a cozy little place. The lights were turned down, slow, relaxing strains of music drifted through the air, and the room was quiet with the absence of children.
The hostess showed them to a small booth table in the corner, where Lionel slid in beside her. She was about to tell him to move and sit across the table from her, but he gave her an adorable impish grin that made her brain freeze. All thoughts of protest fled her mind.
She grabbed the menu and studied it intently. Instead of looking at his own menu, he slid one arm behind her back, snuggled up beside her, then pointed to one of the items listed on her menu. “That’s what the dispatcher recommended. He also said the chocolate cheesecake here is excellent, so save room for dessert.”
Gwen couldn’t concentrate. She could feel his breath on her neck. Not that she didn’t expect him to breathe, but it was distracting having him so close. If she turned her head, they’d bump noses.
She snapped the menu closed. “That’s what I’ll have, then.” She didn’t know what it was, but she wasn’t going to open the menu again.
Without warning, he covered her hand on top of
the closed menu.
“I enjoyed going shopping together. It would be nice to do it again some day.”
“I don’t really like shopping,” she mumbled. “What we did today was buy exactly what we went for, then leave. That’s the way I always shop.”
“I know. I shop that way too. That’s why I like shopping with you.”
Gwen shuffled away a couple of inches on the seat and turned to face him, needing to crane her neck back so she could focus on his face, he was so close. All he did was give her a goofy grin. Gwen wondered if maybe he needed glasses or something.
While the waitress took their orders, she slid a respectable distance away.
He opened his mouth to start talking, but Gwen was too nervous about what he would say, so she quickly said the first thing that popped into her mind before he had a chance to speak first. “When I checked my E-mail today, Garrett told me Robbie’s ultrasound showed something really interesting. He sounds really excited, so it must be something good, but he didn’t say what they found out. He also said that she’s feeling better. She’s just past her first trimester, and he was worried about her being so sick all the time.”
Suddenly, Gwen snapped her mouth shut. She couldn’t believe she’d just started to discuss her friend’s morning sickness with Lionel. She’d found him easy to talk to, and they’d shared some very personal things, but this time she knew she’d finally gone too far. Lionel couldn’t possibly want to hear about how sick Robbie had been.
He leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest, and that dopey grin came back. “Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be as in love as your brother and your friend?”
Gwen sighed and stared into the yellow candle in the center of the table. “What they have is really special. It’s funny how they met. We were all camping together when they fell in love. It hit him right smack between the eyes. I’d never believed in love at first sight until it hit my brother. Everyone saw the signs but him and Robbie. It was almost laughable. He was falling all over himself, behaving like a lovelorn puppy, anything to be close to her, and she couldn’t see it. He couldn’t even tell he was acting like an idiot around her.”
Lionel shifted closer, the dopey grin unchanged. “Really?”
“Yes, and they’re so different. He lives for the great outdoors, and she’d never done anything outside the city limits. Like night and day, those two. Yet they’re perfect for each other.”
He flipped a lock of her hair and rested his finger under her chin, leaving her no choice but to meet his gaze. “Does that make you think of anyone else?”
“Yeah … kinda …” Gwen stared into his eyes. Lionel was such a handsome man. He was intelligent, but probably very few people realized his potential because he didn’t spend long enough in one place for anyone to really know him. She wondered if he knew his neighbors. Uncle Chad’s neighbors really didn’t know him because he wasn’t around in the evenings or on weekends. Being a fellow trucker, Lionel’s lifestyle would be the same. She already knew he’d been to what he called his home church only a handful of times because he was out on the road almost every weekend.
At first she had him pegged as the strong, silent type. In a crowd he was thoughtful and serious, but the more she got to know him, the more friendly he became, and he really was a lot of fun once he let his guard down and was away from a crowd. He had a quick wit and an easy laugh, and she had never enjoyed being in anyone’s company so much.
Gwen wrapped her hands around her coffee cup and picked it up. “Yes. My friend Molly and her husband, Ken, are like that too.”
Dinner turned out to be a barbecue steak dish, which Gwen thoroughly enjoyed. Tonight Lionel didn’t tease her about the volume she ate. In fact, he didn’t tease her about anything. She would never have pegged Lionel for the sensitive male type, but tonight he was different, and she couldn’t figure him out.
They lingered a sufficient amount of time after dessert and then left the restaurant.
It was already dark outside, and although the air was still hot, it wasn’t uncomfortable. They turned in the direction of the mall, and Gwen held out her hand, expecting him to take it because they’d walked hand in hand on the way to the restaurant.
He picked up her hand, but instead of letting their joined hands dangle between them, he lifted her hand to his mouth. Her knees turned to rubber when he kissed it, let go, and slipped his arm around her waist.
She barely realized they had started to walk. She slipped her arm around his waist for lack of someplace better to put it.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m trying to be romantic. Is it that hard to tell? If it is, then I must be doing something wrong.”
Gwen tried not to choke. He wasn’t doing anything wrong. But this was Lionel. The man she argued with every day about whose turn it was to crawl under the trailer and check the slack adjusters. She didn’t want to be romantic. Yet they were walking down the street arm in arm.
Since they were exactly the same height with her shoes on, every step was in perfect unison, as accurate as marching, except their pace was leisurely and slow. His arm around her waist felt comforting and secure, and right.
They stood outside the truck door while Lionel fished in his pocket for the keys. “I guess this is it. Our date is over.”
Date? Gwen swallowed hard. Without question, tonight something had changed between them. She just wasn’t sure what. They hadn’t merely gone out to share a meal. They had breakfast, lunch, and supper together every day, but nothing about tonight had been the same as any other day. He’d been sweet and kind and attentive to her every need. He’d also been serious in everything he’d said and done.
She thought of the way he’d kissed her hand. He wasn’t trying to comfort her over something she was upset about, nor had panic and mayhem driven them into each other’s arms.
There wasn’t any other way to describe it. This had really been a date.
He inserted the key into the lock but didn’t turn it.
“I want you to know that I will never take advantage of you and never put any pressure on you when we’re in the truck. Just like that curtain is the separator for personal privacy, once we get inside the door of that truck, that’s the line. We can’t do anything that could jeopardize our working relationship in any way, not when we have to stay side by side for days without being able to get away from each other. I like you a lot, Gwen, and the only way I’m going to be able to handle this is to make the rules very specific. I don’t know about you, but I can’t mix business with pleasure.”
Gwen nodded. “No, we can’t do that.” This wasn’t a nine-to-five job. What little space they could call home was mobile. They’d seen each other at their worst, and they had no normal routine. There were no boundaries, no rules, no guidelines.
He stepped close to her. “So this is the end of our evening out, where a man takes a woman home. Here we are, our traveling home.” His hands cupped her face. “So this is where I kiss you good night.”
As Gwen’s eyes drifted shut, Lionel kissed her with such an aching sweetness she didn’t want it to end. She wrapped her arms around him and kissed him back, not caring that they were standing in the dark mall parking lot. He was tender and gentle yet held her so firmly that the bond between them was almost a tangible thing. When she thought he was pulling away, he instead tilted his head and kissed her again.
By the time he stopped kissing her, her knees felt wobbly. All she could do was watch as his eyes drifted open slowly. Very gently he touched her cheek, and then his hand fell to his side, completing the separation.
“Wow,” he murmured.
She didn’t know what had happened, but she couldn’t have expressed it better. Her world would never be the same again. “Yeah,” she mumbled back. “Wow.”
One corner of his mouth tilted up in a lazy half smile. “Will you still respect me in the morning?”
Gwen blinked. By morning they would be on their way
home. In fact, within an hour they were supposed to be on their way home. She shook her head to bring herself back to reality. “Not if we’re so late picking up our load that we get fired. You wait out here, I’m going to get changed first.”
She yanked the door open and hopped up. Lionel closed it softly behind her once she was inside.
Gwen’s hands shook as she pulled her duffel bag out of the bin. Every other time she’d kissed a date good-bye, that was it, it would be days before she saw him again. When a man looked like he was starting to get serious, she always had sufficient time to evaluate the relationship before she saw him again. This time she didn’t have that option. Lionel was waiting outside. She wouldn’t have that separation for thirty-two hours.
The importance of being so specific about drawing the line between work and their personal lives finally sank into her addled brain. When they were inside the truck and working, there was no room for romance, and that’s exactly what was happening. Strange as the situation was, she’d never had such a romantic evening in her life as what she’d just experienced with Lionel, and no man’s kiss had ever affected her like this.
Gwen had never changed her clothes so fast in her life. If she couldn’t have the time to recover from the rapid change in whatever it was that composed their relationship, and if she couldn’t change the setting of being confined inside the truck with him, then the change in clothes was the best she could do to emphasize the separation between a date and work.
She pulled out her grubbiest jeans and oldest T-shirt and slipped her feet into her beat-up old sneakers. As a finishing touch, she messed up her hair.
The transformation was complete.
She was back at work.
Chapter 12
What do you mean, there’s been a change in our running orders?”
The dispatcher tossed the trip envelope through the window onto the counter. “I said the customer got a rush order and put the load for Vancouver off ‘til another day. Now they’ve got a priority load for Phoenix. They need it picked up as soon as they’re finished with it. A doubles team can get it to Phoenix in thirteen hours. That’s you.”