The Littlest Matchmaker Read online

  “Practice makes perfect.” She brought her lips the rest of the way to his.

  They kissed until he had to hold on to the edge of the worktable just so he could stop his hands from taking her and hauling her up against him. A noise somewhere cut into his concentration enough that he could recall how Lisa wanted to take things…slowly.

  This was going to be tough.

  Or maybe for right now, not so tough.

  Kevin identified the sound that had been distracting him as the sharp clatter of a wooden yo-yo bouncing against the tile floor.

  “What’cha doin’?” Jamie asked.

  Kevin stepped back, but kept his attention on Lisa.

  Please don’t let me see regret for that kiss.

  She smiled at him, then looked past him to Jamie.

  “We’re being happy, sweetie,” Lisa replied.

  And those were the best words that Kevin had heard in one helluva long time. If ever.

  DINNER WAS WRAPPED UP, the dishes cleared, and all that remained was the original purpose of the meal…the details of the Thanksgiving pageant. Lisa had ducked the topic as long as she could. While Kevin relaxed on the sofa, and Jamie closeted himself in his bedroom to do battle with his yo-yo, she slipped into her room and retrieved the pageant info she’d gathered from Hillside’s hummingbirds from her dresser.

  “So let me see what I’ve signed myself up for,” Kevin said when she reentered the room.

  She settled next to him and handed over the notes. “You really don’t have to do this, you know. Jamie would get over it.”

  Kevin briefly glanced over at her while thumbing through the information. “Careful, or you’re going to give me some sort of rejection complex. I told Jamie I’d do it, and I’d never let him down. Besides,” he said, waving a page at her, “set construction is right up my alley. I’ll call the head dad and volunteer the back of my shop. It’s the slow season. We have the room and the supplies to build the trees they need.”

  And yet another connection was to be forged.

  “I feel like we’re taking over your life,” Lisa said.

  He laughed as he set the paperwork on the coffee table. “Hey, I’m a little more multidimensional than the props we’ll be building. I still have my job and friends and family, okay?”

  It felt distinctly not okay to Lisa. Life had been closing in on her enough without this complication, but she’d have to deal with it. She saw no choice.

  “If it gets to be too much, you’ll let me know?” she said.

  The concerned look he gave her went well beneath her skin, all the way to her heart. “If you promise to do the same in return, absolutely.”

  She hated feeling like such a prima donna. This wasn’t her style. “I know I’m being kind of weird about this, but—”

  He gently settled his hand against the side of her face. “Don’t…. Don’t try to excuse your feelings or discount them, either. This is new territory for both of us, but if we communicate and take it one day at a time, we should all be fine.”

  Communication. Now there was a concept. She’d had precious little of that in her marriage. Her pregnancy had been a surprise to them both, but she’d been sure that James would adapt to fatherhood. That he’d at least engage, rather than view his son as a new set of chores. How could he not? Jamie might have been unexpected, but he’d been the most beautiful baby, plump and serene. But James had never quite connected, and their marriage had begun to fray. Whether that had been James’s fault, hers or both of theirs didn’t matter; the end result had been the same. Lisa knew that her communication skills were rusty.

  “I’ll try to let you know how I’m feeling,” she said. “That’s the best I can promise.”

  “Hey, that’s the best anyone can,” Kevin replied. “Now how about if I take a minute and call this guy?” he asked with a nod to the pageant notes. “Then we can get the focus back where we need it…on us?”

  How did he know just the right thing to say? She felt some of her tension recede. Maybe she could do this, after all. Maybe her time for happiness had finally arrived.

  “I’d like that…very much,” she said.

  THE FOLLOWING TWO WEEKS blew by at a crazy pace for Kevin. He had the Alden bid to deal with during the day on top of all his other work, and renovations on his own fixer-upper at night. But most important of all was his time with Lisa and Jamie. So far in the great battle to keep all matters equal, the scale was tipping heavily toward time with Jamie.

  Kevin had worked things out so that the Hillside gang got together at his shop Monday and Thursday evenings at six-thirty. First up on the list had been to create the trees for the pageant’s forest setting. As it turned out, a couple of the dads were actually pretty handy with the jigsaw, so they were almost able to keep up with the mad painting skills of Jamie and the other kids. It was a toss-up to see whether the tree trunks and branches would wear more paint than the children.

  This wild Monday night, the kids had gotten the lion’s share. Jamie was one continuous splatter of paint from head to toes. While Kevin was looking forward to being done with the painting and on to gluing autumn-colored paper leaves onto the tree frames, he shuddered to think what the kids might be able to do with glue.

  Because he was becoming attuned to what Lisa could deal with and what she couldn’t, he had every intention of scrubbing Jamie down in Shortbread Cottage’s kitchen as soon as they arrived. The interior of his truck, he’d address later, he thought, giving a wry glance at the smudged, brown handprints Jamie was currently placing on the passenger window.

  Kevin parked in front of Lisa’s place, then went around to help Jamie out of his car seat.

  “Hang on while I get your seat, buddy,” he said to the little boy, but Jamie was already cruising up the walk to the café entrance. More handprints to clean for sure, since he was going to beat Kevin to the door.

  They were at the sink, and Jamie on his second round of singing “Happy Birthday”—which Kevin totally didn’t grasp—when Lisa entered the kitchen.

  “Who won tonight, the kids or the trees?” she asked with a nod toward the paint that still marked Jamie’s face.

  “The kids…again,” Kevin replied.

  “Think you can have him clean by Wednesday?” she asked, her voice light with laughter.

  “It’s possible, though not probable.”

  Especially since out of the corner of his eye, he could see Jamie tiptoeing away, taking advantage of the fact that the grown-ups were all wrapped up in each other. Kevin quickly shut his mind to the other ways he might be wrapped up with Lisa. He was going to take this at the slow pace she desired, even if it killed him. And it just might.

  She waved a hand in front of his face. “Hey, are you okay?”

  That was open for debate, but he fibbed a little and said he was fine.

  “About Wednesday,” she said. “It’s Inquisition Night.”

  “Ah. Steeling yourself already?”

  “Watch and learn. You’re going to need it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It seems that my mother’s curiosity has been piqued. Your presence has been firmly requested.”

  “Really? Why?”

  Could this be a “meet the parents” Were they actually going to move past stolen kisses when Jamie wasn’t looking?

  “I’m guessing it’s because Jamie can scarcely get out a sentence without your name in it. In Mom’s words, she wants to see who this Kevin is.”

  Okay, so it was more of a “meet the grandparents.” Kevin would take what he could get, especially if it was being offered by Lisa. Better that than feeling as though he was forcing himself on her.

  “So what do you say?” she asked. “Ready for a command performance?”

  “Sure. What time on Wednesday?”

  “Six,” she said. “Meet me here and we’ll all go together. It will be safer for you that way.”

  “Do I look like I need a bodyguard?”

  She sh
ook her head. “You don’t know the half of it, my friend.”

  Chapter Seven

  Lisa loved her mother, yet she had to wonder why it was that a woman who had made a living communicating with others would now pick up a phone only when it suited her? Wednesday morning, she pulled into her mom and dad’s driveway. She needed to smooth the path to Kevin’s first Inquisition Night, more for her own peace of mind than his. If he could deal with a pack of Hillside kids and dads in his shop on a twice-weekly basis, he had the Zen thing down. Lisa, however, did not.

  “This is Grammie’s house, not Miss Courtney’s,” Jamie pointed out from the backseat.

  “I know. Mommy just needs to talk to Grammie for a minute. Let’s go on in and surprise her.”

  “Kay.”

  Though it was just past seven, Lisa knew that her early-rising dad would already be at the office. Her mom’s schedule these days, she was a little less certain of.

  “Mom?” she called as she closed the front door behind herself and Jamie.

  No one answered.

  “Let’s go check the kitchen,” she said to Jamie, who nodded in agreement.

  There, she found her mother, dressed for the job she no longer had. Lisa let her gaze drop to floor level. High heels, even. One would think after thirty years in them, sneakers would sound pretty appealing.

  Her mother looked up from her laptop computer. “This is a pleasant surprise.”

  “You’re a tough woman to track down,” Lisa said. “I’ve been trying to reach you.”

  “I had you penciled in for a return call later this morning.”

  Lisa laughed. “Good to know.”

  Her mother gave a brisk nod. “But as long as you’re here, Jamie, why don’t you go on up to your room? There’s a little surprise waiting for you.”

  “Really?” he asked, his voice rising on a note of excitement.

  “Would Grammie tease you?”

  He shook his head vehemently. “Nuh-uh. ”

  “Then go on,” Lisa’s mom said.

  Jamie needed no more encouragement.

  “What was that about?” Lisa asked as she pulled out a chair opposite her mom.

  “Nothing. Just a trifle.”

  Her mom had sounded a little too casual to be believable, but Lisa let the matter rest.

  “Kevin is coming to dinner tonight,” she said.

  “So your voice mail told me,” her mother replied. “Did you want to discuss the menu? We’re having citrus-honey glazed Cornish game hen and a mix of oven-roasted sweet potatoes and Yukon Golds.”

  “Cool, just so long as you don’t plan to have Kevin on a platter, too. For tonight at least, no deposition tactics, Mom. He’s off-limits.”

  Her mother removed her reading glasses and set them on the table next to her computer. “Well, this sounds personal. Is Kevin more than just Jamie’s pageant helper?”

  Maybe she should have included herself in the moratorium on deposition tactics.

  “We’ve been…1 don’t know…hanging out together, for lack of a better term.”

  “Hanging out, as in dating?”

  Lisa sighed. “One meal without Jamie, weeks ago. No official dates since.”

  “But the meal was a date?”

  “As it turned out, yes.”

  “Really? It’s surprising you couldn’t have identified that going in. And you wonder why I’ve been pressing you to get out and about?”

  “Good news. You can stop pressing.” Of course Lisa knew she’d have better luck in asking the Mississippi to reverse its flow.

  “How funny, yet somehow fitting. You’re dating Kevin Decker…”

  Just then, Jamie burst back into the room.

  “Mommy, guess what?”

  “There was a pony in your bedroom?”

  “No! Better! Grammie got me a race-car bed.”

  “And you can sleep in it any time you want,” her mother said to her son.

  “Wanna go see it, Mommy?”

  No was not an acceptable response, though it covered the way Lisa was feeling. Jamie didn’t need a race-car bed any more than he needed his own toy room. She was surprised her mom hadn’t yet evicted the plants and let Jamie move into the conservatory.

  “You two go on,” her mother said.

  Lisa gave her a pointed look. “I’ll be back,” she said, and she meant it as a warning, not a promise.

  Jamie took her by the hand and hauled her upstairs to the room that her parents kept for him.

  “Look!”

  Though Lisa wasn’t a racing fan, she’d peg the bed as a Formula One…low, red, sleek and so expensive that she wanted to march downstairs and shake some sense into her mother.

  “I wanna sleep here tonight,” Jamie said, dancing in place.

  “Not tonight, but soon, honey,” Lisa promised.

  What child wouldn’t want to sleep in this fantasy of a room? In this latest redo—the last one having been just six months ago—her mother had gone all-out with a race-car theme. In addition to the bed was a checkered flag rug next to it, and a low white bookcase packed with new toy cars. Lisa’s gaze narrowed as she took in the framed, autographed photos of drivers, be they NASCAR or Indy or Formula One. She had no doubt that all were authentic, too. Heck, Jeff Gordon’s came with a “To Jamie.”

  Sheer overkill.

  “Why don’t you stay up here and play?” she said to her son. “I’ll come get you in plenty of time to go to Miss Courtney’s.”

  As she returned to the kitchen, Lisa collected her thoughts. She needed to put this in perspective. While careful spending was mandatory for Lisa, it wasn’t for her mother. She’d worked hard, earned a lot, and Lisa had little say over how she spent her money. Still, she had to believe her mom hadn’t thought this wholesale spoiling of Jamie all the way through.

  “Impressive,” Lisa said as she entered the kitchen.

  “It turned out quite well, didn’t it?” her mother asked.

  “It’s astounding.”

  Her mother’s finely arched brows rose even higher. “Am I sensing some displeasure?”

  “The room’s great. Really. It’s the message it delivers that doesn’t do much for me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Mom, I know you didn’t intend it this way, but let me tell you how it feels to me. It feels as though I can’t compete.”

  “Compete? We’re his grandparents, for heaven’s sake, Lisa. There is no competition here. We’re all one family.”

  Lisa shook her head. “I’m telling you how it feels. My perception, okay?”

  “Which is miles away from reality,” her mother replied.

  “I think reality is a relative thing.”

  Her mother sighed. “All right, then, tell me your reality, and I’ll tell you mine.”

  Lisa pulled out a chair and sat. “My reality is that I’m a single mother who works darned hard to keep her son on the right path. I want him to understand that things are nice, but not the be-all and end-all. Even before you redecorated, he had a great room here.”

  “A room you never let him stay in.”

  “Not true. We’ve stayed here.”

  “Easter was the most recent time. I track it, Lisa,” she said, waving a hand at her computer.

  It hadn’t felt that long ago, but there was no denying her mother’s love of spreadsheets and accuracy.

  “Of course you do,” Lisa replied.

  “Don’t be mouthy,” her mother said. “My reality is this. Now that my life is taking a slower pace, I have more time for my grandson and even for my daughter, believe it or not. But it seems that you don’t have any time for me. All I’m trying to do is create an inviting atmosphere. I’ve been plain about the fact that I’d like to see you both move home, and you’ve been equally plain about the fact that you’d starve in the streets, first.”

  “Isn’t that overstating it?”

  “I’m telling you how it feels. My perception,” she replied, echoing Lisa’s own
indisputable words.

  “Mommy?” called a tentative little voice from the kitchen’s arched entryway.

  Lisa turned, and her heart sank at Jamie’s furrowed brow. The last thing she wanted was for him to hear any discord. No matter what her personal dispute with her mom, they both loved this little boy.

  “Can we go to Miss Courtney’s now?” he asked.

  She looked back at her mother. “Let’s talk later, okay, Mom?”

  Her mother, who looked just as shaken as Lisa felt, nodded. They both wanted the best for Jamie, but they’d just shown him their worst.

  KEVIN WAS WILLING TO CEDE that this might be a meal of inquisition, but the home that Lisa had grown up in was no dank Spanish castillo’s dungeon. He might not have grown up wealthy, but he was thankful that his mom had instilled manners into all the Decker kids. Yes, he’d thought Amanda’s palate-cleansing sorbet between courses might have been a little show-offy, but at least he’d known which spoon to select.

  Jamie looked pretty jazzed by all of the ice cream, though. He sat in his “special chair” at the head of the table, just like a little king. Lisa had been seated pretty much at the opposite end of the room from her son. Kevin was beginning to wonder if she hadn’t exaggerated family dynamics, as he’d first thought. It could be that Amanda was subconsciously engaging in the age-old battle tactic of divide and conquer. But Kevin had decided long before entering this opulent mahogany dining room that tonight, he would be an observer. A journalist reporting from the front lines…

  “So, Kevin, tell me a little bit about yourself,” Amanda said.

  Or maybe it would be the other way around.

  “Mom,” Lisa cut in before Kevin could begin to frame a safe answer. “This isn’t a job interview, and you know plenty about Kevin already.”

  “It’s okay,” Kevin said. “What are you curious about, Amanda?”

  “Oh, I don’t know, exactly…Your family, perhaps. We saw a lot of Courtney when Lisa was in high school, but I’ve never met your mother and father.”

  “They moved to Arizona a few years ago,” he said.

  “And are you close?”

  “We talk at least weekly, so I’d say, yes, we’re close.”