The Littlest Matchmaker Read online

  “You talk weekly? How wonderful! Do you see them often?”

  Lisa set down her fork with a rattle that elicited a chuckle from her father. Kevin briefly settled a hand on her knee to let her know that he had this under control.

  “I’ve spent the past few winters down there. The Davenport area gets pretty slow for construction once the first snow falls. I pick up small renovation jobs just to keep myself busy and money coming into the business.”

  “Have you ever thought of moving down there…living in Arizona full-time to be closer to them?” Amanda asked.

  “Not really,” he replied. “They have their own lives and their own set of friends.”

  “True, but I’m sure they’d welcome you. Every parent wants to see more of his or her child.”

  Lisa rose. “Okay, Mom, that’s it. Into the kitchen.”

  “Sit down, Lisa. I was just making an innocent comment.”

  “Innocent? That was as calculated as they come,” Lisa replied. Kevin was relieved to see that she’d sat, anyway.

  Lisa’s dad, however, rose and went to the end of the table to see Jamie. “What do you say, champ, that we go into your favorite jungle room?”

  “Okay, but I still get cake, don’t I?”

  Kevin had watched the kid eyeing the German chocolate cake on the buffet the entire meal. Heck, he’d been doing exactly the same thing, too.

  Lisa smiled at her son. “Of course you do. Grampy will bring you back here in time.”

  “Care to come along, Kevin?” Bob asked.

  In a heartbeat, but he wanted to be sure Lisa was okay with that, first. He glanced over at her, and she nodded her head.

  “Sounds good,” he said to Lisa’s dad.

  “I thought it might. Ladies, we’ll be back in ten minutes. I trust by then you’ll have hammered out a truce?”

  From the look on Lisa’s face, Kevin had his doubts. He’d come back later and count the casualties.

  THE DINING ROOM MIGHT have cleared, but the red haze around the periphery of Lisa’s vision hadn’t.

  “Well, that was fun,” she said to her mother. “I have my doubts that Kevin will come back for a second round of this.”

  “You underestimate your appeal.”

  “I was referring to you.”

  “Whatever do you mean?”

  “I mean that since you’ve retired, you’re not the mom I always told people you were. The nonmeddling, always supportive, amazing mom. Don’t get me wrong, I love you as much as always. I’m just finding it darned tough to be around you.”

  Her mom took a sip of her wine and leaned back in her chair, her usual ladder-straight posture gone. “Well, that hurt. I don’t know what to say, Lisa.”

  Lisa felt more than a little chagrined. While she knew her mom appreciated straight-talk, maybe that had been more razor-straight.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t mean to be harsh, but you’ve been making me feel cornered, which is also one of my hot buttons. Can you please give me some space in which to be an adult?”

  Her mother sat silent, regarding her.

  “I’ve really upset you, haven’t I?” she eventually asked.

  Lisa nodded. “And kind of freaked me out.”

  Her mother’s laugh sounded too close to tears for Lisa’s comfort. “To think that I retired partially to make things up to you. Fine job I’ve been doing.”

  “Make what up to me?” Lisa asked.

  Her mother looked down at her hands. “I…I suppose to make up for not being home so much.”

  Lisa scrubbed her hands over her face. She felt tense, tired and very sorry she hadn’t brought this to a head days—no, weeks—ago.

  “I can’t change the way you feel, Mom, but I can tell you that from my end of the mother-daughter relationship, I have very few complaints. Oh, there’s the slinky black dress you wouldn’t let me wear to junior prom—”

  “Low cut, verging on tartlike,” her mother said.

  “Which I understand now,” Lisa added. “And I had some quibbles about the curfew you and Dad insisted on, but on the whole, I think I’ve been lucky to have a mom who not only said but always proved that if you work hard, anything is attainable.”

  “Well, thank you.”

  “But now let’s fast-forward a little. Whatever you think you lost can’t be regained by trying to haul me home when I’m closer to thirty than twenty. I’m a grown woman, with a child of my own. I get that you love Jamie. I do, too. I’d give up my life to protect him.”

  “And I feel exactly the same way about both you and Jamie.”

  Lisa nodded. “I know you do. The thing is, I need you to recognize my independence.”

  “Your independence?” Her mother gave a bemused shake of her head. “Lisa, from the moment you dropped out of college and married James, you became a fully independent woman…and far before you were ready. I think perhaps you need to take a moment to acknowledge your own independence. Your father and I were more than happy to loan you the money to start your business, and we’d be far more than happy to help you out now. Why do you always have to fight us?”

  “And why do you always have to try to pull me in so hard?” Lisa demanded in the same angry tone that had come into her mother’s voice. She paused, then laughed. “I am my mother’s daughter, aren’t I?”

  “You are,” her mom agreed.

  They regarded each other from across the Irish linen tablecloth.

  “How about if I don’t pull so hard and you push a little less?” her mother asked after a measured silence.

  “Think it’s possible?” Lisa said.

  “Of course. If you work hard enough…”

  Lisa completed the phrase she’d heard since childhood. “Anything is attainable.”

  Her mom smiled, and Lisa relaxed a little.

  “Okay, so how do we work this out?”

  “How about if I drop the idea of you moving home?” her mother offered.

  “That would go far.”

  “But I want to take Jamie now and then, for all of our good. You’re his mother, and I will always respect that. I think you sometimes forget, though, that I’m his grammie, and now that I have the time, I want to be a part of his life…and in a more meaningful way than dinners once a week. Do you think that would work for you?”

  Lisa thought back to something Kevin had said weeks ago: Maybe if you let them help more, they wouldn’t push so hard…Smart man, Kevin Decker.

  “What do you propose?”

  “Let me take Jamie from Courtney’s to Hillside Academy. Let your father and me have him overnight now and then. I don’t think you’ve had a single night away from him, and it’s time that changed. He’s not a baby anymore.”

  “I know,” Lisa said. “There just hasn’t been any reason to be apart.”

  “I can think of one,” her mother replied. “The fact that you need a night for yourself. Say, maybe next Monday night? Your father and I have date nights this weekend or I’d offer to do it then.”

  “You have date nights?” Lisa asked, distracted by the concept.

  “Of course,” she replied. “At least once weekly. More, now that I’m not working and can arrange some fun things. I’ve reserved the honeymoon suite at The Abbey Hotel. It has the most fabulous—”

  “Monday would be fine,” Lisa quickly replied. Anything to block the flow of too much information. She really preferred not to think about her parents’ love life. Among other things, it reminded her of her lack of the same.

  “Okay, no more talk of honeymoon suites,” her mother said. “But I just have to wonder, what are you going to do with that whole night to yourself?”

  Chapter Eight

  Lisa lurked outside the door of her son’s room, where she’d left Kevin sitting on the foot of Jamie’s bed, chatting it up about the Thanksgiving pageant and what they would be working on next Monday night. She’d tried to linger for some of the talk, only to be banished by her son because if she heard, it
would “mess up the ‘prize.’” Heaven forbid she mess up any prizes. As it happened she had a prize of another sort taking front and center in her mind, anyway…exactly as her mother had intended.

  A whole night alone, and what was Lisa to do with it?

  She plopped down on the sofa and considered her options. A Reese Witherspoon chick flick retrospective held some appeal. So did a good book, a glass or two of wine and all the chocolate she could eat. Those ideas appealed to her need for leisure, if nothing else. But another need kept calling to her, one Kevin had awakened, but they had yet to fully satisfy. She wanted him. A full, delicious uninterrupted night with him. At least that was what her body wanted.

  Her mind? The word conflicted didn’t begin to cover that territory. Kevin was being pushed on her, and she and Jamie on him, at a pace that made her very, very uncomfortable. And yet she wanted to urge him into yet another role…lover. She was being unfair to the both of them, but she couldn’t stop herself. But maybe she needed to stop overthinking—and just start doing—in order to chase off that odd emptiness that still lingered deep inside.

  She knew herself well enough to accept that she cared about Kevin. She wouldn’t hunger for him like this otherwise. She’d never been one for casual flings or sex without a deeper attraction. The most casual kiss shared with Kevin pushed her imagination ahead to other possibilities. She’d never seen him with so much as his shirt off, but she knew the warm, resilient feel of his skin. She knew the hard responsiveness of his body, and she knew her own need was going to make her crazy if she didn’t do something about it.

  Once she satisfied that hunger, maybe she could start acting like a sane woman again. Maybe she could focus on business more than she had in the past couple of weeks. She’d been paying a price for her distraction in batches of overbaked shortbread and messed-up orders with her suppliers.

  Kevin came down the hallway, then sat close enough to Lisa that she could pick up the spicy scent of his aftershave. Just the smell made her want to move closer, so she did, earning a look of slight surprise followed by a smile as she snuggled in. She’d take her small thrills where she could get them.

  “Interesting night,” he said.

  “Very.”

  “Nice that you and your mom didn’t manage to kill each other.”

  She laughed. “We’ve lasted this long, so we’ll probably last a few more decades, even if we do scare people in the process. Thanks for your concern, though.”

  “No problem, but I have to admit that I’m thinking of me, too. If homicide had been involved, I might have missed that German chocolate cake.”

  She nudged him on the chest. “I know where I rate.”

  He tipped her face up to meet his eyes. “Seriously, you rate far above German chocolate.”

  “Definitely good to know.”

  Now if she only knew how to lead this conversation where it needed to go. She had told Kevin she wanted to take matters slowly, and he had honored her choice. If they were to move ahead, she would have to pointblank let him know that was what she wanted.

  “What’s up?” he asked. “You’re brooding.”

  “Brooding? No. More mulling.”

  “Okay, then what are you mulling over?”

  All she had to do was say it: I need for us to make love.

  She drew in a deep breath and tried to form her thoughts.

  “I don’t know how it happened, but I seem to have agreed to let Jamie have a sleepover at Mom’s this coming Monday night,” she instead found herself saying in a ditzy-girl voice that made her feel as though she’d been possessed by Malibu Barbie or one of those annoying chicks on MTV’s reality shows.

  Kevin gave her a what-the-heck? look. “That doesn’t sound so bad. He’ll have fun, and you can kick back.”

  “Yes, well…I was thinking maybe you could kick back with me?” she blurted.

  “Sure,” he said. “I could bring over some movies, or maybe we could go out.”

  “Out would be good, in a way. This will be my first full night away from Jamie.” She’d lost the Barbie tone, but words were still tumbling from her nearly at the speed of sound.

  He leaned back a little and looked her square in the eyes. “Ever?”

  “Yes, ever.”

  “Wow. So a nice dinner, maybe?”

  She drew in a breath and told him what she really needed. Or at least what she thought she really needed. Her excitement seemed to be edging its way toward a case of nerves, but all she could do was push on.

  “I was thinking more about a whole night. With you.”

  Now he was paying attention. “The whole night?”

  “Until morning.”

  “You’re sure?” he asked.

  His question was casually delivered, but she saw both the focus and the passion in his eyes. She was sure that he’d make love to her with that same intensity, and the thought sent a honey-slow-and-sweet shiver through her. Because she needed to be closer in order to chase away her nerves, she brought her arms up around his neck and kissed him.

  “Yes,” she said. “All night.”

  He kissed the spot on her neck—just beneath her ear—that never failed to make her want more.

  “I want this to be your choice,” he said. “No pressure, okay?”

  “Okay,” she said, but this didn’t feel about choice, and it did feel all about pressure. It was as if their steam locomotive of a relationship had barreled on to this station.

  Kevin kissed her deeply and hungrily. Lisa tried to focus on just the feeling, but all around her, worries drifted like smoke.

  Was she conflicted?

  Yes. Crazy conflicted.

  Kevin stopped kissing her and sat back on the couch.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Okay, whatever it is that’s been bothering you, tell me, Lisa. If you can’t do that, we probably aren’t ready to do anything more.”

  “You could tell that something was bothering me?”

  “You’re asking if I could tell that you went on a mental vacation in the middle of a kiss?” He shook his head. “Of course I could.”

  This was new territory. She wasn’t accustomed to being around someone so attuned to her. Honestly, it didn’t help with the discomfort factor. All the same, he was right. If she couldn’t talk to him, how did she expect to make love with him? It was time to leave Malibu Barbie fully behind.

  “What I need to know is whether you’re with me romantically because you feel some sort of responsibility toward me?”

  “Wow. A while back that would have been a fair question, but I didn’t expect to hear it now.”

  “I really need to hear the answer.” She knew he wouldn’t lie to her, even if the truth hurt.

  “Okay. Here goes. After James…um…” he began, then trailed off.

  “Died,” Lisa offered.

  “Yes. Died…”

  She placed a hand on his leg in a conciliatory gesture. “This talking thing has to go both ways, you know?”

  Kevin nodded. “You’re right. I’ve wanted to bring this up for so long, but now that we’re talking about it, I realize I never quite got all the words straight in my head. Anyway…when I first started coming to the bakery every day, I guess you could say a sense of responsibility drove me, but I think it’s closer to the mark to say that I cared. That I was worried.”

  “Worried? What is it with people worrying about me?”

  “I’m talking then, not now. And was that so strange? You were a young widow with a baby and a relatively new business…not to mention the fact that I’d known you since you and Court started hanging out together in grade school. Yeah, worried.”

  She frowned. “And so now?”

  He shook his head. “I’m not sure who you’re selling short, you or me. Either way, let me spell this out for you. Yes, I started coming around out of a sort of guilt. I was James’s boss. I was there when the accident happened. I felt like hell. But do you know what? It’s been over three yea
rs, and I’m still coming around. I’m past the guilt. And I don’t look at you as some sort of atonement program. I look at you as a woman…one who I find amazing.”

  “You’ve never talked about it,” she said quietly.

  “What? Finding you amazing?”

  She knew he was trying to bring a little lightness to the moment. It wasn’t going to help, but her throat felt tight with gratitude that he’d try.

  “No,” she replied. “About that day. About how James fell. I mean, Scott has talked to me, but you…you never said much of anything.”

  “You don’t remember in the hospital…when I spoke with you?”

  She shook her head. “No. I was on adrenaline and autopilot.”

  “Amazing.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve been beating myself up over something you don’t even recall.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I tried to say something at the hospital but messed it up so badly that I never knew how to fix it. And so I started visiting you…”

  “Not the most auspicious start, and now here we are,” she said.

  “We are. And there’s no changing the past. But you know what? Our future is what we choose to make of it.”

  And that was something she believed wholeheartedly.

  “So, are we okay?” he asked.

  She tilted her head and looked at him. He was so many wonderful things: independent, hardworking, kind and darned sexy.

  “I think we’re better than okay,” she replied.

  But still the ghosts of worry lingered.

  SUNDAY AFTERNOON, Kevin stood in the middle of his semirenovated residence, awaiting Courtney and Scott’s arrival. He’d skipped their planned lunch at Malloy’s to focus on bigger issues. And he had those, all right.

  As if it wouldn’t be enough pressure to make love to Lisa for the very first time, it also had to be her first night away from Jamie?

  He wanted Monday night to be perfect for Lisa. Unforgettable. And considering the college-frat-gone-downhill state of his home, it might be for that, alone.

  The front door creaked open, then closed under protest. Scott and Court entered the room. His sister looked like she wanted to sit down, but thought better of it when she saw the plaster dust that coated the furniture like powered sugar from Lisa’s bakery.