“What we did wasn’t kissing,” Will said morosely. “That was panic, fear, and a bunch of other things. She saw my art, made some comments, and then something erupted between us. I need another chance with her, Melanie.”
Melanie sighed deeply, fetched the coffee pot, and refilled his cup. “Why?”
Will thought about that for a moment.
“I don’t know for sure,” he finally admitted. “I can’t stop thinking about her, and just know I need another chance. I can’t let what happened be all Jessica Daniels remembers about me.”
Melanie saw genuine concern in his face and mentally crossed her fingers at her decision to help him again.
“Do not make me regret telling you this. Jessica is coming by Sunday to put up some art outside. We’ll be closed then, but you might just want to swing by on your bike and see what happens. If you tell her I told you about it, I’m banning you from coming here.”
“I won’t tell her, and I’m doubling your tip today,” Will told her, smiling. “Thanks, Melanie.”
Melanie looked at him hard. He didn’t seem so intimidating today, didn’t seem like anything more than a sad older man who’d messed up with a nice woman.
“You remind me of my father today, and I’m feeling sorry for you. Want me to give you some more advice? It might embarrass you,” Melanie warned.
“Sure,” Will said. “Can’t be any worse than what my sons said about the situation when I told them.”
“Do more of that stool thing you did the first time you met her,” Melanie said carrying the coffee pot back to the burner, laughing when Will covered his flushing face with his hand. “I know it embarrasses you, but Jessica loved that. She loves to flirt. You don’t know her, but she has more life in her than any ten women you will ever meet. I think she needs romance the way flowers need water or human beings need air.”
Will nodded affirmatively and sighed again as he sipped his coffee.
“Thanks, Melanie,” he said, hoping his screw-up with Jessica Daniels was as redeemable as he hoped.
***
When Will swung the bike into the café parking lot on Sunday, he was greeted by Jessica’s jean covered backside bent over a large plywood construction project on the ground. So mesmerized was he by the site of her jeans stretched over her hips, he hit the parking space chock abruptly and stalled the bike. He hadn’t done such a dumb thing in years, and it flustered him.
Will saw Jessica’s head come up and her gaze swing around to him, but there was no friendly smile or wave, no welcome excited energy rolling off her toward him. He felt the loss in his gut. Then Will finally noticed the other people with her, lots of men of various ages, except for one young woman he would guess to be around Shane’s age.
Several of the younger men were openly admiring the bike. Others, like the older two men, moved closer to Jessica. Will watched her shake her head in answer to a question from one of them. Then she turned her back and returned to what she was doing, which seemed to involve a lot of energetic pounding on nails.
Will stowed his jacket in the storage compartment and hung his helmet from the handle bars. Pulling himself up to his full height, he walked slowly over to join the group where Jessica was bent over and working. He scowled at one man across the way, who was sneaking looks at Jessica’s bent form when she wasn’t looking. It was effective enough to stop the man’s leering and to momentarily ease the frown on Will’s face.
The young woman, who had blatantly watched the exchange, smiled broadly at Will.
Closer now, he could see the young woman was at least in her late twenties, and he would bet she missed nothing, judging by the knowing smile she kept sending his way. She reminded him of Melanie, only sassier. He also saw her hair was red, like the other sassy woman in his life, who was still bent from her very alluring hips and completely ignoring him.
If Jessica Daniels had been a mind reader and seen the images in his head that her rear inspired, she would have straightened right up, Will thought darkly. He was not even comfortable himself with where his thoughts had gone, but with the other guy staring at her, Will’s need to compete for her ruled his common sense. He imagined his fantasies were affecting tightness of his jaw as well as his jeans.
“Hello, Jessica. You look busy,” Will said, hoping to snag her attention and get her to stand up and look at him.
“Hello, Will. Out for a Sunday drive?” she asked politely, not raising her gaze from her work.
Will debated what to say. He hated lying, but didn’t want to admit his intentions and scare her either.
“Not really,” he finally said, disappointed when she didn’t pry. “I thought I’d stop by when I saw you. Melanie said something about you doing some art for the café.”
“Okay, it’s ready,” Jessica said out loud, ignoring Will’s last comment and standing up at last. She wondered briefly just what Melanie had told him, then reminded herself she didn’t care.
“Kyle? You and Tom stand it up. Let’s take one more look before we mount it on the building,” she said.
Jessica stepped back to let the boys have plenty of room.
Will watched two tall young boys run to do her bidding and heave the large art piece up to a standing position so she could inspect it. He grinned at the plywood woman’s face, her playful nose sniffing daises and fifty other kinds of colorful flowers floating out and up the curved design. It was colorful, eye-catching, and glitzy.
And it suited the café perfectly.
“It will do,” Jessica said, perusing it. “We can fix the little things once it’s up.”
“Hey, gorgeous,” a deep voice said nearby, “ready for your manpower yet?”
“Your timing is perfect as always,” Jessica purred. “Thank you, Steve.”
Will gritted his teeth as the tall, well-built man she called Steve walked to one end of the sign. The man nodded at Will with his chin. “Can you get the other end?”
Saying nothing, Will just nodded and went to the other side and lifted. While he and the man held the art to the building, ten hammers descended on it. Will felt his teeth rattle as the boys went after the nails with the zest of young men showing off for each other. Their full-out enthusiasm made him smile because he’d always loved kids, and not just his own. It’s why he’d gone into teaching in the first place, though he’d ended up a principal for a much longer time than he had taught.
Will was still smiling when he felt Jessica’s gaze on him, but when he caught her staring, she only looked away. However, the younger woman by her side had taken her eyes off Will only long enough to look at Jessica and back to him.
It was like she was trying to figure out a puzzle. And that makes two of us, Will decided, smiling genuinely at both the boys and the younger woman.
Steve let go of the sign at last, and Will stepped away as well.
“I’m Steve Lipton,” the man said, walking to Will and sticking out a hand.
“Everett Williams. Call me Will,” Will said, taking the hand and looking at Jessica again, not willing to tell her about his other life until he had settled the issues of this one, because it was the life he was trying to share with her.
“You a friend of Jessica’s?” Steve asked, a knowing look in his eyes.
“Trying to be,” Will replied, watching Jessica walk away and out of earshot after hearing his words.
He watched as Jessica walked to a group of kids painting a giant flower pot and bent from her hips again to inspect their work. Will narrowed his eyes on her very appealing jean-covered rear end and sighed loudly.
Steve laughed. “Good luck with that. Jessica is a tough woman to genuinely get to know. Adam over there is trying the same thing.”
Will looked in the direction of a man who had risen from his task of assembling some sort of metal pot hanger. He walked over to Jessica and stood as close to her as humanly possible without actually putting his arms around her.
The man was at least ten years younger than he was, Will observed unhappily. Hell, the man might even be closer to Michael’s age. Did Jessica prefer younger men, he wondered?
“What does Adam do?” Will asked.
“He’s a math teacher,” Steve said, enjoying the big man’s obvious jealousy. This was not Jessica’s usual sort. Will didn’t look like he’d be so easily managed by flirtatious charm. “Adam has been dating her for a while now, but I would say he’s gotten about as far with her as you have.”
“Really?” Will said, wondering why it hadn’t occurred to him Jessica might have already met someone new. “How long have they been dating?”
Steve shrugged. “Let me think. Probably for six months now—something like that. It was after Jessica and I broke up. I think it was before Sam the councilman, and after George the electrician. There were a couple other guys in there, too, but I forget their names. Jessica likes men, and she dates a lot.”
Steve laughed openly at the shock on Will’s face. “I see you don’t know Jessica.”
“Why are you here if you broke up with her?” Will asked, not fully believing the man’s story. Though he was reconciled to his wife’s new relationship, he wasn’t rushing over to the cabin on the lake to help Ellen and Luke work on it any time soon. Steve Lipton had to be exaggerating.
Then Steve pointed at the boy Jessica was currently patting on the shoulder.
“My son adores her, and she encourages his art. And she’s a great person, like what she’s doing today for Melanie and Brent Madison. Jessica and I are friends, Will. Once you know her, you always care about her. She’s just that kind of person. I’m engaged but still planning to invite Jessica to the wedding. What we had was great, but is no more.”
Will looked at Steve, and then looked at the math teacher hovering over Jessica’s arm. If the man had looked at Will, he’d have found him scowling again. If the man put his hand possessively on Jessica Daniels, Will wasn’t sure what he would do. Breaking the math teacher’s fingers held a certain appeal, but it would only be another show of the same aggressiveness he’d displayed in Berea. Aggression was not going to net him the result he wanted.
“So what kind of work do you do, Will?” Steve said, trying to distract the giant guy and save Adam’s butt from violence. Whatever was between Will and Jessica, it was something Adam needed to steer clear of until it had run its course, which knowing Jessica wouldn’t be long. This giant man with brooding eyes didn’t look like the kind of person to willingly share a woman with anyone.
“I’m an artist—a stone sculptor,” Will said.
Steve raised his eyebrows. “An artist? Have you seen any of Jessica’s work?”
“No,” Will said, fully intending now to find out what it was as soon as he could. “Where can I find some? It may be a while before I get a personal invitation. I messed up with Jessica on our first date.”
Steve laughed. “I doubt you go any place where you would ever see Jessica’s art. It doesn’t really end up in art shows or museums. It’s best you just let her show you sometime. Her art is very personal. She doesn’t show it to many of her dates.”
“So I’ve heard,” Will said, frowning. “She showed it to you?”
Steve smiled, narrowed his gaze. “Jessica and I were very close. I would have married her if I thought she would have ever loved me. I never found a permanent place in her heart.”
Will wondered how many other old lovers he was going to have to wade through, and asked himself if Jessica Daniels was really worth it.
Then the young woman, who was nearly as tall as Jessica, whispered something to her after the math teacher stepped away. Jessica’s peal of laughter rang out, and every man, regardless of age, looked up grinning to see if he could take credit for her amusement.
When Jessica’s laughing gaze reluctantly met Will’s, he saw the enthusiastic girl in the woman again. He saw the woman he’d messed up with and the one he wanted. And even though Will could hear both his sons laughing at him now, it looked like he wasn’t going to have to worry about dating anymore. He’d found the woman he ached for already.
“You friends with the math teacher?” Will asked roughly.
Steve’s laughter was low and conspiratorially male. “Not really, but he’s an okay guy. Why? Is it time I go distract him to keep you from pounding on him?”
Will smiled, all wickedness and determination. He shook his head from side to side. “No, I’ll take care of discouraging him. I just wondered if you cared. You seem like a nice enough guy.”
“I am a nice guy. That’s why I’m giving you all this free advice. Jessica doesn’t like to be chased,” Steve warned him, grinning. “She likes to do the chasing, and you have to pretend to let her.”
“That’s going to be a problem then because I’m not good at pretending,” Will said, reaching out a hand again, “but I appreciate the advice, Steve.”
Steve laughed and shook his head. “Good luck, Mr. Williams. You’re going to need it if you’re interested in Jessica Daniels.”
Will grinned and walked off to join the group where Jessica now stood.
***
“Mom, who is the hot biker guy who keeps glaring at your math teacher?” Brooke asked.
“He’s not hot,” Jessica asked. “He’s as cold as the stone he carves.”
“Cold? I don’t think so,” Brooke said smartly in a sing-song tone. “And just how do you know?”