Believing (Lily Dale #2)(58)

Gert shoots her an accusing look through the glass, then trots back toward the kitchen.

The rain has stopped, leaving Lily Dale glistening and misty as twilight falls.

Sitting on the porch, Calla wishes the Taggarts would show up on theirs, but the house is dark and the driveway empty. Evangeline said Ramona was taking her and Mason out to eat tonight.

Spotting a figure sprinting down Cottage Row toward her, she realizes it’s Jacy. He’s wearing gray sweats and sneakers, obviously taking his nightly run.

She doesn’t know whether to call out to him or hope he doesn’t spot her. She hasn’t seen him since he left her at the door after almost kissing her . . . or so it seemed.

Watching him look up toward Odelia’s house, she realizes he almost seems to be looking for . . . something? Someone? Her?

When he sees her, he hesitates only briefly before waving. She watches as he slows his pace and jogs toward her.

“How’s it going?” he calls from the street.

“Good.”

“Good.”

She sees his dark eyes checking her out from head to toe. Is he going to ask her why she’s all dressed up? Ask her where she’s going? And with whom?

Nope.

Maybe he already knows, she realizes. Just like everyone around here seems to know everything.

“Got to keep my heart rate up,” he announces. “So, see ya.”

“See ya,” she calls back, disappointed, and watches him literally run away from her.

That’s just because he’s training for track, she tells herself.

But she isn’t so sure.





So far, Calla’s date with Blue has been as close to perfect as any date she’s ever had. Including with Kevin.

No, Blue isn’t Kevin. And she isn’t in love with him.

He isn’t Jacy, either.

But Blue is fun and funny and cool—not to mention hot. Plus, he’s so at ease in any situation that Calla finds herself instinctively relaxing whenever she’s around him.

At the concert—where they had great seats, comp tickets someone gave to Blue’s dad—Calla discovered she really likes jazz, and told him so. Afterward, he asked her if she likes wings, too.

“You mean Buffalo wings?” she asked, hoping “wings” isn’t some style of music she never heard of. She gets the impression that well-traveled, worldly, wealthy Blue is far more sophisticated than she could ever hope to be.

He laughed. But not because she was ignorant about music.

No, just about chicken, apparently.

“We don’t call them that around here,” he said with a grin.

“What?”

“Buffalo wings. That’s a dead giveaway that you’re a tourist. In western New York, they’re just wings. And you’ve never had them until you’ve had them at the Anchor Bar. Those are the real deal.”

The Anchor Bar turned out to be a jam-packed, no-frills restaurant right downtown, not far from the concert hall. And Blue was right. She’s never had wings like this.

Sitting at a cozy table in the big, brick-walled dining room, they polished off a gigantic bucketful of wings so hot they’re listed on the menu as “suicidal,” and a pitcher of Pepsi to cool the flames. They also split a sandwich, another local delicacy, called “beef on weck.”

Calla was stuffed by the time it arrived, but Blue made her taste it. She bit into a heap of thinly sliced rare roast beef, served with au jus and horseradish on a “kimmelweck”—a big roll sprinkled with crunchy pretzel salt and caraway seeds.

It was awesome.

The whole date was awesome.

How can anything bad happen now?

It can’t, Calla decides, riding home beside Blue in the darkness of his car, with an old John Mayer song playing on the radio. It just can’t.

She wonders what to do when they reach her grandmother’s house.

Odelia won’t be home yet.

Back when Calla was dating Kevin, an empty house meant a rare opportunity to be alone together.

But Blue isn’t Kevin, and this is barely their third date.

Still . . . he’s incredibly good-looking, and she’s just as attracted to him—tonight, anyway—as she ever was to Kevin.

Which is exactly why you shouldn’t be alone with him, she tells herself firmly.

Okay. So she won’t ask him to come in when they get to Odelia’s.

She’ll just kiss him goodnight here in the car, and that will be that.

Ha. Easier said than done.

Because when Blue pulls up in front of the house, he immediately cuts the engine. “Looks like nobody’s home, huh?”

Calla looks up to see that the porch light is on and there’s a lamp lit inside. “How can you tell?”

“Your grandmother’s car is gone.”

“Oh, right. She went, uh, to . . .” She can’t even remember at the moment, because Blue is leaning toward her and pulling her close.

“Hmm?” he asks as he wraps his arms around her.

“Uh—”

He cuts off anything she might have said—not that it was likely to have made much sense—with a kiss. Not just a peck goodnight. A full-fledged, sweeping, passionate, expert kiss that leaves Calla feeling absolutely light-headed. And terrified.

Whoa.This must be why I felt like I was in some kind of danger all day.