Love on Lexington Avenue(16)

Scott frowned. He hadn’t thought about Meredith in months. Maybe years. She’d popped into his mind twice in the last week, first when he told Claire he’d been engaged and again at the thought of Claire’s husband. Irritated with himself and, irrationally, with Claire, he jerked his chin toward the painting on the wall. “I’ve got a couple of guys coming over later to move everything. They can take care of the art.”

“Oh. Well, you didn’t mention that,” she said primly, starting to drag the chair back across the room. The chair was ugly, but it was substantial, and he stepped forward to help. His hand brushed over hers as he reached out to take over the task. He was annoyed he noticed the contact. Even more annoyed that she didn’t.

Instead, her attention returned to the dog. More curious than trepidatious now. “I really didn’t expect her to be so big.”

“I told you yesterday she was a Lab.”

“I haven’t spent much time with dogs. I didn’t realize Labs were the size of camels.”

She reached out a hand toward the dog, then stopped a full foot from the dog’s face, palm up, the way one might offer a horse a carrot.

Bob gave Scott a puzzled look. What the hell do I do with this?

When Claire’s hand dropped back to her side without making contact, Scott sighed and stepped forward.

“Here,” he said crouching beside the dog to hold Bob in place. “Give me your hand.”

“No, thanks. I’m good.”

Ignoring this, Scott reached out, snagged her smaller hand in his. Again registering the contact, again hating that he did so. The last thing he needed was to be physically aware of a widow for God’s sake. Not to mention, she was a friend of Oliver’s. Scott never apologized for his one-night-stand lifestyle, but he also made it a point to treat the people closest to him—and the people closest to them—as off-limits.

He held her hand still just long enough for Bob to sniff it and give her fingers a friendly lick. When that didn’t freak her out, Scott released her hand, smiling a little as she gave Bob’s head a pat, the way a little kid might with a tentative tap, tap, tap.

“Good dinosaur,” she said, growing more confident in her pats.

Bob, bless her, seemed to sense the woman’s wariness and kept her butt planted on the ground, tongue to herself, despite her barely contained enthusiasm at finally getting some love from Claire.

Scott watched the woman carefully, relieved to note that she looked more wary than scared. “You always been scared of dogs?”

“I didn’t realize I was,” she admitted. “I’ve never had one and haven’t spent much time around them. Especially not big ones like Bob.”

“It’s the big guys who are the most gentle,” he said, patting Bob’s back.

“Big girls,” Claire corrected. “You said she’s a lady. Named Bob. I think she needs a pink bow. So people know.”

“Nope,” Scott said, standing. “We’re not doing that.”

“I didn’t say we were. I said I was.”

Recognizing a pointless argument when he saw one, he changed the subject. “When the guys come over later, you want us to put the ugly painting with the rest of the furniture in the spare bedroom? Or hang it somewhere else? Say, the trash can?”

“The painting’s not ugly.”

He looked at the painting of an extremely mediocre, drab landscape of the countryside with copious shades of brown, then looked back at her.

“Okay, it’s a little ugly,” she admitted.

“So why do you have it?”

She opened her mouth, then shut it, frowning as she gave the painting an assessing look. “I don’t know. It was here when Brayden and I moved in. He inherited the place from his grandmother. I guess it never really occurred to me that I don’t have to keep it.”

Bob wiggled up to Scott’s side and nudged his hand for a pet. Scott obliged the dog while studying the woman. He couldn’t quite figure her out. She gave off stubborn I don’t care what anyone thinks vibes one minute, and people-pleasing rule follower ones the next. She’d told him to bring his dog over, yet she was apparently terrified of dogs. Her makeup was muted, her clothes unimaginative neutrals, and yet she wanted a pink house. She wouldn’t let him help open a damn pickle jar, but he was welcome to drag a chair across the room.

“I guess, for now, put it with the rest of his stuff,” Claire said distractedly, still staring at the painting.

His stuff. The husband’s.

Scott had combed over every inch of the house during his assessment, and though Claire was fairly neat and minimal, one of the upstairs bedrooms was a noticeable exception. It looked like a hoarder’s haven, filled nearly floor to ceiling with haphazardly packed moving boxes, stacks of books, skis, luggage. Even if he hadn’t noted that the assortment of stuff was distinctly masculine, the fact that the door was kept closed—always—told him exactly whose stuff it was.

“You ever think of getting rid of it?”

“What?” she snapped, her gaze coming around to his.

He nodded in the general direction of the stairs. “It’s not like he’s coming back for it.”

Her hazel gaze flickered with an emotion, but it was gone before he could identify it. Pain? Anger? Denial? Still, he couldn’t bring himself to feel guilty for his remark. The woman was too darn interesting to be hung up on a ghost. Especially one who, from what he’d heard, had been the world’s worst husband.