Along Came Trouble(70)
Jamie had asked Ryan a lot of questions on the drive out to the airport, and Ryan seemed surprised at first, pleased, as if Jamie were bestowing a favor on him instead of the other way around.
Don’t think that way, Jamie wanted to tell him. I’m nothing special. Barely worth talking to.
But he was going to figure out how to be different. He was going to learn how to stick, how to be who Carly and the baby needed.
His life so far had been a matter of setting and meeting the wrong goals, one right after the next.
Winning Carly back was the first worthy goal he’d ever had.
Chapter Eighteen
When Ellen had sent Caleb the text about chocolate sauce, she’d been imagining a scenario like that morning’s: he would show up in her doorway with a bottle of Hershey’s syrup dangling from his fingers, and with one hot look, he’d liquefy her female bits.
Maybe she would walk backward toward her bedroom, pulling her T-shirt over her head and discarding her shorts along the way. Maybe he would lock up and prowl down the hallway after her, shedding his clothes with a lazy grace that made her wet.
Wetter, anyway. She’d been wet since breakfast.
So it was a bit of a letdown when she heard the doorbell and walked as seductively as she could to the front door, only to find him leaning his forehead against the jamb with his eyes closed, looking like someone had just asked him to shoot Old Yeller.
“What’s the matter with you?” she asked.
“Nothing fourteen hours of sleep won’t fix.”
“Another long day?”
“You have no idea.”
“Come on in.” She opened the door and noticed the bag of groceries under his arm. “Did you buy all the chocolate syrup in the store?”
“I bought ice cream,” he said. “I wasn’t sure what you liked, so I got options.”
He unpacked the cartons on the kitchen counter. Cherry Garcia, vanilla, double-fudge chocolate, sprinkles, Magic Shell, jars of caramel and hot fudge, and a big bottle of Hershey’s syrup. Plus a bag of chips and a six-pack of beer.
“What’s that?” she asked, pointing to the beer.
“In case I get thirsty.”
“You want me to keep your beer in my fridge?”
“I was hoping.”
“And your chips in my cabinet?”
“In case I get hungry after.”
“After the beer?”
He lifted his eyebrows.
“Didn’t I just meet you a couple days ago?” she asked.
“Yeah, and look how well we’re getting along. We’ll be married by the weekend.” He flashed her a winning, if slightly weary, smile.
Ellen rolled her eyes and stomped, stomped, stomped on the tiny fluttering, leaping thing in her chest. “You know, you don’t actually have to try this hard to impress me. I already slept with you twice.”
“I know, but we skipped all the early dates, and I could really use one of those third-date neck massages.”
“The kind where we watch a movie and then I move back behind you on the couch and rub your shoulders, and you offer to take off your shirt to make it easier, and then before we know quite what happened, we’re making out?”
“Exactly. But don’t skimp on the massaging. I have to be seduced slowly, like I don’t really want it.”
“I think you’ve got our roles reversed.”
Caleb flashed her another smile. “Do I?”
“You know, you could just ask me for a massage.” She pried the lid off the vanilla ice cream.
He shook his head. “I swear, Ellen, it’s like you don’t want to be courted.”
“Right. I don’t want to be courted.”
When she bent over the silverware drawer for a spoon, he leaned in close and put his mouth behind her ear. “Suck it up. If you want chocolate sauce drizzled all over your nether regions and licked off, you have to watch the news and flirt awkwardly with me first.”
Ellen straightened, savoring the molten blush his words ignited. “Fine. But only because I’m going to have a sundae.”
He brushed his lips over the pulse at the base of her throat. “That’s my girl.”
Then he kissed her, and she got so distracted by the taste and feel and smell of him, she didn’t remember to say “I’m not your girl” until he’d already walked into the living room.