Page 31 of An Unexpected Love

“You heard me.”

“Shelly, no! I absolutely forbid you to discuss me with Jordan. How would you have felt if I’d called Mark?”

Shelly frowned. “I’d have been furious.”

“I will be, too, if you say so much as one word to Jordan about me.”

Shelly paused, her eyes wide with concern. “But I’m afraid you’re going to mess this up.”

Nothing to fear there—Jill already had. She reached for a package of rye crisps from the bread basket, and Shelly frowned again. That was when she remembered she wasn’t any fonder of rye crisps than she was of split-pea soup.

“Promise me you’ll stay out of it,” Jill pleaded. “Please.”

“All right,” Shelly muttered. “Just don’t do anything stupid.”

* * *

“This is a pleasant surprise,” Jill’s mother said as she opened the front door. Elaine Morrison was in her late fifties, slim and attractive.

“I thought I’d bring over your gift from Hawaii,” Jill said, following her mother into the kitchen, where Elaine poured them each a glass of iced tea. Jill set the box of chocolate-covered macadamia nuts on the counter.

“I’m glad your vacation went so well.”

Jill pulled out a bar stool and sat at the counter, trying to look relaxed when she was anything but. “I met someone while I was in Hawaii.”

Her mother paused, then smiled. “I thought you might have.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Oh, there’s a certain look about you. Now tell me how you met, what he’s like, where he’s from and what he does for a living.”

Jill laughed at the rapid-fire questions.

Elaine added slices of lemon to their tea and started across the kitchen, a new excitement in her step. Finally, after all these years, her mother was beginning to overcome the bitterness her husband’s obsession with business had created. She was finally coming to terms not only with his death but with her grief over his neglect.

Jill was relieved and delighted by the signs of her mother’s recovery, but she had to say, “Frankly, Mom, I don’t think you’ll like him.”

Her mother looked surprised. “Why ever not?”

Jill didn’t hesitate. “Because he reminds me of Daddy.”

Her mother’s face contorted with shock, and tears sprang to her eyes. “Jill, no! For the love of heaven, no.”

* * *

“I’ve been giving some thought to your suggestion,” Jill said to Ralph a few hours later. Her nerves were in turmoil. The clam chowder sat like a dead weight in the pit of her stomach, and her mother’s dire warnings had shaken her badly.

Ralph wasn’t tall and strikingly handsome like Jordan, but he was a comfortable sort of man. He made a person feel at ease. In fact, his laid-back manner was a blessed relief after the high-stress, high-energy hours she’d spent with Jordan, few though they were.

Jordan Wilcox could pull together a deal for an apartmentcomplex before Ralph stepped out of the shower in the morning. Ralph’s idea of an exhilarating evening was doing the newspaper crossword puzzle.

Everything about Jordan was complex. Everything about Ralph was uncomplicated; he was a straightforward, honest man who’d be a good husband and a loving father.

“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” Ralph prompted when she didn’t immediately continue.

Jill held her water glass. “You said something not long ago about the two of us giving serious consideration to making our relationship permanent and…and I wanted you to know I was… I’ve been giving some thought to that.”

Ralph didn’t reveal any emotion. He put down his hamburger, looked at her and asked casually, “Why now?”

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