Page 17 of Tempting the Heart

My mom circled her long index finger on the table and brought her gaze to mine. “I was hoping you could come to dinner tonight with your dad and me.” She bit her lip. “Your siblings will be there too.”

I straightened and stared at my mom. “Is everything okay?”

She smiled and nodded, letting out a deep breath. “Everything is fine. We want to chat with our kids while they’re all in one place. That’s not easy nowadays.”

“Mom, you know I don’t do well with secrets. Just spit it out. What’s going on? Is it you? Is it Dad?”

She took a sip of coffee, and her gaze fell to the table. “Don’t worry. It’s allgoodnews.”

“You’re retiring? Adopting a puppy?” I prompted with raised brows, but I could see it in the way her lips pressed together into a tight line. She wasn’t going to say a word. “Okay, fine. When and where?”

“The new Italian place. Bella Vita. Have you been?”

“No, but I’ve wanted to go.”

“We’ve got reservations for the patio at seven.”

I smiled, wishing my mom wouldn’t be such a diplomat. I hated being in the dark. “I’ll be there.”

“Good.” She pushed an envelope toward me and smiled. “Bring this with you, and don’t open it until we tell you to at dinner.”

“Why not just wait until dinner to hand it out?”

She smiled coyly. “I like to see who of my grown children still listens to me.”

I chuckled as she stood and finished off her coffee.

“Those earrings still look great on you, Mae,” she said softly.

I kept them in nearly twenty-four-seven since my ears had been pierced when I was twelve. The little mayflowers were so delicate that the earrings went with everything. Keeping them in was easier than taking them out and losing them, which I’d done with nearly every other pair of earrings I’d owned.

My mom hugged me and stepped back. “Okay, then. See you for dinner. We’re doing family style, so be prepared to eat a lot.”

“Not a problem. I can always be counted on to pull my weight.” I chuckled and walked my mom to the door, closing it after her before spinning around and grabbing my gardening gloves, which I kept in a trunk by the front door, and my red straw hat to keep the sun out of my eyes.

I wanted to pretend my mom’s request to attend an impromptu family dinner didn’t concern me, but it did. We often all grabbed dinner together here and there, but it wasn’t usually something this… formal.

And they were getting older, but they seemed just fine.

Securing my hat and pulling on my gloves, I grabbed my tiny hand shovel and walked out the back door where red, hot pink, and pale pink geraniums waited to be planted, along with some purple petunias I’d picked up at the hardware store.

The morning air hadn’t heated up to the usual springtime warmth as I grabbed two trays of plants, walking them around the side of the house, where I set them down next to some colorful planters I’d painted bright blue last summer.

A slight breeze ruffled the leaves as I used my tiny shovel to make holes for all the flowers. This was the fun part of gardening, when the soil was already prepped, the weeding done, and all I had to do was make things colorful.

As my shovel scraped the soil, I took a deep breath and tried to clear my head of worry about tonight’s dinner, leading me to think about Tyler and last night’s dinner.

There was something so easy about being around him, but that was probably because I’d known him since I was a kid. I tapped my shovel onto the soil and nodded.

Exactly.

“Totally it.” It was only because I’d known him for years—not that he was extremely sexy and easy to be around. I crawled on my knees and stretched toward another planter, thinking back to his gorgeous eyes.

Granted, I hadn’t seen him in over a decade… okay, nearly two decades if I were being honest with my age. Somehow, it had snuck up on me, but anyway, I was in my late thirties, and I didn’t need to be worried about whether Tyler and I clicked.

It didn’t matter.

He didn’t live here, and I certainly wasn’t about to give up all my dreams to follow him around like a puppy dog.

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