Page 2 of Second Time Around
Will was headed back toward her, his blond head and fluid stride snagging the approving glance of almost every woman he passed. A little spurt of triumph jetted through her when he sat down at her table, and she caught a few of those glances turning to envy. She’d felt the same way at Brunell when Will would catch sight of her between classes and call out for her to wait so he could walk with her. For those few moments, his golden attention made her feel like she belonged.
“They’ll bring the wrap to the table as soon as it’s ready,” he said as he slid onto the seat, his gaze skimming over her. “You look terrific.”
“Thanks, and I’ll return the compliment.” Truthfully, she looked better than usual because she’d just had her hair done, so its long, artfully highlighted brown waves flowed over her shoulders and down her back. It was an investment for work. When she’d started at Stratus, she’d noticed that the bartenders with long hair got bigger tips, so she’d let hers grow. And she’d invested in a couple of expensive black lace push-up bras that also added to her take for the evening.
“No, I mean it about looking terrific,” he said, his gaze limpid with genuine admiration.
Will’s sincerity was one of the things that had disarmed her back in college. “Why do you thinkIdon’t mean it?”
He made a dismissive movement, his long, elegant hand capturing her gaze. “I’ve just got a better haircut. Although I sometimes miss the ponytail.” He had always disregarded the power of his strong cheekbones and the indent in his chin, which had made him all the more magnetic. Unfortunately, she had a weakness for cleft chins.
His gesture reminded her of how she’d always pictured him in a courtroom, swaying the jury with his sincerity and his flair for the dramatic. “Why aren’t you a lawyer?”
“‘Two roads diverged in the wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by.’” His smile was tight.
“‘And that has made all the difference.’” She finished the line of Robert Frost’s poem. “Also too easy.”
She waited, a trick she’d learned when negotiating down her mother’s credit card debt.
He met her gaze. “The law didn’t appeal to me.”
“I remember you felt that way, but the family firm was there for you to claim your place in.” Late one night, he’d confided his distaste for the path that had been laid out for him almost from birth: Brunell, Harvard Law, a partnership at Chase, Banfield, and Trost.
“A woman I knew back at Brunell gave me some wise advice,” he said. “She told me that our parents’ expectations belong to them. We need to run our lives by our own expectations.”
“Did I say that? If I did, I was trying to convince myself.” She didn’t want him casting his mind back to college days.
“You lived it,” he said. “As I remember, your parents didn’t want you to go to a liberal arts college, so you got yourself a scholarship and went anyway. That made a big impression on me.”
She had admitted to him that neither of her parents understood why she wanted to go to a fancy college that taught nothing practical. “Yeah, that didn’t work out so well.” Her partial scholarship had required her to take out a pile of loans. Now she had plenty of debt and no degree to show for it. And she’d wanted so badly to be the first person in her family to graduate from college.
“Why didn’t you come back?” he inquired. “I asked around when I didn’t see you the next fall, but no one seemed to know.”
The disconcerting flush burned over her skin again. He was circling too close to her mortification.
“My father got sick. My mother needed help taking care of him.”
Her father had told her to go back to school. She’d been so tempted to leave the terrible sight of him wasting away in the hospital bed set up in their living room. Not because she didn’t love him, but because she wanted to remember him as the man with hands so strong that when he’d tossed her up in the air as a child, she never once doubted he’d catch her again. He’d worked in the nearby Mack Trucks factory, handling the inventory of heavy metal engine blocks and giant wheel rims. The job turned his wiry frame into pure tensile muscle.
Forestalling the inevitable question, she continued. “He died late that year.”
“I’m sorry,” Will said. “You were close to him.”
“He supported my dreams, even when he didn’t understand them.”
“I know how rare that is,” Will said.
She nodded, unable to force words through the clog of emotion in her throat.
“But you became an editor?” he asked. He pointed to her backpack with a smile. “Is that filled with unpublished masterpieces?”
That swept away her moment of weakness. She shook her head and gave him a wry smile. “Publishers tend to want editors with college degrees.” In fact, with her two jobs, she barely had time to read a book for pleasure these days.
A server dressed in the Ceres uniform of tan polo shirt and green trousers arrived at their table, laden down with a tray and a large take-out bag. “Here you are, Mr.Chase.”
“The sandwich is for my friend,” Will said, taking the bag from the young man.
The tray held not just a wrap, but also a glass of lemonade, a bag of sweet-potato chips, an apple, and a giant chocolate chip cookie.
