Page 12 of One Christmas Eve
“Anotch?”
“Anyway, apologies were made, and he’s actually kind of funny.”
“When were these apologies made?”
“He came in the store while you were in Rhode Island.”
“Huh.” She propped her elbow on the table and rested her chin on her hand. “So? Was there chemistry?”
After debating on lying for a few seconds, Zoe sighed deeply and rolled her eyes. “Yes.”
“Okay, so why aren’t you withhimtonight instead of us?”
Zoe turned the margarita glass in her hands, belatedly wishing she’d told Noah to bring her another, after all. “I don’t know. I mean, even though he apologized and he sincerely meant it, there was still that look. That disapproval, you know? And he can be funny and nice, but maybe at his core, he’s too... I don’t know.”
“You can’t assume he’ll be like Ben because he scowled at a window display.”
“No, he scowled at a fun and sexy window display with obvious disdain, so I can assume he’ll be at least something like Ben. I am a fun and sexy woman and we have a fun and sexy bookstore and I’m not dimming that light to be acceptable to somebody ever again. Not a man. Not my parents. Nobody.”
“Honey, since you dumped Ben, not even a blackout curtain could dim your light, and I will never, ever suggest you should.” Carly paused when Zoe swore under her breath and dabbed at her eyes with her cocktail napkin. “Look, I don’t know the guy, so I can’t say if he is or isn’t a jerk, but I think there’s a tiny chance you’re hypersensitive and you’re taking it all a little personally.”
“Yes, I’m sensitive to judgmental asshats.”
Carly chuckled. “As you should be. But he reacted to the window, not toyou.I don’t know how to explain it, except that I think you read Ben’s voice into Preston’s expression and that might not be fair to him. Or healthy for you.”
“What Ben said hurt so much, though.” It still hurt, if she let herself think about it too much. “He was the man who was supposed to love me for the rest of his life. He didn’t like talking about intimate things, so it took a while to work up the courage to tell him what I wanted him to do and then he says, ‘Don’t be disgusting, Zoe’?”
“Hey, look who I found,” Noah said from right behind her, and she could tell by the overly loud and cheerful way he said it, that he and whoever he’d found had been standing behind her long enough to overhear what she’d said to her cousin.
Even Carly, who was facing that direction, had been so intent on their conversation she hadn’t noticed her husband coming back. “Hi.”
“I hope you don’t mind me interrupting,” a man said, and Zoe’s stomach dropped. Of course it was him. “I’m Preston, by the way. We haven’t actually met yet.”
Carly stood to shake his hand, and Zoe stared at her drink as Preston walked around the table to her. Her face was on fire and the chilly November night wasn’t doing a damn thing to help.
“Preston was alone at the bar, so I invited him to join us,” Noah said. “Since we’ve got an empty chair and all.”
“I don’t want to intrude,” Preston said, and Zoe looked up to find he was talking directly to her.
She forced a smile. “Of course you’re not intruding. Brush the snow off and have a seat.”
He hesitated for a few seconds, his gaze searching her face and leaving her no doubt he had in fact heard her saying the hurtful words that had effectively ended her marriage.
“I heard you came into the store while I was away,” Carly said once everybody was seated. “I’m sorry I missed you.”
“Zoe showed me around,” he said with a genuine smile. “And she helped me find some books.”
“Anything good?”
Zoe’s face flamed all over again when her cousin asked the totally innocent question, because if Noah told them about the romance with the sticky notes, they would never let her live it down.Never.She’d probably have to sell her half of the business and move to the other side of the country to get away from them.
Luckily, he just said that he hadn’t a chance to readallof them yet, and then turned the conversation by asking about their trip to Rhode Island. Zoe only half listened to the ensuing conversation because she was wondering, if he hadn’t read all of the books yet, which ones hehadread.
It took all of her willpower to take a sip of her cocktail instead of downing what remained in the glass, and she tried to focus as Noah and Preston made the small talk men make to get to know each other. What they did for work. Sports affiliations, although that was something of a dead end because Preston confessed he didn’t really follow sports. After floundering for a few seconds, Noah bounced back with a question about the BMW in the parking lot. Then they talked cars.
Every time Carly caught Zoe’s eye, she made some kind of face. First a grimace to acknowledge how embarrassing it was to have been in the middle of the conversation they’d been having. But now, the glances were becoming increasinglyyou should totally go home with this guyand Zoe was doing her best to ignore those suggestive eyebrow arches and not-so-subtletalk to himhead tilts.
She’d already said more than she should ever have said out loud tonight. She had no intention of wading into the conversation and making it worse.
