Page 59 of Ethan

Ethan?

I’m here. Just thinking about you in something from Paige’s.

She grinned.

So, you know the shop?

Every man in Clifton, Spring City, and Hartland knows that shop.

She laughed.I’ll see you later.

See you soon.

She set the phone down and smiled at the ceiling.

Six thirty couldn’t come fast enough.

At six fifteen she sat on the sofa staring at the clock.

She got up. Paced. Sat back down. Got up again.

She was nervous, which was ridiculous. She’d already been with the man. But this felt different somehow, more loaded than the first time. The first time had been heat and want and finally giving in to something that had been building for weeks. This was deliberate. She’d bought something at Paige’s and told him about it and now she was sitting here waiting and her stomach was doing things it had no business doing.

She didn’t want him thinking this was just about sex.

Because it wasn’t. She knew that much. She was so close to falling for him that it scared her a little, and she had no idea where his head was. Men were complicated when it came to that. At least in her experience they were. They could want you completely and still keep their feelings at arm’s length, and she’d been burned before by assuming she knew where she stood.

She sat back down and looked at the clock.

Six-twenty.

She told herself to breathe.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when the knock came.

She pushed to her feet, smoothed her dress, and crossed to the door. She stood on her toes and looked through the peephole.

He was standing there in jeans and a dark green T-shirt, hat in hand, looking down at something in his other hand.

She sighed.

The man was just so handsome it was almost inconvenient.

She took a breath and opened the door.

He looked up and his eyes moved over her, taking in the white summer dress with its blue flowers, how it fell soft around her knees, the white sandals. He was quiet for just a second.

He raised his eyes to hers. “You look beautiful.”

“Thank you.” She looked him over. “You look very handsome.”

“I’m just wearing jeans and a T-shirt.” He grinned.

“You still look handsome.”

She stepped back to let him in and that was when she noticed what was in his other hand. A small bunch of wildflowers, purple and yellow, the kind that grew along the fence line.

She stared at them.