Least Likely to Fall in Love Page 9

  Maddie was right. The kitchen didn’t smell like charred meat or wood smoke. Instead, she picked up warm bread, garlic, and a hint of chocolate. There was a gorgeous chocolate layer cake cooling on the counter, so her eyes might have been sending chocolate signals to her brain.

  “I thought we’d eat in here in the kitchen, if that’s all right.”

  Maddie snorted. “Uh, Dad, unless we’re eating on the living room furniture, we don’t have much of a choice.” She shook her head. “We don’t have a dining room table yet.”

  Ryan pointed an oven mitt at her. “You don’t have to tell everything you know. Sometimes you can just smile. Maybe nod. It’s called being polite.”

  Lindy cleared her throat. “Something smells delicious.”

  Maddie smiled and then disappeared. Ryan laughed. “So, instead of steaks, I went pasta. I hope that’s all right. Those are my two choices. Well, that and whatever we can order for delivery or carryout.”

  Lindy slid into one of the chairs at the island and hung her purse on the back. “Pasta is fabulous, especially if that’s garlic bread I smell.”

  Ryan clapped an oven mitt to his forehead and spun to yank open the oven door. He was wearing jeans and a button-down flannel shirt. And it looked good on him. When he bent to pull out the pan of bread, Lindy was glad Maddie had retreated. Watching a man pull out a pan of garlic bread, his butt displayed perfectly in faded denim, was a truly erotic experience. When he set the pan down and did a victory dance in his oven mitts, Lindy’s eyes followed his pockets closely and she nearly fell off her stool.

  She managed to tear her eyes away when Ryan turned, but he could tell something was up. He slowly stripped off both mitts, and his eyes never left her face. When he tossed them on the counter, he propped his hands on his hips and raised his chin like he was inviting whatever comment she might like to make.

  Lindy rubbed her finger down her nose. “Uh, is there anything I can do to help?”

  She tensed when it seemed he was about to say something…sexy, maybe, to her. She wasn’t quite sure. There was a heat in his eyes and the intensity on his face seemed to say it was all about her. Why that made her want to scurry was clear, but she was here to just get right over that.

  A small smile twitched on his lips as he answered, “Nah. How about a drink?”

  Tequila? Scotch? Valium? A sharp blow to the head? Lindy would have picked something then and there to ease her nerves but he said, “I’ve got soft drinks, iced tea, water…” When she didn’t answer, he said, “Um, milk, orange juice, coffee... That’s it.”

  Lindy licked her lips. “Iced tea.” She had to clear her throat because her first answer sounded like a bullfrog with a three-pack-a-day habit. “Tea would be good.”

  He walked over to a cabinet. As he stretched up to grab a glass, he sent her a testing look over his shoulder. She laughed and blushed when he did, too. Maddie danced back into the kitchen and said, “Time to eat yet?”

  Ryan rolled his eyes. “Set the table, Bebop.”

  She scowled at him and stomped her foot. “Don’t call me that!” She turned to Lindy. “He’s not supposed to call me that in public, and he’s done it in front of you. Twice!”

  Lindy shrugged. There wasn’t much she could do about it, and there was no way she was getting involved at this point. She had her own issues to deal with.

  “All right, everybody to the table.” Ryan carried two large bowls and set them down before he went back to grab the bread. Maddie made quick work of placing three sets of silverware and plopped in her seat just as Ryan set three glasses of iced tea down. After he distributed everything and made two more trips back to the refrigerator for salad dressing and butter, he sat down between Maddie and Lindy at the round table.

  As they passed dishes and ate, they talked about Maddie’s plans for the anti-bullying campaign, what the chances were that the Lincoln Lions would win the homecoming game, and whether or not ranch or honey mustard made a better salad dressing.

  Maddie cleared their dinner plates and Ryan handed out three huge pieces of chocolate cake. When Lindy started to protest, Maddie said, “Come on, Principal Mason, don’t wimp out now.”

  Lindy caught Ryan’s eye behind Maddie’s back and mouthed, “Authority” while she drew a finger across her neck. It was gone at this point. Eating garlic bread around a kitchen table put her on a whole different level with Maddie.

  If worse came to worst, she’d threaten to call Maddie Bebop in a pep rally.

  She made a good, solid effort to retire her piece of cake. When the doorbell rang, she was just wishing she’d gone for less skinny skinny-jeans but there was no going back now.

  “I’ll get it!” Maddie dropped the dishes she’d cleared from the table in the sink, just as Ryan said, “Hey, wait a minute.” He trotted out after her and Lindy finished clearing the table before she started loading the dishwasher.

  The clatter of footsteps was her first clue that there’d been a party at the door. When Rob, Eric, and Sarah bounded into the kitchen behind Maddie, Lindy checked to see what Ryan thought about the gang’s arrival. He was resigned. Living with Maddie no doubt gave him a lot of practice perfecting the look.

  Maddie’s posse was frozen in the doorway to the kitchen. Sarah was on the verge of saying something that would probably embarrass everyone in the room when Maddie darted around the group to pull down four plates before she rifled through the drawer for four forks. “Eric, grab everyone a bottle of water. And Sarah, you carry the cake.”

  “Wait, what? Where are you taking the cake? What’s going on?” Ryan looked lost. Lindy fought the urge to laugh out loud. She was glad she hadn’t missed this.

  “Dad, we’re going to work on our stuff. Up in my room. That’s okay, right?” Maddie was innocent and earnest and up to something. Her dinner with a chaperone was about to become something else, something more like what a fifteen-year-old thought a date should look like. At this point, Maddie knew she had to get them alone. It was a good instinct.

  Ryan opened and closed his mouth once or twice before he shooed them out of the kitchen. “Fine. Get. I’ll be up to check on you so no…funny business.” Every one of the teenagers was quiet as the filed past, but the giggles started as soon as they cleared the doorway.

  Lindy frowned and then shook her head. “Funny business. Good one.”

  Ryan collapsed on a stool. “I’ve lost control.”

  “Well, as I recall, that was inevitable. Be happy. You had a good run.” Lindy resumed rinsing and filling the dishwasher.

  “No. Wait. Stop. Please don’t.” His puny objections got her attention, but she didn’t stop loading the silverware.

  “It’s the absolute least I can do to thank you for that dinner.”

  He nodded like she was absolutely right and propped his elbow on the island to rest his chin on his hand. “All right, then. Proceed.”

  Lindy did her best to ignore the quiet and tension in the kitchen as she made quick work of the dishes and wiping the counters down. He was a neat cook. Cleaning up after him had been easy. She bent to slide the bottom rack in and then shut the door. She ignored the feeling of his eyes on her as she rinsed and dried her hands. And then there was nothing left to do. She turned around to face him and propped one hip against the counter.

  Ryan’s hands were loosely tangled, resting in front of him on the island. The heat was still there and one corner of his mouth turned up. “You, loading the dishwasher, that’s a thing of beauty.”

  “Right.” Lindy crossed her arms over her chest. “We should get something straight. Maybe Maddie thought this was a date. I thought it was a thank-you dinner and an opportunity for me to talk to you. Date never entered my mind.”

  She hoped the lie wasn’t written on her face. Date had definitely crossed her mind, mainly in the mourning, ridiculous wishing kind of way.

  Ryan pursed his lips. “Okay, well, let’s talk about whatever you have in mind. Then we can circle back around to this da
te question.” He pointed toward the living room. “I don’t have many knickknacks out yet, but I do have some nice comfy furniture. I’ll make coffee. It’ll be like we’re old friends.”

  Lindy covered her face with both hands. “Fine. Good. Yes.”

  Ryan slid off the stool and walked around the island. Every step was deliberate, as if he was doing his best not to spook her into retreat. He stopped in front of her and Lindy was struck all over again at the changes in him. He seemed bigger, more solid, and this close, she knew that he smelled like shampoo and deodorant and laundry detergent and heat. At the idea that it would be so easy to tip up on her toes and press her lips against his, Lindy’s breath caught and her heart raced. She licked her lips nervously as he leaned closer.

  One hand hit the counter next to her hip while he reached around her with his other. When he brushed her arm with his, Lindy shivered and felt that simple touch, those sparks, all the way to her toes. She heard a quiet click. His lips so close to her ear, Ryan whispered, “Got the coffee started.” He leaned back, his lips twitching as he watched her face. And Lindy would have retreated. Quickly. But he caged her in with his arms and waited.

  She’d come here with a plan. Kissing him in the kitchen hadn’t been a part of it. With a pang of loss, Lindy raised a hand to his chest and pushed.

  Catching her breath after her narrow escape while the coffee brewed, Lindy wandered over to the nearly empty built-in bookcases on either side of the fireplace. It was a beautiful living room. Or it would be with a personal touch.

  And comfortable. She eased down on the couch and studied the few shelves that held books and framed photos. Front and center, in the place of honor, was a family photo.

  Ryan and Maddie and a beautiful blonde posed on a sandy beach. All three of them were dressed head to toe in white, and Anna, Ryan’s first wife, looked like an angel. A supermodel angel.

  The angel part was new. She’d been head cheerleader and valedictorian and homecoming queen, but Anna Bridges had never been a nice person. At least, not to Lindy. More than once, Lindy had regretted stepping into the girl’s bathroom when Anna and her crew had been reapplying their lipstick.

  She might owe them for her improved fashion sense. Once she’d been destroyed over a fashion faux pas, she never made the same mistake again. By process of elimination, Anna had helped Lindy find her way. Like the ultimate form of tough not-love. At the same time, she’d made Lindy want to crawl under a rock, so it was impossible to feel any gratitude.

  At eighteen, she’d been pretty sure Anna and Ryan deserved each other and that they’d retire to the fiery pit that spawned them one day. It was hard to reconcile those memories with the family in the photograph. She’d been convinced they were bad people, but they’d produced a pretty great daughter. Or Ryan had.

  “Here you go. I wasn’t sure how you take it. Here’s sugar, sweetener, creamer.” He motioned at a small tray on the coffee table and Lindy was impressed.

  He must have seen her amusement. He picked up his own cup and settled on the opposite end of the couch. “Kitchens are easy to pack. Throw everything in and label it ‘kitchen.’ You end up finding your turkey platter before your cereal bowls, but it’s all gotta come out eventually.”

  Lindy shook her head. That was hard to argue with. It made perfect, simple sense.

  She, on the other hand, would have had a sophisticated system involving room labels and rankings in order to accomplish first things first. Also, the house would have been up and running in under two weeks. And she would have made herself a cranky, anxious mess.

  She blew on her coffee before she took a sip and then set the cup back down.

  “So.” Lindy folded her hands together and crossed one leg over the other.

  “So.” Ryan stretched one leg. “What’s up?”

  “I wanted to talk to you about high school and about Maddie and some things I’ve learned, thanks to her.”

  Ryan scratched his chin and then set his cup down. “One more time, I want to apologize. I’ll climb the old water tower to scream it. I’ll put an ad in the paper. I’ll tattoo it on my forehead.” Ryan shrugged. “Okay, I won’t do that last one, but take it in the spirit in which I intended it. I’m sorry I was not better in high school.”

  Lindy ran a fingernail down the seam of her jeans. Not better? It lacked a little something.

  “Dammit, that’s not what I meant either. It’s like I don’t want to say ‘I’m sorry I was an asshole’ because then it gets real. But I am sorry I bullied you or let it happen. And the idea that that could ever be something to hope for, that you’d just stood aside and let someone else be mistreated, it’s sobering. I never had to teach Maddie to be better than that. Ever since she was a girl, she’s hated to see anyone left out. And I’ve regretted not standing up against the other jocks and shitheads that I thought were good guys for a long time. But seeing that despair on her face, like a hero had just died or something…God.” Torment mixed with sadness and regret on Ryan’s face.

  Lindy reached over to pat his hand, and he wrapped both his hands around hers. “You’re lucky she’s such a smart girl. I think—I know when she mentioned Rob and his wave in the cafeteria, something changed for her. And for me. Rob was kind of a victim, too. He made the wrong choice, but he’s just figuring things out. Maddie would have made the wrong choice too if I’d missed what happened and you’d listened to her pleas. Just like I made the wrong choice.”

  Lindy snorted. “I mean, the wrong choices. I had plenty of opportunity to make a change but I didn’t.”

  Ryan frowned. “So, you’re here to tell me that you’ve switched from being mad at me to being mad at yourself?” He leaned his head back. “Am I supposed to be mad at you too?”

  Lindy tried to yank her hand away. “You better not.” When he kept a firm grip but rolled his head to smile at her, she added, “And not mad exactly.”

  She tried to ignore the light teasing swirls his thumb was tracing on the back of her hand. But it wasn’t easy. “Instead of pretending that nothing affected me, I should have tried to stop it, told somebody, punched you in the nose, something.”

  “Ow. Escalating to violence is never the answer.” He reached up to rub his nose with his free hand. “I’m glad you didn’t do that. Would have ruined my classically handsome profile.”

  “And that would have been a real shame.” She was glad her voice had the proper tone of dry amusement.

  “Why didn’t you? Say something? Do something? You never seemed to be bothered by anything I said.” He grimaced. “Which just made me worse.”

  Lindy was quiet as she tried to decide just how far she was willing to go here.

  Some days she still had trouble making sense of it all. She turned to face him and pulled one leg up under her. “Did you know I was not always this put together?” She swept a hand up and down in a television demo kind of way. “Hour-long sessions with a professional were required. I finally got fed up with feeling so out of step and just…wrong. We talked about a million different things, but we kept circling back to the same conversation, the real issue.”

  “That’s how you knew that Maddie needed someone to talk to right now.” Ryan turned to face her fully.

  “Right. I had all this stuff I hadn’t handled and it was messing me up. I sort of had this feeling that I was weak. I should have everything together.”

  “I don’t get that.” Ryan grabbed both of her hands. “Everybody’s got something they’re dealing with. Why’s it such a problem for you to struggle, too?”

  Lindy blinked her burning eyes. I’m not going to cry. I should never have gotten into this. I’m not going to cry. “After my parents divorced, my dad wasn’t around much. Even before my mom moved to Lincoln, my family didn’t spend much time together, but whenever I stayed with him for the weekend, I learned to pretend I was having a blast, no matter what. Anything less ruined our time together. He didn’t know much about girls, except that they liked to buy things and
eat chocolate. He just wanted me to be happy, but he didn’t know me well enough to make it happen. For that matter, neither did my mother. She just worked. So hard. Hurting his feelings made me feel awful, especially since I never knew when I’d have another chance to spend time with him.

  “So, for both of them, I learned to pretend that everything was okay, that nothing hurt me. And if it did, I could go to the mall and buy something I would look terrible in. My mother never had the time or the money to help, and my dad was happy enough to drop me off, even if he couldn’t figure the rest of it out. And then, after the high of retail therapy, I’d follow it up with something sweet. Instant happiness. Everything was easier for a while.”

  Lindy shook her shoulders to release the tension. “None of that is your fault. I learned to pretend nothing bothered me and to take care of myself. I didn’t learn much about boys, how to handle them, or the proper way to punch one in the nose, so…”

  “It’s not your fault either, Lindy.”

  Lindy blinked to chase away the tears. “Of course not. And if I’d told my mother, she would have done something. I wanted to be a help, not one more trouble.” Lindy rolled her eyes. “And of course, to her I was always the prettiest girl ever.”

  Ryan shifted on the couch. “Somehow I feel even worse now than I did before we started this. No little girl should raise herself.”

  Lindy growled. “There. That. That’s why I have to forgive you. Maddie’s lucky to have you.”

  Ryan didn’t smile at her frustration and the intensity in his eyes surprised her. “Being a good parent is like walking through a mine field without a map. You just take careful steps and hope you don’t blow something up.”

  “After talking with Rob, I know more about where this whole thing started.” Lindy ran a finger across both cheeks to chase away any stray mascara smudges and sat straighter. “I wondered if Coach Ford had encouraged his players to act more aggressively. Too many movies, I guess, but Rob made it clear that Coach has a zero tolerance policy for aggression off the field. Which is a relief.”