The Restoration of Celia Fairchild - Marie Bostwick Page 0,63
a whole lot less,” he would say with a grin. “Depends on the day.”
I do give points for humor. But I felt bad for Lorne. I suspected his humor was insulating a whole lot of pain, just like everybody else’s.
“What’s happened between you and Trey?”
Lorne chewed his pizza and gave me a pointed look.
“No, I mean besides your conviction. I feel like there’s more to it than that.”
“We’re brothers,” he said, as if this explained everything.
“Come on. I asked Trey but he said there wasn’t enough liquor in Charleston to get it out of him.”
“See? And with me it’d only take half a bourbon. Which is another reason I don’t drink. Miss?” Lorne waved his hand, trying to catch the eye of our server, then mimed a signing motion.
He’d told me before we sat down that he was in a hurry because he had an AA meeting later. His momentary distraction gave me an opportunity to take a good look at him. His jaw was sharp and as angled as a cleaver, his eyes deep brown and fringed with a bristle of thick lashes, a feature that all the mascara in the world cannot buy, as I am all too aware.
Handsome. An ex-con. A recovering everything. A million red flags, all waving madly. No wonder I was suddenly finding myself attracted to him. Until a few months ago, he’d have been just my type, a man who presented yet another opportunity to make myself absolutely miserable. Now there was Peaches.
When the server brought the check, I grabbed it first. Lorne protested, said he was the one who’d invited me, so he should pay the bill.
“You didn’t invite me. You rescued me from Foster Pickney, remember?”
“Well, I wanted to invite you. Doesn’t that count?”
“This was a meeting, Lorne. I’m the boss, so I should pay.”
“You’re the client,” he said, his tone making it clear that he had no boss, “so I should pay. Besides, it’s not that much. Half-price pizza during happy hour. Don’t take this the wrong way, Celia, but you’re a cheap date.”
I smiled. How could I not? Lorne grinned, looking pretty pleased with himself, then leaned closer, and waited. If I had moved my head forward an inch and a half, two at the most, our lips would have met. I won’t say it wasn’t tempting. But then what? Whatever happened next, I knew it wouldn’t end well.
I turned my head to one side and dabbed my lips with my napkin, pretending I hadn’t noticed him. Lorne narrowed his eyes as if he was trying to size me up and see if I was worth the trouble. Finally, he shrugged and picked up another olive.
“Okay. I get it. Probably the last thing you need right now is a man.”
Probably.
“SO? DID YOU go out with him?” Calvin asked when I talked to him over the weekend and told him about what had happened at the Pickneys’ party.
“No. Yes. But not like that,” I said when Calvin gasped and started to sputter. “What I mean is, we got together after he wrapped for the day but just to go over budgets and the punch lists. It wasn’t a date. We shared a pizza—”
“Where’d you go?”
“Someplace on King Street, I can’t remember the name. But the pizza was fabulous. It had shaved brussels sprouts, thin slices of apple, pancetta, and some kind of cheese.”
I’ve known Calvin long enough to accept that the conversation could not continue until I related the particulars of the meal. However, I didn’t tell him anything about dodging Lorne’s kiss because there was honestly nothing to tell.
“Ricotta,” Calvin said authoritatively. “And did they drizzle a little honey on it? I bet it was Indaco.”
“Calvin, do you spend all your spare time memorizing the menus of every restaurant in America?”
“Only the good ones.” He sniffed. “So, how was it? Besides the food, I mean. Did you have fun?”
“I wasn’t there to have fun. I was there to crunch numbers and check things off lists. Honestly, Calvin, the only thing I am thinking about right now is getting the house ready in time for the home visit.”
“No room for romance?”
“None. And if there was, you can bet it wouldn’t be with a thrice-divorced felon and recovering addict.”
“Wouldn’t have stopped you before.”
“Yeah, well. The prospect of impending motherhood changes a person. No more bad boys for me,” I said.
“What about good men? Trey Holcomb seems like a solid citizen.”
Yes, he was. And I liked Trey, or might have, if the