Happy Mother's Day! - By Sharon Kendrick Page 0,156

I also know that to be putting stuff like that out there on a first date you are either terrified of how much you like this girl or the complete opposite. And only you can know which.’

Matt patted him on the shoulder, then stood and left him to his thoughts.

His thoughts? His thoughts weren’t the problem. It was his conscience that was having trouble keeping up.

‘So how was your big date?’ Rick asked Siena when she came out of the body shop staff bathroom all dolled up in her now cola-free Dolce suit, looking and feeling much more like herself than she had in the last twenty-four hours.

‘It wasn’t a date,’ she said, as she ran a finger around the edge of her lips to make sure her lip gloss was picture perfect.

She swung her Kelly bag into the cracked vinyl lounge chair in Rick’s office before following in its wake, letting her legs flop straight out in front of her and slinging an arm over her tired eyes.

She heard Rick sit down in his bouncy office chair on the other side of his big messy desk.

‘If that nice James Dillon had anything to do with it, that was a date,’ he said. ‘Though I don’t know what you two are playing at, Siena. He has a kid and he never did answer me properly about his wife.’

She shifted her arm and glared up at him. ‘He’s a single dad, Rick. His wife died over a year ago, but I hardly wanted to bring that up while introducing you to the guy. God, Rick. What sort of person do you think I am?’

‘I see you so infrequently, Siena,’ he said, his face hard, ‘I’m sure I wouldn’t know.’

‘Well, know that I would never date a married man, or actively not date one, as the case may be. And, to put your troubled mind at rest, I have no intention of throwing my terrible self at nice James Dillon either. I’m leaving tomorrow. There would be no point.’

‘So how about your fellow in New York? Why didn’t the fact you were leaving the next day stop you from hanging out with him?’

She glared at him from beneath her arm to find him spinning a grimy old soccer ball on the end of his finger. ‘James asked me out because he is a kind man and I agreed because I have seen enough of your ugly mug for one visit!’

Rick rocked back in his chair and watched her. ‘Here we go again.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘You bounce about like a jumping bean while here, and bounce away before anything gets too settled. But this Dillon guy sees past the jumping bean, and that’s a rare quality. Probably more than you deserve.’

And there he was—the Rick she had run from the minute she’d had the chance. She was shocked it had taken him all of twenty-four hours to tell her she was worthless.

Siena’s blood quickly reached boiling point. Rick had cast off enough such throwaway comments at her as a kid that she had begun to believe them.

But she had shown him that she was better than that. She had shown the world she was better than that. She had flown into town for a personal meeting with Maximillian, for goodness’ sake! If that didn’t show Rick that she was deserving, then she had no idea what would.

Siena tried to sit up to defend herself but Rick threw the football at her and she slumped back into the couch, trapped and winded.

‘He’s a keeper, Siena,’ Rick continued. ‘He’s financially successful and, according to the girls who were watching you guys leave, he is—and I quote—a “hottie”. Don’t do a typical you and blow him off like you’ve blown off everyone else who has tried to get close to you.’

She managed to pull herself upright and keep her skirt from hiking under her armpits at the same time. ‘I don’t blow people off,’ she said.

‘That’s exactly what you do, Siena. You couldn’t give Dad the time of day from the second you became a teenager.’

I was a teenager! she wanted to scream. All teenage girls go through that cringe against their father. Especially ones who had always been daddy’s little girl. That didn’t mean that it was her fault that his heart had given way.

‘Heck, you tried to blow me off long ago,’ Rick said, ‘and you would have succeeded if I didn’t give you free rein on the end of a long rubber