“Wrong. But I can tell the difference between someone who really likes me and someone who needs a distraction from—”

He was kissing her all of a sudden, and how the heck had she gotten against the wall? The clever man had backed her right against it, and holy bleep, Jack could kiss. His mouth was insistent and warm and his hand cupped her face, and she was kissing him back without even thinking about it, and her arms went around his lean waist, and whoops, yes, she might’ve been grabbing his ass, but come on, he was completely irresistible.

He pulled back a little, then kissed the corner of her mouth. Em was dimly aware that she was breathing hard.

Jack took her hand and put it over his heart; she felt the hard, solid thumping.

Damn, he was good.

“Please have dinner with me,” he whispered.

“Okay.” She cleared her throat.

“Saturday?”

“Okay.”

He smiled. “I’ll call you.”

“Okay.”

Not put off by her one-word vocabulary, he kissed her forehead and then walked off, just like that, leaving Emmaline shaky and flushed and...and worried.

It didn’t look like she’d need twenty or twenty-five minutes to fall in love. It looked like she’d just needed that kiss.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“YOU NEED A thong, darlin’.”

The statement was delivered by Allison as they stood over Em’s pathetic wardrobe, the nicest piece being a cashmere sweater with a hole in the sleeve, courtesy of Sarge, who was surreptitiously trying to reclaim it. Allison’s thumbs flew over her phone. “Yep. Caroline concurs with my professional opinion.”

Was it wrong that Allison was consulting her child about slutty underwear? Granted, Caroline was on the elderly side of “child,” but still. “Well, Jack’s not going to see my underwear,” she said.

“Sure, baby doll,” Allison said. “They all say that.”

“Who’s they? Is Jack a slut? Tell me the truth.”

“Hell, no! Maybe I could’ve gotten me a little some-some if he was. That being said, he was the best date I’ve ever had, and don’t think I didn’t call Charles to gloat about it.”

“How is Charles?” Emmaline asked.

“Oh, fine. We’re probably getting back together. He’s given up the cookie jars. Don’t tell anyone, though. I want to lord that over his little bald head the rest of our natural days together. Anyway, back to you. Thong. Let’s go. The bridal store has some real nice trashy underwear. Don’t you make that face at me! I assure you, that ex-wife of his wore thongs all the time. Tramps like that give us Southern girls a bad name. And you’re wearing a dress.”

“This is not a dressy occasion.”

“Shush, darlin’. You just let Auntie Allison do the thinking here.”

And so it was that two hours later, Emmaline stood in her bedroom, cutting the tags off a pale pink lace bra-and-thong set from the bridal shop across the green. They were very pretty. And small. She put the bra on first. A little scratchy, but not too bad.

And then the thong.

This couldn’t be...did women really...? She must be wearing it wrong, because good God in heaven! It was horrible! Was the little string supposed to...

She took it off, went to her laptop and Google searched “how to wear a thong.” No, she hadn’t put it on wrong. She tried again.

Ow. Fantastic. This was just a twenty-five dollar version of a severe wedgie. She picked up her phone and called Allison. “Hey, Allison, I—”

“You’ll get used to it,” Allison said without bothering to say hello. “Takes a couple of weeks to adjust.”

“Weeks? Are you kidding?”

“Gotta run. Some kid put a Lego Darth Vader up his nose, and I’m the doc on call tonight.”

Okay, well, the thong was...horrible; there was no getting around that. But it did look nice. Better than the cotton panties with the orange and purple stripes (on sale, don’t judge) and the rip in the side, purchased in the year I Can’t Remember. And if she was going to sleep with Jack (slow down there, girl, warned the smarter, less slutty part of her brain), she felt he deserved better than orange and purple stripes. And rips. He deserved thongs and shoes with heels and Sicilian hair slime.

The fact that she’d already slept with Jack felt surreal. The moon had been shining that night, and the doors to the balcony had been flung open, and the ocean had lapped at the shores and all those other innuendo-laden metaphors. If he didn’t refer to it, she’d pretty much think she’d made it all up in a post-wedding, homemade-vodka-induced fantasy.

But if they slept together here, in Manningsport, it’d be real.

She took a painful step toward the bathroom. Crikey! That hurt! How was she supposed to be able to walk, let alone sit?

She practice sat, made it halfway down, then jolted up, causing Sarge to run over to her, jump and cover her front with dog hair.

A half hour later, after slapping several yards of tape over her front to remove German shepherd fur, Emmaline’s doorbell rang. She hobbled to the door, and there he stood, the blond, the blue-eyed, the beautiful Jack Holland.

He had a bouquet of red tulips in his hand. “Hey,” he said. “You look fantastic.”

“Thanks.” She took the bouquet, mentally counted the number of steps it would take to get to the kitchen and put the flowers in a vase and tossed them on the coffee table. “Where are we going? O’Rourke’s?”

“Hugo’s just opened for the season. I thought we’d walk there. It’s nice out. Don’t you want to put those in a vase? Your dog might eat them.”

Indeed, Sarge was snuffling them right now.

She sighed. “Sure.” Then, every step a reminder of heretofore ignored parts of her anatomy, she walked into the kitchen, grabbing the flowers on the way. Put them in a vase, stopping for a minute to touch the smooth, cool petals. Nice choice, tulips. Less cliché than roses. And she’d always liked how they felt.

She rubbed a bloom against her lip, breathing in the faint, peachy fragrance. Small wonder deer ate the blossoms right off every spring. She’d almost like to give it a try and see how they tasted.

Turning, she gave a little start. Jack was leaning in the doorway, hands in his pockets, a half smile on his face.

Something pulled in her chest.

“Ready?” he asked.

“You bet.” She almost forgot her thong pain. He was that beautiful.

They didn’t hold hands as they walked down the sidewalk, which was a shame. Maybe Jack could carry her and make her forget that her thong was trying to eviscerate her. Also, her left breast was incredibly itchy. She tried to rub it with her upper arm, which just made it worse. Wondered if she could subtly go at it with a fork once they sat down.

But they were almost there. (Just thirty or forty painful steps to go, and had she mentioned she was wearing heels? Not the sprain-inducing kind, but the kind that nevertheless made her feet throb.) Being a girl sucked.

Just as they got to Hugo’s, however, Jack stopped in the foyer, and a curse slipped from his lips.

“Forget your wallet? Don’t worry. I’ve got money.”

“No. It’s...uh...”

“Oh, my God! It’s you! Honey, look—it’s Jack Holland!”