Getting Lucky by Marilyn Pappano

Author:Marilyn Pappano [Pappano, Marilyn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-48542-7
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2012-08-29T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

McCauley’s Steakhouse was located on a side street in downtown Bethlehem. It was casual and crowded, with booths along the walls, tables in the middle, and customers waiting in the small lobby. When Ben reached the hostess, he automatically returned her smile. “I’m meeting a party that may already be here. Lynda Barone?”

She checked her list, then shook her head. “Maybe she left your name … No, no Ben. How many are in the group?”

“Four. Two men, two women. One of the women is …” He thought of all the superlatives he could use, then settled for simple. “Tall.”

“Oh, like …” The hostess raised her arm above her head, waving her fingers in the air up high. “I didn’t seat them, but I remember her.” Stepping into the dining room, she scanned the room before gesturing toward a distant booth. “Is that your party?”

At the same time Ben saw them, Lynda saw him and left the booth. She moved so gracefully, and she looked so damn beautiful that he simply stood there and watched. Beside him, the hostess was watching, too. “Wow,” she murmured admiringly.

Wow, indeed. Then Ben glanced at the girl—short, chubby, with braces, glasses, and enduring a bad-hair moment. Someday the braces would be gone. Weight could be lost, glasses traded for contact lenses, and bad hair fixed. Someday she would be very pretty … but not a wow. Not like Lynda.

“You could have met me halfway,” Lynda said mildly when she joined him.

“And miss watching you walk all the way over here?”

“How’s your hand?”

“Sore, but better.” He leaned close enough to smell her perfume, to see the dim light glisten on her lipstick. “Do I get to kiss you hello?”

She avoided answering, but she couldn’t stop the flush that crept up her neck. “I—I really appreciate your doing this. I had no clue they were going to show up with law-boy in tow.”

“ ‘Law-boy’?”

“Richard Andrews. He’s a lawyer. Not that I have anything against lawyers in general …”

“Except the one you used to be engaged to.”

“But his handshake is limp, and he kept looking at my house as if he were appraising it. I left them downstairs while I changed, and when I went back down, he was measuring the doorway into the living room.”

“Fifty-eight inches.” She gave him a startled look, and he shrugged. “The pocket doors are warped. They need to be replaced, and of course it’ll be a custom order.” He glanced across the room again. “Are your parents going to hate me?”

“Dad thinks you do good work, and that counts for a lot with him. Mom … She’ll probably try none too subtly to show that what’s-his-name is the better catch.” Her smile looked more like a grimace. “We’d better join them before she pushes Dad out of the booth trying to get a better look at you. Feel free to talk. A lot.”

As they approached the booth, Ben’s gaze shifted to the lawyer. His tan looked as if he spent hours in a tanning bed, and his teeth were too white and even to be natural.

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