“I have to go,” he said reluctantly. “I left Josh at the barbershop, and Katie’s either done with him or she gave up and threw him out.”
“He was looking a little ragged around the edges when you brought him in for breakfast yesterday.”
“Definitely overdue for a trim.” He stood. “I’ll see you later.”
“Enjoy the weather.”
He was halfway across the park when he turned back—intending to ask her if she wanted to do something, like maybe take a ride on the bike with him—but Paige already had her nose buried back in her book. She wasn’t even watching him walk away, which didn’t bode well for her wanting to spend a little alone time with him after dark.
He walked back to the barbershop, wondering who else around town he could spend a little time with during his not-quite-a-vacation. But nobody on his mental list really piqued his interest. Nobody but Paige Sullivan.
*
The nice thing about living in a mobile home not much bigger than two pickup trucks parked bumper-to-bumper was the fact it didn’t take long to clean. The previous owner had updated the bathroom, and Paige had replaced the linoleum and carpet before she moved in. She loved being barefooted too much to walk on flooring as old as she was.
The kitchen and the bedroom were a little on the shabby side, but every month she tried to set aside enough money to make a small improvement. This month it was replacing the ancient lauan closet door in her bedroom with a white louver bifold that brightened up that corner of the room.
She opened and closed it a few times, proud of how well it came out and how smoothly it moved in the runner, and then she flipped on the vacuum to clean up the small mess she’d made. The old door was already outside, leaned up against the skirting, and she’d have to remember to ask Carl if he’d mind throwing it in his truck and disposing of it after his next shift.
The comforting drone of the vacuum lulled her mind into roaming free and she wasn’t surprised when it roamed right to Mitch Kowalski. She’d been thinking about him almost constantly since he’d sat down next to her on the park bench yesterday.
Mostly she wondered if he was just being nice or if he was actually interested in her. And then, no matter how hard she tried not to, she’d imagine what it would have been like if he’d put his arm around her and kissed her right there in the park in the broad daylight.
That definitely would have given the town something to talk about. Not that they needed much prodding to talk about Mitch, but Paige had never done anything—besides reopening the diner—that put her on the gossip hot sheet.
From what she’d heard, Mitch had an apartment in New York City, but he rarely stayed there. He traveled from job to job, either staying in hotels or renting a furnished apartment if he’d be there a few months.
That probably explained how he’d avoided any heavy relationships so far. He wasn’t in one place long enough for things to get serious. Sort of like her mother, except Donna Sullivan was usually running toward what she thought would be love and not away from it.
She wondered how it worked for Mitch. Did he stay on the run so love couldn’t catch him? Or was love simply unable to pin him down? It was like a chicken-versus-the-egg question for his love life.
Laughing at herself, Paige yanked the cord out of the wall and wound it around the vacuum. Maybe he traveled because his job demanded it. Period. And she had better things to do than ponder the state of Mitch Kowalski’s love life.
Her cell phone vibrated in her pocket and she rolled her eyes when she saw the name on the caller ID screen. “Hi, Mom.”
“Hi, honey. How are you?”
“Good. How about you?”
Wait for it… “I’ve been better.”
And, as expected, her mother launched into a litany of complaints revealing her growing doubt about her current relationship. Corey was five years younger than Donna, a fact which had thrilled her mom at first, but was quickly becoming a source of insecurity. “I swear, he would have forgotten the anniversary of our first date if I hadn’t put it on Facebook.”
Paige put her phone on speakerphone and very quietly spread some work out on the table in front of her, careful to make sympathetic noises at the appropriate times. Pulling what she thought of as the “Gavin’s Specials” tally sheet out of the pile, she scanned through the numbers.