She just needed some time to recover from having her life turned upside down and he was going to give her the time she needed because he liked her—a lot—and he thought maybe they could make a go of it. She was smart and funny and stubborn and independent and, even now when he was doing one of his favorite things, he counted the minutes until he’d see her again.
After the Patriots walked the ball into the end zone and the cheering died down, Mike elbowed him. “Women can be…unstable, emotionally, during the first part of a pregnancy, just so you know. Stick it out if you really think she’s special.”
She was special. He wasn’t sure how special yet, because it was hard to separate how he felt about her from the fact she was having his baby, but he did know he’d be devastated if she ever pulled another Cinderella act on him. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“So you really like her, then?” Joe asked.
“I really do.”
Joe, being Joe, probably had more to say, but the Patriots intercepted the ball and the brothers rose to their feet, cheering with the crowd, as the cornerback engaged in a rowdy foot race with the Jets offense.
As the clock ticked down on the third quarter, the conversation moved on to draft pick progress, injury reports and whether or not the blonde two rows down had real breasts or not, but Kevin had only one foot mentally in the game.
When the crowd erupted into an angry roar and Kevin had no idea why, Mike sadly shook his head. “Man, you got it bad.”
Yeah, he was beginning to think he really did.
***
Paulie slid into a booth at her favorite greasy spoon diner, careful not to catch her jeans on the duct tape covering a split in the vinyl. She’d caved when Sam returned after Thanksgiving weekend in Boston and threatened her into another dinner date, but he’d been stupid enough to leave the reservations to her.
This place didn’t take reservations and there was never a wait. And she had a nice view of Samuel Thomas Logan the Fourth’s face as he walked through the door. His expression was pretty similar to her mother’s the day six-year-old Paulie accidentally dripped chocolate ice cream on her dress. She’d been restricted to bland, non-staining vanilla until she turned sixteen and could drive her shiny new BMW to the ice cream parlor herself.
Sam grimaced as he slid into the booth. “Do they print the menus on the back of the condemned signs they rip off the door?”
“Snob.” Besides the meatloaf special, she’d brought him there for a reason—the diner perfectly illustrated how different her world was from his.
“It’s called standards.” He pulled a menu out of the rack behind the condiments and sugar dish. “How long did it take you to find a place you thought might scare me off?”
“Paulie!” Cassie, who not only waited the tables but owned the place, rushed over. “The flowers you sent Mom were beautiful! It was the biggest bouquet in the entire wing and everybody was jealous.”
She smiled, noting Sam’s incredulous stare in her peripheral vision. “I’m glad she liked them. How’s her new hip?”
“Good. The doctor says she’ll be good as new in no time. You both want coffee?”
When they nodded, Cassie left them and Sam nudged Paulie’s ankle with his toe. “You actually eat here? On a regular basis?”
“Yes, I do, so do you get it now? Your life and my life have nothing in common.”
“You’re telling me we don’t have a future together because you’ve got a fondness for one-star food?”
As if the critics would get close enough to give the diner one star. She didn’t have to answer him, though, because Cassie came back with their coffees. After they’d both ordered the meatloaf special, Sam leaned back in the booth and sipped his coffee.
“Not bad,” he admitted.
“This is my idea of a date. Not some fancy restaurant with a ma?tre d’ who’ll only seat you if your family’s listed in The Social Register. I’d rather come here or go to a game and eat hot dogs from a street vendor.”
“I can do that.”
“Sure, right now. Once or twice, maybe. Not as a lifestyle.”
“Why are you being so stubborn about this?”
Only the fact she needed the caffeine kept her from whacking him upside the head with her coffee mug. “Sam, you know this isn’t going to work. I don’t know if it’s a game to you or—”
“It’s not a game.”
“If I thought we’d be happy together, I would have met you at the end of the aisle the first time.”
“That was then. Now I know how you feel, which you never bothered to tell me before.”
“And what’s knowing going to change?”
He managed to capture her free hand in his before she could snatch it away. “No matter how much I told myself I didn’t, every day for the last five years I’ve missed you. And this time I’m going to fight for you.”
“Even if you have to fight dirty,” she muttered.
“You know I’m not going to tell anybody who you are. That was…you’re so damn stubborn I knew that was the only way I’d get you to go out with me.”
“I already told Kevin, anyway.”