It All Started With a Lima Bean (21 page)

“Good. You shouldn’t, but just knowing you are wearing pretty ones is truly empowering. Trust me. It will help build your confidence.”

Was she serious? “Underwear will change my confidence level? You have got to be kidding me. I’ve never heard of such a thing.” Now Abby looked offended, and noticed the sales girls starting to gather around them as if they knew what she wore under her clothes. Wait, could they see the elastic band showing above her capris? She felt between her top and bottom. Nope. Not this time at least.

“That’s because you wear ugly ones. Come on, let’s get you set up.” Leah turned to the girls waiting to help them. “Panty emergency. Show us all the pretty, non-thongs you have.” Well at least she spared her a little embarrassment.

After Leah felt satisfied that she had solved Abby’s panty debacle, they left the store and headed over to the chain restaurant located at the end of the mall. This one served soup, salad, pasta dishes, and incredible specialty pizzas. She couldn’t wait to bite into her favorite vegetarian pizza covered in several types of cheese and various vegetables.

About halfway through the mall, she noticed a familiar smiling face walking toward them, and she cringed. Quickly, she looked around for a shop she might be able to hide in for a moment. She really loved living in Santa Barbara, but you couldn’t go out of your front door without running into someone you knew. Normally she would have loved running into him, but not while carrying the bag she currently had in her hand.

As she heard Caleb’s deep voice addressing her, she realized it was too late, and her opportunity to escape had past. “Hey Abby. Hey Leah. Are you eating or shopping this evening? Did you find anything interesting?” He glanced down toward the bags the girls were holding.

Abby felt her cheeks heat as she discreetly hid the hot pink lingerie bag behind her back and hoped it was out sight. No way was she telling him what they had found that was interesting. She knew what he would probably think; it insinuated she was buying sexy lingerie before their weekend away together.

The motion of hiding her purchase only drew more attention to it as his eyes zeroed in on the bag. It felt as if it had a neon sign flashing and pointing, saying, ‘Sexy underwear. She has sexy underwear in this bag.’

“This is Leah’s,” Abby blurted, shoving the bag into Leah’s arms, and fumbling to untwist the string handles from around her fingers.

Caleb looked at the label across the front of the bag, and then snapped his eyes back to Abby. His eyes had darkened, and she was trapped in his lustful gaze.
Oh my!

Leah’s all-knowing voice broke through their trance. “Looks like you got some new cologne from the department store, Caleb.” They both turned to find Leah smirking and looking at the bag that he held at his side. From the corner of her eye, she saw Caleb winking at Leah in response.

Heat now flushed through her whole body, and she looked back down to her feet to conceal it from their view. She really needed to learn to control it, or at the very least mask the emotions that showed all over her face whenever he was around. Maybe these new un-granny panties were a brilliant idea after all because she could use all the extra confidence she could get around him.

“We were actually just heading home. I’m really tired, and need to get all the rest I can for this weekend.” Abby looked surprised by her own words. “I mean, I don’t want to be tired, and knock out on you during our drive tomorrow.” Caleb watched her as she spoke, and then looked at her mouth as he’d done so many times before. He was slowly killing her every time he did that.

“Oh? I thought we were going to eat some pizza over there.” Leah pointed toward the restaurant with the hand holding Abby’s pink bag. It dangled from her wrist in the air for all to see. Leah was really enjoying herself during this humiliating interaction.

“No, I really just want to head home now,” Abby said between gritted teeth to this best friend of hers that was going to get it.

“Okay, well I won’t keep you then.” Caleb looked at Leah and then turned toward Abby. “I’ll pick you up at 3:00 tomorrow if that still works for you.”

Abby bit her lower lip and slightly rocked her hips back and forth. “Uh huh, sounds good.”

“Okay, I’ll see you tomorrow then. Bye ladies.” He raised his hand then turned to walk into another shop.

Once he was out of sight, Abby decided it was the perfect time to smack Leah’s shoulder.

“Ow. What the hell was that for?”

“Are you kidding me? That was so embarrassing. I don’t want to eat with him and our underwear bags. You practically swung them under his face.”

“Calm down. Everyone wears underwear. You have to buy them at some point.”

“Yeah, but merchandise from this particular store could insinuate that there was something a little more scandalous in the bag.” Abby pointed to the sack now dangling from Leah’s fingertips.

“Really Amiga, there are worse things he could be thinking about than the fact the woman he is swooning over is buying lingerie for the hot weekend ahead.” She snickered.

Abby smacked her again. “Damn it, now I’m going to be freaking out wondering what he could be thinking about.”

“Yeah, because you weren’t freaking out about it before now, right?” Leah chuckled, worked some ninja moves, and was able to avoid the third shoulder smack.

After getting home from work, Abby found herself nervously pacing back and forth across her living room while her bag sat, waiting patiently by the front door. Caleb wasn’t going to pick her up for another two hours. Her tummy was doing flip-flops, filled with anxiety. If she kept this up, she was going to wear a hole in the wood flooring. She’d never gone away with a man for the weekend before, and although it was an innocent trip, she’d developed such strong feelings for him already. She was afraid of making the wrong move, or doing something that would thoroughly turn him away from her. She was driving herself crazy, and needed to do something productive. Grabbing her things, and then getting in her car, she headed over to Leah’s shop to see if she could be of any use there.

The recognizable chime on the storefront’s entrance sounded. Leah appeared from the back carrying a beautiful arrangement of her favorite flowers. Different shades of pink, yellow, and orange puffy Pincushion Proteas were displayed on top of the clear vase. She was all too familiar with these flowers, thanks to her best girlfriend’s love for them. Abby had taken the drive with Leah all the way down to the growers in Fallbrook several times.

The floral aroma permeated the air. Abby enjoyed coming in the shop for the smell alone. “Hey chica, what are you doing here?” Leah placed the vase on the countertop.

“I just wanted to see if you needed any help since I have a few spare hours.” Abby hoped Leah was buying her reason for standing there.

“I’m actually good, but you can hang out with me if you want.” Leah squinted one of her eyes and placed one hand on her hip. Abby was familiar with this stance. “Why are you actually here? Are you nervous? If I were you, I’d be going crazy right now.” She smirked.

Abby scowled at her. “Thanks for the pep talk, amiga.” She emphasized the Spanish word for friend.

Leah laughed. “You know I love you, and I’m only giving you a hard time. Stop with the nerves. He is totally into you, and you are into him; everything will fall into place, just as it should.”

“Well I don’t know about the he likes me part, but I’m trying not to get my hopes up. I can’t imagine him ever giving me more than friendship, and I guess I can live with that. I don’t know that I’m worthy of him anyway, and before you start with the real pep talk, you know what I’m talking about. I mean this man is perfect. I know he said he wasn’t a great guy before, but I just can’t imagine him ever doing a bad thing in his entire life.” She felt her worry line deepen on her face.

“Abby, nobody is perfect. You know that as much as I do, so you stop. He may have evolved into one hell of a man...” Leah winked. “But as he said, he has his skeletons. No guy that good looking has a completely squeaky clean past.”

“Would you stop talking about his appearance? He is so much more than that. He has the best heart. Oh, and he is the most incredible dad.” She stared off to the side with a dreamy look on her face. She’d fallen hard for him already.

“Wow. You have it even worse than I thought. You’re in love with him aren’t you?” Realization hit Leah’s face.

“What? No!” Abby’s expression said one thing, but her heart said something entirely different.

“Sweetie, you are completely in love with him. Your face says it all.” Leah reached for her hand that rested on the countertop, rubbing Abby’s knuckles with the pad of her thumb.

Defeated, she looked down at the table behind Leah where a variety of cut flowers laid. “Yes. I’m in love with him. I didn’t want to say it because then it’s real. I don’t want to love him. What if he doesn’t like me back Leah? I will be completely devastated.”

“What if he does?” Leah smiled and raised her eyebrows.

“I don’t know what to do with that either. He’s everything I could ever want in a man. But how could he ever care as much for me as he did Rene? I would always be second to her, and I don’t know if I could deal with that either.”

“Well, let me tell you what I see as an outsider. This ‘perfect’ man has been struggling because he does have feelings for you. Honestly, it’s even more obvious on him than on you. He is completely gaga over you. It’s a tough situation with Rene in the mix, but I believe he can or already does love you the same if not more than Rene. He was young when they married. He’s a man now, and he has been through hell and back. He can offer you more mature, deeper feelings than he ever could have offered Rene.”

“Where did that come from?” That was pretty insightful.

“Most of it from me, but Grace and I have had some conversations too. We both see it, and can’t wait for you two to make it official.”

“Great, you guys are talking about us?” Abby had already suspected these ladies spoke often.

“Um, yeah.” Leah looked like she was hiding something.

“Why do you look so guilty Leah? What did you do?” Abby squinted her eyes, looking suspiciously at her best friend.

“I didn’t do anything. Grace may have orchestrated some of your chance meetings, but I didn’t do anything except maybe tell her where you would be at times. You didn’t really think you ran into this hot guy all the time on your own, did you?” She snickered loudly.

“You guys are quite the team, aren’t you?” Quite the sneaky team that is.

“Well forget that now. The bottom line is that you guys are crazy about each other, and if it’s meant to be, this weekend will move you closer together.”

“Or it will solidify our friendship.” She had to be prepared for this also.

“Let the cards fall where they may my friend; just don’t smell your underarms in front of him okay?” Leah hooted loudly and smacked the countertop.

“Stop! I changed deodorants. I’m good.”

“Don’t forget those panties we just bought too.” Leah pointed at Abby as if she was scolding her for already packing her white cotton briefs.

She squared her shoulders with complete confidence. “I’m ready to go. Don’t worry your pretty little head about my undergarments.”

Caleb pulled up to Abby’s house at 3:00 sharp. He was so nervous. This weekend was going to be his deciding factor. It would be the longest time they’d spent alone, and he was going to dive in to discover every little thing he could about Abby Sullivan. If he was going to do this, he was going to do it right. He strolled up to the wooden door and knocked. Abby opened it, and the sight of her nearly knocked him over. She stood before him in a pair of dark jeans, a silky blouse and heeled sandals with her hair cascading down her shoulders. Her bright eyes stared back at him, probably wondering why he was gawking.

“Uh, you ready to go?” He was shocked he’d been able to put a few words together to make a complete sentence.

“Yeah, let me grab my bag.” She bent down to pick it up, and Caleb stepped in, taking it from her hand. He got a whiff of what he assumed was her shampoo, and nearly tackled her right there. She smelled so good. He was sniffing her like he’d caught her doing to him at the zoo.