Made For Us (5 page)

“So that was…what? You were teaching me a lesson?” he asked as he sat down.

Picking up the menu, Zoe simply shrugged. “It would have been nice if you’d actually asked me what I’d like to eat rather than just making the decision for me.”

Aidan was stumped. What was the big deal? He was hungry, she was hungry, and neither of them had eaten dinner. They were passing the pizza place, end of story. Aidan wondered why he didn’t just take her home and get something to eat on his own. Trying to get this woman to soften toward him was starting to feel like more trouble than it was worth. Not that he cared what this woman in her sexy pencil skirts thought about him. No, sir.

Zoe’s face was mostly hidden by the menu, but he saw her sparkling eyes peek at him briefly, and he could see her shoulders shaking.

She was laughing at him? Seriously?

“What is so damn funny?” he demanded.

“You have a lousy poker face,” she said, putting down the menu. “You looked like your head was about to explode.”

Nailed
it
in
one
. “Okay, fine. You had your fun. If you didn’t want to eat with me, you should have just said so.”

“Um…when? You pulled in the parking lot and climbed out of the truck without asking if I wanted to stop.”

Aidan looked up at the ceiling and then back at Zoe. “Do you want to eat or not?”

“That depends,” she said sweetly.

“On?”

“Are we going to share in conversation, or are you going to be all bossy and dominate the whole thing?”

If Aidan didn’t know any better, he’d swear that Zoe had talked to his family, or at least Darcy. Doing his best to relax, he picked up his menu to give himself something else to look at besides her distracting eyes, distracting hands, distracting everything. “We can talk about whatever you want.” His teeth were clenched so tightly, he was sure he’d broken a molar. He’d dealt with quite a few difficult clients in his line of work with no problems. Why did this woman make him so damn uncomfortable?

“If you weren’t grinding your teeth when you said it, I would have believed you.”

That was it. He was done. She was fired. He’d find another design firm because nothing was worth all of this aggravation. Slamming his menu down, he went to slide out of the booth when the waitress came over. “Hey, Aidan! This is a surprise. We normally only see you back there at the takeout counter. It’s nice to see you sitting inside for a change.”

Aidan had known Tammy Wilson since high school. He was totally trapped. “It’s good to see you, Tammy. How’s Richie doing?” Casually, he slid back into the booth and did his best to ignore Zoe’s satisfied smirk.

“Working like a fiend, as usual,” she said as she placed two glasses of water and a basket of bread on the table. “The tourists don’t make it easy for him. I think he’s given out an entire year’s worth of speeding tickets in the last week alone.”

Aidan smiled. “Hopefully that means he’ll let me go with a warning next time I’m rushing through town.”

“Oh, stop. You don’t rush anywhere, and Richie wouldn’t dare give you a ticket.” She winked at him and then suddenly seemed to realize Zoe was a woman she didn’t recognize. Her eyes went wide and then she looked from Zoe to Aidan and back again. “So…um, hi. I’m Tammy.”

“Hi, Tammy, I’m Zoe Dalton. I’m working for Martha Tate, doing the model homes for the new Shaughnessy community. I moved to town about a month ago.”

“I knew I hadn’t seen you in here before,” Tammy said with a smile. “Welcome to the area. What can I get the two of you to eat?”

“We’ll have—” Aidan started.

“Actually, I haven’t had a chance to look at the menu yet, Tammy. Can you give me a few minutes?”

“Absolutely. Take your time.” She smiled at Zoe and then at Aidan. “You should try something new too, Aidan. We happen to make more than pizza and spaghetti and meatballs.” She winked at Zoe and walked away.

He actually felt himself blush. Picking up his menu, he noticed that Zoe was studying hers with a serene smile on her face. “Enjoying yourself?” he asked.

Without looking up, she nodded. “More than I thought possible. You’re really quite entertaining to be around. This whole adventure has allowed me to learn so much more about you.”

“Like what?”

Zoe found what she wanted to order and then placed the menu down and looked at Aidan. “For starters, you like to have control of every situation. You clearly don’t think anyone can make a decision for themselves and that whatever you decide is better. You don’t like to try new things.” Pausing, she reached for her water and took a sip. “How am I doing?”

Nailed
it
in
one. Again.
A change of subject was definitely in order.

“So what are you ordering?” he asked with a huff. Geez, when had he become this controlling, predictable guy? Everyone seemed to see it but him. What was wrong with liking some order in his life? Or with wanting to help people make their decisions? When had it become wrong to just stick to the things he liked without it being a federal case?

Despite how fun it was to push his buttons, Zoe thought she had pushed enough for one night. “I think I’m going to have the caprese salad.”

“And?”

“And what? That’s it. I’m having the salad. What’s wrong with that? I mean, I know it’s not as original as pizza or spaghetti, but…” She trailed off teasingly.

“Nothing. It’s fine,” he said with mock nonchalance. He continued to peruse the menu, trying to come up with something, anything, besides pizza or spaghetti. Maybe Italian hadn’t been such a great idea.

“Out with it, Shaughnessy,” she said with exasperation.

“It seems to me I had to sit here and get razzed for my lack of originality and then you go and expect to get away with just ordering a salad? How is that fair?” he said, stalling. If Zoe weren’t so distracting, maybe he’d be able to make a simple decision about what to order for dinner.

“Maybe a caprese salad is out of the ordinary for me,” she teased and was relieved to see a hint of a smile on Aidan’s face.

“Or maybe you’re one of those women who don’t eat when she’s out on a date.” As soon as the word “date” was out of his mouth, Aidan realized what he had said. Zoe’s eyes went wide for a second before she recovered.

Two
can
play
at
the
change-of-subject game
, she thought. “Okay then, what are you ordering?”

“I am going to go with the lasagna with meat sauce.” And he was quite proud of himself too.

“Way to be different,” she mumbled.

“Now what?” Seriously, he was ready to order a strong alcoholic drink because this woman was killing him. And it wasn’t even a Friday.

“So basically you’re skipping the spaghetti and meatballs to order a differently shaped pasta with chopped-up meatballs.”

Well, when she said it, it did sound ridiculous. “Okay, how about this? I’ll let you order for me…”

“Really?” she asked, her voice almost giddy.

“But…”

“Damn it, you’re going to ruin this, aren’t you?”

“But I get to order for you.”

Interesting
. Zoe considered it and knew she was safe. Carbs and pasta were her weaknesses, and she pretty much wanted one of everything on the menu, so she couldn’t go wrong. “Okay, fine. Deal.” Reaching across the table, she held out her hand to shake on it. As soon as Aidan’s hand touched hers, she felt it. That zing or zap or whatever it was that people said happened when you were attracted to someone.
How
did
that
happen?
she thought. She quickly pulled her hand back and rubbed her palm on her leg. “Just…just no pasta with meat sauce.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want you trying to steal a taste.”

So many things raced through Aidan’s mind at that moment, he thought his head might
actually
explode. If he was going to steal a taste of anything, it wasn’t going to be of her dinner.

“Deal.”

* * *

“So what did you do?” Aidan asked with a hearty laugh.

“What do you think? I said ‘no thank you’ and got the hell out of there!” They both sat back in their seats and laughed some more. “I mean, when he asked during our initial phone interview how open-minded I was, I thought he was talking about colors and design and that sort of thing. I didn’t think that he’d…”

“Want you to work naked?”

Zoe shook her head and blushed furiously. “Okay, that was my worst client experience. Now it’s your turn.”

“I don’t think I can top that,” he said as he reached for his soda and took a drink.

“I didn’t say top it. I just said worst. Come on. Spill it.”

Aidan looked at Zoe and for a moment was simply in awe of her beauty. She was laughing and smiling and teasing and…everything. Clearing his throat, he did his best to get back to the conversation. “Okay, it was one of my first big renovation jobs. I had been doing some minor carpentry work for about a year and was ready to branch out. So this guy calls me and I go out to the house and meet with him and his wife. He takes me outside, to where they have a detached two-story, two-car garage, and he wants me to convert the upstairs to a man cave.”

Zoe quirked a brow at him. “A man cave? That’s what you’re going with? What’s so weird about a man cave?”

He held up a finger to stop her. “Ah, I haven’t finished yet.” Zoe nodded, and he leaned his elbows on the table and got comfortable. “So we go inside and his wife goes back to the house. We’re talking about what he wants in the space and it all seems pretty straightforward—a bar, big-screen TV, bookcases, new bathroom, yadda, yadda, yadda. So I’m taking measurements and writing my notes, and he asks me if I do any excavation work.”

“For a man cave? On the second story?” Zoe leaned forward, clearly intrigued.

Nodding, Aidan said, “Weird, right? So I tell him it depends on the project and if we have plumbing issues and whatnot, and he interrupts me and says, ‘No, I’m thinking like a tunnel.’ I still wasn’t sure what he was getting at, so I turned to him and was like ‘Dude, what do you need a tunnel for?’ And he’s like ‘I want to be able to sneak my girlfriend in and out of here without my wife seeing her.’”

“No!”

Aidan smiled and continued to nod. “Yes! And he was totally serious!”

“So he wanted you to build like a walking tunnel from the back of the garage to where?”

“The property was heavily wooded behind the garage. They owned about an acre back there, and he only wanted a crawl-space tunnel from the back of the garage out to the property where she could park her car without being seen.”

“And he expected her to crawl for an acre?”

“Apparently so.”

Zoe leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms. “Well, that’s just all kinds of wrong. What did you do?”

“Honestly? I wanted no part of it. I told him I could do the renovations on the garage and do the man cave thing, but he’d have to find somebody else for the tunnel.”

“So you did it? You did the man cave for him?”

He shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”

“Because he was a freak!” she said with a laugh. “And you were just helping him stay freaky!”

“The way I see it, he was a freak no matter what I did or didn’t do. I just knew where to draw the line.”

Zoe reached for her drink and finished the last of it. “When did people get this way?”

“What way?”

“Freaky. What happened to normal people?”

He chuckled. “They’re still out there. They’re just harder to find.”

They sat in companionable silence for a moment until Tammy came over. “Well, you two, I hate to say it, but we’re getting ready to close.”

They both looked at her like she was crazy. “You close early on Mondays?” Aidan asked.

Tammy laughed. “Um…no. We close at eleven, just like we do every night.”

Aidan looked down at his watch, his eyes going wide. “Well, damn.” From the looks of it, Zoe hadn’t realized the time either. “Sorry, Tammy. We didn’t mean to hold you up.” Fumbling for his wallet, he promptly paid the check.

“No worries,” she said with a wink and walked away.

They each quickly scrambled from the booth. “Okay…wow. I had no idea it was so late,” Zoe said as she straightened her skirt and fidgeted with her hair. “Um…do you think we can check on my car? Maybe it’s ready and we can just pick it up while we’re here in town and then you won’t have to drive me home.”

For a moment he was stumped. They were having a good time—or at least he
thought
they were having a good time—and now she was looking to get rid of him. “Yeah, sure. I’ll call over and see what’s up.” Taking his phone from his pocket, he walked ahead of Zoe out of the restaurant.

She joined him and looked at him expectantly. “I couldn’t get anyone on the line,” he apologized. “I’m sure it’s no big deal, and for all we know, your car could be waiting for you at home.”

Zoe climbed back into Aidan’s truck and directed him to her house. When they pulled into her driveway, she noticed the look on Aidan’s face. “What? What’s the matter?”

“You live on the beach.”

“Uh…yeah. Why? What’s wrong with that?”

Shaking his head to clear it, Aidan turned and looked at her. “What? Oh…it’s nothing. I just didn’t realize you had a house that was, you know,
right
on the beach.”

“It’s only a rental. I could never afford to actually own one of these houses, but for the time being, it’s mine. I’ve dreamed of my own beach house for as long as I can remember.” Opening the car door, she climbed down and looked up at the sky. It was a beautiful night, positively filled with stars. She sensed more than heard Aidan’s approach. Closing her eyes and inhaling deeply, she said, “I love the sounds and the smells of the beach. Don’t you?”

He couldn’t have spoken if he wanted to. There she stood with her head thrown back, her eyes closed, looking like some sort of ethereal being in the moonlight. His mouth went dry and his throat tightened. It was considerably inappropriate for him to be entertaining the idea of kissing her, but right now that was all he wanted.