Now and Then (3 page)

“Hi,” she said,
flashing a smile she probably didn’t realize was sexy.

Fuck me. I’m in trouble
, he thought as he looked at her. God, he wanted to be responsible for that light flush on her ivory cheeks.

“Hi. I love this pla
ce, I’m glad you picked it.” He had been to the sports bar once, and he didn’t remember what he’d eaten.

“They have great chicken strips,” she said, piling a bulky canvas bag and her purse into an extra chair. He glanced over at the seat silently.

“Drawing supplies,” she said, grinning. “Sometimes I walk down to the park on lunch and draw.”

“Can I see something you’ve done?”

“Sure,” she said, reaching into the bag. Cole admired her pride in her work. He couldn’t believe this was the same woman who had been unable to say hello to him as a girl.

“This is a man I see in the park a lot,” she said, flipping
the pages of the spiral bound book to a soft pencil drawing of an older man with a sad, lined face.

“That’s beautiful, Em,” Co
le said, awed by the life she’d infused into the drawing. “I had no idea you could do that.”

“I couldn’t have done anything like this before art school.”
She smiled as she closed the book.

“How was that, living in Paris?”
he asked.

“I loved it. It took some getting used to, since I didn’t speak the language, but it’s an amazing place. I took train trips to Italy, England, Germany…”

“Were you anxious to get back here when you finished school?”

“I had mixed feelings about it. I considered staying, but my parents really wanted me to come back here. I missed them and Layla. A friend of mine in Paris, Andrew, lost his mother during our last year of school, and I realized then that nothing lasts forever.”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

“How do you like being close to
your family again?” Emma asked, skimming the menu.

“
It’s nice to be close, but not too close.” He smiled.

“Y
ou live downtown?”

“Yeah, i
n a high-rise a couple miles from here.”

A
blonde waitress strolled up to the table.

“Know what you want?” she asked.

“Why am I even looking at this?” Emma said, laughing and closing the menu. “I want the chicken strips.”

“Me, too,” Cole said, passing his menu to the
waitress. When she left, he looked at Emma intently.

“Are you seeing anyone?” he asked, holding his breath as he waited for her answer.

“Oh, no. No, I keep pretty busy with work and painting. How about you?”

“No, I’m single.
I work a lot.”

“Well, you always had someone on your arm in high school. I don’t imagine you’ll be single for long.”

From her, the words were a sweet compliment. Cole tried to banish the mental image of
her
on his arm. Emma Carson wasn’t even an option. A break-up would create awkwardness between their families, and the Carsons were his parents’ closest friends.

The thought d
idn’t keep him from noticing Emma’s alluring habit of toying with the curl at the end of a strand of her long hair, or from feeling a flicker of excitement every time her light brown eyes met his. The lunch passed quickly, and he was sorry when she said she had to get back to work.

“It was great seeing you again
,” she said as they parted ways outside the restaurant. “I know Layla was glad to see you Saturday.”

“Sure,” he said, unable to fe
ign enthusiasm. Layla wasn’t the Carson sister who would be on his mind all afternoon.

Then – 11 years ago

Emma
rolled her eyes when she looked down. One of her tennis shoes had stuck in a caramel colored stain on the concrete floor just as she was about to reach the gap of sunshine between the bleachers above her. She pulled her sole off the sticky spot and went the last couple of steps, staring into the slice of open space. The grass of the football field was an even brighter shade of green from this angle.

“Eww … I stepped in gum,” Dani muttered with a frown.

“Shh!” Emma warned, turning toward her. A janitor had caught them under the bleachers the last time they’d hidden there to watch football practice, and she didn’t want it to happen again.

“Sorry,” Dani whispered, shaking her shoe vigorously in an effort to get rid of the gum.

Emma scanned the players on the field, unable to tell any of them apart since they all wore the same uniforms and helmets. But she knew how to find Cole. He was number 25 -- she’d memorized it when the team’s photo was in the newspaper.

She spotted him just as he was taking his helmet off to tip a water thermos over his mouth. He let the water splash over his face and into his hair, drops flying as he shook his head.

“He needs a haircut,” Dani whispered. Emma gave her a look.

“I like his hair,” she said.

“Long hair on boys is girly,” Dani argued.

“Not on him. And it’s not even that long. It’s not like he could put it in a ponytail or anything.”

Emma’s attention went back to the field as a coach blew his whistle and the players ran to huddle around him. She couldn’t see Cole anymore, so her gaze drifted to the other side of the field, where cheerleaders were practicing. Layla was there, her dark curly ponytail bouncing as she went through the steps of a cheer.

Layla broke away from the group, running to gain speed for a
back flip. Her body gracefully arched again and again, and the other cheerleaders clapped and yelled out how many times she had flipped. After number seven, Layla stopped, laughing as she ran back to the group.

Layla had attracted the attention of several football players, including number 25, to Emma’s dismay. Emma sighed, wondering how she could be related by blood to anyone who could do seven
back flips.

I wish I was her.
I can’t even do a cartwheel.

“Did you see that?” Dani whispered with excitement.

“No … what?” Emma said, following her friend’s gaze.

“Cole just caught the ball right before it hit the ground. He fell and rolled a couple of times, but he kept it!”

Another player had stretched a hand down to help Cole up, and Emma sighed as he pulled his helmet off, shaking his hair away from his face.

“He’s so cute,” Emma said
softly. “Isn’t he?”

“Yes,” Dani agreed. “But it smells like stale popcorn down here and it’s hot, can we go?”

“Yeah … I guess,” Emma said wistfully.

“You see him all the time, he lives across the street from you,” Dani said, rolling her eyes. “Let’s go to the library.”

Emma followed Dani away from the crack of light in the bleachers, wishing she could stay. She did get glances of Cole when he was coming and going from his house, but this was the only time she got to look at him without worrying he’d notice her staring. Or worse, that Layla would.

Now

Emma knew it was no accident that Layla dangled her long, bare legs over the side of her barstool that faced a nearby table of attractive men in suits. She had an internal radar that allowed her to attract men without conscious thought.

“It might not have been so bad if he was saying, ‘Great job on that brief, sugar’,” Layla said thoughtfully. “I actually find ‘Bring me some coffee, sugar’ to be impressively insulting.
He has an assistant for that kind of thing. I didn’t work my ass off in law school to fetch anyone’s coffee.”

“Maybe he was saying he wanted sugar in the coffee,” Emma offered. Layla rolled her eyes.

“No. When I asked if he wanted anything in it, he said he wanted it black.”

“Well, there’s your mistake. Next time he asks you to get his coffee, fuck it up. Take a really long time, make sure the coffee’s cold and spill it all over him. He won’t ask you after that.”

It was the perfect opportunity to bring up her own coffee mishap with Cole, but something made her remain silent.

L
ayla casually made eye contact with one of the suits, and Emma glanced at her phone, her heart skipping a beat when she read the waiting message.

Hey, it’s Cole. Are y
ou free for dinner Friday night? It was great seeing you today.

She
grinned, unable to contain her happiness. Just as she was about to tell Layla, Emma turned and reached for her drink instead.

“What? You were about to say something,” Layla said.

“Nope. Just got a text from a cute guy at my office is all.”

“Good. Y
ou’ve been celibate for months now. You’re making me look like a whore.”

“You’d look like a whore with or without me,” Emma said sweetly. Layla extended her middle finger as she finished her drink.

“I might be using my key to your apartment over lunch soon,” Layla said.

“You want to have lunch at my dumpy apartment?”

“No, I want to fuck Chad at your apartment. It’s closer to my office than mine is.”

“Chad who?”

“I don’t even know his last name, and I like it that way. He’s the one from that band I saw with Court a few weeks ago. He’s really, really hot.”

“Are you putting your
Layla Carson-Marlowe
plans on hold?” Emma asked wryly.

“No. What’s wrong with having a little fun in the meantime?”

“That’s a little creepy, Layla. I could go home and lay down in God knows what after you rendezvous with some stranger at my apartment, and not even know it.”

“We won’t use your bed, we’ll use the couch.”

“Oh, good, because I don’t mind having a strange man’s semen
on my couch
.”

“Lighten up, Em. It’s for a good cause. You know how bitchy I get when I’m not getting laid.”

“Seriously, Layla, don’t be a slut.”

“Did you just call me a slut?”

“No, I said not to be one, which is different than saying you
are
one. You say you want to get married, and you aren’t going to fuck your way to a good husband.”

“Oh, I hold out on the
ones who are marriage material,” Layla said. “Chad’s strictly for sex. Are you jealous because you aren’t getting any?”

Emma rolled her eyes, pushing her plate aside as she finished eating.

“I’m happy with my life the way it is. I don’t need a man taking up the time I want to spend painting and reading and doing whatever else I want.”

“You certainly ran through plenty of men in Paris.” Layla gestured to the server for another round of drinks. Emma smiled a
t the memory of her time abroad, where she’d discovered that she was more than just Layla’s shy, awkward little sister.

“That was different. I’m feeling settled now
,” Emma said.

“You haven’t met any men you’re interested in here?
Other than the office guy who just texted you?”

This is my opening.
This is when I tell her I had lunch with Cole Marlowe earlier. I can tell her right now.

“Nope.” Emma
shrugged, her heart picking up speed as she lied. Layla was the one person she was always completely open with. But something was making her hold back. She felt a stab of guilt at knowing she didn’t want Layla to go after him. Cole had never looked at Emma, actually looked and seen her, before their recent run-in. It had been an innocent lunch anyway. And dinner Friday … that would be innocent, too.

The mention of the text she’d gotten made Emma grab her phone and write back.

Sure, call me. Great to see you, too.

The casual tone of her message belied the way she felt about seeing him again.
Cole and I are just old acquaintances, nothing more
.
We’ll hang out and that’s it.
So why don’t I want Layla to know?

She realized with another flare of guilt that it was because Layla would manage to insert herself and join them for dinner, and she would command Cole’s attention. Emma had spent years longing for his attention, and even if it was just over a casual dinner, she wanted to feel those blue-gray eyes seeing her –
really
seeing her, again.

“I’m picking you up for dinner at Mom and Dad’s Sunday, right?” Layla asked.

“Yeah. Remind me to give back that jacket I borrowed from you.”

“I’m going out with Kim and Lane Friday night, want to come?”

“No, I’m planning to paint,” Emma said, the stab of another lie making her look away from her sister. “And if you use my apartment for your hook-up, will you please leave me a note so I can avoid sitting in any wet spots you leave behind?”

“At least
someone
will be leaving wet spots on your couch.”