dropped a cheese cube on the floor. Lulu, their scruffy but well-loved beagle blend, gave an appreciative whine as she snapped it up.
“No food on the floor, kid. Lulu already had her supper.”
“Ruru supper?”
“That’s right. She already ate. Don’t want her to get sick.”
“Ruru sick?”
“No.”
Cady’s tiny blond head shook back and forth. “No sick.”
Maybe he was going about this dating thing the wrong way. Maybe he should stop taking women to nice restaurants and coffee shops, and start arranging to meet at Bits and Pizzas. He could take Cady, the date could fall in love with her—or not—and depending on everyone else’s reaction, then he could worry about details like his feelings for the woman in question. Or how Ms. Online handled the revelation of his time in the Big House.
“Except I feel like I have to tell them up front,” he said to Cady. “If that’s gonna be a stumbling block, I want to know straight out of the gate. It wouldn’t feel right to keep that hidden.”
Which he supposed was rather ironic—the former convict worrying about doing the right thing. But it wasn’t like history was destiny.
“Did the crime, did the time, from here on in my life is mine. Right, Lu?”
Lulu paused in her nosing of a piece of pasta long enough to glance his way.
“I shouldn’t complain.” He spooned up more beans. “It’s not like things were going really well anyway. I mean, she was nice enough. She has a kid, told me all about him, really loved the pictures of you, Cady girl. So you know she’s smart.”
Cady raised her cup at an angle he knew too well.
“Uh-uh. No shower, remember?”
“Milk!”
“Drink it.” He tapped the cup. She peeked up at him. He plastered on a stern expression, she sighed and cup met mouth.
“The thing was, Cade, she didn’t laugh a lot. I can’t see how you build something with someone you can’t laugh with. And I’m not saying I’m Mr. Comedy,” he added when Lulu rose and turned away from him. “But I had some good lines in there and some funny stuff happened. Like when the guy at the next table got a call. You could tell he was in the middle of being dumped, and instead of taking it outside, he sat there saying ‘but...but...’ and then he came out with, ‘Damn it, I even paid for you to get your cat fixed!’ I was busting a gut trying to keep from laughing. She—Amanda—she kept sending him dirty looks and complaining about cell phones in public. Which, hey, I totally get it. Still, there was something freakin’ hilarious going on beside us, and all she could think about was the rule that was being broken.”
“Cookie? Daddy? Cookie?”
“Two more bites.” He pushed the necessary pieces in her direction. As expected, Cady ignored the small portion he’d set in front of her and raked up a handful from the remainder.
“Eat slowly, kid. Don’t want you to choke. Sloooooooooow.”
Which was advice he should have given himself last night. Instead, as soon as Amanda had finished commenting on the lack of consideration and broken rules, he had gone for the ultimate test and told her about his own experience breaking the rules. And the law.
To her credit, she had listened to the whole story—at least the thirty-second version he had perfected. She had nodded and said something about everyone making mistakes, and downed the rest of her wine pretty fast.
“But I really wasn’t surprised when she left to go to the ladies’ room and never came back.”
“Back?”
“She went bye-bye, babes.”
“Bye-bye,” Cady echoed. “Cookie? Pease?”
He checked the tray, then the floor. Either Lulu was getting faster or Cady really hadn’t dumped it all overboard. “Okay. You earned a cookie. Maybe even two, but don’t tell Mommy.”
“Mommy?” Cady swiveled toward the door. He needed to work fast.
“Mommy in the morning, Cade. After night-night. Look, here’s a cookie! Who do we have—is it a lion? Yeah, I think it’s a lion. What does Leo the Lion say?”
“Rawr.”
“Good trained monkey.” He dropped a couple of animal crackers on the tray and gave thanks that Cady wasn’t yet old enough to tell Darcy everything that went on at his place. Not that Darce would care about an extra hippo or tiger. She was into nutrition, but she wasn’t overboard. But he could live without having her hear about his Adventures in Dating from their daughter.
“The problem is, you’re too smart, kid. Pretty soon I’m going to have to keep all my stories for Lulu. Either that or find someone else to share them with.”
Of course, that was the rub, wasn’t it? If he had someone to share things with, he wouldn’t be off on these fiascos in the first place.
“Ah, well, Cady. I never thought I’d have you, and here you are.” He bopped the end of her nose. “And that right there makes me the luckiest daddy on the planet.”
She beamed up at him and whapped her cup against his arm.
“Ow!” He pulled the cup from her grasp and did the parental finger wag. “No hitting. Got it?”
She scrunched up her face in what he knew was the precursor to a wail.
“Tough, kiddo. You hit Lulu last week and now me. Not good.”
Tiny pink lips quivered.
“No. Hitting.” He squatted in front of her and tweaked her ponytail. “And no complaining when you do something and have to face the music.”
She searched his face and broke into a slow, sunny grin.
“Guess I’m not so good at taking my own advice, am I?” He returned to his chair, picked up his bowl. “I’ve been doing a lot of complaining myself. I’ve gotta move forward. Stop whining. Go with my gut.”
My gut is the last thing I need to listen to.
“You know, Cade, Heather didn’t send me her résumé.”
Cady picked up her second cracker and waved it in the air. “Rawr.”
“Technically, I don’t think giraffes roar, but what the hell.” He shoveled in another bite. “Maybe I should drop her a line, remind her that I was serious about the offer.”
The giraffe giggled.
“What? It’s a friend thing. Perfectly legit.”
Lulu barked sharply.
Xander sighed. “Yeah, I know, girl. It’s probably not a good idea.”
But Heather knew all about his past. It had never stopped her from hanging around with him at the North events.
“Of course,” he mused, “there’s a big difference between goofing around in a group and...and whatever.”
But she was so easy to joke with.
“And if I ask her out and she says no?” he asked Lulu. “I bet there’d be lots of jokes at Thanksgiving dinner after that.”
Yeah. Bad idea.
He tossed his bowl in the sink and grabbed a washcloth. Cleanup time. That was what mattered at this minute: cleaning and chattering and singing and pushing all thoughts of Heather from his mind.
It would have been a lot easier if she hadn’t been wearing those shorts.
* * *
HEATHER LOOKED AT the résumé on her