The evening’s going better than I ever could’ve imagined. I haven’t felt this comfortable around someone in so long. There hasn’t been a moment of quiet, and for that, I’m thankful.

“Another?” I ask, holding the pitcher of beer in my grip as I fill my glass.

Tilly nods and pushes her glass toward me. “I could drink you under the table,” she teases and leans over the table. “Don’t forget, I grew up on moonshine.”

“I beg to differ. I don’t drink often with the kids around, but I’ve been known to hold my liquor better than most.”

“Want to put your money where your mouth is?” She raises an eyebrow, challenging me.

God, I love a woman who’s willing to gamble, especially on trivial shit that really doesn’t matter.

“Maybe. I don’t recover as quickly as I used to when I was younger. A hangover with two little kids is not fun.”

She winces. “I can’t even imagine. I don’t know how you do it.”

“What? Take care of the kids?”

“How you survived,” she tells me as her mood darkens, and she stares down at her beer. “I couldn’t even take care of myself for a long time. I don’t know if I could’ve kept two kids alive in my grief.”

“My family helped for a while, especially Lucio. But you kind of go on autopilot and just take it day by day. There’s so much I don’t remember from the first year because I went through the motions in a complete fog.”

Sometimes I’m surprised we all survived Marissa’s death. I couldn’t have made it through that dark time without my family. There are days, even now, I’m not sure I can do it, but the kids pull me forward and keep me in the present.

“I know the feeling.” She sighs and brings her green eyes back to mine. “Do you ever feel guilty?”

“Every day.”

“I feel guilty right now,” she admits.

“Do you feel like you’re cheating?” I ask.

She nods slowly. “There’s always a part of me that’s thinking about Mitchell, and being here with you, enjoying your company, somehow feels wrong. Like I’m cheating on his memory and our vows.”

I know exactly what she’s talking about. Everything feels like a betrayal. Even breathing, when Marissa no longer can, feels wrong. The guilt has waned over time, but sometimes it’s still suffocating.

I reach across the table and place my hand on top of hers. “I feel the same way, Tilly. I don’t think you can truly love a person and lose them without feeling that way.”

“I haven’t been out with another man since.” She’s staring at my fingers as I swipe my thumb across her wrist. “I haven’t let another man touch me since then either.”

“When you say forever, it’s hard to open yourself up again. My family keeps telling me it’s time, but…”

“No one knows unless they’ve been through what we’ve been through, Angelo.”

“This is the closest thing to a date I’ve done since Marissa died.”

Michelle wasn’t dating. That wasn’t love. There were no feelings involved. We never went all the way either, and I never kissed her on the mouth. It never felt right. That’s why I knew there wasn’t a future for us, but I wasn’t sure how to tell her until she chose to leave town.

In the end, the limited pleasure wasn’t worth the guilt I felt afterward.

“Well.” Tilly turns her hand over, intertwining her fingers with mine. “Why don’t we call this a date, even though it’s not. Then we don’t have to say we haven’t? We’ll make this the first part in our comeback, or at least, get a few people off our backs.”

“That could work.”

A small part of me wishes we were really on a date.

I like Tilly.

I like her a lot.

She’s easy, light, and so full of bubbly energy, I want to surround myself with her and never let go.

I hadn’t realized I was still holding her hand. It seemed like the most natural thing in the world. We hadn’t taken our eyes off each other as our bodies were connected, sitting across the table from each other. This was, in fact, the closest thing I’d had to a date in years.

“Roger says I need to move on and stop living my life in the past.”

“He sounds a lot like Daphne and my mother.”

“He means well. They all do. I have to be honest with you.” She glances down. “Your mother has talked to me about you.”

My body tenses, and I don’t know how I feel about that. It’s everything I’d expect of her. She has balls of steel and isn’t afraid to speak her mind. “I’m sorry.” It’s the only thing I can say. I hate that Tilly felt put on the spot.

“Don’t be.” She peers up, looking me straight in the eyes. “That’s not the part I wanted to be honest about.”

“Oh.” My eyebrows rise.

“The day we met, with the mixer on the floor, I know I came on really strong, or you could say, a bit crazy.”

“It was adorable.”

She blushes. “I had made a vow to Roger that I wouldn’t be so closed off with the next man who turned my head.”

I swallow hard, knowing I was that guy. The one who turned her head.

“I hadn’t found any man interesting or truly attractive until you walked into my kitchen with your big muscles and handsome face. You were the first man who made me feel like I wanted more. Like I was ready to move on with my life.”

“Really?” I ask, taken aback but also intrigued.

“Yes.” She bites her lip. “I feel like a fool telling you this, but in the name of transparency, I want to be honest with you.”

I run my finger across the underside of her wrist. “To be honest, I haven’t had another woman spark my interest as much as you have in the last few days. You’re charming, beautiful, and a little bit of a firecracker. So, in the name of transparency, as you say, I like you a lot, and I’m not entirely sure how I feel about that.”

Tilly beams. “I’m okay with that.”

“Me too.” My heart’s racing, so I’d say a part of me is more alive than I have been in years. “I think we should be friends, and if something more comes of it, so be it. We can’t rush these things, especially with our history, no matter how badly our friends and family want us to.”

“So, is this officially a date?” She looks at me with so much hope in her eyes.

“Yes,” I tell her because, for the first time in forever, I can say the words without the knot forming in my stomach. “It’s a date.”

“Pepperoni well done,” the waitress says as she stands beside our table with the pie in her hand.

I don’t look up or pull away.

I don’t want to.

“Oh, sorry.” Tilly slides her hand back, breaking our contact. “Smell that,” she says as the waitress sets the pizza in the middle of the table. “That’s what you call heaven.”

While I love my pizza, I could think of so many other things that would top my list of heavenly smells. Tilly’s scent would be one of them. Marissa always wore Chanel No 5, but Tilly smells like the sweetest confection.

“I would’ve thought cupcakes were your favorite food.”

She shakes her head as she pulls the first slice onto her plate. “Nope. I love them, but I’m all about the pizza.”

I like a chick who can wear five-inch heels, a little black dress that leaves little to the imagination, and downs cheap beer and piping hot slices of pepperoni.

“You’re different than I expected.” I watch as she takes a giant bite without giving two shits about burning her mouth.

She opens her mouth, waving her hand frantically in front of her face. “Oh fuck.” Tears start to form in her eyes, and she grabs her beer, chugging half the glass.

“Are you okay?”

“Who needs all that skin on the roof of your mouth anyway? Hell, taste buds are overrated too.” She laughs, wiping the tears from her eyes.

I push my glass of ice water across the table. “Drink,” I tell her.

She doesn’t hesitate in taking the glass and downing the entire thing in a few gulps. “Christ. Okay. Maybe it’s not that bad.” She laughs again.

“Do you want to go?”

“No. I’m going to make this pizza pay for burning my mouth.”

It’s my turn to laugh. She has the best attitude about everything. I can’t imagine her being down a day in her life. Knowing what she went through, losing her husband, I know there’s still hope for me.

“Don’t hold back on my account. I love a woman who can eat.”

“Well, Ang, you’re about to see me demolish the hell out of this bad boy.” She takes a smaller bite this time, careful not to have a repeat performance. “Eat fast or risk starvation,” she tells me.

I only take a few slices, putting them on my plate for safekeeping. I really want to see how much this little redhead can put away. She’s great at shit-talking, but I need to know if she can back it up. I’m giving her free rein over the remaining two-thirds of the pizza.

“Do your damage,” I tell her, loving the little noises she makes with each bite.

My cock seems to like it too. Each moan causes the fucker to twitch, telling me I better get my shit together. Three years is a long time to go without being inside a woman, vows or no vows. I said the words, not my cock and balls, and they’re starting to revolt.

I’m slow to eat my pizza, staring at Tilly in amazement as she puts away each slice like she’s an NFL linebacker and not a Southern lady who wouldn’t be caught dead in a pair of blue jeans. In under thirty minutes, she polishes off every slice of pizza on the tray and half a pitcher of beer.

“I’m stuffed.” She dabs her lips with the napkin.

I stare at her in amazement and shake my head. “I don’t know where you put it.”

She drops the napkin to the plate and grips her stomach. “You can’t lay down a challenge and not expect me to follow through. I’m as competitive as they come.”

“I can see that.” I can’t wipe the dopey smile off my face. “You want more to drink?”

She shakes her head. “I seriously can’t fit another thing inside me, or I’ll look more like a sausage roll in this dress than an actual human.”

“Don’t be silly. You’re a knockout.”

“It’s been a long time since a man has flirted with me.” She touches the base of her throat, drawing my eyes away from her face. “I could get used to this.”

“I highly doubt I’m the first. Maybe you just weren’t listening. If a man has a pulse, he’s at least thinking what I’m saying.”

She blushes again. “I’m sure all the ladies are after you.”

I shake my head and laugh. “A single father isn’t really most-eligible-bachelor material.”

“A handsome man with two children whom he loves and cherishes is most definitely a head-turner.”

“Well, my attitude sometimes has a way of putting women off.”

“You’re intense, but that shows you’re passionate.”

“I’ll remember that the next time my sister tells me to stop being an asshole. I’ll just tell her I’m passionate.”

Tilly laughs loudly. “That one may not go over so well.”

“She’ll probably smack me,” I say, laughing with her.

Tilly sobers. “She loves you, though. You don’t know how lucky you are to have three siblings. I have no one except me.”

“I can’t imagine. I’m sorry.”

The thought of being an only child is so foreign to me. Yeah, the house would’ve been quieter growing up, but there would’ve been so much boredom in the silence.

She waves me off. “Don’t be sorry. I don’t really know what it’s like to have a brother or sister.”

“Loud.”

She laughs again. “I could get used to a little noise.”

“Roger seems to care about you,” I tell her, prying into their relationship.

He didn’t seem to be happy when he found me in the kitchen at her shop. Roger was overprotective, almost like he was sweet on her.

She sighs. “When his brother died, he made it his mission to make sure I was okay. He cares too much sometimes, but he’s not in love with me, if that’s what you’re hinting at.”

“I wasn’t.”

But I was.

No man sticks around that long and is that fierce about someone unless they love them.

She smirks, probably not buying my statement. “Mitchell was his only sibling. I guess Roger adopted me in a way so he wouldn’t be as lonely too. Besides—” she leans forward with her chin resting against her fingers “—he’d more likely be into you than me.”

“Oh.” I laugh, feeling like a complete tool for thinking I was going to have to worry about Roger.

“Yeah. He’s a good guy, though.”

“You want to get out of here?”

“I’m sure you need to get home to the kids.”

“They’re sleeping by now. I don’t live too far from here. Maybe we can swing by and check on them before we head back downtown.”

“I’d love that,” she says and grabs her purse off the table, standing as I do.

While I do want to check on the kids, I really want to be alone with Tilly. I’d like nothing more than to kick up our feet and talk until the wee hours of the morning instead of sitting in a pizza shop on the far South Side. I’m not ready for the evening to be over. Not quite yet.

She walks in front of me as we walk outside. The wind kicks up, and her vanilla scent surrounds me. There’s a peacefulness to the smell. Comfort. I place my hand on the small of her back, guiding her toward my car.

“Are you sure it’s okay?” I ask because the last thing I want to do is make her feel uncomfortable.

She turns her face toward me. “Your hand or your house?”

“Both.”

“They’re more than okay, Angelo.”

In this moment, standing in the parking lot and touching her, it’s the first time I’ve wanted to kiss someone other than my wife.