Chapter 11

True to Cole’s word, he hadn’t let Monday get awkward.

Nor Tuesday. Or Wednesday…or any of the days that followed. Nearly two weeks had passed, and to say that it was like the kiss had never happened was the ultimate in understatements.

Which was good. Really good.

Or so Penelope had told herself twice a day, every day since it had happened.

“Yo, Tiny—you coming to lunch?” Cole asked, knocking on her doorframe.

Lincoln appeared behind Cole. “Yes, come with.”

She chewed her lip. “I shouldn’t. I brought a sandwich.”

Cole made a thumbs-down motion. “Boo. We’re going to Roadie’s.”

“Onion rings,” Penelope breathed reverently.

Cole lifted an eyebrow in challenge. The man was getting to know her all too well. He understood that her appetite ran more toward battered and fried onions than it did the turkey on whole wheat sandwich that was waiting for her in the fridge.

Then she glanced down at the article she was working on. “I have to finish this before my meeting with Cassidy.”

“Need help?” Cole asked. “I can stay.”

Cole didn’t see the surprised, thoughtful look Lincoln shot him¸ but Penelope did. Lincoln shifted his gaze to hers, wiggling his eyebrows, and she gave him a Knock it off look.

“No, I’m good,” she told Cole, not wanting Lincoln to get the wrong idea. Or heck, not wanting Cole to get the wrong idea.

Although she doubted she needed to worry about that. Any vibes she’d gotten the night of The Kiss that he’d seen her as a woman rather than a colleague hadn’t made even the briefest reappearance.

Cole shrugged and he and Lincoln headed off to lunch.

Penelope returned to her computer. She tried to lose herself in the world of golf stats, but golf was one sport Penelope had never been able to get particularly excited about, and she found herself pulling up Facebook instead.

A mistake.

“Oh God,” she breathed as she looked closer at the screen.

Without tearing her eyes away from the screen she reached for her cellphone. Two rings later her sister picked up.

“I’ll never forgive you for helping Mom get on Facebook,” Penelope said by way of greeting.

Janie groaned. “What now?”

“Let’s just say she’s interpreted Throwback Thursday as ‘opportunity to show my daughters naked,’ ” Penelope said.

“Again? How many naked pictures does she have?”

“Lots, apparently,” Penelope said. “Today’s feature is of you running around in a diaper with ketchup smeared all over your face, and she caught me in the process of whipping my sunflower dress over my head.”

“You know, you always did have a naked thing—”

“I do not have a naked thing,” Penelope said.

Although, with as many pictures as her mother had of her tearing her clothes off, her sister might be onto something.

“Did you see her post last night about Dad’s bunion?” Janie asked. “It got a hundred and four likes. I didn’t get that many likes when I announced my engagement.”

“It’s not right,” Penelope muttered, as she scanned the highly amused comments on her mother’s post. “We should change her password.”

“Eh, at least it keeps her busy,” Janie said dismissively. “Now she only calls me once a day instead of five. You?”

“I’m still on the thrice-a-day schedule, but I’m hoping that’ll die down once she understands I’m not at constant risk of being mugged.”

Penelope’s phone beeped, and she pulled it back to look at the incoming call.

She smiled. Of course it would be her mother.

She went back to Janie. “Mom’s calling. Don’t even try to tell me that she doesn’t have us bugged to know when we’re talking about her. I know she does.”

“Have fun with that,” Janie said in a singsong voice. “Also, next time you call me, it better be to discuss your adult naked time—”

Penelope switched over from Janie to her mother before her sister could finish.

“Hey Mom.”

“Penny! Hi, honey!”

Penelope smiled. Lydia Pope was of one of those chronically happy people whose face was never without a smile, and whose voice was never without an exclamation point.

“How are you, sweetie? Anything new happening?”

“Since yesterday?” Penelope asked, taking a sip from her water bottle. “Not really.”

Her mom made a soft scolding noise. “How often do I have to tell you that life happens in moments, honey. Anything could have happened since we last spoke!”

“Sure, but you have to admit, the chances of my meeting the love of my life or getting pregnant since we last talked yesterday afternoon are slim.”

“Only because you moved to New York,” her mom said. “Had you stayed in Chicago, I’m confident your father and I might have found a nice boy for you.”

Penelope rolled her eyes. “Yes, because that’s every thirtysomething woman’s dream. To be set up by her parents.”

“Fine, fine. I’ll admit that we don’t have much in terms of the under-sixty connections. But, oh! I didn’t tell you who I ran into last night!”

“Who?” Penelope asked, even though her mother was going to tell her with or without her participation in the conversation.

“Evan!”

Penelope froze with the water bottle halfway to her lips.

“You know…Evan Barton? Barter?” her mother said.

“Barstow,” Penelope said casually—as though mention of his name didn’t have her feeling slightly sweaty. “Where’d you see him?”

“Oh, your father dragged me to Wrigley Field last night. I was bored out of my mind, as always, but then, lo and behold, guess who was sitting right in front of us! I can’t believe he recognized me. We only met him that one time you brought him to our Memorial Day BBQ….”

Penelope squeezed her eyes shut, wishing there was a way to change the subject without her mother catching on to the fact that Penelope’s chest hurt a little at the mention of Evan. At the memory of how she had so foolishly thought there was something between them…

“Anyway, he asked about you.”

“Did he,” she murmured.

Of course Evan would ask about her. He was nothing if not polite. Fake and manipulative, but polite.

“Said he might be coming out to New York soon for work. Said he was going to look you up.”

Penelope blew out a breath. She knew that tone—her mother was matchmaking.

“He has a girlfriend, Mom.”

“Not last night he didn’t,” his mother said smugly. “He was at the game with a short, portly fellow.”

Penelope would bet serious money that the short, portly fellow was Caleb Mulroney, one of the guys who’d interviewed Penelope for the job Evan had swiped out from under her nose.

Although, surprisingly, that memory didn’t sting as sharply as it usually did. She’d wanted that job with Sportiva, certainly. Had she gotten it, she was sure she’d be loving it. She’d be going to Cubs games with the friendly, likable Caleb.

But maybe it had worked out for the better. She was loving New York. Loving Oxford. Loving the friends she was making, thanks to Cole bringing her into his group of friends.

And then there was Cole himself…

But Penelope wasn’t ready to talk about Cole. Not to her prying mother or her mischievous sister. If anyone was capable of taking a simple kiss and turning it into wedding planning, it was her family.

Instead she changed the subject to another of her mother’s favorites: Facebook.

By the end of the phone call, she had her mother’s promise that she wouldn’t post any naked pictures of Penelope in which she was over the age of eight.

Hanging up with her mother, Penelope forced her attention back to golf stats.

Despite her lukewarm feelings on the thought, she supposed its rise in popularity was refreshing.

There was something very human about a sport that anyone could pick up, at any age. Baseball fans were limited to amateur softball leagues, basketball fans to picking up a random game after work at the gym. Football? Definitely not a layman’s sport.

But golf was a level playing field. Kids. Women. Retirees. Anyone could play.

And thanks to guys like Adam Bailey, it was now every bit as cool as it was approachable.

Penelope still thought the man was a slimebucket, but it didn’t mean she wasn’t slightly giddy about getting to meet him at the photo shoot next week. For some reason, when she’d decided to pursue the Oxford job, the potential perk of getting to meet professional athletes in person hadn’t occurred to her.

It was just one of the many perks about the job she hadn’t seen coming. The other unexpected perk?

She enjoyed working with a partner.

Working with Cole was…

Well, it was right. She didn’t know how else to put it.

It was early in their partnership, true, but other than the occasional squabble, they seemed to see eye to eye on most everything.

He challenged her when she got too attached to a pet project, and he was always open to her challenging him. Which she did. Often.

Penelope’s stomach did one of those grinding, growling things, and a glance at the clock showed her why.

It was nearly one-thirty. Way past lunchtime.

She pushed her chair back and stood, trying to muster enthusiasm for the turkey sandwich that awaited her, when Cole came strolling in the door.

“Looking for this?” he asked, holding up a brown paper lunch sack.

“Oh! Yeah, I was, actually,” she said, smiling in thanks as he set the bag in front of her on the desk.

He tapped the front of the bag where she’d written her name, first and last, in black marker.

“Really?” he asked.

“What?”

“This is so third grade.”

“Well, how else am I going to know it’s mine?”

“Maybe because nobody else literally brown-bags their lunch?”

“Oh,” she said, feeling a little foolish.

“Don’t fret,” he said. “It’s cute.”

Before she could register what that meant, he dropped something else on her desk. A white Styrofoam box.

She looked up in question, but he merely lifted his eyebrows.

Opening it, she breathed a sigh of delight when she saw the onion rings. “You brought me leftovers.”

“Nope,” he said, plopping in her chair and putting his shoes up on the desk as he made himself comfortable. “Ordered them special, with instructions not to cook them until we were paying our bill so they’d still be hot.”

Penelope paused in chewing the greasy, oniony goodness and looked at him in surprise, but he was busy typing something on his phone and didn’t notice her curious glance.

She chewed thoughtfully as she studied him, wondering, not for the first time, if there were depths to Cole Sharpe that he kept carefully hidden from the world.

Sure, it was common knowledge that he was nice. Friendly. Charming.

But did people see beneath that to the kindness?

“Quit looking at me like that, Tiny,” he said, not glancing up from his phone.

“Like what?”

“Like I just threw myself in front of a truck to save a toddler. They’re onion rings, not flowers.”

“I don’t like flowers.”

He glanced up at that. “What do you mean, you don’t like flowers?”

She shrugged and dunked another onion ring into the spicy mayo that came in a little side container. “I mean, I like flowers. But I don’t like to receive them.”

Not that she’d been on the receiving end of a lot of flowers.

“What do you have against a bunch of nice roses?”

“Don’t get me wrong, they’re beautiful,” she said, polishing off the onion ring and looking in dismay at her now completely greasy fingers.

Cole shifted his weight and reached into his pocket, pulling out a bunch of napkins.

It was her turn to lift her eyebrows, and he just shrugged. “Figured you’d need them. But back to the flowers thing—how can you both think they’re beautiful and not like them?”

“I don’t like that they’re cut,” she explained, wiping her fingers on a napkin. “I like flowers in their natural habitat. They belong in nature, not hacked up and sentenced to die in a vase somewhere.”

“Huh,” he said, looking at her. His feet came down off her desk, landing softly on the carpet of her office as he leaned forward. “Well, then, tell me, Tiny, how do you expect a guy to woo you if you don’t get all gushy over overpriced long-stem roses?”

“I don’t,” she said.

“What do you mean, you don’t?”

“I don’t expect to be wooed,” she said, picking up another onion ring, getting her fingers greasy all over again. “Don’t want it, really.”

“Every woman wants to be wooed.”

“Nope.”

He leaned back and tapped his fingers against the arm of the chair as he watched her eat. She supposed she should feel embarrassed about the speed with which she was finishing off the deep-fried goodness, but…nope.

“You know what I think?” he asked.

“I don’t know what you think, but I do know that I don’t want to hear it,” she replied.

He told her anyway. “I think that despite all your I’m just a simple girl next door charm, you’ve got walls.”

“Oh boy,” she said, dunking another ring in the sauce. “This should be good.”

He leaned forward again, smiling evilly. “I think that you pretend you don’t want to be wooed, because no one’s made the effort, and deep down, you’re terrified that nobody ever will.”

Penelope ignored the truth of his words and rolled her eyes. “This is good stuff, Cole. Do you accept credit cards, or should I write you a check?”

He ignored her dismissal. “I’ll drop it if you answer one question for me.”

“Fine,” she said with sigh.

His eyes locked on hers. “When was the last time you got flowers?”

“Two weeks ago,” she said, happy to have a ready answer.

Cole’s eyes narrowed. “Who were they from?”

She licked her thumb. “A friend.”

“And the occasion?” he asked.

She hesitated, wishing she could tell him they were of the romantic variety. But she was a terrible liar. “They were congratulatory for the new job.”

“Mm-hmm,” he said. “And which friend were they from?”

“You said one question,” she said primly. “This is turning into an inquisition.”

“Fair enough. I’ll rephrase my original question,” he said, as though this were a fair compromise. “When was the last time you got flowers from a man?”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

Her voice was defensive, and he knew it. “Aha, so these last flowers were not from a man.”

“My sister, Janie, sent them,” she admitted somewhat reluctantly. “But her husband’s name was on the card too. And he’s a man.”

Cole shook his head and looked disappointed. “I knew it.”

“Knew what?” she asked, even as she told herself not to play into his little game of goading.

“You’re so prickly that men are too scared to try.”

“Prickly!” Penelope said, outraged. “I am not prickly.”

“Not personality-wise,” he said, his voice reassuring, as though talking to a skittish horse. “But romance-wise…you’re prickly.”

Penelope crossed her arms on the desk and leaned toward him. “Is this because I told you not to kiss me again?”

He crossed his own arms, mimicking her posture. “Definitely not. You’ll be relieved to know I’ve found my way to women who actually want to kiss me.”

Penelope tried to ignore a stab of jealousy. Of course he’d found women more willing. That had been her entire point in putting up these boundaries between them.

The reason she had insisted things not become romantic.

For Cole Sharpe, Penelope would have been one out of a million other women in his life.

For Penelope, Cole might have been one in a million. The only one. It’s how she rolled, throwing herself all the way over the ledge without looking.

No way was she setting herself up for that kind of pain again.

“Are you going somewhere with this?” she asked wearily.

“I am,” he said with a wide smile. “I’ve decided to make you my pet project.”

She groaned. “No way. Pass.”

“Come on. A woman who hates flowers? That’s just wrong.”

“Plenty of women don’t get off on flowers,” she said testily.

“Fair enough,” he said, standing. “You’re more the box-of-chocolates type. I can work with that. My point is, I’m going to show you that a little romance can be nice—fun. Casual.”

No doubt it could.

For him.

“Actually, I’m not really much of a chocolate fan either,” she admitted, picking up an onion ring. “Not much of a sweet tooth.”

“Well, what would make you swoon, Pope?” he asked, pausing in the doorway. “There’s got to be some shortcut to your heart.”

Without realizing she was doing it, Penelope glanced at the onion ring in her hand. Thought about the way he’d ordered them separately rather than just throwing some leftovers in a box. Thought about the way he’d tried to time it so they were as hot and nonsoggy as possible.

Lord help her.

Onion rings for Penelope were what roses and chocolate truffles were to other women.

And when she glanced up and caught Cole’s cocky departing wink, she saw that he knew it.

He’d known it all along.