“What was that about, anyway?” she demanded. “He was ready to turn around and walk out the door when you asked him to stay.”
“It was...an impulse,” he told her, because he wasn’t entirely sure of the reason himself.
“Why?” She lifted her glass to her lips.
He shrugged. “Doesn’t the definition of impulse preclude there being a reason?”
“Not necessarily.”
“And anyway, you’re the one who promised an explanation,” he reminded her.
“You’re right.”
“Am I also right in assuming that what happened tonight is somehow connected to the conversation you had with your mother this morning—the one in which you lied about having a boyfriend?”
She nodded.
“And the reason you lied?” he prompted.
“Because of Diego.” She sipped her wine. “No, that’s not entirely true. Diego is only the most recent of my mother’s matchmaking efforts.”
“How many have there been?” he wondered.
“It seems as if there’s a new one every time I go home,” she told him. “At Thanksgiving it was Tony. At Christmas it was Evan—until she realized no progress was being made there and brought Diego in to celebrate the New Year with us.”
“Is your mother a professional matchmaker?”
“No. She’s a financial analyst, but trying to find the perfect man for me has become her latest hobby. Or maybe it’s an obsession. But it’s not because she wants to help me find the perfect guy—she just wants me to find a guy who will convince me to move back to California. And not only is Diego her best friend’s favorite nephew, he lives in the same neighborhood as my parents.”
“That kind of relative and geographic proximity is a definite red flag,” he agreed. “You never want to get involved with somebody that you might run into on a regular basis after the relationship ends, because those encounters can be awkward and messy.”
She studied him over the rim of her glass. “On the surface, that sounds like a valid argument—except for one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“It assumes that every potential relationship is doomed from the start.”
“Have you ever had a relationship that didn’t end?” he challenged.
“Since I just told you about my mother’s efforts to find my perfect match, it’s safe to assume you already know the answer to that question.”
“There you go,” Jay said.
She shook her head. “Just because I’m not in love—and not looking for love—doesn’t mean that I don’t believe it exists,” she told him. “And I’m not going to let some artificial boundary determine who I can and cannot date.”
Which prompted him to ask the question that had been nudging at his mind for the past two hours: “Is that why you kissed me?”
Alyssa stared at him, certain she couldn’t have heard him correctly. “What did you just say?”
“I asked if you kissed me because you were tired of waiting for me to make a move.”
His response did nothing to clarify his question, but only succeeded in flustering her almost as much as the kiss.
“I was never waiting for you to make a move,” she assured him. “And when I kissed you—that wasn’t me making a move, that was sheer desperation.”
He frowned. “You’re saying that you don’t want to go out with me?”
“Ohmygod—no!” she said quickly, emphatically.
“By all means, take a minute to think about the question before you answer,” he said drily.
She felt her cheeks burn. “I don’t need a minute to think about it,” she said. “I do not want to go out with you.”
Okay, maybe she secretly thought he was the hottest guy she’d ever known, but he wasn’t at all her type. Not that she had a type—but she was certain that he did. She’d seen him around town with different women on various occasions, and they were all tall, slender and blonde. Alyssa was five feet six inches—when she was wearing two-inch heels—and though she wasn’t overweight, she was definitely more curvy than most of the women he’d dated, with dark hair and eyes that attested to her Mexican heritage.
“And seriously, what kind of question is that?” she demanded. “How massive is your ego that you’d think I was looking for an opportunity to get close to you?”
He just shrugged. “A lot of women in this town consider me to be a catch.”
“I’m not interested in catching you—or anyone. I don’t even want to play the game.”
“So I really was just in the wrong place at the wrong time?”
“You really were,” she confirmed.
But even as she spoke those words to reassure him, there was a part of her that wondered if she was wrong—and that he’d been in exactly the right place at the right time.
Jay heard voices in the hall and glanced up when Carter, Nat and Kevin came into the office together the next morning. They had a tray of coffee and box of pastries from The Daily Grind, and he held out his hand for his usual—large, black—desperate for the hit of caffeine to revive his sluggish brain. He peeled back the lid and lifted the cup to his mouth.
“Thanks,” he said. “I really needed that this morning—I don’t think I managed even four hours of sleep last night.”
Carter opened the box of pastries and Jay’s gaze zeroed in on the bear claw—at the same moment Kevin snatched it out of the box and bit into it.
“I thought the bear claw was mine.”
“Did you?” his friend asked around a mouthful of sweet, fried dough. “It really sucks when someone else moves in and takes something you’ve had your eye on, doesn’t it?”
Jay looked questioningly at his other friends. “Why do I get the impression this isn’t about the bear claw?”
“Because it’s about Alyssa,” Nat said.
“What about Alyssa?” he asked cautiously.
Kevin’s only response was to take another big bite of the pastry.
“When we were at The Daily Grind, we heard Megan Carmichael telling Kenzie Atkins that you were locking lips with the new bartender at Diggers’ last night,” Nat explained.
Jay shouldn’t have been surprised. The Daily Grind wasn’t just Haven’s café and bakery, it was where the latest rumors were always as hot as the coffee.
“It’s not what you think,” he said.
“You mean you weren’t kissing Alyssa?” Kevin challenged.
“I mean that’s only part of the story.”
“I don’t care about the story,” his friend said. “It’s Lacey Bolton all over again.”
“Seriously, Kev? That was twelve years ago,” Jay said. “Can you forget about Lacey Bolton already?”
“Can you not see that this isn’t about Lacey Bolton but the guy who screwed over a