Dateline Matrimony (Hot off the Press! 3)

Chapter One

The man with the sharp gray eyes was back for breakfast. It was Friday morning, and it was the third time he’d come in during Teresa’s first week on the job in the Rainbow Café. Still she hadn’t gotten any more comfortable with him. On each occasion he had been reasonably well behaved, but there was something about him that made her nervous.

He flirted with her—not overtly, but with an underlying impudence that made her wonder if he was mocking her. What was it he found amusing about her? Was he one of those smug and superior types who thought everyone else was slightly beneath his intellectual level, especially a waitress in a small-town diner? He looked the type, she decided, then chided herself for making judgments about a man she didn’t even know.

“What can I get you this morning?” she asked him.

She had never seen him open the menu, but he always had his order ready when she asked. “Denver omelette with a side order of salsa. And coffee. Black.”

“Biscuits or toast?”

“Toast. Has anyone ever mentioned that you look a bit like Grace Kelly?”

“Oh, sure. I get compared to dead movie-star princesses all the time,” she answered airily. She’d decided the first time she met him that he enjoyed disconcerting people with off-the-wall comments, and she’d quickly decided that the best way to respond was in kind and without making it personal. She figured this guy didn’t need any encouragement. “I’ll be right back with your coffee.”

She made another couple of stops on the return trip with the coffee carafe. Two elderly gentlemen, old friends who met in the diner every morning for breakfast, flirted outrageously with her when she refilled their coffee cups. She deflected their teasing easily, comfortable with them as she couldn’t seem to be with the gray-eyed man watching her from the back table.

Though most of the customers were pleasant enough, there’d been a few who were rude, one or two whose innuendos went a little over the line, even a couple who were downright obnoxious. Having worked as a waitress before, she handled them all skillfully. The man who’d introduced himself to her only as Riley didn’t fit any of those descriptions. He just made her…nervous.

“You aren’t letting those guys turn your head with their flattery, are you?” he asked when she approached his table again to fill his cup. “Old Ernie thinks he’s a real Romeo. He’s probably proposed to you two or three times already.”

She poured his coffee and answered blandly, “They seem quite nice.”

It appeared to her that his smile turned faintly mocking again. “Do you say that about everyone you serve here?”

“Not everyone.” With that subtle zinger, she stepped away from the table. “I’ll go check on your food.”

She didn’t hurry to the kitchen, stopping twice on the way to refill coffee cups and check on customers. Letting the kitchen door swing closed behind her, she set the carafe down with a thump. “That guy is j

ust strange,” she muttered.

Shameka Cooper looked up from the pancakes and sausage links sizzling on a large griddle in front of her. “Which guy is that, hon?”

“Around thirty, brown hair sort of falling in his face, silvery gray eyes. Attitude.”

Shameka didn’t even have to glance toward the pass-through window that gave her a view of the dining room. “Sounds like Riley O’Neal.”

“Yes, he said his name is Riley. Is he a jerk, or have I gotten a bad first impression?”

Shameka responded with the deep chuckle that had drawn Teresa to her from the beginning. “Oh, Riley’s a sweetie who comes across as a jerk. Usually you just want to hug him, even though there are times you’d really like to whomp him a good one.”

Teresa couldn’t imagine actually hugging the guy, though she could picture herself wanting to whomp him. “He acts so smug,” she said. “As if he knows something I don’t. Something he finds amusing.”

“That’s Riley. And that’s exactly why some folks don’t care much for him. Myself, I’ve always gotten a kick out of him. He’s not half as cynical as he pretends to be. He just thinks it goes with his image—you know, hard-nosed reporter.”

“He’s a reporter?” Teresa curled her lip. No wonder he acted so bored and worldly.

“Sure. He works for the Evening Star. That sort of makes him a co-worker of ours, I guess, since the family that owns this diner also owns the newspaper. Marjorie’s daughter and son-in-law run the paper, while Marjorie keeps the diner going.”