She blushed at my words as I let my eyes linger down the line of her body.
The evening was going a lot better than what I could have even hoped for. We spent the car ride talking and just generally getting to know each other for the first time.
“My parents weren’t too happy when I told them I was ditching all my pre-law work and going a totally different way,” she continued to tell me when we sat at the quiet bar with our drinks. “Hell to make matters worse I told them it was because I wanted to be an artist.”
“But they came around in the end?” I asked.
“Yeah. I mean at first when you think artist you think starving and spray painting on the street. It’s really easy to make it a marketable skill though. So now I’m a project designer and my parents have backed off from their skepticism.”
“How about you?” She asked as she spun the red straw between her fingers and pressed it to her full lips.
I wondered if she knew that every movement she had made since I first laid eyes on her that night had been driving me wild. Even the way her face lit up when she talked about her work and how she turned her head slightly to the side when she laughed made me want to take her and make her mine all over again.
“Uh, well big shocker I didn’t always want to be a gynecologist when I grew up.”
“Oh no?” she added sarcastically.
“No” I said in a teasing tone. “I did know I would be a doctor though.”
“Why is that?”
“I come from a long line of plastic surgeons. I knew I didn’t want to go that route but nothing really beyond that. I worked for the red cross my summers while I got my doctorate. I loved it. It was like I was actually making a difference.”
“That sounds really wonderful,” she said encouraging me with a smile.
“Yeah it was. I loved it so much once I got my doctorate and did my residency, I decided to join full time. I went to some amazing places, helped a lot of people. It was great. But it was hard on my parents me being gone all the time. My mother always worried that I was going to be killed or catch some deadly disease.”
“So you came back home?”
“Well, I'm originally from New York. I kinda wanted to get away from my family name for college though, that’s why I came here. I just fell in love with the city so when it was time for me to come back stateside I knew this is where I wanted to be.”
“And it is close enough for your mom,” she asked in a knowing tone.
“Well, it’s not a dangerous third world, bombed out country, so she had to settle for it.”
I couldn't help but be mesmerized by the shinning glint in her honey eyes as she listened as I told her stories of my time overseas.
I realized suddenly as I had that very first night that she was special and this time I wasn't going to let her go.
Thirteen
Lilly
“This was fun,” I said as the night was wrapping up.
I hadn't realized how long we stayed. Not even when we decided to get desert. Now the tavern was basically empty. I had been so enthralled with everything Barrett told me, soaking it all to memory to retell one day, that the hours had slipped passed, unnoticed.
“I should probably go, my babysitter will be wanting to get back home,” I said.
“Yeah of course,” he said helping me out of my seat.
I couldn’t help but feel the tingle as his hand rested on my lower back as we walked out of the building. We slipped into the leather seats of his car without any other words between us.
“Can I just say something?” I said half way home.
“Sure?”
“What’s wrong with you?”