Chapter 23

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Caroline wasn’t surprised by how good of a night she had with Rhett and Jay, but she was surprised by how easy it felt to sit at the table with Jay and help with his homework. She had never spent a lot of time around children, but it didn’t feel as daunting as she would have thought. If anything, it felt rewarding to sit there and help out, not unlike the way she felt helping her family with the inn. She liked being able to help and find solutions, she realized. And Jay was easy to get along with, even though he was frustrated with the homework.

It made sense to her, how to explain it in a way that would work for him. She knew he loved dinosaurs and fossils, so she found ways to weave that into the spelling, sounding out the words for him in sentences having to do with those things to keep his interest.

She could tell it was helping, making it click for him, and it felt good to know that she was helping him get over this particular hump in his schoolwork.

“I can cook for us, since we’re staying in,” Rhett offered when he came back downstairs, having changed out of his nice wool sweater and chinos into a t-shirt and jeans. “It won’t be the kind of meal you would’ve gotten, but it’ll feed us.”

“I’m happy with whatever you want to make,” Caroline assured him, and Rhett went to look in the refrigerator.

“Well, I’ve got all the stuff for spaghetti, including salad and garlic bread. How does that sound? And I think there’s some leftover peppermint icebox cake that the neighbor brought over last time.”

“That all sounds great,” Caroline said, and Jay agreed that spaghetti sounded good. She helped Jay with the last few sentences of his spelling, and then as he moved on to his science homework, she got up to help Rhett with dinner.

“Here. Can’t let that pretty dress get messed up.” He got an apron off a hook on the wall, putting it over her head and tying it around her waist for her. She shivered a little as she felt his hands brush against her waist, feeling warm and happy and domestic. If she’d known this was going to happen beforehand, she would have worried herself to death that it would feel awkward, that she would feel like she was intruding on Rhett’s space. But it had all happened so naturally, and it felt natural. It felt like the most normal thing in the world, standing there in his kitchen with him as he passed her a cutting board and knife, along with a sweet onion and some fresh basil.

Rhett went into the living room and put on some music in the background, and then rejoined her in the kitchen, chopping garlic as olive oil heated in a pan. Caroline relaxed into the familiar rhythm of chopping up her ingredients for the spaghetti, passing them over to Rhett as he finished with the garlic and then a handful of mushrooms, adding them all to the pan. Before long, the kitchen was full of the scent of savory meat and onions and spices, as Rhett handed her a loaf of fresh sourdough from the local bakery to slice and spread with fresh butter and minced garlic for the garlic bread.

While she did that, he poured them each a glass of red wine, his fingers brushing hers as he handed her a glass. Caroline couldn’t help the smile that spread over her face as she took it.

“I don’t know,” she said softly as she took a sip, setting it aside to spread more butter over the soft bread. “This feels pretty fancy.”

It was starting to snow again outside, the fluffy flakes visible through the large window in the kitchen. She felt a warm sense of peace wash over her as she passed Rhett the bread after he got the water boiling for noodles, the two of them moving as easily around each other in the kitchen as if this wasn’t their first time together doing something like this. There was no bumping into each other, no awkwardness. The dinner came together flawlessly, and as Jay finished up his homework, Rhett had him get the jar of tomato sauce and put it into a small saucepot to heat up as he finished assembling the spaghetti.

“This is amazing,” Caroline said as they sat down and started to eat. “Seriously, you were full of it when you said you couldn’t cook.”

“Well, I had help.” Rhett grinned, reaching for a piece of bread. “I couldn’t have done it all on my own.”

“I don’t believe that for a second.” Caroline looked over at him, her face softening. “I think you’re managing very well, on your own.”

There was more meaning to it than just dinner, and she saw from the look on his face that he understood what she was trying to say. His face softened too, and they exchanged a long look as across the table, Jay attacked his spaghetti enthusiastically.

It wasn’t a fancy dinner out, as nice as the evening was. But it was fun and domestic, and Caroline found that she was glad it had turned out like this. If anything, this felt more her than any expensive night out. A dinner at home, in a warm kitchen that smelled of bread and spices, music filtering in from the living room—all of that felt familiar and safe and good.

“What made you so interested in dinosaurs?” she asked Jay, twirling her fork around a bit of spaghetti. “Have you always liked them?”

Jay nodded, taking a bite of his garlic bread. “Mm-hm,” he mumbled through a mouthful, and Rhett chuckled.

“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” he cautioned Jay. “Why don’t you tell Caroline about the first time you went to a museum and saw dinosaur bones?”

Jay grinned. “There were so many dinosaurs! Big scary ones with huge teeth, and smaller ones, and ones that live in the ocean.”

“I’ve read some of them had feathers.” Caroline smiled. “And then there are those ones with leathery wings.”

“Ptero-dactyls.” Jay enunciated the word, stumbling over it a little, but clearly enthused to tell Caroline about his favorite thing. “I really like the T-Rex though.”

“We went to the Smithsonian for a weekend,” Rhett explained. “Jay was so excited he didn’t want to leave. Wanted to know if he could have a sleepover with the dinosaurs,” he teased, looking at his son, but there was a loving note in his voice that Caroline heard clearly.

Jay made an embarrassed face, and Caroline laughed softly.

“Wouldn’t that be cool if you could do that, though?” She smiled. “There’s a movie about that you might like.”

“Oh he’s seen it so many times,” Rhett assured her with a laugh. “He was hoping the dinosaurs might come alive and he’d get to see them the way they used to be.”

“I want to be an archeologist,” Jay said, mispronouncing the word a little, but saying it clearly enough that Caroline understood what he meant. “And find more dinosaur bones.”

“I think that sounds like a great career goal. And who knows? Maybe there even are some under the inn. Maybe all those millennia ago, there were dinosaurs here?” She shrugged. “It could be.”

Jay’s eyes went round at that, and Caroline couldn’t help but smile. She thought to herself that she really liked Jay. She found it easier than she would have thought to relate to him. She’d always assumed she wouldn’t be good with kids, that they’d automatically hate her because she always hewed so close to the rules, because she tended to be so stiff and serious.

But she could feel herself loosening up, becoming more comfortable every time she was with Rhett and Jay. And Jay didn’t seem to think of her as a “stiff,” awkward adult to avoid. He’d been beaming the entire time they were talking, and when she glanced over at Rhett, she could see him smiling warmly at them both.

Out of nowhere, as she took another bite of her spaghetti, she felt Rhett reach over and squeeze her hand.

It made her heart race, and she looked at him, wondering if he could see it in her face.

He made her happy, she realized. She was happy, in this moment, the way she rarely was anywhere other than at home at the inn.

But this made her feel at home too. And it gave her a flicker of hope for something that she’d never thought she would have.

When dinner was over and they’d rinsed the dishes and loaded the dishwasher, Rhett found that he didn’t want Caroline to leave yet. He glanced over at where she was wiping the table down, and cleared his throat, turning around as he dropped soap tabs into the dishwasher. “How about a board game?”

He wondered if she’d say she needed to get back to the inn. But instead, she looked up, flashing him a smile. “That sounds fun.”

They went into the living room, and he lit a fire in the fireplace as Caroline got out all the pieces for the board game, sitting next to Jay on the couch. He glanced over once as he fed kindling into the fire, and felt a warmth in his chest at the sight of Caroline sitting there with Jay, patiently letting him help her arrange the game board. Was there a future, he wondered, where this was possible? Where he got a second chance at having a complete family, here in this place that had so quickly come to feel like home?

It felt like a lot to hope for, but the moment felt so right. The whole night had felt good—warm and comfortable, and happily domestic. Caroline felt like the kind of person he’d been waiting for, someone who was happy with a simple life and quiet evenings, who could find happiness in just being together. There was no awkwardness with her, no need to fill silences unless they wanted to talk, just a quiet synergy that he couldn’t remember ever having had with anyone before.

She so easily accepted Jay too, something that he had endlessly worried about whenever he’d thought about what his dating life might look like in the future. She was patient with him, explaining the rules as they started playing the game. Jay liked her too, he could tell. He stayed next to her as they played, asking questions, laughing whenever she joked. Rhett thought that whatever other obstacles there might be in the way for him and Caroline, her accepting his son and vice versa wouldn’t be one of them. And that was a huge weight off of his shoulders.

Around ten, he looked up at the clock above the fireplace mantel. “I’m going to put Jay to bed,” he said, as they finished the game and Caroline started to box it back up. “Do you want to stay a little while longer?”

“Sure,” she said easily, and he felt a smile spread across his face. She was clearly in no hurry to end the night either, and it made him feel good.

“All right, buddy,” Rhett said, getting up from his chair. “Time for bed, then. Say goodnight.”

“Goodnight.” Jay leaned over, hugging Caroline, and her eyes widened a little in surprise. But she hugged him back, looking at Rhett over Jay’s head with a startled smile on her face.

Rhett took him upstairs, returning the hug his son gave him and then tucking him into bed. “Did you have fun?” he asked, and Jay nodded.

“I like her,” he said decisively, and Rhett chuckled.

“That’s good, because I do too.”

He turned on Jay’s nightlight, flicking off the main light as he walked out of the room, and headed downstairs to find Caroline still on the couch, her legs tucked up underneath her. She looked beautiful in her dress, the firelight flickering off of her face, and he thought he could have stood there in the doorway and looked at her forever.

Instead, he went to the kitchen and got the rest of the bottle of wine they’d opened before dinner and a pair of clean glasses, and went to join her on the couch.

“Thank you for helping Jay with his homework,” he said as he sat down, pouring a glass of the red wine for them both. “I know that might not have been the date you were expecting to have.”

She flushed a little, her cheeks turning a little pink in the firelight. “It was no problem,” she said. “It was fun. More fun than I would have imagined, actually. And we can go out on a fancy date any night. It seemed pretty clear that Jay needed you home tonight.”

“Is that you agreeing to a third date?” Rhett teased lightly, and Caroline’s blush deepened.

“I might be convinced.” She bit her lip as she took a sip of her wine, and he felt his own pulse quicken at the idea that she was flirting with him. It had been a long time since he’d had this kind of flirtatious moment with someone he liked and cared about. That playful spark had gone out of his marriage long before the end, doused by his ex-wife’s need to be absorbed with her work and irritation whenever she was interrupted. He was worried he was too rusty to be any good at it, but Caroline didn’t seem to mind.

“I never expected to make friends here so quickly,” he said, glancing at her as he took a sip of his own wine. “And I definitely never expected to meet someone who would turn my life upside down the way you have.”

This time, Caroline’s blush couldn’t be explained away by the warmth from the fire. He saw her color deepen, her lips part a little, and his heart thudded in his chest. The evening was soft and intimate in a way that made him a little nervous, but excited at the same time. She felt the same way he did, that much seemed clear. It made him feel comfortable enough to open up to her.

“Honestly…” He chuckled a little, the sound raspy. “It’s a little silly, but with how much I didn’t expect to make those connections right off the bat, I started off writing letters to an unknown person.”

Caroline blinked at him. “How so?”

Rhett shrugged, taking another sip of his wine. “My therapist back in Cleveland suggested I start journaling, while I was going through my divorce. It wasn’t something I’d ever tried before, but things were hard, and I thought why not? It really did help, getting my feelings out in writing. So the first night I got here, after I put Jay to bed, I went out on a walk and sat out by a tree, did some writing. I had a lot on my mind that night, a lot of anxious thoughts. I ended up staying out there longer than I thought I would, panicked a little, and left my notebook behind.”

Caroline said nothing, just watching him as he spoke, and he took it as encouragement to keep going.

“I went and found the notebook a few days later,” he said. “Turns out someone else had too. They’d read what I wrote, and answered it. It seemed like they were going through some stuff too. I felt a little silly, but I needed someone to talk to, even if I didn’t know who it was. So I wrote back. And it’s just kind of been this back-and-forth thing ever since. It’s been nice, actually, even though I probably won’t ever know who they are.”

“That’s quite a story.” Caroline was still smiling, reaching for her glass again, but he thought he saw an odd expression cross her face. “You weren’t upset that someone read your journal?”

Rhett shook his head. “I mean, I guess I thought it was kinda odd at first, but it wasn’t like there was anything crazy in there. If anything, I kind of appreciated that someone took the time to read it. They could’ve just read the first entry, thought this guy really should get a therapist, and chucked it.” He laughed dryly. “But they kept reading, and wrote back. It really meant something, especially that first little bit of time I was here. Really felt like it reinforced that I’d picked the right place to move.”

Caroline nodded, setting down her glass. “Evergreen Hollow is tight-knit like that. Everyone cares, even if they don’t show it all of the time. And most people do show it, one way or another.”

“I got lucky, I think.” Rhett leaned back, still looking at her. “Very lucky.”

Caroline smiled, but he couldn’t help but think it looked a little tighter around the edges than before. She stood up, running her hands over her skirt. “It’s getting late,” she said, her gaze flicking toward the door. “I should probably head out. I have an early morning at the inn tomorrow.”

“Oh. All right.” Rhett blinked, startled. He hadn’t expected that. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected, really. Not for her to stay the night or anything, but he’d thought they’d sit and chat a while longer. But, he supposed, she was right that it was getting late.

He stood up, walking her to the door. She gave him a hug before putting on her coat and scarf, but she didn’t move to kiss him. He watched as she left, walking carefully down the steps, and he couldn’t help but feel that he’d done something wrong.

He just couldn’t think of what it might be.