Линда Миллер – A Creed in Stone Creek (страница 15)

“How high?” Matt persisted.

“Really, really high,” Steven promised.

Matt brightened. “Okay,” he said, making for the door, with Zeke right behind him. “Let’s roll.”

Steven laughed and, fifteen minutes later, they were nosing the truck into a parking spot in the lot beside the Sunflower Bakery and Café. Recalling yesterday’s parking ticket, he made sure there were no fire hydrants within fifty feet.

They brought Zeke as far as the front of the restaurant and secured one end of his leash to a pole with a sign on it that read, “Park pets here.” An oversize pie pan full of fresh water waited within reach.

Steven was just straightening his back, about to follow Matt inside the café, when Melissa O’Ballivan came jogging around a corner and up the sidewalk, straight toward him.

She wore pink shorts, a skimpy white T-shirt, and one of those visor caps with no crown. Her abundance of spirally chestnut-brown hair bobbed on top of her head in a ponytail.

Her smile nearly knocked Steven over—even if it was focused on Matt and the dog with such intensity that he might as well have been invisible.

Holy crap, Steven thought, because the ground shook under his feet and the sky tilted at such a strange angle that his equilibrium was skewed. He gave his head a shake, in an effort to clear away some cobwebs.

“Morning,” Melissa said, jogging in place.

All the right things bounced, Steven noticed, grinning down at her like a damn fool. “Morning,” he responded, after clearing his throat.

She looked up at him with a surprised expression in her blue eyes, as though she’d momentarily forgotten that he was standing there. Or never noticed him at all.

She apparently wanted to give that impression, anyway, and he was intrigued.

“Would you mind opening the door?” she asked, unplugging the white earbuds attached to an armband MP3 player from her head.

It took Steven a moment to register what that simple phrase actually meant.

She wanted to go inside the café.

Feeling his neck warm, Steven pushed the door open and held it, so she could jog over the threshold and across to the take-out counter.

Morning greetings and the scents of fresh coffee, baked goods and frying bacon washed over Steven, but starved though he was, he barely noticed. He couldn’t seem to take his eyes off Melissa O’Ballivan’s springy, perfect little backside.

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