He’d added some extra spices and some sort of crunchy topping to the massive dish of chicken casserole. Along with her mother’s vegetarian lasagna, he’d whipped up a quinoa dish with kale and beans and flavorings she didn’t recognize but were delicious.
Luckily, since Jack’s heart troubles, he’d been dissuaded from turning out his homemade wine that tasted like drain cleaner and packed a punch stronger than moonshine. Evan and Prescott had made a wine run earlier so the wine was excellent. There was also beer and ice tea.
She’d half hoped that Iris and Geoff would tell everyone about the baby, but the dinner dragged on and there was no announcement.
Alexei sat beside her at dinner and she had to fight all her instincts not to feel thrilled to have him there, as though he were making a point, when likely he’d sat himself there because she was the only person he really knew at the dinner apart from Matt, and obviously he wasn’t going to sit beside his older brother. She knew enough about boys to understand that.
He felt so good sitting there beside her, gorgeous, solid and strong. Everyone loved him. Her mother, her father, all her sibs, even his own brother obviously thought enough of him to take time out of a successful career as a surgeon to help out in the food truck.
That was the trouble with Alexei. It wasn’t only that he was gorgeous; lots of guys were gorgeous and left her cold. He was also nice. The kind of man who donated a Saturday, and a lot of profit, to help out kids in a town he didn’t even live in. Everyone loved him, she reminded herself, which made it doubly scary for her to even think of him as a romantic interest.
Marguerite liked to think of herself as the kind of flower that perhaps blooms in a woodland meadow. Easily overlooked and very easily eclipsed by the fancier show off blooms. And she was fine with that. But for her to think of herself with Alexei was like putting a shrinking violet in the shadow of a huge sunflower. Sunflowers needed other sunflowers or big, bold blooms that could stand up. A violet would be totally eclipsed. It wasn’t that she minded most of the time. She accepted her limitations. And yet, for some reason, this woodland violet had a yearning that was growing stronger by the day for the biggest, brightest, sunflower she’d ever seen.
After dinner, the family gathered in its usual noisy collection all over the living room. In a tribe where if you wanted attention you generally had to talk louder than anyone else, she was pleased to see that Alexei and Matt could hold their own. She imagined that in a Greek family the same rules applied as in the Chance family.
Matt was staying overnight. He and Rose had already commandeered the guest cottage on the property. That meant Alexei was driving back by himself. By the time he was ready to leave, he had charmed all of her family but nobody could possibly feel a yearning as potent as hers.
When he was ready to leave, Daphne insisted on hugging him and thanking him profusely for taking part in the fall fair. “It added so much pizzazz to our little event to have food trucks this year. Thank you so much for putting the word out and for taking part. I hope you’ll do it again next year.”
“Love to. I had a great time today.” He turned to say good-bye to everyone and then Daphne said, “Marguerite, why don’t you walk Alexei out?”
Before she could answer,Alexei said, “I’d really like that.”
With every fiber of her being she forced herself not to blush. She was fairly certain that every fiber of her being let her down as she felt heat crawl up into her cheeks. “Sure,” she mumbled and, keeping her head down, followed him out of that overheated, overcrowded house and into the relative cool of the evening.
She glanced up and caught him gazing at her with amusement. She said, “I’m sorry. I think her success at running the fair has gone to Mom’s head. Now she’s moved on to matchmaking.”
He chuckled softly and she was immediately glad that she had been honest with him about her mother’s very unsubtle antics. “It’s a mother thing,” he said. “Believe me, my mother is worse than yours. She’s so desperate for grandchildren she pretty much grills every woman we meet on whether she wants kids or not.”
She glanced up at him with concern. It was one thing to feel embarrassed for herself, but her sister Rose had just become engaged to his brother. “You know Rose doesn’t want kids, right?”
He nodded. “Which puts me in the firing line for producing grandchildren.”
She wanted to tell him that she loved children and would be more than happy to throw herself on that production line, starting right this second, to make his mother a grandmother.
“And do you? Um, want kids?”
“Sure. I love kids.” The evening air felt soft. A light breeze ruffled the leaves in the trees. He said, “How about you?”
He was only making conversation, she reminded herself, as she replied, “I do.”
“I had a good time tonight. It was good to see your family all together.”
“Not all together. For that you’d probably want to have a couple of stiff drinks first.”
“My family is Greek. You got nothing on us.”
She merely smiled, but thought how very much she’d like to see him with all of his family.
They arrived at his truck, then stood awkwardly for a moment. He said, “Well, I’d better get going. I’ll call you about the cookbook.”
In that moment he leaned swiftly forward and touched his lips to hers, so fast she barely had time to register that Adonis himself was kissing her when he’d pulled away and was opening the door to his food truck.
“I’ll call you,” he said.
She couldn’t find the words to reply and simply stood there, with her lips tingling, speechless.
