“Oh. Superman.”
“What underwear were you thinking of?”
“None. I mean…I wasn’t thinking of you in anything.”
Interesting. A pretty blush spread over her cheeks and he chuckled as she dug herself deeper into a hole.
“You know…um, Jack, he really likes Spider-Man underwear right now, but last month it was SpongeBob.”
Matt was learning little things about her, like she babbled when she was nervous.
“And Charlie, he’s obsessed with this dog from—”
“You make me laugh.” Something he used to do a lot. “Now, tell me something about you I don’t know.”
She chewed on her lip like he’d just asked her to recite a mathematical equation, and he did a quick kid check. Gracie dug with the single-minded determination of a trench digger.
Jack looked up to find Matt watching him and lowered the bucket from above Annie’s head. The disappointment of a foiled plan was evident on his five-year-old face. Matt had antagonized his own sister enough to know.
“Well?” he prompted.
She adjusted her chair, fiddled with the strap on the bag beside her. “I don’t know. I really like your stories.”
“Nope, I’ve talked about myself enough. It’s your turn.” Although if she didn’t want to talk, he’d be happy just to stare at her. He could do it all day and never get tired of it. The way she moved, the way her hair blew around her delicate shoulders.
He pushed on because, among other things, he liked the sound of her voice. “I’m not going to tell you any more stories until you tell me one.” Of course he was bluffing. He’d talk all day if it kept her sitting beside him.
“I’m an only child, so…there’s not really any funny stuff.”
“Ah, just what we all wanted to be,” he joked wistfully. “The spoiled only child. What was it like getting all the attention, never sharing a room or a car?”
A flicker of pain crossed her face but she covered as well as any of the guys in his platoon.
“Hey, I was just kidding. I didn’t really mean you were spoiled.”
“It’s okay.” She pushed her toes deeper into the sand. “I might have been spoiled. I don’t remember. My parents died when I was five.”
Shit. Matt looked at his feet. “I’m sorry. I’ve been going on and on about my family, showing pictures, and…Damn. I feel like an ass.”
“Why? It’s fine. I’m fine. It was a long time ago.”
Her smile was so forced it hurt.
“There’s no reason to feel bad,” she told him. “We don’t even know each other.”
Yes, we do. Or at least he wanted to know her like no other woman he’d ever met.
“Abby.” He waited for her to raise her eyes to his. “I didn’t ask because I wanted to know about your family. I asked because I want to know you.”
Chapter 6
What? Wanted to know about her, he meant. Out of curiosity. Like you might want to know about your waiter or your mailman. But you didn’t want to know them.
“Good grief,” Matt said, then softened his exasperation with a smile. “What’s your favorite color?”
Really? Abby’s heart was pounding, so intensely aware of his nearness, and he was talking colors? “You’re serious?”
“Yes.” He sat back, closed his eyes. “And that’s an easy question.”
She bit at her nails. Okay, she could do this. She could be relaxed, or pretend to be, sitting inches from the most amazing man she’d ever met. She cleared her throat. “Blue.”
“When’s your birthday?”
“March third.” Not a day she celebrated. “If we’re playing twenty questions, we can at least take turns.”
“Fair enough.”
“Okay. Dogs or cats?” she asked.
“Dogs. Real tree or fake?”
“Real.” And one of her very favorite things about Christmas. “Doughnuts or cookies?”
“Mmm, that’s a hard one. Are we talking homemade cookies?”
She smiled at the question. “Yes, homemade.”
“Then I’m going with cookies. Han Solo or Luke Skywalker?”
“Neither,” she said sweetly. “I’d be Princess Leia, of course. Which one did you want to be?”
“Solo,” Matt said with a sexy grin. “He got the girl.”
Like I bet you do.
Not a pleasant thought, Matt getting the girl. She imagined he left a string of heartbroken women in his wake. “Did you have the costume and everything?”
“I did, but my older brother, Tony, always got to be Han, and our next door neighbor, also older than me, was Luke. I had to be Chewie. I’m pretty good, though. Want to hear it?”
He did such an impressive impersonation of Chewbacca, she laughed until tears squeezed out of the corners of her eyes. She waved off Jack when he came over to see what was so funny, then she sat back, getting her breath, with a hand on her belly and a smile on her face. He was cute. Not a word you’d think applied to him at first glance, but…
“Okay, now that you’ve gotten the hang of talking about yourself, tell me something no one else knows.”
Would it sound too pathetic, she wondered, to say no one knew any of what she’d just told him?
He leaned in close. “And make it good.”