The Last First Kiss

He really was spoiling for a fight, wasn’t he? Not that she was intimidated, but she wanted this to get under way quickly. The sooner the better.

“Maybe. We’ll have to play it by ear. But they’ll be so upset that we’re upset, I guarantee that it’ll cure them once and for all from trying to play matchmaker with us on any level—separately or together.” She paused to take a breath. “What do you think? You game?”

If he said no, he had a feeling she’d keep calling and badgering him until he agreed. Still, throwing his lot in with Kara made him uneasy.

“Why do I get the feeling that I’m about to sign my own death warrant?”

What was it about him that set her off like this? Eighteen years and nothing had changed. Except that he was better looking, but that had no bearing here.

“Because you’re running on next to no sleep, you have no imagination and you don’t know a good plan when you hear one. Shall I go on?”

He laughed shortly. “Not that I have the slightest doubt that you could, but please don’t.”

She was still waiting for an answer. “Does that mean no?”

This was the moment of truth. He could still walk away. But he had a feeling that she had a point. Though he loved his mother dearly, he could think of nothing he wanted less than to have her playing matchmaker on his behalf.

“That means that I’m probably going to really regret this, but you do have a point.”

Yes! “Glad you recognize that.”

He wanted to move this along while he still had a prayer of getting some sleep. “All right, mastermind, so what’s our next move?” he asked her.

She would have thought that was self-evident. “We pretend to go out.”

“And what, notify the press first? How are our mothers going to know we’re going out? I think they’d be suspicious if either one of us just picked up the phone and called to tell them.”

She smiled. He was almost cute when he tried to be flippant. The key word here was almost.

“Ah, there is more than just space between those manly ears. You’re absolutely right. How about that birthday for your cousin’s son?” she asked. “The one I got you the video game for.”

“Ryan,” he supplied.

“Ryan,” she repeated. “Ryan’s going to have a birthday party, right?”

“Yes—” He got no further.

Kara pounced on the next question. “Is your mother going to be there?”

Okay, so now it was all crystal clear to him. Not bad, he acknowledged, albeit silently. Saying it out loud would just give her a bigger head. “Yes.”

“Okay, then we will be, too. All we need is one eyewitnessing mother to spread the news to the other.”

“Eyewitnessing,” he echoed. “Is that even a word?”

“It is for this purpose,” she said glibly. “Anyway, they’ll think their plan is working—until we show them otherwise. So, are you in?”

“I’m in,” he answered even as part of him had the sinking feeling that by agreeing, life as he knew it would never be the same again. This very well could be a huge mistake.

Joining forces with Kara was always dangerous. It was a known fact that she possessed a golden tongue. It was also a known fact that she could abruptly leave him holding the bag if it suited her purposes.

He had no reason to believe that eighteen years had changed anything, her greatly improved figure notwithstanding.

Chapter Four

The phone rang just as Paulette walked past it. On her way out, she debated just letting the answering machine pick it up. But there was something about a ringing phone that always captured her attention to the exclusion of everything else. It was irresistible.

Pausing, she lifted the receiver from the cradle and brought it to her ear. “Hello?”

“I thought you’d want to be the first to know—well, not really first, but close,” the voice on the other end said.

Lisa. Paulette dropped her purse to the floor, kicked off the high heels she’d just slipped on and deposited her body into the overstuffed chair in her living room. There was no such thing as a quick exchange of words between her and Lisa.

“Almost the first to know what?” Paulette asked. Even as she did so, she mentally crossed her fingers, hoping that her little plan had succeeded in its next stage.

“That Dave called Melissa and asked her if she’d mind if he brought someone to Ryan’s birthday party.”

Paulette could hear the smile in her friend’s voice. It mirrored the one on her own face. “And this friend wouldn’t be Kara, by any chance, would it?”

At this point, it was a rhetorical question. She sincerely doubted that Lisa would be calling her to say that her son was bringing someone else to the little boy’s party.

And then Lisa confirmed all her hopes by saying, “Yes, it would.”

Paulette would have clapped her hands together with glee if both of them had been free. “See, I told you so. All it took was for the two of them to be in the same place at the same time.” And just like that, she was flying high on confidence. “The rest will soon be history.”

“Don’t start sending out the wedding invitations just yet,” Lisa cautioned. “I mean, it’s not like Dave hasn’t dated before. And you’ve told me that Kara has gone out with a few guys from time to time. Wasn’t there that guy, Alex something-or-other, she was seeing pretty regularly a while back?”

The name instantly brought a wave of anger. “You mean the bigamist?”

“He was married?” Lisa asked, horrified.

“Well, not exactly,” Paulette backtracked. “But he was seeing several women at the same time, including a live-in girlfriend who just happened to be the mother of his little boy. Kara was devastated when she accidentally found out—devastated and furious. He’s the one who made her swear off having anything to do with men.”

At the time that it happened, she’d kept the news to herself in deference to Kara’s wishes. But in her opinion enough time had passed for the truth to finally come out. Besides, she wanted Lisa to know that her daughter wasn’t a wallflower because no one was interested. She was one by choice.

“I don’t think you realize what this actually means,” Paulette continued.

“Enlighten me,” Lisa urged.

“If Kara actually agreed to go out with Dave, it means she’s ready to get back into life. This is a really big deal,” Paulette enthused. “Why don’t we get together at the end of this week and celebrate?”

As ever, Paulette was getting ahead of herself, Lisa thought. “A family gathering for a child’s birthday doesn’t exactly fall into the same parameters as a date,” Lisa pointed out.

“Walking down the block holding hands is a date,” Paulette insisted. “Anything involving two consenting people is considered a date. C’mon, Lis, don’t rain on my parade.”

It wasn’t that she wasn’t as hopeful about the outcome of all this as Paulette was, it was just that she was a little more grounded than her friend. And yes, a little more pessimistic.

“I’m not raining on it, Paulette, I just want you to have an umbrella handy—just in case,” Lisa explained. “By the way, about Ryan’s party … There’s always room for one more. Would you like to come?”