Baby Steps. Karen Templeton

chuckling, Dana stood again, tugging and hitching and flicking leaf pyuck off her bazooms, only to take a long, hard, honest gander at herself in the mirror. Generally speaking, she was okay with her body. For the most part, things curved in and out where they should, even if a few of the outs were a little farther “out” than average. But she’d long since learned to work with what she had, to spend a few extra bucks to have highlights put in her hair, to use makeup to emphasize her large gray green eyes, to wear clothes that made her feel feminine and good about herself. Dowdy, she didn’t do.

      However, that didn’t mean she wasn’t a realist, or that while she knew any number of full-figured women—her mother included—in very happy relationships, neither did her father look anything like C. J. Turner. Nor had any of her former boyfriends. The odds of C.J. being interested in her in that way, even as a passing fancy, were slim.

      Well, that certainly takes the pressure off, doesn’t it? she thought, giving those bodacious bazooms a quick, appreciative pat. If nothing else, they’d always have Paris. Or something.

      She flicked off the light to the ladies’ room and walked out into the hall, chin up, chest out, feeling pretty and confident and…

      “Ready to go?” C.J. said from the lobby, his model-bright smile lighting up those baby blues.

      …seriously out of her depth.

      “Sure am,” she said, smiling back, praying for all she was worth that she didn’t snag her heel on the Berber carpet and land flat on her equally bodacious fanny.

      “Yes, that’ll be fine, I’ll see you then,” C.J. said into his cell phone, clapping it shut and slipping it back into his pants pocket. Not a single call between lunch and Dana’s appointment; since then, the damn thing had rung every five minutes. “Sorry about that,” he said. From the other side of the vacant storefront, she waved away his concern.

      “At least this way,” she said, making a face at the bathroom, “I don’t feel guilty about takin’ up so much of your time.”

      “It goes with the territory,” he said. “Take all the time you need.”

      Her back to him, she lifted both hands in the air and waggled them as she click-clacked over the cement floor toward the stockroom.

      Chuckling softly, C.J. decided he wasn’t quite sure what to make of Dana Malone. She exuded all the charm and femininity befitting her Southern upbringing, but none of the coyness. No eyelash fluttering, no feigned helplessness. On the contrary, her incessant fiddling with the printouts, the way she worried her bottom lip as they inspected each property, told him she was genuinely nervous about the position her partners had put her in. And becoming increasingly embarrassed—and ticked off—about being unable to make a decision.

      The storm had lasted barely ten minutes, but leftover clouds prowled the sky, leaving the air muggy, the temperature still uncomfortably high. And, after a half-dozen properties, Dana was grumpy and irritable. Now, at number seven, C.J. stayed near the front, his arms folded across his chest as he leaned against a support pillar, watching her. Trying to parse the odd, undefined feeling that kicked up in his gut every time she looked at him.

      “It’s okay, I suppose,” she finally said, her words literally and figuratively ringing hollow in the vast, unfurnished room. “It’s certainly big enough. And the double doors in back are great for deliveries….”

      She looked to him, almost as if afraid to say it.

      “But?” he patiently supplied.

      Her shoulders rose with the force of her sigh. “But…there’s not much parking. And you can’t really see the front of the store from the street. I mean…” Annoyance streaked across her features as she fanned herself with the sheaf of printouts. “I suppose we really don’t need more than five or six spaces in front.” She crossed to the front window, her skirt swishing softly against her legs. “And this big window is not only perfect for display, it lets in lots of outside light for the play area Mercy wants to put in. Right now, the toddlers have the run of the shop, and we’re so afraid one of them is going to get hurt….”

      He thought he heard her voice catch, that she turned a little too quickly toward the window. “And maybe that Mexican restaurant next door would pull in enough traffic to compensate for being on a side street….” Fingers tipped in a delicate shade of rose lifted to her temple, began a circular massage.

      “So we’ll keep looking,” C.J. said mildly as he straightened up. “Next?”

      A couple of the papers fell from her hand as she tried to shuffle them; he went to retrieve them for her, but she snatched them up before he had a chance, pointlessly pushing back a strand of hair that kept falling into her eyes. “Oh, um, this one near the Foothills might not be bad. Great square footage for the price, lots of families in the area…” Then her brow creased. “But I don’t know, maybe we should stick with something more centrally located…oh, shoot!”

      “At the end of our rope, are we?”

      “There’s an understatement…oh! What are you doing?” she asked as C.J. took her by the elbow, ushering her through the glass door.

      “Break time. For both of us.”

      “I don’t—”

      “You’re making yourself nuts. Hell, you’re making me nuts. This is only a preliminary look-see, Dana. No one expects you to sign a contract today.”

      “Good thing,” she said, her hand shooting up to shield her eyes from the glaring late afternoon sun as they walked back to his Mercedes, “since it’s all a blur.” He opened the car door for her; she didn’t protest. Once he’d slid in behind the wheel, she plonked her head back on the headrest and closed her eyes. “But what a weenie-brain,” she said on a sigh. “I can’t even eliminate the dogs.”

      C.J. felt a smile tug at his mouth as he pulled out into traffic. “I can assure you I’ve met a fair number of people who’d qualify for that title, Dana. You’re definitely not one of them.”

      She seemed to consider this for a moment, while her perfume sambaed around the car’s interior. Something high-end and familiar. But, on her, unique. “Thank you,” she said at last, her eyes still closed. “But I sure do feel like one.” Her eyes blinked open. “Why are we pulling in here?”

      “Because it’s at least five-hundred degrees out, you’re obviously fried, and this joint makes the best ice-cream sodas in town. My treat.”

      A pickup festooned with yapping mutts rumbled up the street behind them as a whole bunch of questions swarmed in Dana’s hazy gray-green eyes.

      “You hate ice-cream sodas?” he asked.

      A startled laugh burst from her throat. “No! I’m just…” She shook her head, dainty, dangly earrings bobbing on tiny earlobes that had gone a decided shade of pink. “But I think I’ll stick with Diet Coke.”

      A four-by-four roared past, spraying soggy gravel in its wake.

      “It’s that woman thing, isn’t it?”

      Her eyebrows lowered. “Excuse me?”

      “Where you won’t eat in front of a guy. If at all.”

      Her mouth twisted, her gaze slid away. “I think it’s kinda obvious I’m no anorexic.”

      “Good to know. Because I’m here to tell you that not-eating business annoys the hell out of me. But hey—” he popped open his car door, then loosened his tie, having already given his jacket the heave-ho three properties ago “—if you really want a Diet Coke, knock yourself out.”

      “Actually…” She hugged her purse to her middle, as if trying to shrink. “I can’t stand the stuff.”

      “Then it’s settled.” He shoved open his door, then went around to open hers. “Maybe if you just chill for a bit, you’ll be able to think more clearly.