Hidden Summit

knowing the pitfalls and consequences, isn’t it?” he asked her. He held the front door for her. “I remember being sixteen, going out with a girl in a car for the first time and being pretty strung out, but more excited than scared.” He chuckled. “I should’ve been scared—she ate me alive. She wasn’t happy about too much—she didn’t like the movie, the food wasn’t right, she didn’t want to make out....”
    She laughed at him. “Poor Conner.”
    He opened the passenger door to the truck and helped her up and in. “I learned to pick ’em better after that.”
    “Went straight for the ones who wanted to make out, huh?”
    “Well, of course,” he said, slamming the door. He came around and joined her in the cab. “I didn’t pick you solely based on the making out aspect, though I do see the potential, it being your first mustache and all.”
    “I never dated much. I had a couple of boyfriends before I met Greg, but nothing too serious. But I bet you always had girls.”
    “Not always, just sometimes. I kept pretty long hours at work, it seemed. One short marriage.” He looked over at her. “I am going to tell you more about that, you know. But not tonight. I don’t want to spoil tonight. I want to have fun.”
    “I understand completely. It’s been a year and a half for me, too. Not so much as a cup of coffee.” She let go a little laugh. “What a couple of go-getters we are.”
    “But this isn’t really our first date,” he said. “More like our third with lots of contact in the middle. We had a couple of coffee dates, I’ve insulted you at least once, we had a flower planting date with a take-out dinner chaser, and this is a dinner and movie date. And we saw each other almost every day for three weeks until you moved the trailer. If we were in high school, that would equal carrying your books to class all week, then meeting you at the burger barn on the weekend with the gang....”
    “Then making out,” she added.
    He grinned at her. “Absolutely.”
    Leslie found the nervousness of her first post-divorce date had gone within ten minutes of getting in the truck with him. Being with him was so easy. He had this gruff exterior and a deep sexy voice, but he had a very soft center. His honesty charmed her to the marrow of her bones. Everything about Conner seemed spontaneous and real as opposed to premeditated. He was what he was, take it or leave it.
    The movie was a sci-fi thriller, very tense. When she gripped his arm, he put it around her shoulders and pulled her protectively close. When they went to a nice restaurant in Arcata, she spent the whole meal praising the food and telling him all the things she liked to cook; he told her everything he liked to eat. On the long drive home she talked about how much she’d like to travel more than she had, which was very little, while he talked about how little wanderlust he had. Home was all that mattered to him. If he could stay in the same place forever and always know where a couple of beers and his TV broadcasting pro football games would be, he’d be content.
    “I love football,” she said. “But I’d still like to travel.”
    “I’ve never really had the time or money for travel, but if I did, I can think of a few things I wouldn’t mind seeing.”
    “Like?” she pushed.
    He shrugged. “The Super Bowl?”
    She laughed. “I don’t know if we have a lot in common or nothing in common.”
    “It’s really too soon to tell.” He parked the truck in front of her little house. He turned in his seat and faced her. “Let me come in, Les,” he said.
    “Oh, right. The making out part,” she teased.
    “Or coffee,” he said. “But I’m not done yet. Are you?”
    “I am not,” she said, surprisingly happy about it.
    He came around the truck to help her out. He lifted her to the ground. His arm around her waist both supported and hurried her, and when they were inside the house with the door closed, he swept her up to him, his lips on her lips, kissing her deeply once again as though he’d waited all night to do it. She dropped her purse on the floor and gave herself over to this kiss, wondering how she’d made it this long without it.
    And that fast she decided—she was going to enjoy her life rather than subject herself to some kind of torture of denial to avoid ever being hurt again. If he wanted to devour her with these fabulous kisses, and more, she’d just have to endure it.
    He backed off the littlest