didn’t look surprised. “Georgianne and Edward’s boy?”
Matt nodded. So he was definitely the Matt Webster, Katie thought. Funny, he didn’t look like a wild child. She couldn’t imagine him married to Olivia, either. She seemed too…arctic and polished.
“You have a lot of gumption to come back. But it’s good to see you home, where you belong.” Miss Marchand nodded.
“Thank you, ma’am. I’m back for good,” Matt said.
But that statement only started the crowd’s titterings up again. “I think that’s my cue to go, before they decide to lynch me,” he said with a dry, bitter laugh. Then he took Katie’s hand and brought it to his lips. When he kissed it, his gaze never left hers. The air between them crackled with sensuality and promise. “It was a pleasure to meet you. I do hope I see you again, Mystery Woman, and finish what we started. Soon.”
Then he was gone, striding past the gaping townspeople, leaving Katie with a smile on her lips and a burning curiosity to know more about Matthew Webster.
Tools and parts were spread around Matt in an ever-multiplying circle as he dismantled his motorcycle and began the tedious repair job. His midnight-blue Chevy SS convertible, which had patiently waited under a tarp for the past eleven years, had miraculously started this afternoon. Someone had taken it in for service. The telltale sticker on the windshield said the Chevy had been in for an oil change two weeks ago.
Matt figured his mother had taken care of the car, though he couldn’t quite see her ordering up the lube special. Either way, the pampered auto had started easily, saving him from having to ask to borrow his father’s Mercedes. He was back, but he wasn’t up for a confrontation. Not yet. Using the motorcycle as an excuse, he’d taken a quick shower, avoiding his father, and then run into town for the parts he needed.
And run into one hell of an interesting woman, he mused, recalling her impetuousness and her kiss. She’d been hot and sweet at the same time, like the fireballs he’d eaten as a kid. He imagined drawing her closer, taking her into his arms, lowering the straps of her tank top down her shoulders, over the swell of her breasts….
The socket wrench slipped from his fingers and tumbled into his lap. Throbbing pain brought a quick halt to his fantasy.
He took a deep breath, trying to block the searing pain and focus on the motorcycle, not the girl. It wasn’t easy. The fluid lines of the bike, the butter-softness of the leather seat, the sleek metal curves, all had him picturing the stranger named Katie and imagining her on the bike wearing nothing more than a smile.
This time, he managed to catch the wrench before it rendered him impotent.
“Matt, you’re home!” His mother rounded the corner and entered the garage, a basket of freshly clipped yellow tulips in her hands. Georgianne Webster, her ash-blond hair in slight disarray from her trip to the garden, stood in the shadowed entryway clutching the basket like a lifeline, looking unsure.
“Hello, Mom.” He scrambled to his feet and grabbed a rag. He wiped his hands several times, avoiding her gaze. After eleven years of nothing but letters, he felt self-conscious, clumsy.
“I saw you take the Chevy out earlier,” she said.
“It started right up,” he said. “Thank you for taking care of it and getting the oil changed.”
“I didn’t do that, Matt. Your father did.”
“Oh.” He let that thought digest for a minute. He grabbed the bouquet, thrusting the flowers at her. “These are for you. I know roses are your favorites and because it’s April, yours won’t be blooming for two more months…” he shrugged. “Anyway, I thought they’d cheer you up a little, since you’ve been so worried about Father.” He leaned over and kissed her cheek.
When the familiar scent of her hit his senses, the full impact of how long he’d been gone slammed into him. He swallowed several times to get rid of the lump that had suddenly formed in his throat before he started acting like a blubbering idiot.
Without thinking, he drew his mother to him. The move popped the tension like a balloon burst by a pin. The basket clattered to the ground and she enfolded him in a fierce hug, not even noticing the flowers crushed between them.
“Oh Matthew, we’ve missed you,” she whispered. Then she leaned back, cupping his face in her soft hands and studying him, as if searching for the Matt she knew. Tears trickled down her cheeks, tiny lines of emotion marring her makeup.
The feeling of home, of belonging, surged through him. That damned lump forced its way back into his throat. “Me too, Mom,” was all he could manage.
“I’m so glad you’re home.” She wiped her eyes and took a half step back. “I guess the flowers got caught up in our reunion.” Her laugh was shaky when she took the bouquet from him and buried her nose in their scent.
“It’s okay, Mom. They’re just roses.”
“No, not just roses. Not when they’re from you.” She added them to the basket, careful not to crush them further. “Remember the time you picked those daisies for me? You were seven, I think. The poor things were drooping like sad little puppies. But I kept them, pressed into the front of my Bible. They’re still there, between Genesis and Exodus.”
He chuckled. “If I remember right, you were pretty mad about those daisies. I’d yanked them out of Mrs. Rollins’s garden and she complained.”
“Eugenia Rollins was a cranky woman who couldn’t appreciate a little boy showing his mother he loved her. I did have to give you a lecture, but your heart was in the right place.”
“I’ll keep that in mind on your birthday.” Matt winked. “I noticed the neighbor’s petunias are blooming.”
“You’re still incorrigible,” she said softly, brushing a hand along his cheek. Her deep-green eyes were misty.
When he was younger, that word had been used to describe him more than once, especially by his father. It had practically become his middle name after he’d kidnapped a cow from Amos’s farm and snuck it into the high school’s gym the night before the Thanksgiving game. And the time he’d been caught driving his father’s car—at fourteen and without a license. Not to mention the long list of smashed mailboxes and broken windows that littered his childhood résumé. But all that was over now.
“I’ve changed, Mom. For the better.” And he had. It had been a long road to get there, but he’d made it, half dragging himself out of the depths of hell and back to the surface.
She searched his gaze, considering, evaluating. “I believe you have. I’m proud of you, Matt. It must have taken a lot of courage and strength, after what you went through.”
Her face softened. In her eyes, he saw sympathy, an echo of his own pain. Images of that last night rocketed through him, fast, furious, hard. With a mental slamming of the door, he sealed that vault of memories. Their reunion was still a fragile thing, vulnerable to the past and he wasn’t ready to face everything. Not yet.
“Will you be here for dinner?” she asked, clearly sensing his need for a change of subject.
“That depends. Are you making meat loaf?”
She laughed again,
