love to make a few new friends in the area finally and have some adult company, as a single mom, she didn’t have a lot of free time to read and what free time she did have she saved for her romance novels. A. C. Arthur, Ann Christopher, Brenda Jackson, Deatri King-Bey, Victoria Wells, Beverly Jenkins and LaConnie Taylor-Jones had first billing whenever she had a moment to spare.
“Plus, you know I don’t like to leave Dillon with a babysitter, especially on the weekend. My ex finds every conceivable way to skip his visitations. And I’m not mad about that because I don’t want my son around him anyway. But that means no weekends off for me.”
“First of all, it would do us all some good to expand our horizons and read outside our comfort zones. I’m doing it because I want to read something besides all the boring stuff I’m reading in school.” Toni shook her head and the razor-sharp asymmetrical cut moved with precision and then fell right back into place.
“And it will only be one book a month,” Toni added. “You might like it. And for all those romance novels you’re reading, you would think you would be more open to going out on a date with that fine Captain Patrick Hightower. Yummy…I can’t believe you turned him down!”
“Oh, would you look at the time…” Aisha glanced down at her watch. “It’s almost time to get these little ones up so they can get ready to go home for the day.”
“Uh-uh, don’t even try it. We’ve got five minutes. But I promise I’ll leave it alone if you agree to go with me to the book club meeting. Just come to this first open meeting and see if you like it. Maybe we could even read a couple of those romance novels you like so much…”
“What about Dillon? It’s too late for me to look for a sitter—”
“You don’t need one. You can bring him along. My cousin Jenny has two kids of her own, a little boy and a little diva-in-training, and they’ll more than likely be playing in another room. So you can totally bring Dillon with you. He’ll have fun and you’ll both make new friends.”
“Well…I have wanted to meet new people. We’ve been in Paterson a few years, but I still haven’t made a lot of friends outside of work. And Bill got all our Montclair friends with the divorce…I suppose I could go and check it out. But I’m telling you they need to read at least two romance novels.”
“Great!” Toni bounced up and started putting away books and construction paper and anything else the children might have left out in the common areas.
Aisha smiled. At least she had gotten Toni to stop ragging her about Patrick. She had narrowly escaped that situation still on course. It would have been so easy to say yes to him. To give him her number and take a chance, even when he was everything she needed to avoid in a man.
The only place a larger-than-life alpha male like that could exist and not be a danger to those around him was in a romance novel. And the only way for her to change the cycle of abuse that plagued the women in her family was not to date and never be vulnerable again. As long as she kept her focus and stayed away from men like Patrick Hightower, she should be okay.
That should be a snap. She could totally do that. No problem.
Patrick who?
Patrick freaking Hightower, that’s who! Of all the YMCAs in all the world, or at least in the north Jersey area, he had to walk into hers. Granted, she wouldn’t have been there this evening if Dillon’s usual karate class hadn’t been rescheduled, forcing her to attend the Zuumba class instead of her normal Pilates. She tried to grab an exercise class while Dillon took his karate lessons and art classes at the Y. The family membership was in her budget, and the fact that she didn’t have to spring for a sitter while she exercised and Dillon actually got to learn new things made the price more than worth it.
She had never seen Patrick Hightower at the Y before. It had been two days since she’d met him at the fire station, two days of her wondering what if she had said yes to his request for a date. It was bad enough he had invaded her mental space. Did he have to invade her gym, as well?
And here she was fresh out of class, sweaty, looking a mess with her hair pulled back in a ponytail, and she had to run into him. He looked great, perfect, with strong muscular thighs and arms in full view. God bless the person who’d turned those particular pieces of cotton into a T-shirt and shorts. He had a basketball in his hands and he looked as if he was about to shoot some hoops.
She was just about to pray that he wouldn’t notice her when he looked right at her and walked—no, strutted—his fine self right over.
“Well, hello there, Ms. Miller. I didn’t know you belonged to this Y. Why haven’t I run into you here before?” Patrick offered that smile of his, that half-tilt, sparkly-eye thing he did apparently just to make her skin run hot.
“I’m not usually here during this time of day. My schedule got turned around.” And you can best believe it won’t happen again now that I know I could possibly run into temptation on legs. Strong, long, take-me-now legs…
“Listen, I think we may have gotten off on the wrong foot the other day and I—”
Another voice interjected, “Aisha, I’m so glad I didn’t miss you. This schedule change has my day all screwed up. You said you would help me figure out these forms the next time the boys had karate. And I left them home and had to go back for them. Can you take a look at them now?”
Aisha turned and saw Mrs. Oliver walking over, waving a bunch of papers, and for a minute her brain had a disconnect. She shook her head to clear it and remembered that the widowed grandmother, who was raising her drug-addicted youngest daughter’s children, had asked her for some help last week filling out the oldest child’s financial aid forms.
When Mrs. Oliver reached them, her eyes sort of squinted and her lips curved. “Oh, I can see you’re busy. I can try and—”
“No, Mrs. Oliver, I’m not busy at all. We have a half hour before the boys are done with karate. Let’s go over here and I’ll try to help you as best I can. It’s been a little while since I last had to fill out financial aid forms. They can be frustrating, but we’ll get them done.” Aisha turned to Patrick. “It was nice running into you again, Captain Hightower. Enjoy your game of basketball.”
She then took off with her new savior, Mrs. Oliver, and found a quiet spot to help her with the forms.
Sure, she would now wonder what would have happened if Mrs. Oliver hadn’t shown up. And seeing him in those shorts wouldn’t do a thing to chip away his muscular image from her mind. But at this point running was the safest thing for her to do.
Patrick stared after Aisha and he couldn’t help the smile that took over his mouth. It still felt foreign and he swore he’d never get used to grinning this much. But ever since he’d met her the other day, he’d found himself smiling more, especially when he thought of her. And he’d thought about her often during the past two days.
Even though it seemed as if she couldn’t wait to get away from him, he sensed a spark there. And even though she was sweat-soaked from her workout, with her hair pulled back, she looked amazing. He glanced over to where she sat helping the older woman with the financial aid forms and he couldn’t help but remember how she had calmly, patiently and lovingly consoled the little girl the other day. She clearly had a gift for helping others. He liked that. Her kind and generous spirit was refreshing and intriguing, and seeing her again worked only to make him all the more determined to get to know her better.
