Page 10 of Always the Matchmaker

It sounds too good to be true and I recoil from his sincerity. I want to believe him, but that’s why they sting all the more. I bite my lip and hold back my tears. Clearing my throat, I slap on a plastic smile that hurts my cheeks.

“Sorry, I just wanted to throw your massive yule log in my fire,” I reference his crotch and pull away from him.

I put distance between us but can’t help but look back. He’s still standing there, looking down where he cradled me between him and the wall, his hands down at his side...dejected.

Why does it hurt me to see him like that? Why did my muscles twitch for me to run back to him, an apology burning the tip of my tongue?

It’s better this way.

But I doubt every step I take out the door.

Ben

Feeling like a wounded animal, getting up the next morning isn’t easy. Still I have an appointment, just like I have a beer with Abe on Thursdays, I have a coffee with Steve on Friday mornings. Just because I had basically been kicked in the holly berries last night didn’t mean I couldn’t still go on with my life even if I was limping through that said life. I’d taken the chance and kicked my foot through the door of opportunity and it had been slammed shut on my ankle and boy did that’d fucking hurt.

I pull up to the Cove Home, Ribbon Cove’s retirement village. I grab the white paper bag in my passenger seat and head up the small lane to Steve’s. Each unit is a small cottage home, small yards for each resident, but they are close enough together they’re like large out in the open dorms.

I’m about to knock when voices inside stop me. I crane my neck to listen, pressing my ear to the door.

Shit, it’s Candy.

Of course she would be around to see her own father.

The check in gate would’ve already called when I first entered the property. They always ring guests in after confirming them with residents. They know I’m coming. Sighing, I take the plunge and knock. I suppose more wounded pride won’t kill me.

“Come in!” shouts Steve. I check the handle, unlocked, so I open the door and let myself in, bracing for Candy’s reaction.

“Ben?” She turns pale, sitting at an antique kitchen table decorated with a plaid tablecloth.

Holy shit, she’s beautiful with those big blue eyes.

“Morning,” I greet her back cautiously, still standing in the entrance.

“Well don’t just stand there, boy,” Steve waves me in. “Ben comes every Friday morning.”

“Oh, that’s nice of him,” she murmurs quietly, fiddling with her hands in her lap.

“Have my donuts?” Steve spots the bag in my hand and grins. “I need a glass of milk and my meds,” he excuses himself from us, taking the donuts from me and disappearing into the kitchen.

I chance moving in closer, standing beside the table, unsure if I’m allowed to join them.

“Just sit down, I’ll go,” she says, with a huff, standing. “I won’t ruin my father’s routine.” A sweet daughter all the same, even if I get all the spiciness.

As she moves past me I grab her hand, keeping her from leaving me too quickly. “Have dinner with me, please,” I beg. I was already wounded, what could one more shot to my dignity hurt?

She wrangles her hand free from mine, curling it to her chest as if I had burned her.

There’s uncertainty in her eyes until she answers me simply, “Okay.”

* * *

Candy

I’m going to regret this. A date? Who even dates anymore? It’s all Tinder swipes and friendships until someone makes a move on the other one and ruins it with either disappointment or sex—both are equally possible.

Even Belle and Wynter hadn’t really had dates, just chance happenings. I can sense my own bitterness, foul in my mouth as I think of my friends and my past relationships. Why am I so angry? What had those men ever done to linger on my soul and in my head?

“Flowers?Andchocolate?” I blink at the handsome man before me, hands outstretched with a bouquet of red roses and a heart shaped box of chocolates both gifts decorated with Christmas colors and images. It’s cute, like prom all over again. “Um, thank you.” I awkwardly set them down. I’m not in my own home at the B&B.