Champagne and Lemon Drops: A Blueberry Springs Chick Lit Contemporary Romance (8 page)

And there he was. Tall, handsome, ambling
along, shrugging off congratulations with a smile as he cruised
through the crowds, a massive teddy bear tucked under his arm.
Spotting her, he drifted toward her side.

"Hey," Oz said standing above her, his free
hand tucked in the pocket of his jeans.

Beth gave him a nod of
acknowledgement, squinting against the splashes of sunshine poking
through holes in the branches above him. What would he do if she
stood up, grabbed his face and gave him a long, passionate kiss?
Would he reciprocate? She hated to admit it, but the comment she
overheard Mandy tell her friend about what men wanted and what they
needed being two different things was still circling around in her
head. Did Oz need space? Or did he just
think
he needed it? And what was she
supposed to do about it? She pondered it every day and was still
stumped.

"I heard the news." He tipped his head
toward the carnival. "Your sister and Dan, huh?"

"Yep."

"Was it cheesy?" He sat beside her on the
grass, propping up his new stuffed friend. She resisted the urge to
reach out and wrap her hand in his. Everything about him right now
was familiar and comforting. Like it always had been. Except... it
wasn't.

She shook her head. "She said it was
romantic and personal and just the way I always said it should be."
She looked away from Oz, remembering their own engagement and how
they'd made an ordinary day special. Made it theirs. No tacking
onto holidays. That day was all theirs.

"Good," Oz said.

"But they picked Valentine's Day for their
wedding." Beth raised an eyebrow and Oz burst out laughing, leaning
back to prop himself on an elbow.

"For real?"

"I know. Cheese alert,
right? I tried to convince her to move it to the
17
^th
."
Beth batted her eyelashes and twisted a bare shoulder his way. "I
will be a lovely bridesmaid, of course." She tried to smile,
despite the pain of talking about someone else's
wedding.

"Of course," he said quietly, his eyes
focused on the baseball diamond in front of them.

The sat in silence, watching the two
baseball teams rearrange players in order to even things out again.
Most years Oz was traded back and forth to even out the teams.

"You're not playing today?" she asked,
casting Oz a sidelong look.

He shook his head.

"Why not?"

He shrugged.

"What's up with the teddy bear?"

Oz rubbed its blue ear. "Habit."

"What are you going to do with it?"

"Charity, I guess." Beth reminded herself
that she didn't need another teddy bear. A token of Oz's affection,
yes. But another bear, no. "What's that one you always give
to?"

"I give them to whichever kid has been in
the hospital overnight. If there isn't anyone, I give them to Katie
and she passes it on."

They sat in silence for a moment. "I heard
you got your car fixed at the shop?"

"In April, yes." She turned to him, hoping
to see a look of pleased relief on his face. Instead she saw pain.
"What?"

"Why didn't you come see me?"

"Because you're... busy. And I can get
things done on my own." Plus, she didn't want to spend their
precious weekly check-in talking to whatever part of his body was
sticking out from under her car. Not being able to see his face
made it difficult to gauge how he was feeling about his life and
their relationship.

He tilted his head. "You don't want me to
work on your car?"

"Oz, we only see each other for an hour a
week. I can't expect you to fix my car. Paying someone else to fix
my car is a small price to pay for you having a little extra time
to figure things out."

Oz leaned back on his elbows and studied her
for a moment. "You're different."

"No, I'm not." She shook her head, her
ponytail tickling the back of her neck.

"You are. I think you needed a break,
too."

"I most certainly did not!" Beth stood up,
dusting off her bottom. "Just because I'm not sitting around and
only having a life if it's with you. And just because and I'm out
there trying to wrestle life by the horns, it doesn't mean any of
this is good." Oz popped up from his spot on the ground and she
raised her voice. "And like you're one to talk about changing. What
have you done over the past three months other than drink more beer
than usual? This was supposed to be time apart so you could find
yourself! You're wasting my life. You aren't even going in to
work!"

"Ed is taking care of my clients so I can
think."

Beth tried to hold her ground when Oz
stepped closer, his nostrils flaring slightly. She couldn't help
but wish he'd kiss her even though they were starting what was sure
to be a good fight that would blow out all the frustration she was
feeling. "Of course he is! He's your direct competition! He's going
to take your clients. It's irresponsible and—"

Chest to chest, Oz's warm breath blew over
her. "You know what's irresponsible? Going to the office and not
taking care of myself. My needs."

"And what exactly are
your
needs
, Oz?"
She leaned back and poked him in the chest. "You think you're
important enough you can screw over everyone who depends on you?
Why don't you just waltz around town saying, 'Sorry, this is
me time
, folks' then sit
at home and do
nothing
? How many people do you have waiting in limbo because you're
a big chicken shit who can't dump what he doesn't want any longer
and move on?"

Oz grabbed her wrist and held her body tight
to his. "Don't push me Beth. Don't make us say things we'll both
regret. I'm trying. You have to trust me." He held her chin in his
hand, his gaze softening. "Do you trust me?" he whispered.

She sniffed back tears and nodded, even
though she didn't want to. She just want him to release her and not
make her feel everything that was whirling through her life her
body was on spin cycle.

"Then you have to believe that I'm working
as hard as I can. And right now I have to figure out if some of the
things I took for granted are missable."

"Am I missable?"

Oz sighed and gave her a tired
half-smile.

"Am I?" she insisted.

He gave her a light kiss on the forehead and
released her from his grip. She held her anger in check, waiting
for him to tell her he loved her and missed her desperately, as
desperately as his eyes sometimes showed. But he remained
quiet.

Oz scooped his hands through his hair and
turned away. "I need to go. I can't talk about things yet. Maybe in
a couple of weeks."

She watched him stride across the grass, his
head lowered. She sat against the tree and hugged her knees,
burying her face so nobody would see her wet eyes. Slowly regaining
control, she leaned back against the tree and ground her teeth.
Without seeing, she watched the baseball game until a shadow moved
across her legs.

She looked up to see a decent distraction.
Her friend looking as handsome in his around-town garb as he did in
his scrubs. "Oh my God! Who's manning the hospital?" she half
joked, trying to smile.

Nash laughed. "Everyone seems to be here.
Besides," he tapped the pager hanging from his belt, "I have
this."

"Well, you'll be treating her in a few
hours." Beth pointed to a fair-haired lady playing shortstop. She
smoothed her hands over her bare knees, trying to dissipate the
residual hurt from her conversation with Oz. "If you see her
heading for the parking lot, consider yourself paged."

"What? Why?" He studied the woman in
alarm.

"She gets heatstroke every year." She bit
down a smile as his gorgeous eyes flicked around the park before
sneaking a peek at his pager, his shoulders stiff.

Once certain he hadn't missed a page, he
asked, "Can I get you an ice cream?" He gestured to the ice cream
truck parked on a sunny patch of grass. "I was going to get myself
something."

"An ice cream would be great," she said,
reaching into her pocket. Beth pulled out a crumpled five.

"My treat. What would you like?"

A way to motivate Oz into fixing whatever
the hell was wrong with him. Someone to take her to lunch and make
her forget her problems. Maybe show her the world. A little wining
and dining. Someone kind, generous, and caring. Someone to snuggle.
Someone to take the edge off of being heartbreakingly
almost-single. Unfortunately, she was pretty sure Mandy wasn't
serving that up in her cousin's ice-cream truck and it was all a
bit much to ask of Nash.

"A Creamsicle would be fabulous," she
replied, finally. "Why aren't you playing?" She tilted her head
toward the ball diamond.

"Oh," Nash shook his head. "I don't
play."

"It's just for fun. Non-competitive."

He shook his head again. "Nope. Not for
me."

She frowned. Two outfielders were
piggybacking, yelling for the batter to hit the ball to them. Not
exactly competitive. "You have to compete or you won't play?"

"I meant baseball isn't the sport for me."
He held up his baby-soft hands. "These are my instruments. I can't
afford to injure them."

"Well, you get a mitt. I'm sure you'd be
okay."

"There are no guarantees. Better safe than
out of work for six weeks."

"Right." Beth nodded. "So, uh, a
Creamsicle?"

"Orange?"

"Is there any other?" Beth asked playfully,
slipping out of her funk.

"There is also pink and blue."

She lowered her gaze to her tank top's
spaghetti strap and slipped it off her shoulder, pretending to
check for signs of sunburn. She snuck a peek at Nash through her
mascaraed lashes. His face turned a lovely rouge, and his eyes
appeared stuck on her bare shoulder. "Orange is fine, thanks."

"Me too. I like orange. Orange Creamsicles."
He smoothed the front of his shirt and ran a hand through his hair.
"Well, uh, I'll..." He cleared his throat and tore his eyes away
from her tanned shoulder with apparent effort. "Just go over
and..." His voice trailed off and he pointed to the ice-cream
truck.

"Thanks." She gave him a shy smile, feeling
guilty for flirting as a way out of her funk, but relieved that at
least someone still found her appealing. Oz was seriously not good
for the self-esteem these days. She glanced over her shoulder,
worried that maybe Oz had been coming back to spill his thoughts
and had seen her flirting. It seemed like whenever she felt the
sting of rejection with Oz she turned straight to Nash to let his
attention make her feel better.

There was nobody paying attention other than
Mary Alice who was stuffing blue cotton candy in her yap. Great.
That woman could spread gossip faster than the flu in a whorehouse.
She closed her eyes hoping if word got back to Oz he'd know she was
just being a goof and not seriously after Nash. He was a city boy,
after all, with plans to return there. It was pretty obvious she
was just playing around. Wasn't it?

Her gaze wandered over Nash who had joined
the ice-cream lineup in his crisp chino shorts, his athletic legs
bearing just the right amount of hair. Despite herself, she had to
agree with Gran: the man had a nice tush. And when was the last
time he had a girlfriend? Judging from the way he threw himself
into his work, it had probably been a long, long time which made
flirting with him all that much more fun.

And dangerous.

"Were you just
flirting
with
Nash
?" Katie whispered as
she joined Beth in the grass.

"What? No." She gave a little start and a
laugh. "I work with Nash. Like I would flirt." She made a
disgruntled sound.

But oh, yeah. She would flirt. She would
flirt his shirt off and keep on going if she were carefree and
single. Which she wasn't. She scanned the crowds again, hoping to
spot Oz's broad shoulders heading back to her.

"I happen to work with him, too," Katie
said, "but I don't expose flesh for him."

"I was checking for sunburn! The UV index is
very high today."

"Right, Roomie." She flipped Beth's strap
back onto her shoulder.

Beth blinked back sudden tears. "I heard the
place above the laundromat is available next month."

"What? Move out?"

"I know exactly what I've missed every
single second Oz and I have been apart, Katie. But Oz doesn't. If
he hasn't figured that out in three months then I think the message
is pretty clear." The man was shoring up his courage before cutting
the last cord between them.

***

"So, nobody got sunstroke? That must be a
first," Beth said, as she sauntered down Main Street with Nash.
While she knew she shouldn't be hanging out with Nash because of
the rumors they would start, a part of her wanted to prove to the
town, as well as Oz, that she could be friends with a man and not
have anything untoward happen. Besides, Oz was either going to see
them together and decide he really did miss her, or he was going to
see them together and decide he didn't. Either way something would
happen.

The streets were still busy at four in the
afternoon and every so often they had to dodge clumps of
pedestrians, but it wasn't nearly as bad as the square where the
band had started up, the baseball games were still going, and the
mini carnival was making such a racket it was almost impossible to
speak without shouting—even while tucked under a tree watching
Katie play ball.

"Nope." Nash tapped his pager. "And I'm off
call now."

"You're almost like a true member of
Blueberry Springs. Going to a town event. Careful or our warm
country ways will get to you! You'll wake up and find yourself
happily married to a country bumpkin and driving a beat up old
truck." She gave him a teasing shove.