“Of course!” The woman beamed at him, clearly not immune to the charms of a bad boy with good looks.
As he offered them to the child, Pru took a picture. Lots of pictures. Couldn’t have enough pictures of Lucas Darling, she decided, turning to follow him to the next child with the camera, keeping her foot on Tor’s leash.
This time, she tapped the video icon and got the exchange with him explaining what they were doing.
Dang. He was good at this. He was adorable with the kids and charming with the moms, and every time he looked over at Pru and gave her a thumbs-up or a smile, her heart just…
Oh crap. She was crushing on the guy so hard. That was not supposed to happen.
Control the crush, Pru. Control the—
Tor suddenly stood, snapping her attention back to her first job—which was not to stare lovingly at Lucas Darling and admit she had a crush. Tor had zeroed in on the cashier now, who had pulled out a huge tray of dog treats for the kids to buy.
“Easy, boy.” She bent over to get the leash, taking her foot off it for one nanosecond, but that was all it took for Tor to launch in the direction of the treats. “No!”
But nothing had prepared her for how fast that dog was. He leaped toward the counter, both paws up, scattering the kids, some of whom screamed.
“Tor!” Lucas and Pru both vaulted toward him, but her foot caught the metal gate on the puppy pen, knocking it over as she tumbled straight to the ground. She broke her fall with her backpack, looking up as Tor’s big front paws managed to slam the tray of treats and flip the whole thing, sending them flying like a volcanic eruption of organic peanut butter dog bones all over the store and all over the now un-penned puppies.
Kids shrieked. Dogs barked. And the lady at the front looked like she wanted to kill somebody. Somebody named Pru.
In a flash, Lucas had captured Tor, who was chewing God knew how many treats. As Pru scrambled to her feet, she could hear Lucas apologizing to the cashier, but the high-pitched barks of puppies and a few of the customers’ dogs joining in the madness were way louder.
“Get the puppies!” the woman from the front door hollered, making Pru realize that the gate had lifted high enough for them to scatter. “And you, get out!” she yelled at Pru.
“I’ll help get the—”
“Out!” She pointed to the door. “With your boyfriend and your dog!”
“He’s not—”
Lucas put his arm at her back, his other hand holding on to the leash to lead a still-chewing Tor. “Come on,” he said. “They want us out of here.”
“I know, but the—”
Suddenly, Tor stood at perfect attention.
“Whoa,” Lucas said. “He wants to run. He has to run.”
“No.” Pru reached for the leash to add her weight to it.
Tor pulled, his gaze on something out in the mall. Who knew what could get his attention? Sniffing noisily, he pulled them toward the door, looking one way, then the other, smelling the ground as he went, stopping for the Christmas train and sniffing each car as it rolled by.
Finally, they managed to get him three stores away, and he walked to a bench, crawled under it, and dropped to the ground.
“His post-chaos nap,” Pru said, only then catching her breath as she took a seat. “I’m so sorry, Lucas. I thought I had him and…”
“Don’t sweat it.” He sat on the bench, as spent as the dog. “He is totally out of control.”
Below them, he snored.
For a second, they just looked at each other in dismay, then smiles pulled, and they both laughed from the bottom of their bellies.
“He’s wild,” Pru managed to say. “And then…” She pointed toward the sleeping dog. “This.”
Still laughing, Lucas shook his head. “I really need some help with him.”
“I think my dad could help you. Or my uncle Shane.”
His laughter faded a little bit. “Thanks.”
“Hey, that was my fault for taking my eye off the ball.”
He put a hand on hers, his palm so big and warm she almost gasped out loud. “Are you okay? You fell.”
“Not my most graceful moment.”
“But you…” He gave her hand a squeeze. “You were awesome.”
She stared at him for a moment, blinking, her mind blank except for one single thought.
Don’t make me like you. Don’t make me like you. Don’t make me like you.
Still holding her hand, he stood, bringing her with him. “We better go find those grannies before they get into more trouble than Tor.”
Oh snap. Too late. She liked him.
Chapter Six
“Are you hungry?” Finnie asked as she and Agnes slipped into plastic chairs at a table that gave them a direct view of Santa. He had two babies on his lap, one screaming, the other pulling his beard, while parents snapped photos. “There’s a Greek place right there.”
Agnes gave her an are you serious? look, then wrapped Pyggie and Gala’s leashes around the leg of a chair at the next table, which was empty, but the slobs who’d sat there had left all their plates and plastic cups. Pyggie sniffed at the remnants, but knew well enough to settle on the cool tile floor under a chair at that table, so Agnes hooked her pocketbook on the empty chair above him.
“I know, I know.” Finnie lifted the plastic lid to drop a tea bag in the wildly overpriced hot water from Starbucks. “‘It’s not Greek food if it’s cooked by a pimply-faced teenage boy who doesn’t know souvlaki from tzatziki.’” She somehow managed to lose the brogue when she imitated Agnes, but couldn’t deliver a line with snark to save her sweet life. “Why are you putting your bag on that chair?”
“In the off chance it gets bussed, I don’t want anyone sitting there.”
“The dogs can be under our table. ’Tis quite crowded in here, and there aren’t many empty tables.”
“If someone sits there, it’ll block my view of Aldo,” she admitted. “And I still want to see what he’s doing.”
“Aye. Wouldn’t want to miss his next hit job…on a blonde.” Finnie grinned. “See what I did there?”
Agnes leaned in. “You judged,” she said through gritted teeth. “The very thing you’ve been trying to drum out of me since the day we met.”
Finnie’s little shoulders dropped. “Aye, true.”
“You think he’s some kind of criminal because he has an Italian last name.”
“No! I’m telling you my husband knew the man—or knew of him. He was part of a hunting club that Seamus belonged to years ago, and word was…he knew his way around the guns. Maybe a little too well, if you catch my drift.”
“It was a hunting lodge.” She rolled her eyes.
“But, oh, the ladies. Rumor was he had a different one every season.”
“He told me he’s been widowed for more than forty years. Can you blame the man for dating?”
“Dating women young enough to be his granddaughter?” Finnie tipped her head in the direction of Santa’s Workshop. “Ye heard him with that lassie.”
“I heard more than you did.” And had seen the phone number exchange. “But I might have misunderstood. We can’t assume he’s all things bad until I get to know him. But I admit, it didn’t look good.” She let out a deep sigh. “I’m wasting my time, aren’t I? There’s no match for the matchmakers.”