When the bathroom door opened, Michael looked up, smiling faintly at Rochelle's appearance. She looked like a teenager in jeans with the baggy T-shirt hanging loosely over her shoulders and breasts. She returned his smile, her sparkling white teeth glistening behind full rosy lips. She took her sneakers from the duffel bag and slid them on without socks. Rising, she took a hairbrush from the mirrored vanity and ran it through her hair. All the time Michael watched her, observing her indulgently while the pulse throbbed at the base of his neck and temple.
“Your hair is gorgeous, Rochelle. I've never seen a color quite like yours?” The compliment exposed his personal thoughts, and aired a kind of unspoken understanding that any further interaction between them from here on would be personal.
She blushed, and then smiled, handling his compliment with humor. “You should have seen me as a blonde,” she teased, putting down the hairbrush and coming to stand beside him, her hand resting on the chair-back. “I stuffed it in a trash can when I stayed overnight in Bozeman.”
Michael stood up. “Good choice. Blonde hair can't compare to that gorgeous gold color you have. Are you ready?”
Rochelle smiled shyly and nodded. Their conversation had turned personal, and suddenly she felt like she was out on a limb.
After five years of socializing with a bunch of foul-mouthed drunken men and petty women who were also drunks, while sitting back listening and observing rather than talking, what did one say to a normal person on a social outing?
“Do you have your key?” he remembered to ask before closing the door behind them. She darted back inside, found the key and put it in her purse. Rejoining him by his car where he held the door open, she slid inside and made herself comfortable.
“George would have let you in, but the only thing that upsets him is being awakened after he turns in for the night.” He cranked the car and pulled out onto the street.
“Is he upset at the late guests who stop for the night?” Rochelle asked.
“Yes, even late guests. He thinks everyone should keep daytime hours.”
“You can tell he's lived here all his life,” Rochelle suggested, thinking of the people she and Tobias knew who kept late hours at night and slept in during the morning. “City life would definitely upset him with its busy round the clock pace.”
A lazy dazzling smile swept across Michael's tanned face. “City life wouldn't agree with him at all. He keeps the same hours as most other working people here in Windy Point. Here we have an early-to-bed, early-to-rise community.”
“Are you part of the status quo?” Rochelle asked. “Somehow you don't seem to fit the mold of a small town banker who goes to bed at dusk and wakes up with the sun.”
“Bad habits are acquired easily, good ones with more effort,” he laughed. “I have my share of both as it suits my purpose. I'm capable of adapting to whatever my environment requires.”
“Have you always lived here?”
“I was born here, and after high school there was college. I spent a few years in San Francisco, and then came back here to run my father's bank after his death.”
“I wonder why we didn't meet that time when my folks brought me here.”
“If it was in the summertime, my brother and I were likely away at summer camp.”
“If I recall, I believe it was in the summertime. Is banking what you wanted to do?” she asked, watching the sensual mold of his firm mouth, the arrogant cut of his chin and jaw, and his compelling good looks. She knew it would be all too easy to become attracted to him, if for no other reason than the need for human companionship.
A flicker of seriousness crossed his features and disappeared just as quickly. “I had other plans until my father died, but somebody had to run the bank. There was no one but me. What about you? Did you ever wish you could go back and change things, live your life differently?”
She glanced out of the car window, seeing the small town sliding past them as they neared the outskirts of another small town.
“You are kidding, of course.”
“Kidding? Why do you think I'm kidding?”
“The very fact that I'm here talking to you right this minute is indicative of my desire to totally erase my life for the past five years. Yes, to answer your question, I'd like to change it, but sadly, we don't have the choice of rectifying the past through hindsight.”
“No, we don't, but I've known people who dwell on past mistakes as if they might reshape them somehow.”
“Do you do that Michael; try to reshape your past mistakes, I mean?”
“Aren't we all a little guilty of doing that? I suppose I have often wondered on the phrase, what if. What if I had done this, or what if I had done that? Perhaps it's a method we use to learn how to prevent making the same mistakes twice.”
“Well, I suppose from that perspective, there might be some value in supposition. None of us wants to suffer repeated tragedies.”
“What tragedies have you suffered, Rochelle—or is that question too personal?”
She took a deep breath and exhaled. “It's personal, Michael. I don't know you well enough to share such confidences.”
“If you knew me better, would you share them?”
“Is that one of those what if questions?”
He chuckled. “Okay, you caught me. I am prying, so I will change the subject. I hope you like steak. A friend of mine has a steak house with the finest steaks found anywhere. If you don't like steaks, he also serves seafood.”
“Steak sounds great. I feel like I could eat about anything right now.”
A few minutes later, Michael pulled into a jammed parking lot below a steak house sign, and turned off the engine.
He reached across the seat and briefly squeezed Rochelle's hand. “I'm glad you decided to have dinner with me,” he said before getting out of the car.
His touch seemed entirely personal now, Rochelle thought; the serious banker image now shed, or exchanged for a more lighthearted persona.
He opened Rochelle's car door and took her hand, gently pulling her from the seat and up against him. He needed no encouragement as he slid both arms around her waist, savoring her closeness as long as he dared before moving back from the car to close the door. There had been many women in his life, at college, in San Francisco, in Bozeman, and locally; yet, he could not recall any of them fitting quite as perfectly in his arms as Rochelle did.
His arm encircled her waist possessively and they went inside.
“Hey there, Michael, we've missed you. I haven't seen you in a while,” the cashier, owner, manager said. The man's close examination left nothing to the imagination as he scrutinized Rochelle carefully.
“I've been busy. How's it going, Ken?” Michael asked, reaching out his hand in greeting.
“Got a full house tonight, so I can't complain,” Ken replied, shaking Michael's hand, while he stared at Rochelle. “Who's your friend?”
“This is Chelle,” Michael said, his left hand giving a tiny squeeze to Rochelle's waist.
“Nice to meet you, Chelle,” Ken said, glancing from Rochelle to Michael, tempted to ask where he found such a delectable doll.
He held his tongue, however, knowing that gossip would soon provide him the information sought. He, among others, had advised Michael many times to ditch Caroline. She was not right for him, never had been, and never would be.
His bear-like paw squeezed Rochelle's hand lightly and released it. Rochelle gave him a warm smile, aware that Michael's arm felt wonderfully protective about her.
She liked the feel of his arms, the touch of his hands, them warm and reassuring. She breathed deeply of Michael's spicy scent, laying her palm over his hand at her waist. The strong muscular arms bulging against the fabric of his shirtsleeves sparked an intimate thrill that raced along Rochelle's spine. It's just relief at having a friend in a strange place, she assured herself. To dare imagine her feelings might be more enterprising would be preposterous after the hell she had suffered with Tobias.
“Do you have an empty table for us, Ken?” Michael asked, glancing over the crowded room of diners, seeing people he knew. It dawned on him that Caroline and everyone in town would know about his dinner companion by tomorrow. The grapevine of gossipers never rested.
“I believe one table is vacant. Give them a minute to clear it and you can seat yourself. It's over there in that dark little corner.” He gave Michael a sly grin and winked.
Rochelle pretended not to notice.
When the waiter finished clearing the table, Michael escorted Rochelle across the noisy, crowded room. He nodded his head, returning greetings to several people who called out to him while eying Rochelle with interest.
Everyone knew Michael, and he seemed to know everybody, Rochelle thought. While she wasn't aware of anyone noticing her in particular, everyone was. She could not have known, but in a small town such as this one, she was big news. Any new person to the area became worthy of a great deal of speculation, sometimes good, sometimes bad. The fact that Michael, the most eligible bachelor for miles around was her escort, they would draw a wave of wagging tongues. It was not until she and Michael sat down at the small square table that she noticed sly glances darting toward them.
“Why are those people looking at us, Michael?” she whispered, always a little paranoiac because of her fear of Tobias finding her.
“They're curious. You're a new face around these parts, and everyone is wondering who the beautiful lady is that's spending the evening with me,” he laughed softly.
“Michael, there's a question I need to ask you. You're not married or…”
“Or taken?” he filled in for her, smiling. “No, neither. I'm unattached.”
That knowledge made her feel better. “Good, I would hate to think they're staring because I'm out with a married man.”
The casual atmosphere was so pleasing she could nearly forget that she was running away from a monster and that her life remained in jeopardy if he should find her. When she turned her brightest smile upon Michael, he looked longingly at her lips. She could not begin to imagine the strength of his urge to kiss her, it growing stronger by the minute.
The waiter gave them menus and took Michael's wine order.
“Why have you never married?” Rochelle asked when the waiter walked away.
“I suppose I've been busy doing other things.”
“Most men are busy, but they find time for home and family.”
He looked away, either thoughtful about his answer or trying to find a way to evade the question.
“I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry.” Rochelle stated after his lengthy pause.
“Would you believe I've just never met the woman I want to spend my life with?” he asked good-naturedly, grinning.
She sent him a sidewise glance. “Is that because you're hard to please, or just not interested in marriage?”
“Well, I suppose you can say I'm selective instead of hard to please, and I do plan to marry someday. It just has to be with the right woman.” He appeared amused and his attitude was playfully humorous.
“You're never very serious when you're away from the bank, are you?”
“One must wear many hats,” he grinned with a sparkle in his blue eyes.
She searched his face, thinking a hat was the only thing missing from his attire that would have given him the appearance of a real Montana cowboy. “Yes, I suppose one does,” she agreed with a sardonic grin.
Their eyes met and held for an instant, something clicked between them, just a subtle flash of deep feeling, and then it was gone. Rochelle lowered her eyes, and was thankful for the waiter's timely interruption as he poured glasses of wine and took their food order.
“You'll find that here most people refuse to be rushed. The food is worth the wait though,” said Michael, when the waiter went away.
“I don't mind waiting. This is a pleasant change for me,” she said, thinking of Tobias and his drunken friends whom she had despised. Michael helped her forget, in lapses, the hell of what she had left behind and the fear of her past catching up with her.
“A pleasant change from the motel room, or am I to understand that you're referring to your life in Miami?”
She searched his face a moment, and then smiled. “Michael, you're a sly one, you are. You don't miss an opportunity to learn more about me.”
He reached across the table and took her hand, smiling. “Well, what's wrong with that? I want to know more about you.”
“What's wrong with that is that you don't disclose anything about yourself. Have you heard of the sharing game—I tell you something, and then you tell me something?”
His eyes were laughing at her. “You'd be bored to death,” he grinned.
“I think I'd be the best judge of that,” she smiled. His lightness of manner had relaxed her enough she could almost forget her fears associated with Tobias—almost.
The time quickly moved past nine, and toward the front of the large dining room was a platform where a group of musicians started setting up their instruments. A small dance floor was next to the platform.
“You didn't tell me they had a band. I thought it was just a restaurant.”
“There's not a great deal of entertainment around our small town, so proprietors take advantage of what people like and turn it into money-making enterprises. After the dinner crowd leaves, you'll see an entirely new group fill the tables. They're more like party animals than the ones you see now. Do you dance?” he asked as an afterthought.
“I have been known to,” she said, remembering it as about the only thing she and Tobias did well together. He actually taught her to dance. Her high school dances proved less than instructive. “I assume the after nine group you speak of are the exception to the early to bed, early to rise crowd.”
“They are the nonconformists,” he chuckled.
They sat silent as they watched the band set up and test their instruments in a cacophony of sounds contrasting against each other.
The waiter brought their food, and Michael was right. The steaks were delicious, juicy and tender. The earlier diners were beginning to clear out, and Rochelle did not feel the unbidden stare of curious eyes. She found it easier to relax and enjoy her meal, and shortly after they began eating, the band struck up a soft arrangement of dinner music for the last diners of the evening.
“Michael, this one's for you and your lovely lady,” one of the band members said over the mike, quickly drawing Rochelle's attention. Michael nodded his head in acknowledgment, turning his eyes and attention back to his lovely lady.
“Do you know everybody?” Rochelle asked with amusement
“Everybody knows everybody else in a small community.”
“And is everyone as well liked as you?”
“They treat me well because I handle their money,” he teased.
“What an original idea,” she said raising her brows cynically in jest. When she looked at him, he was smiling mischievously. His humor was fetching and she chuckled happily. Michael Matheson was good for her. He brought out the best in her.