"Have I tried to leave yet?"
His bright smile tilted his lips up at the corners and made his eyes twinkle from the lights around them. She couldn’t tell what shade they were, only that they were dark. "Are you here on vacation?"
That was one of the problems with living in a beach town. Singles and family men alike came to visit, often looking for a little companionship or a vacation fling while they were in town but never anything more serious.
"I'm a local, actually."
"Really?" She wasn’t sure why she was surprised but she was.
"Yeah. Well, okay, I’m a transplant originally, but I think five years makes me a local now. Does that mean you'll consider having dinner with me after all?"
Her heart raced in her sixty-two-year-old chest, and she couldn't help the surge of warmth his question brought. It was silly of her to think anything would come of it, but what would dinner hurt? An evening with a good meal and a handsome man for company?
"I can tell you want to ask, so I'll get it out of the way. I'm forty-nine."
Oh. Wow.Morethan ten years younger. "Kirk, I'm beyond flattered that you'd ask but I don't think—"
"Don't think," he said. "Just say yes. Come on, take a chance. You never know, I might be the man of your dreams."
"I don't even know you."
"Isn't that the point of dating? Getting to know someone?"
It was. And since her last husband had died several years ago, all she'd done was throw herself into work. After three strikes, she figured she was out of chances to find happily ever after.
Did she dare? Just for fun?
"Come on, beautiful. Say yes. We'll have dinner. Take a walk on the beach. Whatever you want," he said.
The engaging smile on his too handsome face and hopeful look she couldn't ignore left her nodding. "Okay, yes."
He clapped his hands together once in his excitement that she'd accepted his request, and she laughed at his exuberance.
She hoped she wasn't making an embarrassing mistake. "Tell me, Kirk. What do you do besides flatter old women on the boardwalk?"
Kirk reached across the expanse of the bench and plucked her hand from her lap, carrying it to his lips.
"I only see a beautiful woman. As for what I do..."