Page 24 of Waiting in Wyoming
He got lucky. No one but a single waitress was in the dining room. It was midweek, and it was snowing outside, and the inn just wasn’t crowded. Mostly, people left him alone at the hotel. They were getting used to seeing him or his brothers around the place, at least. Being a famous actor had its definite drawbacks.
There was a new waitress working that he didn’t think he’d met before—she was rolling silverware, sitting on a high stool when he walked in. She looked up and smiled.
She had a beautiful smile, short, curly white-blond hair that stuck up everywhere, and was tiny. Cute, too. Quade felt an unexpected smile hit him when he saw the familiar red and black tennis shoes on small feet.
The waitress wore Wonkus McBubbles and Prince Rufus sneakers.
“Hello, welcome to the dining room of the Talley Inn, Mr. McBubbles,” she said brightly. “I’m Dylan. I’ll be your hostess-slash-server-slash-bus Talley this evening.”
“Just you tonight?” The dining room had a bit of a hollow feel tonight. But Quade thought he liked it best that way. It seemed so old, but in a good way. Like it had stood the test of time.
“I’m good at multitasking. Justyoutonight? Prince Rufus and his princess were in this evening. You missed them by about an hour. They were really cozy looking. Nikki greatly approved of the pecan pie.”
“I really just want a sandwich or something. But…pie sounds really good, too.” He looked at her more closely. The green eyes were very distinctive. “You have to be a Talley?”
“So I have heard. It’s kind of required around this place, I think. I’m still figuring it out. And yes, I am one of the secret-baby-Talleys. My dad is Arthur; I was the mystical, mythical Holy Grail Missing Talley one, I think.”
“So Charlotte and Marin are your cousins.” Marin had the same pale blond hair. Charlotte was almost as small and had the same big, wicked green eyes. All of the Talleys had the same eyes—except Marin’s were startling blue.
“Yep. I’m one of the foundlings, though.”
“I’ve heard the story.” Charlotte had told him—her uncle had hidden four of his daughters in the Witness Protection Program. Charlotte’s four youngest cousins had just recently been reunited with the rest of the Talleys.
“It’s a bit complicated, no denying that.” She shot him a wicked grin as she led him to the far corner booth. “And it’s bound to get attention around this place. There are so many of us Talleys now, you know. Easy for the runt of the litter to blend in.”
She peeked up at him through long, pale blond eyelashes that made her eyes look huge and beautiful. She really was beautiful,in an unusual kind of way. It made a man want to look twice and then a third time. And when she smiled, a man wanted to smile right back.
Like Ashley. She’d been a green-eyed blonde, too.
“You look kind of sad,” she said suddenly. “Not that I’m prying or anything. Just tell me to butt out. Well, that was seriously rude of me. Excuse me, I’m a seriously unsocialized homeschooler, you know. I have never learned how to act in society.”
Her cheeks were turning a little red, making the freckles stand out. Quade smiled for real this time. She made a guy want to smile. That was what it was about her. She made a man want to smile. “You do just fine. I’m just…what are you supposed to do when you’re ninety-nine percent certain your long-lost sister is walking around the same hotel you are, but you don’t know if you want to meet her again or not?”
“Well. Dude, I think you have come to the right place. I’m still trying to figure out this long-lost sister thing myself.”
Well, he supposed she was probably one of the few people around who could halfway understand what he felt right now. “Can you sit for a while? Talk?”
Maybe…maybe thelastthing he really wanted to do was be alone tonight, after all.
“I sure can.”
Maybe tonight…maybe Quade just needed a friend.
20
He was avoiding her.Well, Meyra was avoidinghim,too. Partially because the inn had gotten a little busier than expected, and she’d had to work. But mostly because she didn’t know what to do now. And he was busy with his family—she didn’t want to interrupt.
An excuse, and she knew it. She’d deliberately hidden from him—much like she suspected his sister had hidden from Gunnar Erickson.
Men could be so confusing.
Brandt’s family stayed three more days, but those women and girls from Finley Creek stayed another day after them. Meyra tried not to watch them too much. She didn’t think he was related to those two women—but they had brown hair and eyes like his sister and seemed to know them all really well. Even the blond guy Gunnar, who Meyra thought was Brandt’s sister’s boyfriend. He’d stayed, but Brandt’s sister had left.
Meyra had seen Brandt’s sister and Gunnar kissing in the hallway on the security monitors in the back office earlier that morning—but she would keep that fact to herself. She’d seenone of the Finley Creek women arguing with the other cop from Finley Creek on the monitors, too.
They were beautiful women. Really beautiful women. She’d seen men in the hotel looking at them. They’d looked at them when the women were in the diner. Jack Masterson had talked to them, too. So had Quade Davis.
Even Martin Tyler had looked at the older of the two women and tried to get her attention. He’d talked to her about her little girls. It was obvious he was interested in her and everything. Martin was a bit on the flirty side. Her cousin Darcey had told her that before. Said he seriously lacked the ability to make a commitment, unlike the rest of the superhot Tylers running around Masterson. She’d called him a Commitment Coward, whatever that meant. Meyra didn’t ask.