“It’s nice to meet you, Amanda,” he said gravely. “I’ve heard a great deal about you from my grandmother.”

“I tried hard to get out of this dinner,” she said quietly.

“I know. I was there when she was speaking to you. She’s very attached to you.”

“Which you don’t approve of.” When he didn’t immediately respond she shook her head. “Let’s just get through the evening.”

“Agreed.”

Rocco’s was just another block south on Church, the Italian restaurant tucked into the ground floor of an old brick building next door to the church.

Inside Rocco’s, Amanda removed her black wool coat, revealing a peach plaid dress with black cap sleeves and a narrow black belt cinched around her waist. The bodice of the dress was fitted with tiny peach buttons from the waist to the neat Mandarin style collar, while the skirt was full, hitting just below her knee.

It might be thirty degrees outside, and late February, but Amanda looked like a breath of spring.

Her long golden blonde hair was down, curling over her shoulders like a 1940s actress, while small black button earrings matched the cap sleeves on her dress.

“Is that a vintage dress?” he asked her as they were seated at the big corner booth. Purple plastic grapes hung in generous clusters from the arbor ceiling, while murals of Tuscany covered the pale yellow walls. “Or new, to appear vintage?”

“It’s a new dress, my sister’s design. Charity and I make a lot of our clothes,” she answered as she settled into the booth, next to Bette.

Bette reached over to pat Amanda’s hand. “Mandy and Charity are extremely talented seamstresses. If Mandy wasn’t such a good hair stylist, I’d tell her to open her own dressmaking shop.”

Tyler looked at Amanda and she shrugged. “Our family didn’t have a lot of money. We did all of our shopping at second-hand stores. Knowing how to reinvent thrift store clothes saved face, and stretched a miniscule budget.”

“And knowing how to cleverly adapt the house, turning it into your salon and home is another example of your money smarts,” Bette said.

“You live in the back of the salon?” he asked her.

“Above,” she corrected. “The upstairs is my lair.” Her generous mouth curved, a dimple fluttering in her cheek, the dimple a tease.

His chest tightened. His body hardened. How could he desire someone he wasn’t sure he even liked?

No, that wasn’t fair. He liked her. But he wasn’t sure he should like her.

That was the problem.

“How many rooms are upstairs?” he asked, trying not to focus on Mandy’s soft lips, or the way her golden hair brushed her cheek making her look like a siren from a 1940s film.

“There were three tiny bedrooms and a bathroom, but I took down the wall between the two smaller bedrooms, turned it into a living room with a mini kitchen. It’s on the cozy side, but perfect for my needs,” she answered.

“You should see it,” Bette enthused. “It’s just delightful. Vintage and yet chic and modern. I’m so proud of everything she’s achieved.”

Tyler didn’t miss how Amanda reached over and gave Gram’s arm a little squeeze. “Thanks, Bette, but I had a lot of help with the house. You helped me—”

“Not much.”

“No, you did, and then Charity helped me make the slip covers and drapes, and Sadie supplied all the furniture, and helped me pull it together.”

“Sadie is a genius,” Gram said nodding.

“Have you met her, yet?” Mandy asked him, her wide blue eyes locking with his.

His grandmother had blue eyes, light blue like water, but Amanda’s reminded him of the Texas bluebonnet, intensely blue, and utterly captivating.

“She has a shop on Main Street,” Amanda continued, as if her information was exactly the sort of thing he’d want to know. “The Montana Rose. She calls herself a shabby chic shop, but it’s so much more than that. She has an amazing design aesthetic.”

“And a new husband,” Gram added. “She married Rory Douglas and it was supposed to be a small wedding but everyone in Marietta came. People were so happy for them.” Her eyes suddenly watered.