Cheek To Cheek

Chapter 2

The sound of lively chatter filled Charlie's ears when she opened the door to her grandmother's quaint home in the late afternoon of the sunny day. Instantly, a smile spread across her face, her heart feeling so full from the sound, loving to hear the home that had been so quiet recently once again filled up with laughter and chatting.

"Grandma, it's me," Charlie called out.

"We're in the living room," Helen replied. "We were just talking about you."

When Charlie rounded the corner, her eyes instantly landed on the person sitting in the wingback chair who was chatting with her grandmother. His hunky frame filled up the chair and she noticed the few little bits of grass on the bottom of his straight legged jeans, giving away that he must have been over mowing the lawn earlier. A grey henley was clinging to his toned chest but the top couple buttons were unbuttoned, letting his chest hair and a peek of a tattoo show. A smirk was on his bearded face before he took a sip of the lemonade that was in the glass he held in his hand and Charlie's mouth quickly smirked to match his.

"Uh oh, I hope nothing too embarrassing," She put her hands on her hips in reference to her grandmother's previous words.

"Oh it for sure was embarrassing," Chris teased her, making Helen laugh and Charlie try to hide her smile while she playfully glared at him.

Just then, the clacking of nails on the wood floor echoed and suddenly, Charlie was taken by surprise with a blur of brown and white fur jumping all around her. It took her a moment to realize it was a happy dog trying to attack her with affection and when she figured out what it was, she quickly got out of her chair and dropped to her knees to excitedly greeted the dog, "Hi puppy! Hi precious! You're so pretty!"

While she was laughing from the dog licking at her face, she saw Chris' hunky frame come over and kneel down across from her, petted the dog's head to calm him down and told her, "This desperate attention seeker is Dodger."

"Aww, hi Dodger," Charlie tucked her dark curls behind her ears and scratched behind the dog's ears.

The action caused his tail to wag wildly, hitting Chris in the face with each wag and making his face scrunch up while he said, "Thanks a lot, dodge. I see where I rank now."

Charlie and Helen both laughed from his statement before Chris filled her in and explained, "Dodger didn't have any plans today so he came over to help me mow the yard and chased some squirrels."

"Well it's nice to know that his schedule was open enough to come over," Helen replied but just then, her phone rang and she told them, "Oh I should get that. I'll be right back."

Once Helen had walked out of the room and Dodger had wandered over to the window to look outside, Chris went back to sit in the wingback chair and picked up his glass while Charlie came to sit in the chair near him and said, "I'm actually glad you're here today because I've been wanting to talk to you."

"Oh yeah?" His eyebrows slightly rose while running a free hand through his thick dark hair.

"I wanted to thank you for coming over to mow my grandma's yard, it's something I didn't even think about after my dad passed but I wanted to tell you that you don't need to do that Chris. I'm going to come do it for her," She crossed her legs while relaxing into the old chair.

He waved off her comment with a swish of his big hand and told Charlie, "It truly is the least I can do."

"But I can only imagine how busy you are with your life and work and all and you don't need to worry about my grandma, I can take care of her," Charlie was honest.

"But you don't have to do it alone," His blue eyes were honest and kind as he gazed over at her. "Besides, I'm filming a TV show in Boston so I'm home a lot and it gives me a reason to get outside. Also, then I get to hang out with Helen and I get free lemonade when I'm done so that's a bonus," Chris chuckled while holding up his glass to show her.