by Dana Roquet
“Ahhhh. I see,” Dave nodded. “Well, I think I can find plenty for you to do, that’s for sure.”
“I noticed that the deer was gone when I came into town yesterday,” I said quizzically.
“Oh, I called the sheriff’s office and let them know what had happened. After all, I fired off a gun in the dead of the night so I wanted to be sure that they knew about it, in case they got any reports about the noise. The sheriff probably had it removed.”
“You know,” I said conversationally, looking at him sidelong while nudging his shoulder playfully with my own. “You’re a good man to have around in the case of an emergency, Mr. Cameron.”
He gave me a light answering nudge with his shoulder and chuckled but didn’t look over at me; instead he blew across his cup to cool his steaming coffee.
“I have my moments,” he admitted self-deprecatingly, taking a sip from his cup.
He looked over at me then and we smiled at each other before each turning our attention to the unencumbered vistas of open land before us. We were both quiet, taking a few more minutes to enjoy our coffee and just listening to the myriad of Iowa songbirds, none distinct but rather an orchestra of varying voices raised in the springtime gleeful joy of life renewed, coming from a large copse of trees a quarter mile away and amplified by the otherwise stillness of the countryside around us.
A few minutes later I sensed Dave’s regard on me and looked over and up into his warm blue eyes that were reflecting the brilliant blue of the sky above and I could feel my face warm with a sudden flush, feeling like a giddy school girl who has somehow miraculously caught the eye of the most popular boy in her class. I must admit that after everything he and I had shared over the last few days, I was becoming a little smitten with Dave Cameron, I think, and had the thought occur to me that I just might need to base a character on him in my next novel if he were to keep up his chivalrous tendencies.
He smiled at me again and then his expression changed as he seemed to remember something.
“Oh, hey, since you’re here…” he said and leaned back slightly, reaching into the front pocket of his blue jeans and pulling something out. “I had this made for you the other day. No sense in you being locked out of your own house.”
He dangled a silver key on a matching chain out toward me and dropped it into my upturned palm. The chain had a sterling silver charm on the end, which was in the shape of a stack of four books. The top book had been engraved with my first name across it at an angle in teeny, tiny, ornate scrolled lettering.
“You know, you just keep racking up those brownie points, Mr. Cameron,” I informed him with a shake of my head. “Thank you.”
He chuckled, lifted an index finger and made a hash mark in the air.
“I guess I’m on a roll,” he said, coming to his feet.
“All right, time to work,” he ordered with a grin, reaching down to take my hand and pulling me up to stand before him.
“Oh and kinda bossy too, I think,” I teased, turning for the front door.
***
I spent the rest of the day with Dave at the house doing what I could to help out. I scrubbed the front-room fireplace with a nylon bristled brush and some soot remover until it looked almost like new. I swept the floors on all levels, including the small basement area that had been added sometime during the 1940’s and which had been deemed sound by the inspectors but was not at all fancy and would never be more than a laundry room and storage area. I wiped down all of the new and beautiful fixtures and cabinets in my upstairs bathroom and washed the grout dust off of the freshly laid black-and-white daisy-patterned tile floor. I shined all of the new, old antique brass doorknobs on the newly hung vintage doors throughout the entire house, and spent some time exploring the other buildings on the property to see exactly what all was there. I wanted to eventually get all of those outbuildings into good order as well.
After we stopped for some lunch at the Finish Line Diner, we headed back to the house and Dave broke out a couple of pairs of goggles and face masks and revved up a power sander to start stripping the hardwood floors on the lower level. There had been a lot of abuse to the old floors over the last 142 years including several early and varying shades of stain, more recent polyurethane lacquers, telltale signs of vinyl flooring in the kitchen and mudroom and some areas in the front room where glue had been used for wall to wall carpeting. By the snags of carpet fibers still clinging to some of the glued areas, it appeared to have been an interesting shade of pea green that dated it as likely from the nineteen-sixties Dave told me.
At 3:00 p.m., I decided that I’d better call it a day because I needed to get home and cleaned up before Derek was due to arrive. I was going to barbeque out on the gas grill out back of the house that had been included as part of the rental. I was planning to serve him a nice steak and baked potato dinner and I’d left the steaks marinating in the fridge all day in a glaze of red wine, garlic, and olive oil.
Dave paused in the stripping of the kitchen floor and turned off the sander, moving his mask and goggles up so that they were sitting atop his head and he walked with me into the dining room as I prepared to go.
“Thanks for all of your help today, Torie. I really appreciate it.”
“It was my pleasure,” I said, laying my goggles and mask aside on his large rolling tool cabinet just inside the dining room and grabbing up my hoodie. “I may bring Derek over to take a look when he gets here. Maybe you two can meet?”
“Sure,” he said with a nod. “I’ll be here until about six.”
“Okay. Hey, if I don’t end up seeing you, you have a good weekend, Dave.”
“You too,” he said with a warm smile, watching me as I walked under the ornate dining room archway and on through to the foyer. I turned back to see him still observing me and waved with a final call of farewell as I headed out the front door.
Chapter 6
The red Porsche 911 Carrera arriving in the driveway of a home in Fremont, Iowa, was an oddity to say the least. In a town of pickup trucks, horse trailers, and hay wagons, the extravagant and flashy sports car looked very much out of place.
I watched through the picture window as Derek Bonner opened his car door and gracefully stepped out, revealing his six-foot, muscular and well-toned forty-year-old frame. He was still dressed in his work clothes, complete with a power tie and tailored suit coat. He is an insurance broker who also personally dabbles in the markets and some day trading and has been very successful at it. We met in Chicago when I had been out to dinner with my agent, Tom Rhoads, shortly after my second novel had been launched. Tom and Derek had happened to have an investment club in common and when Derek had recognized Tom and had stopped at our table to say a few words, Tom had introduced us. That’d been eight months ago now.
Derek, I observed now, was looking as if he had just stepped out of GQ magazine. His sandy-blond hair was one-hundred-dollar-a-cut, styled perfection and his handsome face is nearly flawless. My best relatable imagery I can offer as a close proximity, which I’d decided on some time ago, would have to be Brad Pitt. Okay—okay, so no one comes close to Brad but, in my opinion, Derek was giving him a good run for the money, in the looks department.
My best friend Mindy had disagreed with me vehemently regarding this comparison when I’d made it one night while she and I were having a girl’s night out. She was in the middle of her second margarita in as many hours and in no uncertain terms, except for the slight slur that had accompanied the derision which had dripped from every word, had argued that he looks more like the three times removed ugly adopted child of a distant step cousin of Brad Pitt. My dear sweet friend Mindy is definitely not a fan of Derek.
Derek surveyed the neighborhood while he slipped off his suit coat, folding it carefully across his forearm before popping his rear lid and pulling out his luggage. I opened the screen door and stood on the front porch waiting for him. I didn’t feel the need to rush to him and leap into his arms like I would have if t
his were a scene from one of my novels, because we just don’t have that passionate type of relationship. Oh, it’s good enough behind closed doors, but he doesn’t like PDA in the least, and after eight months I have come to the realization that he never will.
I had bathed and was dressed in a revealing black slip blouse that is one of the sexier items I own. I was wearing my skinny jeans, with moderate high heels and underneath it all was a new lacy black bra and matching G-string.
“Hey, stranger,” I greeted him as he mounted the steps.
I reached out to help relieve him of some of his burden by taking his laptop and suit coat from his hands.
“How was the drive?” I asked.
“Not bad. You look beautiful,” he complimented me as is eyes looked me over from head to toe.
“Why, thank you. You’re looking pretty good yourself. Are you hungry?”
“I could eat. I think I need a shower first and maybe a beer?”
“I’ve got some Heineken all chilled for you.”
He grabbed hold of the screen door and followed me in and once inside, he immediately put his bag down, and before he’d even glanced around at the place, he took his computer and suit coat from my hands, dropping them onto the nearby sofa, and then pulled me into his arms, engulfing me in a passionate kiss as his hands moved over my blouse, squeezing my breasts gently.
“God, I’ve missed you. I’m about to burst,” he whispered while taking my right hand from around his neck and kissing the back before leading it down to place it over the undeniable proof of his statement and guiding my palm up and down over the front of his pants.
“I thought that you wanted to shower first?” I reminded him, amused. “I was also hoping that maybe you’d want to take a drive to get a look at the house and meet the contractor that I hired while the baked potatoes finish up.”
“You want me to drive my hundred-thousand-dollar car out on gravel? Are you kidding me, Torie?” he asked dumbfounded, as though he couldn’t even believe that I would say such a ridiculous thing.
“We could take my truck,” I offered.
Derek was already preoccupied with kissing me and he wasn’t listening to me at all. I know that I should feel happy that he desires me, and I am, but I want to at least have some conversation and maybe a drink first, like civilized people.
“Not tonight, babe, okay? I’m really fried. I had a hell of a week at work. Can we see about that shower now?”
“Let me at least give you a tour of this house,” I insisted, as we grabbed up his things. “It will take half a minute. Okay, so this is the living room.”
“Nice,” he gushed, acting as if he were impressed but I knew that he was messing with me.
“And here we have the combo kitchen slash dining room,” I said flapping my free hand in that direction as I started down the hall. “Hallway—bedroom number one, bathroom, and my bedroom.”
“Ooh—aah,” he sighed in an overly enthusiastic display of awe. He was grinning at me when I rounded on him, irritated.
“You ass,” I hissed but felt myself smiling in return and leaned in to accept the conciliatory kiss he offered.
Entering the bedroom, I grabbed him a couple of hangers for his work clothes, and while I hung up his suit coat, he stripped out of everything else and pulled out his shower supplies. I finished up hanging his suit pants on a hanger and headed to the kitchen to get him a beer, while he sauntered after me, buck naked and proud of it. He gave my butt a playful swat as he turned to enter the bathroom and I squeaked, scampering quickly out of his reach.
***
While Derek showered, I brought him a beer and set it on the vanity next to him.
“Beer is at three o’clock!” I called over the sound of the water.
“Thank you. Sure you don’t want to join me, babe?” he asked pulling back the curtain to reveal himself to me in all his naked glory.
It was obvious that he spends two hours a day, six days a week in the gym because no man gets those kind of rippling abs sitting at a desk job pushing paper all day. My eyes skimmed down the entire length of his perfectly sculpted and meticulously manscaped body and I leaned in to give him a kiss to appease him until he teasingly tried to pull me into the shower with him.
“Bonner, you get my clothes wet, and you’ll be in big trouble,” I warned him with menace.
He just smiled his seductive, bad boy smile that usually has a way of winning me over, but I resisted and turning, headed out.
“Shower, Derek! Dinner is almost ready.”
***
It didn’t take long after the dinner dishes were cleared and in the dishwasher before Derek was calling out for me to come join him on the sofa in front of the television. It wasn’t long after I’d joined him on the sofa that he’d managed to have me seated snuggly in his lap, keeping my mouth busy with ardent kisses, while his hands were exploring what was underneath my top. His kisses came to a smacking pause as he became occupied and engaged in trying to pull the edge of my blouse out so that he could peek underneath, hoping to get a glimpse of what he had perceived by touch to be a very daring plunge cut bra. I couldn’t help but snort a laugh at him and his single-minded tenacity. Derek Bonner is a man who is a connoisseur of many things, not the least of which is a love of women’s breasts and seeing them displayed in sexy lingerie.
He hushed my jocularity with another ardent kiss as he attempted to get me prone and his hand dove down the front of my jeans. However he couldn’t get comfortable on the small living room sofa and soon we were both struggling and laughing like loons before he finally gave up and with an animalistic growl, jumped up, scooping me off of the sofa as if I were as light as a feather, and carrying me off to the bedroom.
***
It was sometime later I lay staring up at the ceiling, feeling a little melancholy and unsatisfied with the just completed activities while I listened to the water running in the bathroom.
“Your turn,” Derek said as he returned a few minutes later, turning off the stereo, slipping on his boxers and climbing into bed. He gave me a light kiss, and I could tell that he’d brushed his teeth again and had used mouthwash which about sums up sex between Derek and me, very antiseptic and sterile, not a sharing of one’s self with another person really at all. It’s more like two solitary, individual occurrences that we are each there to witness but that we never truly share.
I rose and grabbed a pair of boxers and a T-shirt out of my dresser and went into the bathroom to get ready for bed. Afterward, I went out to the living room to turn off the TV and lights and logged on to check my email for a few minutes before returning to the bedroom to find my man, eyes closed and breathing deep and regular, sated and sleeping by 9:00 p.m. on a Friday night.
I wasn’t near ready to sleep, so with an outward sigh of resignation directed at my peacefully slumbering boyfriend, I turned off the bedside lamp and closed the door behind me so that the light from the living room wouldn’t disturb him, thinking uncharitably as I did so that, No way will this night of lovemaking ever be reenacted in one of my romance novels.
I turned on a reading lamp at the side table in my perfectly constructed and wonderfully cozy reading nook that I had created in one corner of the living room and after grabbing my own novel, Passion’s Fury, off of the built-in bookshelves and atop a small stack of reading materials that I’d brought with me; I curled up in the overstuffed easy chair near the lamp, opened the book to page 132 and read the scorching hot, wet, messy, and romantic sex between my handsome leading man Beau Gardner and his sexy siren of a heroine Melody Turner. Now that’s lovemaking!
Derek and I, well, I can’t blame Derek for my lack of ability to explode in ecstasy like the women in my novels or normal women apparently do during the actual act of lovemaking. Maybe I’m just not built that way but whatever the reason, it’s my issue and always has been, even before Derek. I sure can write about great lovemaking, though. The sex romps in my novels were described by romance critic Ja
nelle Landry as quote “Hot enough to cause the pages to spontaneously combust!”
Yes, Ms. Landry, I thought sullenly. But little do you know that it doesn’t come from any firsthand experience. It’s probably come from nearly twenty years of reading other women’s romance novels and absorbing the details through osmosis. In the area of romance, I, Torie Mills—am a total fraud.
Chapter 7
And so I began my acclimation to life in Fremont, Iowa, now with a total population of 763. Most of the next two months, I spent all of my days helping out at the house with Dave. We became a pretty good team, he and I. I came to sense exactly when he needed a tool and would have it ready for him even before he had to ask. I was like a top-notch surgical nurse, assisting Dr. Dave as he painstakingly renovated and restored Rose’s house to circa 1870.
We spent quite a few days roaming around Des Moines browsing at the Brass Armadillo Antique Mall, West End Architectural Salvage, and other antique and salvage shops in search of hidden treasures and it seemed that we had Dave’s pickup truck bed loaded to the brim at the end of each excursion.
We went on a couple of fun day trips to Omaha and we scoured store after store for vintage supplies; Dave insisted on vintage as much as possible. We hit three different estate sales out in Keokuk County, and Dave managed to salvage quite a bit of hardware he needed for the outbuildings of my homestead and we found an awesome antique door to replace the nearly deteriorated one at the entrance to my storm cellar.
By mid-April, the house was coming together nicely. I’d been so successful at my gathering of vintage furniture that I’d ended up renting a PODS and I’d had it delivered to Rose’s house so I’d have someplace to keep everything safe and dry. It was sitting out back in the yard between the house and barn and it was beginning to bulge by the time I was ready to leave for my book signing tour on May 1st.