Reality of Love Boxed Set: Books 1-3

by Marika Ray

  I stood there lubing my chain, trying to figure out what just happened. My athleticism hadn’t seemed to have any kind of effect on her, other than to get an introduction and a promise to share rides with our kids. Like neighbors. Or, at most, friends. Definitely not love.

  Which was exactly in line with my hypothesis.

  So why did I feel so let down?

  I should be feeling relieved to have the first confirmation of my hypothesis. As I scanned my body, I noticed my chest felt heavy, my stomach was in knots, and joy was nowhere to be found. What was going on here?

  I needed to get my eye on the prize and stop thinking about her eyelashes, so long they nearly hit her eyebrows. Or the way her body moved with the grace of a dancer, but the curves of Marilyn Monroe. I hadn’t accounted for such beauty in my specimen for this experiment, but I wasn’t a green scientist. I wouldn’t be swayed from my goal.

  Number two on the list was going down as a dud in the love column. Score one for my hypothesis. Nineteen more ways to try before proving my theory correct.

  And in the meantime, I was going to ride thirty miles to burn the memory of her perfume out of my brain.

  5

  Lily-Marie

  “Get your ass over here.”

  Sunday morning dawned bright and beautiful, like most mornings in Southern California. But this morning was particularly bright, probably because I had a solid plan for starting on my list to find a husband. Today was pie-baking day.

  I was on the phone with Gabby—who wasn’t super supportive of my new man-magnet idea, I must confess. I’d explained everything to her yesterday and judging by the snorts and chuckles, she thought the whole thing was comical. I wouldn’t let her negativity get me down, though. I’d take comical over getting pickpocketed again. No, thanks.

  Her groan was the only answer.

  “Seriously, Gabby. I need your help making these apple pies and the cookies for my new neighbor. Losing weight is on the list too, so I need you here to slap my hand if I try to eat the baked goods.”

  “What am I, the food police?”

  “Yes! Now get over here and help me!”

  I hung up on her and went to change out of my pajamas. After my run-in with Jameson yesterday, I wasn’t going to be caught lounging in my pajamas all day like a total slouch. It got me hot and bothered and confused just thinking about him.

  The man was hot, let me tell you. Dark, thick hair that had just a touch of wave to the longer bits on top. Tanned skin, even in January. And the bike shorts! Holy mother of pearl, those things were skin-tight and didn’t hold back. I could see the outline of...well, everything. And, girl, I was intrigued with the size of his everything.

  My ex, Shawn, had been good-looking, but he wasn’t super muscular. In tighty-whities he looked a little ridiculous with his chicken legs, I’ll be honest. But Jameson? Whoa, Nelly. Those legs were gorgeous and thick and muscular, especially encased in spandex. I’d wanted to climb his tree trunk legs and lay my head on his broad chest while my hands sank into his hair and held on tight for the ride.

  On his bicycle. Duh.

  He’d looked damn good, okay? But then he’d been super awkward, which was funny and a little bit charming. If nothing else, I was happy to have found another parent to carpool with when necessary. Hopefully the boys got along or I’d have to carefully extricate myself from the arrangement.

  I had a firm rule against shitting in the sand box where I played. That was a really gross analogy for not getting mixed up romantically with a neighbor. When I came home, those four walls were my sanctuary. My place to relax. I didn’t want to have to pull the curtains, kill the lights, and dodge a romantic suitor gone wrong on my own sanctuary turf. Which meant putting Jameson and his thighs of wonder out of my head and getting my bake on.

  I finally had all the ingredients I had on hand laid out on the counter. I’d been thinking about Jameson the whole time I was getting ready to make my man-catching pies. Some might take that as a sign, but not me. I was in this to win Prince Charming and I was pretty sure a ripped, bicycle-loving, slacks-wearing science nerd was not him. While Jameson could sweep me off my feet literally, I highly doubted he possessed the characteristics to do it figuratively. So man-pies it was.

  “I’m here, woman!” Gabby let herself in the front door, as usual. Once you’ve known someone for thirty years you give them free rein to come and go as they please.

  I clapped my hands. “Excellent. Now we need to go to the store. I made a list.”

  Gabby rolled her eyes. “Of course you did. I assume you put coffee on that list for your bestie?”

  I nodded graciously. “We can make a coffee run on the way back.”

  With that, we were on our way to the grocery store, no Jameson sighting, thank God. I filled Gabby in on the conversation yesterday, leaving out his physical attributes. She’d see him soon enough and I didn’t want her teasing me about my hot-but-weird neighbor. If I didn’t watch her closely, she would be setting me up on a date with every eligible man we encountered. Trust me, it had happened before.

  We pulled into Vons and I grabbed my cloth grocery bag from the trunk before we crossed the parking lot and grabbed a cart. An old lady cut right in front of me, stealing the only cart in the carousel. How she managed it moving at a snail’s pace, was beyond me, but the evidence was there. She rolled off into the store, smug smile and pokey pace her elderly version of the middle finger.

  While counting to ten and walking to grab an empty cart off to the side of the store, I remembered my abbreviated list of Fifty Ways. Number three clearly stated to be nice to everyone as they may have an eligible son, father, brother, uncle who could ride off into the proverbial sunset with me. So instead of being passive aggressive and mumbling under my breath about her rude behavior or “accidentally” ramming my cart into hers as I entered the store, which I’d been known to do in the past, I pasted on a smile and called out a jaunty, “Good morning to ya!” as I passed her.

  Gabby looked at me in horror. “What the hell’s wrong with you? Are you feverish?” Her cold fingers probed my forehead as I tried to swat them away and still handle the shopping cart. “I’ve seen you verbally cut down lil’ old grannies who just looked at you wrong at the grocery store before. You’re kind of infamous with your old lady kerfuffles at the store.”

  “I’m fine. I’m just following my list. ‘Be nice to everyone.’” I found the baking aisle and turned down the lane, scanning for white sugar and flour, hoping my blood pressure would get the message and calm down.

  Gabby snorted and grabbed a box of sugar. “I’m telling you. This list is going to be downright comical. I won’t even get into how sexist some of those items are on the original list. It’s like sitting in a car watching a train wreck happen right in front of you. You want to look away, but you just can’t miss all the gory details of the disaster, you know?”

  I finally relinquished the cart to jab my fists onto my hips and narrow my eyes. “Thank you so much, bestie, for your vote of confidence. It really means the world to me that you’re motivating me to find my happily ever after.” The sarcasm was so tangy I’d need another box of sugar to cut it down.

  Gabby looked unconcerned by my anger. “Careful. I might have a brother or uncle. Better be nice to me...”

  The narrowed eyes turned into a full-on glacial death glare. “I’m rethinking sharing everything with you. Clearly, I need to put a filter on my mouth. You can’t be trusted.”

  She broke out into a smile and put her arm around my shoulders. I remained stiff as a board. “Ah, come on, Lil. I’m just teasing. You know you love me.”

  I shrugged her arm off and grabbed a bag of flour. “Yeah, yeah. Come on. Let’s get out of here so I can make my man-pies.”

  Gabby followed me toward the checkout stands. “I’m not even going to comment on what those are. See? Totally supportive.”

  My eye roll was thwarted by the sight of the little old lady with her infamous cart hol
ding exactly two items: a loaf of bread and a pack of gum. Perhaps the cart was just a substitute for a walker. Besides the utter emptiness of her cart, what really froze my eyeballs was the man walking next to her. He appeared shorter than my son and as bald as my daughter when she was first born. She smacked him in his belly with the back of her age-spotted hand when he tried to rush her to unload her two items onto the conveyer belt.

  A tingling sensation crept over my skull. It may have been embarrassment or shame, I wasn’t quite sure. Maybe it was just the sudden realization in real terms that my list of ways to get a husband might be as silly and unfruitful as Gabby thought it to be.

  “You were so right,” Gabby whispered in my ear. “You should totally get his number now that you were nice to her.”

  “Shut. Up.”

  She nudged me in the kidney with her elbow. “Seriously, bald guys are hot, didn’t you know?”

  I eyed the man in front of me, now trying to get dear old mom to push her cart through the checkout stand and collect her items on the other end. His pants were at least three inches above the back of his orthopedic black tennis shoes. And Gabby was wrong. He wasn’t bald. He had two long, curly black hairs that originated on the back of his head and were combed to the side with the help of a generous glop of gel.

  I swallowed hard and put my groceries on the belt, unable to look away from the old lady smacking her son with a grocery bag when he was too slow in bagging her stuff.

  “I need you to shut up right now,” I whispered savagely out of the side of my mouth.

  Choked laughter fanned the flames of my embarrassment.

  “You know, number twenty on my list is to make and sell toupees because bald guys are easy catches. Just be glad I had the sudden insight to nix that from my to-do list.”

  Gabby whooped out a loud laugh, turning the head of the old lady and earning us a frown. I just smiled serenely and waited for them to move along. Clearly, not all the things on the list were going to work for everyone. Hopefully the pies gave a better result than being nice.

  Back at home, with coffee in hand, Gabby and I got busy rolling out dough and slicing apples. I tried three different ways to steer the conversation to Gabby’s boyfriend, Hewitt, but she was avoiding my obvious traps and moved the talk to something far less personal. I was now officially worried about what was going on with them, but I knew Gabby would talk to me about it when she was ready. And today was not that day.

  “Oh, crap.”

  Gabby spun around, rolling pin in hand. “What?”

  I bit my thumbnail. “I forgot cinnamon.”

  “Who doesn’t have cinnamon?” Gabby teased me.

  “A mom whose kids hate oatmeal, that’s who.” I sighed and went to grab my purse by the door. “Back to the store I go.”

  “Why don’t you just ask to borrow some from Mrs. Reynolds next door?”

  Gabby was the voice of reason among the two of us. “That’s a great idea. I’ll be back in a flash.”

  I dropped my purse, jammed my feet into my ratty slippers, and rushed over to Mrs. Reynolds’ house. I rang the doorbell and hopped from foot to foot to keep warm. After a significant wait and a second jab to the doorbell, I had to face the fact that no one was home. I spun around to traipse back across the lawn and grab my purse for the trip to the store after all when my gaze landed on Jameson’s house.

  What were the odds he’d have cinnamon on hand?

  What were the odds he’d be in skin-tight biker shorts again?

  I hustled across my lawn and up to his door, taking a deep breath before ringing his doorbell. I was there for cinnamon, not a peek at his muscles. Besides, it would take having all my wits about me to navigate a conversation with him, as awkward as he was.

  The door swung open and there he stood, creased slacks, dark blue sweater vest over a button-down shirt, and a severe expression. His thick eyebrows were drawn, a significant valley gouging between his eyes.

  “Um, hi! Sorry to disturb you.” I went for a smile, but he continued to look at me with that expression. His eyes had a hazy look to them, like he was seeing me, but not really seeing me. It made about as much sense as my previous interaction with him. I forged ahead. My man-pies were desperate. “Okay, so, I’m baking some apple pies and just realized I forgot to buy cinnamon. Any chance you have some lying around I could use?”

  He stared at me for a beat longer before his eyebrows relented and his gaze cleared. “Uh, sure. I think I have some. Come on in.” He backed away from the door and spun on his heel—yes, he was wearing dress shoes in his own house—and walked toward a doorway that I presumed led to the kitchen. I shuffled behind in my fuzzy slippers.

  “All our stuff is still kind of packed away, but I’m sure I can find it.” He came to an abrupt stop and I almost ran into his broad back, my slippers giving very little traction on the wood floor.

  I backed off quickly and silently, and peered around him. There were three large open cardboard boxes in the middle of his kitchen. One was packed to the top with small appliances and all manner of spatulas and serving spoons. Another held a year’s supply of canned soup. The last one was a mystery in that everything in it was wrapped in brown packing paper.

  He stood there staring at the three boxes, not moving.

  “So, you guys like soup?” I could have slapped my forehead. What the hell kind of question was that? Felt like the awkward conversation virus was spreading and I was its current victim.

  He whipped his head toward me, like he’d forgotten I was there. “Oh, yeah. I’m not much of a cook, so I keep a lot of soup on hand. Pretty hard to mess that up.”

  Then he started digging around in the small appliance box, setting a lemon pepper container on the counter, then a garlic salt shaker, before finally unearthing the cinnamon container from under the toaster.

  “Aha! I knew I had it.” He presented it to me like a proud cat dragging in a dead mouse.

  “Well, thanks. You’ve saved me a trip to the store. I appreciate it. I’ll bring it back shortly.” I hugged the bottle to my chest and inched my way out of the kitchen.

  He waved off my suggestion. “No worries. Take your time. I rarely use cinnamon.” Then he grinned and I froze for a second. Gone was the nerdy professor, in its place a handsome man who could turn female heads if he only tried. Then he frowned and I could breathe again. I must have been mistaken, the glimpse too brief to have been real.

  “Okay, well, thanks again.” I lifted the cinnamon in some sort of weird toast and then hightailed it back to the front door. I had to get out of there. I barely knew the man. I probably shouldn’t have come in his house what with all the crazy stories you heard about murders and kidnappings in Southern California.

  I was halfway to my house when I heard his front door finally click shut.

  “Hey, Mrs. Reynolds came through, huh?” Gabby smiled at the cinnamon in my hand when I came into the kitchen.

  “Not really. I got this from my new neighbor, Jameson.” I got busy finding the teaspoons to measure it into the apple and sugar mixture.

  “Jameson, huh? He sounds hot.” Gabby elbowed me. “Is he?”

  I didn’t meet her eyes, just kept mixing the apples so they were thoroughly coated with the cinnamon and sugar. These pies had to be perfect so Mr. Future Lily-Marie would know how fabulous I was and want to taste all my other delightful desserts, if you know what I mean.

  “Um, not really. He’s kind of a nerdy professor, to be honest.”

  “Hmm...sometimes those types are actually the really hot ones under their glasses. Looks can be deceiving, you know?”

  “He doesn’t wear glasses, I don’t think. Sweaters, yes. But not glasses.”

  Gabby was staring at the side of my head. I could feel her stare, but I refused to take the bait. If I showed any type of interest she’d be marching next door to rope Jameson into a date with me. Nope. Not gonna happen. I had my own plan.

  The doorbell rang out and we both jumped.
>
  “I’ll get it.” I was all too happy to escape the kitchen and Gabby’s hawk-like attention.

  I swung open the door to find Jameson standing there, his frown gone, thankfully. It was replaced by a smudge of dirt on his cheek. My hand lifted a few inches before I realized what I was doing and forced it back down to my side. His dirt smudge was none of my business and my fingers certainly did not need to swipe it away.

  “Hi.” He waved from two feet away. “I found something else I thought you might need for your apple pies.”

  He handed me a blue and white ceramic pie cutter, clearly older than both of us. It looked like an antique, charming and yet still useful so many decades later.

  “It was my grandmother’s.” He shrugged.

  “Oh. Thanks. I actually could use that.” I hooked a thumb over my shoulder. “I’m taking these pies to work tomorrow. All the single guys there devour desserts, so I’ll have to show them how to slow down and cut a proper piece.” I laughed, but he didn’t join in. Instead, the frown was back full force, the eyebrows nearly puckered into a unibrow.

  He didn’t answer, so after a beat or two I tried to fill the silence. “So, how about I have you and your son over sometime this week so our kids can meet?”

  He nodded, a quick jerk of the head, no warmth in the movement whatsoever. “Sure.”

  “Okay. How about Wednesday?”

  Another head jerk. “Wednesday it is.”

  I smiled and slowly closed the door while he just stood there. When the door was finally closed, I grimaced from yet another ungainly conversation.

  “Who was that?” Gabby joined me, peeking out the front window like the nosey woman she is.

  “Never mind.” I headed back to the kitchen, needing to divert her as quickly as possible.

  Those two could never meet.

  6

  Jameson