by Diana Castle
“Look, hon,” Saffron retorted, “I didn't say I felt guilty about it. I just didn’t want to—”
“A man marries a woman young enough to be his daughter,” Lydia interrupted. “Nobody blinks an eye. But if a woman lusts after a man younger than she is, the eyebrows shoot up and the tongues start to wag.”
Saffron threw up her hands. “Whoa! Rein it in there, pardner. Where the hell is all this coming from?” She glanced around the club. “You lusting after somebody? Where is he?”
Lydia shook her head. He’s gone. And he’s gone because I sent him away and I sent him away because I was too much of a coward to deal with it.
“I'm sorry,” she said instead, not wanting to talk about her encounter with Tristan. It wasn’t as if she was ever going to see him again. “It just makes me mad. This double-standard when it comes to age.”
“Hey, you're preaching to the choir here.” Saffron shrugged. “But that's just the way things are. Can't let it drive you crazy.”
If Tristan had been a younger woman and she an older man, she wouldn't have had to think twice as to whether it was appropriate to have a drink or a dance or even have sex. She could have go on and done so if she’d wanted to. But Saffron was right. That’s just the way things were. Best to just let it go and move on.
“So where'd you find Reeve?” she asked.
Saffron’s face brightened, making her look years younger. “Well, after I got rid of that escapee from kindergarten, I had to take a piss. On my way back I ran into Reeve.”
Lydia smiled. “Your old friend.”
Saffron laughed. “Yeah, I guess you could call him that. Considering the fact I've fucked him at least a dozen times these last four months I suppose that qualifies him as one.”
“You must like him.” Lydia had never heard of Saffron spending that much time with anyone.
She shrugged. “He’s okay. Doesn't talk much. And when he does, it's mostly about his bike. He rides a Harley. But don't let his skinny bod fool you. He's got an amazing cock. And he knows how to use it.” She made an exaggerated shivering motion. “I get wet just thinking about it.”
“Well, don't let me keep you from it.” Lydia blushed. “I mean, from him.”
Saffron laughed then her face sobered. “I'm sorry, Lydia.”
“About what?”
“I know you didn't have a good time tonight.”
“It's okay.” She glanced around the club then realized she was looking for Tristan. She quickly looked back at Saffron. “It's just not my thing. You know?”
Saffron patted her arm. “Yeah, I know. C'mon. I’ll walk you to your car.”
Once they were outside, Reeve, who had been leaning against the wall of the club smoking a cigarette, pushed himself away from it and joined them.
When they reached her car, Lydia turned towards Saffron. “Thanks again for taking me out.”
Saffron's expression was worried. “You sure you're going to be okay?”
“Yes, I'll be fine. Don't worry about me. You go and have fun.”
Lydia unlocked her car and got inside. She looked through the window at Saffron and Reeve. He once again had his arm around Saffron’s shoulders. But this time he also had hold of one of her breasts. He slowly caressed it, his fingers inching toward the taut nipple. He looked directly into Lydia's eyes as he did so. Her throat tightened as she watched his long fingers tug and squeeze Saffron's nipple. Then, with a wide, leering grin, he winked at her.
Despite herself, Lydia felt a stirring in her pussy, and she couldn’t help imagining him playing with her nipple. She quickly jerked her eyes away, started the car and drove out of the club parking lot and into traffic.
Saffron was on her way home with someone who was going to fuck her. Yes, fuck her. Even Saffron admitted it was first and foremost about the fucking when it came to the men she dated.
As for Lydia, she was on her way home to a half-eaten box of dark chocolate and her erotic romances. But it could have turned out differently. She had been propositioned. She could have gone home with someone too.
Not that blond young man. No, not with him.
The other one. The one who’d called himself Tristan Drake. Her knight in shining armor with the face of a fallen angel. He had seemed to like her. Had asked to buy her a drink. Had even asked her to dance.
Lydia made a left turn onto a quiet cul-de-sac and drove down the road that led to her house. She pulled into the driveway and stopped the car. She stared out the front windshield. There sat her house. Her house, which she’d bought after her divorce from Douglas, who was now married to a woman nearly half his age. The adultery had been bad enough, but it had hurt even worse when he betrayed her with someone so much younger.
She keyed off the ignition and listened to the soft ticking sound of her car cooling down. She could have been with someone younger. Tristan had seemed interested in her. Maybe she could have even brought him home. Taken him to bed.
But it wasn't because he’d been so much younger that she turned him down. She didn’t take Tristan up on his offer for a drink, a dance, or possibly even some wild, hot monkey sex because she wasn't ready.
She was scared. Scared shitless as Saffron would have put it. She had trusted Douglas. She had loved Douglas. All those years they’d been married loving him had been her sole reason for being.
He repaid her love with betrayal.
Now she was so scared of being hurt she’d rather be alone than take a chance on being hurt like that again.
Lydia gripped the steering wheel, tears stinging the edges of her eyes.
Damn it all. She just wasn’t ready.
Not even for someone as incredibly gorgeous and sexy as Tristan Drake had been.
Chapter Two
“No, Mother, I don’t have any plans for next Saturday night.”
Lydia pressed the cell phone against her ear. She was in the back of the New Age bookstore where she’d recently started working. She was on her fifteen-minute break. She didn't need to work. Douglas, defying the advice of his lawyer and, out of a sense of guilt she suspected, paid her more than enough alimony.
But she’d been bored sitting at home reading or working in her garden. Saffron, who shopped at the store, had given her the heads up about the job opening. It was nothing fancy. Just your basic, part-time retail position.
She didn’t have any work experience or much in the way of job skills. Douglas had been one of those husbands who liked to brag that his wife didn't need to work. He had rebuffed all her attempts to get a job. She didn’t even have a degree. She foolishly dropped out of college when Douglas asked her to marry him.
Her eyes roamed over the tiny storeroom. Colorful posters advertising psychic fairs, meditation retreats and conferences on the mind/body connection were taped to the wall. They’d probably been kept for their artistic value since all of them were months out-of-date. Recently delivered boxes of merchandise lined the walls and covered the floor. At some point she and Elaine, the store’s other employee, would open them up and inventory them.
“What? No, I told you, Mother, I’m not interested in learning how to play bridge.”
Her mother had been trying for months to get her to join her bridge club, which consisted of wealthy widows in their seventies like herself. All the women did as they played cards was complain about their investment portfolios, the current state of the world (which was always terrible and getting worse), their ungrateful children, and their maids and/or gardeners who refused to learn to speak decent English and who were, or so the women claimed, either stealing from them or plotting to do them in.
Lydia used her foot to push the door to the storeroom open a bit wider. The sound of voices from the front of the store came through a bit clearer. She had ten minutes left on her break but if it got too busy, she didn’t want to leave Elaine out there all alone to handle it. But so far it didn’t sound terribly hectic.
She switched the cell phone to her other ear. When she did a man’s voice, low but me
lodic, flowed towards her from the front of the store.
Her heart skipped a beat.
She’d heard a voice like that before. Two weeks ago, in the pulsing darkness of a campus club.
“Mother, I have to go. Yes, now. I’m at work and I—” She could no longer hear the man’s voice. “Goodbye, Mother.”
She thumbed off her cell phone and pushed it into the pocket of her slacks. She hurried out of the backroom and to the front of the store. It was empty except for Elaine, who was arranging crystals on a shelf.
“Was someone just here?” Lydia asked.
Elaine turned towards her. “Is your break over already?”
“Was a man just here?”
Elaine stared at her then a smile broke across her pixyish face. “Oh, yeah. Sir Lancelot.”
Lydia blinked. “Who?”
“That’s what I call him. He’s soooo handsome. He reminds me of Lancelot du Lac.”
Elaine was obsessed with anything Arthurian. She’d seen every movie and read every book about King Arthur. She claimed that her mother had named her after the two Elaines from the Arthur stories; Elaine of Astolat, who had hopelessly loved Lancelot, and the Elaine who gave birth to Lancelot's son, Galahad.
“What did he look like?”
Elaine tilted her head, her blonde, chin-length hair brushing across her cheek. “Well, he's tall. Gorgeous. Nice body.” She grinned mischievously, her green eyes lighting up. “Very nice body. Really hot—”
Lydia must have made a face because Elaine quickly went on with the rest of her description.
“Black hair. Dark blue eyes.” She frowned. “No, they’re more indigo. Or a kind of twilight blue. Or maybe a—”
Lydia moved past her.
“Hey, where are you going?” Elaine cried.
“I’ll be right back.”
Lydia flew through the front door of the store. Once she was outside, she looked up and down the sidewalk. There was no sign of Tristan. That is, if it had in fact been him. But the voice she’d heard and the way Elaine had described him.
It had to be him.
But which way had he gone? She doubted Elaine would have noticed. The windows of the store were covered with advertisements and posters so it was difficult to see the outside from where the cash register was located.
She turned to her right. As it was a Saturday afternoon and an unseasonably warm day for early fall, the downtown sidewalks were teeming with shoppers and students from the nearby campus. She was forced to maneuver her way through the crowd, avoiding baby carriages and leashed dogs. Tristan was quite tall so she hoped she’d be able to spot his head over the crowd.
There was no sign of him.
She stopped. She’d probably gone the wrong way. It was no use. He was gone. Unless he had some reason to come back to the store. But she only worked part-time. What were the chances that the day he chose to return would be the day she'd be working?
Slim to none.
She could go back and see if she could find his address or phone number from whatever he had purchased. Maybe through a receipt or a credit card transaction. But that sounded too much like stalking and, she miserably admitted, implied a rather pathetic and pitiful desperation on her part.
Honestly? Could she sink any lower? She wasn’t even sure if he had bought anything. She’d been in such a hurry to find him, she’d forgotten to ask Elaine why he had come into the store in the first place.
And what was she doing? Chasing after a man and a much younger man at that. She probably needed her head examined. Her mother had certainly insisted she do so after she filed for divorce from Douglas. She’d told Lydia that she no longer trusted her to do the right thing anymore and that she needed to go and see a shrink. Lydia had ignored her mother at the time. But maybe she was right. Running out of the store like that. Acting as if she was thirteen years old instead of thirty-nine.
As she turned around to head back, she ran smack into someone.
“Oh, I’m sorry.” She quickly took a step back, but as she did her feet became entwined and she felt herself spinning towards the ground.
Someone grabbed hold of her arms and steadied her. She looked up and gasped.
“Why, hello, lovely Lydia. We meet again.”
As she stared up into the face she had fantasized about every night for the last two weeks, the blood in her veins flooded with heat.
Tristan’s dark blue eyes gazed down into hers, his firm lips curved in an inviting smile. He looked as handsome in reality as he had in her fantasies. His warm hands were still around her arms and the current she felt from his touch was jumpstarting nerve endings she had long thought numb. As she continued to stare up into his eyes, she was barely conscious of the people eddying around them.
“Um, hello,” she finally managed to say. She was painfully aware that he was seeing her in the glare of the sun instead of the darkness of the club. Every line and crease alongside her eyes and mouth seemed to itch and burn.
Tristan’s smile deepened, bringing out those sexy dimples on both sides of his mouth. “I told you we’d see each other again. It’s fate” He glanced at her arms. She was wearing a short sleeved yellow shirt over her green slacks. “Where's your jacket? Aren't you cold?”
“My jacket? Oh, it's at the store.”
She had been so intent on finding him that she’d run outside without any thought as to her jacket. It was warm for fall, but not that warm.
“The store?”
“I work at the new age store. The one you just left.”
“Really? I didn't see you there.”
“I was in the back. In the storeroom. Talking to my mother.” Why was she babbling? She was sure he probably didn’t give a hoot as to whom she’d been talking to. “I heard you, but by the time I got to the front you were gone.”
“And you came in search of me.” He reached up and brushed away an errant strand of hair, which a breeze had blown against her cheek. “I’m flattered.”
Her cheeks burned like hot coals at his touch. “I…uh…I wanted to…I thought I could…”
“I was hoping to see you again, too.”
“Really?”
He nodded. “Unfortunately, since I didn't get your last name at the club I had no way of finding you.”
“I'm sorry about that. It was the first time I'd been out in a while. I was just being cautious. I didn't mean to be rude.”
“You were hardly being rude. You did the right thing. And, well, here we are, so it worked out for the best.”
She had fantasized about him so much that having him here in the flesh was hard for her to believe. But it wasn't a dream. He was here and he was real. She glanced at the people walking past them. A few of them gave her and Tristan double looks. She hoped it was only because he was so tall and so gorgeous and not because they were wondering what someone her age was doing with someone like him.
She stepped away from him and he let go of her arms. “I'd better get back to the store.”
“What time do you get off?”
She started, not sure she had heard him right. “What?”
“From work. What time will you be done?”
“Three. Why?”
He stared at her for a moment then laughed softly. He took a step towards her until he was only a hairsbreadth away. She smelled not only his cologne, which was some intoxicatingly musky scent, but she felt the heat of his body.
“Because, lovely Lydia, now that I’ve found you again, I don’t intend on losing you. I want to see you. If that’s all right with you, of course.”
He wanted to see her? Really? Even after she had blown him off at the club? Even when, in this pitiless sunlight he had to see that she was at least a decade older than he was.
“Yes. Sure. That’s fine. With me.” Great, she sounded like an idiot. But she still wasn’t sure she’d heard him right.
“Great.” He glanced at the heavy gold and silver watch on his wrist. Because her ex had been into such thi
ngs, she recognized it as a very expensive watch. “I’ll stop back at three.”
She nodded. “That would be fine. “Still sounding stupid there, Lydia. Remember what Saffron said. Loosen up.
“Does coffee sound good?”
She nodded, not wanting to risk sounding even stupider.
He took her hand, lifted it and kissed the back of it. As his firm lips pressed against her skin, her pulse skittered, but she also couldn't help noticing that the people who passed them now were openly staring.
“Till then, lovely Lydia. I shall count the minutes until we meet.” He looked up at her from underneath his brows, his voice low, his breath caressing her hand. He gently released it, gave her another warm smile then turned and headed down the sidewalk.
She watched Tristan until he disappeared into the crowd. She felt silly doing so, but she wanted to convince herself that she hadn’t just dreamed their encounter. She headed back to the store. It felt as if she were floating ten feet off the ground. As a matter of fact, she hadn’t felt this giddy in a long time. Not since she was thirteen and had been on her way to the roller-skating rink with Winston Bailey, the boy who’d been her first crush.
The bell above the door tinkled and the smell of incense wrapped itself around her as she entered the store.
Elaine, who was behind the counter, looked up from the magazine she was reading. “So, did you find him?”
“Actually, he found me.”
“Are you and he dating?”
Lydia stiffened. She wondered if Tristan was more than just a customer to Elaine. “No. Not really. I met him the night I was out with Saffron.”
“At The Mortarboard?”
Lydia nodded. “But we didn't actually meet. Someone was bothering me and Tristan made him stop.”
“Sounds like something he'd do. So that's his name? Tristan?”
“Yes.”
“Interesting.” Elaine twirled a strand of her blonde hair about her finger. “And here I was thinking of him as a Lancelot. Not as a Tristan.”
Lydia went over to the counter. “Was Tristan another of Arthur's knights?”
“Sort of. Depends on what you read. But he's the main character in some of the stories associated with the Arthurian legends. The most famous being the story of Tristan and Isolde.” She gave Lydia a keen look. “So you met him at the club and he chased away some jerk. Nothing else happened?”