by Rachel Lacey
“No hay,” Megan said, swirling her wine gently, watching as it coated the glass in its ruby tint before sliding back into the bottom of the glass. “But there might have been a horse blanket involved…”
“Oh my God,” Elle said with a delighted grin.
“A lot of kissing and groping, but not much more than that,” Megan said. “I mean, we were there watching over Bug while she was sick, but I’m not sure we would have gone much farther anyway. He’s got a lot of emotional baggage from what happened with his wife.”
“And you’ve got some emotional baggage of your own,” Elle said as she uncovered the trays, and Ruby’s tower bedroom filled with the delicious scent of chicken marsala.
“What? I do not.” Megan reached for a plate and began serving herself. “I’ve been with more guys than the two of you combined. I enjoy sex, and I make no excuses for it.”
“Yeah,” Elle said gently. “And how many guys have you been with since the accident?”
Megan slid her plate onto her lap, keeping her gaze firmly on the chicken. “I’ve been focused on my photography.”
“Okay,” Elle said with a shrug, “but if and when you want to talk about it, we’re here.”
Megan had a sudden, vivid memory of the Fairy Tails Ball they’d hosted here at the castle just a week or so after the accident. She’d flown home to recuperate with her family, making the last-minute decision to come back for the party just a few hours before it began.
She’d been in so much pain, physical and emotional, and she’d felt like Frankenstein with the bandages and makeup on her face, hiding the stitches and bruising. Ruby and Elle had held her, laughed with her and cried with her, picked her up when she felt like hiding in her bedroom for the rest of her life rather than facing the world.
“I’m fine,” she insisted now. “Really.”
“So, are you and Jake exploring a relationship or what?” Elle asked.
“We’re having dinner tomorrow night to answer that question,” Megan said. “We were going to have dinner tonight, but Ruby suggested girls’ night, and I guess I used it as an excuse to postpone things.”
“No harm in that,” Elle said. “Besides, I think we all needed this tonight.”
“We did.” Ruby tugged at her ever-present bun. “Although in the interest of full disclosure, I also wanted to tell you something I’d heard about Jake.”
“If it’s any kind of scandalous gossip, I don’t believe a word of it.” After last night, Megan had no doubt Jake was a gentleman through and through. Not many men would remain faithful to a comatose wife for almost a decade, and it told her everything she needed to know about him, as far as she was concerned.
“Not scandalous at all,” Ruby said. “Just…information. And since you’re considering a relationship with him, it feels weird for me to know it and not tell you.”
Megan sipped from her wine. “Spill, then.”
“Apparently, Jake’s wife came from a very strict, religious family. She was saving herself for marriage.”
“Okay,” Megan said, not really understanding what this had to do with Jake.
“They started dating when they were fifteen.” Ruby raised her eyebrows for emphasis. “She fell during the reception, which means they never consummated their marriage.”
“Oh shit,” Megan whispered.
Elle slapped a hand over her mouth.
“Which means, either Jake hasn’t had sex since he was fifteen,” Ruby said, “or if you believe the rumors, he’s still a virgin.”
8
“A virgin?” Megan’s wine sloshed over the side of the glass as she raised it to her lips and gulped. “That’s ridiculous. No way.”
“It’s not ridiculous at all,” Ruby said, “given his situation.”
“That poor man,” Elle said quietly.
“Oh God.” Megan took another gulp from her wine, remembering the awed look on Jake’s face when he’d held her last night. Was it possible he’d never held a woman before? Surely, he and Alana had at least fooled around.
“It’s not a bad thing,” Ruby said. “I mean, if anything, it’s honorable.”
“Should I feel weird about this?” Megan speared a bite of chicken. “I mean, I’m pretty much the opposite of a virgin. And I’ve never had sex with one before either.”
“Not at all,” Ruby said. “It’s really not a big deal. It’s just a rumor I heard, and it felt weird for me not to tell you.”
“How do you have all this town gossip that we don’t?” Elle asked her. “You never go out without us. In fact, I can’t remember the last time you went out at all.”
Ruby was suddenly very interested in her dinner, cutting her chicken with meticulous precision, eyes narrowed behind her glasses.
“Elle’s right,” Megan said. “What’s the deal?”
Ruby glanced guiltily toward her laptop, which sat on the table beside her bed.
“Have you been checking up on Jake on the internet?” Megan asked.
“Like you did with Theo?” Elle added.
“Not exactly.” Ruby looked up at them and sighed. “Okay, I’ve been hanging out in this online group of local gamers.”
“That sounds like you,” Elle said with a grin.
“We play online together,” Ruby said with a shrug. “They get together once a week to play in person, but I haven’t gone yet. I’ve usually been too busy here at the castle.”
“You should totally go,” Megan told her. “I’ll cover for you if anything needs covering. You need to get out more, Ruby, and these sound like your people.”
“Okay, okay,” Ruby said, “but anyway, a couple of the women in the group have crushes on Jake. One of them was a good friend of Alana’s in high school, so she told us the rumors about his virginity.”
“So, nerds are gossips,” Elle said with a smile. “Who knew?”
“We can be huge gossips,” Ruby said. “And everyone would know that if you bothered to pay attention.”
“What are you going to do, Megan?” Elle asked.
“I don’t know,” she answered honestly. This was exactly why she’d decided not to date this year. She needed to sort herself out before she got involved with anyone else. But could she really walk away from Jake without exploring the chemistry between them?
“I think you should do whatever feels right,” Ruby said.
“That’s one of those things that sounds so simple,” Megan said, sipping from her wine. “But how do I know I’m not just letting my hormones cloud my better judgment?”
“Well, what’s the worst that can happen?” Elle asked.
Megan contemplated this for a minute. “Jake realizes he’s not ready, or the sex is terrible and we still have to see each other around the castle every day, or we have great sex but things get awkward between us somehow, and again…we’re stuck working on the same property.”
“I don’t think the sex will be terrible,” Ruby said, grinning into her wine. “And there’s no reason you have to go down to the barn if things get awkward between you two. The rescue horses will be gone soon enough, and then Jake’s on his own from us, more or less.”
“Plus, you’ve always been good at staying civil with your exes in the past,” Elle added.
But this is different, Megan wanted to say. Jake was already more to her than a random man she’d picked up in a bar, and she was still in an emotionally vulnerable place after the accident. But maybe a few passionate nights with Jake could help her heal. “I guess I’ll just see what happens when we have dinner tomorrow night.”
Jake wandered the aisles of the local supermarket, consulting the list of ingredients he needed to cook dinner for Megan tonight. Maybe it was ambitious, cooking for her instead of taking her out, but the things they needed to discuss weren’t things he wanted an audience for.
He wasn’t sure whether they ought to pursue a relationship. It certainly wasn’t ideal, given that they both lived and worked on the castle grounds—close quarters i
f things didn’t work out. But there was no denying the chemistry crackling between them either.
He turned down the toiletry aisle to grab a new bottle of shampoo when the condom display caught his eye. Should he…? He scraped a hand over his chin, glancing surreptitiously up and down the aisle. There was absolutely no reason for him to feel self-conscious about buying condoms, and yet…small town and all. If he was spotted buying condoms, half the population of Towering Pines would know about it in no time. Better not.
But what if things went well between him and Megan tonight? He reached for a box. Ribbed for her pleasure, it announced in big, purple letters. He faltered. Magnum. Ultra. Flavored. Colored. Lubricated. There were dozens of different kinds, and he was painfully aware that he’d never bought condoms before.
It felt almost ludicrous for him to be standing here now, in front of the condom display at the grocery store on a random Sunday afternoon. So what if he and Megan had kissed a couple of times now? That didn’t necessarily mean they would take things farther.
But it was better to be prepared than not, and even if he didn’t have sex with Megan, he was a single man, had been widowed for almost a year, and sooner or later, he was going to have to climb into this particular saddle. Hopefully sooner than later, if his dick had any say in the matter.
He grabbed a nondescript black box and shoved it below the rest of his groceries, continuing down the aisle with what he hoped was casual nonchalance.
“Jake?”
He turned at the sound of his mother-in-law’s voice. Tina Robertson was walking toward him, a wide smile on her face, pushing a cart of her own. “Hi, Tina.”
“Fancy seeing you here,” she said. “How are things going at the castle so far?”
“Really well,” he told her.
“Have you already started training that new horse for Mr. Nichols?”
He nodded. “Duchess. Gorgeous thing. She’ll make a wonderful horse for Kassie.”
“I have no doubt, especially with you training her.” Her gaze dropped to the contents of his cart, and his face turned flaming hot. A package of steaks sat on top, next to a container of baking chocolate and a bottle of red wine. He might as well have written “date” at the top of his shopping list and stuck it to the cart. “Are you cooking dinner for someone?” she asked, her tone rising slightly.
Jake cleared his throat awkwardly. “Having a friend over for dinner, yeah.”
She looked up at him with sad eyes. “It’s been almost a year, Jake. It’s natural that you’ll want to date other women. Alana would want that for you.”
“It’s just dinner, Tina. I’m not sure I’m ready for more than that yet.” The bottle of wine rolled to the side, and the corner of the box of condoms peeked out from beneath a head of lettuce. Jake felt like his face must be redder than the wine.
“Take your time, dear, and do what feels right,” she said, oblivious, as she touched his arm gently.
“I will.” He silently prayed that she wouldn’t look inside his cart again, that she wouldn’t recognize the box for what it was. After all, the Robertsons were so devoutly religious that Alana had been willing to wait until her wedding night to lose her virginity. If Tina saw the box of condoms, she would be disappointed in him, and that feeling sat like a boulder in his gut.
“Well, I won’t keep you,” she said, abandoning her cart to give him a spontaneous hug. “Speaking of dinner, it’s been too long since we’ve had you at our table. Could you make it for supper on Wednesday? I could make that roast you like so much.”
“I’d like that a lot, Tina. Thank you.”
His cheeks were still flaming hot as she turned the corner. He almost grabbed the box of condoms from his cart and put it back on the shelf, but that would be ridiculous. He was a grown-ass man who had a date tonight, a date with a woman who made him hotter than he could ever remember feeling, and he wasn’t going to apologize for it or deny himself this opportunity to move forward with his life.
He finished his shopping and brought the cart to a checkout lane manned by a teenage boy he’d never seen before. The kid rang him up without comment—or recognition—and Jake made it out to his truck without further embarrassment.
At home, he put everything away and pulled up the recipe on his phone that he’d found earlier for chocolate fondue. He just had to make the sauce and put out a plate of stuff for them to dip in it. Sounded easy…and romantic. The only problem was that he couldn’t make it ahead of time. He’d have to melt the chocolate and serve it after supper.
Well, no problem. He might need an activity to keep his hands occupied after they ate. A burst of nerves fired through him. He was so out of practice, so inexperienced.
Dinner. It was just dinner.
To settle his mind, he went down to the barn and saddled Twister. They went for a long ride on the trails adjacent to the castle, breaking into a canter in the open field just over the hill. With the wind whipping in his face and the pounding of Twister’s hooves against the dirt obliterating everything else from his consciousness, Jake finally relaxed. He melted into the saddle, one with the beast beneath him.
After his ride, he took a long shower, shaved, and dressed in a fresh pair of jeans and a black T-shirt. Nothing too fancy. Just dinner. He prepped their salad and rubbed seasoning on the steaks. Didn’t think about the box of condoms in the table beside his bed.
There was a knock at the door.
Everything inside him went all warm and tight. He rubbed his hands against his jeans, took a deep breath, and opened the door. Megan stood there wearing formfitting jeans, a dark green top, and a smile that knocked the knees right out from under him.
Megan stood on Jake’s doorstep, inexplicably breathless at the sight of him. “Hi.”
“Hey.” His eyes melted her from the inside out, his gaze locked on hers as he motioned for her to come inside. “I hope you like steaks?”
She nodded. “That sounds great.”
“I didn’t know,” he paused, giving her a hesitant glance, “so I made sure everything I bought was Kosher.”
She pressed a hand against her chest. “I’m not very strict with it, but it really means a lot to me that you even thought to check. Thank you.” Most men never did. In fact, she wasn’t sure she’d ever dated anyone who had, unless he was Jewish too. But, as she was learning, Jake wasn’t most men.
He nodded, cracking one of those smiles that revealed the dimple in his right cheek. “Wouldn’t make a very good impression if I cooked you a meal you couldn’t eat, would it?”
“Very thoughtful of you.” She stepped closer, sliding her fingers over the kitchen counter. “What would you have done if I was a vegetarian?”
“Uh.” He gave her a blank look, as if this had never crossed his mind. “I reckon we would have put the steaks back in the fridge and gone out to dinner.”
Dammit, she liked him more and more with every word out of his mouth. “Good answer, but I have to say…I’m really looking forward to having you cook for me tonight.”
“I’m glad.” He looked genuinely pleased by this.
She leaned against the counter. “Anything I can help with?”
“Nope. The steaks are already on the grill, so we’re in good shape. Wine?” He gestured toward a bottle on the counter.
“Sure.” She watched as he opened it and poured two glasses. “Thank you.”
“Bug’s still looking good,” he said, raising his glass for a sip. “Checked on her when I took Twister for a ride earlier.”
“I stopped in to visit her before I knocked on your door,” she admitted.
“I see where your priorities are.” There was a teasing glint in his eye.
They kept the easy conversation going while Jake set out their salads, and together they sat at the table to eat. By the time she’d finished her salad, he’d brought in the steaks, which he served with roasted red potatoes.
“This is really good,” she told him after she’d taken a bite of t
he steak. “I have to admit, I didn’t expect you to be able to cook.”
“If a man lives alone long enough, he learns how to cook the basics. It was that or let my in-laws invite me to dinner every night, and while I do love them, I don’t need to spend that much time with them.”
“It must have been awkward, living on their property for so long,” she said.
“Not awkward exactly.” He looked thoughtful. “But…if I say suffocating, that sounds even worse, doesn’t it? It was time for me to move out and move on.”
“I think that’s totally fair,” she agreed. “And I’m glad things worked out with the barn and farmhouse here at the castle.”
“So am I.” He looked up, and their gazes caught. “Although it definitely complicates the things I’m feeling for you.”
“It doesn’t have to.” She tipped her head, watching as he took a sip of his wine. “I’ve dated enough guys to know I’m good at being civil after things end. It wouldn’t have to make our positions here at the castle awkward.”
“That’s good to know…I think.” He gave her an amused glance.
She rolled her eyes. “I’m just saying, I don’t tend to attract drama in my relationships. We could stay friends and be professional to each other afterward, if we got far enough into a relationship to warrant a breakup.”
“Okay.” He looked a little bit uncomfortable with the shift in the conversation.
“This is what we planned dinner to discuss, right?” she said. “How things would work between us if we decided to take things farther?”
“Yes.” He nodded, standing to clear away their plates. “You’re right.”
“I’m not looking for anything serious right now,” she said as she picked up her wine and followed him into the kitchen. “I’m focused on my photography and the stuff we’ve got going on here at the castle. And I’m assuming you’re not either. I mean, you’re just getting back into the dating game.”
“Yeah.” Something heavy shimmered in his eyes.