Chapter 5
5
brONTE
I ’d never had a sidecar before. I honestly thought brandy was nasty after tasting it in college. But now, sipping the drink Sean made for me while seated on his couch, I decided a sidecar just might be my new favorite drink.
“You sure I can’t help you with anything?” I called out.
Sean was making me dinner. He’d pulled some pork chops out of the freezer, thawed them, and was now frying them.
“Nope,” he said. “It’s ready.”
I widened my eyes in surprise, but I was even more surprised as I approached the table and saw four fried pork chops on a plate, a bowl of white gravy, and a separate bowl of mashed potatoes. My mouth watered at the sight.
“I was the only child of a single mom who worked all the time,” Sean said. “My grandma pretty much raised me. She was one of those old-school cooks. She even fried in shortening. Don’t worry, I use vegetable oil.”
“I wouldn’t know what food fried in shortening tastes like,” I said. “My mom was a health nut. Still is. We’d be lucky if we had chicken or turkey. Usually, it was some sort of vegetable or soy substitute.”
Sean stared at me with his usual neutral expression, but I’d swear I saw a hint of sympathy in his eyes. I’d take that sympathy.
“Another drink?” he asked.
I shook my head. I was halfway through this one. I should probably pace myself.
“I’ll grab you some water,” he said.
He didn’t wait for my answer. He just turned and went to the cabinet, grabbing a glass to fill with ice and water. I was surprised to see he poured the water from a bottle.
“I don’t need a glass,” I said too late. “You could have just brought the bottle. I’m not really fancy.”
He set the glass in front of me and shrugged. “I’m not used to company, if you can’t tell.”
He gestured toward the table, and I assumed he was indicating the plain white plates at each place setting. They weren’t much different than the flower-covered ones my roommate and I ate off of—when we cooked. In fact, he was definitely doing better than the two of us. Far better.
I was so busy looking at the place settings, I didn’t realize at first that we were standing awkwardly. He was waiting for me to make the first move, so I gripped the back of the chair and pulled it away from the table, then sat down. Only then did he finally sit.
“So, what do you do for fun?” I asked, eager to keep the conversation light.
We’d discussed some pretty heavy stuff over the course of the very short time we’d known each other, and I wanted to get to know him without bringing my petty life problems into it.
He gestured toward the wood carving near the door to his right. “That’s pretty much it. Every Saturday, I head over to Adairsville for supplies, and the rest of the time I either work or carve.”
I didn’t know how to ask my next question. I wanted to know so much more. Did he have friends? Did he talk to his neighbors? Did he hang out with his coworkers? What about his military brothers, as he called them? They’d all moved here to work. Wouldn’t it stand to reason they’d hang out?
But mostly, I wanted to ask if there were any women in his life. Seduction Summit was a small town, but the lodge was full of people.
Finally, I just blurted it out before I could lose my nerve. “You’ve never been married? No kids?”
He shook his head. “Nope. You?”
“Well, I’m twenty-three, so…”
I froze, fork and knife in hand. Now that sounded rude. He was clearly older, but not that much older. Mid-thirties, I was guessing. Someone at that age would typically have a story, wouldn’t they?
Maybe not. Maybe I was making a lot of assumptions.
“I gave my twenties to the military,” Sean said. “I just settled here a few years ago…”
Now he was the one who trailed off. Meanwhile, I slid my first bite of pork chop into my mouth and closed my eyes as a variety of flavors lit up my taste buds. Finally, I chewed and swallowed.
“Holy shit, that was good.” My eyes popped open, and I smiled. “I don’t even normally use that kind of language, but that’s the best piece of meat I’ve ever put in my mouth.”
The words were out before I’d really thought through what I was saying. They were completely innocent, but they didn’t sound so innocent.
I set down my fork with a loud clang, knife still in my left hand as heat rose to my face. I didn’t normally blush, but I was fair-complected enough that if I was turning even a slight shade of pink, it would probably show.
Sean stared at me a long moment, the hint of a smile tugging at his mouth. “One of my best dishes. I also make a really good ribeye.”
“You’ll have to show me sometime,” I said.
Our eyes held at those words. They came with a lot of weight. I was basically saying I wanted him to cook dinner for me in the future, which meant we had a future. I could be talking as friends, though, right?
“Only if you bake me something,” he said. “I have a sweet tooth.”
“Sounds like we’ll make a good pair,” I said.
I’d done it again. Was it the brandy? No, I’d barely had enough to even feel the effects yet, and he hadn’t mixed it very strong.
This was something else. This was me feeling comfortable being open with him. I’d never had that with a man before, especially not one who also made me feel warm and tingly inside.
“You have a deal,” I said when he said nothing about my “good pair” comment. “What’s your favorite dessert?”
“Apple pie with ice cream. I guess that’s called à la mode.”
A groan escaped at the mention of apple pie. I didn’t even realize the sound had come out until he frowned at me.
“That’s what lost me the competition,” I said. “We had to pick a bunch of ingredients from a stash in the corner. I was one of the few who managed to get some really good ingredients in the scramble. I was sure that was going to seal the deal for me. I make a kick-ass apple pie. Strawberry too. Have you ever had strawberry pie?”
Now I had his attention. “That sounds amazing.”
“I’ll definitely make that one for you sometime.”
Again, future planning. But he seemed okay with that. He wasn’t freaking out like guys had done on some of my friends when they mentioned anything beyond the immediate moment.
“Their loss,” he said.
It took me a second to realize he was talking about the competition. Funny, if I hadn’t met him, my loss would probably consume every single thought I was having right now. But I’d completely shoved it to the back of my mind almost as soon as I’d seen him again.
What did that say? It said the competition wasn’t really all that important in the grand scheme of things.
“Thank you,” I said. “I’m sure I’ll look back on all of this someday and realize it was for the best, but right now it hurts, you know?”
I was making myself vulnerable to this guy. I was opening up like I wouldn’t have even opened up to my closest friends. I didn’t like to be seen as weak. I wanted everyone to believe I had it all together.
But I didn’t want this conversation to be loaded down with negativity. In an effort to lighten the mood, I blurted, “You’ll have to carve something for me. Maybe you could make a wooden figure in my likeness. Do you ever do people?”
That was a stupid question, considering if I turned around, I’d be looking right at the figure of a little boy holding a towel. The detail was impressive.
“I don’t think I could capture your beauty in wood,” he said.
I nearly choked on the bite of creamy mashed potatoes I’d just taken. I took a drink of water to catch my breath and avoid making a fool of myself in front of this guy. Well, more of a fool of myself than I’d already made, that was.
“Thank you,” I finally said as I set my glass down. “I’ve never had anyone do anything like that. I can’t imagine it would be easy to do.”
“I could carve a figurine in an hour or so. It wouldn’t have much detail, but I could do a basic outline of you.”
An outline of me. Suddenly I was imagining him sculpting my body out of wood, taking extra pains on my breasts and hips. It would almost be like having him touch me.
I squirmed in my seat a little and was surprised to find I was wet. Just the thought of Sean carving a wood sculpture of me was turning me on.
Was that weird? I wasn’t sure.
“Would you carve my clothes too?” I asked.
He shook his head. Then he nonchalantly popped a bite of pork chop into his mouth, as though that head shake hadn’t sucked all the air out of my lungs.
“So would it be an outline of me naked?” I somehow managed to ask.
He nodded, then shrugged. My heart was pounding as I picked up my fork and knife, but my hands were shaking too. He was sure to see that. I did my best to slice off another small piece of meat as I waited for him to speak.
“I wouldn’t want to offend you,” he finally said.
“How would you know what I look like under all my clothes?”
I wanted more than anything to see how he pictured me naked. No man had ever seen me without my clothes on. Were men always imagining what I looked like underneath whatever I was wearing?
More importantly—was this man imagining that?
“I can use my imagination,” he said. “Not that I’m picturing you without your clothes on. Well…”
For a second, I thought he was going to correct that. I should keep my mouth shut, but instead I reached for my glass—the one with brandy in it—and took a big sip for courage before setting it down and speaking.
“Describe me,” I said. “How do you imagine me?”
He was confused. I should expect that. He just stared at me with that same neutral expression that was driving me crazy. I wanted to know what the guy was thinking, and he hardly wore his emotions on his sleeve. The opposite. They were locked away in a vault, and I had a feeling nobody got the key.
“Rose-colored,” he said.
I didn’t want to ask, but I had to know. “Rose-colored?”
“Your nipples. Am I wrong?”
I frowned. “I guess I haven’t really assigned them a color. I read somewhere that nipples are the same color as a person’s lips.”
At the time, I thought maybe I should go check in the mirror and see. I didn’t do it, though. The thought of staring at myself naked made me blush. It felt like something I shouldn’t do. Like something good girls didn’t do.
“And those hips,” he said. “I picture your chest tapering to a waist that then flares out to the most beautiful hips I’ve ever seen. It’d be hard to look at them without wanting to run my hands over them.”
I wasn’t eating at all now. I wasn’t sure I was even breathing. All I could do was stare at him as he talked to me, his words taking my breath.
“Sorry, is that too forward?” he asked, suddenly looking down at his plate.
He’d stabbed a piece of pork chop with his fork and now held it there, not moving, just looking at it. He’d only eaten one of his pork chops, and I had a feeling normally he would have cleared his plate already.
“No,” I said. “It’s just…nobody’s ever said those words to me. I’m new to all of this.”
His head snapped up. “New to all of what?”
I gestured to indicate the area in front of me. “This.”
But that didn’t make sense. I wasn’t new to eating. I was newish to eating pork chops, if that counted. But what I was really new to was talking to a guy about these things.
“Having a guy tell me I’m beautiful,” I said. “I’ve never had any of that.”
He narrowed his eyes. “You’ve been in relationships, though. You’ve dated.”
I hesitated. How did I say this?
“Nothing serious. A few first dates that never went anywhere. Crushes on guys who didn’t even know I existed, that sort of thing.”
“Any guy who doesn’t know you exist is blind as a bat,” he said. “And stupid on top of it. As I said earlier about the competition, their loss.”
I stared at him, not speaking. I wasn’t sure what to say to all this. I couldn’t imagine a guy like him would see me as beautiful—not even on my best day—and that made little sense since I had plenty of confidence. But guys like him usually didn’t go for girls with my kinds of curves, did they?
I’d lived my life hiding from adventure. I was suddenly seeing that, clear as day. It wasn’t that I couldn’t attract a guy and get naked with him. It was that I hadn’t even tried. New things scared me.
But today, I’d gone for a run on a snowy mountain trail and met a super-hot lumberjack. Today was all about adventure.
So I took another big sip of my drink, summoned my courage, and blurted out what I wanted before I could stop myself.
“I want you to make a wood figure out of me,” I said. “And I’ll pose for it.”