9. Clara
CLARA
The brush slid over the canvas like silk over skin. I could feel the colors coming alive beneath my fingertips; vibrant blues, bright yellows, and greens so vivid, you could get lost in their depths.
I sighed in contentment as I looked at the image before me. I’d never been at peace like this in all the years I lived on the ranch. After days of setting up a small studio for myself on the opposite side of my new office, I finally had the time to sit down and be at one with nature.
And it was magical.
“What in the hell is that?” Krista asked as she walked into the room, grimacing at my attempt to be an artist.
“It’s the mountains.”
She came closer, cocking her head to the side as she studied the landscape. “That is most definitely not the mountains. Maybe a woman laying down with her nipples sticking up. Is she orgasming?”
I smacked my daughter before dipping my brush in the jar of water. “It was supposed to be my attempt at a masterpiece.”
“Oh, it’s a piece of something, alright,” she snorted, striding over to my desk where she plopped down, kicking her feet up on my desk. “So, what’s with the painting?”
“I always wanted to do it. I thought it would be peaceful.”
“Was it?”
“Until you walked in and called my mountains nipples.”
“Well, come on, Mom. Those are not mountains. But if you keep it up, you might have a talent for painting erotic images.”
Maybe I wasn’t cut out to be an artist like I thought. My back groaned as I got up, taking off my apron. Hours of sitting in one spot didn’t agree with my body. I wasn’t used to sitting for so long in one position.
“Well, maybe I’ll have better luck with my writing.”
“Yeah, I heard about that. Any idea what you’re going to write?”
“I was thinking about maybe a female detective mystery.”
She grimaced at the idea, her nose scrunching up as she turned away from me. Obviously, she wasn’t on board with that.
“Okay, then what do you suggest I write?”
“Well, if it were me, I’d say write what you know.”
That left very little to work with. “So, I should write about being a bored housewife?”
“Or a romance.”
After my fight with Ben the other night, I wasn’t sure I was the right person to give my two cents to the romance community. “I’m not sure I have anything to say about that subject that anyone would want to read.”
“Just write about you and Daddy.”
She made it sound so simple, but what was once a passionate romance between us had dwindled into something no sane person would care to read about.
“Do you really think a book about old people having sex would sell?”
“You’re not that old. Besides, you can write about when you were younger.” Her eyes filled with laughter as she waggled her eyebrows at me. “Make it dirty.”
“Krista!” I couldn’t believe my daughter was talking to me like that. “I would never put my sex life out there like that.”
“Why not? Plenty of people read it. I bet you didn’t know that the romance genre takes up fifty-five percent of the market.”
Rolling my eyes, I walked away from the ridiculous conversation. “How would you even know that?”
“Because I’ve been going to the bookstore quite a bit lately. I have a thing for bikers.”
I really didn’t want to know any more, yet I found myself glancing back at her curiously. “Like, you’re taken by a biker and…forced to ride his bike?”
She barked out a laugh at my naivety. “More like he takes me back to his clubhouse and makes me get a tattoo of his name. Among other things,” she grinned.
I covered my face, mortified that my daughter was telling me about her fantasies. “I can’t be hearing this.”
“And sometimes, the biker takes his woman in front of everyone.”
“Oh my gosh! Stop!”
“And when she’s really bad, he spanks her.”
I was burning up, partially from embarrassment, but also with curiosity. It wasn’t like I’d never read a dirty book before, but I definitely never discussed it with my children.
“Well, you can be sure that I’ll never write something like that.”
“Why not? I bet you’d enjoy it.”
From the massive grin on her face, she was enjoying teasing me a little too much. “So, painting is out for me.”
“But dirty books—”
“I think I might go make some dinner.”
I headed for the door, but she jumped up and quickly dashed ahead of me, blocking my exit. “Come on, Mom. You can’t be that much of a prude. Just let me take you to the bookshop with me. I’m sure we’ll find something to…give you inspiration.”
When she widened her eyes knowingly at me, I knew I could never look at her the same way again. My daughter was…well, she was everything I was when I was younger. Only, there was no way I’d ever have said those words to my own mother. She’d have had a heart attack.
“We are not talking about this any longer.”
Her gaze narrowed on me, and no matter how hard I tried to keep my eyes on her, I gave in and looked down.
“Fine, I’ll agree to stop nagging you about this if you agree to go to Cassidy’s store with me.”
“For what purpose?”
“Well, you’re trying to change things, right?”
I sighed, already knowing where she was going with this.
“How can you discover the new you without trying something different?”
I was stuck. If I didn’t want to hear about her fantasies, I had no choice but to go along with her. It was only one day in a shop. It couldn’t be that bad. Besides, she was right. I was all about trying new things right now.
“Fine. I’ll go with you as long as you agree to buy whatever books I want.”
“Deal.” She shoved her hand out, locking mine in a firm grip, shaking it hard. “I am so going to enjoy this.”
I rolled my eyes as we walked out, but my confidence in my plan quickly wavered as we walked through the shop doors of Once Upon A Bookseller only twenty minutes later.
I was immediately bombarded by commentary from all around. It was like senior citizens day at the bookshop, only these old ladies were not getting cookbooks and sewing magazines.
“Cassidy, dear. Did you get that new Why Choose book I was telling you about?” Mrs. Abernathy called across the store.
I glanced around, looking for Cassidy, but not seeing her. Maybe she wasn’t actually there. Maybe this was all in Mrs. Abernathy’s head.
Krista leaned in, keeping her voice low. “A Why Choose is a romance novel where the heroine has multiple men to choose from, but decides she wants them all.”
My eyebrows shot up at her explanation, but I tried to keep the shocked look off my face. This was a new age. My old Harlequin romances were a thing of the past, apparently.
Just then, Cassidy popped up from behind the counter, her hair a frazzled mess as she held her hand up in the air with what I was guessing was Mrs. Abernathy’s book. “Right here! I almost couldn’t find it,” she said, rushing around the counter.
Mrs. Buttersworth stopped her on the way. “Um…dear, I was looking for a uh…well, I was watching this show the other night, and I just couldn’t help but notice how handsome the men were.”
She flushed bright red as she tried to spit out the words.
“He was a Highlander,” she hissed.
“Highlanders, pirates, and regency romance is all on the second to last shelf on the left over there.”
My eyes quickly followed the direction, and it took everything in me not to rush over there and see what all the fuss was about. After all, I didn’t want word to spread around town that I was getting my rocks off in the bookstore.
Well, buying dirty books. Not that I would actually get off in a bookstore.
I fanned myself, trying to flush the heat from my cheeks. “Is it hot in here?”
Krista chuckled, pulling my hand over to the first row of shelves. “This is your typical, everyday romance. Modern day, normal guys. All that stuff.”
“Normal guys? What does that mean?”
But she didn’t bother to answer. Instead, she continued to another aisle, pointing out more books. “Werewolves, dragons, vampires…basically all your shifter books.”
Shifter books? I mouthed, wondering what in the hell she was talking about.
“And down this aisle, we have your fantasy and your romantasy.”
“What the heck is romantasy?”
“Fantasy with romance elements.” She cocked her head, thinking it over. “Or romance with fantasy elements? I’m not sure. You’d have to ask Cassidy. But think of fae, mages, witches—”
“Okay, this is all over my head. I officially have no clue what you’re talking about.”
Grinning, she picked up the nearest book and plopped it in my hands. “Read the synopsis, then search for whatever your heart desires.”
And with that, she left me alone to stand in the middle of the bookstore with no idea what I was looking for or where to start.
“Anything I can help you with?” Cassidy asked with a knowing grin plastered on her face.
I let out a humorless laugh. “Any chance you have a novel to do with kings?”
It was a joke, obviously, but she took my hand and pulled me down another aisle where she pulled a book off the shelf and placed it in my hands.
“Here Be Dragons.”
“However, if you’re looking for something a tad spicier, I would head over to the Highlander section with Mrs. Buttersworth.”
I found myself glancing around the store, checking to make sure no one was watching me before I ventured down one aisle after another, basing my choices purely on the covers that attracted me.
Hours went by, and when the shop was ready to close, I found myself in a corner with a stack of books, reading the first chapters of all of them to see which intrigued me.
I had every single kind of genre stacked around me, each of them begging for someone to flip the pages and fall into their world.
“Mom?”
I peeled my eyes away from the page just long enough to find the sun had shifted around the room. “Is it that late?”
“I didn’t want to interrupt you, but Cassidy wants to go home.”
“Oh, I didn’t realize,” I said, scrambling to my feet.
My hair fell in my face as I rushed to pick up all the books I wanted, gathering them in my arms. By the time I got to the counter, I was a hot mess, and not because of the books I’d chosen, but because I hadn’t bothered to change before I came out, and my hair was still tossed up in a messy knot, falling chaotically around my shoulders.
“I’m sorry to have kept you waiting,” I apologized as Cassidy started ringing up my purchases.
“It’s no problem. I used to find myself lost in the pages as well.”
“Not anymore?”
“Well—” She bit her lip. It was clear that a certain someone kept her entertained and she no longer needed the novels to lose herself in.
“Sorry,” I rushed on. “I sometimes forget that Sam and you—”
“Well, he’s out of town so much, it’s easy to forget.”
She must get so frustrated by his constant absence. “Doesn’t it bother you?”
“What? His job?” She shook her head with a smile. “Sometimes, but most of the time, I’m fine with it. He loves to box, and I know it won’t last forever. Eventually, he’ll come home and brood.”
I knew all too well about a brooding man. I didn’t envy the day it happened to her.
“But when he’s gone, we find other ways to keep the relationship alive.”
“That’s nice,” I smiled. “Talking on the phone is always a good idea.”
“Talking and…other things,” Krista laughed.
“Shut up!”
My eyes widened in shock when I realized what Krista meant. They really were playing a young person’s game. I had never in all my life done something like that. Of course, Ben had never been away from home long enough for us to miss each other that much.
But wasn’t even one night enough? As we left the store, I started to wonder if the spark had gone out long before I realized. Had we put in the effort sooner, would things be different between us?
“Thinking about your Highlanders?” Krista asked as we walked to the car with our bags of books.
I smiled tightly at her. It was times like this that I wished I had a good girlfriend to discuss relationships with. There were just some things a mother didn’t discuss with her daughter.