A Lover's Secret by Bethany Bloom Read Free Book Online Page A

out
the front door. Just for a moment. Just so she could breathe.
    She would walk, just around the block. The wind picked up
and the spring air bit into her skin. She felt her nipples hard against her
bra, against her dress, and she rubbed at her bare arms. Why couldn’t people
just leave her alone? That’s all she wanted, really. A car roared by and a man
hung his head out the passenger window and shouted something. Something
unintelligible. She must have looked ridiculous, walking along on the side of
the road in high heels and the tightest mint green satin.
    She could feel the wind blowing the dress against her. She
looked down and regarded the silhouette of her own body. The way her breasts
pushed against the fabric. The soft barely-there, feminine mound of her
stomach. She drew her gauzy scarf around her shoulders and continued to walk,
faster now.
    Her feet were beginning to pound. The left pad of her foot
was almost numb, and she thought about taking off her shoes. Of swinging them
in her hands. Of feeling the earth on her feet as she strode along the
sidewalk. The tiny rocks digging into the fleshy part of her foot. The sole,
her heels. Tiny twinges of pain.
    What was wrong with her? Was it seeing him again, after so
long? After so many years of remembering that kiss. Even now, imagining it, a
wave of warmth coursed through her. All she had to do to make that feeling go
away was to remember his arrogance. “You’ll call. You’ll change your mind.” He was so sure of himself. Like every woman he met was a sure thing. But there
was nothing sure about her. Jake Lassiter had never met a woman like
her, Jess thought with a laugh. That was a certainty. No one so confused, so
inexperienced, so utterly lame at the game of life.
    A burst of wind sent a shiver down her back. She thought
about going back to the church. She knew she really should. The bride and groom
hadn’t even left yet. She hadn’t thrown the birdseed. But, here, in front of
her, was that coffee shop. The one she had loved escaping into with her father
as a child. It was always just the two of them. They would read the newspaper
together on Sundays, after church. Or they would just sit and talk. His
favorite thing to discuss, always, had been the variety of amazing things she
would accomplish with her life. The diseases she would find a cure for. The
honors she would accumulate. The good she would do with her logical yet
nurturing brain. One time, her father had even asked her to autograph his
napkin, because, he said, it would be worth so much once she had won her Nobel
Prize.
    The last thing she ever wanted to do was to disappoint him.
Now, since she’d come home, her father could hardly bring himself to look at
her. He could hardly be in the same room with her. She shivered again and found
herself pulling open the glass door.
    The café smelled exactly the way she remembered it. Like
amaretto and waffle cones, melding with the bitter scent of Dark Roast
Espresso, so strong it seemed to throb. The place was empty, and a slow beat
churned from the speakers behind the counter.
    A tall Jamaican man at the cash register gathered his long
black dreadlocks in his hand, moving them behind his shoulders, and then he
smiled. “Am I missing the party?” he asked.
    “Pardon?”
    “You aren’t dressed for a solo coffee run.”
    “Oh. Yes. I’m just taking a little break from a wedding.”
    “Ah. That explains it. So what will you have, pretty lady?”
    Jess blushed. “Coffee. Black.” She looked at his deep ebony
skin, and she worried that perhaps he would think she was addressing him, so
she said, quickly, “I mean, with no sugar or creamer, please.”
    He laughed, low, and his eyes flashed. “I have a nip of
something back here if you want it.”
    A nip of something? What did he say? Was her nip showing?
“Pardon?” she said again, wishing that being alone with a man didn’t always
make her so ridiculously nervous.
    “A jigger of something