She ripped three packets off the strip then noticed the numbers printed on the packets.
They’d expired.
She let out a rueful chuckle. She hadn’t had sex in so long that her condoms had expired.
It didn’t make sense, though. Condoms were good for a few years, weren’t they? It had only been eleven months for her...though she’d stopped using condoms with that guy several months earlier.
Hmm. Maybe she had a newer box.
Amber searched through the rest of her night table and came up empty.
Alright. She needed to get condoms. Best to be prepared, and she was going to the bar with her friends tonight—perhaps she’d get lucky. Unlikely, but not impossible.
It was three o’clock and she wasn’t meeting Gloria and Roxanne until seven. She’d run out to the grocery store, which had a pharmacy. Surely they’d stock condoms, and hopefully there would be discounted Christmas chocolate, too.
Condoms and chocolate. How wholesome.
* * *
Amber lived in Stratford, Ontario. Home of the Stratford Festival and the Ontario Pork Congress, as the sign said. It had about thirty thousand people, so it wasn’t huge, but it was much bigger than the town where she’d grown up, Mosquito Bay, which had a population of less than two thousand.
Her apartment was nothing special, but fortunately, it was less than a ten-minute walk from the grocery store. She picked up a basket at the entrance and quickly located the Christmas chocolate. She was able to get cheap Santas and reindeer chocolate, plus some truffles. She also managed to find some candy cane ice cream for less than two bucks.
After that, she headed to the “family planning” section, feeling a little uncomfortable. Even though she was twenty-six and not at all ashamed of her love for sex, there was just something about buying condoms that made her cheeks turn bright red.
It was probably because of what happened the first time she’d tried to buy condoms.
She’d gone to the lone pharmacy in Mosquito Bay. Seventeen years old and ready to have sex with her first douchebag boyfriend. Thankfully, her father worked at the pharmacy in Ashton Corners, the next town over, and not this pharmacy. But as she was heading to the cashier, her grandmother came in, noticed the box in her hand, and screeched, “Aiyah! What are you doing?”
Ever since, Amber had hated buying condoms.
She looked left, then right.
No grandmothers or other family members. Excellent. Seeing as her grandmother didn’t live in Stratford, it was unlikely, but you could never be too careful.
She knelt down and plucked a box of condoms off the shelf. When she stood up—
“Ow!” she exclaimed as she knocked into someone, who must have been reaching for something above her head.
“Sorry, I’m so sorry,” said a low voice.
She rubbed her head as she turned around. The guy was kind of cute. A stocky East Asian man, her age or a little older, with short hair. Even his frown was appealing.
She had a split second to consider that he could help her with her New Year’s resolution before she noticed the box of Magnums in his hand.
Amber couldn’t help rolling her eyes.
She’d had two boyfriends who’d insisted they needed larger-than-average condoms, but honestly, they were both average size—which was fine. However, with the second boyfriend, the condom had slipped off, and she’d had to take the morning-after pill. After that, she’d insisted on normal condoms.
But what if this man is actually...
Well, whatever. Amber wasn’t a size queen; she was the Queen of Bad Boyfriends. More likely, this guy had an inflated ego.
And then something truly horrifying came out of his mouth.
“Amber Wong? Is that you?”
Oh, God! This handsome guy with the box of Magnum condoms knew her!
She regarded him closely. There was something familiar about his features.
“Sebastian Lam?” she whispered.
He nodded.
The Lams had been good friends with her family when they were growing up. Sebastian was the same age as her brother Zach, and they’d been best friends.
Yes, someone who’d seen her play hopscotch and belt out tunes with a hairbrush as her microphone had now seen her put a box of condoms in her basket.
It seemed wrong.
“You’ve, uh, grown up,” he said.
“Brilliant observation. I thought you were out west, doing your residency.”
“I finished.”
“And now you’re working in Stratford?”
“Small town about twenty minutes from here. The doctor retired and I took over his practice, but I live in Stratford.”
Sebastian had always been a good kid. His mother had bragged about him constantly, much to Amber’s annoyance. He’d been a great student, excellent piano player, and then he’d gone to med school.
Holy shit, when had Mr. Perfect Son gotten so hot?
* * *
This was wrong.
Sebastian should not find Amber Wong so attractive.
He did some quick math. She’d be twenty-six now. He assured himself there was nothing weird about a thirty-year-old man lusting after a twenty-six-year-old woman. Perfectly reasonable.
But this was Amber. Zach’s little sister. The last time he’d seen her, she’d been in high school and he’d been in university. It was hard to reconcile the woman standing in front of him with the girl he remembered. He’d barely recognized her.
Her dark brown hair was in a low ponytail that curled over her shoulder, and her lips were pink and full and lickable. She was still petite, but she had curves that hadn’t been there before. Very appealing curves.
“You have a romantic night planned?” He gestured to her basket, with the box of condoms and surplus of chocolate. Surely she’d tell him that she had a boyfriend, making her completely off-limits.
“You think Christmas chocolate and candy cane ice cream on January fifth means I’m planning a romantic night?”
He scratched the back of his neck. “I don’t know. But...condoms.”
“Useful things to have on hand. Mine expired.”
He couldn’t help chuckling.
“What about you?” she asked. “What are your condoms for?”
She said it casually, as though it didn’t matter at all to her, but her gaze traveled over his body, and stupidly, he puffed out his chest.
He’d had a
