Nichole walked up the stairs to the main entrance and rang the bell. The door swung open. Chase stood in an unbuttoned dress shirt. His wrinkled tie hung loose around his shoulders. He looked disheveled and dashing and drew her in like a magnetic field. She said, “I’m guessing your grandmother didn’t take the news well.”
“My mother and sisters were there too.” Chase opened the door wider and motioned her inside. “They were thrilled I married you.”
“But,” she pressed. No area rugs softened her footsteps on the worn hardwood floors, nothing dulled the racing pulse buzzing in her ears.
“They have to be invited to my next marriage and be included in the wedding planning.” Chase shut the door and walked barefoot past her.
“You’re getting married again?” Nichole skipped her gaze from the fitted white T-shirt under his dress shirt to his bare feet and back again. Opposites do not attract. She ran her hand across the microfiber couch in a familiar red wine color rather than reach for Chase and conduct her own experiment on the outdated opposites attract theory.
“Definitely not on the agenda, but don’t tell them that, please,” he said. “What about you?”
“What about me?” I’m definitely not interested in you. Not like that. Her hand stilled on the couch as if he’d caught her reading his personal files.
“Do you want to get married for real?” He moved closer, his gaze serious. His tone thoughtful.
“I did.” I could. Nichole blinked, disconnected her old daydreams and blamed Josie. Had Nichole not put on the stunning wedding gown or carried a bouquet of her favorite flowers or stood inside Chase’s embrace, she’d never have imagined again. That old whimsy caught her, and she whispered, “Once upon a time.”
“And now?” His voice softened to a murmur. His gaze warmed as if he too saw her in the wedding gown. As if he too imagined.
Stop. She unplugged the illusion. Willed her racing heart to quit. She needed to be convincing. “I have other priorities.” Her son. In A Pinch. Helping her grandparents retire. Never getting her heart broken again.
Chase clutched the ends of his tie as if centering himself. “One of which is Wesley.” He checked the time. “We don’t want to be late.”
“I’ve mastered the car line.” She hadn’t mastered what to tell Wesley. Or how to tell him. Or how to protect her son. “We still have time.”
Chase motioned to his suit pants and started for the staircase. “Make yourself at home while I change. I’ll be fast.”
Nichole wandered into the kitchen, away from her ill-timed thoughts. The appliances looked a decade older than the dated ones in her rental. The cabinets might’ve been circa 1930s but the layered paint on the cabinet doors obscured the wood. The kitchen wasn’t restored vintage charm or modern and sleek. And nothing she expected Chase Jacobs to own. The Chase Jacobs portrayed in the media should have a high-end bachelor pad that converted to a swanky nightclub in the evening. Every extravagant toy from a speedboat to a 4Runner to a snowmobile in his garage. Yet she’d glimpsed the tailgate of an older truck on her way to the stairs.
One lone placemat sat at the head of the oval kitchen table. Nichole skirted the table and drab eating nook and moved into the connecting sunroom. A floral-patterned couch was the only foliage in the room aside from several small pots of herbs sitting on a TV tray—the kind she hadn’t seen since she’d been about six. The bright space begged for a potted palm tree or a fountain. She picked up several CDs from one of the many stacks towering on the floor. Her mouth dropped open.
Not CDs, but audiobooks. Nichole flipped through one stack. Everything from classic literature to biographies to current fiction filled the pile.
“Those aren’t mine.” Chase’s deep voice came from behind her, defensive and guarded.
Nichole spun around, still holding an audiobook, and swallowed her apology for snooping. “You have a roommate?”
“Never. I’ve always lived alone.” Chase bent down, straightened one of the stacks and avoided looking at her. “They belong to an old girlfriend.”
Nichole read the title of the audiobook she held. “Your ex liked to learn about how to build the supreme male body.”
Chase rubbed his chin. “What can I say? She had rather eclectic tastes.”
And Chase had secrets. Ones he refused to share with her. That shouldn’t bother her. Business deals were never personal. Emotions were always excluded. Yet the slight needled her. She set the audiobook next to the herb plants. “Did your ex grow herbs too?”
“Those are mine.” Chase checked the soil in one pot, affection in his tone. “Can’t cook without fresh herbs.”
The man before her was somewhat of a contradiction. She never liked those much. Always wanted to reason through the different layers and make sense of every inconsistency.
The boy she’d known had despised reading. Claimed literature belonged to the select few who could understand it. The man she fake married, the one she knew from the endless media stories, wasn’t sprawled out on a sofa, listening to Homer’s Odyssey, waiting for his fresh herbs to grow. That man was mingling with fans, devising new escapades and winning over the public. “You cook often?”
“As often as I can.” Chase carried one of the herb plants to the kitchen sink.
She walked back through the kitchen into the living room and stared at the stained glass windows framing the fireplace. The original glasswork attempted to stand out despite the deterioration around the rest of the house. The same way Chase stood out. Except now, Nichole questioned who he really was.
“Why haven’t you fixed this place up?” Even Nichole, the least qualified DIY-er in the state, could see the potential. Envision the possibilities.
“I don’t own this place.” Chase sat on the couch and tied his running shoes. “I rent it.”
“You rent?” Nichole rolled her lips together too late. The shock already bounced against the scratched hardwood floors.
“It’s not that much of
