AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She looked down at herself, with her denim painter’s coveralls. “I should take this off.”
He shrugged. “Sure.”
“What should I wear?” she asked uncertainly. “Should I change what I’ve got on underneath? Should I—”
“Melanie.” His voice was deep and brooked no opposition. “You are a grown woman, in charge of your life. In charge of your own decisions, big and small. You do not need me—you do not need any man—to tell you what to wear.”
She stared at him, stunned, as if this revelation had never occurred to her. Then she flushed. She’d been doing to him what she’d done to Wilder throughout their marriage; deferring to him about what she should do with and to her own body. Struggling to master the heat in her face, she nodded way too vigorously. “Of course.” She tried to make her voice sound casual. “I will be ready in fifteen minutes.”
By the time he was back, she had changed into one of her new pairs of jeans and tops, both items that she had been gifted at the spa by the strange, irascible little woman. And she had to admit that these fit her much better than her old ones. They hugged her curves closely, yet allowed easy movement, and were a size or two smaller than the baggy old garments she had grown accustomed to hiding herself behind.
Even as she got dressed, she noticed that her body felt more toned, trimmer, even though in the last few days she’d frequently forgotten to log her calories, much to the annoyance of her diet app, which had begun sending her passive-aggressive notifications like, Have You Given Up on Yourself? and I Miss You!
But no, she hadn’t given up on herself, far from it. She was sure that her stronger body had come from the many hours she spent every day working alongside Corbin and the craftsmen or helping Rhys and Zanifa in their garden.
She stepped into the early afternoon sunshine to find Corbin standing with his back against his truck. Immediately, his dogs spotted her, and poured out of the back window in a stream of hair and happy yelps. They flung themselves at her, and she laughed under their gleeful assault. Simone especially was happy to have her sister-friend back and pranced around with her mouth curved into a wide smile.
Corbin let his eyes travel up and down her, his satisfaction evident, but said nothing about how she looked. Instead, he suggested, “Let’s walk. We will enjoy one of the trails in the woods, then find a path that leads back to my house. I have a roast in the oven: it will be ready by the time we get there.”
It was hard to walk shoulder to shoulder with him because the dogs constantly competed for their attention, jostling their legs, twining themselves in and out, and generally getting underfoot. Once in a while they spotted a squirrel or lizard and pelted off into the undergrowth in a merry chase, but Corbin seemed unbothered even when they were out of sight. He knew they would come back.
Whenever their entourage allowed them to walk more closely to each other, he reached out and took her hand. No fanfare, not making too big a deal of it, not even exchanging glances. He just took her hand and kept walking.
For Melanie that brought a wonderful feeling of warmth and security. She would have expected that she would feel nervous, anxious, all aflutter… but no. There was nothing but a deep-seated serenity. Corbin was that kind of man.
“Here we are,” he said softly as they rounded a twist in the track.
Melanie looked around herself, surprised. They’d approached the house from a completely different direction, and her radar was so off that she was sure that if he and the dogs hadn’t guided her she would have been wandering around for days. Probably winding up asking an old crone in a gingerbread house for directions. The idea made her giggle.
He gave her an enquiring look and she explained. He laughed. “Winding up in an oven would not be good.”
“Huh. I’d push her in first,” she scoffed.
“I’m sure you would, little firecracker.”
Then, to her absolute shock, he leaned forward and kissed her, softly and lightly, his lips lingering for just a few moments before he lifted his head and gazed down at her. His eyes seemed darker and more intense, and Melanie could feel the ripple of heat that he had caused move through her.
“What was… why did you do that?”
He shrugged, turning to unlock the back door and ushering her inside. The dogs bolted past them, panting happily, and went straight for their water bowls. “I wanted to remove the question, get it out of both our heads right away, before it ruined our afternoon.”
“What question?” she stammered.
“Will he or won’t he?”
She narrowed her eyes at him. His ego was showing a little, she decided. “Will you or won’t you what?”
“Kiss you,” he said simply. “In case you were wondering whether I intended to kiss you this afternoon, the answer was yes. Now, I have removed all doubt, so we can eat in peace.”
She bristled at the idea that he thought she was waiting on this. “Why would I be wondering—”
“We begin with soup,” he announced, withdrawing a pair of stoneware bowls from a cupboard and placing them on the kitchen island counter. There were three stools there, and he motioned to her to sit. “I’m, sorry, it is only canned, but I had little notice. At least I was able to put it into the crockpot, so it is nice and hot now. Tomato is okay for you, yes?”
She nodded, slightly chagrined at the way he had overridden her protest, but also had to admit to herself that her argument was pointless anyway. He was right: she had been wondering if he was going to kiss her. The question was never too far from her mind.
She accepted the soup with thanks, and then for the next few minutes he slid into easy conversation that had nothing to do with her expectations of intimate contact or lack thereof. She was grateful for that.
The next course was comprised of baked potatoes and thin slices of the roast he’d left in the oven. As he had predicted, it was perfectly done by the time they’d come in. He followed it up with a cheese platter and a sweeter wine than the one they’d enjoyed over lunch, making her smile.
