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CHAPTER1
CHERYL BOW
“So what do you think?Is it going to be stupid? I mean I know the title isStupid Cupid, but the book shouldn’t be stupid, and the cover shouldn’t either. Not that you could make a stupid cover. I don’t mean your covers are stupid…I was just saying…” Oh, sugar sticks. Why can’t I shut up? It’s not like I haven’t been talking to him for months, but suddenly, I am a silly Suzy or something. “Uh sorry,” I say lamely, trying to fill the awkward silence.
“No need to be sorry, Cheryl. I understand everything you say.” Oh gosh. Here he goes being nice again. My stomach is starting to do that flutter thing it does when I see his name on the caller ID.
“It’s because you are such a good listener, Nolan.” It's true. He is awesome. I met him when I was searching the internet for a graphic artist who could design my first book series,The Adventures of Beau.It’s a clean series about a girl named Beau who just turned eighteen and leaves her small town of Peep and Steep Hollow to find her destiny. What she doesn’t know is that she is a witch. Not a mean kind. Eww. No, she comes from a long line of good witches who help people find love.
What Beau doesn’t realize is that every town she goes to has a potential mate for her, and though he falls for her, she is oblivious to his charm. Until she comes to the end of her journey and has a line of suitors waiting to take her hand. It’s really quite cute.
Any who, I needed an artist who could make the witch come alive with a trail of sparkles behind her, but it needed to look like love dust, you know. I saw, like, a hundred submissions, but the minute I saw Nolan’s, I called him right away, and well, the rest is history.
Now, I am moving more toward direct romance, and it is a bit awkward trying to convey what I want the cover to look like without being embarrassed or blushing. Thank goodness it is over the phone. “Naw. No one ever accused me of being a good listener, doll. It’s just you. I like listening to you.” My cheeks are on fire. I put both of my hands up, and, yep, red hot.
“Well… uhmm, hold on,” I tell him, taking a deep breath when my other line rings. “This is Cheryl.”
“Honey, are you busy?” My mom sounds a little frazzled, and it has me worried.
“Mom, are you okay? I thought you were setting up for the festival today?” She sighs, and I know I hit the nail on the head.
“I am, sweetie. But the arch won’t stay, and I can’t find your brother or your father. Help!” Oh boy.
“Okay, Mom. I will be there in a few minutes. Just sit down, take a break. I need to finish talking to Nolan. Okay?”
“Alright sweetie. Just hurry.” Darn. I wanted this conversation to be longer, but now I have to go. I hate hanging up with him.
“Nolan?” I am hoping he didn’t hang up yet.
“Yeah. I’m still here.”
“Oh Good. Sorry about that. Festival business.” I don’t know why I didn’t tell him it was mom, other than I don’t want to seem like a mama's girl.
“I understand. Speaking of…I was wondering if you would like to go to the festival with me?” My phone falls from my hands, and I spend seconds trying to stop it from cracking as the last three have. When I actually catch it, I look at it, positive I misheard him.
“I’m sorry my phone fell. Did you just ask me to hang out with you?” He hesitates and does an exaggerated yes. Then I hit myself in the forehead because, of course, he was just asking to be nice. Duh, Cheryl.
“No, thank you. You should take someone you like, silly. That is what the festival is for. Anyway, I have to go. We will talk soon. Bye.” Hanging up, I sag against the wall, sad once again. “One day. One day you will find someone who likes you for you.” I tell myself this every day. Affirmations are a thing you know.
I just hope this one works.
CHAPTER2
NOLAN PIKE
Four months ago,my whole life changed. For the better. A routine meeting with a new client sent me on the path that I am currently on. Growing up in Chicago, my mother and father provided a loving, nurturing home that most of my friends just didn’t have. My brother, Nick, my sister, Nora, and I grew up with the expectation that one day we’d meet our soulmates, and everything would change. Now, I wasn’t a saint while I waited for my soulmate. I dated and even slept around in my early twenties. I’m not proud of that, by the way. I’ve had a few serious girlfriends, but I’ve never been in love. I know that I’ll be able to tell the difference between a fling and the real thing. I wasn’t expecting it to hit me over the head like a ton of bricks, but when it did, I seized that feeling. I owned that feeling and made it my motherfucking bitch.
It started on the phone. The first time I heard Cheryl Bow’s sweet voice, two things happened simultaneously: first, my cock immediately hardened to the point of pain. In thirty-seven years, twenty-one of which I’ve been sexually active, I have never been harder. The longer she spoke to me, the harder my cock throbbed in my pants. Like an animal, I had to stroke my cock while she talked to me about her sweet and clean romance novels. It wasn’t what she was saying, it was how she was saying it. Her voice rose and fell with her excitement, and it washed over me like a touch. Quietly, I stroked my cock until I came into my hand. It was savage and hot as hell.
All I wanted at that moment was to find her and plant that seed inside of her. The second thing that happened was my heart beating out of rhythm inside my chest. It was like the tattoo of a drum solo. The kind of solo that you think about every time you think of music in general. The combination of her voice, my cock, and my heart was like having a heart attack that you never want to end. Before we ended that very first call, I set up an in-person appointment with her two days later. In Maine, where she lives. I never do that. As a graphic designer, one hundred percent of my job is done online. I work exclusively with authors looking for book covers, teasers, book trailers, and social media videos. That income, coupled with a sizeable inheritance that I received when my grandmother passed away and lucrative investments, I live comfortably, and I can afford to do rash things.
Rash, as in booking a ticket to fly from Chicago to Maine, renting a car, and driving from Portland to Cupid’s Cove. Cupids Cove is a tiny town about twenty-five miles outside of Portland, nestled on the shore of Sebago Lake. We met at a small diner in the heart of Main Street. Coming from Chicago, I had never seen anything so quaint before. I was taken with the town. I arrived and waited. I had refrained from googling her, but I regretted that since I had no idea what she looked like, but then I heard her laugh. I had thought I had gotten there first, but she was already there. Holding court with four old men at the counter. There were listening, in raptures, to whatever story she was telling them. I couldn’t hear what she was saying from across the room, but she was gesturing wildly, and the men laughed at her.
For the first time in my life, not only was I jealous, but I was jealous of her harem of octogenarians. I couldn’t help being immediately struck by her beauty. Her skin was glowing. Her tight jeans showed off her surprisingly thick ass. Her red shirt left her shoulders and a lot of her back bare. I longed to move over to her and place kisses on every single bit of her skin that was exposed. Her long auburn hair was pulled into a high ponytail. I remember wondering what it would feel like wrapped around my fist as I fucked her from behind. My cock, which had been constantly hard since we first spoke, twitched right back to life.
Getting up from the table that I claimed because the sign at the door told me to seat myself, I walked over to the group.
“Hi,” she says, looking at me with intense blue eyes. Eyes so blue that I could get lost in them and not give a fuck about anything else.
