“I was particularly cruel to my first love.”
My heart slams against my ribs. He’s never mentioned any former lovers. I swallow hard. “What did you do?”
“We were together since we were young. We planned on getting married. Then, as we grew older, things…happened. I was dealing with anger and personal issues. I couldn’t be honest with her, and she could tell I was hiding something. She left me for someone else. When that relationship didn’t work, she returned, begged me to take her back. I hated her for having left me and that made me unfeeling toward her. I…did things I’m not proud of. Used her obsession with me for my own selfish pleasure without ever fulfilling her hopes that we’d get back together. We carried on a sexual relationship for years without forming a true connection. It was a terrible thing to do with an aristocratic woman whose virtue is everything. She treated me like something disposable one time, yet I treated her like rubbish for years.”
Despite his self-condemnation, the spike of anger that pierces my chest isn’t directed at him but this first love of his. She’s the one who left him, and during what sounds like a difficult time in his past. Then again…
“What were you hiding from her? What couldn’t you be honest about?”
“There are things I simply can’t share about myself. Family issues that aren’t mine to admit. Secrets I literally can’t speak of.” He rubs his fingers over his lips in an anxious gesture as if he regrets having said what he did. His eyes meet mine, and there’s a haunted look in them. “I will not say more than that. I know that means I can never truly be a worthy friend, but I hope you can accept the pieces of me I can give.”
My heart cracks for whatever pain he’s hiding. “You don’t have to tell someone everything to be a worthy friend. At least not for me.”
His expression unravels, smoothing with relief. “You think so?”
“I do. There are plenty of things I don’t admit to you, Edwina, or Araminta.”
Like the urges I’ve started to feel for a certain someone. I plan on keeping that to myself.
He holds my gaze for a few more beats, then gives me a dimpled grin. “That means a lot. That I can still be your friend, regardless of secrets.”
I finish my tea and lean back on my forearms. The faintest blush of sunrise begins to peek over the mountains in the distance. “Are you ever going to answer my question about your type?”
He lights the cigarillo he’d been playing with, takes a drag, and heaves a smoke-filled sigh. “I don’t have a type anymore, and I don’t take lovers. It’s better to be alone than to hurt someone like I always do.”
He doesn’t take lovers? He isn’t a womanizer after all?
“That leads us to Lesson Four,” he says. “A man’s actions must align with his words and vice versa. If he says one thing but does another, don’t waste your time, even if he makes you feel like he has the potential to give you exactly what you want. For example, if a potential partner states he is not seeking marriage, only sex, but youfeellike he’s falling for you, do not give him your heart. Do not try to fix him. You’ll both only get hurt in the end.”
The edge in his tone makes it clear he has personal experience with this lesson. After what he said about his past, it makes me wonder…who exactly is this first love he hurt? What’s the full story? Was he truly so cruel to her? And who else did he hurt?
But as I recall the haunted look I glimpsed in his eyes, I think the real question is who hurthim?
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
MONTY
Monday mornings are poorly regarded by members of the working class, but they’re my personal favorite. Not only am I well rested after the weekend and far more optimistic than I am by Friday, but Mondays are also when I get to read my newestAsk Gladysmail. Since all the lead columnists at theCedar Hills Gazettewrite under pseudonyms and those who write to us do so anonymously, the best time to turn in questions is over the weekend when the office is closed and our drop box is open. Monday means ample entertainment, sometimes even terror, over the queries I receive.
Yet there is one thing I’ve come to dislike about Mondays lately.
How far away they are from my next weekend session with Daphne.
I force this sentiment from my mind as I arrive at theGazettefor my workday. Such mental meanderings can only lead to more meanderings, and soon I’ll be recalling the feel of her sleeping form against my chest and the curvature of her ass under my palm?—
Swine.
That’s what Daphne would call me if she knew how often that memory has looped through my head.
I settle in at my desk, my newest stack ofAsk Gladysmail in my hand. A bustle of activity is already underway outside my closed office door and its frosted glass window. As one of the lead columnists, I’m afforded a small private office attached to the main newsroom. The room features exposed brick walls decorated with paintings of kittens, piglets, and cherubs. An enormous floral arrangement crowds the doily-laden side table beside my coat stand, filling the room with the fresh fragrance of roses and daisies. One might assume the feminine touches were already in place when I inherited theAsk Gladyscolumn and took over for the previous Gladys, but that would be false. I added the hideous doilies and painfully sweet paintings because the décor helps me get into character. Otherwise it would only be me, my wide oak desk, and clouds of lavender-scented smoke.
I light a cigarillo and open my mail one piece at a time. From there I read each letter and separate my papers into different piles. One for fan mail, which I’ll reply to. Another for letters with the potential for a feature. And another for letters I have no intention of answering via my column. Finally, I read a query so amusing it doesn’t go into any pile. Instead, I lay it open on my desk, extract a fresh sheet of paper, and refill the ink reservoir of my fountain pen. I rewrite the letter in the proper format for publication in the column, editing out any extraneous information.
Dear Gladys,
I’ve recently taken a new lover, a sea serpent. Our sex life is rather fantastic, but there is one thing I’m not confident about. You see, my lover has two penises, and I never quite know what to do with the second one when we have intercourse. I’ve used my hands, but often the angle is all wrong, or I end up focusing so much on performing that I forget to enjoy myself. If I ignore the second member, I fear I’m neglecting his pleasure. Can you help?
Sincerely,
