Page 53 of The Flirty Forward

“I know, but I’d like to help. Put me to work. Please,” I add after a moment. I think she’s going to refuse me, but she surprises me.

“Can you make a salad?”

I take the knife and cutting board from her. “Don’t insult me; I can make a salad. My mom made sure I knew how to cook.” She shrugs and turns back to the stove. I move close to her and set up my work station. Could I work on another counter, further away from her?Yes. Am I going to?Nope. She’s stiff as she stands at the stove, and I want to help her relax. “How was school?”

“It was fine.”

Her response is short enough to try to discourage conversation, but I don’t let it. “Did you give your principal a piece of your mind for making you take off this week?”

She smirks. “No, but Brielle did apparently.”

I snort. “She’s been hanging out with Aiden for too long.”

She turns to me, eyes wide. “That’s what I said.”

I smile. “Great minds think alike.” She smiles softly but doesn’t say anything. “When do you find time to fit in writing?” I can see my question surprises her.

“You remembered,” she says softly.

“That you write?” I question.

She shrugs again. “Very few people know that about me, and most people forget about it.”

Holding her gaze, I say, “I don’t forget anything about you, Doll.”

She breaks our connection and turns back to the meatballs. “Sometimes I find it hard to fit in the time, but I fit in writing on the weekends and whenever I can in the evenings I don’t have a ton of schoolwork to grade.”

“What are you working on right now?” She gives me a look. “What?”

“Do you actually want to know?”

I frown. “I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t want to.” She shrugs again, and I find myself wanting to dig deeper to figure her out. I don’t think she’s going tell me, but once again she surprises me.

“It’s a romance; well, all of my books are romance.”

I grin to myself but keep my mouth shut. If she’s finally talking to me, I don’t want to do anything to make her stop. For some reason, it thrills me that she writes romance. She’s so uptight and proper: I would have never pegged her for a romance writer.

“Okay, I see that look. I don’t write romance like that,” she says.

“Like what?” I ask.

“Like whatever you’re imagining,” she responds. “I don’t write the kind of romance novels you see on the shelves at the store.”

“What kind is that?” I prompt.

“The kind everybody thinks of when I say I write romance.”

“And what is that?” I push, even though I know exactly what kind she’s talking about.

“You know,” she says in exasperation. “The kind that have half naked men and women on the front who are all over each other. I don’t write like that.”

This does not surprise me. At all. “But you write romance.”

“Yes, but it's not like those books; it’s not explicit or anything.”

“So, you don’t write any romance scenes in your books,” I prompt. I’m not trying to goad her; I just honestly want to know.

“I mean there’s romance, just not like...you know.”

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