Page 32 of Hot for the Jerk

His lips twitched beneath his beard.What would it feel like to have that beard against my cheek?Against my skin?

Snap out of it!

“It’s mean, and I should stop,” he said.“It’s because Elsa is the Ice Queen.And, well … up until this so-called truce of ours, you’ve been pretty damned frosty toward me.However, I … I’m sorry.”

I sat there in quiet contemplation for a moment, mulling over not only his insult, but his apology.There were certainly worse names to be called, and I’d given him plenty of reasons to use them in reference to me.Frozenwas a good movie, and in the end, Elsa turned out to be good.The longer I thought about it, the more I didn’t hate the nickname.The more I actually kind of liked it.

My mouth twisted as I scanned the puzzle pieces.“I don’t …hatethe nickname.I have been, as you put it, rather ‘frosty’ toward you.It’s fitting.”Hedging a glance upward at him while still staring down at the puzzle pieces, I caught him smiling.

“Can I ask you a personal question …Elsa?”

“You can ask any question you’d like, doesn’t mean I have to answer it.”

He snorted.“Where’s Marco’s dad?”

Jagger certainly wasn’t the first person to ask me that question, and he definitely wouldn’t be the last.Very few people knew the long version of this story.In fact, I could count the number of those people on one hand—and one of those people was dead.

“You don’t have to say, if it’s too hard,” he quickly added.“I just … nobody really knows how four cousins—all single moms—ended up inheriting Dolores’s vineyard.Everyone knows what happened to my brothers—losing their wives in that car accident.But are you all widows too?”

“I’m a widow,” I said softly, glancing into the sitting room when an outburst of laughter rattled the chandelier overhead.“So is Naomi.Gabrielle and Danica are divorced.”There was a lot more to Gabrielle and Danica’s husbands and justwhythey were divorced, but those weren’t my stories to tell.

“I’m sorry,” he said gently, and I suddenly found his hand on mine, his eyes soft and beseeching behind his glasses.

Clearing my throat, I carefully moved my hand out from beneath his like I was certain I found two puzzle pieces that fit together perfectly—and his hand on minewasn’tmaking my belly-dwelling butterflies get all excited.“Thanks.It’s been a few years now—seven, actually.”

His brows climbed toward his hairline.“Is that why … was I going to be … Ohhhh, this is making more sense now.”

“What is?”I snapped, instantly regretting my tone.

“Was I your first date after you lost him?”

Technically, yes.My head bob confirmed it.

He nodded too.“That makes sense now.You weren’t ready to get back in the saddle.And definitely not with a stallion like me.”His quick flash of a smile and salacious brow bob was absolutely meant to disarm me, but all it did was charm me.And irritate me.Because he was right, and I hated that he was.He would have been my first date since Josiah died, and seeing Jagger in that café made me realize that I wasn’t ready to date, or at the very least, date someone as intimidatingly good-looking as he was.

I absolutely would not let him know that was the truth though.No way, no how.I was sober and planned to stay that way.It was the only way I could keep my wits and the truth about me.

“Have you dated anyone since?”he asked, reaching right in front of my chest to grab a puzzle piece that matched with the one in his hand.

I studied the puzzle pieces, doing my best to subtly calm my nerves and my unexpectedly raging heart rate.“No,” I finally said, after a long, awkward pause.“I haven’t dated anybody.”I was too nervous to glance up at Jagger.Instead, like a coward, I stood up.“I need to check on the chili.”I blurted out, my throat scratchy.“Tea?”

“Uh, sure.Thanks.”

I nodded once, then I was out of there, leaving him sitting with the puzzle pieces, a puzzled look on his very symmetrical, very ruggedly handsome face.

CHAPTER NINE

Jagger

Thisexplainedalot.

Raina’s husband was obviously the love of her life, and his death ruined her.She tried dating apps, which is where we initially met, but then she must have realized she wasn’t ready to date when she saw me.While she certainly could have been more polite about it all, and not ghosted me—or turned into an icicle toward me—I understood where she was coming from.There was no timeline for grief.My brothers all found new relationships when they were ready.

And Raina would too.

Maybe.

She spent a considerable amount of time in the sitting room, stirring the chili and making small talk with the rowdy grandparents, but eventually, either the room got too warm for her liking—it was too warm for me—or she felt the alluring pull of the puzzle again, and she rejoined me.Bringing with her two steaming mugs from the kettle Lenora must have put on the woodstove.

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