Page 28 of Honk if You Love Real Men (Tempting SEALs 1)

There was a knock at the door. Estrella’s stomach gave a funny little spin, but she told herself it was Brenda, or one of the neighbor children, smelling the freshly made churros. She lifted the fresh batch out of the fryer and laid them on folded paper towels before answering the door, peeping through a crack with the safety chain on.

/> It was Jesse. With more sunflowers. Smiling and wearing long sleeves that covered his tattoos.

Estrella shut the door. She fussed with her hair, her shirt. Patted her flushed cheeks. Her heart tried to drum itself out of her chest, but she swallowed it down again and opened the door. “Hello, Jesse. How did you find me?”

“I remembered that Brenda had mentioned working on Alvarado. I went from cafe to cafe until I found her. She gave me your address.”

“You know Brenda?”

“We met, a couple of nights ago. By chance.” He extended the flowers. “To replace the ones your boss smashed.”

“That was an accident. Eve was startled by the sight of us.” Estrella accepted the flowers, widening the door so he could enter. “Come in. Um, it’s nothing fancy. Watch your head.”

He had to duck the doorframe, going into the living room. “This place looks more like you.” He turned a slow circle, studying her secondhand furniture and the few homey touches she’d added to brighten the apartment—family photos, mosaic flower pots, a woven wall hanging. “Smells good.”

“I was making churros.” She hurried into the kitchen and thrust the flowers into the stained ceramic sink. “The oil is hot. . . .”

“Go ahead. I don’t want to interrupt.”

“Please sit.” She nodded to the drop-leaf table with a pair of rickety chairs she’d painted emerald green and robin’s-egg blue. “Have you ever had churros?”

“I’m not sure. What are they?”

“Fried pastry. Very simple, just flour and water and a few other ingredients.” She piped several stripes of the dough into the oil. “When I’m homesick, I crave them.”

Jesse sat, cautiously. “You’re homesick?”

She poked at the pastries, making them swim in the bubbling oil. “I haven’t seen my family in two years, since I moved here. We don’t get to talk very often either.”

“Why not?”

So many questions, but none of them about her charade pretending to be Eve Romero. The delay was making her nervous. Or it might have been the surreal experience of having Jesse in her house, filling the rooms with his very large presence. For a fantasy man, he’d become all too real.

The oil popped, stinging her as she transferred the churros to the paper towels. “I have to be careful about contacting my family. My ex-husband has tried to use them to find me. Even threatened them. We call and send letters through a neighbor, so there’s no record of my address and phone number in their house.”

She stole a look at Jesse. He’d lost some of the old poker face, and she could see him grimly absorbing the news. “Did Brenda already tell you about that?”

“No.”

“Oh.” Of course not. Brenda wouldn’t, although she might hint, if she was convinced that Estrella wanted Jesse for more than the fantasy.

“What did she tell you? About Eve, or my job, maybe by accident?” A thought struck Estrella. Perhaps Jesse had known all along that she was not the sophisticated lady she’d pretended to be. Her faced heated, and she hurriedly bent over the fryer, adding more dough. Too many churros already, but she needed to keep busy.

“No, we talked about me. But she did tell me to try again with you. That you had your reasons for the phobia about tattoos.”

“Tony, my ex-husband, had tattoos. I used to watch his hands and arms a lot, to be ready if he was . . . in a bad mood.”

“He hurt you?” Jesse kept his tone neutral, though she could hear how doing that strained his throat.

“Some. Mostly it was about being in control of me. When I did something he didn’t like, he might grab me, push me. Now and then I had bruises, but mainly there was a lot of yelling. He was threatened because I wanted to be more than his wife.” The old feelings of humiliation swept over her. She hated to think of how long she’d stayed, making excuses for putting up with the bad treatment. “I was sixteen when we met, eighteen when we married. You know, young and stupid in love. It wasn’t always so bad.”

Jesse had put his head down. She saw him clench and unclench his hands beneath the table. “And you feel safe here?”

She rescued the well-browned churros. “Yes, finally. We think he’s given up, and soon I may be able to have my family out to visit. Until we’re sure, I’m using an old family name from my father’s side—Ianesque.”

“But you really are Estrella?”

“Oh yes.”

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