Chapter 4
The scent of Bluebonnet’s rosemary roasted chicken did strange things to Ransom Payne.
It stirred all of his appetites.
Every. Single. One.
He understood why the scent of the chicken made him think of home. It was his favorite dish, and it stirred happy childhood memories. Ransom wanted to swim in them, experience that joy and warmth for as long as he could. A simpler time when all he had to worry about was tracking mud from the creek on the godmothers’ freshly waxed floor. It reminded him of summers that seemed to last forever, bedtime stories, and midnight ice cream sodas.
Except now, these memories stirred other longings. He wanted his own children to run and play in the creek, to spend long summers chasing each other and climbing trees. He wanted to help teach them about growing things in the godmothers’ garden. He wanted to have to buy the godmothers a bigger table so their giant family could eat meals like this together.
After one bite of the chicken, and seeing Lucky across the table from him as she laughed at something Jonquil said, her dark eyes sparkling with mischief, he wanted those summers, those memories, and those children with her.
God, but she was the most beautiful creature he’d ever seen.
He was struck by her beauty with the same force as the first time he’d seen her walking across the quad.
Even when she’d tripped over a gopher hole.
He remembered their first kiss. The moonlight had shimmered on her smooth skin, and her lip gloss had smelled like strawberries. Tasted like them, too.
They’d been in the middle of the lake, and he’d planned a candlelit picnic on the rowboat. Drawn together, she’d pinched out the candles almost effortlessly as she leaned in to meet him.
That kiss had been like hitting him with a bat.
Or maybe it was just because their boat had capsized, dumping them into the cool water.
But the heat between them hadn’t abated, they’d laughed and swam to shore and made out there, with the fireflies dancing around them until dawn.
Ransom reminded himself that this wasn’t what he was here for, and no matter how much the idea appealed, the two of them were not meant to join in that way.
They couldn’t be.
They’d tried to complete the deed several times, and each time had been a bigger disaster than the last.
Skinny-dipping in that same lake had resulted in leeches that got much too close to delicate goods.
A tornado had hit the cheap motel they’d tried off I-70 and had ripped the roof off of only one room. (Thankfully, no one was actually hurt.)
When the equestrian team had gone on its fall break, they’d been making out in the barn and as soon as Lucky had asked him if he wanted to have sex, they were charged by feral pigs. Ransom, being determined, had decided they should climb up to the loft, but a mutant wasp colony had taken up residence.
God, they should’ve stopped after that. But did they? No. They were in love.
They’d gotten close in the back of his car, but then the engine caught fire.
Lucky looked up at him then and offered a soft smile.
That softness on her beautiful face, the way she looked at him, it was all worth it.
For a moment, even as aroused as he was, he wondered if they could have a life together without sex. It wasn’t the most important part of being with someone.
He’d fucking miss it, that was no lie.
But he still loved her, still wanted her as a person as much as he had all those years ago.
They could adopt children.
Because sex was always when things had gone bad.
Then he realized that his train of thought was on crazy tracks. They didn’t know each other anymore. They weren’t the same kids they were in college. Just because she was stunningly beautiful didn’t mean he should be building fairy-tale castles in the—
Fairy tale. Castles.
Ransom didn’t like the connection that just sparked in his brain. He looked down at the bite of chicken on his fork and raised an eyebrow at Bluebonnet.
“Something wrong with your chicken, dear?” Bluebonnet asked.
“I don’t know. Is there?” Had the meddling old dears put some kind of love potion in his food? That was the only thing that made sense. He knew they weren’t above that kind of thing.
“Whatever do you mean?” Petty asked.
“You know damn well what I mean,” Ransom said.
“The chicken tastes delightful, as always, Bon-Bon.” Lucky took a drink of her cherry blossom tea.
“Lucky likes it,” Bluebonnet said in defense.
“I didn’t say I didn’t like it. We’re already here to help you. Don’t meddle,” Ransom warned.
“I hope you don’t mind that you’re sharing the attic suite,” Jonquil said, as if there wasn’t already a discussion going on. “We thought you two should spend some time together before the press descends on our little town.”
“Or before we can escape each other at the castle?” Lucky asked.
“Precisely,” Jonquil agreed easily.
Ransom put down his fork and glared at each of his godmothers in turn.
“Ready for dessert?” Bluebonnet asked, blinking her eyes with faux innocence.
He narrowed his eyes, but then picked up his fork again. If she’d done something to the delicious chicken, he was already under its influence. No reason to go to bed hungry.
“Not quite.”
Lucky took seconds.
Then thirds.
He wondered if she knew the truth about the godmothers. She didn’t question that there always seemed to be more chicken. Even though no actual, living chicken had eight breasts.
“Godmothers,” Lucky began after chewing a bite. “Would you mind if Gwen and the kids joined us for dinner from now on? She’s left Jake and I’m . . . we’re her only other family.”
Petty gasped. “This is fantastic news.”
“Like you didn’t know,” Ransom said with a snort.
“Well, I mean, I knew it was coming. I just didn’t know when.” Petty puffed with pride.
“I had another idea,” Lucky continued. “I know there’s already a bakery in town, but if you want to be a wedding town, you’re going to need more than one. Gwen didn’t bat an eye when the school asked her to bake three hundred allergy-friendly cookies for the bake sale.”
Jonquil trilled. “I see exactly where you’re going with this and it’s marvelous. She and the kids can continue to stay in the cottage until the business is up and running. The town could all chip in to get her started. She could take over for Red and Grammy. They’re looking to move farther out into the country and start a ranch. They’ve wanted to for ages.”
“I can’t wait to tell her!”
“Does she need help collecting her things from the soon-to-be ex? I could send Roderick,” Ransom offered.
Bluebonnet smiled and for a moment, she looked almost vulpine. “Oh, that would be just perfect, don’t you think, Lucky?”
Lucky laughed. “I don’t know if I’d say it was perfect. They didn’t exactly hit it off.”
Ransom snorted. “Actually, Brittany called him an asshole.”
“Did she?” Petty arched a brow. “Well, children are the tellers of universal truths.”
“They’ll figure it out. But it can’t hurt to help it along. That would be lovely if you could send him a textural,” Bluebonnet replied.
“A text, Bon-Bon,” Lucky corrected.
“Whatever.” Bluebonnet waved the words away with her left hand while she stuffed a golden, buttered roll in her mouth with the other.
Lucky met his gaze across the table and for a moment, the rest of the world fell away. It was only the two of them.
And Bluebonnet’s damned chicken.
“Lucky, why don’t you tell Ransom about that new piece you’re working on?” Petty prompted.
“We’re adults. We can figure out how to talk to each other,” Lucky said.
“Well, then do it. I’m watching new witch hairs grow on Jonquil’s chin waiting for you two to have a conversation.”
Jonquil gasped. “You are not.” She rubbed her thumb over her chin.
“No, Petunia has confused herself again.” Bluebonnet narrowed her eyes. “She caught her own reflection on our grandmamma’s silver.
“Bluebonnet, so help me—” Petty began.
“Lucky, would you like to walk in the backyard before dessert?” Ransom blurted.
“I would.” She pushed her chair back and headed out the back door.
“What is your problem? How are we supposed to pull off a wedding in two weeks when you three can’t stop bickering?” Ransom demanded.
Petty sniffed. “Oh, go for your walk. You handle your end. We’ll handle ours. We’ve been doing this a lot longer than you.”
“Maybe start getting it right, then.”
Jonquil made a sound that was not unlike that of a startled bird. “Insolent boy. We should zap your bottom.”
“Or turn you into a toad for a week,” Bluebonnet threatened.
“I can’t woo the girl if I’m a frog, now can I?” Ransom grinned, sure of himself.
“It can be done,” Petty said with a surety that made Ransom cringe. “But our Ransom has never been a frog. We save that for special cases. Everyone is on edge. We really need this to work.”
“I know, Godmother. But give us a little space, okay?”
“We’ve given you several years of space. Really, it’s above and beyond, I think,” Jonquil informed him.
“Yes, Godmothers. But you do remember this marriage is fake?”
The three old dears flashed him their best smiles and nodded.
Ransom arched a brow. “Uh-huh. Well, you know to be legal, we have to sign a marriage license. Which we’re not doing.”
“We said we understand, darling. Do run along. She’s waiting under the cherry tree.” Jonquil came over behind him and nudged him toward the door.
He allowed them to usher him outside and they closed the door behind him, leaving him mostly alone with Lucky.
“I can see their sweet little faces in the window watching us,” Lucky said. “They look like little kids in line for an ice cream truck.”
“I know. They want so desperately for this to be real.”
Lucky pressed her lips together and looked down at her feet for a moment. It seemed as if she had something to say, but ultimately decided not to share whatever it was.
“Do you think the town really needs help? They seem like they’re doing okay.”
“I think it’s a front. They don’t usually bicker like that. A little back and forth, for sure. But there’s an edge to them. I think they’ve been struggling.”
“Question, and feel free not to answer if you don’t want to.”
Ransom cleared his throat. “Well, let me have it.”
“If the town is struggling so hard, if our godmothers are struggling so hard, why don’t you just give them the money? They gave you the seed money for Heart’s Desire, after all.”
“That’s a fair question.” But he didn’t know how to answer it. It was obvious now that Lucky didn’t know about the fairy part of their godmothers. That they didn’t need money. They needed love to fill up their magical wells. “You know I would, if they’d take it.”
Lucky looked around his shoulder back to the window. She made a motion with her hand, waving them away. “For the love of . . . everything. How are we supposed to talk with them perched over us like pigeons on a bag of bread?” She shook her head. “I know they love us, but . . .”
“Yeah, it feels a bit like being in a fishbowl. Much like how we’re going to feel when the press gets here.”
“That terrifies me.”
“Me too.”
She snorted. “Thanks.”
“No, I didn’t mean . . . Me. Not because of you.”
Lucky bit her lip. “Honestly, if it was because of me, I wouldn’t blame you.”
He remembered her reaction to seeing him by the fountain and he understood it. “None of that is your fault. You don’t have any control over it.”
“I have control over what I do. Who I spend my time with.” She looked up at him. “Who I touch.”
The way that she looked at him now, like she was thinking about touching him. That couldn’t possibly be what she was thinking.
Could it?
No, no. Even if it was, he wasn’t going there. It could only end badly for both of them.
“We should probably get our stories straight. I was thinking it would be easier to lie if we came up with them together.”
A lie. Right. That’s all this was.
“Good idea.” He stuffed his hands in his pockets to keep from reaching for her. “It’s not all a lie, though.”
“No,” she agreed softly. “Can I ask you something else?”
“You just did?”
“I mean . . . something real.”
“Of course.”
“My friend Gwen thinks that we should sleep together. I kind of do, too.”
He coughed and took a moment to breathe before replying. “Is that the question?”
“Maybe.”
“Lucky . . .”
“It’s okay if you don’t want to. I wouldn’t either, if I were you. I mean, a tornado, feral pigs, wasps, leeches, fire . . . Actually, I’d probably run screaming.”
Ransom tried not to think about how he was being offered something he still desperately wanted. “Why does she think that?”
“I’ve always been unlucky, but things didn’t start to go horribly wrong for me until our near misses. She thinks if we followed through, that would bring my old not-great luck back. Which is better than my unluck.”
“So it’s not because you’re still attracted to me?”
“Oh for . . . Have you seen yourself? Of course, I’m still attracted to you. A board would be attracted to you.”
He felt his lips curl into a self-assured half grin. “Oh yeah. Tell me about it.”
“Not a chance. I’m definitely not feeding your beast.”
“That’s not what you said five minutes ago.”
She gasped. “I don’t know what I was thinking. You’re awful.” The smile on her face said she didn’t believe any such thing.
Stuffing his hands in his pockets worked for only so long. She was so close, and she smelled so good, and she offered everything. He reached up to touch her cheek, sliding his thumb over the elegant arch.
“Maybe we should get our stories straight first.”
Her skin was so soft, and he remembered what it was like to touch almost every part of her body.
“Our stories.” She nodded and turned her face into his palm.
“I suppose it would go much like it is now. We ran into each other after these long years apart, and nothing had changed. We both knew we wanted forever. So we decided to tie the knot in the quaint little town where our godmothers live. We decided we get the fairy tale.”
If only that were true.
What would he give to make it true?
“Wouldn’t that be nice?” she murmured, her lips brushing against his skin.
He knew he shouldn’t kiss her.
But when she turned her face up to his, the polarity between them was undeniable.
She rose up on her tiptoes, and he bent down to meet her.
Their lips collided and for a solid minute, he was in heaven. Lucky felt so good in his arms, and everything was right with the world.
Lucky melted into him, her arms around him and her body pressed so tightly against him. She tasted like the cherry tea she’d been drinking and sunshine. He couldn’t get enough. She seemed as hungry for him as he was for her, which pushed his need even higher. He wanted to taste her every desire, push her higher than she’d ever been, and stay that way with her until the stars burned out.
Until the scent of cherry blossoms exploded around them. Which in and of itself was rather lovely, but the tree began to creak and groan, and even though Ransom was sure he was in mortal peril, he couldn’t bring himself to stop.
Not until Lucky broke away and looked up at the branches of the tree above them.
Holy God, she mouthed.
Ransom looked up just in time to see a cherry the size of a grapefruit drop like an anvil. He pushed Lucky out of the way and barely dodged the missile himself.
Only the tree shifted and groaned, heavy with the ridiculously large fruit, and more of the cherry brethren followed to cannonball to the ground below.
Lucky and Ransom made a mad dash for the back porch as the rain of monster cherries continued.
He turned around to take stock of the devastation and that’s when he saw it.
A dark-red softball-size cherry comet headed right for his face. Ransom’s brain screamed at him to duck, to move, to do anything but stand there and wait for it to hit him in the face.
Unfortunately, his body didn’t obey his mind and the missile made contact with his face.
Damn, but that thing had weight. Even though it split apart on contact, some of the flesh of the cherry found its way up his nose and it packed a devil of a punch.
So much so that to Ransom’s utter humiliation, the cherry, as they say, knocked him the fuck out.