Page 29 of Darling Obsession

A place where the same rules don’t apply?

Maybe it’s okay to be bad in here, a little voice inside me says.

I’m pretty sure it’s Nicole’s.

The sitting room opens into a grand dining room through a set of wide double doors. I can see the table lavishly set for our meal.

The sitting room itself is dark, luxurious, and furnished like a relic lives in it. I wonder if some elderly but now deceased relative previously owned the house, because it doesn’t suit a totally fuckable man Harlan’s age. According to Nicole and her internet sources, he’s thirty-three.

There’s not one spark of life in the room, except?—

“Oh, you have a cat. I love cats.”

“I don’t have a cat,” he says.

“Um. There’s one right there.” I point to the petite black cat lounging on the fancy sofa.

Harlan frowns, and promptly shoos it out one of the French doors into the yard.

“What’s its name?”

“It’s just a stray,” he mutters as he shuts the door, then draws the heavy curtain back into place.

Okay… it sure didn’t look like a stray. Its coat was glossy and lush, and it was chilling like a little royal on the sofa when we walked in.

But Harlan looks stressed, so I don’t mention it.

“Do you have something against sunlight?”

“What?”

“The drapes. It’s gorgeous outside right now.”

“Well, we’re not outside.”

We stare at each other again. So awkward.

“Let’s prepare,” he says tensely.

“Okay…”

“Dinner will be in the dining room,” he informs me, as if I didn’t notice. “We’ll eat, and after dinner I’ll have you driven home. My siblings won’t be bringing dates. It will just be the four of them.”

“Okay.”

“Jameson is the youngest. He may seem like a flirt, but that’s just how he is. Don’t let it go to your head. He’s happily engaged.”

Wow. Do I seem that easy?

“Okay,” I say carefully. “Uh… I actually know who Jameson is. My girlfriend Nicole is pretty close with his fiancée, Megan. They grew up together.”

His jaw does this clenching thing that doesn’t seem like a good sign. “You didn’t mention that.”

“I didn’t know I should. I’ve only met Megan a couple of times since she moved to Vancouver this summer. I don’t know her well.”

“You haven’t met Jameson?”

“No. I doubt he even knows who I am. But Nicole’s the one who encouraged me to apply for a job at Velvet.”

---