“Grandma Aileen,” he said. The few times he’d seen Mina’s grandmother, she’d been kind to him. And she was known around the school for having a meal ready whenever Mina had friends over to study. He’d always been envious of the people who got to take advantage of that—and sit at Mina’s small kitchen table, working with her. “How’s she doing these days? I never got much of a chance to stop by when you lived with her. You still doing that?”
Mina’s smile flickered and died, turning into something melancholy. “Oh, she’s—well, she’s doing as well as can be expected. I actually had to move her into Sunnyside a couple of years ago. Dementia.” Mina’s gaze fell to the floor, and when she looked back up at Liam, her eyes shone with unshed tears. “She’s happy there, as far as I can tell. But there are days when…” She looked away and shook her head. “There are good days and bad,” she said instead.
He had never been so stricken with awkwardness in his life. He’d only meant to ask about her family, and now here she was, on the verge of tears in his kitchen. A certain desperation filled his chest. If he couldn’t make Mina comfortable here, then what? “Oh, Mina, I’m so sorry to hear that.” He rubbed a hand through his hair. “I didn’t want to make you focus on something sad. Not when you’re here in my palace of pleasure.”
She snorted, the laugh coming strong and fast afterward. “Your palace of pleasure? This is what you’d call a palace of pleasure?”
“Hey,” he shot back, pretending to be wounded. “This could be a palace if you squinted and turned your head just right. Besides, you have to admit that the decor’s as nice as anyplace else.” He rapped his knuckles against the faux shutters that framed the kitchen window. One of them chose that moment to detach from its upper-right-hand nail. The loud crack sent Mina into another fit of laughter. “I’ve been meaning to fix that,” he said. “Oh, hell, at least it’s clean.”
That, she couldn’t argue with. Liam didn’t have much to do, and he was the kind of man who needed to keep busy. He’d liked a clean house before his accident. Now it had, perhaps pathetically, become one of his hobbies. The sink was always cleared of dishes, and she hadn’t had a single complaint about the bathroom, which he knew had been sparkling. “You’re right,” Mina said, struggling to catch her breath. “It’s very clean. I’m just not sure it’s a palace.”
“I can prove otherwise.” He bent down and pulled a pan from one of the lower cupboards. “You just stay right there. Don’t go anywhere.”
“There’s nowhere else to go.” Mina craned her neck to look behind her. “Or is there? Are you hiding another set of rooms in a secret closet somewhere?”
“No other rooms,” he said. “Just some excellent hot chocolate.”
“Hot chocolate?”
He’d drawn her another step into the kitchen. “Have a seat at the table and learn from the master.” Here, at least, he had his footing. Flirting was second nature to Liam Wells. He just had to forget that it was Mina Heath he was talking to. Or…remember that once, long ago, she’d been a sweet teenager who’d looked at him like he held the entire world in his backpack. “This is technically my mother’s recipe, so she’s the original master. Or mistress.”
This earned him another laugh from Mina. “I’m not sure I have many family recipes.”
“This one’s good because of the extra touch at the end.”
“Extra touch?”
“You’ll see.” Liam felt her watching as he heated up the milk and stirred in a generous helping of cocoa. When it was bubbling, he poured it into two big mugs and added another inch of milk. This brought it to the ideal temperature to drink right away.
“Okay, I have to say…so far this looks like regular hot chocolate,” Mina said from the table.
“That’s because you haven’t waited long enough.” Liam opened a cupboard above the fridge and brought out a bottle of peppermint schnapps. “This is the Wells family secret.”
Something in the air shifted and changed around them. He brought the mugs to the table and put one in front of Mina, then took the seat opposite her. She looked almost comfortable, with her legs crossed underneath her and her hair nearly dry. But she spun the mug around in her hands, watching him.
“How’d you get injured?” she said finally. “Did you fall off your horse?”
“Nah,” Liam said, the memory of it flashing into his mind as vividly as any of the ones from high school. “Well, yeah. We were coming out of the ring and she lost her head a little bit.” It had taken him by complete surprise. “Not a big deal under normal circumstances, but I came down wrong on the leg. Really wrong. But things are getting better. What about you? Got anything exciting going on?”
Her eyes lit up, but Mina didn’t answer right away. “I’ve been working with one of my friends from college. I got my degree in graphic design, but I—I really love fashion.”
“Wow. I really chose the right clothes for you, then.”
She laughed, a low sound that sparked something deep in his belly. “It’s actually quite appropriate. One of the things I focus on is clothes with pockets.”
“Clothes with pockets?”
“Lots of women’s garments don’t have pockets. Or they have fake pockets, or pockets that don’t actually hold anything. I want cute and fashionable clothes that have plenty of pocket space. So that’s what I’m working on with my friend.” She blushed a little. “I haven’t really told anybody else about the project.”
“Aha. Is that your biggest life secret?”
“I don’t know if I’m the only one with life secrets.” Mina gave him a pointed look across the table.
“What’s that look for?”
She took a deep breath, like she was preparing to jump into the deep end of the pool. “Liam,” she blurted, after a heavy silence, “are you a sperm donor?”
4
The empty mug clattered out of his hands and onto the antique surface of the table. Liam scrambled and caught it, thanking his lucky stars that only the dregs of the cocoa were left. His heart raced a million miles an hour. “I—wow, I—yeah. I did. I donated years ago. Signed about a half a year contract, but I ended up going out on the circuit not long after that and only had time to go in the once. So, yes. I did donate sperm at one point.” He was talking way too much. “That’s your answer.”
Mina stared at the table, her face scarlet. He couldn’t figure it out. What did this have to do with anything? Why would she be red in the face about it? It wasn’t as if they’d been in contact. It wasn’t as if they’d been anything to each other. “Okay,” said Mina softly, clutching her mug. “All right. That’s the answer, then.”
“Yeah.” The kitchen closed in around them. It had seemed like such a good idea to live in the cottage when he came back to stay on family land, but now he was wishing they had extra breathing room in the farmhouse. Though there were people living there, too, so maybe this was for the best. It was so hot in here. He hadn’t even cooked anything substantial on the stove. Maybe it was just being this close to Mina that did it. He wished for a mansion. He wished for a football field’s worth of space between them. And then he wished for even less than that. Some conversations were better had naked, he thought, the idea striking him as so absurd and funny that he had to choke back a laugh. Mina would not find it funny. He could tell from the look on her face.