Free Candy Apple by Tielle St. Clare Page A

out?” She looked at Heather. “Aren’t two
enough?”
    “What? Me?” Heather slapped her hand on her chest. “No. I’ve
got plenty. Wasn’t me.” Heather turned deliberately toward Tasha.
    Tasha felt her shoulders start to sag as her mother turned
her attention to her.
    “Are you thinking about putting it on?”
    Tasha’s chest constricted as she took a deep breath.
    “I, kind of, already did and I’m not sure what—”
    Before she could blurt out her explanation and all the
questions that were teeming through her head, footsteps thumped on the stairs
and tall, dark and mysterious came jogging down.
    Wow, when he isn’t all fuzzy, he’s gorgeous. But then, so
is Nathan.
    Seeing him standing, she renewed her resolve that he looked
a lot like Nathan—same height, same dark hair, shoulders might be a little
broader but she had no problem with that. He was dressed in dark jeans, white
t-shirt and was pulling on his leather jacket. The twist of his body as he
slipped his arms in and pulled the t-shirt tight against his chest and abs,
showing the luscious definition.
    He nodded to her mom and Heather, then turned those piercing
blue eyes on her.
    “Morning.”
    “Morning,” Heather and Katherine mumbled.
    Tasha stumbled forward, feeling like she was under some sort
of spell.
    He took her hand and pulled her with him to the door. “I’m
going to have to take a rain check on breakfast.” He kissed her. “I got called
in to work.” He tipped his head toward the stairs. “I left my number on your
bedside table.” He kissed her again, taking his time, easing his tongue between
her lips as if he wanted to carry her taste with him. “I’ll see you,” he
whispered.
    He looked over her shoulder, nodded once again to the other
two women, then disappeared out the front door.
    Moments later, the rumble of his bike filled the air.
    She took a deep breath, gathering the courage to turn around
and face her mother.
    Katherine folded her hands together in front of her and
waited, a grin on her lips and a twinkle in her eye.
    “Who was that?” she asked.
    “Uh…uh…” She could feel her cheeks turning red.
    “Oh my God!” Heather shrieked. “You don’t know his name.”
    Tasha glared at Heather.
    Heather had the grace to look embarrassed. “Sorry.”
    “Tasha, is that true? You don’t know the man’s name?”
    She winced at her mother’s question. The teasing had
disappeared from her voice and a hint of disappointment had taken its place.
Great.
    “Well, sort of, but not really. I mean, I thought I knew his
name but he wasn’t who I thought he was.”
    Her mom and Heather stared at her, the confused rambling
obviously making no sense when it was outside of Tasha’s head.
    Needing to tell someone about the tale, she blurted out the
whole story about the gown and Jason and Nathan and the previous
night—though she glossed over most of those details—then she told them about
this morning and the man she thought was Nathan.
    “I mean he was a little fuzzy but he looks so much like
Nathan, even once I had my glasses on, that they could be twins.”
    Heather and Katherine nodded and Tasha could feel her
mother’s disapproval fade.
    “What I really don’t understand is the dress.” Tasha looked
at her mother. “It worked on both of them. Last night in the elevator, the
dress fell off around Nathan and this morning, with,” she waved her hand toward
the front door, “whatever his name is.
    “Mom, you always said the dress only worked on one man, that
it helped you find your true love. I don’t understand how it fell off for both
of them.”
    Cait and Heather had told her, sworn, that the dress
had fallen off around two different men but Tasha hadn’t believed them. Her
mother said it was one man—your true love.
    “I might have been fibbing just a little on that.”
    A weight settled on Tasha’s chest. For years she’d believed
that the dress could help her find—or at least confirm—her