Clara tapped the cards to even them out. “You said it, I didn’t.”
He didn’t want to insult her so he remained silent, but the facts remained. If a man’s last name was Corwin, it wasn’t easy getting laid in Jason’s hometown, never mind finding someone to settle down with.
He bent to pick up his extra equipment and tossed the items into his tool chest.
“You weren’t always so cynical,” Clara said.
Jason raised an eyebrow. “How can you be so sure?” Although he liked and respected her, he couldn’t help challenging her so-called intuition. And he knew from previous exchanges, she enjoyed a challenge.
Clara merely shook her head. “I just know you were different before. Just like you’ll be different after.”
He knew he’d regret asking, but he did anyway. “After what?”
“After she rocks your world.”
DESPITE THE COOL FALL temperatures, Lauren drove back to her grandmother’s house from the prison with the convertible top down. After being in the small room with her sister, she needed the fresh air, open spaces and wind blowing on her face.
As she always did after one of these visits, she searched for something to focus on that didn’t involve her sister, grandmother, the jail, or the damn Corwin Curse. Paris and her upcoming show consumed her thoughts for the better part of an hour until she came to the outskirts of town and saw the sign for the fall festival.
An annual event, the masquerade ball was always held in time for Halloween. The party sounded like fun. She remembered hearing about the festival from Jason. Back then he’d wished she could stick around long enough to go with him. Well, it looked like she was going to get her chance. Years too late. And she wouldn’t exactly be attending with him.
But he might be there, a small voice in her head whispered. She’d heard he was back in town from her one friend here. Lauren and Sharon Merchant, now Sharon Stern, wife of the current mayor of Perkins, had met during Lauren’s summer visits to her grandmother’s, and they’d kept in touch over the years.
Sharon was the only person she’d confided in about her relationship with Jason Corwin. She hadn’t trusted her sister, knowing Beth would run off to tell their grandmother that Lauren was consorting with the enemy. Sharon had been understanding then and she’d been understanding years later. Lauren’s grandmother and sister had blackmailed Sharon in order to try to prevent her husband, Richard, from becoming mayor, so Lauren considered herself lucky her friend didn’t extend a grudge toward Lauren by default.
Sharon would be there tonight and Lauren could surprise her by showing up. Behind a mask, of course. She’d rather observe without outing herself. The executor of her grandmother’s will told her the townspeople wouldn’t welcome her with open arms. Lauren could handle their disdain with her head held high. She hadn’t hurt anyone and she didn’t approve of her family’s behavior. Still, remaining anonymous while she took the temperature of the town, so to speak, appealed to her.
Especially if she ran into Jason. Her stomach curled deliciously and with nervous anticipation at the thought of seeing him again. Ten years was a long time and he probably wouldn’t recognize her behind a mask. She remembered him telling her no self-respecting man would wear a mask, so she’d have the opportunity to watch and observe him with anonymity.
Yes, she thought, a night out was exactly what she needed to put the depressing prison visit behind her.
Once back at the house, she searched through an old trunk in her grandmother’s attic, picking through feathers, lace and masks. She discarded the orange mask for obvious reasons and bypassed the boring blue one in search of the perfect color.
Suddenly, she found what she was looking for. The mask that called to her. The boldest color. The one destined to make an impact.
A red mask to match her red car.
CHAPTER TWO
JASON MILLED around the festival grounds, a stretch of farmland that had been donated to the town and dedicated as a park. Although this was an event he’d enjoyed as a kid, tonight he was uncharacteristically on edge and Clara’s prediction was to blame.
Not that he believed in tarot readings.
Yet, as he smiled at people without stopping to make conversation, the uneasy feeling remained. The fact that most wore masks didn’t help. Nor did the sheer volume of people. Almost the entire town had turned out for the evening.
“Jason, no mask? I’m disappointed.” Gabrielle, his cousin Derek’s wife, zeroed in on him, pink feathers covering her face.
If her long chestnut hair wasn’t a giveaway to her identity, her trademark stiletto heels were. His cousin was one lucky son of a bitch, but he deserved good fortune. Derek had suffered plenty before finally reclaiming his high school sweetheart and the
love and family he was meant to have. As the oldest of the Corwin cousins, Derek had set a stoic example for Jason and Mike to follow. Each had held out on relationships for a long time before succumbing. As for Mike, despite a rocky start, he and his wife Amber seemed to be going strong.
Jason, on the other hand, was finished with women for anything but sex-and that was something he hadn’t had in too damn long. Five months to be exact. But now he was open to the possibility. He wasn’t desperate, never had been, and not even a self-imposed dry spell would change that. He just knew better than to expect to find someone from around here. Predictions be damned, he was a Corwin and therefore a realist.
“Jason?” Gabrielle repeated. “I asked you what happened to your mask?”
He refocused his attention on his cousin’s wife. “No self-respecting man would wear one of those things.”
“He’s got a point,” Derek said, joining them. He wasn’t sporting a mask, either.