“Good.”
Her gaze bounced in his direction, then returned to the cupcake in front of her as she piped on a healthy dollop of butter cream. As if recalling his statement from a moment ago, she added a bit more.
Good Lord, I love this woman—and he was only half-joking.
“Now back to me being nosey.” Because it only made sense to make the most of his limited time. “Is it because someone broke your heart? Is that why you don’t believe in love?”
“Now I mind.”
“I’m sorry,” he said sincerely as he kept washing. “Must have been a doozy.”
“It wasn’t me,” she huffed with exasperation. “More like, my parents have seven divorces between them.”
Yeah…that could definitely skew a person’s view.
“My parents have been married for thirty-five years,” he countered. “And my—”
“Grandparents for fifty-five. And your uncles. Yeah, Roxanna told me all about them. And as I told her, they’re the exception not the rule. In addition to my parents, my brother and sister are both divorced, too. The Hartman’s don’t have happily ever after in our DNA.”
The hint of bitterness in that statement had him asking, “Have you ever been in love?”
“No, and I won’t ever be.”
The way she said it, all firm and matter of fact, made Asher snort. “Funny you think you get to decide that with your head.”
She shrugged her shoulders and finished the second cupcake, then pulled the whole cooling rack over and started on the others. Absently noting those received half the amount of frosting, he began to suspect that maybe it wasn’t so much she didn’t believe in love, but more so she didn’t know about love. What it was and how it worked.
His heart thumped with the idea he could be the one to show her.
“What about you?” she asked. “Have you ever been in love?”
“Once. Or so I thought. Bought a ring and everything.”
“What happened?”
His shoulders tensed as he scrubbed crusty batter remnants off the bowl from her first batch of cupcakes. He hated admitting he’d been totally suckered by Brianna’s act, but if he wanted Honor to be honest with him, he was going to have to do the same.
“Turned out she was only with me for the political connections that come with the Diamond name. Her ‘real’ boyfriend was in local politics, and she was using me to make inside connections so he could set up a run at the state level.”
“Wow. That’s ballsy.” She sounded offended for his sake. “Please tell me it didn’t work.”
Bittersweet satisfaction sparked a grim smile. “Not even close. He was handily defeated in the primary after word got around about how he ran his campaign. Last I heard, Brianna was no longer useful, and he dumped her after the election.”
“That’s karma for you. But it sounds like they both deserved what they got.”
In total agreement, his shoulders relaxed again. He liked that even though she didn’t believe in the elusive happily ever after, she had no problem voicing what she felt was right and wrong.
She stepped back two steps to check the oven, skimmed to the counter to exchange frosting bag for pot holders, then pivoted and opened the door to remove the two pans inside. Each movement was smooth and graceful, like part of a dance that made him want to take her in his arms and spin her around the kitchen. Why hadn’t his parents had dancing at the party?
Honor set the pans on the empty cooling racks before picking up the frosting again. “If that doesn’t make my point, I don’t know what does.”
After placing the final rinsed dish in the drying rack, Asher swiped a towel off the counter to dry his hands as she finished frosting the first batch of cooled cupcakes. “As I recall, your point was only hypothetical,” he reminded. “And, you didn’t make a point so much as ask why your beliefs would matter to your business.”
She cast him a sideways glance, then set the frosting bag aside and turned to face him. “All right, then, let me ask you a question.”
“Go ahead.”
Her gaze shifted to the treats on the counter, then bounced back to him. “How can you believe in love after something like that?”