Kissing Lessons (Kissing Creek)

by Stefanie London

  He wore a blazer with leather patches on the elbows, which should have seemed like he was trying too hard…but somehow it didn’t. Dark denim jeans covered long legs, capped with a pair of Converse sneakers, and a fitted white T-shirt hinted at a lean yet muscular physique. Not bulky, like some of the gym bros Audrey saw at the smoothie place on Main Street. But more…economical. Sleek.

  None of that compared to his eyes, however, which were a pierce-right-through-your-soul blue. They were eyes that promised to melt any form of logic or common sense a person might have until they were nothing but a mindless, willing vessel for pleasure…

  “Like a sex robot?” She shook her head, then clamped a hand over her mouth when she realized she’d said it out loud.

  The guy looked up, brow crinkled as he cocked his head to one side. His gaze caught hers immediately. Seconds ticked by as mortification trickled through Audrey’s system, freezing her to the spot.

  Relax, you weren’t that loud.

  “Excuse me,” he said, blue eyes staring intently into hers in a way that halted her breath. “Did you call me a sex robot?”

  Chapter Two

  “I did not call you a sex robot.” The woman behind the counter flushed almost the exact same color as the pink polo shirt displaying a cutesy lip-print logo.

  She was gorgeous. Tumbling blond hair swept up into a bouncy ponytail, wide green eyes staring at him unflinchingly, and full lips all competed for his attention. There was something arresting about her, something strong and willful and so electric it grabbed Ronan Walsh by the balls. Add to all that a full figure with the kind of curves that could make a grown man weep, and he was momentarily robbed of his resolve to not even think about women for the next twelve months.

  “She totally called him a sex robot.” One of the younger women at a nearby table snickered and ducked her head behind a coffee cup big enough to caffeinate an entire college faculty. “How embarrassing.”

  “Can I help you with a drink?” the woman asked, trying to act like she wasn’t ruffled. As she came closer, Ronan caught the name Audrey printed neatly on a white badge. “Maybe a croissant or a bagel?”

  “A coffee, black, in whatever is your biggest cup.” He tore his eyes away from the barista to scan the bakery display. “And a blueberry muffin.”

  Audrey nodded and rang the items up on an iPad that served as the café’s cash register. Kisspresso Café had been one on a list of recommended local businesses that his new boss had provided him when he’d checked into his visiting accommodation late yesterday. At first he’d almost walked straight past the place. Not because he’d missed it—a feat impossible to anyone who could see, thanks to a hot pink front door that looked like something out of a Wes Anderson movie. Rather, Ronan wasn’t sure his long-haul-travel-weary eyes were ready for the visual assault.

  But he’d quickly learned that pink and red were town colors and, therefore, were unavoidable. The college that he would call his workplace and home for the next twelve months had gone with the more universally appealing red for their school logo and for the uniform of their much-revered baseball team, the Flames.

  “One coffee and a muffin,” Audrey said. “To go?”

  Ronan nodded. He could handle all the brightness for the five minutes it would take to get sustenance, but then he wanted to go back to his apartment and face-plant onto the couch.

  Thank you, jet lag.

  Audrey gave him the total, and Ronan pulled his wallet out of the back pocket of his jeans. “I’ve been told there’s a discount for college staff?”

  Audrey’s eyebrow immediately arched. “Yes.”

  Hmm, was it a faux pas to ask? The information had been printed alongside the coffee recommendation in his welcome pack. “Great. I’m a professor there.”

  “I haven’t seen you before,” she said. “I’ll need to see your faculty card.”

  “Uhh…I’m new, so I don’t get my faculty card until the office opens back up next week.”

  Audrey cocked her head. “You know, we’ve been warned about people like you.”

  “Sex robots?” The words leaped off his tongue before he could stop them. Someone behind him snorted, and Ronan cringed.

  Great. His first day on campus, and someone was probably live-Tweeting this whole silly conversation.

  “People posing as professors.” She waggled her finger at him and made a teasing, tutting sound.

  “Posing?” Ronan literally studied the very things which made people who they are—the very fiber of their motivations and morals. He would never scam someone. But this wasn’t the first time someone had questioned him because he was younger than average. “I’m a professor at Harrison Beech College. I don’t have my faculty card yet, that’s all.”

  “You really thought you could get one past me by trying to look the part?” She shook her head. “The elbow patches were a good attempt, but don’t you think they’re a little cliché?”

  Now she was insulting his fashion choices? He blinked. “What’s wrong with elbow patches?”

  “It’s like you googled ‘what do professors wear?’ and then bought the first thing you saw.” She bit down on her lip as if stifling a laugh.

  Everyone was looking at him now, but luckily Ronan was impervious to embarrassment. Maybe it was years of growing up with his Irish grandmother, who was as blunt as a hammer.

  Although he had googled that exact question before his first day as a professor in his late twenties. He’d been more insecure back then, feeling the age gap between him and his colleagues and his lack of life experience like a weight around his neck. These days, he’d learned to hold his own, academically and personally.

  And he damn well liked his elbow patches.

  “And besides,” Audrey continued, gesturing to him. “You’re so…”

  He was certain he wasn’t going to like this answer. “What?”

  “Young.”

  He was thirty-four, to be exact. Clearly, he shouldn’t have shaved his beard off before leaving the UK. The scruff had made him look older, more mature. But he’d wanted to make a good impression, and he could hardly turn up at his new job looking like he didn’t know how to present himself. Still, maybe it was better to look older and a bit rough around the edges than to have a clean-shaven baby face.

  He was going to toss his razor in the trash.

  “Maybe I have a good skincare routine,” he joked.

  “Look,” she said, holding up her hands. “I’m sure a man like you is used to getting what you want—”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” He laughed at the absurdity of it. A man like him?

  “Well…” Her eyes flicked over him, her cheeks growing even pinker. She liked what she saw; that much was obvious. “I mean, if you’d come in here claiming to be a model, now that I would have believed.”

  Ronan couldn’t help but puff his chest out a little. First a sex robot, now a model. He’d never thought it was possible to be so flattered while someone was accusing you of theft, but here he was. “How am I supposed to prove to you that I’m a professor?”

  This wasn’t about the discount. Not at all—Ronan didn’t need to save a dollar or two on his morning snack. His bank account was perfectly fine. But he was far too intrigued by this woman to walk away now.

  “Ummm, what’s something only a professor would know?” Audrey tapped a finger to her chin, and Ronan felt the curious stares of the entire café behind him. “What is pi to the first ten decimal places?”

  “Three point one four one five…” Hmm, she had him there. “Well, I’m not a math professor.”

  Her green eyes searched his, mischievous and sparkling. “Okay. Which letter doesn’t appear in any U.S. state name?”

  That seemed almost too easy. But Ronan’s mind whirred as he scrolled through state names, finding all the letters he thought of. He wa
s stuck on blond hair and full, smirking lips, and his brain whirred like a tire bogged in mud.

  “Are you trying to trick me, Audrey?” He leaned against the counter and folded his arms.

  “I’m not,” she said, planting a hand across her ample chest. She was having far too much fun with this.

  “I don’t trust you. It’s a trick question.”

  “No, it’s not,” someone piped up from the back of the café. “There’s no Q in any state name.”

  Crap. Ronan was officially rattled.

  It was this woman—this gorgeous, quick-witted woman. Ronan’s personal catnip was humor and a curvy figure, and Audrey had both dialed up to ten. He couldn’t remember the last time a woman had gotten under his skin so damn quickly.

  “I’ll give you one more shot. Everyone deserves a third chance, right?” She planted her hands on the counter and leaned a little forward. “What is the official term for the hashtag or pound sign?”

  Ronan shook his head. He should know this one, but she’d turned his brain into a pile of sludge.

  “You’ll have to forgive me,” he said with a charming smile. “I’ve just flown in from Cambridge, and the jet lag is affecting the part of my brain responsible for storing trivia.”

  “Cambridge, huh? Fancy,” she teased. “I’m going to put that in the same category as the elbow patches. A good call, but a little cliché. You would have been better going with something less well-known.”

  As he opened his mouth to fire a comeback, the front door of the café opened and a young woman walked in, wearing an identical outfit of a pink polo shirt, blue jeans, and a red apron. Lana. She was the younger sister of one of his former colleagues when he was still working as a TA before he moved overseas. They’d asked him to keep an eye out for her on campus.

  “Ronan, so nice to see you,” Lana said with a big smile. “Sorry, it’s Professor Walsh now, isn’t it? I heard you were teaching here.”

  The café erupted in titters and whispers, and Audrey’s face slowly drained of color until she no longer resembled the perky pink polo shirt that hugged her figure perfectly. And maybe it made Ronan a grade-A bastard, but damn if he didn’t feel a little smug about the whole thing.

  He greeted Lana and then turned back to Audrey. “That’s right. I do go by Professor Walsh these days.”

  “The guest psychology professor,” she said, scrubbing a hand over her face. “You’re teaching the Wednesday night Brain-Changing Positivity class.”

  Ronan hadn’t been sure the moment could have gotten any better, but he was more than pleased to be proven wrong. This was the gleaming, chocolate-dipped cherry on top of the sundae. “I take it that means I’ll see you next Wednesday night.”

  She nodded, sucking on the inside of her cheek. Now her cheeks weren’t simply pink—they were bordering on being as red as the lip prints he’d already spotted in the half the business logos around town. “Yes, that’s right. I’ll be there on Wednesday.”

  “See you then,” he said as he handed a few bills over to pay for his snack. “I’m really looking forward to it.”

  Later that night, Ronan forced himself to get off the couch. He’d napped for a few hours, his body completely confused about what time zone he was in, and he still wasn’t sure whether the short sleep had made him feel better or worse. All he did know was that it felt like there was a small creature repeatedly slamming a pickax into the back of his eyeball.

  Thank God he had a full week before classes started. He’d need it to shake the jet lag.

  After downing a few painkillers with a glass of water, he showered and headed out into the balmy evening to meet his family for dinner. The walk to the restaurant took a good half an hour, but the air cleared his head, and by the time he made it to the bar and grill—which, thankfully, didn’t have a stupid puntastic name—he was feeling more than ready for a family reunion.

  When he arrived, he found his sister helping his grandmother out of her car. The visual struck him deep in the chest. Grandma Orna had always been a fearsome presence in his life—she was a gnarled root of a woman, hardened and impossible to bend. But with that stubbornness came a strength Ronan rarely found in others and a resilience that could only be admired. The last six years hadn’t been kind. Her body stooped more than it did before, and her hand curled fiercely around the top of her cane. Her snow-white hair was still neatly coiffed, however, and she wore her signature slash of magenta lipstick.

  “Don’t stand there, Ronan,” she barked in her Irish accent, which was still as thick as the day she’d stepped off the boat. “Come help your sister.”

  Keira looked up, her face blossoming into a huge smile. She was still in her work outfit: a tailored navy pencil skirt, a white blouse, and heels that couldn’t have been comfortable for the hour-long drive they’d made from Boston. She must have gone straight from the office to Gram’s house.

  “Here, let me get that.” Ronan reached for the large tote bag dangling from Keira’s arm and offered his free hand to his grandmother. “It’s good to see you both.”

  He bent down to give the older woman a hug, and she felt smaller than ever. How had six years changed her so much? Would they have to start measuring her height in the doorway, like she used to do when they were kids, so he could tell if she was actually shrinking or if it was simply his worries dwarfing her?

  “Would have been better if you hadn’t gone to that miserable part of the world,” she muttered, patting an arthritic hand on his back. “But I’m glad you’re home.”

  Keira shot Ronan a look over their grandmother’s shoulder and rolled her eyes. “I see we’re going to continue with today’s theme of deeply ingrained Catholic guilt.”

  Ronan snorted. “I expect no less.”

  Orna narrowed her eyes at him and stepped out of his embrace. “I’m glad you finally came to your senses.”

  It might sound harsh, but Orna had plenty of reason to detest the idea of her grandson going anywhere near Ireland. To her, it was a place full of betrayal and bad memories. She’d immigrated to the U.S. at nineteen, pregnant, claiming she was going to stay with relatives—although it was a lie—and she’d lived in a small, dirty house crammed with other young women who’d been cast aside for various indiscretions. And from nothing, she had forged a life.

  “Where’s Mom?” Ronan asked. “Is she heading over on her own?”

  Keira’s expression was all the answer he needed. “She’s in the middle of a big project…”

  Six years, he’d been away. Six fucking years without his mother returning his calls or texts for weeks at a time. Six years of her likely being happy that she didn’t have to worry about him bugging her for some semblance of a relationship. He should have known she wouldn’t show.

  This is it. You’re officially done.

  “You don’t need her,” Orna replied in a clipped tone. “Come on. I’m hungry.”

  His grandmother would never coddle him—that wasn’t in her character—but he knew that she didn’t support the complete disinterest Merrin Walsh took in her children’s lives. She hadn’t even shown up at the hospital when Keira had given birth to her little boy, Lukas.

  So why would she turn up for a dinner to welcome her son home?

  “How’re Lukas and Andy?” Ronan asked as they walked into the restaurant and got seated at a booth.

  “Amazing.” Keira smiled. “I can’t believe my little man is two already.”

  “And I can’t wait to meet him in person instead of only seeing him on a computer screen,” he replied. “Looks like motherhood suits you.”

  “Thanks, Ro.”

  “Don’t you mean motherhood suits Andy?” Orna said, picking up a menu and peering at it.

  Keira’s mouth tightened. Orna hadn’t readily approved of her being back at work full-time while Andy stayed home with their son. It made financial sense,
because Keira’s career was incredibly lucrative. Both Ronan and Keira had been raised to be type A high achievers who were incapable of not working. Maybe there was something about trying to win the love of their absentee mother in there, or maybe that was just the researcher in him looking for meaning where there was none?

  “I would say parenthood suits Andy,” Keira replied in a frosty tone. Clearly the hour-long drive with their grandmother had worn her patience down.

  Orna looked up and winked at Ronan from over the top of her menu, a wicked sparkle in her eyes shaving a decade off her age. Yeah, she was inappropriate and old-fashioned and stubborn as a bull. But Ronan’s grandmother was one of the biggest influences in his life—hell, she was the reason he’d chosen to study resilience and mental fortitude for his master’s thesis. Because for all her faults, she’d stormed through life’s challenges like a Spartan warrior, and that was something to be admired.

  “You shouldn’t make jokes like that, Gram,” he admonished.

  “You two are no fun,” she groused. The waiter interrupted their catch-up for a moment to take their orders and leave them with some fresh-baked bread and butter.

  “I can’t believe you’re back,” Keira said to Ronan as the waiter walked away.

  “I can’t believe you’re living in a town called Kissing Creek.” Orna made a face, her crow’s-feet deepening with the disgusted expression. “When Keira told me, I thought she was pulling my leg. What a stupid name.”

  “Apparently they named the creek after a town in Bavaria called Kissing, where the founders were from. I read somewhere that one of the men wanted to name the town after his family name, but it was Leichenberg, which literally translates to mountain of corpses, and they thought it might bring bad luck.”

  Keira blinked. “That’s dark.”

  Orna simply shrugged, as though naming a place Mountain of Corpses was completely fine by her. “So tell us, Ronan. Why’d you come back?”

  “I told you when we Skyped,” he said, meeting her hard stare with a charming smile. “I got a job offer.”