What The Heart Learns Read online

  Riley's eyes scanned the wallpaper - emerald green ivy on a white background - and the offensively matching comforter on the bed, her brows moving up dubiously. "If you say so."

  "Trust me. Plus," he added, moving casually across the room, pushing open another door to turn on the light. "You have a shower."

  "As opposed to a pitcher and washing basin?" she asked with a smirk.

  Devon snort-laughed, shaking his head. "Clawfoot tubs," he clarified. "Which may be nice occasionally, but not every day. Anyway, let's get the spiel over with."

  "Oh, a spiel," she said, wiggling her brows a bit. "I feel wholly un-special."

  He gave her a smile and a What can ya do? Shrug before speaking again. "This is your closet, in case that was not painfully obvious," he told her, opening the door, pulling the string for the light. "There is a porch on this level which can be accessed through a door in the hall. But if you happen out there, don't be too surprised if everyone else accesses it through their bedroom windows. There is a brochure on the nightstand with meal times and a map of the town. Do you need any help with your bags?"

  Riley smiled a bit at that. "Right. You totally seem like the manual labor sort," she drawled.

  "Hey, don't let these glasses fool you. I am all sorts of manly under these very stylish clothes." His voice had dropped into a sexy innuendo that was not lost on her. She was, after all, female, and slightly overdue for a good lay, and he was handsome, funny, and smooth.

  "I'll keep that in mind."

  He offered her a wink that - on anyone else - would have been cheesy, but he managed to pull it off. "Well then, settle in. I'll see you tomorrow, Riley."

  With that, he moved across the room, going out into the hall, and closing her door with a quiet click.

  Alone, she moved across the room to the windows, yanking one open, half-hanging her head out to see the stables view she was promised, a light on within. An office, maybe?

  It wasn't a bad place for a vacation.

  If she were honest with herself, she needed one.

  It was easy back at home to fall into habits that were maybe not all that healthy. She woke up late, drank too much coffee, ate takeaway leftovers, read, worked from home.

  Shower. Rinse. Repeat.

  Day in and day out for weeks or months.

  Having found a fair amount of success professionally, it had been easy to be completely obsessed with work and shirk all other responsibilities and social engagements.

  Hell, before she had decided to come to Stars Landing, she hadn't left her apartment in a week except to check her mailbox in the lobby.

  She was overdue for a change of scenery.

  Maybe if her motivations for the trip weren't exactly sane or healthy, they would be able to get her out of the funk she had felt stuck in for longer than she cared to admit.

  Walking into the bathroom, she was met with hideous mint green tile across the floors and halfway up the walls. But it was clean. And the ornate gilded mirror above the vanity was stunning. The complimentary bath products seemed surprisingly high end. And the towels and robe were soft and fluffy.

  Once the renovations were done, it was going to be a really nice place to stay.

  She walked to the sink, washing the residual Frito grease off her fingers. Looking up at the mirror, she saw herself staring back. Her long black hair was twisted into a messy bun at the top of her head. The glasses were the only adornment to her dark brown eyes, making her wonder when the last time she even saw her mascara tube.

  Eyes drifting lower, she saw her body clad in gray yoga pants, an oversized purple sweater with pockets big enough to squeeze a Mass Market paperback into - her clothing decisions ultimately came down to the likelihood of fitting an extra book in the pockets in case she finished the one in her purse - over her simple tee that declared I Like Big Books And I Cannot Lie.

  She shrugged at her reflection, never having really given too much thought to her appearance, raised to be more concerned with what was in her head than on her body.

  There were many days when the only person she'd see were the delivery men bringing food to her door.

  The only thing she gave thought to when it came to her body was gratitude to her father that she had inherited his fast metabolism lest all her overeating catch up to her. They also let her wear her roomy, oversized clothes without it making it appear as though she was hiding something.

  Grabbing her key, she made her way back toward the hall, going down the stairs to find Devon perched on the desk once again, nodding his head to a tall, thin redhead who seemed perpetually in motion.

  "This one gave me quite a thorough tour of my room," she declared. "I know where the closet is and everything," she added, shooting Devon a wink as she moved past.

  "How much did you pay her to say that?" the redhead asked with what sounded like a smile in her voice.

  "Em, how could you ever accuse me of such a thing? Me, the poor, lowly front desk attendant?"

  "Please," Em snorted. "Poor, my ass, money bags," she added as Riley stepped out into the front porch.

  As she made her way toward her car, a sound caught her attention, making her turn to look down the street, finding a man closing the door to the bookstore that had absolutely been closed when she had driven past.

  It was too dark to make him out, but he didn't even pause to look for a possible car on the road before jumping off the curb and running across the street to disappear into the mechanic shop situated there.

  Book emergency, possibly?

  An itching desire to read the next book in a series?

  She'd been there, once showing up at the bookstore as the owner was locking the front door and begging, pleading, offering her firstborn child for the chance to get the next book in a YA dystopian series.

  Book emergencies happen.

  She grabbed her bags, going into the sitting room with an abundant supply of books, snagging a few off the shelves without even looking at them - always being a fan of the idea of blind dates with books - and heading up to her room.

  A book and a half later, when the sun was nearly getting ready to peek out, she fell into an exhausted sleep with one final thought.

  Whoever curated the books for the inn definitely knew their shit.

  And that, well, it didn't bode well for her, did it?

  TWO

  Riley

  Consciousness came to her the way she liked it least.

  Suddenly.

  Intrusively.

  On a grumble that would impress a moody teenager, her hand swung out, snagging her cell phone off the nightstand, checking the time.

  Ten a.m.

  Not exactly early, but still.

  People needed their beauty sleep.

  She heard it again then, heavy boots in the hall.

  Knowing that the bustling of life and unyielding morning sun would prevent her from falling back to sleep, she rolled out of bed, reaching for her glasses. Flattening her hair as best she could, she grabbed her key, and stepped into the hall, desperately in need of coffee and not giving a good goddamn about looking like she was in desperate need of coffee.

  "That's a look," a deep, sexy, masculine voice met her, making her stop short and look down the hall to see the man who was the apparent source of the boot-stomping. And from the looks of his giant, perfect frame, there was no way he could step quietly even if he tried. Because he was six-and-a-half feet of muscled, tattooed, dark-haired, golden-eyed masculine beauty.

  Almost as a rule, Riley tended to go for substance over looks. It often led her to date somewhat nerdy milksops of men who you were more likely to find in a library or classroom than anywhere near a hammer. But, yeah, there was no denying the raw masculine sex appeal radiating off the man in the hall across from her.

  Angling her chin up to make eye-contact, she shrugged. "If someone didn't stomp around like they had cinder blocks attached to their feet, maybe I wouldn't have needed to roll out of bed well before my normal time, a
nd have to make a mad dash for the coffee pot. I'm sorry I couldn't be your expected level of pretty this morning. That must really suck for you."

  To that, his lips tipped up into an amused smirk as he closed the space between them at the top of the stairs, not stopping when he got close, making her need to take a step back until her back hit the wall.

  Towering over her, his hand planted on the wall beside her head as his other hand lifted to snag her chin, angling it up. "You're plenty pretty. And, baby, know what I could do with a mouth like this?" he asked, tone rumbling deeper in his chest.

  "Show it respect and supply it with coffee on the off-chance it has the need to be roused before noon on any day of the week, perhaps?"

  To that, he chuckled, the sound low and rolling. And it maybe moved through her system and made her belly do a little flutter. But she tried her best to ignore it.

  She could spot a manwhore from five miles away in a dense fog. And the man in front of her had "I will fuck you until you can't walk right for a week, but toss you out of my room before the sweat is dry" written all over him.

  "What's your name, babe?"

  "Riley," she answered automatically.

  "Got a last name?"

  "I do. But I can't fathom why you'd need it."

  He gave another chuckle as he pushed off the wall and moved back a step. "I'm Dane Broderick. You'll hear a lot of shit about me around this town. All of it is true. You decide you want to find out how fun it is to get that kind of reputation for yourself, I am just a couple doors down the hall."

  With that, he turned and took down the stairs two at a time, leaving her to lean against the wall and suck in a breath so deep it made her lungs burn.

  Sure, she knew he was a jerk.

  But he was a jerk who looked like the god of sex and spoke and acted like a man who knew exactly how to make that mouth of hers open wide and scream through half a dozen orgasms.

  So, yeah, her body was buzzing a bit as she made her way down the stairs toward the dining room situated directly behind the staircase in the hall of the first floor. And she decided that the reaction was solely because she had been a verifiable shut-in for the past few months. She hadn't been around any men, let alone players. Her defenses were low.

  "Do you wake up like that every morning? Devon's voice greeted her as she moved into the dining room doorway.

  "More or less. Is it that bad?" she asked, somewhat self-consciously raising a hand to her hair that felt like it was about in fifty different directions at once.

  "A man rolls over to see that, Riley, you won't be getting out of that bed for a good, long time," he said, shaking his head as he turned away from her.

  He returned a moment later with two mugs, a bowl of creamers, and a carafe of lifeblood coffee. "Are you flirting with me, Dev?" she asked as he sat, kicking out the chair across from him for her to take.

  "I, ah..."

  "Aren't used to being called on it," she mused with a smile as she reached for the mug of steaming coffee he offered her, starting to pour the sugar.

  "Something like that," he agreed with a smile. "Blunt is a somewhat rare quality to find in the women around here."

  "I'm not from around here," she reminded him as she emptied a creamer into her coffee before taking a long, scalding sip.

  "That might be what I like best about you."

  "Why is that?"

  "This is a small town. You try dating someone you literally knew when you were both in diapers.

  The image of making the moves on someone, then getting a vivid flashback of them blowing snot bubbles flashed across her mind. "I see your point."

  "So are you hitting the bookstore today?"

  "After about a pot of this," she said, holding up her coffee cup. "This is great, by the way."

  "Emily has very specific rules about the grounds-to-water ratio."

  "A woman after my own heart," she mused. "What time does the bookstore open?"

  "Honey," Devon said with a somewhat teasing smile. "It's been open since eight."

  "Eight? Who the hell gets up before then to open a store if they don't need to?"

  "It's a farming town. Most people are up well before five."

  "Well, they're nuts. The crops would still be there after ten," Riley said with a smirk. "Any chance I could take this up to my room with me?" she asked, stroking her hand down the carafe. "We need to get more intimately acquainted."

  Devon chuckled, waving a hand. "Have at it. I'll try not to be too jealous."

  "Awesome. Catch you later," she said, snagging the carafe, cream, sugar, and her mug with a spoon, and headed back into the hall toward the stairs.

  She finished off the coffee while checking all her social media accounts, doing a little book shopping on Amazon, making notes for ones she would pick up. In the store. Like the Luddite she was at times.

  But to her, there was nothing like being able to walk into a bookshop, smell the paper and glue and ink, run your fingers over spines, read as much of it as you wanted before deciding to take it with you, give it a good, loving home at your wildly overstuffed Billy Bookcases you bought after college because, really, who had the money to have built-ins made?

  Book mail was all well and good when she couldn't find what she wanted in the store, or was on a work binge and didn't have time to leave the house.

  But it paled in comparison to actual book shopping.

  After showering, drying her hair, and changing into a pair of dark wash skinny jeans, a white tank top underneath an oversized and unbuttoned purple and white flannel, a pair of beat-up old black Chucks from high school, she grabbed her purse and key and headed out.

  Anticipation and nerves swirled around her belly, made her skin feel electric, buzzing as she crossed over Main Street and started down the sidewalk toward the bookstore.

  Why?

  She wasn't sure.

  It wasn't like it was in her plans to confront the owner.

  She just wanted to see who it was, get an idea for the kind of person they were, their literary taste in general. Nothing else. Anything else would be out-and-out nuts. Psycho. Certifiable.

  She was halfway there when a body sidled in at her right, keeping oddly perfect pace, and making a curious Riley glance over to find a middle-aged heavyset black woman there with one long braid down her back and an assortment of colored necklaces bouncing against her chest with each step.

  Seeming to notice her inspection, the woman's head turned, smiling. She held up her hand where a trashy, bodice-ripper romance novel was situated. "Heading over to the bookstore to get the next in this series," she supplied. "You heading there as well?"

  "Ah, I... yeah," Riley said, a little weirded out that her destination was guessed so easily. Unless news really did travel that fast in small towns. Grapevines and all that.

  "I'm Maude," the woman supplied. "Maude Mays. You're new here."

  "Yeah, I am... just here for a... stay," she decided on as her hand moved out to touch the handle on the door to the bookstore, finding herself mildly disappointed for the distraction this stranger provided. She was ruining a moment Riley had been waiting for going on about a year and a half now.

  "Well, welcome," Maud said, her keen eyes seeming to read beyond Riley's words, like she knew her real reasons for being in Stars Landing, for visiting the bookstore. But that was absurd. "I will leave you to your... browsing," she said, stepping inside, and disappearing behind a bookshelf, though Riley got the irrational feeling that the woman was not far away.

  Taking a deep breath, pulling in the scent of paper, glue, and ink she craved like any addict craved their fix, she was met with something unexpected. A strong overtone of fresh coffee mingled intoxicatingly with something sweet and chocolatey.

  True, she might have been on a mission, but she was also a complete book, coffee, and sweets junkie.

  And nothing - not even her anger and curiosity - was going to stop her from browsing.

  What she found made her
heart sink to her belly.

  There were the classics, as expected, as any self-respecting store stocked even though the only time anyone bought them was when schools required them.

  There was also healthy, fat, overstocked genre rows. Romance that showed all the sub-genres from historical to paranormal, from Amish to panty-rippers. The science fiction section was just as stocked. Along with mystery, true crime, non-fiction, YA. You name it.

  But that wasn't what impressed her per se.

  No.

  That was the giant built-in unit to the front of the store that was jam-packed, no-space-left crowded with what she was pretty sure from the first glance were paperback indie books. You could usually tell just by looking - there was no variety of spine size, everything the usual six-by-nine format independent authors used, giving you a nice solid tome to hold in your hands.

  She didn't trust that, though, moving across the store to lift a few from their places, flipping open to the copyright page to confirm her suspicions.

  Every last one was indie.

  And judging by the blurbs and first few pages she read of a bunch of them, they were all good.

  On a sigh for giving them any kind of business - least of all hers - she stacked those on top of the new copy of Jane Eyre she hadn't seen in New York yet to bring home to add to her shelf of twelve other copies of the same book.

  With that, she followed the enticing scent of another newly brewed pot of coffee toward the back of the store, breathing deep like a newly healthy person finally leaving their sick room.

  She found a small fenced-in area full of small two-top tables painted in bold primary colors. The chairs weren't exactly of the cozy variety, but there had been a few plush armchairs in the main part of the store to sit and get lost in new worlds while huddled in. These chairs were meant for coffee drinking and sweets eating.

  To the back was a long counter with a dessert case boasting a variety of pastries just begging her to overindulge in.