Ten Reasons to Stay ((The Risky Hearts Duet) Book 1)

  This book is a work of fiction. Any reference to historical events, real people-living or dead, real locales is entirely coincidental and used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, any place, events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and story lines are created from the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Ten Reasons To Stay. Copyright © 2018 by Candace Knoebel

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes. If you are reading this book and you have not purchased it or won it in an author/publisher contest, this book has been pirated. Please delete and support the author by purchasing the ebook from one of its many distributors.

  Cover design by Candace Knoebel

  Interior book design by Candace Knoebel.

  Edited by Cynthia Shepp.

  First Edition

  Published by Candace Knoebel

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  The Taste of Her Words by Candace Knoebel

  Other Works by Candace Knoebel

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  Corinne

  “Are you really going to go through with it?” Macy asked me.

  I stared at the screen of my phone as if it were a snake, fangs bared. My insides screamed no, heart slamming against the base of my throat as my eyes grazed over the picture of someone other than my husband.

  Cole. I tested the name, tossing it around in my mind. It made me think of long, hard days of sweat and sun. Rough, calloused hands with a tender touch. My stomach tightened as I studied his picture. He had hard eyes. The kind that said he’d never let someone in, even if they begged. And a smile that suggested he’d take a woman to all the dark places she’d never dreamed of visiting.

  That was good. I didn’t want to be let in.

  I swiped right, holding my breath.

  “Shit, Corinne. What if… what if Jack decides he doesn’t want it?”

  I steeled my heart, locking up every good memory… every sweet kiss… with a key I just handed to the snake in my hand. “Then he shouldn’t have suggested it to begin with.”

  Jack’s words pounded in my head like a witch’s incantation from a nightmare. I want an open marriage. I want an open marriage. I want an open marriage.

  Nine years. Nine loving, happy years I’d given him, and he crushed it under the weight of five words.

  “What if this guy is a total jerk?” Macy asked as I chewed on my lip, trying to think what to type.

  “What if?” I tossed back. “It’s not like I have to see him. I can just… flirt a little. Feel it out. I mean, Jack’s going to do what he’s going to do with or without my permission. I might as well test the waters.”

  I didn’t mean it. Even as the words rolled off my tongue, I wanted to reach into the air and pluck them away, shove them back into their dark hiding place. Fire burned behind my eyes just thinking about talking to a man other than Jack. He was all I’d ever known. My first love. First everything.

  But that wasn’t enough for him.

  Sitting the phone on my desk, I released a pent-up sigh. I couldn’t do it. Even though every vengeful fiber in my body begged me to, I couldn’t. I didn’t want it.

  Macy rubbed my shoulder. “Corinne, just tell him.”

  The touch was small, simple, but it was strong enough to fracture my frail courage.

  The emotions crashed hard, like a wave, pulling me under. “Tell him what, Macy? That I can’t bring myself to sleep with another man? That I hope he decides he doesn’t want to sleep with another woman?” I covered my face with my hands, a swell of tears pushing behind my lids. My words sloppy and broken. This was all so fucked up. “Even if he said he wouldn’t. Even if he said he’d respect me, it still doesn’t change what he put out there in the first place. It can’t reverse the truth. Whether I agree or not, it’s what he wants.”

  Macy pulled my hands from my face. “You know, you have a choice whether your husband gets a free pass. We aren’t living in some fucked up dystopian novel. At least, I don’t think we are. With the way things are going politically though…” She cracked a smile, but it was hollow. Her gaze softened. “Just be honest with him.”

  “I know, but I shouldn’t even have to say it. He should know.” I felt pathetic uttering those words out loud, but they were the truth. I envied those able to speak their minds. Those who didn’t put their feelings on the backburner to tend to the feelings of others.

  If you cracked me open and dug through my truth, you’d see that my heart had always been too soft. Too forgiving, and it led me to this point in my life… a crossroads I was stuck at… without any idea of which way to turn.

  “Maybe… maybe what we have isn’t enough anymore.” My heart felt mangled, lost, rotting away.

  “Corinne, did you get those papers filed?” Joseph, our boss, called over the top of our cubicles.

  I jumped at the sound of my name. “Almost done,” I said loudly, swiping the tears away while trying to gather myself.

  He appeared beside my desk. Joseph was a weasel of a man. Tall and lanky, with a receding hairline. He always wore a ridiculous smirk. Finished nearly every sentence with the word so.

  So…

  “Do I need to separate you two?” he asked, coffee in hand. His tone was flat, condescending. Like he was talking to toddlers.

  Macy had wheeled back to her desk behind me, her gaze glued to the screen as her fingers danced across the keyboard. She was good at seeming inconspicuous. I, on the other hand, was too meek to hide.

  I swallowed. “No, sir.”

  Setting his coffee down on top of my papers, he leaned toward me. He loved to invade personal space. Teeth yellowed, he smelled of stale cigarettes, and my stomach turned sour. “You know, all it would take is a mention to Shelley, and you’d be written up, so…”

  I stared at him, waiting, like always, for him to finish his thought.

  “So,” he continued, hiking up his pants. “When you’re on company time, you work. Not gossip. Understand?”

  My entire body pulsed with anger, but I kept it inside. I always did. “Yes, sir.”

  He stared at me a moment more, a certain twisted twinkle circling his pupils. “Good girl.”

  I shuddered. All the way down to my toes, praying he’d walk away. I hated when he looked at me like that… like a piece of meat he wanted to sink his teeth into.

  I waited for him to leave, but he just stood there, staring at me, words hiding behind his lips. He leaned in closer, face just a few foul breaths from mine. “You know you’re my strongest girl h
ere, right? That’s why I put so much extra work on you. I count on you.”

  “Yes,” I said, turning back to the safety of my screen. Willing him to leave.

  He sat on the edge of my desk, his voice lowered, causing the hair on the back of my neck to stand. “There’s this convention coming up in a couple of weeks. Three days in lucky Las Vegas. I put a word in with the big man upstairs to allow you to go with me, so…”

  “So…” I drawled out.

  “So, maybe we could uh… sightsee, if you’d like.”

  There it was. The pig.

  Keeping my face straight, I turned. “I’m sorry, Joseph. I’d love to, but I’ll be out of town with my husband that weekend. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have those extra projects you gave me to complete.”

  “If you change your mind…” he said, picking up his coffee, leering at me until I squirmed.

  I tried to smile. I really did. It may have come off more as a scowl, but I swiveled away from him fast enough he couldn’t tell. A second later, he disappeared around the corner, his musty scent still lingering. There was a coffee ring on the report I’d printed out a little bit ago. Fucker.

  I didn’t think this day could get any worse.

  “Good for you,” Macy whispered behind me, raising a small fist of triumph in the air.

  I was shaking. That was hard for me. Standing up for myself, I meant. The fear of what would happen if I actually said what I thought was the blood that ran through my veins. It fed my insecurities. It was the worry that pressed heavily onto me, crippling my tongue.

  “We’ll talk at lunch, okay?” Macy said when I headed for the printer.

  I nodded, scooped up the freshly printed report, and then headed back to my computer. Staring at the screen, I tried to figure out where everything went wrong. When the fire in our marriage bed was snuffed out, and then rekindled with the idea to fill it with others. It started with going a few nights between, and then a couple of weeks, to not even remembering the last time I’d been touched in a way that made my nerves spark with electricity.

  But even so, I still loved Jack. He was my world. I couldn’t even fathom letting another man touch me in that way.

  Could I?

  I jumped in my seat when my phone vibrated against my desk. Glancing down, I half expected a message from Jack, only to be hit by a rolling wave of heat when I realized it was a message from Cole.

  Hey, gorgeous.

  Shit! What do I do? I thought as my heart jump-started to life. Already, my palms, forehead, and underarms were beginning to sweat. I darted my gaze furtively around… as if my husband were going to appear from thin air to confront me.

  I’d only considered swiping right on Cole because his About Me made me laugh. The real kind of laughter that woke me up inside. And… maybe… maybe because of his eyes.

  I hadn’t expected anyone to respond to my profile.

  It was a picture of an actual lit tinder I made from the lint in my dryer. The only caption I wrote was Love Me… The name I used was Priscilla.

  I took it a week after Jack told me what he wanted. When I’d been going through my angry phase, trying to decide if I wanted to burn all his shit… maybe even the house.

  I like your wit. Love me tender, right? Presley fan?

  I felt all the blood rush to places that had been dried up for longer than I realized, my heart thudding and skidding behind my rib cage.

  Don’t answer him, Corinne. You’re just going to encourage something you don’t want. This was foolish. You’re foolish.

  I opened my drawer and set my phone inside, determined to leave it be. Focusing on the spreadsheet on my screen, I tried to lose myself in the numbers. I was a numbers kind of girl, but I felt like someone was watching me.

  From inside my drawer.

  I opened it. A new message.

  I bet you’re hot.

  What a creep, I thought, rolling my eyes. Were all men creeps? There. Proof this was a bad idea. Just message him back and tell him that, then delete the app.

  I opened the app with a renewed sense of purpose. Jack might want an open marriage, but I sure as hell didn’t.

  Thank you for the compliments, but I’m afraid this was a bad idea. Hope you find your match.

  I left the message, starting to close the app… just as another message came through.

  Don’t rush off. I just… I just want to talk. If I offended you, I’m sorry. I’m used to the women on here wanting something easy and quick with no strings.

  I stared at the screen as my eyebrows formed a V. Was that… was that what this app was for?

  You didn’t offend me. I’m sorry. I’m…

  I bit my lip as Jack stared back at me from the photo pinned to my cubicle wall.

  I’m married, I finished typing.

  A second later, Then why are you on the app?

  I flinched. Shit. Why the hell did I put myself in this situation? I chewed on the end of my thumb, staring at the question. I felt swallowed up by all my scattered feelings. My heart was twisted inside out.

  The truth… tell him the truth, Corinne.

  My husband wants an open marriage, I typed back. Maybe sharing a secret with someone I didn’t ever have to meet in person could be okay. Making him my personal confessional.

  Do you want one?

  No.

  Tell him.

  I did. But it doesn’t change what he wants.

  What do you want?

  It was the first time I’d been asked that by someone of the opposite sex in a long time. Jack never asked what I wanted. He was too busy worrying over what he wanted. A new big-screen TV. The latest toolset. A singing doorbell.

  An open marriage.

  I stared at the message as if it were in a language I didn’t understand.

  What did I want?

  I wanted a husband who wanted only me. To feel like I was more than the person who did the laundry, dishes, and cooked dinner. To feel lusted after, like the great heroines in every novel I’d ever read. To feel the weight of a man’s gaze roaming my body, his arousal rolling off him in waves.

  I practically threw the phone back in the drawer, shutting it as another surge of tears surfaced. No. I wouldn’t do it. I couldn’t.

  “I hate eating here,” I whispered to Macy as we headed for the cafeteria line. The place was packed full of employees, the many voices raised to the ceiling, beating against my eardrums. I liked quiet, neglected places where I could lose myself in a good book and not be bothered.

  “Yeah, but the food is cheap and our break isn’t long enough to leave the building,” Macy said as she grabbed a tray, and then handed one to me.

  I stepped in line, only to be shoved out of the way by some guy I’d never seen before. He didn’t even say excuse me. Just butted ahead, digging his hands into a pan of dinner rolls, touching each of them until he found the one he wanted.

  What in the actual—

  “Say something,” Macy said behind me, against my ear.

  I shook my head. Though I hated all assholes just like the next person, I hated causing scenes even more. Confrontation was one of the main things I steered clear from in life. Being the quiet one in the corner worked just fine for me.

  “Fine. I will.” Macy stepped around me, shoulders back, chest out. “Hey… fucker.” She nudged her tray against him. Stepped into his space. All five foot two inches of her.

  Macy was my polar opposite. For all my quiet, she was loud and boisterous. The courage to my passiveness. If she had an issue, it was made known. If someone else had an issue, she put them in their place.

  The man was scowling when he spun around. He was at least a foot taller than her, but that didn’t mean a thing to Macy. Her energy and determination towered over any man.

  “Yeah. I’m talking to you,” Macy pressed on, invading his space, practically pushing him out of the line. “You skipped her, you dingleberry. That’s not nice, now is it?”

  My cheeks were on fire when he
peered past her. The confusion he wore slowly morphed into annoyance. Building like a fire across his face.

  She took the dinner roll he picked off his plate, and then put it on her tray. “I’m going to take this, and then watch you get in line like the rest of us, okay?”

  He paused a moment, most likely debating if he wanted to get into it with her, and then rolled his eyes. I wanted to hide in a corner as he walked off, muttering under his breath while the few within earshot chuckled amongst themselves.

  “See? That wasn’t hard, was it?” Macy said with an accomplished grin as she sat her tray against the metal bars and proceeded to grab a plate of fried chicken.

  “I can’t believe you just did that,” I whispered, picking a pre-made salad.

  “You let people walk all over you too much.” She grabbed a slice of chocolate cake, chewing on a piece of her chicken. “It isn’t healthy, Corinne. You need to learn how to stand up for yourself.” There was a prudent pause, and then she added, “In more ways than one.”

  My skin went warm. She was talking about Jack, and it made me wish I hadn’t said anything to her. But that wish was only momentary because Macy was the only friend I had that I could be completely honest with, knowing I wouldn’t be judged.

  Well… with most things.

  After lunch, I dove into work, refusing to give any attention toward my phone. Soon, I’d be home, cooking for Jack. I had it all planned out. I’d cook his favorite pasta dish, and then cuddle up to him while he watched whatever show he put on. I’d wear his favorite perfume, and kiss his earlobe like he liked me to do. It would distract him, like it used to, and then we’d make love right there on the couch. I’d fight for the fire we once had. I’d rekindle our love.

  I had to.

  Chapter 2

  Corinne

  Jack had his feet kicked up on the couch, phone in his hands, while Jaws played in the background. I stood over the stove, pushing crushed tomatoes around the pan. I picked the ripest, wanting the dish to be the best possible.

  I thought about asking him what he was doing, but I wasn’t the sort to pry. His phone was his. My values were mine.