36. All The Days

Juliet

"And welcome to another episode of Heartbreakers and Matchmakers," I say into the mic, dipping my face so I don't break into a giddy smile on air.

Sadie's at her laptop, shaking her head with amusement. She knows what we're going to tell listeners today. She's been having too much fun ribbing us since she learned we're now together. The took you forever. The I saw it coming. The your flirting was endless. I swear they're never going to stop from her.

Today's our first episode since we left Darling Springs and became not just co-hosts, but a couple. I'm giddy, yes, but also a little nervous about sharing that with our listeners.

But they made this possible in many ways, by listening to us, and giving us chances every week to spend time together. Time that brought us back together. After the intros, we slide into our first segment, where we address questions written in by listeners. When's the best time to share about your family, how to talk about sex-pectations, and when to end things.

After we tackle those topics, Monroe lifts a brow. "I have a dating question."

We planned that as the opener. But then Sadie surprises me by cutting in. Every now and then she joins us on air. I just wasn't expecting her to today. "Actually, I do," she says.

I blink, surprised. "Oh. Sure. The floor's yours."

With an impish grin, she says, "What took you two so long?"

Well, then. I smile at Monroe. "Valid question."

"And a very good point," he adds, then shrugs happily as he clarifies. "I guess now's as good a time as any to let all our listeners know that the Heartbreakers and Matchmakers are now…well, matched."

Sadie hoots. "Called it. Actually, the number of listeners who called it is probably about the same as the number of listeners."

I laugh. "Is that so? Has everyone been writing in and telling you we should go out?"

She nods vigorously. "Pretty much from the get-go." She leans back in her chair. "So, tell us. How did it happen?"

While we were in the thick of it, we agreed not to discuss our dating experiment on the show. We said we'd decide later if we'd ever discuss it on air. But on the drive back to the city, we made the decision and it was an easy one. We want to share our love, and our story. That's why we do this podcast—because we love love.

"I decided to give the apps another try while I was out of town. New town, new chance," I explain, then nod toward my guy. Monroe smiles slyly. "And I volunteered as her dating coach."

"You couldn't possibly have had an ulterior motive," Sadie deadpans.

Monroe acts aghast. "I just wanted to help."

It's my turn to smile slyly. Pretty sure he did have ulterior motives, but didn't know it. "And he was very helpful. So helpful he offered to be all my dates," I explain.

"How very generous," Sadie quips.

"Yes, I thought so too," Monroe retorts.

"You couldn't actually have offered so she wouldn't date anyone else," Sadie says, dry as the desert.

Monroe adopts a thoughtful look. "I mean, I suppose that was a benefit."

"Yes, just a little one," our intrepid producer says.

Monroe sneaks a peek at me. One that makes my heart flutter. And my lady parts too. "But at the time, I wanted to help." Then he laughs, self-deprecatingly. "At least that's what I told myself. I also couldn't stand the thought of her dating anyone else."

"And that wasn't a tip off to you?" Sadie asks him, incredulous. I'm having a blast watching her both tease him and grill him.

Maybe I'll get in on the action more. "Yeah, was it?"

"In retrospect," he grumbles.

"Fine, fine. So you taught her how to date," Sadie says, sketching air quotes, "By pretending to be other guys? So then, was she kissing you or some other guy?"

Ooh, good question.

"Me. Only me." His answer is instantaneous and possessive.

Sadie arches a skeptical brow his way. "You sure about that?"

"Positive," he says. It comes out as a growl.

"But how do you know?"

His eyes narrow, and he stares at me with heat and desire. "Because I do," he says, answering it in a defiant, but crystal clear way. Then, with his gaze locked on me, he adds, "Because I told her I wanted to. Because I said I wasn't pretending then. Because we talked and both admitted it was us kissing, us wanting, us connecting."

It's said with such passion that I can feel our practice dates all over again, in the form of flutters racing up and down my chest, settling in my core, heating me up.

"It was us," I say, caught up in the intensity of his admission. "Just us."

Sadie's waving a hand in front of her face. "Well, that clears it up, and I suspect we're going to need to sign off for now since Monroe and Juliet look like they're about to kick me out of the studio so they can break in this table."

That breaks us out of our lust tractor beam. I shake off the fog of hormones. Monroe drags a hand through his hair, like he's trying to clear off a cloud of lust too. "Sounds like we were practice dating as us, after all," he says.

Sadie smiles like I told you so. "That's what I was saying."

Monroe might have started each date pretending to be someone else, but with each one, we learned how to be together. We learned about each other. I'm not sure I saw it that way at the time, but looking back, we were dating each other all along.

"Let's keep practicing," I say.

"We will."

Thirty minutes later, we practice something else entirely in my bedroom. "Deeper," I urge.

My man drives into me, filling me so much, so fantastically that I arch my back. Pleasure ripples through me, stretching to the ends of me.

And, pleasure radiates in him too. I can tell from his sounds, his breath, and from the view. I'm gazing at the ceiling in my bedroom, where my very handy man indeed installed a mirror earlier this week.

That ass.

That back.

Those legs.

Those shoulders.

Monroe's body moves and pulses as he rocks into me, hips swiveling, then as he eases out, pauses, and…I moan a carnal, wild yes.

The sight of his ass muscles bunching as he thrusts into me are driving me wild. Sending me spinning. "Again," I cry out.

"Yeah? Like this?" he asks, a rhetorical question as he pumps into me, hitting that spot inside me again and again.

My toes curl.

My stomach clenches.

And my mind lights up. I'm watching him fucking me and it's the sexiest thing I've ever seen. This view of my guy. This view of him taking me, owning me, pleasing me.

I get it now—why mirrors are such a thing.

I've unlocked a new kink. "I love," I gasp out, my words bitten off by a wild cry ripped from deep inside me as my clit sings from the pleasure pressing down on me…

"You love what?" he prompts as he fucks me deep.

Words are hard. Thoughts are hard. My body is buzzing, my cells are pulsing. I'm close, so close. "I love watching us," I finally manage to say. "I just love…watching us."

This is my true new kink. My eyes wide open, enjoying the view of the man I love, taking me far into the night.

Another pump, another thrust, and my vision blurs and I spiral into the bliss of this love, this passion, this man.

In seconds, he's coming too, hard and loud, just the way I like it.

Later, we're lying in bed, cleaned up and sated, and he takes my hand. "Maybe we were practicing as us all along. I don't think I knew it for a while. Or that I wanted to admit it even when I did realize. But now I do, and you know what they say?"

He turns to face me, eyes expectant.

"Practice makes perfect?"

He nuzzles my neck. "Yep."

Someone else nuzzles my hair. Then purrs loudly, like an engine rumbling down the highway. I reach a hand up to scratch Mustache's chin. "I know you missed me."

My cat rubs his head against mine, answering yes in his own way.

Monroe scratches the feline's chin.

Yeah, I think I'll keep them both.

I have an hour before we hit the road a few weeks later, so I walk with Fable to Elodie's in Hayes Valley, catching up on her latest news along the way. Dating news.

"He's pretty fun," she says of a new guy she's started seeing. His name is Brady, and he's a stock broker. But there's some hesitation in her voice. I wonder if she can hear it too as she tells me more about him. "He's just one of those people who likes everyone," she adds but the report doesn't sound entirely great for some reason I can't quite put my finger on.

"I'm glad it's going well, but don't be afraid to listen to your gut," I say.

She gives me a friendly smile. "I hear you. I'll let you know if my gut says something interesting."

"You do that," I say, then flash back to a time at a football game when I saw her boss — the billionaire owner of the football team looking at her longingly when we were all in the suite. Something in his eyes made me feel like…he really saw her. Understood her even. "Maybe Brady is the right guy for you. Or maybe there's someone else."

"Can you send me this someone else right now?" She jokes, then waves when we reach the chocolate shop. "Have fun with your mom."

"I will. Can't wait to hear more about your guy," I say, then add, "Or your someone else."

She laughs. "Yes, me too."

As she leaves I head into Elodie's, scanning the shop for a familiar face. There she is. Mom's clutching a cup of hot chocolate and waving frantically to me from a table.

Like I could miss her in her pink sneakers, flare jeans and a sleek white top. But it's not even the fashion mom look that stands out. It's the glow on her cheeks.

"I seriously need your skin care tips," I say when I join her.

She wiggles a brow. "It's called…wait for it…a third date."

My eyebrows rise. "Is that so?"

"Yes. Tonight. Tell me everything I need to know about third dates these days," she says, then waves a hand. "Well everything you don't say on the podcast. Since I do listen."

It's sweet that she does. Though, that might also mean she knows Monroe gives it to me good every night. Hmm. Must rethink what I share. Not that I shared intimate details, but I don't exactly keep it a secret that he makes me grab the sheets every night. But I push those thoughts aside as I answer Mom. "Then, you pretty much know about the, ahem, sex-pectations of the third date," I say.

She scoffs. "Please. That was the first date. Why do you think my skin looks so good?"

And I'm a little speechless. But I'm all ears as she asks me what to do if Josiah, the hardware store owner, wants to ask her to DTR tonight when they have dinner here in the city.

"I don't think you need to define the relationship tonight," I say.

"Oh good, because I just want to keep this little situationship we have for a bit longer," she says, then smiles.

It's the kind of carefree grin I never really saw growing up. I'm so glad it's there.

"I have the perfect tunes for our road trip," I declare as we cross the Golden Gate Bridge that afternoon.

"Is that so?" Monroe sounds highly suspicious.

"Trust me." With the Saturday afternoon sun bright and bold through the windows, I toggle through Spotify, hunting for the playlist I made, when Monroe reaches over to the console and hits a button.

News blasts through the car, something about politics and D.C. and it's all so screechy it sounds like a hyena sawing a trumpet. "Make it stop, make it stop," I whine, stabbing the off button.

"I sensed you were attempting to subject me to show tunes," he says.

"And you did subject me to news," I retort.

"All's fair in love and road trips."

"Don't make me play Rodgers and Hammerstein," I seethe playfully.

"Don't make me break out the top of the hour."

I flash him a scathing look as we wind through the Marin Headlands, on the start of our drive to Darling Springs.

"Fine," I concede. "How about a compromise?"

"What do you have in mind?"

"For every Pearl Jam, you give me one Tate McRae."

"I have no idea who that is," he says drolly.

"I know. But she's hot and makes me want to fuck you."

He hits the play button on my phone so fast.

I smile. I guess I won. He listens to my music the whole way, and when we get to our room at The Ladybug Inn he throws me down on the bed, hikes up my skirt and fucks me on all fours till I'm screaming his name.

Then we get dressed for a wedding.

With Monroe in slacks and a button-down—cuffs rolled up to show off the flowers and that ladybug ink I love madly—we leave the inn and walk down Main Street. We're early for the wedding. Quite early. But Monroe was insistent we leave soon so we could walk to the farm even though it won't take too long.

We pass the arcade, Monroe tugging on my hand as the old Frogger machine winks at us from inside the window. "I have a confession," he says, using the same words he did that night of our first date.

Tingles rush through me as I anticipate him telling me he wants to kiss me, like he said that night too. "Tell me."

He pulls me close, tilts his head, then whispers, "I can't stop thinking about how bad we were at Frogger."

I swat his chest. "That's what you're thinking about?"

"I mean, we were terrible, Juliet. Awful."

I tiptoe my fingers up his shirt. "Probably because you couldn't stop thinking about kissing me."

"Ah, that explains everything." He tucks a strand of my hair behind my ear. "I've wanted to since the second I saw you in Darling Springs," he says, an echo of our first date at last.

The words thrum in my chest, making me more aware of every detail. The warm breeze, a summer afternoon, a heart that grows bigger. I kiss him, slow and tender and full of promises.

When we break the kiss, we resume our pace through town, passing the single-screen movie theater, its marquee advertising a Retro 2000s Night this week. "Hey, I wonder if they have a cheese and cracker night now?"

Monroe laughs fondly. "I'd almost forgotten you'd made that suggestion. If they're smart, they took up Anonymous on it."

"And if they did, my snack snob legacy lives on," I say.

One night, we went there, but pre-planned our snacks. We'd lifted our noses in advance at the prospect of over-buttered popcorn and Junior Mints, opting instead to sneak crackers and cheese into the theater in my purse. Then we laughed and crunched our way through 1990s comedies on retro movie night, before we kissed as the credits rolled.

That week with him years ago was wonderful and poignant. We always knew it would end. Now, everything feels possible with Monroe. Now our days aren't winding down. They're unfurling in front of us, a red carpet into our future. "We should go tomorrow," I say, squeezing his hand, like I'm sealing this plan.

"It's a date. Since you did say practice makes perfect," he says, then comes to a halt. I startle, then follow his expression as his gaze drifts upward.

Oh. We're here.

We're under the awning with its logo of the woman in the claw-foot tub.

"Huh. Didn't realize we were here," he says, and it's cute. Truly it is how he tries to be all nonchalant about The Slippery Dipper.

"I had no idea either," I say, letting him have this moment. This stroll down the memory lane of our once upon a time summer romance.

He scratches his jaw. "Maybe we should go inside?"

What does he have up his sleeve? He's not proposing. It's way too soon. I'm sure of that. Maybe he just wants to buy me a bar of soap? Reenact that fateful day more than eight years ago? That's probably it since he seems in a romantic mood today.

"It's always a yes with you," I say.

We go inside, meandering only briefly before he says, "Let me get you something," he says, then heads for my favorite scents. The vanilla and honey. And I was right. He grabs a small candle, sniffs it, then hands it to me. I waft some into my nose.

Mmm. "Nice."

"Smells like you," he says, then before I can even return the favor and beeline for the rosemary and shea butter, he's at the counter, buying the candle from a red-headed man.

As Monroe asks how he's doing, how his kids are, how the wife is, I wander around the store, sniffing a strawberry body spray, then a coconut grapefruit body wash as Monroe chats more with the man.

Outside the store, he hands me the wrapped candle. "Here you go. Open it."

I already know what it is, but still I take it, undoing the purple twine, then the brown paper.

But there's no candle.

Inside there's a small box. From my sister's jewelry shop. I blink, confused but intrigued. "You got me…"

I know it's not a diamond. She doesn't sell those. Still, I'm so damn curious.

"Open it," he urges once more.

With a thumping heart and excited fingers, I tug off the top of the box. On a jewelry pillow, a silver chain sits, bright and shiny. Gently, I pull it out, and my breath catches.

It's a necklace with a charm on it of a little house, like the cottage Eleanor gave us, the home that brought us back together. "Oh Monroe," I say, a lump rising in my throat.

This man is so romantic. I don't know why I'm surprised. He's surrounded by it on our podcast, in his practice. But still, I'm thrilled and lucky that he is.

"It seemed…fitting," he says.

I unclasp it. "I want to wear it today."

"Yeah?" He sounds enchanted.

"I do."

"Let me help," he says, then moves behind me, as I brush my hair off my neck. Carefully, he drapes the chain around my throat, his fingertips dusting my skin as he hangs it just so, then as he links it together. "There. It's where I fell in love with you."

I shiver and smile all at once. "I know. I fell in love with you too."

A soft kiss from him makes my skin tingle. "Correction: fell in love with you again."

Correction: my skin doesn't just tingle. It sizzles.

I murmur as he kisses my neck on Main Street in the town where he grew up. The town where we fell in love again. Thanks to a house. "It's perfect."

When I spin around, I'm in his arms, where I belong. "Where's the candle?"

"I've got that too. It was just a cover up."

I laugh. "I figured as much once you gave me this. You had it all planned out?"

He nods toward the store. "That guy's big into giving gifts to his woman too. He helped me out with the switcheroo."

"You planned this to that degree?"

"I planned all our dates. Of course I planned this," he says.

Yes, of course. Since that's who he is.

We walk through town on this warm summer day till we reach Ripley's farm. There, Vikas and Bowen stand in front of their friends and family and pledge to love each other always.

"I now pronounce you together always," the officiant says, and I love that their vows are uniquely them. "You may now kiss your groom."

As they kiss, we all clap. I scan the guests, spotting Ripley in the back, her tattoos on display in her sleeveless dress. She looks relieved and happy, like she's glad she pulled off this wedding. A few rows away, a strapping man with the kind of watchful eyes that see everything is looking her way. "He looks like," I begin, whispering to Monroe as I nod to them.

"A bodyguard? Yeah, that's Banks," he says. "And he knocked some sense into me the day of my dad's party."

"Oh, I like him then. And I wonder if he likes Ripley? Or if he's watching out for her?"

"He's definitely watching her quite close," Monroe says. "And like he wants to know what she looks like naked." He swipes my hair off my neck. "It's a look I'm familiar with since it's how I look at you."

I love that look for me and as for Ripley and Banks, I'll have to ask her later.

For now, I turn all my focus back to the two handsome men walking down the makeshift aisle together. As they stop to say hi to all their guests including me.

Bowen looks me up and down with a knowing grin. "Looks like you're getting your happily ever after," he says. "Told you so, hun."

Then Vikas turns to Monroe, a stern look on his features. "Be good to her. She's one in a million."

I run my finger along the house charm, feeling the full weight of its meaning as Monroe drapes an arm around me and squeezes possessively. "I know and I will. I promise."

Vikas wiggles his eyebrows my way. "Like I said, yesss and please and sir."

That night as we dance under the Darling Springs stars,I can see our future clearly. It feels like today, and tomorrow, and the next day.

Monroe

A few weeks later, when we're back in the city, I get up early on a Sunday, the sun streaking through the bedroom window. Juliet's sound asleep, looking peaceful and happy. Even in her sleep. That's how she's appeared lately, and I'm damn glad I put that look on her beautiful face. Once I'm ready, I give her a soft kiss, then turn to leave.

She grabs my wrist and blinks her eyes open. "Hey."

"Didn't realize you were up," I say.

"I'm not but I need you to find out something when you play golf today with Wilder Blaine."

He's the owner of both a football team and the golf course in the city where I like to hit the links. Sometimes he's my golf partner, like this morning. "Okay. What are you angling for?"

She smiles. "I had this feeling he was into Fable."

I roll my eyes. "Juliet."

She sighs, like she's exasperated with me. "I'm a matchmaker. I can't help it."

"I promise nothing," I say.

But when I arrive I know I'll do everything I can to find out — for her. Love just has that effect on you.

And a funny thing happens when I play a round with the dark-haired, sarcastic, inked billionaire who owns the joint. I ask him a few questions about work, and before I know it, he's mentioned how brilliant the team's head designer is. How talented. "She's fantastic. I'm so lucky to have Fable Calloway working with me," he says.

The way he says her name makes me think Juliet is right.

When I return home I tell her everything, finishing with, "And I didn't even have to ask."

Her eyes pop and she throws her arms around me. "You're brilliant. And I just have a feeling."

I have a feeling too. As I nuzzle my face into her chestnut locks, I have a feeling I'm going to be happy for the rest of my life.