Baked with Love: A Sweet Pursuit of Passion

Foals

There was a sudden knock on my door it was close to dinner time. I open up the door and see Lord Nicholas Strain.

"Hello, Lord Strain," I say, confused.

He looks down at my attire.

He nods in approval.

"Come on, it's dinner time. I thought it was a perfect time to go on a date," he says smugly, a smirk coming on his dimpled face.

"I guess you are trying to court me as well?" I ask him, crossing my arms and looking at him, watching my brow in question.

"Well, I figured if a lady is as fine as you are available, I should try to take a shot, hoping for the best. Your mother already told me you had other suitors that didn't concern me. Just keep your parts untouched for your husband. That includes your beautiful lips." He says, softly touching my bottom lip with the pad of his thumb.

Looking at me intently. Shivers go down my spine.
He chuckles softly, retracting his hand from my mouth. He holds out his arm for me to lock my own.

He asks me, "Have you ever ridden on a horse before?" He arches his brow in question.

"Yes," I tell him, confused by his seemingly random question.

"Well, maybe we could ride some trails together." He suggested.

"I like that; I don't like being stuck here," I replied.

"Oh, Isabella I already know that you practically threatened to run away from your future husband. Hmmm. I wonder if I should warn him once you're married if it's not me." He tells me I'm walking around somewhere else I've never been before. A giant barn I've seen.

"Climb up the ladder", he says, pointing to the ladder in the barn.
I slowly climb the ladder and see food.

"After we get done eating, I thought you might enjoy helping me bottle-feed twin foals," he tells me.

"Baby foals?!" I am excited.

"Yep, but only after we've eaten dinner," he states firmly.

"Okay. Fair enough," I chuckle, sitting down as we begin eating.

"Tell me about yourself, Nicolas," I say, drinking the cup of water.

"Well, what do you wanna know, Sugar, im an open book?" He replies cocky.

"Do you have a good family life?" I ask him.

"Yes, actually, other than my mom passing away unexpectedly from something the doctors didn't even know. This was about 10 years ago. My dad has remarried, and she is a fine woman my mom would have loved," he tells me with a small smile.

"Oh, I'm sorry to hear about your mom; it must have been very hard to go through that. My mom never remarried when my father died. I'm not sure if she didn't want to; she wasn't very interested in the idea. I think her heart was just broken when he left her so suddenly.

"How did you lose your dad?" He asked me carefully as if trying not to offend me.

"Yes, there was something wrong with his heart, as they told us," I replied with a small smile. Talking about him didn't fill me with sadness like one might think, but talking about him seemingly brought more repressed memories of him.

"I see. My condolences. Tell me Issbella what you do in your free time." He asks me before gulping water.

"I like to do things outside—read and write," I tell him.

"You can read and write?" he asked, almost shocked.

"Yes, Nicolas, not everyone only likes to cook and bake," I say with a tease in my voice.

For the rest of the meal, we exchanged small talk until the food was gone.

"Let's go feed the baby foals," he says with a smile, cleaning up our mess.

He walks down first and makes sure I don't fall.

These are Maxwell and Maximus. He points to the twin newborn goals. He makes the bottle and hands it to me. He shows me what to do, gesturing for me to do the same. Which I gladly do, petting the baby softly as it drinks from the bottle.

"I've never seen a baby horse before," I tell him with a small smile as I look at the miracle in front of me.

"Well, if you want to some other time, you can feed them again," he tells me softly as if trying to convince me.

"I'd like that," I tell him, continuing to feed the baby foal.

After the foals had finished their bottle, Nicholas told me, "I'm going to take you home; it's getting late. You should probably rest." He tells me with a small smile, taking the empty bottle from my hand and setting it down.

He holds his arm out for me yet again to lead me around. Which I was honestly thankful for because I definitely would not have been able to get to my room.

His strides are almost impossible to keep up with walking speed-wise.
"Do you think you could slow down just a hair? You are walking way too fast." I ask him with a laugh.

He chuckled slightly, but reducing his walking speed made it much easier for my short legs to catch up to him.

"Did you have a good time, Isabella?" He asked me softly.

"I did, thank you. I enjoyed feeding the baby foal. I've never done anything like that in my whole life." I tell him as we walk slowly down the dark hallways.

"Well, I'm glad I made at least one memorable event and hopefully many more." He tells me this with a cocky smirk.

We approached my door, and he unlocked his arms from mine.
Softly grabbing my hand, he kisses my knuckles.
"I hope to see you soon, hopefully at the dance tomorrow. Save me a dance. I know you have two other lords who will ask you too. Just save me one. Isabella." He pleads slightly with a smile.

"I'll save you one dance; I know my mom would want me to," I say

"Until then. Beautiful lady." He lightly bends and walks away.

"Goodnight," I say with a small wave and a smile on my face.