I spent so much time on my hair that I still hadn’t put on my bodice when the morning’s briefing started. Like we had during the rehearsal process, we took attendance every morning and had a quick meeting. Last-minute instructions, schedule changes, that kind of thing. I looked around while lacing Stacey into her corset and wow, we looked like a professional operation. Costumes were all on point, down to hairstyles and hats. People I didn’t know lingered on the edge of the meeting, but since no one else seemed alarmed I decided not to be, either. They must be the talent. Musicians and other touring acts had been booked by the Faire (well, by Simon and Chris) to play with us and for us for the next few weeks. Most stayed only a weekend or two at a time, so the briefings would also let us know who was playing at what stages.

This kind of information was lost on me, so I listened with one ear while I tucked the blue skirt up in front and secured it with pins. Then I tugged down my chemise and tugged up my breasts while Stacey finished tightening me in. As the meeting broke up, I stashed my empty coffee mug in the bottom of my wicker basket and covered it with a tartan scarf I’d borrowed from April. Together, Stacey and I started up the hill away from the Hollow and toward the grounds themselves. Some of the kids ran ahead of us, swirls of color and skirts and hats with feathers in them.

Stacey sighed, a wistful sound. “I remember being young and having that much energy.”

“Come on, Grandma.” I elbowed her in the side, which she probably couldn’t feel through her corset. “You’re the same age as I am, right?”

“Twenty-six in October. But this early in the morning? I feel about a hundred and four.”

I couldn’t argue with that.

We were almost to the top of the hill when an outburst of male laughter from behind us startled me. I looked over my shoulder and spotted a group of pirates about halfway down the hill, huddled together as they walked, sharing a joke of some kind. One of them had his back to us, walking backward up the hill, telling a story I couldn’t hear but that made the other guys laugh uproariously.

Walking backward. Up the hill. Did I mention he was wearing leather pants?

I couldn’t tell who the pirate was from the back. He was dressed all in black, with a hat with a large red feather. The hat looked familiar. While half of my brain melted at the sight of what a pair of leather pants did to a man’s ass while he walked backward up a hill, the other half wondered who the hell he was. I’d spent two months of weekends with these people, and knew most of them well enough to stop and chat at the grocery store if we ran into each other. I thought I was becoming part of this community, but if that was true then why didn’t I recognize this guy?

Then Leather Pants turned around and our gazes collided. The smile on his face slipped a fraction, and I almost swallowed my tongue.

Leather Pants, whose ass I’d just been ogling, was Simon Fucking Graham.

Life wasn’t fair sometimes.

He didn’t look like himself at all. Was it because he was smiling? The only other time I’d seen him smile—like, a full-on, with-teeth-and-everything smile—had been an accident too. Those smiles were never meant for me.

But now, he held my gaze in a way he never had before, and his faltering smile rallied into a broad grin. He nodded in my direction, touching his fingertips to that ridiculous hat in a kind of salute. Not only was he not avoiding me, he was flirting with me!

Well. This was new. I whipped my head around again, breaking eye contact. But it was too late. The image of him was already seared in my brain.

And what an image. Black, billowy shirt open about halfway down his chest, bracketed by a deep red vest the color of blood, showcasing a sprinkling of dark hair across an unexpectedly defined chest. Now his longer hair made sense; his former shorter cut would have been completely hidden under his hat.

Oh, no. The Ren Faire Killjoy was hot. Even his stupid hat couldn’t dim the wattage of his smile, and my heart still pounded in reaction to the sight of him.

“Jesus.” I’d meant to mutter the word under my breath, but it came out as more of a wheeze, and Stacey turned to me.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. Just . . . Simon is a pirate?”

She glanced back over her shoulder at the pirates behind us and grinned, nodding a hello in their direction. “Oh, yeah. Captain Ian Blackthorne. He’s been a pirate since the early days. Him and his brother, Sean.” Her grin transferred to me. “I forgot you haven’t seen him in costume yet. He said he was a pirate, don’t you remember?”

I searched my memory. I really didn’t. But I hadn’t cared much about details, least of all related to Simon, those first few weeks. He could have said he was playing a dragon and I wouldn’t have given a shit.

But now . . . All this time I’d been wondering why Simon did Faire every year if it was so stressful. I was pretty sure I had my answer. He’d slid into this new identity like a second skin and he wore it now with ease. It wasn’t just about carrying on his brother’s legacy. It was because for a few weeks every summer, he could put on that getup and become someone completely different. Someone who didn’t have to worry about summer reading lists or losing a brother to cancer.

I looked over my shoulder again. Yep. Still hot. He was talking to the pirate next to him, but looked up as though he could feel my eyes on him. The flirty grin came again to his mouth as though he wore it every day. His smile sent a tingle across my skin, and to my surprise and horror I felt an answering smile come to my own face. I couldn’t help it. His eyes flared in response, and his grin widened, all straight white teeth.

I took a shuddering breath as I faced forward again, stunned by this new realization. Emma the Tavern Wench was turned on by Captain Blackthorne, Pirate.

This could be a problem.

“Well met, ladies.”

My attention snapped forward again at the sound of the deep voice in front of us, and a smile broke across my face. This smile made a lot more sense.

Mitch Malone stood at the very top of the hill, in the middle of the lane, backlit by the morning sun. Knowing him, he probably consulted the Farmers’ Almanac to determine the exact place to stand so the sun would halo his head, making him look like a golden god. In his kilt, boots, and sporran, shirtless, with his hands on his hips, he should be obnoxious as hell. But I’d grown used to smiling at Mitch. Just as I’d grown used to Mitch and his insanely ripped physique. Gorgeous as it was, it didn’t thrill me anymore. I wanted to turn around and look at Simon again. The leather, the open shirt . . . now, that was a revelation.

But I kept my eyes forward, and my mind on task.

“Well met, good sir!” I dropped into a short curtsy as Mitch stepped forward to offer me a hand as I rose again. For all his obnoxiousness, when Mitch turned his attention to you it was like getting the full force of the sun. I was going to need a stronger SPF if I was going to make it through August.

“Good morrow, ladies.” He tucked my hand in the crook of his elbow and offered his other arm to Stacey. Could a girl ask for a better escort on the first morning of Faire?

When we stepped onto the main lane, my jaw dropped. We’d spent the past two Saturdays in what was basically an empty forest. I’d helped place what felt like ten thousand benches at each of the performance spaces, but the stages had still looked desolate, like something you’d stumble across in . . . well, a deserted forest.

But now . . . now I stood in an Elizabethan village. Or a reasonable facsimile thereof. Brightly colored flags hung from poles at certain intervals along the lane, and there was activity everywhere. The lanes were lined with stalls, and merchants in period dress set out their wares for the day. Leather goods in one stall, hammered silver jewelry in another. My steps slowed as I found myself window-shopping while we walked. One large stall had outfits, and I practically drooled over an intricately embroidered corset, even though my wench’s mind dismissed it as far too elaborate, given my status.

We passed one of the performance spaces, where musicians lounged center stage, acoustic instruments at their side. If I squinted and knew where to look, I could spot the sound equipment, discreetly placed to the sides of the stage and covered with fabric. But most of the musicians didn’t need amplification. The stages were rather intimate, after all, and sound carried out here in the forest.

Then we made it to our tavern, and I couldn’t keep the grin off my face. Our blank clearing had been utterly transformed. Colored banners wove through the trees to form a kind of canopy above our heads, making it easy to spot. We had a real canopy as well: an open-sided tent, which gave the tavern an actual roof, and under the tent was the bar itself, with a few tables and benches scattered in front of it. It was weird to see a bar in the middle of the woods—the right thing in the wrong place, like seeing your teacher at the grocery store. As we approached I could see it was an actual, proper bar, with a particleboard surface and tip jars already placed. Behind the bar was a cooler that housed the beer kegs. The taps were already hooked up, judging from the red-shirted volunteer who stood behind it, a plastic cup half-filled with a dark beer in his hand.

“Jamie!” Stacey broke away from Mitch and me and hurried to embrace the volunteer. Her exuberance knocked his baseball cap askew and he laughed as he straightened it. “Emily, this is Jamie. He’s one of our best volunteers. I’m so glad you’re here again this year!” She punched him in the arm. “The man actually knows how to pour from the tap, unlike some of the volunteers we get.”