Second chance romance, p.9
Second Chance Romance, page 9
The cap matched his, which definitely didn’t give her a certain warm glow of satisfaction, because that would be foolish.
Anyway, once she’d put on the non-warm-glow-inducing cap, he’d donned another beard net and begun making up for time lost during their earlier conversation. After throwing together a quick bagel dough and kneading it in his stand mixer, he’d set it aside to proof and began working on umpteen other tasks. Making pastries to be refrigerated and baked off the following morning. Mixing up various glazes and icings. Measuring out ingredients for a batch of cakes. Cooking homemade jams as scone toppings and cake fillings.
Other than a quick pause to answer his mom’s and sister’s texts, he hadn’t taken even a minute to rest.
“Coffee break soon,” he told her now, never looking up from his work. “Whatever you want, Johnathan’ll make. Sandwiches too, if you’re hungry.”
He’d almost finished icing his brownies, even as oven timers continued to sound at regular intervals. And somehow, amidst all that controlled chaos, he’d still considered her needs and how he could satisfy them.
If anyone had asked her yesterday whether watching a man multitask in a beard net and green, flour-dusted Crocs could be sexy, she’d have laughed and given the wrong answer.
Because oh, yes, it could be sexy. Especially if she considered other arenas where competent multitasking, attention to her needs, and strong, agile hands could prove helpful.
Their time apart definitely hadn’t lessened his appeal for her. She’d always liked men who appeared poised to find a cave somewhere and take a long winter’s nap. Tough but cuddly, with strong shoulders and arms and a solid belly. Karl’s wavy russet hair hadn’t thinned yet, his reddish beard had grown even more lush over the years, and together they only added to the overall ursine effect.
His faded graphic tee clung to those wide shoulders and his round stomach, and when he turned away from her, his equally faded jeans outlined nicely thick thighs and the subtle arc of his butt. Her palms itched to shape themselves to that tempting ass. Her fingers twitched as she imagined dragging her nails over tough muscle and soft flesh and hot skin.
His style hadn’t changed over the years. His body had only gotten better.
Looking up from his last tray of brownies, he caught her staring. “What?”
“Crocs, huh?” Once they’d slept together, she’d admit to ogling him. Not yet.
He shrugged. “Easy to clean. Back hurts less when I wear ’em.”
His job entailed leaning over his worktable all day, and neither of them was young anymore. No wonder his back hurt. Could he use one of those gel mats on the floor?
As she considered the matter, he remained stuck on her lodging situation.
“A month at Battleaxe would cost a damn fortune, but where else . . .” The swirl of his offset spatula suddenly halted, and he raised his head. “Got an idea. Hold on.”
Laying down the spatula, he stripped off his gloves and washed his hands, then disappeared into his back office.
By the time she followed him and leaned a hip against his doorframe, he already had his phone in hand and was texting someone. When he didn’t receive an immediate answer, he aggressively swiped and tapped a few times, then set the cell on his desk.
The sound of a ringing phone emerged from the speaker.
“Who—” she began, but he stabbed his finger in the air in a request for silence.
A faint click. “Karl. Is something the matter? Because I was in the middle of a conversation with—”
“Spite House still for sale?”
Her eyebrows rose. He was calling someone about the town’s infamous Spite House? Because she’d rambled down that street yesterday, and there was a real estate agent’s sign—Fawn Something-or-other—planted in the home’s tiny patch of front yard.
The place looked a lot less abandoned than when she’d left Harlot’s Bay, with pretty curtains and a flower box at every window. The brick row house was still as ridiculously narrow as ever, though. Ten feet wide, at most.
“Hold on a minute.” The other man sounded resigned to the interruption. “I’m sorry, Hector, but could we possibly postpone—”
The line went silent, presumably as Karl’s mysterious contact muted his phone.
Matthew, Karl’s screen informed her. And while that was hardly the world’s most uncommon name, she suspected she knew exactly who was making his excuses on the other end of the call.
She pointed to the display. “You’re still friends with Matthew Vine?”
Karl and his closest high school companion had been an odd duo in certain ways. Matthew had been very reserved for a teenager, but also polite and kind. Karl had been simultaneously uncommunicative and loud, his own kindness hidden by cranky bluster.
But neither boy socialized much, and both were fundamentally good kids who worked hard for their families. She’d understood how the two of them could have become close, and apparently they’d stayed that way for two decades. Which said good things about both men’s steadfastness and reliability.
Karl dipped his chin in confirmation just as Matthew came back on the line.
“Okay.” He sounded breathless. “The Spite House is more a curiosity than a viable residence for most people, so yes, it’s still for sale. Athena got an offer last week, but it was insultingly low, so she turned it d—”
“She open to a month’s rental?” Karl interrupted. Again.
Let him finish a sentence, Molly mouthed, ignoring his scowl.
In a testament to Matthew’s good nature and tolerance, his response was amused rather than irritated. “I’d be happy to check with her and tell you, assuming you let me finish a sentence in the near future.”
She arched a single eyebrow and directed a pointed look at Karl.
“If you’d get to the goddamn point more quickly, I wouldn’t—” As her stare became an incredulous glare, Karl shifted his weight and directed his own gaze to the floor. “Sorry, man. Running behind on my bakes and prep. Not an excuse. Just a reason.”
“It’s fine.” Matthew’s voice remained warm and sincere. “Before I call her, why don’t you tell me what’s going on? If you don’t have time for that now, we can talk later.”
Karl hunched forward over the phone, his meaty fists on the desk supporting his weight. “Molly needs a place to stay.”
A moment’s silence. “Has something else happened since you texted me yesterday? Because last I heard, you were upset that she—”
“You’re on speaker, dude. Molly’s right here.” His nostrils flared as he exhaled heavily. “Interrupted again, I know, but that’s on her. One hundred percent her fault.”
She sighed too. “Really, Karl?”
“Um . . . hi, Molly.” Matthew’s tone had become significantly more cautious, although he still sounded friendly enough. “Welcome back to Harlot’s Bay. I’m sorry you returned under such unusual circumstances, but I hope you’ve had a good visit thus far.”
Unusual circumstances was a considerable understatement. Sometime soon, she really needed to hear the full story of how that mistaken obituary had even happened.
“Hey, Matthew. Luckily, the reports of Karl’s death were greatly exaggerated, so this trip has been much better than I’d anticipated. I hope you’re doing well?”
“I’m fantastic. Thank you for asking,” he told her, sounding firm and sure and happy. “Since Karl is most likely on the verge of spontaneous human combustion—”
“Not a real thing,” she said under her breath, and Karl screwed up his face in exaggerated shock and dismay at her near-silent interruption.
Rude, he mouthed, and shook a reproving finger at her. She wanted to bite it.
“—due to acute impatience, I’ll cut to the chase. I got married not long ago, and my wife Athena owns the Spite House. She’s leading a tour right now at Historic Harlot’s Bay, but she should be on break soon, so if you tell me what you need, I can ask her about it almost immediately.”
A woman’s faint voice filtered through the speaker, growing louder by the word. “Speak of the devil, and she appears.” After a quiet rustle came the faint smack of an abbreviated kiss. “Tour got canceled. I’m done for the day, so I thought I’d come see the best husband ever, on this or any other planet.”
Karl snorted. “Then why are you at Matthew’s office?”
“Shut up, Special K.”
Special K? Karl must loathe that nickname.
As Molly quietly snickered to herself, Karl rolled his eyes. “Told you not to call me that, Greydon. Do it again, I’ll throw you in a vat of pastry cream and hold you under till you’re a human fucking eclair.”
“You did tell me that”—the other woman paused meaningfully—“Special K.” Ignoring Karl’s sputters of inarticulate, overdramatic outrage, she breezily continued, “Anyway, someone had a question for me?”
Matthew came back on the line. “Yes. Sorry. Molly Dearborn, please meet Athena Greydon. Molly is a former high school classmate of ours. Athena is the owner of the Spite House, an amazing historical interpreter at Historic Harlot’s Bay, and . . . my wife.”
As he spoke about Athena, pride and pleasure suffused his words, virtually dripping from every syllable.
“Lovely to meet you, Molly,” his wife said, then added, “By the way, Matthew, I consulted Professor Google about spontaneous human combustion a couple of years ago, back when you could still get decent search results, and scientists are almost entirely certain it doesn’t exist.”
Molly liked her already. “I was just thinking that.”
“Any relevant incidents are probably due to the wick effect,” Athena explained. “Basically, someone catches fire due to an external ignition source, like a cigarette or spark. And then the victim’s melted fat soaks their clothing and acts like a wick in a candle, so their body smolders for a long time and burns to ashes without damaging their surroundings. If there’s no evidence left as to the actual cause of the fire, it looks like the body burned entirely on its own.”
“Thus the seemingly logical but ultimately false explanation of spontaneous human combustion,” Molly concluded.
“Exactly.”
“That’s fascinating.”
It was the honest truth. As much as she enjoyed Sadie’s work, murder mysteries and pop science books were her favorites. This whole conversation might as well have been labeled “Molly catnip.”
“I know, right?” Athena’s voice somehow brightened even more. “We should get together while you’re in town and discuss Special K. I have so much to tell you. When are you free?”
“My schedule on weekday evenings is pretty open right n—”
“No.” Karl snatched the phone from the table and angled away from Molly. “Not happening, Greydon. You two? Together? Goddamn disaster in the making.”
For all his bluster, when Molly promptly retrieved the cell from his fist, he didn’t fight her for it. “I’ll get your number, Athena, and we’ll find a time to compare notes about Karl. Also, please ignore his previous pastry cream threat. As I’m sure you already know, he would never actually do anything like that.”
“Nope. He’s a secret softie. Aren’t you, Special K? Yes, you are. Yes, you are,” Athena cooed, as if soothing a frazzled cat or a fussy baby. “Molly, is he looking especially murderous right now?”
“He is indeed.” His chest had swelled in indignation, and the homicidal fury in his glare would have terrified Molly—if he weren’t, in fact, a secret softie. Which he totally was. “Rest assured: If spontaneous human combustion were possible, the searing heat of his fiery rage would have already rendered him—”
Athena laughed. “Literally.”
“—a greasy spot and a heap of ashes on his tiled workroom floor.” Molly smiled. “It’s very entertaining to watch. Thank you.”
Karl was muttering to himself again. The phrase two harpy peas in a fucking harpy pod stood out, although Molly couldn’t decipher everything.
“My pleasure. Trust me on that.” Athena’s tone turned brisk, albeit still friendly. “Okay, as delightful as this conversation has been, Matthew needs to see a patient soon, and I need to make out with him before he does. So whatever question you have, let’s hear it, and if we don’t have enough time to nail down everything now, we can talk again later.”
Molly kept things brief. “I’m looking for somewhere to stay until the high school reunion in early October. Karl apparently thinks your former home might be a good option, even though I’m concerned it may be too narrow for someone of my size.”
“I know that feeling.” A faint hum, as Athena considered the matter. “Why don’t you come tour the place tonight? If it seems doable for you, we’ll work out a fair rental price. Friends and family discount. Speaking of which—why haven’t I heard about you before now? Special K, why have you been holding out on me, despite our deep and abiding friendship?”
Karl made a very rude gagging noise, while Molly snickered.
Even over a cell phone speaker, Athena’s personality sparkled. She had charm to spare and an open demeanor, matched with obvious intelligence. If Molly were staying in Harlot’s Bay permanently, Athena Greydon would be someone she’d—
It didn’t matter. In a month, Molly’s plane would haul her back to California.
“That’s my fault,” she told the other woman. “After I left town at the end of senior year, I didn’t really stay in contact with anyone.”
“Gotcha.” Athena conducted a brief, muffled conversation with Matthew. “Okay, making-out time is upon us, so have Special K send your number to me, and we’ll text to work out all the details for tonight.”
A few hurried goodbyes—and one loud grumble from Karl—later, the call ended.
“Greydon’s a damn menace.” When his timer went off, a stab of his finger silenced it. “Speaks to me like a fucking toddler sometimes.”
Molly lifted a shoulder. “If the onesie fits . . .”
Middle fingers aloft, he turned his back to her and stomped out into his work area, but not before she spotted the grin splitting his ruddy beard. She followed him, something long-knotted in her chest fraying at the edges. Loosening. Unraveling.
Rob had bemoaned her missing sense of humor so many times, she’d finally believed him. But in the past several days, she’d made both Lise and Athena laugh. Broken through Karl’s fake grumpiness until he couldn’t hide his amusement any longer. Felt truly likable and connected for the first time in years.
Why hadn’t she seen it sooner?
In her marriage, in too many of her abortive would-be friendships, she’d been sending out messages in bottles that kept bumping against the wrong shores, landing in the hands of people who couldn’t read what she’d written. And after years of silence in return, she’d mostly given up. Stopped launching her bottles, stopped believing her offerings could be deciphered by anyone but herself and maybe Lise.
But one of her last remaining missives had finally bobbed ashore at the right place.
Her messages could in fact be decrypted by someone. Possibly several someones. And those messages were worth reading. They were worth returning. Which meant they were still worth sending.
She didn’t trust easily. She might harbor more than her fair share of cynicism. That didn’t mean she had to burrow beneath her shell and give up on companionship forever. Lise was a dear friend, as Molly had only just realized. Possibly even a best friend. She could make other friends too, if she put in the effort.
And she had Karl’s nonexistent death to thank for that revelation about her life.
Suffused by warmth that had nothing to do with the kitchen’s balmy temperature, she propped her butt against his office doorway and watched him multitask like a freaking sex god. Not graceful in the traditional sense of the word, but sure in every action, with no wasted gestures or energy. Strong. Fierce. Eminently capable.
Complaining all the while, beard net and gloves back in place, he removed several heavenly smelling baking sheets from his two large ovens, slid the hot pans onto a rack, and wheeled the rack out front, then returned to shove yet more trays of unbaked treats into the ovens and set several timers.
Under his age-thinned tee, his triceps flexed with each heft of a loaded pan, each shove of his rack. His thighs tensed and released. His thick shoulders rose and fell. His sharp eyes narrowed beneath the brim of his cap as he focused on his creations, and starbursts of tiny lines appeared at their corners. The tendons in his hands shifted beneath those tight blue gloves, delineating his tiny adjustments to temperature and placement and timing, tweaks whose purpose she couldn’t begin to fathom.
Then he was evidently done. After removing his gloves with twin snaps of nitrile, he whipped off his apron and beard net and turned on his Croc-clad heel.
His stare locked her in place.
When he stalked toward Molly, her pulse thudded faster. Harder. So fast she could feel the tick at her throat. So hard she could no longer hear soft jazz or the murmur of customers or anything but her heartbeat and the faint rasp of her quickened breathing.
Her words sounded muffled to her own ears. “Do Matthew or Athena know about my alter ego?”
He halted only inches from her, and she didn’t know whether to be outraged or relieved.
His brows thudded together, creasing the pale skin between. “’Course not.”
“Why didn’t you tell them?”
“You use a different name. Figured there must’ve been a reason, and I won’t share information you want kept secret.” His jaw ticked. “Could have an abusive ex. Stalker. Other privacy issues. No way for me to know.”
Another knot of tension and uncertainty unwound in her chest. “You were protecting me.”
He nodded, then bridged that final gap between them, stepping into her space fully. Shadowing her against the glare of the fluorescent overhead fixtures, pressing belly to belly, the denim of his jeans brushing hers. She bit her lip against a gasp, and her knees weakened beneath her, melting like ice beneath a blowtorch.
