The Little Brooklyn Bakery

by Julie Caplin

  ‘You OK?’ he asked, laughter dancing in his eyes.

  ‘Yes,’ she beamed back at him, exhilarated by the rush. With a brief do-or-die moment of hesitation, she rose to her feet, threw herself forward into the water before the next wave came splashing furiously as the cold enveloped her whole body. She swam into the rising swell, hoping her muscles would warm her up.

  ‘Cold. Cold. Cold. Cold,’ she gasped as the breath stalled in her lungs, her ribcage almost frozen stiff by the chill.

  Todd laughed, swimming alongside her, like an expert dolphin. ‘Of course it’s cold. It’s the Atlantic.’

  Thankfully, it didn’t take long for her to warm up and together they swam, bobbing over the swell of the waves as they rose and gathered momentum to crash onto the beach. Sophie had forgotten how lovely it was to swim in the sea, but she was nowhere near as good a swimmer as Todd, who dived in and out of the waves. He also stayed close, for which she was grateful, even though there was a lifeguard on the beach. The sea here was much stronger than she was used to.

  ‘Fancy lunch soon?’ asked Todd as they lazily floated on their backs.

  ‘Mm,’ said Sophie, closing her eyes, tipping her head up to the sun. ‘That would be nice.’

  ‘Nice? Don’t let Mahalia hear you say that.’

  ‘Well, I’m expecting there to be plenty, after I lugged that box all the way here. It weighed a ton.’

  ‘It would be a stain on her mortal soul for anyone to go hungry on her watch. You should hear her and Rick go at it. He’s the cook, although Mom insists its chef.’ In a falsetto he mimicked, ‘“You no put enough on those plates. What, you want people to starve?” She’ll have packed enough for a voyage to Mars.’

  ‘Now you’ve made me hungry,’ complained Sophie as her stomach grumbled. ‘Those cinnamon rolls were hours ago.’

  ‘They were good. You can make them again.’

  ‘I can, can I?’ she teased, amused by his confident assumption that she would.

  ‘After those Yorkshire pudding things you promised me, I want to try those again.’

  ‘You’ll have to wait until autumn, I’ll do a roast. Invite Bella and maybe …’ She didn’t get the chance to finish. Another wave had swelled up in front of them, this one bigger than any of the others. Transfixed for a second, Sophie watched it growing and growing as it headed their way. Like a fish, Todd dived under it while Sophie hoped to bob over it, but she’d mistimed it and just as it reached her it curled over itself, crashing down with white froth coiling around her, gathering pace, and before she knew it she was under the water, being spun around as if she were on a roller-coaster, until she was spat out, skidding onto the sand. She emerged choking and wheezing, thinking she must look like a drowned rat as she surreptitiously tried to shake out the sand which had accumulated in her bikini bottoms.

  ‘Hey, you OK?’ Todd bounded over, his face holding a touch of uncertain anxiety. ‘That was a …’ His voice died away as she straightened.

  ‘Huh, j-just got my breath back.’ She swiped her wet hair from her face, trying to smile through the splutters. ‘That certainly woke me up.’

  She wasn’t sure he was listening, he looked oddly strained. Then something flared in his eyes, launching a sudden flutter in her chest.

  ‘Mmm, and me,’ he breathed with a wobbly half-smile, nodding his head towards her chest. ‘Erm, you might want to er … might want to … before you give half the guys on the beach a bonus today.’

  She glanced down and blushed, hastily rearranging her bikini.

  ‘Oh. Sorry.’

  ‘No need to apologise to me.’ His lips curved in a broad smile. ‘For the record, there’s nothing wonky-looking about those babies to me.’

  The warmth in his voice made her nipples tingle and, to her horror, she could feel them tightening into hussy take-me-I’m-here points accentuated by the flimsy Lycra of her bikini top.

  She looked away and focused on thrashing through the foaming waves back up the beach, fighting against the sand sucking under their feet.

  From behind her another wave caught her and she fell over again, dragging Todd down with her.

  He hauled her up again and as she got to her feet another wave crashed into him, sending him toppling into her, and she crashed backwards onto the sand. Todd went with her, landing on top of her, and immediately raising himself onto his arms to take some of his weight from squashing her.

  For a moment she lay there as their eyes locked onto one another. A breath caught in her throat, her body going still with heightened awareness as they stared at each other. Her heart thudded, a wake of adrenaline coursing through her system.

  As he began to lower his head, never taking his gaze from her, she could scarcely breathe.

  The first tender graze of his mouth, so soft, so slow, so tentative, made her chest tighten. His lips were cold, but his breath felt warm. Her pulse kicked in objection when she felt him stop, an infinitesimal moment of hesitation. Without thinking, she slid her hands over his shoulders, even though she knew this was a big mistake, but it was a delicious mistake, made even more delicious when with a tiny moan, he deepened the kiss with slow sure movements, lazily teasing at her lips. Holding himself on his elbows, his mouth roved over hers but with an all-the-time-in-the-world leisureliness and determined, sedate thoroughness that left her reeling.

  Despite the careful, unhurried attention, it was without doubt the most passionate kiss Sophie had ever had. Even knowing it was wrong, she couldn’t help herself. With a sigh she melted, giving herself up to pure sensation, her body totally limp.

  Every nerve ending was alert to the feel of him, the hair-roughened skin of his thigh, the bone of hip to hip and the odd, cold/hot sensation of their water-cooled skins touching each other.

  His heartfelt groan as she pressed her chest into his made her heart leap and she could feel his heart pounding too.

  Above them a gull screamed, penetrating Sophie’s consciousness. What the hell was she doing? This was Todd. They were friends. Stiffening, she started to pull away, her eyes darting down to his chest to avoid looking at him. ‘I think that’s Seagull for Get a room,’ he said wryly, rolling to one side and scrambling to his feet before holding out a hand to pull her up.

  Sophie’s cheeks turned bright pink and she ducked her head as she took his hand and clambered upright.

  ‘Well, that was …’ The husky timbre of his voice almost made her heart stop. She closed her eyes and swallowed hard, feeling her heart pounding crazily in her chest. What had she done? Todd was so far out of bounds, it was ridiculous. Too gorgeous for his own good and for her peace of mind. And thoroughly, thoroughly intoxicating. Oh God, she needed to be cool. This was probably all in a day’s work for him.

  ‘Very nice,’ she said, stretching her mouth into a desperate grin. Keep it light, Sophie. Keep it light. ‘Now I get what all those girls see in you.’

  It would have been nice to believe that there was a brief shadow in his eyes before his usual broad smile lit up his face, but Sophie knew better.

  ‘All part of the service, English. Come on, let’s see what Mahalia’s got lined up for us. I’m hungry.’

  Together they walked back to their spot where Marty was sitting on a towel, his back to them, headphones on, attached to his phone, nodding away to an inaudible beat.

  ‘Hey guys, I’m starving,’ said Marty, looking up as soon as Todd’s shadow fell over him.

  Sophie was impressed he hadn’t already made inroads into the cool box. Mahalia had done them proud and as Todd unpacked the picnic lunch, she tried to focus on laying out the different plastic boxes on the towels, but she couldn’t help sneaking the odd peek at him. She found herself drawn to watching his mobile lips as he teased his brother, who was making short work of several rustic, well-filled sandwiches, wolfing them down as if he hadn’t seen food in weeks. Every now and then Todd would shoot her a glance and several times she was mortified when she wasn’t quick enough to look away.
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br />   As soon as they’d eaten and Marty had finally given up trying to wheedle his own bottle of beer out of Todd, he spotted his friends who’d also taken a lunch break and, with a spray of sand over the towels, he bounded off to join them.

  As Sophie packed away Todd lay on his back, his arms behind his head, his eyes hidden behind the dark sunglasses. With that innate sense, she knew he was watching her. Despite the sun high in the sky, giving off a steady heat, she shivered, packing up quickly.

  She needed to clear the air. Wriggling the lid to get it back into place, she sat back on her heels, pursing her mouth.

  ‘English.’ His low voice and the serious set to his mouth made the butterflies in her stomach take flight and race around like windblown lunatics. ‘You’re thinking so loud you’re giving me a headache.’

  ‘Sorry. We shouldn’t have done that.’

  ‘Done what?’ his mouth quirked in one corner, but behind the sunglasses she couldn’t see his face properly. It made her feel at a major disadvantage.

  ‘You know,’ she said severely.

  ‘English, it’s fine.’

  ‘Hey guys, we’re going to play volleyball. We need a couple more on the team. You’ll play won’t you?’ Marty’s yell came from a few yards away.

  ‘Of course, we will,’ said Sophie, jumping up immediately, kicking sand all over Todd. ‘Although I’m not sure I’m dressed appropriately.’

  Marty shrugged with a whatever sort of gesture. Todd narrowed his eyes as he looked at Sophie’s cleavage and then dug around under the bags until he found his Timberland T-shirt.

  ‘Here you go. Wear this. It’ll stop you getting burned.’

  Chapter 19

  Sophie felt the glow on her skin as she stepped into the shower, her legs aching from the unexpected volleyball marathon. Thank goodness for Marty and his friends and their inexhaustible supply of energy. It had meant she didn’t have time to think about that kiss, but now she couldn’t get it out of her head or the image of Todd’s golden body when he’d stripped off his T-shirt.

  With an annoyed huff at herself, she yanked the big white super-fluffy towel from the rail and wrapped herself up in it. She wasn’t fifteen, for heaven’s sake. She glared at herself in the mirror as, with tentative fingers, she traced her lips. No, definitely not fifteen, that had been one adult kiss.

  And she was a grown-up. Beyond this sort of silly … infatuation. This was just a crush. Wayward hormones distracted by extreme good looks.

  She lay on the bed and picked up one of three complimentary magazines from the table. Dinner wasn’t until six-thirty. There were a few hours to kill. After flipping through the pages, she threw the magazine down in disgust. Bloody hell, why couldn’t she get her mind off Todd?

  With a sigh, she snatched up her phone.

  ‘Hey Sophie.’ Kate’s face appeared on her phone. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Nothing. I thought I’d ring you from … the Hamptons.’

  ‘No! How come?’

  ‘I got an invite for Fourth July. Look.’ Getting off the bed, she flipped the phone around and gave Kate a walkthrough of the bedroom and the huge bathroom. ‘And look at this.’ She stepped out onto the wide wooden balcony overlooking the pool. Damn, there was Todd ploughing up and down, cutting through the water with a fearsome front crawl.

  ‘Whoa. You lucky thing. And who’s the hot bod in the pool?’

  ‘Todd,’ said Sophie, hoping her voice wouldn’t give her current turmoil away.

  ‘That’s Todd! The Todd. And you’re staying with him in the Hamptons? You kept that quiet. What happened to Paul?’

  ‘Nothing happened to Paul, except that he has a girl next door in waiting and so it wasn’t convenient for me to spend the holiday with him. Todd invited me to his parents’ place because they have a big, huge party here.’

  ‘Back up a spot. Paul has a girl in waiting?’

  ‘Yeah, turns out that there’s an understanding between them.’ She did the quote marks with one hand.

  ‘And how do you feel about that?’

  ‘When he told me, at first it didn’t matter because I’ll be back in London in six months, but now I’ve had time to think about it, I feel a bit shit, to be honest. It’s like James all over again.’

  ‘Ouch.’

  Sophie shrugged.

  ‘And what about the lovely Todd? He invited you to his parents’.’

  Sophie looked away, back towards the pool.

  ‘He’s … he’s a friend.’

  Kate smirked.

  ‘What?’ asked Sophie.

  The smirk turned into a full-blown grin. ‘You like him.’

  ‘How old are you?’ said Sophie, which was ironic given she’d been asking herself that question a little while before.

  ‘Distraction-technique alert. I’m onto you.’

  Sophie pursed her lips but Kate’s eyes bored into hers. Damn, half the time Facetime froze and blurred but today the signal was absolutely perfect.

  ‘He kissed me today.’ The words tumbled out.

  ‘Who? Todd?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, you don’t exactly look chuffed about it. Is he a crap kisser? Halitosis? Slobbery?’

  Sophie giggled. ‘I bloody wish.’

  ‘Run that by me again. You want a slobberer?’

  ‘No,’ she paused, feeling a slight flush run up her body at the memory of that heart-stopping, time-freezing, momentous kiss. ‘He’s bloody sublime. A champion, hormone-exploding kisser. That’s the problem. He wasn’t supposed to kiss me. I don’t want him to be a good kisser.’

  ‘Why not? He sounds rather yum to me.’

  ‘And that’s another problem. He’s too yum.’

  ‘No one is too yum.’

  Sophie looked glum. Todd was too everything. He had danger written all over him. A danger to her equilibrium in complete contrast to James and Paul, who’d both seemed safe. And look how they’d turned out.

  ‘When you met Ben … did you know?’ The pair of them seemed to fit so well now, although it hadn’t been plain sailing.

  A warm light lit Kate’s eyes and her mouth curved, her whole face instantly serene. ‘The very first time I met him, I knew that he might be. The first time he kissed me, I knew for sure.’

  Sophie closed her eyes for a second. Oh shit.

  ‘What was it like kissing him?’ Kate’s question made her start and she opened her eyes wide.

  ‘Like falling off a cliff.’ There, she’d said, good as admitted it.

  ‘Oh,’ breathed Kate, with a smile.

  ‘No, not oh!’ Sophie shook her head, feeling slightly sick inside.

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  ‘Kate, he doesn’t do relationships,’ her voice was suddenly desperate. ‘He has a whole harem on speed dial.’

  ‘Are you looking for a relationship?’ she demanded, her face looming large on the screen.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well then.’ Kate leaned back again, much to Sophie’s relief. It felt a bit like being under a microscope, as if she might see too much.

  ‘Well then what?’

  ‘Soph, I can’t believe you’re being so obtuse. You’re only there for another four months. What have you got to lose? Go for it. Have some fun. Dive off the cliff. Embrace the ride. Live a little.’

  ‘Kate … one more cliché and I’ll drop you over the balcony.’ Sophie waved the phone about in threat.

  ‘Diversion again. Being serious and cliché free, James hurt you and getting over that is going to take some time. Perhaps having a rip-roaring fling will do you some good, especially if you know it’s not going to come to anything. Why not? And if Todd’s as gorgeous as he sounds—’

  ‘Oh he is, believe me,’ said Sophie, watching the sleek form slicing through the water down below.

  ‘Then … enjoy.’

  Todd did a racing turn and streaked back down the length of the pool. She could see the muscles in his back and shoulders working, driving him through the wat
er, and her mouth dried as she remembered the moment he stripped off his T-shirt. There was no denying she found him attractive and that kiss had been something else.

  ‘Sophie?’

  ‘Mmm.’

  ‘You still there?’

  ‘I’m still here.’ She sighed and bit her lip. ‘You know what? I’m seriously considering your advice.’

  ‘You know it makes sense.’

  ‘Don’t be smug now, missy. I said considering.’

  ‘Who, me?’

  ‘And how’s Ben?’

  ‘He’s fine,’ drawled a voice and Ben’s face appeared next to Kate’s. ‘And appalled at you two objectifying this poor man.’

  An imperious rap at the door startled Sophie.

  ‘Oh, there’s someone knocking. I’d better go.’ With a hasty goodbye, she put down the phone and opened the door to find Mahalia with a bundle of towels.

  ‘Brought fresh supplies. You want your beach swimming things laundered?’ Even as she spoke Mahalia had darted out onto the balcony where Sophie’s wet bikini was draped over a chair.

  As she snatched it up, Mahalia glanced towards the pool and Todd’s relentless pace. ‘That boy. He’s got some demons chasing him.’ She shook her head, her dark eyes clouded as she gave Sophie a steady assessment. ‘Something’s bothering him. He’s a troubled soul. Needs some kindness in his life. A loving heart.’

  Turning away from that direct gaze, Sophie closed her eyes, barely hearing the diminutive housekeeper leave.

  With a quick flourish, watching the silk fabric flutter with movement, Sophie pulled out her new dress from the wardrobe, holding it up in front of her, suddenly wanting to look more than her best. Teamed with a little cardigan and the new low-heeled sandals, it looked feminine rather than sexy. She put her hair up, leaving a few tendrils down, and gave her lips one last slick of pale lipstick and texted him to say she was ready. He’d said he’d knock for her before dinner.