Delicious

by Lori Foster, Lucy Monroe, Sarah Little

  So maybe fate was looking out for her. And while she wasn’t thrilled with fate at the moment—Dan was really freaking hot—she knew it was all for the best. So what if she spent more time than was strictly necessary watching Dan walk off? The man knew how to fill out a pair of khakis. And so what if she wanted to call him back and give him a free sample, just so they would have more to talk about? It was better this way. Now he would never bother her again and she could go about her business dealing with customers who were actually nice human beings and who didn’t make her want to bash their heads in and maybe also rip their shirts off a little.

  Much better if she never saw him again.

  She winced and yanked her palm off the cookie sheet a second time. She had forgotten it was there. Stupid Khaki Dan ruining her day. She took two pies—apple crumble and straight-up apple—out of the cooler at her feet and placed them on the cookie sheet. She kicked a few cookies out of the way and pulled open the keep-warm oven that was still nice and toasty, and shoved the pies in. They were already fully baked, but letting them cool and then heat up right before she sold them didn’t seem to affect the taste any, and she liked to have a few ready to go for the after-school rush. She’d do the same in a few hours for the after-work crowd, then she’d focus on cookies (she had a few containers left) and slices of cakes and tarts that could be eaten in hand for the after-happy hour crowd. And then she would go home and put her feet up and drink a glass of wine and not think about how she had to get up at the crack of dawn tomorrow to see if her magic would work for one more day. It should; this was the second full moon of the month, and that usually meant extra baking days as it waned. But even though her gift (because when it worked, it was a gift; when it didn’t, it was a curse) was as predictable as, say, the orbit of the moon, she had a constant niggling worry that, someday, it would up and disappear. She had to take advantage of it while she could. She had to hold on to this life she loved for as long as the moon would let her have it.

  So that meant no more throwing her inventory around, and no more thinking about hot accountants. Only hot buns from now on.

  Oh, buns.

  No. Only baking. Baking baking baking.

  “What did you put in this?”

  She jerked around at what sounded like an angry customer, only to be confronted by the very thing she wasn’t supposed to be thinking about. Dan. Khaki Dan, whose eyes were wild and whose hair was disheveled, and who was waving a crumpled paper bag at her. It looked like one of her paper bags. And it looked empty.

  “Hello, Dan, nice to see you again,” she said through gritted customer-service teeth. “Can I help you with something?”

  He gave her a wild look and shook the bag. “The apple cake! Mrs. Harris gave me the apple cake—”

  She loved Mrs. Harris. Had something gone wrong? “What happened to her?”

  “Nothing happened to her!” Now his arms were really flailing. He was going to hurt himself if he didn’t calm down.

  But he still looked hot.

  “It didn’t happen to her! It happened to me! I ate it! I ate the apple cake!”

  “Are you hurt?”

  His eyes, unbelievably, got wider. “No! No, I’m not hurt, but I think I just had a sexual experience eating a piece of cake!”

  Well. That was a new one.

  “Um, thanks?”

  “What did you put in there? I tasted cinnamon, and apple, obviously. But there’s something else, some kind of kick—”

  “You can’t really expect me to give away all of my secrets, can you? How would I be able to fart along with my capricious business model if I did?”

  That seemed to calm him down. His arms dropped to his sides and he looked down at the ground. He mumbled something.

  “What was that? I can’t hear you when you’re apologizing to the sidewalk.”

  He looked up then, and she almost gasped at the look in his eyes. It was, somehow, everything. Laughter and regret and lust. Definitely lust. Again.

  Mona gulped. That was a lot of look.

  “I’m sorry for the way I spoke to you before. I don’t know why I was so rude. I mean, it does kind of frustrate me that you work so sporadically, especially now that I’ve tasted your—”

  “Yes, you mentioned the apple cake.”

  “Mona, it’s amazing! I’ve never tasted anything like it before in my life, and I grew up eating this stuff. How did you do it? And how can you not do it all the time?”

  She sighed. She couldn’t tell him. The truth was ridiculous, and he was not a ridiculous person. If she told him that she was cursed with baking talents that followed the lunar cycle, he would never speak to her again. That might not be so bad. But he would also never give her that look again.

  She was kind of into that look.

  She needed time to think this through, but she didn’t have time since he was standing right in front of her and he looked so apologetic and still a little lustful. She started to pace; pacing would help her think. But her pacing space was limited by the square footage of her food truck, and by the mess she had made earlier. A mess she forgot all about in the face of that lustful look. She turned, took a step to think, and the cookie she stepped on slid right out from underneath her.

  She landed on the floor.

  Hard.

  “Mona!”

  She heard Dan’s panicked cry from the side window, and then she heard the back door being wrenched open. Then she didn’t hear much because suddenly Dan was in her face, leaning over her and clutching her arms.

  “Mona, are you all right?”

  She looked up into those deep blue eyes and said, “My butt hurts.”

  Nice, Mona.

  He kneeled back. “You didn’t hit your head? It sounded pretty loud.”

  She took the hand he offered and let him pull her to a seated position. “No, that was my butt.”

  “Do you want me to, ah, look at it for you?”

  She laughed and put a hand to her forehead. “I can’t believe I just wiped out on a cookie.”

  “It’s sort of a mess back here.” She watched him take in the crumbled cookie mess all over the floor.

  “It’s not usually. In fact, it’s your fault that it’s such a mess.”

  “Me? What did I do?”

  She sighed. “You yelled at me and it messed up my groove. I’ve been dropping stuff and messing up all afternoon. I gave Bobby Warner change for a twenty, and he only gave me a dollar.”

  “Oh.”

  “His mom made him give it back. Which was nice of her. I gave her a pie.”

  “Wow.”

  “See? So you cost me a pie. How am I ever expected to turn a profit if you keep messing me up like this?”

  “I’m sorry.” He was still kneeling in front of her. She looked up at him with an expression she was sure was full of reprimand and disgust. So she was completely taken aback when he reached out and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.

  It was a sweet gesture. She thought he didn’t like sweets.

  And whatever look she thought she was giving out, she could read his clear as day in those blue, blue eyes. The lust was back. He was smoldering.

  She almost looked away—that was a lot of smolder, and she was starting to get whiplash from the way her own feelings were bouncing around—but that smolder was magnetic. When he started to lean forward, she just followed the pull and leaned toward him, too. His hand cupped her cheek, gently pulling her closer.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered a second before his lips touched hers.

  And, hot damn, this man had smolder. His lips were gentle, and surprisingly soft, and she responded to everything sweet in them, tasting, exploring. His other arm came down to rest on the floor next to her hip. She heard him flick a cookie out of the way, and then he leaned in farther, caging her between the lower cabinets and his body. She put a hand up to his arm, just to anchor herself, and she almost broke the kiss in surprise because, damn, this man had muscles. But she didn’t—
she held on, running her hand up his shoulder, trying to concentrate on the way his mouth was slowly taking control of hers but also sort of wondering how an accountant—an accountant!—got shoulders like that.

  But then he shifted forward a little more, and she felt herself sliding underneath him, just a little, and she clutched those strong accountant shoulders and held on as he deepened the kiss, coaxing her mouth open and swallowing her gasp and her sigh.

  Three

  She tasted even better than the apple cake.

  And she felt amazing. Her curly hair was smooth and her skin was soft, and he wanted to wrap her in his arms and feel her whole body pressed against his. But even though she was driving him crazy with those tentative lips of hers, he was still aware that they were on the floor of her place of business.

  He almost forgot that, though, when he felt her hand run up his shoulder, felt her arch up slightly and gasp into his mouth. He took the opportunity—a few cookie crumbs never hurt anyone—and opened his mouth to her, his tongue meeting hers. He moved his hand down the back of her neck, holding her closer, wanting to feel those tank top straps slide down, wanting to see if the rest of her skin was as soft as her neck. He needed her closer. He let go of her neck, but she had a strong hold on him. He moved his hands to her waist, both of his arms making a band around her, and he leaned back. She came with him so they were both sitting upright, her chest snug against his. Her legs were an awkward tangle around his knees, but she didn’t seem to mind; she just held on tighter and angled her head, and he went deeper.

  He felt like he could sit there all day, kissing Mona and pressing her against him. But he was still a human, and he still had to breathe. He broke the kiss, but kept his eyes closed. He rested his forehead against Mona’s as he caught his breath. He could still taste her. She loosened her grip on his shoulders and slid down to the floor. Somehow he hadn’t noticed that he had pulled her so close that she was sitting in his lap.

  Her absence made his arms feel heavy, and he let them fall to his sides. He finally opened his eyes to find her staring at him, hard, her green eyes sparkling.

  “What?” he asked, stupidly. Come on, man. The best kiss of your life, and you’re asking her “What?”

  “I had no idea,” she said, then ran a finger over her lips. “Who would have thought?”

  He thought maybe he was being insulted, or complimented, or possibly both, but the sight of those pretty fingers running over her plumped, moist lips had him too distracted to care.

  “All that, inside those khakis,” she said. He followed her eyes down to his lap. Yup, his high school hard-on was back. Although he felt a little more justified with this one.

  “This whole time . . .” Mona was still talking, but she seemed to be mostly talking to herself. Her eyes ran up and down his body, and he pretended not to preen under her appreciative gaze.

  When he had seen her before, she was always so confident and sure of what she was saying. He had never seen anyone make conversation so easily, or seem to feel so comfortable talking to such a wide variety of people. It was not a skill that came naturally to him, and, frankly, it was a little intimidating.

  So it gave him no small pleasure to see her sitting before him, stunned and blabbering, because of his kissing. It made a man feel good, frankly. She made him feel really good.

  Her eyes finally reached his. This time, her stunned expression turned a little softer, and the corner of her mouth turned up, revealing a small dimple that he wanted to lean in and kiss. God, he wanted to kiss her again. He wanted to kiss all of her.

  But his timing was off, as usual, and he almost jumped out of his khakis when a loud beeping sound interrupted his post-kiss reverie. She wasn’t expecting it, either, if her jump was any indication.

  “Crap,” she muttered, then offered him a rueful smile and picked herself up off the floor. “After-school rush,” she shrugged, and switched the beeping timer off and started pulling things out of secret compartments all around the truck.

  So that was it, he thought as he watched her change from post-kissing puddle of mush (still good for his ego) to quick-moving, confident, efficient bakery operator. She barely looked at what she was doing, but before his eyes the empty counter was transformed into a smorgasbord of cookies and cakes and pies and tarts and . . . he didn’t even know what half that stuff was. But he definitely wanted to taste it.

  This couldn’t be it. She couldn’t just turn it off like that, could she? She couldn’t have not felt what he felt?

  “Can I see you again?” he asked. “Tonight?”

  She turned, then looked down, almost as if she was surprised to see him still there. Frankly, he was surprised to still be sitting on the floor. He was so distracted by her movements that he didn’t realize he was still at her feet.

  “Tonight I have to bake. I’m open tomorrow, then not for a while. So tonight isn’t going to work for me.”

  That was a reasonable enough explanation. Sensible. It was a work night for him, too. He had no business trying to get busy when he had to be up early tomorrow morning.

  But he couldn’t accept it. He had to see her tonight. He didn’t know why, but he just knew—it had to be tonight. Maybe it was the weird double full moon, but he had a feeling about her now and it was way too strong for him to ignore.

  “You have to eat, right?” He stood up so he was facing her. She reached around him for containers and toppings. He plastered himself as tightly against the wall as he could. As much as he wanted to get in her space, she had work to do.

  She barely looked up at him. “Sure, I’ll eat. I usually grab something on the way home.”

  “What if I bring you something?”

  She looked up at him sharply. “You mean you’ll bring me dinner?”

  “Yeah. I mean, takeout or something. I can’t cook. I wish I could cook, but I can’t.” With every sentence fragment, he saw his chances dwindling. “Whatever you want. Anything.”

  “Anything?” She actually paused in what she was doing, and he took advantage of it. He pulled her close so she was flush against him again. With her face so close to his, she couldn’t hide the desire in her eyes. That was what he had been looking for, that it wasn’t just him being crazy, that she felt it, too.

  “Anything.”

  He kissed her on the nose, and then he was gone.

  Mona stood in the center of her mobile bakery with her spatula in the air. She felt a pull toward the side door where Dan and his khakis had just departed, but she stayed rooted to the spot. She wasn’t going to follow him. So what if it was the best kiss of her life? She had work to do. She couldn’t follow him.

  Well, she could follow him with her eyes. She watched him look both ways, then cross the street. He had his hand on the innocuous door to his accounting firm office, and she thought that was it, now she could get back to work. But he turned and caught her watching. And he waved. Embarrassed, she waved back. With her spatula.

  He grinned. Damn, he was cute.

  He turned to go into his office. Damn.

  Anything she wanted.

  She wanted him.

  “I want that one.”

  She jumped a little at the disembodied voice that seemed to be her fiercest competition for Dan. But when she looked down, it was Serena Bradshaw, aged four. Well, it was Serena’s fingers, stretching in the general direction of the cookie tray. Serena was still too short to see over the counter, but her fingers seemed to be able to sense cookies with impressive precision.

  Mona smiled and leaned over the counter. “Which one, now?” She held the tray of cookies a little lower so Serena could see, but not so close that she could reach.

  “She doesn’t need to see them to know which one she wants,” said Serena’s mother, Trish. “She wants them all.”

  “Smart girl,” said Mona, winking at Serena.

  “Takes after her grandmother.” Serena was Mrs. Harris’s granddaughter. It was a testament to Mrs. Harris’s strength of cha
racter that even her daughter-in-law, Trish, liked her. In Mona’s experience, that wasn’t always the case when a mother was so fiercely attached to both her son and her granddaughter.

  It didn’t hurt that Trish was particularly awesome and managed to balance super-mom skills with razor-sharp wit. Mona knew a little tart could make the sweetness go down a little smoother.

  Trish was close to her mother-in-law.

  So maybe she was close to her mother-in-law’s boss.

  “Did I just see Dan over here?” Trish asked, digging in her purse and coming out with her wallet and a wet wipe.

  “I’m not sure.” Mona practiced her most innocent face. Sweet, delicate, innocent. She looked to Serena for approval. Serena watched the cookies.

  “He was walking kind of funny.”

  “Dan is funny!” shouted Serena, momentarily distracted from the cookies.

  “Yes, Dan is very funny,” said Trish. She gave Mona a conspiratorial wink. “Serena is a little in love with him.”

  “You must spend a lot of time with him,” said Mona. Innocently.

  “A little. We like to visit Grandma Jan after school sometimes.”

  “Grandma Jan?”

  “Mrs. Harris.” Trish laughed. “Serena is one of the only people who doesn’t have to call her Mrs. Harris. And since I popped Serena out, neither do I.”

  That was all very nice, but Mona needed more intel.

  Trish stepped out of the way as people started to gather around Apple of My Pie. Mostly moms, and more than a few dads, with kids in tow. Mona was used to the rush, though, so she just started laying stuff out on the little counter. People grabbed what they wanted and handed her cash. She could dig change out of her apron in her sleep. She had just invested in one of those cute little square things that enabled her to charge credit cards with her cell phone, but most people in town still used cash.

  “So Dan finally became a customer, huh?”

  Mona recognized the look on Trish’s face. It was the same fake-innocent look she had had on just a minute ago.

  “I guess Mrs. Harris cajoled him into it.”