“Hey,” he said gently, and she looked up. She had a little sugar syrup on the corner of her lip, but otherwise she was perfect and beautiful, and he was so lucky to be loved by her. “How’s the brazo?”
“Can I please have this in my shop too?” she asked. “It will work so well with the barako. And those biscuits? If we can get mini versions I can serve them for dine-in orders.”
“Anything you want.” He smiled, because of course she was thinking of her café at a time like this. It was one of the things they’d decided to work on—Gabriel was going to make a small line of pastries just for Café Cecilia, and Sari was going to make him a specialty blend in exchange. They’d heard the entire Laneways breathe a sigh of relief when they finally came to the same solution everyone else had thought of the moment they heard of the rivalry.
“Save your New Year’s kiss for me?” he murmured into her ear.
“Convince me.” She turned her head toward him and giggled, licking her spoon.
Once the New Year’s dinner was cleared, it was the Tomas sisters’ turn to entertain when the fireworks came out. Now, Gabriel’s experience with fireworks was limited—he’d seen them, sure, but they were usually accompanied by music and lights and a goodnight from the theme park where he saw them. Apparently, Selene, Sari and Sam had different ideas.
“You look like you’re about to blow up a bank,” he said, his eyes wide at the bouquets of fireworks they carried in their arms, taken from the back of Sam’s truck.
“This is all standard New Year’s stuff,” Sam insisted before she and one of her drivers headed off to the base of the driveway to set up.
“Ooh, what is all of this?” Iris asked as she and her siblings tentatively approached. Selene laid everything out in neat, separate piles for easy access and brought out a little matchbook from her pocket.
“It’s everything you need to ring in the New Year,” Sari informed the wide-eyed Caprases. “We have sparklers, or baby fireworks, as Sam likes to call them, lusis or the Harry Potter wands that actually shoot sparks, then the usual fountains, Catherine wheels, cake fireworks...”
“Cake?” Gab’s eyebrow shot up.
“You know,” Sari said. “Boom! Wheee! Pak! Wooow.”
She’d punctuated this with hand gestures that were less than useful.
“That was unhelpful.”
“You’ll know when you see it,” she insisted, before she pointed at an ominous-looking belt of brown triangles held together on a string. “Then there’s that.”
“Dynamite?” Angelo whispered.
“Sinturon ni Judas,” Selene said ominously. Did Gabriel just imagine the little cackle she made after that? “If you’re going to ward off evil spirits for the New Year, you might as well go all out.”
“This is a little excessive, don’t you think?” Gabriel asked, looking aghast at all the explosive devices that were now sitting in his driveway. It wasn’t hard to imagine one of his siblings accidentally setting the cat on fire.
“This is standard stuff! The neighbors will get crazier, I’m sure,” Sari insisted, tapping him on the chest, picking up a pack of lusis. “Make sure you have a mask later, the smoke will be intense. Now who wants to light up the lusis?”
For the hour coming up to midnight, the older kids kept busy helping the younger ones not start fires with the fireworks. Sam had taken charge of the big fireworks, and would occasionally light up the sky with green and red showers of sparks, fireworks that made noise as they shot up to the sky, and fountains. The neighbors had apparently gotten the memo too, because when the neighbors across the street weren’t lighting something up, the Tomas/Capras contingent was, and if it wasn’t them, it was the house to the left of Gabriel’s rented place. Lipa had quickly become a city of sparks and noise, and it was like nothing he had ever experienced before.
Then his mother set up a pair of huge speakers, and music was playing to accompany the scene. In Gabriel’s head, it was a lot better than any theme park scene he could have watched.
Holding a sparkler, he checked the time. Two minutes to midnight.
“I got it,” he told Sari, approaching her as she held up a huge lusis, making shapes in the dark as Mindy took a photo on her instant camera.
“Hey, safety first, dimples!” She giggled, as three of his siblings snorted at the mention of his little nickname.
“Sorry,” he said, tossing his used sparkler in the bin Selene provided before he approached her again. “It’s about a minute to midnight. And I just wanted to say. You made this year...amazing. I love you.”
Sari looked like she was about to drop the lusis, so he took it in hand with hers, slipping his other hand around her waist. Almost like destiny (or a really well-timed coincidence), “Hooked on a Feeling” played, and Sari started to laugh.
“Oh look, they’re playing our song,” she said, and they started to sway together. She looked up at Gabriel, content and happy, and his heart swelled too. “Happy New Year, dimples.”
“Happy New Year, sweetheart.”
They might have kissed about thirty seconds early, but from the way the fireworks were bursting around them, their families exclaiming close by, it was just as perfect.
* * *
Reviews are an invaluable tool when it comes to spreading the word about great reads. Please consider leaving an honest review for this or any of Carina Press’s other titles that you’ve read on your favorite retailer or review site.
To find out more about Carla de Guzman or the #romanceclass community, please visit www.romanceclassbooks.com
Author Note
Some of my previous readers might have recognized most of the Capras family from my previous title, Chasing Mindy. I hope you also enjoyed the story of the oldest Kuya Gabriel as much as you liked Mindy’s.
If anyone has a recipe for the Red Ribbon mango cake (you know, the one with the perfect mango dome in the middle?) I would love if you could send it to me, and I can make my sister bake it with my mom’s mangoes, and I will be happy forever. Might I also say that Neiman Marcus cookies are the best cookies in the world. Please don’t try to change my mind.
Sadly, the Laneways does not actually exist in Lipa, but was inspired by an alley in Little Bourke St. in Melbourne. Melbourne, however, does not have bonete, pan de sal or sansrival, what a conflict!
Also, disclaimer, I am not a fan of lomi. But I really love tuyo in the morning.
This book was written in 2018, and the world has changed so much since then. And while we’re still trying to figure out what the future is going to look like, this is what I can offer for now.
#romanceclass is a community of Filipino writers, readers and creators of romance in English. Sweet on You would not be the book it is without all the other titles in the catalog. I highly encourage you to check them out. Let me know if you want a rec, too!
Acknowledgments
I have been wanting to write a book about a baker for a long time. Blame it on The Great British Bake Off and my absolute love of a brazo de mercedes and Becky’s Kitchen’s Swiss Chocolate Cake. Mmm. But it didn’t really come together to me until October 9, 2018, when Chachic invited me to be a saling-kit to her, Honey and Kat on a coffee session at the Giving Café. Someone joked about writing a barista MC, and Sari and Gab just sort of came to life right after that.
Thank you to Raoul, who very patiently answered my questions, and also for roasting my mom’s coffee beans. The house has never had such good coffee.
The photo on the cover features the lovely and uber talented Rachel Coates and Jef Flores! Thank you Chi Yu Rodriguez, the emotional photographer behind #romanceclasscovers, the kilig you bring is on another level, kaloka.
To Stephanie Doig from Carina Press, who understood how important the voice of this book was to me, and answered all my impatient questions.
To Ninang Layla, who always h
as my back, and I like to think my entire writing career is thanks to her careful hand and listening ear. And for saying yes to all my panic-messages to her.
To the #romanceclass community, I dedicate this book to you. I wrote it just imagining what you guys would find sweet, nakakakilig, and funny and happy, and I hope that I was able to do that. Thank you for allowing me to be myself, and to find the thing that my heart enjoys doing!
To the Original Rosario, my Mom, who made all her farm dreams (and more) come true. May all your baby cows be girl baby cows. And to Dad, who planted all of the bamboo, and made me climb down a river and up a cliff one Holy Week. Thank you for not complaining (more than you already do) about how much I love a good café. I’m so happy you guys found a little home away from home in Lipa. And to my siblings! I hope you never read this. Or if you do, you don’t tell me that you did.
Special shout-out to Gabbie (Gab, Gabbie, get it?) who explained to me how chocolate can explode, and how sourdough starts don’t start.
And to Ma Cel, the original Cecilia. Lipa always reminds me of you, and all the Christmases and New Years we celebrated with you.
To Tito Johnny and Tito Quitos, who made Lipa special.
About the Author
Carla de Guzman is a Capricorn with a Libra moon and a Virgo rising, and she loves spending her midnights at her desk, writing contemporary romance. She loves to travel, and writes the love stories that those travels have inspired. She’s currently on a quest to see as many Impressionist paintings as she can, and is always in search of the perfect pain au chocolat.
Follow along on her adventures on Instagram and Twitter (@carlakdeguzman) or on her website, www.carladeguzman.com.
It’s the very first holiday Ari and Yin spend together as a couple...and nothing at all goes right.
Keep reading for an excerpt from American Christmas, a Dreamers holiday novella from Adriana Herrera, available now from Carina Press.
American Christmas
by Adriana Herrera
Chapter One
Ari
Christmas Eve
“Bébé, what are you doing?” I called from the bed as I looked at Yin fussing around in our little kitchen on the other side of our studio apartment. I bit back a smile when he whipped around toting two mugs in a candy cane motif.
“I was trying to bring you some coffee with peppermint creamer, Mr. Sleepy Head.” The attempt at sounding stern was thwarted by the grin on his face. He closed the space between us and handed me the steaming mug.
I reached out for the drink knowing it would probably be too sweet. And that I would love it anyway, because how could I not, when it was made for me with such love? It was still hard to believe sometimes that I could have this life.
I patted the spot on the bed next to me as Yin blew on his cup. “Come sit with me.”
He held up a finger and looked down at his drink. “Let me wait until this cools down, because you know me, I’ll probably spill this all over the bed and then we’ll spend Christmas at the ER.” I had to bite back a laugh, because he was a little clumsy. So I waited patiently until he was ready.
Yin finally took a small sip from his coffee and grimaced. “Yeah, the peppermint creamer isn’t really helping. I just don’t like coffee.” He looked so disappointed that he wouldn’t be able to partake in holiday themed caffeinating.
“Tea?” I asked as I took a few more sips of the minty coffee. Yin slumped his shoulders and dipped his head in defeat.
“Yeah. I’ll go make myself some.” He shuffled back to the corner of our apartment that served as our kitchen. I felt the buzz of the caffeine waking up my brain as I placidly watched Yin move. My boyfriend, my man—my whole life if I was honest. I didn’t know how it was that I’d gotten so lucky, but I would never get tired of marveling at this little nest we’d made together. With the help of so many people, but still. Here we were. Some days I could just revel at that for hours. That Yin and I had managed to overcome as much as we did and end up here together. But that wasn’t quite true—we’d fought like hell to be here, both of us.
Yin was slight and sunny, but he was strong, and so fucking smart. I pushed hard, driven to accomplish my goals, and he was the exact same way. He always said that we were both strivers. That we had come up against so much to get here, we knew the value of every little thing we had, and that kept us focused. And he was right of course, but for me it was more. He had been what brought everything together for me. It had been almost three years since I met him and I still could remember what I felt the moment I saw him. He brought the sun into my life and he was still that bright to me.
It was so much what Yin made me feel that I was almost scared of it. I wanted him so much, I feared if I reached for him I’d ruin everything. How could I be so lucky to have something like that in my life? So I kept him at bay, convinced just his friendship was an embarrassment of riches. But Yin wouldn’t let me deprive us for long, and after a year of resisting, I finally fell.
“Babe.” The smile in that one word brought me back from my errant thoughts. I lifted my head back up and I found Yin holding up tea canisters. We had at least a dozen of them, because like with everything else, my boyfriend’s tea preferences depended very much on his mood. I narrowed my eyes, trying to get a clearer view, but gave up and reached over to the side table for my glasses.
“You like cinammony things when it’s cold out.” I said, pointing at the one that said Apple Cinnamon Spice, then at the snow falling outside.
“I do. See, you always know.” He smiled wide as he went back to his tea. I stayed in our bed, knowing he’d come back to me and we’d have a few more hours to play in bed.
I smiled as he hiked up the pajama bottoms with rainbow colored reindeer and worked on getting himself sorted. I kept sipping on my coffee, which really was too sweet, as he puttered about and let myself sink into the rightness of this moment. I looked around our place, taking my time to admire all the little details that Yin had added. There were holiday themed cushions. Garland around the door. Little lights hanging from the window frames. Yin had made a big deal out of our first Christmas living together—and even though he might’ve gone a little bit overboard, I had to admit it looked beautiful. It was festive and so different than my life had been only a few months before.
I hadn’t exactly been in a bad situation. I’d lived with my uncle who had a comfortable—if not very warm—home. I had a roof over my head, but I didn’t have this. A place of my own, a person to come home to—that meant the world to me. I’d given up on trying to be religious long ago, but lately I’d started thinking more and more about gratitude. And that was exactly what was pulsing in my chest as I saw Yin come back to bed, gingerly drinking his tea with his thick black curls a halo around his head.
I grinned and lifted a corner of the comforter in invitation. “Come on, get in here. We have a morning off for once, and I want to spend it in here with you.”
“Hmmm, I don’t know. I was going to go to the mall for some last minute stuff.” I wanted to think he was kidding, but Yin had been increasingly intense, and a little secretive, about our Christmas gift exchange.
I shook my head incredulously. “You said you got all your shopping done on Black Friday,” I said, gesturing to the gifts he’d elaborately wrapped and placed under our tiny tree weeks ago—granted, most of those were for friends and family, but still. We’d both been running ourselves ragged in the last few months going to school full-time, and with two part-time jobs each, so we’d agreed to not complicate things with gifts. We’d even set a budget, nothing over a hundred dollars. Not that I had exactly observed that caveat.
“I haven’t quite gotten all the gifts yet,” he explained as a very sly smile appeared on his face. “And I think you need to convince me. Why don’t you tell me three reasons why I should come to bed and not just stand here and sip my tea while I look at you? From wh
ere I’m standing, it doesn’t get much better than this.” He lifted a hand as if to present me with the evidence. Never mind that exhibit A was my own torso. Yin loved to play like this, he could turn anything into a game. He grinned as I considered him, lust already filling my head. I got a peek of that crooked eyetooth of his that made him look almost impish.
“Come here.” I reached for him and he backed away laughing.
“Nuh uh. Those are not the rules of the game.”
“You’re serious? Also, when did we even start playing?” I asked, shaking my head, already caught up in him. Lust slithering up my spine.
He nodded as he gulped his tea. “Very.” He raised a finger and circled the air above my thighs. ‘You’ve got a lot of material to convince me. So convince me.” Yin widened his eyes and licked his lips, making me laugh. I’d play with him. Because despite my griping, I loved when he did stuff like this, when he made me stop and be silly for a bit. I was not playful by nature, but for Yin I let myself have these moments of joy.
Growing up, I’d been the oldest of four and the only boy, and I had always taken myself a bit too seriously. Yin on the other hand had been the baby in his family, brought up by his two sisters when their mother passed away shortly after they left Myanmar. We’d both had tumultuous histories, our journeys to the States marred with adversity. But for Yin those things had made him push outward, embrace every new thing and suck the marrow out of every moment. But I could go into myself if I didn’t pay attention. Let the heaviness of the past cover me like blanket. And even now, after months of waking up with him next to me, of knowing exactly what my day would look like, I had to tell myself that this apartment in downtown Ithaca, with mix and match furniture given to us by friends, and this man—especially this beautiful, smiling, happy man—were mine. But Yin always knew exactly what to do whenever I needed reminding.
Sweet on You Page 27