“Hi,” she said with as much cheer as she could muster. They headed toward her. “What can I get you?’
“Um, I’m not sure.” The younger woman had a funny expression on her face, like she was trying to place Heather.
“Take your time.” Heather refused to shrink away from the blatant inspection.
“Let’s get this over vith,” Nadzieja said. “I came to apologize for your van. This is Anna. She came to be sure I did.”
Anna…Jase’s sister.
Heather splayed her hands on the counter. Well, that was nice of them to stop by. Nice-ish. “Thank you. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“Also, ve vant you to let Jason take you to dinner,” Nadzieja continued.
Shit.
“We’re supposed to be smooth,” Anna said out of the corner of her mouth.
“Excuse me?” Heather recovered from her momentary inability to process oxygen.
“He’s a great guy and he really likes you. Whatever happened between you, we’re hoping you’ll hear him out.” Anna shifted the purse strap on her shoulder and dropped it to the counter.
“You’re both here.” Heather pointed at them. “To get me.” She pointed to her chest. “To get back together with Jase?” She pointed toward the flower shop across the street.
They had to be kidding.
“After you took out my van because he’d told you we’d broken up,” Heather said with a firm look at Jase’s grandmother.
“I have apologized. You vill call me Babushka and I vill cook for you,” Babushka announced. “When you have dinner vith him.”
The younger woman nudged Babushka. “That’d be weird. They can go wherever. Even here.”
“And that wouldn’t be weird?” Heather asked.
“Wherever you’re comfortable.” Anna leaned forward and whispered as if she were selling government secrets to Russian spies. “Just, you know, communication is a good thing.”
“No, I don’t think so.” Heather made a sound in her throat—half clearing, half breathing. “But thanks for stopping in. Would you like to buy a cookie?”
“For sure. We’ll take a dozen of whatever,” Anna replied.
Heather started filling a box with snuggle birds. She made the mistake of glancing up at Anna.
Anna, who was chewing at her bottom lip. “Jase could just use a break, that’s all.”
“Hey, Anna,” Velma said as she pushed through the doors behind Heather.
“Oh, Velma, good, you’re here, too,” Anna said, relief in her tone. “We’re trying to get Heather to give Jase another chance.”
“Oh, I don’t think—” Velma started.
“What. The. Hell,” Jase said from the doorway. Red-faced, out-of-breath Jase.
Heather’s jingle bells hadn’t even jingled.
“Your family is trying to convince me to take you back.” Heather held up the cookie tongs and pointed at his sister and grandmother with them.
“All the Dvornakovs out of the shop,” he demanded.
“Hey, now. Not until they’ve got their cookies,” Heather said. Hey, a sale was a sale.
“No cookies. Out you two.” He pointed toward the door.
“They’re customers. They’re buying things. If you have a problem, address it with management. In writing.” Heather went back to boxing cookies.
“You own this place,” he said, biting out the words.
“Then perhaps you should mail me a letter.” Heather squared her shoulders.
A muscle in Jase’s forehead twitched, or maybe it was a blood vessel.
“You can’t throw out my customers.” Heather continued loading the box. “Especially when they’re in the middle of buying things. Once the transaction is through, you can take your family wherever you’d like.”
“Holy hell.” Anna glanced between the two of them. “She’s perfect.”
The tension in the room notched higher; even the cashier stopped mid-button-punch to watch.
“You two should talk privately. I vill run the counter.” Babushka shuffled around the pastry case. “I vill need an apron.”
None of Heather’s muscles worked as the old woman headed toward the sink and began to wash her gnarled hands.
“What is she doing?” Heather asked Anna, with a glance to Velma.
“I think she’s preparing to work here,” Velma replied.
“C’mon, Babushka, you work at the flower shop. Let’s go back there.” Jase was clearly doing his best to stay calm.
“I quit.” Babushka began familiarizing herself with everything behind the counter.
Heather tossed Jase her best please-help-me look. Okay, so maybe she should’ve let Jase toss out his family when he’d tried. Hindsight and all that.
“What are you talking about?” Jase asked.
“I quit. I vill be vorking vith Heather now.” Babushka had found the stash of aprons and tied one on.
“Um…no. I’m all staffed up. Don’t have the funds to hire anyone else.” Heather’s heart was kicking in her chest. What was this day, anyway?
She’d left a nice-paying job selling corrugated cardboard designs to open the shop. Sold everything. Her town house. Her car. Even some of her clothes. Moved into the small apartment above the shop and refused anything but success.
“No charge.” Babushka shuffled toward the register. “Favor because I wrecked your van.” She shooed her grandson. “Jason, you may go, I vill check in.”
“This is so not what I expected,” Velma whispered.
Candy popped her head out from the back. “Heather, there’s a problem with the deliveries. The Smith delivery only got two bouquets, not three.”
Oh no. The Smith delivery was three cockie bouquets and an extra four boxes filled with very inappropriately shaped cookies.
Heather glanced to Jase. “I think there’s a missing bouquet of…” She did her best to telepathically say erection cookies while keeping her face as neutral as she could.
Jase clearly got the message with the speed he pulled out his phone and punched in some numbers. “Hey, Ethan…one of the bouquets didn’t make it to the Smith delivery…can you check the back…” He shifted from foot to foot while he waited. “No, I’m sure…they called Heather…where did you—”
He had gone pale.
Where the hell had the cookies been delivered?
“Then go back to the funeral home and grab them,” Jase continued.
Heather’s stomach pitched. Oh, that wasn’t good.
Jase shoved his phone back in his pocket and gave her a look. A look that wasn’t good.
“Tell me you did not deliver my cockies to a funeral.” Heather’s knees went weak, and she actually felt the blood drain from her scalp.
Jase didn’t move. She’d never seen anyone go so still.
“I think that means he did,” Velma said from behind her.
5
Chapter Five
Heather’s arms wrapped around Jase’s waist, the wind in her hair, the rumble of his motor between her legs—yep, Heather was on Jase’s Ducati zipping through Denver. Her thighs pressed against him. And, dammit all, she enjoyed it.
For a moment, she closed her eyes, pretended they weren’t going to rescue her cockie bouquet from a funeral home. Instead, they were riding through the Italian hillside. Just the two of them, maybe a picnic on the side of a hill. She’d lay out a blanket, and they’d cuddle together and make out for a while. No expectations, just enjoying the feel of each other’s lips. The taste of one another. Things would get heated, and they’d make lazy love on a picnic blanket in a foreign country. No cares. Just the two of them.
He pulled the bike into a space in the back of the one-story mortuary, right next to his delivery van.
Nothing killed a wet dream quite like a visit to the neighborhood funeral home. Heather peeked around Jase to where Ethan leaned against the bumper of the delivery van.
She scooted off the bike. Jase followed.
“What’
s the damage?” he asked, setting his helmet on the seat.
“Funeral started before I got here. The director can’t grab the bouquet until it’s done.” Ethan kicked off from the bumper. “I’m sorry, man. I was in a hurry and I totally screwed this up.”
“Did they actually put out the cockie bouquet?” Heather asked. Maybe they’d just put it in the kitchen or something. Surely, someone would’ve noticed.
Ethan nodded. “I looked in the chapel. It’s right next to the casket.”
At first glance, it was just a bouquet of cookies, but if anyone looked closer? Heather shivered. The funeral-going crowd was probably not her target audience.
Jase made a noise in the back of his throat. He was going to grind his teeth right out of his skull. “How many deliveries do you have left?”
“Still have a bunch,” Ethan confirmed.
“Go ahead and get to it. I’ll wait here.” He turned to Heather. “You want to wait with me or do you want Ethan to drop you at your shop?”
“I came to rescue an erection bouquet. I’m going to see that through.” Heather crossed her arms. No one could say she didn’t finish things once she committed.
Ethan nodded to her and climbed back into the delivery van. “Really, sorry.”
“Don’t beat yourself up. It happens,” Jase replied while his hand ran over his face.
“That’s not entirely true.” Heather brushed at her jeans.
“What’s not?”
“Well, it’s just that an inappropriate cookie bouquet being delivered to a funeral home because an old lady decided to go all Grand Theft Auto on a delivery van isn’t really something that just ‘happens.’”
“Well, when you put it like that…” Jase shook his head.
Ethan headed out of the lot, turning onto the street.
“Poor guy,” Heather said.
It wasn’t his fault the morning had gone how it had gone.
“Man, this day,” Jase said to no one in particular.
“Things you never expected to do today for five hundred, Alex.” Heather turned to Jase. “This is not how I anticipated spending my lunch break.”
“No kidding.” Jase flipped over a white bucket and gestured for her to sit. Then he repeated the process for himself.
“For a fake couple who fake broke up, we spend a lot of real time together.” Heather picked at the cuticle of her fingernail.
Jase closed his eyes and leaned his head against the brick exterior of the building. “Times like this make me seriously reconsider my commitment to our breakup.”
“Oh no, bud.” Heather patted his knee. “I get my leather seats out of this shebang. Don’t try to weasel out of it by telling the truth.”
He peeled open one eye. “Grab lunch when we’re done here?”
“You buying?” she asked.
“Sure, what the hell,” he replied.
“Then absolutely. But to be clear, it’s not a date. It’s just the two of us celebrating the freeing of the cockies.”
The cockies, which were in a vase. A pretty large vase.
“How are we going to get the cockies out of here and back to the shop?” she asked.
He ticked his head to the side. “I guess you can hold them between us?”
“You want me to hold a vase filled with penis cookies between us on your motorcycle?”
“You have a better idea?” he asked.
“I could call a car. From my phone,” she pointed out. It’d be a much more comfortable way to get back.
“Then you won’t get lunch with me.”
Well, there was that. Not that she wanted to have lunch with him, particularly. Just lunch in general. Also, free lunch was a good thing.
They sat in silence for a beat.
“You, me, and a bouquet of cookies might be the kinkiest thing I’ve ever done,” she finally said.
He closed his eyes again. “Then you need to get out more.”
That much was true. She really should start getting out more. She’d thrown herself into her business over the past months. And any spare time was spent volunteering at the retirement home. She loved the elderly. They said what they meant and meant what they said. So, she helped out there. Anything to prevent her from actually getting out with people under the age of seventy-five.
“Why penis cookies?” Jase asked, eyes still closed.
She shifted on her bucket. “What do you mean?”
He opened his eyes, sat up, leaned forward. “I mean, of all the shapes in all the world, why’d you pick those?”
“Can’t a girl just appreciate a nice—”
“Absolutely. And she should. But that doesn’t mean she should immortalize them in cookie dough.”
She gave him her slyest smile. “Maybe you just don’t know the right women.”
He snorted. “Touché.”
“Years ago, I made the cookies for a bachelorette party and they were a hit.” Looked like they’d be waiting for a while. She might as well tell the story. “Friends started asking for them, so I baked on the side for a while. Got pretty good at it, and expanded into other shapes. Then I figured one can’t sell corrugated cardboard forever, so I decided to make cookies. The cockies were an obvious choice. I mean, I’d already created an underground following with them. Might as well monetize that.” She lifted a shoulder. “Never thought that choice would lead me right here with you, though.”
“Pretty awesome that it did.” Jase lifted his eyebrows at her.
“See, this is what I don’t get. We’re all fake broken up, and you keep flirting with me.”
“And?”
“And what am I supposed to do with that?”
He chuckled and flashed a set of dimples she had no idea he had. “Flirt back?”
Seriously, where had he been hiding those dimples? “I don’t think you could handle my flirting. I mean, it’d ruin the breakup you’re so committed to.”
“You think?”
“I know.”
“Give it a try, let’s see what happens.”
“And then what?”
“And then we take your inappropriate cookie bouquet and go grab lunch.”
“Not tacos,” Heather replied.
“Tacos are the best.”
“It’s just that they played such a pivotal role in the pretend demise of our never-happened relationship. Maybe we should have something else instead.”
Jase cocked an eyebrow. “Sandwiches, then?”
That totally depended. “Hot or cold?”
“Which do you like?” he asked.
“Depends on the sandwich. Hot sandwiches definitely pair well with cockies.” Oh dear Lord, had she really just said that?
Jase grinned huge. “Yes, I guess they do. Hot sandwiches it is.”
“It’s still not a date. Just you and me and hot sandwiches while we eat cockies.”
“I’m not eating those,” he said. “I make it a point not to eat anything shaped as an appendage. Personal rule.”
“Turn it over and pretend it’s a rainbow.” Heather did her best to dare him with only her eyes.
“Don’t you have to get them to their rightful owner, anyway?” he asked. “We could, you know, not eat them and deliver them after.”
“Candy ran a spare set over. These are all ours,” Heather said proudly.
The heavy metal door creaked open, and a man in a suit stepped through with the bouquet of cockies. “You’re here for the cookies?”
“That’d be us.” Jase stood and snagged the outstretched vase. “We’re very sorry for the mistake.”
“I hope whoever these are for appreciates them.” Mr. Funeral gave Jase a pointed glance before heading back inside.
“Heather?” Jase asked.
“Uh-huh,” Heather replied, taking the cockies from him.
“I need a drink.” Jase headed across the lot to the dive bar up the road. “You coming?”
Heather shrugged.
Why not?
The
scent of bottom-shelf booze, peanuts, and powdery wood particles tickled Jase’s nose. So maybe this dive took the word “dive” to a whole new level.
He held the door open for Heather and her bouquet, tucked against her side.
She barely set foot through the windowless wooden door of the bar on Champa Street before turning on her heel. She ran straight into a solid wall of Jase. Not that he intentionally blocked the doorway.
It just happened that way.
He didn’t dislike the way her chest pressed against his own in that instant. As a matter of fact, he appreciated the contact on a carnal level. He’d always been attracted to Heather, even when she was off-limits. Ever since he found out she was single again, his body seemed to be on a mission to override his brain circuits. He shook the sawdust haze from his brain.
“Trying to run already?” he asked.
“Not even a little.” She shifted the bouquet a bit.
Hands on her shoulders, he twirled her so she faced the long bar top where a handful of rough-looking guys in cowboy hats tossed back bottles of beer. He did a quick inventory of the bar. Four cowboys at the bar top, a guy playing pool with a brunette, and the bartender. Some things stayed the same when he got discharged, including inventorying the room whenever he walked in.
She stumbled along as they shuffled across the peanut-shell covered floor.
“I wasn’t running. Just checking to see if you were behind me.” She clearly did her best attempt at recovery, sauntering deeper into the room.
“Beer?” he asked.
“Sure. I generally wait until after noon to hit the hard liquor.” She winked at him.
Flirted.
Well, looky there. Just a little wink, and she made him go all warm inside.
“I’ll take whatever’s on tap,” she continued as though she hadn’t just given him the one-eyed go-ahead to flirt back.
He hooked his thumbs in the belt loops of his jeans so he wouldn’t be tempted to touch her and headed toward the bar top. The place was decked out in neon beer signs, a small, empty stage splattered with God-knew-what, and a mechanical bull. He should get a mechanical bull for the flower shop. Now that would be kickass.
On that thought, he snagged their beers and headed back.
Just the Tip of the Iceberg: Mile High Matched Books 1-3 Page 31