Peace Love & Macarons - Jessica Gadziala

Contents Peace, Love, & Macarons Dedication Rights - Bitter Tarts - Full-Fat Frappe - Cherry Pie - Crepes - Coffee Cake - French Torte - Pound Cake - Rocky Road Bars - Cookies 'n Cream Cups - Pineapple Upside Down Cake - Wedding Cake - Don't Forget! - Also By Jessica Gadziala - About the Author - Stalk Her!

Peace, Love, & Macarons -Jessica Gadziala

DEDICATION: To the people who can actually make macarons: You are my heroes <3

Copyright © 2017 Jessica Gadziala All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author's intellectual property. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for brief quotations used in a book review. "This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental."

Cover image credit: Kwanbenz/Shutterstock.com

Bitter Tarts Maddy

I was raised to always be sure of three things: always put money in your savings account; never rely on a man; and know that no matter what, you can always come home. Had I maybe heeded the ingenious advice of the former two, I wouldn't be suffering the humiliation of the latter. So, I was going home. Not for a visit. Not to take care of a sick family member. No. I was going home because I had been an epic fool and screwed up my life and I had nowhere to go but home. Did I mention I was twenty-seven? Also, did I mention that the truest sign of failure in life was having to move home at twenty-seven after successfully living on your own since you were eighteen? But I was out of options. See, my story starts with a cliche. I had been young and in love. It went to follow that I was also stupid. It is a law to the universe that you can't be young and in love without being absolutely, mind-numbingly freaking dumb. When you gave up a piece of your heart before the age of twenty-five, apparently a giant piece of your brain went with it. That was just how it was. I had met Richard Elliot Alexander Martin III. Yes, he was a third. I bet you can already guess he came from one of those families too. He totally did. I hadn't known that when I met him though. To me, he was just Richy who could do a one-handed keg stand, sing every last word of "I Believe In A Thing Called Love" by The Darkness in key, had hypnotic light blue eyes, and called me freaking pumpkin when he talked to me. Yes, pumpkin. After years of 'baby', let me tell you, 'pumpkin' was a sweet and welcome change. He had just been like any other frat guy in college. Maybe it should have been a red flag to me that he drove a car that I was pretty sure cost more than my childhood home and that he had really nice watches and that he was in school studying, of all things, finance with a minor in project management. But I was too busy swooning over the lilies he sent me to my door and the post-it notes he stuck

with God-awful, but charming as hell, pickup lines to my textbooks when we studied together. Is your name Google? Because you have everything I'm searching for. It's lucky I have a library card because I'm totally checking you out. Do you like raisons? How do you feel about a date? I know this seems like clickbait, but if you and me dated, you wouldn't believe what happens next! Richy was charming. Richy was handsome. And, the coup de grâs, Richy actually treated me right. I know, right? A college guy who treated his girlfriend like gold? It was like finding a unicorn who guarded the doors to Narnia and could give you directions to Hogwarts. But that was how it was. I had been twenty-two. He had been twenty-three. And it simply... worked. For five years. Five years was forever in your twenties. Five years meant he finished college and went to work and then I finished college and opted into doing an internship at a really prestigious bakery since Richy had a good job and covered the bills and told me not to worry about it, that relationships were about supporting each others' dreams and that I would never get an opportunity like that one again. So I took it. Stupid, stupid girl. I had no income. I had no place that was mine. All I had was a man I loved and his promises. Unfortunately, when a man came from one of those families, it often followed that being privy to their good graces and deep pockets meant there were conditions. Up until that morning, I had liked his family. They had given me every impression that they liked me. Granted, they were big city socialites and I was from a nowhere town in New York state where I had been raised by a single mother who just barely made the ends meet every month. But still, I was no backward country bumpkin. I was educated and cultured and could hold my own in their conversations from art and literature to politics and finance. So when Richy gave me an unexpectedly giant ring and asked me to spend the rest of my life picking up his socks that couldn't seem to find their way to the hamper, I had been absolutely elated. That joy lasted one day. Because the next morning I woke up to find an uncharacteristically solemn Richy standing in the kitchen of our apartment. He had been in a suit for work and, judging by the time, was running late. His eyes moved over me and landed on my left hand, letting out an audible breath. My belly had done a sinking thing, but again, young and stupid, I had shrugged it off. But then he laid it out there. He told me he called his family to tell them the good news and that they hadn't given him the thumbs up he had expected. No, in fact they threatened to take back the car and apartment and the monthly allowance I hadn't actually known he got. Money wasn't something we talked of often because it had simply never been an issue. So I had no idea that his job hadn't been what supported us. No. His parents supported us. And they did not, in any way shape or form, support the idea of me becoming a permanent part of the family.

And Richy, in a move I never could have seen coming if it was a neon flashing sign in my face, broke it off with me, demanded the ring back, and suggested I be moved out by the time he got home from work. "I really did love you, Madeline," he said, voice deep with a meaning I no longer believed. "Not enough," I snapped, raising my chin as I ripped off the ring and tucked it into his front pocket. Then he left. I packed. And I did the only thing I could, I called my mom. Being my mom, she hadn't asked me to tell her my sob story or discussed rent or asked how long I thought I would be there. No, she had just said her door was always open then told me she was bringing up bus and train schedules. Then we planned a route that meant I would have several stops in nowhere towns before the final bus would drop me off right out front of the one and only bar in my hometown. From there, all I would have to do was walk down about five storefronts and there I would be out front my mother's bakery: Madeline's Boulangerie. Yes, Madeline's. Named after me. Because being from possibly the only single mom in the entire small town didn't make me stick out enough. But it was flattering. It almost made up for the fact that she named me after a cookie. Almost. So the next morning after being mostly awake for twenty-four hours and after multiple stops in different towns in the rain between sitting next to various forms of smelly, chatty, and mucus-filled passengers, I finally climbed down off the bus, carrying my duffle because everything else was being shipped since I couldn't bring it with me. "Heads up," someone's voice called from behind me, making me turn and face the bus again, seeing the guy who had been sitting beside me and talking my ear off for over an hour called, flinging something at me just before the doors closed. And me, well, I could bake a Mille-feuille aux fraises that could make you cry. But I had about all the coordination of a baby giraffe trying to stand for the first time. So whatever it was he threw flew directly past me and made me do a comical Matrix-type backbend thing so it didn't hit me. But that move had me slamming back into something that was solid and decidedly human with a very charming, I was sure, grunt. "Don't worry, saved your cell," a voice said behind me. A voice that was likely attached the the solid arm that was suddenly around my belly. "My cell?" I parroted, rushing to get steady onto my own feet and yanking away, my big city mistrust rearing its ugly head. In the City, the only reason men on the street put their hands on you was to grope you or steal your wallet. "Yeah, the guy threw..." he started as I whipped around then cut off suddenly, jerking back slightly like he hadn't expected me. "He threw my phone?" I hissed, brows going together. "Seriously? Who throws a cell? And after I listened to him talk about how he home brews his own beer that he probably filters through his bath hair catch..." I said, exhaling hard, reaching up to run a hand through my wavy brown hair. "Thank you. For saving me a very long, annoying conversation with the Verizon people. For the fourth time this year," I said, giving him what I hoped was a passable smile despite my very broken heart and my very travelweary body. "New to town?" he asked, looking at me for a long minute. It was about then that I realized I didn't recognize him. And I knew everyone in town. But I would have remembered him. He was tall. Where I was a good five-seven in flats which I very rarely wore, he

was at least six-three with wide shoulders, strong arms, and a lithe but fit center that you could see through his somewhat tight black tee under his open gray and black flannel shirt. Then, well, there was his face. Richy had been what I would call classically good looking. He had one of those faces they used in watch ads in magazines- very Roman, very aristocratic. This man, he was ruggedly good looking. He had a strong, wide jaw that was covered in something more than a stubble but less than a beard and the same rich mahogany color of the hair on his head that he left just a tad too long. He had strong, manly brows over warm brown eyes that had tiny little crows feet beside them, suggesting he found reason to smile a lot. Yeah, I didn't know him. "If you're asking that then you must be new to town. I was born and raised here," I provided, taking my phone when he offered it to me. "Must have been gone a while," he hedged. "Nine years, give or take." "Here to visit?" "Are you the local welcome wagon now? Did Hank suddenly retire?" I asked, meaning the very openly gay and adorably flamboyant man who owned a local pet store and was in absolutely everyone's business. He smiled at that, extending his wide-palmed hand to me. "I'm Brant." "Brant?" I repeated. "Brantley Dane," he clarified as I slipped my hand into his. "Madeline St. John," I admitted, knowing it would take him all of two seconds to make the connection. "Related to Alice?" he asked, head cocking to the side. "Her daughter." And then was the inevitable, "No way." "She was sixteen," I supplied, used to the disbelief. Put side by side, we looked more like sisters than mother and daughter. We had the same long, shiny, wavy brown hair; the same oval faces with slightly cleft chins, high cheekbones, pale, smooth skin, and somewhat large stormy blue eyes. We were both also tall with long legs, subtle breasts, but nice asses. What could I say, I was a lucky girl to get her genes the way I did. "Here for a spell?" he asked, irrationally grating on my nerves for no good reason. Frankly, I was twenty-four hours into a breakup I hadn't even gotten a chance to grieve yet. I had been too busy packing and making plans and traveling. And no matter how much my heart felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer to it... repeatedly, I refused to be the kind of person who had a complete and utter breakdown while on public transportation. I didn't have much left in the world, but I did have my pride. So his friendliness, to my frayed nerves, broken heart, wayward emotions, and over-tired brain and body, yeah, it just was hitting all the wrong buttons. "Yes," I said, my voice clipped enough to make me wince and force a somewhat saccharine smile to make up for it. "But I am actually running a little late to meet my mom. Thanks for grabbing my phone. You saved me a lot of grief I don't need right now." "No problem, Madeline," he said, rolling my name around his mouth in a way that seemed almost intimate. Intimate? Jesus. Okay, I needed to sleep. After I cried and showered.

That was the only explanation for thinking the way someone said my name seemed intimate. Hell, it never even sounded intimate when Richy said it when we were having sex. Richy. "You okay?" Brant asked suddenly, looking like he might reach out for me, like I possibly looked weak and pathetic enough to do something like faint in the middle of the sidewalk. "Yes, sorry. Fine. Tired. It's been a long trip. Thanks again..." "Brant," he supplied, brows drawing together. No doubt offended that I might have forgotten his name already. "Brantley Dane, I remember," I said, giving him a small smile before turning and walking with purpose several storefronts down before I found the one that belonged to my mother. It was cute, really. While, as I got older or, as I dated Richy and adopted his tastes, I was used to things being more dark, streamlined, and clutter-free, I could always appreciate my mother's love of all things shabby-chic. The front of the building had two large picture windows on either side of the front door (and, yes, it did have a bell on it if you were wondering). The rest of the front of the building was painted a sage green. The wooden sign for the store that hung from a long, elegant S-shaped hook so that it was actually over the sidewalk and you could see it from down the street, was framed in the same sage color with the interior a pink that was so light it was almost white. There was a small shell-shaped madeline cookie in the center with the two word name of the store on either side. Cute. It looked like the kind of place you wanted to go into for dessert. I reached for the door, pulling and hearing the chime of the bell, a sound that used to bring peace to me as a child when I ran down the street from school and stumbled inside, ready for whatever sweet concoction she would allow me to sample that day. Strange how things changed. Hearing it then, well, it did nothing but remind me of my personal failures, my need to lean on someone who shouldn't have needed to take care of me anymore. Guilt, a feeling most children of single mothers were familiar with. She had dealt with enough raising me. But, there was time for that later. "Madeline!" my mother's voice shrieked across the room, making my lips curve up automatically as she dusted off her hands onto her light pink apron, an action that would ensure that all the flour and sugar would get on me just like old times, and ran across the room toward me. "Oh," she said as she wrapped me up tight, reminding me that sometimes there was nothing that compared to a hug from your mom, no matter how old you were. "How long has it been since I saw you in here?" she asked, rubbing my back. I took as deep a breath as the tight embrace would allow. "Three years, I think," I said with a nod. I didn't often make it home for long stretches on holidays seeing as I always had functions to attend with Richy's family as well. So I was always home the day of Thanksgiving, Christmas, or Mother's Day, when the shop was closed. So that would explain why, as she released me and I got the chance to look around, my eyes caught on the right side of the building that used to hold a wall full of pastry books that were suddenly gone and replaced by a huge coffee counter. It matched the rest of the decor- sage wood, white and light pink accents with a huge white-colored blackboard on the wall behind with menu items listed. Only, unlike the pastry menu, the coffee menu was not in the absolutely almost obnoxiously perfect dainty script my mother used. If anything, it almost seemed... masculine. My eyes moved around, finding people sitting at the small tête-à-tête-type tables, holding white

mugs of steaming drinks that didn't have Madeline's Boulangerie written on them. Oh, no. While they were still the same color scheme on the logo, the name actually said Brantley's. Brantley's. I knew enough of my hometown to know that there was no way there was more than one Brantley among the sea of Johns and Brians. As if I summoned it with my thoughts, the door chimed happily and I turned, a strange swirly sensation in my belly to see the one and only Brantley Dane step into my mother's bakery. "Long time no see," he supplied easily, tucking his hands into his pockets. "Oh! You've met!" my mother gushed, walking over to him and putting one arm behind his back, one on his stomach, in a gesture that was so foreign to me, having never seen my mother within arm's reach of a man in my whole life, I felt myself stiffen. And then my overtired mind went somewhere I never in a million years thought it might goWas my mother a... cougar?

Full-Fat Frappe Maddy

"I apparently saved her a lot of grief she doesn't need right now," he agreed, giving her a smile as she moved away. "Oh," my mother said and my stomach clenched as her face went solemn and I knew, oh yeah, I knew what she was about to say. "Mom..." I tried, hoping my voice held warning. Whether it did or not is up for debate because she was bound to charge on regardless. "Maddy got dumped after getting proposed to just two days ago." Yep. There it was. Now, I really remembered what it was like to come from a small town. "That's a shame," Brant said, giving me what I could only call a sympathetic brow raise and half smile. Whether it was sympathetic because of the break-up or having the news of said break-up trumpeted about like it was front-page news was impossible to tell. "After five years with him," my mother added for effect, making a sharp stabbing sensation pierce my heart. Oh, good God. All those songs I used to pretend to understand, all the angsty, heartbroken songs I had heard all my life, they suddenly made so much more sense. "Well, then she probably needs a giant coffee, a huge box of some of your creations, and some time to nurse her feelings in private, don't you think?" Brantley Dane, local hero, saves girl from sure death brought on by sheer mortification. That'd be his headline. "Right!" my mother said, rushing away from us and behind the counter, grabbing one of her sweet sage boxes and proceeding to fill it up. She, having not dated (to my knowledge) anyone since my father, I was pretty sure just didn't remember what it felt like to be dumped. It wasn't that she was cruel or oblivious, just couldn't relate. "Come on, sweetheart," he said, moving behind me, casually touching my hip in the process, and going behind his own counter on the other side. "What's your poison? Judging by the situation, I am thinking something cold, mocha or caramel filled and absolutely towering with full fat whipped cream." That was exactly what I wanted.

But, broken heart aside, I knew I couldn't let myself drown in sweets. Gaining twenty pounds wasn't going to help anything. There was absolutely no enthusiasm in my voice when I said, "Ah, actually, can I have a large black coffee with one sugar please?" "Not that I'm not turned on as all fuck by a woman who appreciates black coffee," he started, making me jerk back suddenly at the bluntness of that comment and the dose of profanity I wasn't accustomed to hearing in my sleepy hometown. "But if you're only one day into a break-up, you're allowed to have some full fat chocolate concoction to indulge a bit. I promise from here on out I won't make you anything even half as food-gasm-ing as this." He leaned across the counter, getting close enough that I could see golden flecks in his warm brown eyes. "Honey, not even if you beg," he added and, if I wasn't mistaken, there was absolutely some kind of sexually-charged edge to his words too. Weird. I was having a really hard time accepting him as a staple in the town I knew like the back of my hand. But then again, it had been years since I really spent any time there and his sudden appearance wasn't likely the only thing that wouldn't be familiar anymore. "Say yes," he added, lips tipping up at one corner, an action which made the skin next to his eyes crinkle up charmingly. "Alright, yes," I agreed, knowing I would love every last drop of whatever he made me and likely punish myself with an extra long run for it too. "Good girl," he said as he turned away. And there was not, was absolutely not some weird fluttering feeling in my belly at that. Nope. That would be completely insane. "Okay, I got you one of everything!" my mother said, coming up beside me and pressing the box into my hands. She even tied it with her signature (and expensive, something I had tried to talk her out of many times over the years when she was struggling financially) satin bow. I smiled at her, knowing that sometimes, there was nothing liked baked goods from your mother after a hard day. I was just lucky enough to have a mother who was a pastry chef. "Thanks, Mom," I said, the words heavy. I wasn't just thanking her for the sweets, but for letting me come home, for not asking questions, for not making it seem like even the slightest inconvenience. She gave me a smile that said she knew exactly what I meant. "You have nothing to thank me for." She meant that too. Coming from a family that, when they found out she was knocked up as a teen, had kicked her out and disowned her, she made it clear all my life that she was always there, no matter what I did with my life, no matter how high I soared, or how low I crashed. Her arms, her heart, and her door were always open for me. I felt the unmistakable sting of tears in my eyes and blinked them back furiously. There were times and places for falling apart. My mom's business wasn't one of them. "Alright. A large mocha frappe with full fat milk, full fat whipped cream, and both a mocha and caramel drizzle. It's practically dessert masked as coffee," Brantley said, making my attention snap to where he was pushing what was an obnoxiously large large frappe with whipped cream that was towering out of the dome that the pink and sage straw stuck out of. "Don't even think about it, sweetheart," he said, shaking his head as I reached for my wallet. "Thank you," I smiled, and found that it was a genuine one as I reached for it and, in a move that was maybe not brilliant on my part, took a sip. And proceeded to let out an almost porn-star worthy groan of pure, delicious pleasure. Judging by the way Brant's smile went a little wicked, his thoughts ran along the same lines as well. "Alright, Brant," my mother said, giving him a big smile. "Can you hold down the fort so I can walk Maddy home and settle her in?"

"Can't promise I will pronounce even half of those desserts of yours correctly." "Seeing as you still can't pronounce boulangerie, darling, I wasn't expecting you to do anything but point at things and ring them up," she said, giving him a very maternal-type smile. Okay. So she wasn't a cougar after all. That was somewhat of a relief. Not that anything was wrong with dating a younger man, but I had flashes of my mom in God-awful leopard print dresses with her hair teased and stuff and... no. "Well, I can certainly manage pointing," Brant agreed with a smile as he wiped down the counter. "Maddy, it was nice to meet you. And whoever the guy was, it was his fucking loss. Remember that." With that, and the weird way my belly went a little wobbly at his words, my mother put her arm around my back and led me away as if I couldn't be trusted to walk on my own two feet. "You never told me about the coffee shop," I said as we walked down the street. She lived right off the edge of the main drag in one of the town's many Victorian homes. The only difference was hers was split in two right down the center, one half belonging to some nasty older man named Martin who used to accuse me of digging in his yard when it had always been painfully clear the digging was by freaking groundhogs, not a child. It had been the only home I had ever known. She had lived in an apartment when I was very little and she was taking night classes, but that was before I had any recollection of anything. But then she had moved to the town I had always known as home and started renting the smaller half of the Victorian that she lovingly, painstakingly restored. My mother was meant for another time, I'd swear. "Oh, that's not a big deal," she said, shrugging it off. "Sure it is! That's a huge deal." "Well, Brantley just suggested it one day after he moved to town. He said the cold milk was a nice touch, but what people really needed was coffee. I told him I knew nothing about that." And she didn't. My mother had never had a cup in her life. She was a hardcore tea fan. "So he offered to open it?" "In a way, yes. It's been a good move. Business boomed for him and, in turn, I get more business as well. People sit and chat over coffee and eventually get snackish and come to me." "That's great, Mom," I said, meaning it. I knew she always struggled. She ran a very niche French pastry business, refusing to make anything as mundane as an apple turnover or cannoli. In a big city, sure, that was fine. But in a small town, it made things a bit tougher for her. "Wait... you painted the house?" I asked, stopping suddenly and seeing the house that I had always known as a deep, vivid purple with white accents was suddenly a deep gray with white accents. Tame. It seemed so tame compared to how it always had been before. "It was time for a change," she said, pulling me along. Change? My mother? My mother hated change. She liked the comfort of the familiar. Now she had painted her house completely differently and went into a coffee business? What was going on? How self-absorbed had I been over the past few years that I couldn't see how much was different? She led us onto the porch that didn't groan and bend under my feet like it always used to and to a door that didn't squeak in objection and then into a space that was mostly as I remembered it from the antique-looking, but actually new furniture, patterned wallpaper, and knick-knacks I had seen all my life. That was until we got back into my old room. I wasn't exactly a nostalgic kind of person. I was quick to throw away anything I hadn't used in six months or donate clothes I hadn't worn in a year. So when I had moved out, the room had been empty. That being said, it still had my old bed, my old paint, my old comforter and curtains. And that had never changed as far as I knew.

But then again, I guess I had stopped looking years before as well. God, when did I become that girl? That so obsessed with her new life in a new city that she forgot to pay attention to everything else girl? I guess, in a way, it had been when I met Richy. There was another stab at that thought and I pushed it away. A time and a place, I reminded myself. The place might have been my childhood bedroom that was painted in a crisp new shade of dusty rose with a fancy tufted headboard bed and gorgeous white comforter, making the whole place seem incredibly feminine, but also modern and not over the top, the time was not while my mother was standing there. "Wow, I like it," I said, meaning it. "Yeah?" she asked, seeming relieved. "I didn't know how you would feel about change, but I had already done it about a year ago." "It's great, Mom," I said, moving to put my bag in the closet and looking at myself in the mirror over the dresser. I looked like hell. There was no nice way to put that. Hell. My hair was messy and slightly greasy at the roots. My eyes were swollen, my skin pale. My clothes were travel-rumpled and there were purple bruises under my eyes. And for some reason, in that moment, the thought that came to me was, oddly: I met the new coffee guy looking like this? "Well, I am going to let you settle in and maybe get a little rest, honey," she said, picking up on my mood. "I am making baked ziti for dinner. Your favorite," she added, moving behind me and wrapping me up from behind, giving me a squeeze. "It's nice to have you home, Maddy." With that, and the weird guilty squeeze my heart did, she was gone. I took a long drag of my coffee drink, making it mostly empty, put the sweets on my dresser to devour after my shower, grabbed clothes, put the water on scalding, and climbed inside. Then and only then did I finally, finally let it out. There was the pain at first, just the raw, brutal sensation of love lost, of a future I had been planning on disintegrating, leaving me to have to rebuild a new one. After that, oh yeah, that was when the bitter set in. Five years. Five freaking years and he dumped me because Mommy and Daddy didn't approve? What a pathetic, weak-willed, co-dependent excuse for a man. Any real man would have flipped them off, told them to take their money and shove it, and went home to the woman they loved and made plans. And it was an awful, ugly thing to realize that I had been all-consumingly in love with a man who loved money more than he loved me. On that thought and knowing to my soul that I was not going to be the type of woman who broke herself into pieces over a man who didn't deserve it, I wiped the tears away, I got redressed, I ate half my body weight in sweets... and I decided to move on with my life.

Cherry Pie Brant

Not much changed day to day in my town. Since I moved there three years before, you could pretty much count on the same places, the same faces, the same sleepy, stress-free atmosphere. That was, for the most part, the reason I moved there in the first place. I got tired of life in the City. I got tired of not knowing anyone. I got tired of the crowds and the overwhelming pressure of my career. I was just fucking done with all of it. I hadn't really even had much of a plan. I sold my condo. I packed my shit and I drove. I stopped to get gas in this town, took a walk, found the bakery and stopped inside to have something to eat. The rest, as the saying would go, was history. I got a place. I approached Alice with the idea from the coffee shop, sank some of my condo money into it, and settled in. The best goddamn decision I had ever made. Life in a small town was what I never knew I had always needed. That being said, it had its downfalls. This was especially true in the dating department. So seeing a drop dead fucking gorgeous woman step off that bus and seeming like she had plans to be around for a while, that was a breath of fresh air. I had heard about Maddy from Alice in the past. Alice had been a single mom and it was obvious her daughter was her everything. From what I knew, she had just finished a prestigious internship and was choosing between jobs at hotels and restaurants. She had been happily settled with what sounded like a douchebag for five years. I knew she didn't visit her mom much, something that Alice understood but it was clear bothered her. I hadn't even known Maddy was coming back until she introduced herself. And, perhaps in a move that was more than a little mortifying for Maddy, Alice had rushed to tell me why. Not because she was insensitive to her daughter's situation, but because we told each other just about everything seeing as we were together for long stretches of time every day and also because she and I both agreed that her daughter's boyfriend was a tool and, as much as she was hurting for her daughter's pain, there was a part of her that was glad the guy was out of her life. I should have seen it right off. Really, she looked a lot like a younger version of Alice. But I had been too distracted by her newness, the fact that she was gorgeous, and that I wanted to see if she was

interested to put two and two together until she said her last name. She didn't seem much like Alice. Alice was light and sweet and a bit gullible and a pushover. Maddy seemed city-rough. I knew that type well enough to spot it right off. She was used to life being fast-paced and impersonal. She was used to men being nothing more than a catcall or unwanted groping. She was used to women being two-faced and catty. Life was superficial, but cultured. That being said, I would bet money on there being a sweet, open, small town girl underneath the layers the City and her asshole ex painted on her. And, starved for anything interesting going on in town, I found myself excited to watch her come back to her roots. I would put good money on her working with her mother in the shop in under a week. From the sounds of things, Maddy wasn't the kind of woman to sit around and nurse a heartbreak for too long. It would be nice to see another face around the shop, to have another personality to play off of. And, let's just say, I wasn't exactly opposed to making her another concoction that might make her moan like that again. Or do whatever she might want me to do to make her moan like that again...

Crepes Maddy

Okay. So there was one habit I inherited from my mother that I both loved and loathed in equal amounts depending upon the situation. Being a baker, she was an early riser. As in, before the sun even thought about uncurling his fingers across the sky. It was great in college when I partied to the wee hours, but still managed to wake up without an alarm and book it to class. It was wonderful during my internship, always being bright-eyed and bushy-tailed while everyone else was a zombie clutching their coffees like it was a lifeline to their humanity. I hated it on weekends when Richy wanted to sleep in. I hated it on holidays when I could be lazy and catch up on sleep, but couldn't. And that morning, my first morning in my childhood bedroom after moving home, yeah, I hated it right about then too. Because morning meant I had to get up and face my feelings, my uncertain future, and make plans to rebuild a life again. At freaking five o'clock in the morning. And then all damn day since I had nothing to do with myself. On a growl, I rolled out of bed, making it carefully, then digging through my bag to find my bright yellow exercise leggings, matching sports top that came down to cover most of my belly so I didn't look naked, and my sneakers. I dressed and moved downstairs, tying up my hair as I went, to be met with a sweet smell I knew from my childhood well enough to recognize as crepes, but decided to put it off until after my run. I found my key and tucked it into my sneaker and headed outside, shivering slightly against the cool air, but knowing I would be thankful for it once I worked up a solid sweat. "Hey neighbor," a male voice called, making me let out a small shriek as I whipped around, hands already balled into fists, big city distrust rearing its ugly head. "Didn't mean to scare you, sweetheart," Brant added, giving me a warm, lopsided smile that was entirely too boyishly charming on his very masculine face. "Jesus," I said, hand going instinctively to my heart that was slamming hard enough that I could hear it in my ears. I noticed almost immediately that it wasn't the wisest of things to do as it brought perfect attention to my bright yellow sports top that was, well, thin. And by bringing attention to the sports top, I knew there was no way he missed how the chilly morning air had my nipples slightly hardened and pushing out of the material. But his eyes only slipped there for a second. Really, it was actually a

respectable gaze, not ogling. "What are you doing here?" I asked, crossing my arms over my chest a little self-consciously. "I live here," he said simply, shrugging. And it was right about then that I realized he was dressed like me. Well, not like me, but he was dressed to workout too in a pair of black basketball shorts and sneakers. He had on a zip-up hoodie I had a sneaking suspicion he was going to pull off before he did any of the actual working out. "Wait... what? You live here?" I asked, looking back at my mother's place that I knew was only a two bedroom. So unless he was sleeping in... oh, God. "Yeah," he said, waving a hand behind him where I knew the house curved and then had another entrance. The rush of relief I felt was both weird and unexpected. "Oh, right. My mom didn't mention that." In fact, it was something she had expertly sidestepped when I brought up not running into her crotchety old neighbor yet. What was she up to? "That's how Alice and I devised the plan for the shop. I was just coming through town, stopped in her place, liked it, decided I would stick around. I asked her if there were any places in town available and she told me here. We were sitting right on this porch when I laid the plan out to her. Was more fucking nervous than before I gave my goddamn valedictorian speech." "Where are you from?" I heard myself blurt out. "The City. Like you," he said, shrugging. "Wasn't for me. Are you running?" he asked, gesturing out toward the street. "Oh, yeah. I, um, need to work off that frappe and the sweets my mom gave to me. Nice seeing you. I'll, ah, catch you later." With that, before I could have any more unwelcome thoughts about what he might look like under that hoodie, I waved and took off. I was almost to the corner of the street that led onto the main drag when he fell in beside me. "What are you doing?" "Running," he offered as I tried to talk myself into keeping my eyes forward. But I couldn't. And I was right; he had discarded the hoodie. Also, whatever I may or may not have imagined was under it was nothing like the reality. See, after five years with the same man, it was almost easy to forget that they came in all different shapes and sizes. Richy had always been fit, but mostly because he was thin. As the old saying went- 'abs don't count if you're skinny'. That was Richy. He looked great in trendy things like skinny jeans and fitted button-ups with blazers, but naked he was about average and a bit skinny. Brantley was not skinny. And the six-pack he had, it was from obvious hard work. They weren't just a hint of muscle under the skin either. They stuck out and demanded attention. They asked you to run your fingers into the ridges between them, to trace their edges. My eyes followed to the lowest set, seeing how almost indecently low his shorts had fallen from the jog- not only revealing a happy trail that disappeared inside the waistband, but an Adonis belt like I had only ever seen in pictures of fitness models. Bodies like that weren't supposed to exist in a town so small that there wasn't even a gym to workout in. But there he was anyway. "Right," I said, finding my brain again. "But why are you running with me?" "Little cocky there, sweetheart?" he asked, smile teasing. "As much as it's nice to watch your ass while I get my workout in, I'm not following you. There's only one decent running path in town. And

you're on it." Right. Duh. That made sense. It was the only path I ever ran all through my adolescence. It made sense that he ran it too. The town was quiet and even more idyllic in the early morning before everyone else woke up, before all the stores opened, before real life set in. "Oh, alright," I said, shaking my head. With that, feeling a bit fuzzy in the brain for reasons I was choosing not to analyze, I simply turned forward again and kept running. Within a couple feet, he fell in beside me. Which, well, I preferred since he already admitted to watching my ass and I wasn't altogether too comfortable with the idea. Or maybe I was too comfortable with the idea. One or the other. "Got any plans for your day?" he asked, not the least bit winded. Meanwhile, no matter how many years I had been doing daily runs, I had to focus hard on my breathing. "Probably hanging out with my mom at the shop, seeing if she needs any help." "Not going to lay in bed watching romcoms, eating chocolate, and wallowing?" "I'm not exactly the wallowing kind," I said, knowing it was true. I had always been more actionoriented. When something didn't go to plan, I let myself have a day then I got my ass up and I made different plans, tried different routes to get where I wanted to be. Maybe a part of that came from having such an upbeat and supportive mother. She never really had expectations for me so I became a bit harder on myself to make up for it. And, right then, I was glad for it. I didn't want to wallow. I didn't want to sit and mourn lost love. Because, quite frankly, it hadn't been the love I thought it was. If something as simple as money and his parents' opinions could sway his feelings for me, it was barely love at all. I could, possibly, mourn the loss of the life I had built on the idea of our love. But bemoaning that wouldn't change anything. I needed to take control and figure things out. I certainly didn't need to eat my feelings. As a pudgy kid and middle-schooler thanks to my mother's endless supply of junk food, I swore to myself when I finally dropped the weight that I wouldn't turn to food out of boredom or upset again. As a whole, I stuck to that. Candy bar during the red death excluded. "My ass won't keep looking this way if I start laying in bed and wallowing," I said, brushing it off. "Well," he said, giving me a devilish smirk, "we wouldn't want that, now would we?" We fell into companionable silence for a while before I found myself blurting out, "Why did you leave the City?" He didn't seem phased by the question and gave me a shrug. "I was just over it. It's a great place for people who don't want to connect on more than a superficial level, but after a life there, I decided it wasn't meant for me." "So you'd rather be here where they literally gossip about you if you let your lawn grow just a quarter inch too long or didn't do a fresh coat on your trim every spring?" "Maddy, I had the flu this winter and I came downstairs to find three different kinds of soup on my porch along with cornbread, brandy, and a gallon of fresh squeezed orange juice. I've had the flu every winter of my life and no one has ever even checked on me. Not even my office. The only way I would find soup outside of my apartment was if I fucking ordered it." "You have a point," I agreed, remembering how everyone had brought me things to bring with me to college the week before I left. It had been so long, I had forgotten the things like that.

"It's a different kind of life in a small town. It's not meant for everyone, but there's nothing like an entire town that gives a shit about you and roots for you." Again, right. "What did you do?" I asked then, not seeming able to shut up which wasn't like me. "In the City, I mean." "I was a lawyer." "What!" I yelped, stopping running completely, shocked. He went another two feet before he realized I stopped then turned back with a brow raise. "What what?" "No way were you a lawyer." "No? Then my suit collection is really extensive for no good reason." "What kind of lawyer?" I specified. "Corporate." "Corporate attorneys are soulless vampires," I said, shaking my head. Richy had three cousins who did corporate law. And they were, without question, the biggest assholes I had ever met. "Think I'm a nice guy, huh?" he asked, reading too far, too correctly into my statement. "I didn't say that." "Yet you meant that. Nice coffee shop guy who can make you practically orgasm from a frappe couldn't possibly be someone who once ripped a small family business away from them for no other reason than a bigger company didn't like them." "You did that?" I asked, brows drawing low. "That," he said with a nod, "and about a thousand other awful things. Like I said, sweetheart, I got sick of it." "But... coffee shop?" I asked. "Why not do criminal or freaking personal injury?" "I worked in a coffee shop while I was in college. For beer money," he said with a smile. "It was the happiest I had ever been." "And it maybe didn't occur to you that it was the happiest you had ever been because you were eighteen years old without any real life responsibilities and all you had to worry about was which girl would screw you and which wouldn't?" "When did you get so cynical?" he asked, shaking his head at me. I felt myself jerk back, realizing that was exactly what I was being- cynical. And it was maybe something I had been a lot over the years. Ever since... Moving in with Richy. Ugh. Was I really that girl? That girl who let a relationship change her? I guess, in some ways, I was. And I hadn't even realized it happened. "What's that look for?" he asked, head ducked to the side as he watched me. "Nothing. Just... doing some long-overdue life evaluation." To that, unexpectedly, he threw his head back and laughed. It was a deep, masculine, rolling sound that I somehow felt reverberate through my body until I felt like I was actually vibrating with it, even from a few feet away. "What's so funny?" He looked back at me, shaking his head, huge smile on his face. "You're... what? Twenty-six? Twenty-seven? What the fuck can be 'long-overdue' at twenty-seven? Life doesn't have to be so fucking serious, sweetheart." But life was serious.

Life was... life. What could possibly be more serious? "Not taking it seriously in your twenties is how you end up in some dead-end job you hate, living in a shitty apartment, mindlessly numbing yourself with TV and processed food at forty. Alone at home with your twenty cats." "Oh, kid, what did that big, bad city do to you?" he asked, shaking his head. "It's not wrong to have ambition," I said, offended. "No," he agreed, shaking his head. "Ambition is what got your mom her pastry shop. Where she is happy. Is happy something you factored into your ten or twenty year plan, Maddy? It doesn't sound like it. It sounds like hard work and appearances. And if it's not in there, sweetheart, it fucking should be." With that, he moved off in the direction we had come from, leaving me feeling very much chastened, made me feel silly for wanting things I had been raised to never aspire to. Not in eighteen years did I ever have anything designer, name brand, or expensive. All my clothes had been whatever style I wanted, but at whatever budget we could afford. It never even occurred to me to be unhappy with that. Until... Well... Richy. He bought me red bottom heels and a designer dress on my birthday. He got me Tiffany earrings on our anniversary. He was the one who made it seem like designer wasn't just elaborate, overrated clothing, but an important status symbol, something people judged you for if you didn't have. Because in his world, they did. Hell, I thought as I looked down at my feet, my running shoes cost almost two-hundred dollars... for something I would have to replace in under six months with how many miles I put on them. And they were in no way more comfortable than the fifty dollar ones I used to buy myself in high school. I had been so busy planning a life that meant nothing. Labels, cars, positions in companies... it all meant nothing. Brant was right; what mattered was what you were passionate about, what you loved. That was why my mom was blissfully happy with her little bakery, even though it meant she still had to bargain hunt when she wanted new clothes or couldn't get a new car every four or five years like most other people. Those things didn't matter to her. And I was raised to believe they shouldn't matter to me either. On that very heavy thought, on the realization that I had spent five years not only loving someone who didn't love me nearly the same amount, but also that I had become a different person on top of it, I walked back to my mother's beloved house that was more than enough for her, not because it was grand, but because she put her touch, her love into every square inch of the place. I went in and showered, slipping into a pair of gray skinny jeans, flats, and a lightweight longsleeve black tee, ate my crepes, then headed back into town. The smell of sugar, chocolate, and coffee greeted me- happy, welcome, familiar, and I took a deep breath as I stepped in to already find several of the tables full. I greeted a few of the people I knew and avoided eye-contact with Brant, feeling just a little bit like an exposed wound because of the things he had said and not needing any salt poured in. "Maddy," my mother said, coming in from the back with a tray in her hands, dropping it down on the counter with a huff. "Still?" I asked, smiling huge as I looked down at the small little circles that should have been fluffy and just a little firmer on the outside than the inside, but were instead flat and hard as rocks. My mother, through all her years baking and about three million tries, could never seem to master macarons.

It was a classic French pastry that she absolutely refused to believe she couldn't have in her bakery. "Don't laugh at me," she said, scrunching her face up at me, but her eyes were dancing. "It's not funny." "A pastry chef who can't make a macaron to save her life is kind of funny if you think about it. What flavor is this?" I asked as I picked one up and brought it to my mouth. "Chocolate?" "Oh, God," I said, grabbing for a napkin and spitting it out. "How is that even possible that chocolate tastes bad?" I asked, tossing the napkin then taking the tray from her and tossing the rest. "You can not serve these. People might die." She smiled huge at that, giving me a look I would know anywhere. It was one that said she was up to something. "Well, why don't you show me how one more time?" "If the first thousand times didn't work, I don't think a thousand and one will do the trick," I said, but I was already reaching for the elastic band on my wrist and tying my long hair up. "But we can try," I added, going into the back and washing my hands. Then I spent the morning making macarons. There were the classics: chocolate, vanilla, pistachio, strawberry. Then I went ahead and went a little crazy, finding the familiar task relaxing, peaceful, and made some more exotic flavors: raspberry, green tea, honey, rose, kiwi, mint, and coffee. By the time I was done, there were four trays full of the little round mounds of deliciousness out front where people were all-too happy to finally get to try. I wiped my hands and reached for one of my mothers fine China white plates, all so vintage that they had to be hand-washed because they weren't dishwasher safe, and loaded up a small amount of the coffee-flavored ones and brought them across the restaurant toward Brantley who turned to me, head ducked to the side, eyes kind. "You seem less stressed." "Baking does that to me," I admitted, giving him a small smile. "What's this for?" he asked, nodding toward the plate. "A thank you for the frappe and maybe a little bit of a thank you for the reality check this morning," I added, feeling my belly go just the strangest bit wobbly as his smile went sweet, making his dark eyes look positively melty. Thankfully, because my pride couldn't take it if he did, he didn't make any comments about said reality check. He reached to take one of the macarons and looked at it. "I've never had one," he admitted, smelling it. "That's because my mom makes ones that could turn a man off sweets," I said with a smile. "It's coffee flavored with a hint of Bailey's mixed into the filling." With that, he popped it into his mouth and chewed. Then proceeded to make a sound that would make any woman feel the slightest surge of desire- he freaking growled. "Jesus Christ, woman." "Good?" I asked, feeling I needed the approval just a little too much, but asking for it anyway. "No, sweetheart. Good is a fucking jelly donut from Dunkin. This is... other fucking worldly." There was no stopping the smile that spread across my face at that- so big it made my cheeks hurt. I was used to criticism over my baking. That was how schools and internships worked. They picked apart every creation and told you what you did wrong, what you could do to make it better. And Richy didn't like sweets. So for the past several years, I very rarely got the chance to hear someone praise my creations. "Well, there are plenty more of those," I said, putting the plate down on the counter. "And about...

nine other flavors to try if you get adventurous." "Oh, I'm feeling adventurous alright," he said, eyes almost seeming a little heated. "Maddy," he said as I turned to walk away, the sound intimate on his lips again, something I still couldn't quite wrap my head around. "Yeah?" "I think you found what makes you happy," he told me then turned away to deal with a customer. I walked back toward the back of the store, sitting down at the break station in the kitchen that was there because, well, baking things took forever sometimes and your feet got tired, and I thought. And in doing that, I realized he was right. That morning for the first time in ages, I felt happy. It wasn't the superficial happy high I got from shopping or sex or, hell, even looking down at my engagement ring when I got it. It was a different kind of happy, the kind you felt down to your soul. I was pretty sure, too, that I had found my place. Apparently, I had needed to leave it for a while only to realize it. Sometimes life worked that way. Sometimes it threw you in a new direction that seemed to lead in a completely different way, only to find out that it curved eventually and brought you right back to where you came from. Which was where you had always belonged.

Coffee Cake Brant

From that day on, she simply fit. She became a fixture like she had never left in the first place. Every Sunday, she made macarons. She carried her favorite five flavors each week: vanilla, chocolate, pistachio, coffee, and green tea. And then she would add a special flavor as well. One week it was coconut. The next, lavender. The next, well, I was still waiting to see. She fell into a rhythm with the ease of change only small children were usually capable of. She got up every single morning and she ran, but she seemed to make a special effort to leave just before or just after me, for reasons I didn't even pretend to understand. She came into the bakery and forced her mother to allow her to make some desserts that weren't French, but beloved nonetheless. So then Madeline's suddenly had apple turnovers and Nutella chocolate bars and banana bread and, that morning, coffee cake. "Honey, it's so... banal," Alice complained, something she rarely did, but she was very particular about her menu selection. "Mom, you have a coffee shop here now. It fits. In the past, it wouldn't have made any sense, but now it does. I won't make it again if it doesn't sell." But it did sell. Everything Maddy made sold. And not only did it sell in store in pieces, but they got orders for whole coffee cakes for people to have at their houses in case company stopped by. Twelve of them by the end of day. "I'm sorry if I was negative," Alice said, wrapping an arm around her daughter's lower back and squeezing. "You know how I am about change." I understood perfectly well how badly Alice handled change. Even though she had agreed to the coffee counter and knew it was a smart move business-wise, when me and a couple workers from town came in to start doing the changes, she had started talking about how maybe it wasn't such a good idea after all, that the counter was too big, too invasive, that the machines were an eyesore, that my writing on the chalkboard was too manly. I told her the coffee machines were necessary; as was the space I needed behind the counter... to move around. But I had stuck with her color scheme not only behind the counter but on the cups and straws and coffee collars as well, seeing as I didn't really give a damn about that kind of thing. Within two days after the construction finished, seeing the hoards of new traffic coming in, she had been ecstatic.

It was just the fear of change. It was the same thing with my painting suggestion on the exterior of the house. And the choice to cut down an old rotten tree in the backyard. But once it was all done, she was a happy camper. That was just Alice. And Maddy seemed to understand that as well, not getting flustered by her mother's comments because she knew it would blow over when she blew people away with her desserts. Of which I had tried all. And I mean all. I tried every flavor of macarons. I decided after my first bite that I had been missing out my entire life on one of the best culinary creations the world had to offer. Having Maddy around to offer new flavors every week was like Christmas weekly. And while I might not have been crazy about the coconut or lavender, I still would continue to eat them, maybe solely because she had created them. What can I say? I liked the woman. And not just because she was beautiful and I thought about fucking her at least a dozen times a day which made functioning with a cock that had a mind of its own uncomfortable at best. But aside from that, she was coming out of her shell more, letting loose, becoming more herself. That self was not the cold, uptight, materialistic, obsessively driven woman who had stepped off that bus with an open wound in her heart and a strong aversion to being back in town. In fact, the longer she was around, the more her shoulders relaxed, her jaw unclenched, her smile spread easier. I wondered if maybe I had made a similar transition over time. I was every bit as hard as she was, perhaps even a lot harder, when I left the City. Too many years in the soul-sucking world of corporate law, too many superficial friendships and relationships, too much time to become superficial and materialistic myself. I had dozens of two-thousand dollar suits and watches and shoes and a goddamn cigar case that cost a mint. I didn't even fucking smoke cigars except in business meetings with men who did. And, at first, small town life absolutely took some getting used to. I was used to all-night take-out and dozens of art galleries and plays and indie movie theaters and book stores and bars and clubs and just... shit to do. That was a hard transition at first. There simply was nowhere to go. There was one bar, but they closed by eleven on weeknights. There was a movie theater a town over, but they only played the big blockbusters and I fucking hated over the top superhero movies. There were a couple local eateries, but they closed around seven- all nights of the week. It took me a while to find ways to occupy my time without all those distractions. I worked out more. I read more. And, finally once I got to know people, I just plain hung out with people. It was something I hadn't done since maybe high school. It was nothing fancy- just going to someone's house and bullshitting over coffee or a game on TV or some dinner. I had never had so many dinner invitations as I did in a small town. Maybe a part of that was the fact that I was single and doing well enough for myself and the town was lacking in the eligible man department. But I was pretty sure an almost equal amount was just... people were friendlier and people still wanted human interaction. Eventually, it stopped mattering that there wasn't entertainment or Thai food at two AM. All that noise fell away. And there was peace. I was hoping, once she was around for long enough, Maddy would find that for herself as well. She even had a slight advantage of having grown up in this lifestyle. So the transition might not take anywhere near as long as it took me. "Brant," Alice said, coming up to my counter. And I damn sure knew she didn't want coffee.

"What's up, Alice?" "How about you come over for dinner tonight? I'm making baked macaroni." Now, she knew I was a sucker for anything Italian since we had no Italian restaurants in town. But the smile she was trying to hold back told me she was up to something. I just had no idea what. "What can I bring? Desser..." I started to say and broke up on a chuckle. "Yeah, guess that wouldn't be my department. Wine?" I asked, knowing that Alice, while she had fine taste in dessert, had awful taste in wine. As in she liked bone fucking dry red- so dry it made you feel like the insides of your mouth and throat lost a layer of necessary skin. "Wine sounds great. Maddy won't drink mine for some reason," she said, shaking her head like she didn't understand. "Seven?" "Works for me." "See you then," she said, that same damn smile in place. I didn't know what she was up to yet. But I was pretty sure I would know before the night was over.

French Torte Maddy

My mom was humming while she cooked. So something was going on. My mom, the master she was at anything involving food, macarons aside, needed total concentration. She claimed it was so she could make sure all her love went into her dishes and desserts. So if she was humming, something was up. I watched her with lowered eyes for a long minute before she suddenly turned to me, looked me over, then declared I should really take a shower before dinner. Somewhat thrown off and the smallest bit offended (I had showered that morning) I went upstairs and grabbed some fresh clothes then went to take another damn shower for some reason. "No, honey, go dry your hair," she told me when I walked back in with a pair of black jeans and a blue sweater. Dry my hair? For dinner? Who was I supposed to be impressing, her? Deciding my mom might have been slowly going off her rocker, I went and dried my freaking hair. Then, to prevent any comments on my fresh face, went ahead and applied some eye makeup as well before heading back down to the smell of food filling the kitchen. It didn't matter how old you got, there was nothing like your mother's cooking. "Honey, can you put the wineglasses out?" she asked and I felt my lip curl of its own mind. Wine. My mother's wine was, well, revolting. I'd had a lot of wine in my day from every level of expense from the damn boxes of it I used to buy in college to the hundreds-of-dollars per bottle type Rich's family used to get. I had never found a wine I truly hated. Until I tried the kind my mother loved. I wasn't exactly sure how she didn't need skin grafting after her second glass in a row. Yeah, it was that bad. "No, honey, one more," she added, waving a large loaf of Italian bread at me. One more. We were having company. That was why I needed to shower and do my hair.

I couldn't figure out why she wouldn't have just told me that ahead of time. It was no big deal. Unless... Oh, for Christ's sake. She was trying to set me up! It was only a matter of time, really. I always knew that when I went back home. I didn't think it would be my mother to do it, though. My happily single, don't rely on a man, mother. I thought it would be the nosy older ladies in town who thought I was getting too old to be single. That my 'clock was ticking'. That 'no man is going to want a woman losing her fertility by the day!'. Not my own damn mother. Hell, it almost felt a bit like a betrayal to be honest. Why spend your whole life telling me to stand on my own two feet, to not rely on men, to be my own whole person when she was just going to... fling me at whatever eligible man was in town not even a month after I got back? I guess I would never understand her. With a deep exhale, I grabbed the extra wineglass and brought it to the dining room, noticing for maybe the first time that she had set up the table slightly more formal than we usually had for dinner. She always used her nice plates and bowls, but we generally just used paper napkins. There were not only white table napkins on the plates, but they had fancy silver napkin rings on them too- shiny like she had actually taken the time to polish them. There were fresh flowers as a centerpiece, which was normal, but she had candles out as well. How awkward would it be to have a sort-of date with my mother there? And, even maybe more so, how awkward would it be to have a sort-of date with a guy I had known most of my life? A guy I had embarrassing playground stories about that might flash across my memories at any point during the meal? Ugh. Awful. Well, it was only a few hours. And when it was over, I could sit her down and tell her I was in no way in the place where I wanted to start another relationship, let alone be set up against my will. Fact of the matter was, I was settling in. I was enjoying baking just for fun, not to impress my intern chefs or snooty customers. It was fun to be able to make freaking funnel cakes for an after school treat for kids on Fridays. While I genuinely enjoyed a good challenge baking-wise, it was nice to just go with the flow too. Sometimes there was nothing more fun than doing a drizzle on apple tarts. And while it was a bit of a culture shock to be back in town after so long, after a week or so, it was like no time had passed. People welcomed me with open arms. I was less tense, stressed. I hadn't realized how fast-paced my life had become from college on, how hard it was for me to slow down and just... enjoy a day for what it was instead of frantically planning the next. I felt relaxed. At ease. Peaceful. It wasn't something I knew I had been seeking or for how long, but I knew it when I found it. And it almost pissed me off to realize I had gone without for so long. There was a familiar singsong ding from the front of the house and, not a half a second later, my mother called from the kitchen. "Oh, honey, can you get that? I have my hands full." Of bullshit. Utter bullshit. But I was smiling at her silly attempt at coy matchmaking as I walked to the front door and pulled it open to reveal... Brant?

"What are you doing here?" I asked, wincing when my tone came of almost a little accusatory. "Dinner?" he half-said, half-asked. Brant? She wanted to hook me up with... Brant? Of all the asinine ideas! It wasn't that he wasn't prime meat in our little sleepy town. He absolutely was. Rightfully so. He was beyond good-looking. He had a thriving business. He could make near-orgasming goodness out of coffee. Not that I got any, mind you. He stuck to his promise. He never made me another full-fat anything since that first time. Not even when I begged. Which I had absolutely done. What could I say, it was the time of the red death and I was in serious need of chocolate comfort. My pride was in no way part of the equation. My uterus was in full control. But yeah, he had a lot going for him. Which was maybe part of the reason I had avoided him as much as possible outside of the bakery. I didn't want to start getting any ideas about him. It was a terrible idea for a huge laundry list of reasons. Apparently, though, my mother had her own ideas on the matter. As if sensing my hesitance or maybe just because I was completely blocking his way still, he raised his hand with a wine bottle in it. "I brought the wine." "That alone will get you in the door," I said with a smile, moving away so he could walk in. "You look nice, Maddy," he told me, leaning down to plant a chaste kiss to my cheek as he moved past. "Oh, I, ah, thanks," I mumbled, shaking my head at that unusual response. I wasn't usually a mumbler and bumbler. I tended to speak clearly and concisely. Weird. "Hope you brought your appetite," my mother said as he walked up and kissed her cheek as well. She reached in and tossed the tray of garlic bread into the stove. "Just ten more minutes and we will be all set. Why don't you show Brant to the living room and pour the wine? I will be out with the salad in just a minute." It was starting early. With a head shake at her behavior, I led Brantley into the dining room he had obviously been in before seeing as he knew right where to go to find the corkscrew. "Out of curiosity, how often do you come here for dinner?" "Oh, I dunno. Maybe once a week, depending on both our schedules." "Schedule? My mother? She never goes out," I said as I handed him a wineglass he had reached out for. "She's just trying to make sure you aren't lonely, sweetheart. Usually, she's out with friends quite a bit. And there was even a man she sees here and there. But she..." "Wait wait wait," I interrupted him as I took the glass he handed me. "A man? My mother? Are you sure he wasn't like... a new flour vendor or something like that?" "Meeting at eight o'clock at night?" he asked, smile teasing. "Come on, Maddy. You're a grown woman now. You can't be weirded out by your mother dating." "I'm not weirded out," I objected immediately. I wasn't. I wasn't one of those weak-bellied women who couldn't handle even the idea of their mother (or father) getting it on. Again, it just didn't seem to fit the mother I thought I had always known. But, then again, maybe my mother had always just put me first, put her inherent human desire for romantic contact on hold, on a back burner, until she thought I was old enough to handle it. Which, well, that made me almost unbearably sad to think that. Granted, my relationship with Richy might not have been what I had thought it was and my adolescence went down in heartbreak too, but I

wouldn't have traded those things for anything else. There was something just... right about having someone you love's hands around you, to hear them tell you they love you, to feel the way your heart went all squishy just looking at them. She had missed out on all of that for so many years because of me? "What's that look for?" Brant asked, brows drawn together. "I just never thought she had any interest in dating," I admitted. "I feel like I was a twentysomething year cockblock now." To that, I guess not expecting it, he let out a loud, rumbling laugh that I felt float around my chest, my belly, then lower. Lower? What the hell? But even as I wondered if I was imagining it, there it was- desire. "Oh no!" my mother's voice yelled, making me jump then automatically move back toward the kitchen. "What's the matter?" I asked when I didn't find her hurt in any way, but standing in front of the open fridge. I could feel Brant right behind my right shoulder, close enough that my shoulder brushed his chest. I found I had to take a deep, slow breath to stay focused. "I forgot!" she said, reaching inside and pulling out some kind of marbled chocolate torte. "I was supposed to bring this Queen of Sheba French Chocolate torte over to Ginny's! It's her daughter's birthday tonight." I felt my eyes narrow as she, maybe for the first time, lied to me without making it clear she was doing so- being shit at it in general. "No worries. We will wait for you," Brant said. "No no. That won't work. I was supposed to stay for the party too. Oh, well," she said, putting the torte on the counter and reaching for her coat which she so conveniently left hanging by the back door off the kitchen instead of the front where she always kept her coat. "You two enjoy. Save me a plate. Oh, and I have an extra slice of torte in the fridge too," she added, heading out the door. An 'extra' slice. The torte she had was complete. So she had made a second torte and then went ahead and only brought one slice home because she wanted me and Brant to share one. "Slick," Brant said, making me twist my neck around to look up at him, an action that actually made me rest my head on his very solid chest. "What?" "Slick," he said, looking down at me, smile pulling at his lips. "Your mother. I thought she was up to something. I didn't think it was this." "This," I said, feigning innocence. I figured it was the safest move. I reconsidered that stance all of one second later when Brant's arm raised and his forefinger traced slowly, oh so gently, down my jaw before snagging my chin between it and his thumb. "Setting us up." "She's not..." "Sure she is," he said, his thumb moving out to stroke over my cheek in a way that was way too intimate, way too delicious, way too effective. "She loves you. You're her world. You just had your heart stomped on by some guy who didn't deserve you in the first place. And she knows me. She put part of her business in my hands. She trusts me. It makes sense if you think about it." The scary thing was, it did make sense.

Not just her setting us up, but us giving it a try. That made sense. We worked in the same place. We had both lived in the City and found that it wasn't for us. We both loved coffee and desserts and running and movies and plays and art and all the countless other little things I had learned over the past few weeks from the occasional short discussion we shared a couple times a week. "Right, ah, well," I said, swallowing hard and yanking away before I could do anything stupid. You know, like tell him that my panties were still wet from something as seemingly innocuous as his laugh from five minutes ago. "She's right. We should just... eat. I know her. She won't be back for hours and we both had a long day on our feet," I babbled as I grabbed the tray of baked macaroni and brought it with me toward the dining room. "Can you grab the salad and garlic bread?" I called without looking back at him. And then I chose to sit at the head of the table which was normally my mother's spot but I figured it was a subliminal distance thing. He put down his plates and we started serving ourselves up in a weird, tense silence. He was the first to break it after I was two bites into the small salad I served myself, hoping if we ate fast, the awkward affair would be over more quickly and I could be put out of my misery. And maybe spend just a little quality time with my vibrator. "You seem happier, sweetheart," he said, making my belly do a wobble thing. What can I say, I was a sucker for endearments. "It's weird. I can't explain it. I was in a rush to get out of here at eighteen, to see all the things the City had to offer. And I thought I was happy with all those things I found. But then I come back here, begrudgingly I might add, and it's like I found..." I trailed off, struggling for the right way to describe it. "Peace," he filled in for me. That was exactly right. "Yeah," I agreed, nodding. Then he went ahead and got a little invasive. "Have you heard from the ex?" I actually had. Twice. I hadn't expected that. When you pulled such a dick move, who in their right mind would try to reach out? Apparently Rich. "Yeah," I admitted, reaching for my wine. "He texted once and called once." "The fuck could he have to say to you?" he asked, seeming genuinely curious. And, well, I hadn't even told my mother because I thought she would overreact. And all my old friends from the City were Rich's friends too so I didn't feel right bitching to them about him. It felt nice to be able to talk about it. "The text was a basic 'how are you holding up' text and the call was an 'I miss you' voicemail to my machine." "Hope you told him he can go eat a dick," Brant said, making me snort into my wineglass. That was, more or less, what my text response had been before I decided it was better for the both of us if I just blocked his number. "Seriously. Don't fall for that bullshit, Maddy. A man loves a woman, really fucking loves her, he doesn't give her up over something as trivial as money." "I know that," I agreed, feeling the weird warm sensation spread across my chest again. "You don't seem overly broken up about it," he observed. "You gave him what? Five years of your life." I nodded at that. "They weren't bad years," I defended. "We had a lot of good times together even if maybe they had been a bit superficial. I don't regret them. Though I do regret being a bit blind to the fact that I was second in his heart... to money." "Not the type to wallow, huh?" he asked, as I moved my pasta around my plate, finding I actually liked the conversation more than the food. My mother never liked the topic of Rich and when he did come up, she got these lines between her

brows that said she didn't want to talk about the guy who broke her daughter's heart. "What good does wallowing do?" I shrugged. "I mean there is science to this kind of thing. The actual pain of it only lasts a really short time. It's the obsessive wondering and what-if'ing and mourning for your loss that makes you shrivel up in a ball for weeks or months. I have nothing to wonder or what-if or mourn. He didn't love me enough. Case closed. Someday someone will. Or maybe some day a dozen or so cats will. Whatever." "Maddy, you're not going to end up with a dozen cats." "I dunno. I can see myself being like my mom- throwing myself into work, taking pride in whatever place I eventually settle down in, making close friendships." "And that would be a damn shame," he said, shaking his head. "A woman like you shouldn't give up on men because one was a fucking moron who didn't know what he had." "A woman like me," I repeated, brows drawn together. "Please, you gotta see you are something special, right? You have that small town upbringing goodness and that sharp, smart, quick-witted big city education. It's the whole package. Men will be pounding down this door when they think they have given you a respectable amount of time to get over your breakup." I let that sink in for a second, finding it wholly uncomfortable, then quickly tried to change the subject. "What about you?" "What about me?" "Why are you single?" I asked, pushing my plate away and just accepting it was going to be a winefor-dinner night. "There isn't exactly a surplus of eligible men in town. The single women must be practically throwing themselves at you." I realized that comment was a mistake pretty much the second after it was out of my mouth. Because his smile went wicked; his eyes danced. I knew exactly what was going to follow. "Think I'm hot shit, huh?" he asked, leaning back in his chair, looking way too self-satisfied. "I mean... by small town standards," I shrugged, hoping I was coming off as casual I slowly stood and collected my plate to bring to the kitchen. I had scraped the plate and was standing at the sink running water over it when I suddenly felt his entire body press up behind mine, making my hips push against the cabinet as my breath whooshed out of me. I hadn't even heard him follow me in. But there he was, touching me from feet to shoulder. One of his hands moved out and settled on my hip, fingers pressing into the hipbone hollow as his other hand slid gently up my arm and brushed my hair from one side of my neck to the other. Before I could guess his intention, I felt his lips press in to the column of my neck, making my entire body do a shiver at the unexpected contact that shot from the touch to directly between my legs. My head tipped to the side, giving him more access as his mouth moved slowly upward, the hint of his tongue tracing over the skin he kissed as I shamelessly leaned back into him. His arm on my hip slid across my lower belly, anchoring me to him as his lips went around my earlobe, his tongue tracing the outer edge and ripping an almost pained moan from between my lips. My skin felt electric, buzzy, humming, begging for more of the sensation. But he wasn't in the mind to give it to me. Instead, his lips left my skin entirely and I felt the side of his face press into my hair. When he spoke, his voice low and rumbling, causing another rush of desire so strong it was borderline painful; his breath was warm on my ear. "By small town standards, how wet are your panties right now?" Oh. My.

God. He did not just say that. No way. Not when need was a live wire through my system. No way was he just trying to get back at me for maybe offending his pride slightly. The asshole. I didn't think he would be so freaking sensitive. He gave every appearance of being laid-back. My mouth opened and shut several times before words finally forced their way out. And when they did, they were my freaking mother's words. "Don't be crass," I snapped, shoving back against his body and sliding away toward the fridge, grabbing the torte because, quite frankly, my own pride was bruised a bit and the only way to fix it was to act completely unaffected. Though I was affected. Completely. I took a slow breath as I grabbed two forks and a knife, cutting the already small slice in half and putting it on a new plate before shoving it into his chest. He raised a brow at me, but said nothing as he sank in his fork and started eating his dessert. Just to have something to do, I ate mine as well, keeping most of my focus on the torte itself until it was gone. It was right about then as well that his plate slammed down on the counter beside me, making me jump and my gaze fly up as I suddenly felt my own plate pulled from my hand to join his. "French are good at baking," he said oddly, moving in front of me, his knee pressing between my thighs and pinning me against the cabinet. "There's another thing the French do well..." he said, voice trailing off as his hand slid behind me and grabbed me at the base of my neck, yanking my body against his just a second before his lips crashed down on mine. It started hard and rough, his lips bruising into mine, demanding things I didn't even think of denying him. But feeling my surrender, his lips became softer, more explorative. His tongue traced the seam of my lips and they opened for him, his tongue moving inside to show me what the French did well. But he was wrong. The French could go suck it. No one kissed like him. My fingers slid up his arms, feeling the firm muscles underneath, then around his shoulders, folding around the back of his neck and completely pressing every inch of my body to his. My breasts swelled, my nipples hardening against his chest as my hips melded to his- feeling his hardness against my belly and I felt another rush of desire at the realization that he was just as affected as I was. A low, throaty whimper escaped me and his growl in response was maybe the hottest sound I had ever heard. Then, seemingly just as quickly as it started, it was over. His tongue retreated and his lips pressed a sweet kiss to my lips before his forehead came down to rest on the top of my head as we both seemed to struggle to catch breath. It was right about then that my common sense seem to kick back in as well. What the hell had we just done? We worked together. We lived next door to each other. He was a good friend to my mother. If we screwed around and it went badly, it wasn't just a simple 'shrug it off and move on' thing. It would impact every aspect of our lives until one or both of us moved or moved on. And, quite frankly, after one shitstorm of a relationship, I didn't need any more complications from the opposite sex. "You can try to find ways to stop this from happening," he said and I realized he had pulled back to look down at me, "but we both know it is going to happen."

Then with that and not a single thing more, he released me, stepped away, and disappeared out the back door. I sank back against the counter, feeling my heartbeat slamming hard against my ribcage, my lips still tingling from his, my face overly sensitive from the scrape of his scruff. And I was almost overwhelmingly sure that what he had just said wasn't just some kind of hopeful declaration. It seemed a hell of a lot like a premonition.

Pound Cake Maddy

Nothing happened. I cleaned up dinner. I went up to bed. My mother came home and went to bed as well. The next day, I woke up to breakfast as usual- a cherry scone. I went for a run after I knew Brant was already home showering. And nothing happened. My mother didn't grill me about what happened. Brant didn't seem even the least bit different. It was all so normal that I was genuinely starting to wonder if the entire night had been some incredibly vivid dream. Were there not still the tiniest bit of red on my face from his scruff that I had covered up with some makeup, I would have genuinely been able to believe that. After that, everything just fell into place like nothing had gone on. But it had and for reasons I didn't choose to analyze, it was what was the ever-present dominant thought in my head every single day afterward. While he was making my coffee and keeping up light conversation about silly things like the local groundhog predicting six more weeks of winter or the local small business association getting into a heated debate over something as silly as fresh coats of paint, all I could seem to do was watch his lips. After a long day of trying to pretend his very presence didn't seem to keep me in a constant state of arousal, I went home and thought about him in bed and then again in the shower in the morning- to prepare for a long day around him. Meanwhile, he seemed completely unaffected. The bastard. I was a hormonal mess and he seemed fine. Even though he was the one who was insisting something was going to happen with me and him. So then Groundhog's Day rolled into the next week and I had about a million macarons stacked in the shelves for the seemingly endless stream of men (and some women) coming in to pick up treats for their sweethearts for Valentine's Day. Now, when I was with Rich, I genuinely did not care about Valentine's Day. And while he always remembered and got me something, we tended to spend the day in bed watching reruns of some sitcom and not actually engaging in the so-called holiday. It was a stupid day. The thing was, I forgot that Valentine's Day when you were single was completely different from

when you were in a relationship. If you were shacked up with someone and said you didn't celebrate, no biggie. But when you were single, you got the look. And you got the comments about how you would find someone some day. After about six hours of that, well, even I was starting to feel a deep sense of unhappiness crushing down on me. I literally felt weighted by it, like there was something trying to drag me down to the floor where I was expected to cry and bemoan my singledom like any respectable woman steadily heading past acceptable marriageable age. "Honey, why don't you take a coffee break?" my mother asked, knowing me well enough to know I was losing my battle with my emotions. "I have this. It's dwindling down." It wasn't. But I was too grateful to fight with her over a short reprieve. "How you holding up?" Brant asked, reaching for a large hot cup to get me my usual black coffee. "What do you mean?" I asked, feigning ignorance. "Got ears, sweetheart. I don't think a single woman has walked past you without making a comment about you being alone." "I guess women's lib hasn't quite made it all the way to this sleepy little town. I apparently need a man to be a complete person. Who knew?" He gave me a sympathetic smile as he disappeared for a second to make my coffee. "They don't pester you?" I blurted out as I reached for the cup he passed toward me. "About being single? Nah." "But you're older than me," I insisted. "As about ten women have told me so far today, I apparently have 'plenty of time' to settle down." "Sexist," I grumbled, folding back the tab on the coffee and bringing it up. "This isn't coffee," I accused immediately as the rich smell of chocolate met my nose, making me almost want to groan. Okay, I totally wanted to groan. Just not in front of him. Fine, I absolutely wanted to groan in front of him. But in a private setting with his hands and mouth all over me. "Figured you needed a pick-me-up." "You told me you wouldn't give me something like this again. Not even if I begged," I reminded him. "Well, it's made with water, not full-fat milk and there is only a tiny bit of whipped cream," he said, casual as could be. Which was why I took a sip as he leaned across the counter toward me, not thinking anything of it. Until he went ahead and added in a voice low enough that only the two of us could hear, "And the next time you beg me for something, Maddy, it's gonna be my cock." I nearly choked to death. And he just casually walked away, wiping the counter. "You alright there, Maddy?" Eddie, the local handyman, asked, slamming his hand into my back as I tried to breathe properly again. "I... ah... fine," I managed between coughs. "Wrong pipe," I added, shaking my head, catching Brant watching me from the corner of my eye, cocky smirk in place. Beg? Beg for his cock? I think not. I had never needed to beg for anything sexually before. And at twenty-seven I was not going to start. Not even for the sexy as hell man who made my coffee every morning and ate my pastries and had been the star of my fantasies for weeks. Weeks.

Nope. Not even for him. I walked back across the room, trying to ignore the fact that I found his dirty mouth almost obnoxiously sexy as I packed up sweets for more people he felt sorry for me, who 'think they might know someone to fix me up with', who told me to keep my chin up. By the time five rolled around, we were dead and I was dead on my feet. "Ready to head home, Ma?" I asked, wiping down the counter again. "Oh, honey, didn't I tell you?" she asked, looking almost a little... stricken. "Tell me what?" I asked, brows drawing together. "I, well, I sort-of have..." "Are you going out with your friends?" I asked, almost feeling a little relieved at the idea. I just wanted to take a bath then curl up on the couch and watch something with absolutely no romance in it. "No, actually... honey. Well, I have a date." A soft breeze could have knocked me over. A date. And not just a date. A Valentine's Day date? "Oh, wow. Yeah, no. You didn't mention it. That's great though," I said, giving her an encouraging smile. "I can absolutely cancel if you don't want to be alone tonight. Really, it's no..." "Stop," I cut her off, smiling. "I'm actually happy to just have some time to veg around and be lazy and eat food you wouldn't approve of. I'm glad you have someone to spend the night with. That's great, Mom. I'm happy for you." "I might be... late," she said, looking wholly uncomfortable. I laughed at that, my smile huge. "Just remember- the only good sex is safe sex," I teased, making her cheeks get red. "Maddy, this is..." "Normal for a single mother and a single daughter to discuss," I cut her off. "Be late. Stay the night. Whatever you want to do. I am a big girl. I can be home alone." "Alright," she said, looking both embarrassed and relieved. After all, what Valentine's Day date didn't end in sex? And who wanted to do the dirty and then rush to get dressed and head home when you could just stay the night? I genuinely was happy for her. But she was totally going to get grilled about her new man once she got home. "Are you coming home with me to change and grab a couple things?" I asked as we walked toward the front door. She grabbed a "closed" sign and put it on the pastry counter because the coffee shop was still open, Brant finding himself busier than expected with a bunch of young lovers hanging out because they had nowhere else to be. "Have a good time, Alice," he called, making me acutely aware that while she had forgotten to tell me, she had told Brant. He also said nothing in parting to me which, well, I was mostly grateful for. We went home. Mom slipped into a sexy red dress I knew she bought for the occasion because the tags were in the garbage, grabbed a very small overnight bag, and headed out the door, practically bouncing she was so excited. Me, well, I took a long shower to try to wash the sour mood away, slipping into hideously old and oversized sweatpants and a sweatshirt, made a pot of macaroni and cheese, and went ahead and ate on the couch while watching reruns of Law & Order: Criminal Intent because there was no such thing as romance in it and that made me feel better about life.

I was about half an hour into the third episode and fully done with my first bowl of mac and cheese (yes, first. I planned to eat the whole pot of it), when the entire other side of the couch depressed suddenly, hard enough to make me actually bounce on my cushion as my heart flew into my throat and I let out a genuine scream. "Just me," Brant said casually, reaching out to take the bowl from my hands and putting it on the coffee table. "Jesus," I hissed, hand to my heart, taking a couple of slow, deep breaths. "What the hell, Brant?" I demanded, fear making me snippy. He turned to face me, looking as freshly showered as I was and changed into thick black sweatpants and a Yale t-shirt. "Thought you heard me coming in the back," he shrugged. "Ever hear of knocking?" I insisted, moving my hand from my chest and curling it around my legs which were cocked up on the cushion. "Could hear the ding-ding of your show all the way on my own porch. Doubt you would have heard me." He wasn't exactly wrong, I realized, reaching for the remote and turning the volume down slightly. "You went to Yale?" I asked, wincing a bit at the skepticism in my tone. "Yep. And you went to the Institute of Culinary Education," he said, nodding. "Your mom was really proud of that." "What about your family?" To that, his smile was a bit humorless. "Both my parents are lawyers. So was my grandfather and his father. My sister is one too. It's a legacy they hold near and dear. Me? I'm the black sheep. They're proud of my time at Yale and my early career. This?" he said, waving a hand out toward the town in general, "Not so much." "That sucks," I said, shaking my head. My mother wouldn't have cared if I chose to scrub toilets for a living so long as I was happy. I couldn't imagine not having that kind of unconditional support. "I'm a grown man, sweetheart. Their opinions stopped holding weight as soon as I went off to college." Unlike Rich. That was my first thought and I realized I had been comparing the two men a lot over the past few weeks. And in pretty much everything I had to compare them with from cinema opinions to kissing skills, Brantley had come out on top. A man I barely knew trumped a guy I knew almost every infinitesimal detail about over the course of five years. "That's a healthy way to be, I think." "Nothing fucking worse than a thirty-something year old man still hanging on his mother's apron strings." Well, if that wasn't the damn truth. I had known so many of those guys over the years. Grown mama's boys were always a complete and utter turn-off. I didn't know a girl who didn't agree. "I thought you had to keep the shop open late tonight," I observed. "Eh, after three extra hours of listening to shit like 'on fleek' and 'can't evens', and 'feels', and 'goals' and 'turnt', and 'basic', I decided I had about e-fucking-nough of the youths for the day." I laughed at that. "I think you left out 'squad', 'literally' used incorrectly, and 'legit', and 'bae'." "Jesus..." he said, shaking his head at the ceiling. "So was Alice excited for her date?" "It was cute," I admitted, smiling. "She kept nervously fixing her lipstick." I paused, then told him

something I wasn't sure why I wanted to. "She packed an overnight bag." "Yeah?" he asked, giving me a look I couldn't quite read. But I understood it about two seconds later when he reached out toward me, grabbing me by the hips, and pulling me until I found myself straddling his lap. "Brant..." "Less talking. More doing things," he said, one hand staying on my hip, the other going around to cup the back of my neck and pulling me down toward him. "Like this," he said just a second before my lips pressed into his. And, yeah, I was pretty sure less talking was definitely, definitely a good idea. But I was not going to beg him for anything. Even as that thought crossed my mind, his hands went to frame my face and his tongue moved in to claim mine, making me immediately aware as desire started to ping off of every single nerve ending in my body, that I was absolutely capable of begging. My hips sank down on his, dragging a needy whimper from between my lips as his hardness pressed me where I needed him most. Before I could move my hips against him, get the friction I desperately needed, I was suddenly moving as Brant got to his feet, both his hands going to my ass and holding me up by it as my legs wrapped around him. I didn't lose his lips as he seemingly effortlessly navigated past all my mom's haphazardly placed furniture and decorations, not even stumbling over the stupid little toadstool figure she kept in the corner of the doorway that I tripped over at least half of the times I walked into the room. Then he turned and started up the stairs as confidently as you please, his lips pressing harder, getting more demanding. When he turned right into my room, I yanked back, looking down at him with furrowed brows. "How did you know this was my room?" "Who do you think painted it?" he asked, eyes heavy and heated. I couldn't help it, I looked around at the space, thinking of him there with a paint roller, moving my stuff around. I had a momentary stomach drop when I wondered if maybe he had found the loose floorboard where I stored my childhood and adolescent journals before I remembered that a couple years back on a Christmas visit, I had finally cleared them out myself. "Maddy," he called, making my gaze fall back on him, finding his head ducked to the side slightly, teasing smile on his lips. "Did I lose you?" "I was just thinking about my old diaries I used to keep under the floorboard." "Damn, missed those, huh?" His smile went a little wicked after that though. "Know what I did find though?" he asked, making my belly instinctively tighten. "Oh, God, what?" "A MS and a CD in an embarrassingly large heart carved into the wall behind your bed." It was actually under my bed. Where I used to lay and read trashy books I found in the library as a teen so my mom couldn't see me. Not that she would care, but I would have been mortified if anyone caught me with those half-naked man covers. "Should I be jealous?" he asked, eyes dancing, white teeth on full display. "Of Cody Donalds, the boy I had a wicked crush on in seventh grade? I think you're safe." "I've seen Cody Donalds," Brant said, moving toward the bed which meant I was moving backward toward it. "He's got a beer belly and thinning hair already. I say you traded up." I laughed at that, having had caught sight of him the week before and had been shocked by the drastic change. When I had seen him last in high school, he had still been a really good looking guy. "I didn't trade. Cody never even looked my way," I admitted. "Cody's fucking loss," he declared right before his hands left my ass, grabbed my hips, and tossed

me backward. My stomach dropped as I fell through the air for an excruciating moment before I landed on the bed with a bounce, laughing up at him as he kneeled at the edge of the bed. He reached up and snagged the baggy material of my sweatpants and the knees and yanked hard enough to pull them down over my ass and hips. "You won't be needing these," he informed me as he pulled them free of my feet, leaving me in my oversized sweatshirt and somewhat fancy pink lace panties. I had developed a slight obsession with buying pretty underthings in college. Some women had their handbags. Some had their shoes. I had my panties. Then before I could fold up and make some saucy comment about his shirt, he grabbed it behind his back and yanked it over and forward, discarding it to the floor as I let out a slow exhale, eyes shamelessly moving over him, taking in every etch of muscle, before meeting his gaze again. "Ready to beg yet?" he asked, ducking his head to the side, eyes devilish. I smiled up at him then bit into my lower lip, watching his eyes go there. "Not even close." "Well, we'll have to see what we can do about that." With that, his hand reached down and grabbed my leg, pulling it up and slowly, deliciously kissing up the inside of my ankle, my calf, behind my knee, then up my inner thigh. Until every inch of skin was humming, until I could feel my hips rocking instinctively upward, begging for fulfillment, until my panties were wetter than they had perhaps ever been as he dropped that leg and went on to torture the other. But when his lips met the crease where my thigh met my sex, he didn't move in as I had anticipated, as I was half-dying for him to do. Instead, he moved upward, running his tongue along the waistband of my panties then inching up my shirt and kissing up my belly, between my breasts. Then, after pulling my shirt off, over my collarbones, my neck, my earlobe. Touching me everywhere but where I needed him to- my breasts, nipples, clit. "Brant..." I groaned when he grabbed my arms and lifted them over my head, pinning them to the mattress and then kissing up the underside of my arm, grazing his teeth over the inside of my wrist in a place that shouldn't have been erotic, but somehow completely was. "That didn't sound like begging," he said, voice a low, deep, sexy rumble that had my insides turning liquid as a pressure built deep in my lower stomach that was borderline painful. He moved down the next wrist and arm, the side of my neck, between my breasts. But just when I was sure he was just going to torture me forever, his lips sucked one of my nipples into his mouth unexpectedly, making my back arch as I let out a strangled moan, my hand slamming down on the back of his neck as his tongue moved over the hardened point. He moved across my chest to my other nipple before his lips pressed a kiss between my breasts again and he looked up at me, one side of his lips tipped up for a second, looking positively devilish before he started moving downward again. His hand yanked my panties out of the way and then his mouth was on me without hesitation- his tongue circling my clit with perfect pressure, making my fingers curl into his hair as my hips rose to meet him, as he drove me toward the edge. "No!" I shrieked when he pulled suddenly back as I felt just seconds away from coming. He wasn't listening though as he pushed back to sit on his ankles, grabbing the waistband of my panties and pulling, leaving me with no choice but to raise my hips so he could pull the material down and discard it. "What are you..." I started when he just watched me for a moment, lips twitching, and I knew he was up to something. But then I felt two fingers thrust unexpectedly inside me, making me let out an almost pained moan as my hand slammed down on his thigh and squeezed.

There was nothing slow or explorative about it either. His fingers started thrusting- fast, hard, demanding, unrelenting. Until my moans became choked whimpers. Then he stopped thrusting and twisted his fingers inside me, raking up over the top wall, hitting my G-spot with expert precision and I saw white at the contact. "Brant!" I gasped when my walls started to tighten. I should have kept my mouth shut. Because hearing it, feeling my walls tighten around his fingers, he pulled them out quickly, again denying me an orgasm. My chest was rising and falling too quickly, my skin sweaty, my heart slamming, my frustration like nothing I had ever felt before. And judging by his smile as he jumped off the end of the bed, he knew exactly what he was doing to me. He reached into his pocket, tossing a condom casually onto the bed. Then he reached for his pants and dropped them, leaving him completely freaking naked to me- his cock hard and straining, needing fulfillment just as badly as I did. "Brant," I whimpered shamelessly, pressing my thighs tightly together, trying to ease the chaos there. "Mmm?" he hummed, kneeling at the edge of the bed again, fingers whispering down the side of my thigh as he reached for the condom with the other. "Got something you need to say?" he asked, lips tipping up as he opened the condom and slipped it on. I was close. I was so so close to being ready to do it. Beg. But not quite yet. "No?" he asked, smiling wickedly. Then his hand went to my hip and pushed hard, rolling me onto my stomach and I felt his lips press into the back of my ankle, up my calf, my thigh, stopping to slip his tongue between my slick folds, but only for one delicious second before he kissed over one ass cheek and then moved toward the center, gently kissing up my spine. When he reached the back of my neck and I felt his tongue replace his lips as he moved down again, his body curled over mine, his cock pressing against me, I was done. I was so, so done tormenting myself. "Brant, please," I begged, my ass angling upward toward him. The licking paused for the barest of seconds then started again, making me wonder how much more begging I would need to do before he gave me what I needed so badly. But then his hips shifted. His cock slid between my slick folds. And he slammed inside me in one thick, fast, hard thrust. "Oh my God," I moaned into the bed as he settled into the hilt. "Fuck," he growled at almost the same second as his head slammed down on my shoulder for a second as he took a deep breath, tried to hold it together. But I didn't want either of us to be put together. I wanted both of us to shatter apart. I rocked my hips against him, impatient, too needy to care about dragging it out any further. His chest jumped slightly as he let out a low chuckle, pushing up and off me. His fingers whispered down my sides until they got to my hips, sinking in, and dragging me up and back as he settled on his knees.

I pressed up onto my forearms, ass angled up toward him, shoulders down, getting into the best position I could to give me the fastest, most consuming orgasm possible. "Nuh-uh," he said, hand tracking up my spine then into my hair, getting into it at the base, sifting in, turning, and yanking hard. The sting coursed over my scalp as a shocked gasp escaped me, an unexpected rush of wet pooling where our bodies met at the pain/pleasure mix as he pulled me back by my hair until my back was against his front, my ass on his lap. "That's better," he said, releasing my hair so both his hands could slide up my front, covering my breasts, rolling my hardened nipples between his fingers for a long minute. Beyond turned-on, truly in another realm I didn't know existed, I started rocking against him, feeling the angle make his cock scrape against the top wall and making my head fall back on his shoulder as I rode him best I could with his hips below mine preventing too much movement. His hands released my breasts and his hand moved down my belly then lower, his finger pressing into my clit as he suddenly sank his hips down then plowed back into me. "Fuck," I cried, arms going up and behind me to wrap around his neck as he dropped again and slammed back into me. Not fast, but hard, as his finger kept up its relentless torment. The next time he slammed back into me, my hips crashed down to meet him, making me take him as deeply as my body could allow with a delicious little pinch. And after all the foreplay torture and his finger working me while his cock invaded me, by the next thrust inward, my walls tightened hard as my breath caught. His finger swiped. And I freaking shattered. My entire body convulsed once almost violently as my head slammed into his shoulder, his cock slamming into me still, his finger working me, dragging it out, making one wave crash into another until I was sure I was setting off car alarms all down the street as my vision flashed blindingly white for an alarming moment before I slowly came back to myself- my body slick, my breathing erratic, my thighs shaking, a whimper still coming from my lips even after the waves tapered off. Against my back, his chest was as labored as mine, his body just as slick, his heart just as pounding. The side of his face pressed into mine as he let out a long, slow breath. "Jesus Christ," he said on a harsh growl. I took a similarly deep breath, exhaling slowly, realizing what I had just done. I had just made things get infinitely more complicated than they needed to be. About a thousand what-if thoughts swarmed my brain in the span of seconds, each more dramatic than the last. "Still inside you and you're already freaking out?" he asked, but sounded amused as his head ducked and he bit into my neck playfully. His hips dropped and I lost him as he moved away from me and toward the hall to, I imagined, toss the condom, as I scrambled to find my shirt and panties, yanking them on with some kind of warp-speed I didn't know I was capable of accomplishing. By the time I heard the footsteps in the hallway again, I was mostly-clothed and sitting up against the headboard. Brant walked in, paused for a second, brow raised at finding me up and dressed, then moved to his pants, slipped them on, and proceeded to throw himself onto my bed on his stomach, letting out a loud sigh. "Alright, get on with it." "Get on with what?" I asked, looking down at his back because his face was on the mattress so I could do so without being seen. His head twisted to look at me, brown eyes warm, smile teasing. "Whatever it is you think you need

to be freaking out about right now." "I don't know..." I started to object, not having thought anything through enough yet to bring it up. "Don't make yourself a liar and insult me in the process," he cut me off, tone that condescending sharp that only lawyers (or doctors) can seem to pull off with any authority. "I am going to take what is a real wild leap here," he went on, tone sarcastic, "and assume it's because we work together and live next door and I'm friends with your mother." "As if there needs to be anything more than that." "Maddy, we're fucking adults. I am intimately aware of the fact that you were no starry-eyed virgin going into this. You knew what you were doing. I knew what I was doing. We enjoyed it. Maybe we will want repeats. Maybe not. Maybe we will want more than repeats. Again, maybe not. But whatever happens, we'll be grown-ups about it. For chrissakes, you got engaged to and dumped within twenty-four hours by a guy you'd been with for five years and you didn't go all batshit crazy over that. So I think whatever goes on here, we'll be fine." I couldn't exactly find any fault with that logic. Actually, I was pretty sure I could if I tried. But, the fact of the matter was, I didn't want to. I liked Brant. I was attracted to him. And I had just been given the orgasm of a lifetime. If there was a chance for a repeat of that, without drama, well, then maybe he was right. Maybe it would be fine.

Rocky Road Bars Brant

After the very short, very honest talk, we took ourselves back downstairs to eat the macaroni she made, watched more of her TV marathon, and then she eventually passed out on the couch and I carried her back to bed before heading back to my own place, not sure how she would feel if Alice came home to find me there still. Yes, they were both adults. And, yes, Alice had been out all night with a man herself. But she was still her mother and I had no clue if that would wig her out. I slept, went for my run, got ready for work, and headed out. It was the first time ever that I was there to be at work first. Alice's car was at the house so she was back from her overnight date, but she was either just running late or had stopped to talk to Maddy. I couldn't help but wonder what she would say. While we both agreed to doing... something, we hadn't exactly ironed out the details about it. Were we just screwing around? Did she want to work toward something more? Was it maybe too soon, all things considered? I had no idea. So I figured I would have to play it by ear, take my cue from her and her actions. When she came in, gave me a short "mornin'" and disappeared into the back, I got the distinct impression that my ass had another talk with her in the very near future. Then, about three hours later, the first group of early risers coming in for coffee and to read the paper or chit-chat, she finally came back in with a tray of what looked like bars of mixed chocolate and stuck them in the display case before putting one on a plate, as she always did, and walked my way. I poured her black coffee and turned as she came up to the other side of the counter. "What's this?" I asked, putting her cup on the counter next to the plate. "Rocky Road Bars," she supplied with a shrug. "Is that some kind of message?" I asked, head dipped. "Message?" she asked, her brows drawing together and proving that it wasn't. "Never mind," I said, shaking my head, feeling a small wave of relief even if she was standing there wound like a clock for some untold reason. Maybe that was the reason that when she shrugged at me and went to reach for her coffee, I reached over the counter, snagged her chin in my thumb and forefinger and leaned in to lick a small bit of chocolate from beside her lips from where she had smudged it. Her entire body stiffened then trembled at

the contact. It was all the encouragement I needed. So right there, a dozen eyes no doubt on us, I framed her face in my hands and pressed my lips to hers. There was nothing sweet or chaste about it. I fucking devoured her mouth, my tongue moving to invade, drawing a quiet whimper from her as her hands slammed down on the counter. The sound was enough to remind me that I couldn't take it any further right then and there and better stop before either of us got too worked up. But as I pulled away and her eyes fluttered open and all I could see was a deep desire there, I knew she was a little bit more worked up than I intended. There were a couple chuckles and one brave soul let out a loud whistle as we pulled apart, making my smile tip up slightly, knowing I had just, whether I truly intended it or not, staked a claim. I let the whole town know that I was messing around with one of their favorite daughters. "I hate you right now," she said, her voice airy, her cheeks pink, her lips swollen. "No you don't," I countered, shaking my head. "You just hate that you can't climb over this counter and let me fuck you right here and now. Don't worry, you can have me all to yourself in just a couple of hours. If you can control yourself until then..." "Control myself," she hissed, both looking slightly outraged but also equally amused. "I believe you were the one half-mauling me in public." "And I'm pretty sure it was your tongue moving over mine and your whimper I heard, right? Or was that Old Mildred. Hey, Milly..." I started to call, making Maddy's eyes bulge comically as she slammed her hand into my shoulder hard enough to send me back a foot. "Shut up!" she hissed, making me let out an amused chuckle. "Alright fine. You made your point," she said, shaking her head as she reached for her coffee. "What was my point, exactly?" I asked, curious. "You just like... marked your territory or whatever," she said, rolling her eyes at the very idea, but a small smile pulled at her lips. "So, what, you're mine now?" Had I not been paying such close attention, I might have missed the way her face seemed to fall for a second, how her eyes went a little shocked and sad, before she put a mask down over her features. "Oh, I, well... I thought..." she fumbled, shaking her head at her lack of explanations. "Relax, sweetheart," I said, saving her from her misery. "Like I said last night, I'm in. You were the one who came in all anti-social this morning." "That had nothing to do with you," she informed me, looking almost pained. "Alice?" "My mom needs to find some friends to talk to about sex, Brant. I can't take it. I can't," she said, looking horrified. "I thought I was a cool, mature, experienced, metropolitan woman. But when your mom starts talking about blowjobs, it makes you really, really want to stick your fingers in your ears and scream 'I'm not hearing this, I'm not hearing this' until she shuts up." "Traumatized for life, huh?" "He's coming over tonight. Did I mention that part? He's coming to dinner and then, ah, staying the night. Because apparently it's... serious. Do they still sell earplugs at the pharmacy? I think I might actually die of embarrassment if I have to listen to them doing it." I laughed at that, finding myself somewhat charmed by her embarrassment. "Tell you what, why don't you come to my place for dinner. And stay the night if you want. My bed is on the other side of the house. You won't hear shit. And," I added, leaning forward slightly, watching as her pupils dilated when I

was closer. She wanted me alright. "They won't hear anything either," I added with a smirk that made her cheeks heat up again. "You know," I added, wanting to see how red I could make a self-proclaimed 'cool, mature, experienced, metropolitan woman', "you could really get her back with a blowjob story of your own." "Sh!" she said, looking around herself, all paranoid about being overheard. "And I can't do that." "Why not?" "Because we haven't..." she said, waving a hand, eyes big. "Well," I said, feeling my cock twitch at the very idea. "We will have to see what we can do about that, won't we?" I asked, watching her eyes get even more heated. Was there anything fucking hotter than a woman who got off on the idea of going down on you? Wasn't sure there was. I watched as she took a breath, seeming to pull herself together, and gave me a saucy smile, her eyes wicked. "I don't know. Maybe. If you're lucky," she added, walking away. I waited until she was about halfway across the room before I called to her. "I'll make dinner. You bring dessert. Something with some... whipped cream," I said, voice heavy with innuendo, loving watching the confident mask fall again as her eyes went big and she rushed out toward the back while a chorus of chuckles broke out across the space. As she moved into the doorway toward the kitchen, she looked over at me, giving me a 'you're gonna pay for that' look. Quite frankly, I was looking forward to it.

Cookies 'n Cream Cups Maddy

Okay. So I knew I was supposed to be pissed that he was being all possessive-alpha-piss-on-whatbelongs-to-me... in public. And while I certainly wasn't exactly comfortable with the tongue kissing in front of a woman who taught me my ABCs, I found I actually really liked the display. I wasn't supposed to. It wasn't modern or progressive to admit that you liked to, for all intents and purposes, be claimed. But that couldn't change the fact that when Brant was doing the claiming with that sexy smirk of his lips and those warm brown eyes and that lazy confidence of his, yeah, I found I really liked being claimed. Which was why I was standing in my mother's kitchen and carefully swirling whipped cream into the little single serving dessert cups full of layers of crumbled Oreo cookies and chocolate pudding. I would be bringing the remainder of the whipped cream with me to Brant's. You know... in case the cups needed a top off when it started to fall. Or, well, that was what I was telling myself. And my mother. Because godawful, uncomfortable blowjob talk aside, there was no way I was going to tell her I was really bringing it because I wanted Brant to cover me in it... and lick it off. Or that I wanted to do the same to him. There was a knock at the door a moment after I ran upstairs to do a quick freshening up- changing, spraying on a small amount of perfume, doing a fix of my eye makeup. "That'd be my gentleman caller!" my mother said in a dramatic southern accent that had me smiling at my reflection. It might have been a bit uncomfortable to know details about your mother's sex life, but I was genuinely loving seeing her so happy, so excited about another person. It had been so long for her and she had so much love to give. And on top of that, I knew I would eventually move on and move out again. It was something I felt guilty about whenever I thought about it. It was different when I was eighteen and somewhat selfish and making the decision to better my life with education. Being back with her, falling into routines with her, being more mature and seeing beyond my own wants and needs, it bothered me to think of her all alone in the house all the time. I hoped whoever her 'gentleman caller' was was of the lasting variety.

"Oh, honey," she said with a smile as I came down, something that had obviously made them spring apart because he had her lipstick on his face, something she noticed as I stepped into the entryway and she reached up to wipe it away. Her boyfriend was somewhat new to the town, having moved back to care for his ailing mother before she passed three months before. He had apparently fallen for the town (and maybe a little bit my mother) and decided to stay. From the scoop she had given me, he was a retiree from a big deal marketing gig back in California. There was a laid-back kind of air to him in his jeans and gray sweater. His skin was tanned, his hair blond but graying slightly, his eyes blue and warm. And when my mom reached up to wipe the lipstick away and he looked down at her, the look he gave her was all I needed to know that I liked him. Anyone who could look at my mother like she was the most amazing creature in the world, yeah, he had my immediate approval. "Hi, I'm Maddy," I said, offering my hand. He shook it, giving me a smile. "Rob," he told me. "I've heard so much..." he started, only to be interrupted by a loud pounding to the wall that had my mother's framed pictures of herbs shaking. "That'd be your dinner bell," my mother said, giving me a warm smile and I knew without her having to say anything that she was happy that I was going to see Brant. Not because she wanted to be alone with Rob, though I was sure there was some of that, but because she liked the idea of me and Brant. I also realized because of the way she spoke of him and he and I together that she had, in fact, never liked Rich. It was something I had never known before, her always being kind to him. But it had been a formal type of kind. It was a 'my daughter is dating you and you seem to make her happy so I have to accept you' kind of kind. How had I never seen that before? I guess the answer was easy; I didn't want to. What a bubble I had been living in. "Alright," I said, giving them a smile as I went to grab my purse which was doubling as my overnight bag- having learned in college to pack only the very essentials so it never looked like I was moving in with a guy on the first official overnight. "It was nice meeting you, Rob. Have fun. I left some extra dessert in the fridge for you," I said, moving toward the kitchen to grab the dessert for me and Brant and going out the back door then around the porch to the front where I knocked and listened to some slamming inside before I heard footsteps. The door flew open to show Brant in jeans and a tee, a kitchen towel thrown over his shoulder, brows drawn together. "You're knocking?" he asked, sounding completely thrown off by that. "Should I have pounded on the wall back at you instead?" I asked as he moved back to invite me in. His side of the house was nothing like my mother's. Not that I had been expecting it to be, but it was almost strange seeing as the floorpan was nearly identical but looked so different with his decorating choices. Which were sparse. My mother, the lover of knickknacks, found places to stash everything. Brant liked a cleaner look with his almost silverish-gray walls, black bookshelves, leather couch, coffee table, and dining set. All the floors had been redone and stained a darker shade than my mother's. The stairs had no carpets. There were no pictures on the wall, but a few canvas pieces of art that had likely come from his time in the City seeing as our little town didn't have anything even resembling an art gallery. "Come on through and put those in the fridge," he called and I realized while I had paused to look around, he had kept walking, obviously needing to keep an eye on dinner. I shook my head and moved into the small kitchen that looked a lot like my mother's style-wise except Brant had a big coffee machine on his counter. Not a coffeepot, mind you. It was a coffee station. There was a drip, sure, but also a spot for espresso beans and a frother for lattes. I walked to the fridge and slipped the desserts and whipped cream inside, taking a deep breath.

"What is that?" I asked, not able to place the smell that still somehow made my stomach growl. "Love this town, but the lack of food options is sinful. What I wouldn't do for some decent Indian, Chinese, or... Mexican," he said, turning and showing me a tortilla. "Tacos?" I asked, brows drawn together. "Don't insult me," he said with a smile as he turned away. "Not an insult. I like tacos." In fact, I hadn't had any in longer than I could remember since Rich had never been a fan and, like he said, there was no Mexican in town. "Okay, next time. This time, we're having wet burritos." "What is a wet burrito?" I asked, propping myself up on the counter and watching as he scooped rice and then a supply of cooked veggies and beans onto the tortilla. "Depends on your taste. But in general, a tortilla filled with rice, veggies, meat, beans, and cheese. Then you roll it up, melt some more cheese on top then add some Pica de Gallo, salsa verde, rojo, or habanero- depending on what heat-level you can take." "That sounds too good to be true," I said, meaning it. "It is. And it goes great with the beer I have cooling in the fridge," he told me, rolling up one burrito and putting a mix of shredded cheeses on top before nuking it for a couple seconds and handing me the plate, gesturing toward the supply of salsas. Wanting to keep it sexy and indigestion free, I picked the mild as Brant picked something mid-level, grabbed the beers, then utensils and walked toward the living room, expecting me to follow. So I did. And he turned on the TV. And I loved every second of the comfort-level between us, the familiarity, the informality. He wasn't trying to sweep me off my feet with some three-course meal, but he cooked me something that made that frappe foodgasm moan sound tame when I had my first bite. "Oh my God." "I know," he agreed, smiling big at my enjoyment. Then we ate and watched crime TV and drank beer. And I realized with a sort of blinding clarity that I literally couldn't remember the last time I felt quite so content. It wasn't that kind of 'high' you get when something goes right or you achieve something after a long time trying; it was deeper. It was soul deep. I felt it into my marrow. "What's that look for?" he asked as he took my plate and put it beside his on the coffee table. Not sure how to explain it and thinking it was perhaps too soon to even if I could, I took a long swig of my beer and shrugged. "What look?" To that, his lips tipped up devilishly. "You really want to do this again?" "Do what?" I asked as he stood suddenly and walked toward the kitchen. He didn't answer me though as I heard some shuffling before he came walking back with the whipped cream. "Do the 'I am going to get what I want out of you by using sex to do it' thing," he explained as he slammed the can down on the coffee table and moved to stand between it and the couch, reaching down and pulling me onto my feet. "Brant..." I said as his fingers teased up under the material of my tee, running across my lower back and inching it off my skin. "Know what?" he asked as his fingers paused to unclasp my bra. "No, what?" I asked, feeling my chest get heavier as desire started to course through my system. "I'm still hungry," he told me, pulling my shirt until I had no choice but to raise up my hands as he pulled off both my shirt and my bra. "Brant, please," I demanded as his hands landed up my hips and moved upward, barely brushing

over the undersides of my breasts and my nipples hardened almost painfully. "Begging won't help you this time," he informed me as his hands whispered down my belly and unfastened my button and zip before yanking the thick material over my butt then down my thighs. I stepped out of the material as his hands pressed into my hips and pushed me back toward the couch. I had barely sat down before he was grabbing for the whipped cream and shaking the can, eyes devilish, smirk downright sinful. "Lay back," he commanded and I automatically moved to do just that. "Unless you want to end it without all the torture and tell me." Tell him what? I had no idea what I was even supposed to tell him anymore as I pressed my thighs together, trying to ease the ache there. And, honestly, even if I did know what... I was pretty sure I wanted every second of a torment that involved him licking things off my body. I jumped slightly as he circled my nipple with the cold whipped cream, an unexpectedly erotic sensation. He covered both nipples and created a line down the center of my belly and completely covered the triangle above my sex. I waited for him to move over me, to kiss me, then move down to my chest. But then his tongue moved over me and started to lick the whipped cream over my sex, making my legs fall open, swiping the creamy coolness down and over my cleft, making a long, ragged moan escape me, dragging a rumbling growling sound from his chest that made another rush of wet pool as his mouth closed over my clit and sucked hard. Then he devoured me, drove me up fast and unrelenting until the orgasm started to crest, seeming to start at the base of my spine and exploding outward until it took over my whole body, making me cry out his name as he took possession of my clit and sucked it in pulses as the waves washed over me, dragging it out, intensifying it. As soon as the waves lessened, he released my clit and licked a line back upward, taking the whipped cream off my breasts then pressing up to balance over me, wicked look in his eyes. "Tell me." "Tell you what?" I asked, brain nothing but sparking misfirings right then. He smiled at that, either delighted with his prowess or glad to torture me more. Or, more likely, both. He sat back and yanked off his shirt before standing and discarding his pants and underwear as well, giving me a full, glorious view of his hard cock. I curled upward, feeling my own lips curve up a bit wickedly as I reached up and pulled him to sit down on the couch. I grabbed the can of whipped cream as I moved to straddle him, watching as his eyes went knowing just a second before I started making a line down his stomach with the cream, then down the little happy trail, over his balls, and then up the underside of his cock until there was a large amount on the swollen head. Then I tossed the can to the side and gave him a smile before ducking my head and starting my path down, deciding that while foreplay was always good, it was infinitely better with food involved as my tongue licked the cream off his balls then his shaft before closing my lips around the head and licking it off from there as well, making Brant let out a deep, primal groan that spurred me on, made me work him faster, deeper. "Maddy..." he warned, but I didn't need a warning. I wanted to make him come. I wanted to give him the selfless orgasm he gave me. "Fuck," he growled, his hand crushing into the base of my skull as he came down my throat.

I worked him for a long moment before letting him slide away, looking up at him to find an intense weight in his gaze. "From now on, we only ever eat dessert off of each other," he said a second later, his hand going under my chin and pulling me until I moved to straddle him, bringing my face close to his. "I can get behind that plan," I agreed with a smile before he yanked me forward and our lips crashed together. It wasn't a slow, sweet, post-orgasm kiss. It was still wild, hungry, primal. It said we weren't done. "Come on," he said when he pulled away, a little out of breath. "Let's go take a shower. That was hot as fuck but we're both sticky now." Thank God. I didn't want to complain, but every time I moved, my skin got stuck to his skin and it was weird and decidedly unsexy. I went to move off him, but his arms went to slip around my lower back, holding me to him as he stood and started walking around the house. Then up the stairs. I was generally not the kind of girl who got carried around. I was fit, sure, but I was tall and leggy and most guys wanted to carry around the short, lithe little women. But since Brant was a huge wall of muscle, he didn't seem bothered by my height and less than dainty limbs. Brant led me down the hall upstairs, past the spare room which he had set up with a ton of workout equipment, finally answering my question of how he stayed so in shape in our gym-less town. He took the next right, going into the master bedroom which was about the same size as my mother's, but looked much bigger without all the extra furniture and knickknacks. Brant had a large king sized bed with deep blue sheets and comforter, matching the slightly lighter shade on the walls. To the left of the bed was the open door to the master bath which he had apparently completely redone. Where my mom preferred the more classic style with a clawfoot tub and shower inclosure that she could put her frilly lace shower curtains on, Brant liked everything clean and modern. He had a tiled walk-in shower stall and a whirlpool tub. He set me on my feet outside the shower and reached in to put the water on, water I knew would take a couple of minutes to warm up. But he stepped in regardless, cursing at the cold spray. "Yeah, I think not," I said when he looked at me expectantly. I should have known to step away. I really should have. But I didn't and the next thing I knew, he was grabbing my hand and yanking me in with him, making me let out a string of incredibly unladylike curses before I felt the water get warmer against my back. "Tell me," he demanded as he pushed me further under the water so he could share it with me too. "Tell me what the look was about," he added so I couldn't use confusion as a stalling tactic again. "It's nothing it's just..." I exhaled loud enough to call it a sigh as I shrugged a shoulder. "I'm... happy." "Really?" he asked, rolling his eyes. "Happy? That's what all the fuss is about? Pretty sure I wouldn't want you to be pissed or miserable around me, sweetheart." "It's not that. It's..." I trailed off, uncomfortable. How do you tell someone that you had only known a couple weeks that being around them gave you a soul-deep kind of contentedness? I was pretty sure there was no way to say that without coming off as clingy or batshit crazy. "I make you happy," he guessed, no inflection in his voice pointing at anything but understanding. "I guess that's how I would put it." "And that'd be a problem because," he prompted, reaching past me for a bar of soap and sudsing it

up in his hands. When I didn't say anything, he reached out toward me and started soaping up my shoulders, breasts, belly. "Look Maddy, that's the point of being with someone isn't it? To find some kind of happiness there?" "Yeah, it just seems a little, I don't know... soon." "Because of the break-up or just in general?" That was a good question. Maybe both. "Can I ask you something?" he asked at my silence. "Sure." "How long did it take you to decide that your ex was something more than just another guy, just another exchange of flirting, just another sweet nothing." He had me there. "Hours," I admitted. "And we've known each other for weeks. Granted, the physical part of this is new, but we've talked about everything from food and TV to books and politics. How can this feel too soon?" He had a point. "I guess you're right," I admitted as his soapy hand moved lower. "Good, now we got that shit out of the way," he said as his fingers slid between my thighs and up my cleft, working soapy circles over my clit until my hands had to slap down on his shoulders to stay upright. So then he made sure I was thoroughly clean. And then we went to bed and he made me dirty all over again. I fell asleep thinking he was right; it wasn't too soon. The fact that I even worried about it being too soon proved how much I had grown up since that first night I met Richy and had been sure we were meant to be. And while it was smart to be prudent, as Brant yanked me onto his chest and fell asleep with his hand in my hair because he had been absentmindedly stroking it when he passed out, I decided to remember that I couldn't let fear make me ration out my feelings. I wasn't going to sabotage something that made me happy. As the next day would prove, I wouldn't have to be the one to try to do that.

Pineapple Upside Down Cake Maddy

"Maddy!" I could hear my mother's voice whisper-yell from out on the porch as I stood in Brant's kitchen drinking coffee. Despite being enthusiastically acrobatic in bed the night before, his crazy ass was in the gym upstairs killing himself with weights. My thighs felt like I ran twenty miles they were so sore and I was going to go ahead and pretend that that was enough fitness for the day. "Mom?" I asked, walking toward Brant's back door to find my mother standing there, fully dressed because it was already after six and she was running late to open the shop. "Rob's gone if you want to come home and get dressed for work," she said, cheeks just the tiniest bit pink and, in seeing that, I was pretty sure mine went pink as well. It was one thing to be adults and know your mother or your daughter was sexually active. It was kind of another thing entirely to know the other each got lucky the night before. "Thanks," I said, giving her a smile. "You heading in?" "Yep. What are you cooking up today?" "I have no idea," I said, feeling almost startled by the realization. My mother gave me a knowing smile, like she knew just how my brain got turned to mush before she touched my cheek and said she knew I would figure it out. When she was gone, I ran home and changed and was back at Brant's to see him coming down freshly showered and changed, shoes and all. "Ready?" he asked, nodding toward the door. So then we walked to work. And it was normal. Comfortable. Right? It felt right. He made coffee. I went into the back and got lost making some cakes. It was sometime around eleven when my mother's very odd, very hesitant voice called back to me, "Ah, honey..." "I'm almost done, Ma. Just one more..." "Maddy?"

That wasn't my mother. It wasn't Brant either. Oh, no. I'd know that voice anywhere. I looked down at the carefully placed little rings of pineapple and decided that my dessert for the day was like a premonition. Because things were absolutely upside freaking down if Rich was suddenly showing up in my hometown in my mother's bakery where the man I was currently involved with worked as well. I felt my heart seize in my chest for a second before it started going into overdrive as I frantically tried to clean off my hands so I could make sure my hair was still in place in its ponytail. Then, deciding I was about as ready as was possible to meet up with a man who wasted five years of my life and tossed me aside like trash, I took a deep breath and moved out into the front of the bakery. And there was Rich. I won't lie and say he was somehow less attractive now that I didn't love him anymore. That wasn't true. He was every bit as good looking as he had always been, his dress still impeccable even though it was just slacks and a button-down, his hair perfect. And the almost hesitant small smile he gave me as I stepped out was every bit as sweet and genuine as I remembered it. Nothing changed but my feelings. "Hey pumpkin," he said, eyes soft. I won't lie, there was a small gut-punch of familiarity and betrayal at the pet name. "Rich, what are you doing here?" I asked, my gaze going over toward Brant, finding him watching and feeling almost guilty. Which was ridiculous because I hadn't invited Rich. "Didn't have much of a choice after you blocked my calls and texts, Mads," he said, shaking his head. "Didn't you maybe consider that was because I didn't want to talk to you?" I asked, lifting my chin slightly. "The only possible explanation for that," he said, his charming boyish smile in place, "is because you have somehow forgotten how awesome I am." That was so much like him that I wanted to smile. "Rich," I said, voice a little on-edge because Brant wasn't making a move toward us, but he was watching. "Come on," he said, shrugging. "You can give me five minutes, can't you?" "Because five years wasn't enough of my time to waste?" I asked, not caring how snippy that came off. "Mads, please," he said, looking pained. And regardless of the sledgehammer thing he had done to my heart just weeks before, I didn't like that look there. He had been many things to me over the years of our relationship, but most importantly, my friend. No matter what bad blood came between you and a long-time friend, you never wanted to see them hurt. "Five minutes," I specified, tone firm. "Can we maybe..." he said, waving toward the front door. "I don't see why we need to..." "Everyone is watching us," he told me and I realized he was right; every single set of eyes were either watching us intently or coyly, but watching us nonetheless. Likely because they all knew about me and Brant and me and Rich and they were finding the situation as entertaining as a goddamn soap opera. "Fine," I snapped, moving out from behind the counter and walking past him toward the door, making sure I didn't so much as brush him in the process.

I stood right outside the picture window out front, in perfect view of everyone inside because I didn't want anyone, least of all Brant, thinking anything was going on. "Alright, we're outside," I said, crossing my arms over my chest. "I know I hurt you," he said, looking apologetic. "Let's not romanticize it," I cut him off. "You proposed to me and then dumped me because your parents were going to stop paying your bills." His head jerked back, likely not having expected that. I couldn't blame him. We had never had that kind of relationship- the kind where people snipped at each other or yelled or, hell, even argued. We just didn't do that. He bit into the inside of his cheek, looking off past my shoulder for a long second before his eyes found mine again. "I fucked up," he admitted, shrugging. "I made the wrong choice." "Yes, you did," I agreed, having no plans on sparing his feelings. He hadn't spared mine. "Maddy, come on," he said, shaking his head. "Give me a chance here." "A chance to what? Somehow try to make me think that dumping me and telling me to get my things out before you came home from work was not possibly the worst possible thing you could have done after I gave you five years of my life?" "I was..." "Insensitive and cold-hearted and money-hungry and a complete and utter asshole," I filled in for him. His lips tipped up at that, "Yes, all those things. I just... I wasn't thinking straight." "Blinded by the millions you might lose if you picked me," I agreed. "Maddy, I didn't even think..." "That sentence was complete right there," I cut him off. "You didn't even think. Period. You didn't think about how much it would hurt me that you valued your money more than the life we had built together. You didn't think of the fact that I had nowhere to go but back to live with my mother. You didn't think that loving me and me loving you would be enough. You didn't think. And now what? You've finally given it some thought." "I talked to my..." He talked to his parents. Ugh. I had thought maybe he had grown a set and told them to take their money and shove it. Not that it would change anything, but it would have restored my faith in him being the decent person I had always thought he was. "And what, Rich? Tried to convince them that I was good enough for them? I don't need their approval. And I don't want to be with a man who values their approval of the person you've chosen to be with so much that it changes your feelings for them." "It never changed my feelings about you," Rich said, voice sad. And I did believe him. He had loved me. There was no way he had been faking that for five years. Again, the bitter truth was- he never loved me enough. Now that I knew that, there was no forgetting it. There was no pretending it didn't exist. And the fact of the matter was, I deserved to be loved enough. "But it changed your mind about me, Rich. Can't you see how that is just as bad?" I asked, no anger in my tone, just resignation. "It changed right back, pumpkin. That's why I'm here." I exhaled hard, looking off into the bakery, seeing Brant give me what I could only describe as a 'knowing' brow lift and a smirk. When I looked back at Rich, I shrugged.

"I don't want to be a decision, Rich. I want to be someone you love and are with because you can't not love and and you can't not be with me. Who you love isn't something you can flip-flop on. And I am thankful I found this out before I married you. Before we started a family. Before it could have begun to mean more than it already did. If you're here to try to get me to take you back or forget what happened, I'm sorry, but that's not what is going to go on today." "What? You moved on already?" he asked, tone heavy with skepticism. "Yes." And I had. Not just to another man who had the potential to really mean something to me. But to a version of myself that I had forgotten existed. To live somewhere that everyone cared for me. To be near my mother who I missed dearly. To do a job because I loved it, not because I was looking for adulation. He couldn't factor into any of that. "Come on, Mads," he said, shaking his head. And it was right about then that the door to the bakery opened and out walked Brant, holding his jacket and moving to slip it over my shoulders. "Figured you were cold," he offered, but his eyes also said: and maybe needed an escape. He was right on both. Once the warm jacket was on me, he moved to my side, slipping an arm possessively around my lower back, an action that certainly did not slip past Rich. "Seriously?" he asked, looking a mix of hurt and almost... disgusted? "This is a thing..." he halfasked, half-declared, waving a hand at us. "It's a thing," Brant said with a nod. "You fucked up and lost a good thing. I saw that good thing and scooped it up. And I'm not fucking it up. And you're not getting between. So I think that is about all that needs to be said here." Rich's head jerked back like Brant had struck him, but his jaw got tight and his chin lifted. "Knew you were a lot of things, Maddy," he said and I knew whatever was going to follow was out of hurt- hurt heart, hurt pride, but I honestly didn't think he had it in him to be so nasty. "But I didn't think you were a slut." With that, he walked away, leaving me literally with my mouth hanging open. "Five years with you and 'slut' is the best he could come up with?" Brant asked, shaking his head. Then his gaze moved to me, his head ducking to the side slightly for a second before his fingers snagged my chin and tilted it up so he could catch my eyes. "You're not a slut, Maddy," he said, voice firm, brooking no room for argument. "I mean, I'm all for you getting slutty with me, but that doesn't mean you're a slut. He's just being a dick because you bruised his ego." I knew that. And I knew I wasn't a slut. Far from. It was just startling hearing that accusation come from the lips of someone you thought you knew. I gave Brant a slow and saucy smile, eyes going a little wicked. "Well, now that that drama is out of the way. I have an idea of how we can get good and slutty together later." "Oh yeah?" he asked, smirking. "Yeah, it involves pineapples." And later, after we finished work, it did.

Wedding Cake Brant - 3 weeks

She moved in. After the asshole ex of hers disappeared, never to be heard from again, she simply stopped sleeping at her mother's place. Maybe at first, still trepidatious about opening up to someone again, she used Alice's boyfriend as an excuse. But it wasn't long until Alice started spending her nights at his place, helping him box up his mother's belongings and spruce up the joint. It didn't take a genius to know that he was planning on moving her in. That was why he had doilies and shabby-chic end tables instead of the shit that was likely more his style. Alice and I had talked about the eventuality of it- her moving which left me the opportunity to take the whole place over. I could blow out the walls, streamline the floor plan back to one big house with two extra bedrooms for, eventually, starting a family. Yes, it was soon. But I had never been the type of man to not know his own mind. It was why I didn't seriously date women who I knew there was no future with. It was why I didn't hesitate when I knew I needed to leave the City, when I had a plan for the coffee shop, when I set eyes on Maddy. When it felt right, my gut and my past had always proven it was right. So, for me, it didn't matter that it was soon. I wanted Maddy, case closed.

Maddy- 11 months

"Come on, I did everything exactly like you did!" my mother objected, sighing out her breath dramatically at her umpteenth attempt at a basic chocolate macaron. The only reason she was so upset was because I had decided on a macaron wedding cake. It was going to be positively massive since half the town was invited and my mother wanted to be able to help me in preparing them. The sad thing was, she had done everything exactly as I had. We had been working side-by-side. And hers still came out a weird consistency and way too flat. "I think it's time to accept that macarons are not your thing, Mom," I said, giving her a consolation smile. "Well, I still have four months to figure it out," she said, lifting her chin again, still refusing to accept there was anything French that she could not make. But she was right; there were still four more months. And I was praying like hell that my belly would stay at least somewhat flat. Sure, there were plenty of women who rocked a pregnancy belly on their wedding day, but I really wanted to take one life event at a time. As it was, things had been a whirlwind. At least by my standards. I mean, I had been with my ex for five years before he proposed. Brant had gone ahead and proposed on Christmas Eve after only dating for a little over ten months. "It's not too soon," he informed me, reading my thoughts as I looked down at the perfect princess cut ring. "It hasn't even been a year," I had insisted, shaking my head. "Sweetheart, I knew this was where we were heading that first time you moaned like a porn star over your break-up frappe." That was Brant for you; always knowing what he wanted; always going after it without hesitation. It was a trait I was wondering might rub off on me someday. As for me, well, I was still a bit of a planner, an organizer, an analyzer. Which, well, worked out for the baby growing in my belly. He or she would get the best of both worlds- their daddy's laid-back, steadfast confidence and their mother's careful uncertainty. They would get their mother's and grandmother's love of sweets and their father's passion for coffee when the were old enough. The nursery was already underway even though we hadn't told anyone yet. It was too soon. And my mother's wedding was in a month and there was no way I was going to steal her thunder, not after all she had sacrificed for me over the years, not after finding her happily ever after late in life with Rob. "I'm just saying, honey, a Fraisier for each table would be just as unique and much less work," my mother said suddenly, snapping me out of my head and making a smile pull at my lips. "Macarons or bust, Ma," I said, laughing when she let out a frustrated sigh and looked down at the recipe page again. It was right about then that a drink dropped down in front of me on the table, Brant sliding into the open chair to my side. "You know I can't have..." I started, big-eying him so I didn't have to say it. "Raspberry mocha shake with skim milk but full fat whipped cream," he explained, popping the little piece of paper topper off the straw. "Not a damn bit of actual coffee in it," he said, looking disgusted at the very prospect. "Oh, and here," he said, pulling my phone out of his pocket. "Maybe I should refrigerate this for longer," my mother concluded, grabbing the batter and going through the back. Refrigerating it wouldn't help, but I was going to let her cling to her hope. "You know, you can't pull the 'pregnancy' card every time your phone has an issue and you don't

want to go to Verizon." "True," I agreed, taking a long sip of the shake he made and closing my eyes on a sigh. "But I can for the next eight or so months," I concluded, giving him a saucy smile. He chuckled at that, reaching for the piece of paper I had in front of me with the design for the macaron wedding cake. "Macarons, huh?" he asked, looking excited. It didn't matter how many different recipes I came up with, he never seemed to get sick of them. "Alright, well, I am going to go let that sit overnight," my mother said, coming out of the back and pulling off her apron. "Rob and I have plans." Of course they did. It was New Years Eve. In just a couple of hours, it would be the exact time Rich had proposed to me. I couldn't help but think that whole day about how different my life would have been had he never taken back the proposal. I would have still been in the City, living in an expensive apartment and wearing designer labels I didn't care about but everyone else did, working at a job full of stress, and going home to a man who I didn't know loved me second best. I looked around my mother's and mine and Brant's little shop, feeling it down to my soul: peace. Then I looked over at Brant, feeling it down to my bones: love. And finally, to the plate at the center of the table where Brant and I reached toward simultaneously and grabbed one each: macarons. It was all I would ever need.

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About the Author Jessica Gadziala is a full-time writer, parrot enthusiast, and coffee drinker from New Jersey. She enjoys short rides to the book store, sad songs, and cold weather. She is very active on Goodreads, Facebook, as well as her personal groups on those sites. Join in. She's friendly.

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<3/ Jessica