Page 14 of The Longshot

“Like what you see?” She stands restlessly, watching as I take in the space around me.

I scan her up and down—she can’t be anymore than five-foot-four. I tower almost a foot taller than her, yet that personality of hers makes me feel like she towers over me.

I’ll keep that visual for later.

“Very much so.” I confidently lean against the counter. “And I’m not just talking about the shop.”

She rolls her eyes, murmuring, “I should’ve seen that one coming,” under her breath before she reaches for a bag of frosting and surveys it against my jumper. “By the looks of it…” She cranes her neck from side to side. “It’s vanilla frosting. But what about the sponge?” she probes. “Was it chocolate? Vanilla? Half and half?”

Heat rises to my cheeks as I attempt to recall Coach’s explicit instructions.

Was it chocolate cake with vanilla frosting?

Or vanilla cake with vanilla frosting?

I rub along the back of my neck, peering up at the ceiling like it holds the answers I’m hopelessly searching for.

“Let’s go with chocolate,” she suggests confidently as I struggle to remember. “I’m sure your sister likes chocolate. Right?”

I cock a confused brow before I nod my head in agreement—Delaney’s my “sister”, right...

Wait.

Would that make Coach my brother-in-law?

I chuckle at the thought, an action that prompts her to flash me a look of concern.

“You alright over there?”

I snap back into it. “Yep. All good here, though…” I assess her face much more intricately. “Why haven’t I seen you around before? You must be new to town.”

“Am I?” She tilts her head. “Maybe I’ve just been seeing refuge away from the guy who likes to show up at bakeries and demand a cake at the very last minute. Have you heard of him? Is this a habit of yours?”

I bite down on my lower lip.

She’s warming up to me.

“This isn’t a habit.” I break the space between the two of us with a confident stride forward. “But I can make it one if you like?”

There's a pause in conversation as she gazes up at me and now that I’m this close to her, I can’t help but grow even fonder.

She’s got freckles. Sporadic freckles, ones I’d love to spend all day connecting the dots to.

She has baby blue, almost icy eyes, yet somehow, there’s a tinge of green in them, too. But it’s not the color of her eyes that leaves me stumped; it’s the look behind them.

The look that tells me she's as equally intrigued by me as she is closed off—she doesn’t trust me and I can tell that's beyond just that of me being a stranger. There’s more. There has to be.

She doesn’t respond, instead she tucks some stray hair behind her ear before turning on her heel and making a bee-line back into the kitchen.

I take short steps to follow her behind the counter, yet the sound of my footsteps is enough to halt her in place.

“You can’t come back here!” she commands firmly, prompting me to remorsefully stumble back. “You stay here behind the counter and I’ll finish the cake, got it?”

I have to bring my fingertips up to my mouth to suppress the smirk that dares to break free.

Yep, bossiness is being added to the kink list.

“Whatever you say, darling,” I murmur. “I’ll just wait out here.”

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