Page 18 of Sweet Somethings

She stared back at him, sensing there was more behind his words than he would ever tell her. "Would you?"

He nodded, but didn't elaborate.

"Well, maybe he'll come back another day," she said, taking one last glance around, but she knew the child was long gone.

"Probably not for a few days if he saw you chasing him."

"He did see me." She thought for a moment. "I wonder if I should go by the closest elementary school and see if I can find him."

"Whoa, seriously?" he asked in surprise. "You're going to scout out the school now?"

"What if he's in trouble?"

"What if he just wanted to see if he could steal a cookie right out from under your nose?"

"I don't think it was that."

"It could have been."

He had a point. "Well, I'll think about it. I should get back to the bakery. Mornings are my busiest time. Susan probably wonders where the hell I went."

He fell into step alongside her, which surprised her even more. "Maybe I'll take you up on your free dessert offer. I'm hungry," he said.

"I thought you didn't eat sweets."

"Since I came back to Fairhope, I'm doing a lot of things I normally don't do."

"Like what else?" she asked, as they walked back toward town.

He shrugged. "Chase women who are chasing little boys."

She made a face at him. "No one asked you to do that."

A smile played around his lips again. "The bunny slippers intrigued me. I couldn't resist."

"They slowed me down. I would have caught that kid if I'd been in regular shoes."

"I'm sure."

She cast him a sideways glance, knowing he wouldn't like her next question, but she couldn't stop herself. "What's the story with you and Doug Winters? Your conversation at Donavan's didn't look friendly."

As she'd expected, his expression shut down, his profile turning hard. "We were friends before. We're not now."

"That's it? You can't be a little more expansive? What happened between you? Why did you stop being friends?"

"It's not your business, Juliette."

He was right about that, but she was too curious to back off. "Maybe it would be good for you to talk about what happened. You could get rid of bad feelings, release the past."

"I doubt that would occur." He shot her a look. "You seem to talk about everything that's on your mind, and you're still trapped in the past."

Now it was her turn to frown. "That's not true."

"It's completely true. That's why you want to buy your old house, isn't it? You can't let go of the past."

"Well, my past was happy. Yours apparently wasn't."

"You've got me there, but it's my business. You need to stop meddling in everyone else's life. That little kid probably doesn't need your help, and God knows I don't need your assistance." He stopped walking and gave her an irritated look. "I've changed my mind about the pastry. I think I'll stick to an all-protein breakfast."

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