Page 15 of Flake It Til You Make It

“Heiscute,” Rocco allowed. There was nothing wrong with laying some groundwork just in case. Besides, it wasn’t like he hadn’t already told Taylor to his face that he thought he was hot.

“You should ask him out,” Rebecca said. Still casually. But he could practicallyfeelher eagerness.

“I don’t think he’s interested,” Rocco said, but he didn’t know if that was necessarily true. Taylor had that interesting polite-but-cold front, but for a second, Rocco had sworn he’d felt the same attraction he did.

He’d just hidden it better.

Well, that made sense, because Rocco didn’t care about hiding it.

“You don’t know that he’s not,” Rebecca said encouragingly. “You two would be so cute together.”

“Not everyone wants to date,” Rocco said, whichwastrue.

He’d hoped to be far too busy for a boyfriend. Yet, he’d gone and sat next to Taylor anyway, at Rudolph’s, and then had made that suggestion.

Really, he was lucky Taylor hadn’t looked at him like he was nuts and gotten as far away from him as possible. Okay, he hadn’tagreed, but he had said he’d consider it, in that quiet, considerate, restrained way of his.

That way that made Rocco want to know what Taylor Hall would be like when all that restraint melted away.

“You forget I saw you two the first time you met,” Rebecca added slyly. “There was definitely some kind of heat there. He stammered more than once. Taylor doesn’tdothat.”

“Maybe he was massively embarrassed that I was making a pumpkin spice-sized mistake,” Rocco retorted.

“Andyou stared at his ass on his way out.”

“Have you seen his ass? It’d be a crime tonotlook at it.”

The front doorbell chimed, but before Rocco could straighten up and look at who’d come in, Rebecca said, “Keep telling yourself that, okay?”

“Why—”

But before Rocco could get the rest of the question out, he spotted why she’d said it in the first place,andwhy she’d said it all knowing and fond like that.

Because yep, there was Taylor himself, approaching the front counter.

“I’ll be cleaning the tables,” Rebecca said and then embarrassingly headed instead towards the back, making it crystal clear just what she was doing.

Leaving the two of them alone-ish, other than the pair of tourists by the window who were sharing a ham and gruyere croissant sandwich and a large pot of coffee.

“Hey,” Taylor said.

“Come in to discover what you’ve been missing?” Rocco asked. His brain kept screaming,hot guy, hot guy, hot guy, and he couldn’t seem to help the flirty comment.

Taylor gave him one of those blank-ish, stern looks with his light blue eyes, and Rocco shouldn’t have been so into that, but hewas,undeniably.

I just want to know how deep that ice goes.

“I’m not here for coffee,” Taylor said.

Oh yes, please, Rocco’s uncooperative subconscious purred.

“But surely I can persuade you to trysomething. I promise, I’ll keep my goat cheese to myself,” Rocco teased.But that’s all I’ll keep to myself.

Taylor flushed, and there it was. The first inkling of what lay beneath all that composure. “Maybe . . .uh . . .what doesn’t have coffee in it?”

“Hot chocolate? Caramel apple cider?”

“I’m surprised you didn’t take those off the menu, too,” Taylor said, his voice calm and serious, but his eyes full of amusement.

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