I don’t remember dreaming. Either I was too tired, or too mentally fucked to retain it. Which is tragic, honestly, because let’s be real, it was probably me and Edgar in a coffin, making questionable use of his tie and a velvet-lined cushion.
Shit. I need to get up.
I stagger to my feet like a newborn deer with trust issues as my mind drifts to Blake.
“He’s just sweet,” I say, trying to soothe my rapidly spiraling heart rate. “Sweet. Not dangerous. A soft cinnamon roll.”
A vivid, stupidly vivid flash of his forearms while he dug up my garden hits me like a tactical assault.
“Okay. A sharp-edged cinnamon roll. That’s fine. Totally manageable.”
It’s just a casual breakfast. Two innocent words. Harmless. Utterly undeserving of the internal Category Five crisis they’ve triggered.
And yet my bedroom looks like it’s been ransacked by indecisive raccoons high on espresso and anxiety. Clothes everywhere. Piles. Layers. Entire timelines of aesthetic identity. Is she cozy academia? Is she flirty farmer’s market? Is she accidentally about to proposition a man over scrambled eggs?
“It’s just eggs,” I whisper, clutching a sundress like it’s a detonator and I’m seconds from horny self-destruction. “It’s just eggs.”
Outfit number six is a romper that shows exactly the right amount of thigh. Or the wrong amount. I don’t know anymore. Maybe he’s a leg guy. Maybe he’s a neckline guy. Maybe he’s into women who look like they’ve fought a poltergeist in their closet at six a.m.
God, I’m sweating. From panic. Or lust. Possibly both. Probably both.
I’ve buried men with less emotional turbulence. Hell, I am the turbulence. So why is Blake making me feel like I need a parachute?
I literally complimented his ass one time and the man short-circuited like a broken Roomba. Blake adores me. Worships the ground I walk on with gooey, golden retriever devotion. I couldprobably flash a knee and he’d run headfirst into a screen door like a malfunctioning retriever drone.
And it’s just breakfast. Casual. Safe. Harmless.
So why does it feel like I’m about to be cross-examined in the Court of Hot Men and My Terrible Choices?
I open the sliding door to let the morning breeze in while the coffee pot hisses like it, too, is judging me. The sun is warm. The air smells like wet grass and mild panic.
I look to Gary, the smug, ceramic bastard of a garden gnome perched by the door.
“Gary,” I whisper like we’re in a spy thriller. “Be honest with me. Do I look like I’m trying too hard?”
Gary, stone-faced and bearded, says nothing. As usual. Passive-aggressive little fuck.
“You’re a bad friend, Gary,” I inform him with the gravitas of a woman betrayed.
Gary doesn’t blink. Because Gary doesn’t have eyelids. Or empathy. Or fashion sense.
I pace back to the mirror, heels clicking like I’m entering a boss fight.
“It’s just eggs. It’s just eggs. It’s just eggs,” I chant like it’s a binding spell, adjusting my dress straps for the ninth time. “Definitely not a high-stakes romance breakfast with an emotionally complicated golden retriever in man-form. Nope. Just eggs. Purely poultry-based. No feelings. Just food.”
Knock knock.
My soul detaches from my body like it just filed for divorce.
I stagger to the front door like I’m heading into battle. Open it.
And there he is.
Blake. Standing there like the poster boy for awkwardly perfect morning sex you didn’t plan for. Smile crooked, handsstuffed in his pockets, sun lighting up his cheekbones like God’s doing thirst traps now.
I forget how to breathe. Fully. Entirely. Because apparently, this is what “just eggs” looks like now.
Blake in a Henley. Soft gray, clingy in all the right places. His hair’s a little damp and messy like he’s run a hand through it too many times, and he smells like sunshine and nervous sweat and my entire goddamn undoing.