Page 25 of Whisked Away
“I brought coffee.” I lift the to-go cups as I step with him into the kitchen.
He accepts a cup but sniffs it, his lips thinning like he’s fighting a grimace.
“Not a fan of coffee?”
“Um… I like coffee.”
I walk behind the counter with him, past the kitchen island where they prepare things during customer hours, and toward the glowing light of the back room. “Something wrong with this coffee, Chief?”
He looks back at me, offering a lopsided grin that makes my heart tumble, though I’d deny it to Missy and Tish forever.
“You picked that up at Hazel’s, didn’t you?”
The cups’ warmth has seeped into my hands, and suddenly, I feel a bizarre need to defend Hazel and her little run-down diner. “She makes excellent pie.”
“She does.” He nods and crosses his arms, stretching his shirt over his muscled chest, which makes it very difficult to focus on mycompletely illogical desire to defend a woman I’ve met precisely three times in my life. Then Ethan smirks. “But the magic ends there. Her coffee is terrible.”
I open my mouth to argue, but he shakes his head. “Try a taste, then tell me what you think.”
I lift the cup and breathe it in—then freeze, struggling not to cough. Ethan’s grin only widens, making me want to slap the cups down until they slosh over his spotless countertops. Jutting up my chin, I take the smallest sip. The burnt, bitter flavor floods my mouth, and I fight every muscle in my face to keep my expression neutral. The twinkle in Ethan’s eye says I’ve failed miserably.
“It’s all right,” he says. “I keep a pot of the good stuff back here.”
He sweeps his arm toward the kitchen, then offers to take the horrible coffee. I gladly hand it off. I’d rather go through the day in a caffeine-free haze than take another sip of Hazel’s coffee.
“Here we are,” Ethan says. “The heart of the Whisk.”
A breath rushes past my lips as I take in the kitchen. If I had any lingering doubts that Ethan was the real deal, this wood-countertop-laden, well-lit kitchen would dispel them.
An entire wall of shelves lines one side near the fridge. Jars with handwritten labels fill them. There are a dozen flours—whole wheat, almond, spelt, rye, and more. Below that shelf sit half a dozen jars of sugar, including demerara and pearl sugar, followed by mix-ins like cranberries and cocoa nibs.
In another corner, a large metal planter sits below a heat lamp, herbs growing happily under the golden light. A shelf to the right holds cookbooks crammed together like a game of Tetris, their pages decorated with bookmarks, tabs, and food splatters.
There are enough baking pans and spatulas back here to keep a full team busy through the busiest holiday rush, yet theonly employees I’ve seen at the Whisk so far are Ethan, Zoe, and a handful of local teenagers who run the cash register in the afternoons.
It’s eclectic and cozy and smells like creamed butter and sugar. It reminds me—I realize with a start—of my apartment’s kitchen back home. The stacks of books, the trio of overstuffed spoon holders. The variety of ingredients, a testament to someone who truly loves the craft.
For a moment, I’m somewhere else entirely. Back in my tiny kitchen, late at night, exhaustion settled deep in my bones, but Missy insisting we make cookies anyway.Mom never measured,she’d said, dumping a reckless amount of vanilla into the batter.She just knew.We’d ended up with a tray of the sweetest, messiest cookies imaginable, eating them straight from the parchment paper, burnt edges and all.
A lump forms in my throat, unexpected and unwelcome. This space, this feeling—it’s home. And I don’t know what to do with that.
Ethan watches me take in the space, his forehead furrowed. He’s worried that I might find his bakery wanting, that I’ll decide he falls short. That I’ll print it publicly for the world to read. Erase any credibility he might ever hope to gain.
Which is exactly what I’m here to do.
To my right, a dozen glass jars of sourdough starters are pushed against the back wall, each labeled in Sharpie with various clever names. Doughy Parton sits next to Sir Rise-a-Lot, and at the very end, a particularly bubbly batch bears the label Bread Sheeran.
“Cute names,” I say as Ethan hands me a mug of coffee. I take a deep breath and close my eyes, savoring the aroma. Now this is excellent coffee—warm, bold, and with just the right hint of something nutty.
He hides his face behind his own mug. “Zoe named them.”
“What are we working on today?”
He takes another sip, then sets his mug down. “Lavender cake to start—a special order for Mrs. Delehay’s bridge club. In an hour, when Zoe comes in, we’ll get the morning pastries going and start prep for the lunch crowd.”
He offers me an apron, and I loop it over my head and tie it on. The motion is comforting—familiar. Being awake before the rest of the world, the whir of ovens warming, the quiet hum of the kitchen—this is a rhythm I know.
Ethan pulls down a mixing bowl, setting it on the counter with a soft thump. He gathers ingredients, including a jar of dried lavender buds.
