Page 20 of Knot Baked Out For This
I know it in my bones, in the way his gaze dissects me, cataloguing changes—new freckles, the scar on my wrist I keep hidden, the way I've learned to make myself smaller. His hands are empty. Not even pretending to want the cookies.
He remembers how I used to look at him. Before.
I am catastrophically unprepared. Not physically—my body is already responding, omega biology flooding me with hormones I don't want. Not emotionally—my heart is attempting to exit through my throat. Not even gastrointestinally—my stomach has decided to become a black hole.
This is my ex's best friend. The Alpha I trusted enough to cry in front of. The one who saw the bruises, saw the rope marks on my wrists where?—
Stop. Don't go there. Not here.
He saw everything and said nothing because pack loyalty trumps Omega safety every fucking time.
That's not fair to Rowan.
Since when has fairness mattered in this town?
The air between us thickens until I could chew it. I make a sound—part laugh, part death rattle—and thrust a sample plate at him with visibly trembling fingers.
"Pumpkin crème?" My voice comes out high, thin, desperate. "It's mandatory. Town ordinance."
He blinks like I've spoken in ancient tongues. Then—deliberately, slowly, like he's afraid I'll bolt—he takes the plate. Doesn't eat. Just holds it, those fire-gold eyes performing vivisection on my soul.
He sees everything. Every flaw. Every weakness. Every place where I'm still broken.
Three years, and my body still thinks Rowan Cambridge has the right to look at me like this.
He doesn't speak. Rowan never was a talker unless you cornered him about animal rescue or single-malt whiskey or the infrastructure failures that led to the Meadowbrook Avenue fire.
The last time he spoke to me directly, he was telling me I could leave. That it was "safe now." That his pack would "handle the paperwork."
Safe. Like safety is something Alphas can grant instead of something they take away.
He sets the plate down—untouched, because of course—and leans in. Elbows on my table, face suddenly too close. I can see the scar above his left eyebrow I don't remember, the shadow of stubble that would leave marks, the exhaustion carved into the corners of his eyes.
"Need something else?" The question escapes before I can stop it, thinner than tissue paper.
He shakes his head slowly, gestures at the pastries.
"You made these?"
I nod, unable to form words.
"They're good." He hasn't tasted them.
Compliment or accusation? With Alphas, there's no difference.
I look away, rearranging cookies that don't need rearranging, anything to avoid those eyes that see too much, remember too much, want too much.
He lingers. I think he's going to say more—maybe even sayit, acknowledge what happened, what he let happen—but Rowan Cambridge is nothing if not consistent. He pulls back with that ghost-quiet step, leaving only cedar smoke and the taste of regret.
I exhale, shaky and thin, fighting the urge to crawl under the table and cease existing.
First customer of the night. Of course it was him. The universe isn't done punishing me yet.
His presence doesn't ask permission—it takes. The air gets heavier, pressurized. My skin becomes hyperaware of everything: every old scar, every place another Alpha marked me, every soft spot that still aches in the rain.
But it's his scent that devastates.
It steamrolls through the bookstore's pumpkin-spice attempts at ambiance. Deep cedar smoke mixed with bourbon vanilla, cinnamon bark, and that particular smell of firewood after rain. It sinks into my bones, rewrites my nervous system, tells every omega instinct towake up, pay attention, remember what you're missing.
