Page 68 of Home Sweet Home

“Always got better grades in classes with hot teachers.” He winked, making her heartbeat accelerate. “What’s next, captain?”

“Flour.” When West reached for a measuring cup, she stopped him. “Better to use the scale. Flour compacts in the bag.”

Evie set out the scale Kayla had bought her and started pouring flour into the bowl, nearly tearing up when the scale ticked up smoothly. The weight was accurate down to the gram. It was a huge improvement over her old, broken scale, and the one good thing to come out of her birthday.

West came up behind Evie, his body pressing hers against the counter. His arms on either side of her, he planted a kiss on her neck, making her forget who she was, where she was, and what she had been doing. His words were low and soft in her ear. “You know, you’re pretty damn cute when you’re telling me all the things I’m doing wrong.”

Okay, maybe the scale isn’t the only good thing to come out of my birthday.For a second, Evie let herself melt into him, forgetting her flour on the scale.

A loud thud interrupted them, and Evie jumped, looking around to see where it had come from. She didn’t see anyone or anything, but Josh had probably dropped something. Her dad wasn’t around when she’d gotten home from practice, and Josh had tucked himself away in his room, though until the noise, she’d almost forgotten.

“Josh is home,” Evie said with a sheepish smile.

West held up his hands in surrender and grinned. “Best behavior. What’s next, Peach?”

She taught him how to sift the flour through a sieve, making it as light as the first snow, the kind that didn’t stick. They browned butter, and when West tried to turn up the heat on the stove to melt it faster, she swatted his hand away from the knob. They whisked together eggs, sugar, and salt until they were a huge, fluffy yellow mess that wouldn’t have been out of place on Easter. She taught him how to mix it all together oh so carefully with a rubber spatula, so the eggs didn’t lose air. And as they worked, the sinking feeling she’d woken up with that morning burrowed through her.

With the cake in the oven and the timer set, they settled into chairs at the table. West’s legs were spread wide underneath it, his knees brushing up against hers.

“That’s how you make a cake?” he asked. “I just poured the mix into a bowl and added all the shit on the box.”

“I know,” Evie said. “It was obvious by how it tasted.”

West leaned back in his seat and held his hand to his heart as if she’d shot him clean through with an arrow. “You sure know how to hit me where it hurts.”

Her hand inched forward to cover his. “It doesn’t matter how it tasted. It matters that you made it.”

“You usually make your own birthday cake?” West asked.

It was an innocent question, but Evie glanced toward where they’d been standing at the counter. If she closed her eyes, she could see her mom there, smiling at her over a mixer full of white buttercream. “Come get a taste,” she would say, waving Evie over.

Evie nodded, biting her lip, hoping the pain would cancel out the tightening of her chest.

West glanced toward the oven. Evie had turned the light on so they could watch the cake rise as it baked. “What do you think? How’s this one going to be compared to last year’s?”

“I didn’t make one last year,” Evie said softly. “My mom… We used to make the cake together.”

“Oh,” West said, his eyes going wide at the realization. “That’s why you don’t like your birthday? It reminds you of your mom?”

A lump, as thick as batter, formed in Evie’s throat. “The last birthday we made it together… We were out of eggs, so she went to the IGA to get some. Half an hour later, the doorbell rang. A pickup truck ran a red light, apparently. Faulty brakes he’d been dragging his feet on getting fixed. Didn’t find that out until later. They told me it was instant.”

She remembered exactly when they told her. It was like the floor had opened underneath her and she was free-falling, grasping around for something tangible to wrap her fingers around, but there was nothing but air.

West shook his head. “God, I’m sorry. I had no idea, or I wouldn’t have asked.”

It was enough of a reason to dread her birthday, but there was more to it, thoughts that crept up on her no matter how hard she tried to push them away.

Evie inhaled, drawing in the tiniest breath, the biggest one her lungs would allow. Tears pushed up through the corners of her eyes. She pinched her thigh, hard enough to break the skin, but it didn’t stop them from sliding down her cheeks like warm butter.

“Hey,” West said, pulling her into him.

She burrowed her face into his chest so he couldn’t see. His hand rubbed her back in small, slow, comforting circles as the tears flowed out of her. The dam she’d worked hard to construct was completely destroyed.

“Can you get me a paper towel?” Evie asked, her voice muffled in the fabric of his shirt. “I’m getting you all wet.”

“I don’t mind,” he said, but he got up anyway, and when he left her, she wished that he hadn’t. He was back in a second, though, handing her a half sheet. “Here. But you can use my shirt if you like that better.”

Evie laughed, and snot shot out of her nose, which she wiped away with the towel. The laugh was quickly replaced with dread as the weight of what she’d done landed on her. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

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