Page 16 of Bad Boy Bakers, Vol. 2

Her level of don’t-wanna was pretty damned high. But he’d done his part. It was time to suck it up and do hers. “Putting it off isn’t gonna make it any easier.” She crouched to pull on her second bootie. “Was he headed home?”

“Yeah. They were expecting us for dinner in an hour, anyway. I’ll come with you.”

She laid her hands on his forearms, rising to her toes to brush a kiss over his lips. “No. I think I need to do this on my own. Give me a twenty- or thirty-minute lead?”

“I can do that. I have a few phone calls to return.”

“Take care of business. I’ll see you over there.”

She made it halfway to the door before he snagged her hand. “Hadley?”

“Yeah?”

He lifted her hand and pressed a kiss to her palm, brown eyes steady on hers. “I’m glad we don’t have to hide anymore.”

Heart fluttering, she smiled. “Me, too.”

The warm, gooey feeling in her chest stayed with her until she pulled into the driveway. Not allowing herself a moment to wallow in the anxiety lurking beneath the surface, Hadley shut her car door and looked at the house, dreading going inside just as much as she had been three days ago.

Stop being a chicken shit, Steele.

Squaring her shoulders, she headed up the walk.

Because they were expecting her, she didn’t knock.

The quiet snick of the door was lost in the clatter of dishes and pans from the kitchen.

Dinner prep was clearly underway. Following the noise, she found her brother nibbling on his wife’s neck as she tried to chop some vegetables for whatever was for dinner.

Maddie was ensconced at the kitchen table, surrounded by worksheets.

“You know, you really shouldn’t do that while your wife is holding a knife. Fingers are important.”

Cayla lifted her free hand to comb through the hair at his nape. “Much as I’m enjoying this, she’s not wrong, and I need to finish chopping these carrots.”

Holt shot a narrow-eyed glare in her direction, but his grin took the heat out of it. “Spoil-sport.”

Maddie abandoned her homework in favor of hitting Hadley with a tackle hug. “Play with me!”

Hadley stroked her hair. “I’ll play with you in a bit, okay? I think you still have some homework to do, and I need to talk to your dad.” It was a weird thing to say, though Holt had absolutely claimed Maddie as his, even before the adoption went through.

“Can I have another marker tattoo?” She folded her hands in prayer position and deployed The Eyes. Hadley recognized the tactic as one she’d used to great effect at that age.

“If there’s time before or after dinner.”

“There will be time!”

Smiling, Hadley headed for the door to the backyard, jerking her head at her brother. He and BB trailed her outside. The air was cooling with the onset of sundown, and Hadley crossed her arms, ranging herself next to her brother as they both watched the dog sniff the perimeter of the yard.

Do it fast. Like ripping off a Band-aid. “So, Cash said he talked to you.”

“Yeah.”

“How upset are you, really?” Maybe he hadn’t been honest about it with Cash.

“Are you happy?”

That made her look at him because it was a loaded question. He stood beside her, big arms folded across his chest, his blue eyes steady on hers. “With him?”

Holt jerked a nod.

“Yeah. We didn’t expect it to be like this. I wasn’t expecting this to turn into anything serious. I thought we’d satisfy our curiosity and be done. That’s not what happened.”

“Life often surprises us. My marriage is proof of that.”

“True enough.” After the last few days, she wasn’t sure she could handle any more surprises.

With one hand, he tweaked the ends of her hair in an old gesture of affection. “Why didn’t you want to tell me?”

“I legit thought you’d want to pound on him. You’ve always been so overly protective. It’s why I’ve never told you about anybody I’ve dated.”

“It was my job to protect you growing up, when you were too young to be able to do it yourself. I used to be a stupid teenage boy. I knew how they thought, so yeah, I was gonna look out for you. But I never would have worried about you with Cash. He’s not a man who plays with anybody.

He certainly wouldn’t play with you. You both built this whole thing up in your heads for what I was gonna do, based on—I don’t know—assumptions or conventions or something.

If he’d been sniffing around when you were eighteen, that would have been a very different conversation with the age gap.

But you’re a grown adult now. I don’t have any right to interfere in your love life unless I find out that somebody is treating you poorly.

I know he won’t.” He draped his arm around her shoulders and squeezed.

“It seems like you make each other happy, so I’ve got no reason not to be happy for you. ”

She shot him some side eye even as she leaned into his familiar comfort. “That’s it? That’s all you have to say about it?”

“Yeah. I know he’ll treat you well. I know everything he was prepared to give up for you, if I didn’t react well. It tells me he’s serious. Are you?”

She thought of the life growing inside her. “It would be hard not to be at this point.” Resting her head against his shoulder, she sighed. “He’s pretty amazing.”

“Yeah, he is. Big-picture-wise, I think you’ll be good for him. He can be too serious, too buttoned down. You’ll combat that just by being who you are.”

It was Hadley’s turn to laugh. “Yeah, I do a lot of that. He’s stable. So very stable—in a good way. That’s good for me, too.”

“I never would’ve imagined you two together, but the idea’s growing on me. Are you hanging out in serious see-where-it-goes territory or long-term potential?”

He really was being remarkably chill about this whole thing. She’d have laid odds on him making all kinds of assumptions and demands on how they ought to proceed from here. It was nice to be surprised and not have any more pressure on that front. It was a weighty decision either way.

She thought about the conversations she’d had with Cash since yesterday.

He’d insisted he wanted her, no matter what.

That he wouldn’t judge her, whichever way she chose.

That he’d be there with her, by her side, supporting her.

She believed him. And because she did, she admitted the truth.

“Yeah, I think we’re thinking long term.

We were already thinking about it, whether we admitted it or not, and now, it’ll be what’s best for the baby. ”

The arm around her stiffened, and he pivoted to face her. “You’re pregnant?”

Faced with his complete and utter shock, all she could think was Oops.

Apparently, Cash hadn’t told him everything after all.