Page 42 of Indecent Lies

Shame staining her already pale face.

“Hey, stop.” grasping her chin he tipped up her face.

His eyes were so brilliantly blue she felt the power of them somewhere deep inside.

“Your parents aren’t here, Poppy. They got no influence on what you do from here on out, you understand? You make the choices; you make all the decisions to do with your life.”

She nodded, biting her lip nervously.

“Paige is going to like you. You’ll like the job and there’s nothing to be worried about.”

“Okay. Okay,” she repeated, but she still didn’t make a move to leave and Tait sighed, grabbed his jacket from the hook by the door. “Come on, I’ll walk with you.”

She was so immensely relieved; she didn’t even pretend that she didn’t want him to.

The coldness of the snow air hit Poppy full in the face once they were outside and she instinctively wrapped her hands around his arm. Her way of thinking was if she fell flat on her derriere, then she was taking him with her.

At least the cold air made her feel clear headed.

She talked all the way there and when they arrived atSweets by Paige, he glanced through the window. “Go on in, have a good first day.”

“Hey, Tait?”

He sent her a look over his shoulder before he was ready to cross the street.

“Yeah?”

She grinned. “Thank you.”

She really owed him a heck of a lot.

“Was that Texas outside?” The first thing Paige Renner said when Poppy got out of the blizzard type coldness.

Poppy blinked, a little surprised.

The place smelled amazing. Serious sugar inducing goodness and she breathed deeply.

“Oh, yeah. He walked me down. I was a little nervous,” she confessed and Paige smiled sweetly. Poppy loved her pink braid.

“You’re dating Texas?”

If only, was her first thought. “No, he’s letting with stay with him for a while. I lived in New York.” And right there, in a gorgeous smelling bakery, to a woman who had pink hair and was wearing patterned tights—even before Poppy slid her coat off, she blurted out her whole sorry history.

Not leaving out the altar dash.

“In your wedding gown?” Paige’s eyes rounded and Poppy nodded vigorously while she tied herSweets by Paigeapron on.

“Wow. And I thought my amnesia story was a show stopper.” Chuckled Paige.

Poppy learned all about that in the next hour while Paige went through what she wanted her to do.

She was instantly relaxed with the other woman and it made her day go all the faster because they got on like a house on fire.

By the end of the day, Poppy was exhausted. She didn’t know selling baked goods would be so tiring or complicated. She was basically in charge of the counter while Paige baked in the back. Restocking was time consuming, especially when the bakery got really busy.

It was while she was cleaning off the counter spaces that the bell over the door rang and loud bustling male voices came with it.

She turned startled eyes to see six of the biggest bikers she’d ever seen.