Page 23 of Pretty Desperate (Pine Village #6)

JILLIAN

I make myself a decaf caramel iced coffee and head toward his table. “Ladies, holler if you need me,” I say to the quad group of regular customers. They come in every Tuesday afternoon and enjoy a drink and pastry together.

“Take a break, dear. We’ll be fine,” one of them replies.

Kameron is taking his first bite of his cupcake when I reach him. “Mind if I join you?”

He swallows his cake and nods. “Please do. This is fantastic. It’s not overly sweet or zesty. Sometimes you get a lemon dessert, and it’s too much.”

I take a sip of my iced coffee and set it on the table. “Thank you. I think there’s more flavor when you don’t overdo it, if you know what I mean.”

“I do,” he says, taking a second bite. “And the blueberry is nothing but complementary.”

“I usually do vanilla buttercream instead of a lemon flavored so it’s not too strong.”

“Well done. I might even take one to go before I leave,” he replies with a wink.

Grinning, I add, “If there’s any left.”

I watch as he enjoys his cupcake. When he’s down to the last bite, he asks, “Are you the only one here?”

I nod. “In the afternoons, yes. Lisa is one of my part-timers, and she’s here six to twelve, four days a week.

Helen works one day a week and fills in when Lisa needs time off, and then there’s Emmalynn, who’s a senior in high school.

She works with me on Saturdays and helps do cake deliveries when needed. ”

“I know Helen,” he replies, taking his final bite of his cupcake. “She was friends with my mom, even though she was a bit older.”

I nod, realizing this was the first time he’s mentioned either of his parents.

I know the story—bad news travels fast in a small town—and remember them from when I was growing up.

“Helen is a godsend and doesn’t seem to mind being called last minute.

She retired a few years back and just wanted to be out of the house a little bit.

She agreed to one day a week, but since Lisa is a young mom, sometimes she is needed to fill in when one of Lisa’s boys is sick or has a field trip or something. ”

“She comes into the restaurant with her husband from time to time, but it’s…hard. She gets emotional when she sees me. I definitely caught her by surprise when I stopped in last Friday for coffee. She wasn’t expecting me.”

My throat is thick with emotion and my eyes fill with tears. “I can imagine.”

He gives me a soft smile. “Not that I blame her. She was a good friend. My mom loved her.”

I nod, recalling hearing the news more than a decade ago about the untimely passing of both Sidney and Peter Markley.

They were in a car accident outside of town on an icy road.

They slid through a T-intersection, breaking through an already-damaged guardrail from a previous accident two days prior, falling into a ravine below.

Because of the weather, no one was out and about, and unfortunately, they weren’t discovered until it was too late.

Both passed from injuries sustained in the accident, and the town was left reeling from the loss.

He clears his throat and looks down at his empty plate.

“It’s why I moved home. I was already starting to miss the small-town lifestyle I grew up in, but I needed that connection to them, even though they were both gone.

I had been thinking about starting my own restaurant, but it was when I came home for their funeral and to get their affairs in order I realized what my next step was going to be. ”

A sad smile stretches across my face as I reach out and place my hand on top of his. “They’d be very proud of you.”

“Thank you,” he replies, his words heavy with emotion. “I’m certain they would have been my first customers in the door on opening night.”

I remember seeing the photos in the local newspaper of his opening and how he dedicated that night to his parents. In fact, now that I think of it, a photograph of them hangs inside the door at the hostess stand. “I’m sure they would have.”

“Were your parents your first customers?” he asks curiously.

I nod. “They were. They insisted on standing out on the sidewalk on that cold December morning and watch me flip the sign to open.”

He smiles. “I’m glad.”

“They took me to a celebratory dinner later in the week to your restaurant.”

Kameron seems genuinely surprised by that. “They did?”

“Of course. Your place is the nicest restaurant we have, and sometimes the occasion calls for a step up over the diner and Mexican restaurant in town.”

“It does. That’s why I chose that avenue.

I didn’t want to directly compete with another local staple in town.

My previous experience was high-end steak houses, so that’s the route I continued on.

But there’s also a difference between a Chicago steak house and Pine Village steak house, so I had to take the location into consideration from the start. ”

“You’ve done well, Kam.”

He blushes a bit at the compliment. “Thanks.”

The ladies across the room stand up, scooting in their chairs and picking up their trash. “The cake was delicious, Jillian,” one of them says.

“See you next Tuesday,” another adds as they all head for the door.

“Enjoy your afternoon, ladies. See you next week.”

The air surrounding us thickens as we’re left alone. He looks so casual, so relaxed as he stares at me. “So, now what?”

Clearing the dryness from my throat, I answer, “Well, now I would go in back and do some dishes. I’d clean the table that was just vacated, and then I’d prepare to decorate the cakes for tomorrow morning’s pickup.”

“Cakes?” he asks, his eyes full of excitement.

“Yes. That’s a big part of my business and usually what I do in the afternoons and evenings after I close.”

“Interesting,” he replies, leaning back and taking a drink of his tea. “How many cakes do you make?”

“In a week? Gosh, some weeks it’s only one or two, but others, it might be ten to fifteen.”

His eyes widen comically. “Fifteen cakes? A week?”

I shrug. “Fall is a busy birthday season. Apparently, a lot of people make babies during the winter.”

He chuckles at my comment. “I can see that. Not much to do in the dead of winter when you’re stuck inside but…make babies.” His eyes dance with anticipation and desire, and I have to squeeze my thighs together to ward off the onslaught of need it provokes.

Suddenly, he stands up. “How about I help you?”

His abrupt movement catches me off guard. “Help?”

“Yeah. I’ll go clean the table and help you prepare to close, and you can do your cake prep stuff.”

My legs seem a little unsteady as I stand up and face him. He’s so damn beautiful, he’s like the sun. You don’t want to look directly at him because it’ll hurt your eyes. “You want to help?”

“Of course,” he says with a casual shrug. “Unless you don’t want the help. I know what it’s like having someone underfoot and messing up your rhythm. Just say the word and I’ll leave.”

“No,” I blurt out, unnaturally fast.

He cracks a smile. “Okay, but if you ever want me to go, just say the word. You can tell me you have to wash your hair or something, and I will leave without asking questions.”

“Like a code phrase?” My lips flicker upward in a hint of a smile.

“Yes, exactly.”

“All right. How are you at dishes?”

He pretends to push up imaginary sleeves on his shirt. “Are you kidding? I’m great at them. In fact, that’s how I got my start in culinary excellence. I used to wash dishes at Frannie’s Diner.”

I turn to head toward the kitchen area. “Really? I didn’t know that.”

“Yep. Saul taught me some of my early tricks and tips in the kitchen,” he confirms, following me behind the counter. “He was a great mentor.”

“That’s cool. I bet he’s super proud of you too.”

He slowly nods his head, running his hands through his hair. “I think so. He stops by for dinner once or twice a month. He always brings his sister, Frannie, and treats her. I give them the best table in the house.”

“Which one is that?” I find myself asking.

“The one I use with you.”

My heart is doing this happy little jig in my chest, and I want to throw in some hand motions, like raise the roof. That’s how much of a weirdo I am. “That’s nice of you,” I tell him, reaching into the sanitation bucket and removing the warm cloth.

“I got this,” he says, taking the cloth from my hand and wringing it out.

I can’t help but stand here and watch as he walks to the table my customers had vacated and starts wiping it down.

You can tell he’s in the food industry, because he carefully moves the napkin holder in the middle and wipes beneath it.

Then, he wipes down the holder before replacing it in the center of the table.

He even goes as far as to wipe the chairs down, including the backrest and the seat before pushing them beneath the table.

My eyes go ahead and take a leisurely stroll down his backside, memorizing the way his ass looks in a pair of blue jeans. They fit well too, like they were custom-made to accentuate everything God gave him, including an impressive bulge in the front.

“Quit staring at me, perv,” he quips, offering me a wink and a grin when my eyes finally meet his.

“I can if I want,” I insist, grabbing the small stack of dirty trays I pulled from the display case. “It’s one of the perks of being your girlfriend.”

He laughs hard. “I guess that’s true. Lord knows I’ve been doing my fair share of perving.

” He looks down, clearly gawking at my chest before his eyes drop to below my waist. If only I could read his thoughts, because I’m certain they’re in the gutter, and frankly, I wouldn’t mind hearing them.

Like a detailed list of everything he’d do to me the moment he got me naked.

Is it suddenly hot in here?

I head to the kitchen and start filling up one of the sink basins with hot, soapy water. When I turn off the water, Kameron is there. “Go get your cake work ready. I got this.”