Page 24 of The Gingerbread Bakery (Dream Harbor #5)

Chapter Twenty-One

Then

‘I think we should have sex.’

Mac nearly choked on his French fry.

‘You think we should…’ He couldn't bring himself to finish the sentence. He had clearly misheard her.

‘Have sex,’ Annie helpfully supplied, stealing a fry from his plate.

She had ordered the chocolate-chip pancakes, but somehow in the weeks that they’d been hanging out, it had become normal for her to steal some of whatever he had ordered.

Like it had become normal for them to meet in this same booth at the diner to make their plans for the day.

Somehow, in just a few weeks, he and Annie had become normal.

‘Shh…’ Mac said, glancing at the other diners. ‘You can’t just say things like that!’

Annie laughed. ‘What? Are you afraid of the town elders hearing or something?’

‘Kinda, yeah.’

She shook her head like he was being ridiculous, but the last thing he needed was for his mother’s mah-jongg group to hear him discuss his sex life out in public.

‘Hear me out,’ she said, as though he needed to be convinced to have sex with the girl he couldn't stop thinking about, the girl he loved kissing and hanging out with.

Of course he didn't need convincing, but Annie was already in full argument-mode.

It made Mac think that if this bakery thing didn't work out, she should consider lawyering.

‘First of all, I think we have established that we are physically compatible,’ she said, laying the arguments out on her fingers.

Mac grinned. They had proven that several times over the past week.

Making out with Annie had become his new favorite thing to do.

In fact, his whole drive-cross-country-to-find-himself plan would be unnecessary if the thing he could be was the guy who kissed Annie.

‘Secondly,’ she went on, ‘I know you were worried about making rash decisions in the heat of the moment that I might regret, but this is something I have given a lot of thought to over the past few days and I have decided it's a good idea.’

Mac’s brain tripped over the image of Annie thinking about them having sex. Sure, he had been thinking about it pretty much nonstop, but to know she had been thinking about it, too, was a whole new level of hot.

‘And third,’ she said, ready to drive her argument home as though Mac wasn’t ready to drag her out of this booth and back to his bed already. ‘We are working with a limited timeline, and if we only have a few more days together then this is what I want to do.’

Mac felt himself deflate. She’d brought up the one thing they had been avoiding, the fact that he still planned on leaving after the New Year. Not that he’d managed to tell his parents yet but that was another thing he was very specifically not thinking about.

There was a ticking clock on this thing between him and Annie, and he knew that, but more and more, Mac found himself wondering what would happen if there wasn’t? What if he stayed? Would he and Annie continue on like this? Would she still want to see him?

‘What do you think?’ Annie asked, stealing another fry.

She wasn’t meeting his eye anymore. The bravery she’d had during her fully planned argument seemed to have left her for the moment and now she looked nervous.

And what was Mac supposed to say? No, I don’t think we should have sex because I’m worried that, if we do, I’ll get even more attached to you, and then how will I leave?

Or yes, we absolutely should, because I have also been thinking about it nonstop and I know that I will one hundred percent regret it if I leave town without being with you in every way possible?

Neither option sounded like the response of a sane and reasonable person.

This thing between them was supposed to be to kill some time before the holiday.

He couldn’t go saying crazy things like that.

And he really didn’t know how Annie would react to any of it.

All he knew was that Annie was a woman with a plan and, if this was how he fit into it, then who was he to turn it down?

Sex with a beautiful, funny, smart girl? Mac never claimed to be the brightest bulb in the box, but even he could figure out the answer to this one.

In the end he was saved from having to say anything at all.

‘Annie, there you are!’ A girl with curly hair and glasses who looked vaguely familiar to Mac came up to the table.

‘People that are alive answer their texts!’ she said.

‘I’ve been trying you all morning. I ended up stopping by your house and Charlotte told me you were here with your new boyfriend.

’ It was then that the girl’s attention switched from Annie’s surprised face to Mac.

‘Hey,’ he said, fairly sure he was supposed to know who this girl was. They’d probably gone to school together, but he honestly couldn’t remember, which was probably part of why Annie always thought he was an asshole.

‘Hi,’ the girl said, looking confused and then turning back to Annie. ‘What’s going on?’ she whispered, as though Mac couldn't hear her.

Annie gave a strained smile. ‘Hazel, you’re back! I was just grabbing some breakfast, and I ran into Mac. Remember Mac?’

Hazel’s gaze flicked between the two of them like she was still trying to figure out why Annie would be sitting with him. She looked like she would have been less surprised to see Annie eating with a chimp.

Mac thought maybe they’d had Art together for a semester or maybe English? He still couldn't quite place it. The whole thing reminded him that, apparently, he and Annie had attended entirely different high schools.

‘Of course I remember Mac,’ Hazel said. ‘We had PE together for three years.’

‘That’s what it was!’ he said, smacking a hand on the table. ‘PE!’

Hazel blinked and Annie cleared her throat, giving him a pointed look to shut up. ‘Right, you’re old PE buddies. Anyway, what are you doing here?’

‘I came to find you. We were supposed to go Christmas shopping today. Remember?’

Annie winced and Mac thought she must be so tired of Christmas shopping at this point. He had dragged her to every shop, mall, and Christmas fair within a fifty-mile radius, all just so he could spend more time with her.

‘I’m so sorry, Hazel. I completely forgot, but we’re about done here anyway, right, Mac?’ she said, her eyes pleading with him as though he might reveal to Hazel everything they'd been up to for the past month.

‘We're all set here,’ he said, giving Annie a smile he hoped showed no hard feelings. He got it. Their temporary bubble had burst. Fun was over.

‘Oh, good!’ Hazel said with a relieved smile. ‘Because Logan’s on his way, too.’

Annie was looking more uncomfortable by the minute as though she'd been caught doing something she shouldn’t have. It kinda sucked to be the thing she shouldn’t have been doing.

‘I have to get going anyway,’ he said, grabbing his jacket and sliding out from the booth.

‘You don't have to go,’ she said, but he did. Annie didn't want to explain this temporary thing to her friends, and he didn't want to force her hand. There was really no need to. Why explain a thing that was ending?

‘No, I really should go, but thanks for breakfast,’ he said. ‘Have fun shopping.’

‘Yeah, okay,’ she said, her gaze holding his even as Hazel slid into the booth beside her.

‘Oh, my gosh,’ Hazel said as he walked away. ‘What on Earth were you doing here with Mac Sullivan?’

Mac paused on his way to the door, dying to hear Annie's answer.

‘We kind of bumped into each other,’ Annie said.

‘Wow! I'm surprised you even talked to him.’

‘Why would you be surprised about that?’ Annie asked, and Mac strained to hear the rest of the conversation over the clang of dishes and conversation around him.

‘Well, you never liked him,’ he heard Hazel say and, even though he already knew that, it still stung to hear, especially now that so much had changed. ‘You always said he was overrated.’

Mac nearly laughed out loud. That certainly sounded like something Annie would say.

‘Turns out maybe he’s not so bad,’ Annie said. It wasn’t exactly a declaration of love, but it was something, being not so bad. Maybe that was all he was going to get.

‘But I’m so glad you're home.’ Mac glanced back one more time to see Annie’s arm slung around Hazel’s shoulder, the two girls’ heads tipped together. Her people were back. Maybe Annie didn't need him anymore.

Maybe that was for the best. He needed to start his life. He needed to get out of here before he ended up pouring pints at his dad’s pub for the rest of his life and never figuring out what he actually wanted.

It was time to move on.

From Annie. From Dream Harbor.

Mac needed to go.

* * *

‘There's Logan,’ Hazel said, waving him over to Annie and Mac’s table, except it wasn’t hers and Mac’s table anymore because he had left and she had let him.

She didn’t feel good about that, but she had been caught totally off-guard by Hazel.

She’d completely forgotten her friend had come home yesterday.

They’d been texting all month, of course, but somehow the days had gotten away from her.

It was like her two worlds collided and suddenly she was back in reality.

The reality in which she and her friends had never once hung out with Mac and his friends.

She could tell by the look on his face that he had no idea who Hazel was, despite the fact that they had all gone to school together for the past four years, because guys like Mac didn’t notice girls like Hazel and Annie.

But he had noticed her. And it was nice, and she liked him now.

What the hell had she done?

‘Hey,’ Logan said, plopping into the seat across from them.

‘You’re back! How was the cruise?’ Annie asked, pushing her confusion about Mac aside. Now was not the time to sort that out. She was finally reunited with her two favorite people in the world.

Logan grimaced ‘Well, it was far too long to be trapped on a ship with several thousand senior citizens.’