It had been three weeks after we ripped the Band-Aid off, and Liam started conversing with me more while he waited for me to finish up each night. In that time, I learned that he worked as a manager at an auto shop for his uncle and he lived with his mom in a poor neighborhood, not too far away from the bakery. I never got more out of him after that—he always ended the discussion before I dove too deep—and his secrecy left me wondering what kind of skeletons hung in his closet.
Our nightly conversations quickly became my favorite part of the day. I would purposely put work off throughout business hours, just so I could stay late and see him. Liam didn’t judge me for my twisted outlook on life, and he never pushed me to delve deeper into subjects I didn’t want to talk about the way my mom and Cara always had.
Lunar Creations ended up signing a contact with the blond bimbo, Kelly, and her ridiculously overpriced wedding. My mom was beyond thrilled when she finally promised her business, but I knew she would end up being a nightmare, making me work for the money she was throwing at us.
The wedding wasn’t for another six months, yet she was in nearly every week demanding a new sample of whatever dessert she was adding to her table. Mom said it was normal for brides to get stressed with such a high-budgeted wedding, but I’d been dealing with bridezillas for years and I’d never seen one act like her.
“Sounds like she’s using you to maintain her sugar high,” Liam commented one day after I vented to him about the monster.
I was making the third batch of macaroons for her to try the next day and approve the recipe. I didn’t even change anything the past two times I made them, although somehow, she thought they were different.
“I’m not sure. I think she’s a closet binge eater. Her future mother-in-law came in with her one time and all they could talk about was fitting her into the dress. Since then, she comes in alone and scarfs down everything we give her,” I replied mindlessly, throwing ingredients into my mixer and switching it on.
“Why not just buy a dress that fits in the first place?” he wondered.
He sat in his designated spot across from me, flipping through the pages of one of my portfolios with his stony expression in place.
“That would make too much sense,” I replied sarcastically.
Last year, I would have been more understanding toward Kelly’s situation. I might have even gotten along with her. Now, every time she enters the bakery I feel my brows furrow and my mouth turn down in disgust. There were far more important things in life than only allowing yourself a few months to fit into a dress that was four sizes too small for you. Her energy was focused on the wrong things, and she would end up regretting the time she spent at the bakery harassing me about my macaroon recipe instead of being around her family or getting to know her future husband better.
“I’ll never get married,” Liam mumbled from across the room, jolting me from my judgmental thoughts. My face fell.
“Why not?” I questioned, focusing too much on the batter in front of me while I worked to lift the frown out of my features.
“What’s the point? If I’m in love with someone—and I use that term loosely, because I don’t really believe anyone can truly be in love—I’ll stay with them.” He shrugged one shoulder, never looking up from the binder in his lap. “Why do I need to tie myself to them legally?”
It shouldn’t have bothered me. Not at all. Liam was a stranger, a man who was closely connected to the one who’d destroyed my life—even working with him forty hours a week. But still, his response had my heart dropping. The old Luna would argue with him, defending marriage, love, and everything they stood for. She was a hopeless romantic, constantly dreaming of the day she’d finally walk down the aisle and vow to be with the man she loved for the rest of her life.
This current one—the damaged and jaded one who was having the marriage conversation with a dark, tortured man in her bakery—wasn’t even sure if she wanted that anymore. That’s what disappointed me. I didn’t even have it in me to argue Liam’s pessimistic logic. He was right; what difference did a piece of legal paper make on a relationship between two people? Everyone changes. Sometimes those changes aren’t compatible with the people we love. Why complicate the process more with legal fees?
“I suppose that’s true,” I finally conceded.
“How did you get that purple piece to look like that?” Liam asked, already past the bomb he just dropped onto my chest.
He lifted the portfolio and pointed to a picture of a wedding cake I’d completed last year. The theme was Alice in Wonderland, and the bride gave me full creative freedom with that cake. Tilting my head to the side, I squinted my eyes, struggling to see the piece he was pointing at specifically from so far away. The entire cake was filled with wacky details. Noticing my struggle, Liam stood up and walked the binder over to me, setting it on my counter before pointing to the picture again with his long, lean finger.
My lips curled up automatically as I squinted into the photo, reminiscing the time I’d put the cake together, and the fun Mom and I had with the piece he was pointing to. It was an intricate purple teapot turned upside down, floating above the cake as if gravity didn’t exist.
Mom wanted to have the pot pouring tea out onto the cake, so we could use the stream to connect the pot to the base like we’d done in similar cakes. I wanted a challenge, and to take full advantage of the freedom I’d so rarely been given with a wedding cake, so I insisted we have it floating weightlessly above.
“We hung the pot from the ceiling with fishing wire,” I started, my smile stretching further across my face as I explained. “We had to make that pot three separate times because it kept falling and breaking. It drove my mom nuts that I wouldn’t just connect it to the cake like she wanted me to. When we finally got it to work, the bride was so thrilled, she doubled our tip and referred us to everyone she knew. We’re still receiving business from her referrals.”
Heat flooded my cheeks as I remembered the proud look Mom gave me when we’d finally pulled it off. She bragged about our success to everyone who would listen.
Looking up from the picture with my body draped across the counter, I found Liam’s face inches from mine. His blues bore into my browns and neither of us made the move to distance ourselves. I could hear my heartbeat thumping wildly between us, but my exterior remained calm and unmoving. His presence was warm, his breath minty sweet, and I took the opportunity to soak him in for as long as I could.
“You should smile more,” he finally said, managing his deadpan expression.
My body stiffened at his remark. The last bit of my smile that remained disappeared before I pulled myself back and blinked owlishly. We held each other’s stare again across the tiny island before I cleared my throat, overwhelmed with the thick silence and what it stirred inside me.
“We should go. I can finish these tomorrow.” I grabbed the batter and covered it, rushing over to the fridge to store it as he continued calmly, unbothered by the encounter that had my insides shaken.
His phone dinged in his pocket and he pulled it out, rolling his eyes at whatever message he’d just received. I wondered what could have bothered him enough to break his stony expression but thought better of asking when he ground out, “Yeah, I have to be somewhere anyway.”
We didn’t speak for the rest of the night, Liam too caught up in whatever stormy thoughts haunted his head as he walked beside me to my Jeep, making sure I got to it safely before walking toward his old truck in silence.
I lay in bed that night, overanalyzing and obsessing over what had happened between us and regretting my squeamish behavior. I was acting like a crazed teen, one who could barely handle being near a man anymore. So much of my time has been spent in a self-induced purgatory, I was clinging to every shred of conversation and hope he gave me.
He was a pessimistic, brooding man who had clearly been damaged by someone in the past, and he felt some sort of protective obligation toward me. Neither of us was in a position to take things further beyond the platonic state we were in, but that didn’t stop me from carelessly wanting to.
We were oxygen and gasoline, and if we didn’t distance ourselves soon, the heat between us would spark an explosion.