The flower pattern is more intricate, but there are no Swiss dots to follow it with and so I throw myself into the work.

I have less than an hour to go before this cake has to be at the country club, and who knows how long before Adam walks back out the door and I never see him again?

Do I even want to see him again?

The laughter of his friends, even from nine years ago, still echoes in my ears when I breathe in his scent.

I’m halfway done with the smallest layer.

Fifty minutes to go.

It’s a fifteen minute drive to the country club if there’s no traffic.

All of it comes back to me in waves. The day our eyes locked over the last oversized cookie, baked fresh by a jovial lunch lady. Adam Walker and I existed on different planes the social spectrum—he played basketball, for God’s sake, and I was in just about every club you could imagine. I ran cross country. There wasn’t much prestige.

But that day, he saw me.

He didn’t have as many tattoos then, but he had some, just beginning to snake down his arm. Was it true that his parents took him to get them? Was it true he had the best dad in the whole school, who didn’t mind a little recklessness out of his son? I never knew.

All I knew was that when he looked at me like that, my heart went crazy.

We stood there in that crystalline moment until he shattered it by speaking in that smooth voice of his.

“It’s yours, Val.”

Nobody called me Val except my best friends and my parents. The intimacy of it took my breath away.

My instincts took over. “You sure? I’m more than willing to share.” Then I gave him a grin like I’ve never felt on my face before or since.

“We’d have to be together to share this.”

I’d scanned the cafeteria, alive with people stuffing their faces. “Two empty seats. Right there.”

Then, before he’d had the chance to change his mind I scooped up the plate from the table and moved toward the register to pay for it, not looking back, my heart in my throat. If he didn’t follow me…

But he did. He did follow me, and he took more than his half, and he laughed at my jokes.

Everything was like that, surging with a wild energy that grew more powerful by the day. I met him after practice and he’d take me to Lookout Point and kiss me hard, hold my hand tight in his grip, but we never ever talked about being together.

That night outside the gym….

I’d texted him. It was thirty minutes before the big game but he sensed the urgency in my tone and came out the back, his forehead wrinkled with worry.

That was when I said it. “I want to be with you.”

“Val?” His voice was soft, wondering.

“I want to be with you. Not sneaking around like this. With you. A couple.”

He’d given me that wicked grin and pulled me close to him, whispering into my hair: “I want that too. I want that too.”

At the time, I’d taken it to be a promise.

And then the door opened.

The last line on the cake connects with the first part of the pattern and I’m jolted out of the memories. Shit, what time is it?

Thirty minutes to go.

Adam gently puts his piping bag onto the table and steps back, holding his hands out toward the cake. “For your approval.”

I let out a laugh that sounds more hollow than I planned and lean in, spinning the cake slowly around.

Every single Swiss dot is perfection.

“Wow.”

“You didn’t think I could do it?”

I lift one shoulder an inch and turn back toward him with a little smile. “You never know.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Seems pretty risky to take a chance like this on a cake like that.”

“I don’t see anyone else here to help.”

He peers behind me, toward the empty storefront. “On Christmas Eve? Unlikely.”

“Very unlikely.”

That’s when it tumbles out of me before I can stuff the words back into my mouth.

“So what are you doing here? On Christmas Eve? In my bakery?”

His tone is lighthearted, but there’s something underneath that tugs at my heart. “What, a guy can’t visit a bakery on Christmas Eve?”

“A guy who hasn’t spoken to me in nine years? Like you said…it’s unlikely.”

Adam runs a hand through his hair. His eyes are locked on mine. I want to look away, look back toward the floor, but I don’t. This time, I’m not running away. I’m not that girl anymore.

“About that.”