Cate McAllister had baked nine dozen cookies before sunrise. Which wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing, except this was her third baking binge in as many days, and she’d blown her paltry grocery budget on flour, butter, and sugar, rather than anything that would pass as an actual meal.

Lucky for her, she’d rather bake than eat.

She sighed and pulled into one of the handful of parking spots lining Town Street’s main drag, which consisted of about three blocks and just under a dozen storefronts and businesses, including the farming co-op, the Hair Lair, and Clementine’s Diner, which was this morning’s destination. Tucking the box full of cookies (today’s offering was oatmeal raisin) under one arm, Cate got out of her Toyota Corolla and slammed the door as gently as she could. The car was more fossil than mode of transport, and with the suspicious noise the driver’s side door had been making upon use lately, and the fourth-time’s-a-charm magic she’d needed to get it to start this morning, not babying it wasn’t an option. Despite having two part-time jobs, she’d had to play some serious roulette with her bills for the past three months, each one of which had been tighter than its predecessor.

Cate had known a lot of things about her husband before he’d died three years ago in that car accident. How much debt he’d gotten them into?

Hadn’t exactly been on the list.

“Good morning, Cate!” Clementine’s voice was as warm and smooth as butterscotch, and the smile she gave up from behind the counter of her diner was a perfect match. “How you doin’ today?”

“Great, Clem.” God, she felt terrible lying to her boss, who had to be the nicest woman in the entire Shenandoah Valley, although—to be fair—Cate had been equal opportunity with that lie for years now. “Sorry I’m running a little late. My car was acting up a bit.”

“Don’t you worry about a thing, darlin’.”

Clementine’s tone and eyes both softened enough to take a jab at Cate’s belly, and she busied herself with putting her purse behind the counter and her apron around her waist as she waited for the nasty pairing of frustration and guilt to pass. Folks were just trying to be kind, she knew. But after three years of being ‘poor Cate McAllister’, she really just wanted everyone to move on from the wreck that had killed both Brian and their daughter, Lily.

After all, she had. She’d had no choice. As much as she’d thought it might not in the beginning, the sun still came up every day. The roosters still crowed and bread dough still rose and bills still came. Brian’s modest life insurance policy had kept her above water—albeit barely—for a while, but the reality was, the slew of temporary, part-time gigs Cate had picked up here and there were no longer cutting it.

She was going to have to bite the bullet and find a full-time job. Yes, the thought of something so permanent gave her hives the size of silver dollars, but it beat the thought of living in a cardboard box.

Even if only by a thread.

Smoothing a hand over her cheery orange half-apron, Cate turned back to Clementine, the box of baked goods in-hand. “I couldn’t sleep last night, so I made a few cookies to share.”

“A few.” Clem’s brows traveled up toward the green and white scarf keeping her long, sleek braids at bay.

“Okay,” Cate admitted, sending her gaze over the bustling diner so she wouldn’t have to look her boss in the eye. “A few more than a few. I guess I just got into a groove.”

A bitter taste flooded her mouth in the wake of the second lie she’d told in as many minutes, but in this instance, pretzeling the truth was better than telling it. Coming out with the real reason she’d spent the wee hours in her kitchen instead of asleep in her bedroom would only up the poor-Cate ante.

Not that it made her feel like any less of a shit when it worked. “That is one heck of a groove, sugar,” Clementine said, popping the lid off the box with an appreciative smile. “When are you going to get smart and start charging people for this magic?”

Cate’s heart stuttered, her sneakers squeaking on the checkerboard floor tiles as she turned to stare. “What?”

“You heard me,” Clementine said without heat. “You bake some of the best cookies in Millhaven. Why not turn it into something lucrative?”

“Because—” Annnnnd crap. Wasn’t she just lining up lies like dominoes today? But she really couldn’t back up her answer out loud, especially not in front of God and everybody having Sunday breakfast in the diner, so she said, “I only bake for fun.”

Whether Clementine believed her or decided to let her off the hook, Cate couldn’t be certain, but after a pause, the woman murmured, “Hmm. Well, if you’re going to bring me the results, I’m certainly not going to complain.”

“I made more than a hundred cookies.” Cate let a sassy smile take over the edges of her mouth. “If I kept them to myself, I’d need a cardiologist and a personal trainer.” Neither of which they had in Millhaven. Not that she was going to split hairs if it meant she’d score a full-frontal subject change. “Anyway, I’ve got the front of the house.”

“Okay, doll. You get swamped up here, just holler,” Clementine said before heading into the kitchen, probably to do some baking of her own. Cate swept a gaze over the dining room, scanning the shiny Formica tabletops and the cozy, high-backed banquettes, along with checking to see who sat at each one. Harley Martin and his daughter, Michelle, were tucked in at Table Four with what looked like their usual breakfast orders. Amber Cassidy sat across from Mollie Mae Van Buren at Table Nine, both of them guzzling coffee and—if Cate had to guess—copious amounts of weekly gossip.

But it was the two men sitting at Table Twelve who really caught her notice. Silly, honestly, that her stare would stop and linger on Owen Cross and Lane Atlee. She’d known them since they’d all been in kindergarten together, and, anyway, Owen in particular was pretty tight-lipped. Gruff. Borderline broody, even. She had to admit, though, from a strictly visual standpoint, her stare had impeccable taste. From his dark, tousled hair to the jawline that might as well belong to a statue of some Roman god to the leanly sculpted and totally bitable biceps peeking out from the sleeves of his T-shirt, Owen Cross was pure eye candy.

And Cate definitely had a sweet tooth.

One that had been really hungry as of late.

“Don’t be an idiot,” she whispered to herself as she set her shoulders and grabbed the nearest coffee carafe. Sure, Owen was gorgeous. He always had been. But he’d never shown her any interest, and, besides, she wasn’t looking for anything that would last more than a night or two. Having a fling in a town the size of a thimble wasn’t an option. She was already whispered about enough, thanks.

“…and I heard her ring is an en-tire carat and a quarter, princess-cut diamond with those, oh, what do you call those little teeny diamonds on the band? Right! Pavé stones the whole way around. It must have cost a fortune!”

Cate bit back a chuckle at Amber’s exaggerated pronunciation of pavé that came out pah-VAAAAAY, lifting the coffee carafe with a smile she hoped reached her eyes. “More coffee, ladies?”

“Oh!” Amber fluttered a hand over her sequin-studded top, her dark purple fingernails flashing with their matching glitter tips, and Cate’s stomach tightened as the woman’s expression tripped immediately into poor-Cate mode. “I’m so sorry, Cate. I didn’t see you there, otherwise I wouldn’t have...well, you know.”

Ugh, really? People couldn’t even talk about impending weddings around her now? “It’s fine,” Cate said, although her smile now felt tighter than a pair of skinny jeans after Thanksgiving dinner. “Who’s the lucky couple?”

Mollie Mae bit her brightly shellacked lip. “Hunter Cross and Emerson Montgomery. He proposed on Friday night.”

“Oh, good for them,” Cate replied, and meant it. Emerson had been back in town for almost a year now, and she and Hunter seemed really happy together. “Can I get you anything for breakfast?”

“No, thanks. We’re watchin’ our figures. Just coffee’ll do,” Amber said, her smile still loaded with syrup-sweet sympathy.

Cate scooped in a deep breath and topped off both of their cups. “Okay. Just let me know if you change your minds.”

Before she could scream—or, worse yet, say what was really on her mind—she aimed her Keds toward the corner booth where Owen and Lane sat with their menus in front of them.

“Morning, you two. Coffee?”

The words slipped out with more of a scrape than she’d intended, and, crap, Owen’s eyes crinkled in concern.

“Morning.” He tipped his baseball hat at her with a quick lift of his fingers, and even though she knew the gesture was likely as subconscious as breathing and eating (thank you, Southern manners), her guilt still doubled up when he asked, “Is everything okay?”

“Mmm hmm!” she answered far too gleefully before finally finding a balance between bitchy and overly bright. “Everything is great. What can I get you for breakfast?”

After a brief pause for her to fill their coffee cups, Lane said, “I’d love one of Clementine’s breakfast specials, eggs over-easy, with an extra side of home fries. Oh, and an order of toast. And could I get some extra bacon, too?”

Cate was powerless to stop her wry smile. “You do know how much food is already in the special, right?” Of course, she knew he did, because A) Clementine’s breakfast special had been the same three pancakes, three eggs, three strips of bacon, and one serving of her legendary home fries since the dawn of ages, and B) as long as Cate had been part-timing it at the diner, Lane had ordered said breakfast special every single time he’d crossed the threshold before noon, no exceptions.

He looked at her as if she’d just asked whether he was aware that one and one did, in fact, equal two. “Yes, ma’am.”

She shrugged. Lane was built like a retaining wall, with not one ounce of fat on his six foot four frame. If anyone could do right by that breakfast, it was him. “They’re your arteries, Sheriff. How about you, Owen?”

“I’ll take a special, too. Scrambled on the eggs, please.”

“Sure thing,” Cate said, doing her level best not to look at the play of his muscles against the thin, white cotton of his T-shirt as he handed his menu over. But before she could get herself and her mutinous eyes safely behind the counter, Clementine appeared beside her with a cookie-laden plate balanced between both hands.

“You boys want to try some cookies? Oatmeal raisin.”

Cate’s heart did an aerial backflip into her breastbone. “I don’t think—”

Clementine, traitor that she was, cut Cate off with an ear-to-ear smile as both Owen and Lane descended on the plate like locusts.

“Is this a new recipe?” Owen asked after a bite, and Lane slid another pair of cookies from the plate to follow the one that had just gone into his mouth. “These are even better than usual.”

“Not a new recipe. A new baker,” Clementine corrected. “Cate made them.”

“Oh. Oh.” Owen’s shoulders bumped against the red vinyl of the banquette. “I apologize. I mean…not that I wasn’t being honest about the cookies.” He darted a stare between her and Clem, clearly scrabbling for something to say that would keep from offending them both. “Your recipe is, you know, great, Miss Clementine. But Cate, these are—”

“Ridiculous?” Lane asked around a mouthful of oatmeal raisin.

Cate’s cheeks burned so warmly, there was a zero percent chance she didn’t have a blush on full display. “Right. I’m glad you like them. I’ll just go”—run and hide under the counter ’til I’m a hundred and five—“put your breakfast orders in.”

Dodging their stares, she cut a fast path to the kitchen, where she handed Owen and Lane’s breakfast order over to Clementine’s husband and cook/co-owner, Mason. Clementine came back a few minutes later, her plate decidedly less heavy and her expression soft.

“Your cookies were a hit. The Martins’ agreed they’re wonderful. Mollie Mae and Amber even broke that infernal diet of theirs to split one.”

“Oh. Good.” Cate grabbed a towel, swiping away at the already-clean stretch of countertop in front of her.

“I didn’t mean to put you on the spot.” Clem’s voice was low, not quite at poor-Cate status, but close enough to put a twang in her chest.

Wanting very much to do anything other than have this conversation and also not hurt the woman’s feelings, Cate said, “You didn’t. I’m glad the cookies went over well. I noticed we’re running low on napkins in some of the dispensers, so I’m just going to go grab some from the store room. Be right back.”

She measured her footsteps along with her breaths, keeping both even until she got to the cool quiet of the dry storage room in the back of the diner. Pressing her back to the far wall, away from the din of the kitchen, she closed her eyes and let out an exhale that was shakier than she wanted to admit. The sensation didn’t last long, though, before the chime of her cell phone captured her attention from the pocket of her apron.

“What the hell?” She had the bare-bones, pay-as-you-go model, which meant no email or Facebook notifications, only good, old-fashioned phone calls. More importantly, the only person who would be calling was running her diner about twenty feet away. So this was either a wrong number, or…

Peterson Savings and Loan.

Shit. “Hello?” Cate asked tentatively, praying to every deity she could think of that this was a cold call offering her a great, low rate on a new credit card.

No such luck. “Hello, I’m trying to reach Cate McAllister,” came the crisp, businesslike voice on the other end.

“This is she.”

“Mrs. McAllister, I’m calling from Peterson Savings and Loan regarding your mortgage and the home equity line of credit taken out against it four years ago…”

She juggled the conversation as well and as quickly as she could, trying to digest phrases like ineligible for refinance, file for bankruptcy, and—oh, God—foreclosure. She had to promise to send an exorbitant-to-her payment in order to buy time, but thankfully, it did the trick. Cate lowered her cell phone, her heart lodged firmly in her windpipe and dread filling her belly to the brim.

Start her own business and sell cookies for a living. Ha. What a pipe dream. She couldn’t even pay her electric bill, let alone her mortgage.

She needed a miracle. Fast.

But since there weren’t any of those in the dry storage room, and she wasn’t one to cry over her heartaches, Cate did what she always did. Squaring her shoulders, she grabbed the napkins she’d come in here for and headed back to the front of the diner. There had to be a way out of this. All she needed to do was buckle down and find it.

“Orders up!” Mason called, placing a handful of plates in the hot window. Cate ditched the napkins she hadn’t really needed in favor of doing her job, loading up a tray with Owen and Lane’s order and making her way back to their table.

“Oatmeal raisin cookies without walnuts are an abomination,” she overheard Lane say, but Owen, whose back was to her, simply snorted.

“You’re cracked. Simple is better. Plus, they’re not called oatmeal raisin walnut cookies. Still—” A soft thunk sounded off from beneath the table, followed by a less-than-polite hiss from Owen. “Ow, dude! What the…oh, hell.” He snapped to attention, his coffee mug meeting the Formica with enough force to slosh some of its contents over the rim. “Cate. Hi.”

She thought of the walnuts that had been in every single one of the cookies she’d baked at oh-dark-thirty this morning and arched a brow. “Still hungry, I take it?”

“Sure. I mean”—he closed his eyes. Exhaled. Damn, eyelashes like that were honestly unjust on a man. Also, really freaking hot—“the cookies were great, and I’ve got room for breakfast, too.”

“Glad to hear it. Two breakfast specials, one with scrambled eggs, one with eggs over-easy, extra home fries, and extra bacon.” She delivered their respective plates. “Can I get you anything else?”

“Just the check, if you have a minute,” Owen said, and shit. She might be a little light in the filter department (okay, fine, so she didn’t really have one. Potato, potahto), but the last thing she wanted was to piss off one of Clementine’s customers. Not to mention lose her tip.

“You don’t have to rush,” Cate started, and, jeez, those eyelashes were even more lethal when they framed his wide, gray stare.

“Unfortunately, I do. Got a date with the invoices and books at the farm, and it’s gonna take me all day if I’m lucky.”

Confusion kicked in, good and hard. “But it’s Sunday.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he agreed.

A prickle worked its way through her, half irritation at the politeness that bordered on poor-Cate sympathy, half something else that headed decidedly south.

She tried again. “You’re working all day?”

Most everybody around here held Sundays pretty sacred out of self-preservation. Working the land seven days a week was brutal, even for the most well-practiced farmers. And from the look of Owen’s biceps, he was extremely well-practiced.

He dropped his chin but not his stare. “Don’t really have a choice. Cross Creek’s books aren’t going to balance themselves.”

“You don’t have a bookkeeper?” She shifted back on the linoleum, her confusion turning to outright shock.

“If we did, I don’t reckon I’d be working the books on a Sunday.”

Huh. Looked like she wasn’t the only one who was a little light in the filter department. “Okay, fair,” she said. “But Cross Creek is the largest farm in Millhaven. I just figured you’d have someone who handles that for you full-time.”

“Believe me, I wish we did,” Owen said, and her mouth opened of its own volition.

“Do you.”

Cate heard the non-question before she even knew she’d spring it past her lips, but oh, how she wished to have it back. This was a bad idea. No, check that. This was an epically shitastic idea, with don’t-you-even-think-it sprinkles on top. A full-time job was more commitment than she’d had in three years. The thought of something so regular, so permanent, gave her the shakes.

But then Owen was looking at her with a not-small amount of curiosity, and backpedaling was as impossible as catching smoke in her bare hands. “As a matter of fact, yeah,” he said, straightening against the booth. “I’d love to hire a full-time bookkeeper. Why? Do you know someone who’s interested?”

No. Nope. Sorry, buddy, I sure don’t. These were all things her brain instructed her mouth to say, but her mouth—which liked to eat—betrayed her by going with, “Actually, I am.”

The stunned silence that followed told her she’d better start making her case before he dismissed the idea as downright nutters. “I mean, I don’t have a degree or any formal training, but I’m really good with numbers, and I’m not afraid of hard work. I can start as soon as you like, tomorrow, even, and—”

“Done.”

“—I don’t need…wait, what?” Cate asked as his answer caught up with her verbal landslide.

“You said you’re good with numbers and you can start tomorrow, right?” Owen’s piercing gray stare was as tough to decipher as the rest of his expression.

She managed to nod. “Yes.” She was only on evenings and weekends at the diner and The Bar. Time would be tight, but she could swing it. She had to. “I can.”

“Great. Then you’ve got yourself a job.”