She pauses, mid-scoop. Looks up.
I grunt, shifting my weight. Too late to back out now.
“For the pan de sal,” I clarify. Then, after a beat, I add, “...And for you.”
Lena just stares.
Then, very softly, her mouth curves.
Not teasing.
Not smug.
Something gentler.
Something real.
“I know,” she says, resuming her work, but there’s a new rhythm to her movements. “You’re not as sneaky as you think. The flour dust on your shoes gives you away.”
I blink. “You knew?”
She shrugs, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “Who do you think has been leaving the extra pan de sal out? The bread fairy?”
A strange warmth spreads through my chest, settling somewhere behind my ribs. All this time, I thought I was stealing moments in her space before she arrived. But she knew. She was making extra, just for me.
“You could have said something,” I grumble, but there’s no heat in it.
“And miss the chance to see you sneak around like some bread-obsessed ninja? Never.” She grins, setting down her scoop and wiping her hands on her apron. “Besides, I figured you’d tell me when you were ready.”
She steps closer, reaching up to brush something—flour, probably—from my shoulder. Her touch is light, casual, but it sends a jolt through me that’s anything but. I stand perfectly still, like a tree that’s suddenly discovered it has roots, like moving would somehow break whatever is happening between us right now.
“So,” she says, her voice softer than I’ve ever heard it, “I guess we make a pretty good team.”
I grunt, but it comes out different. Less gruff. More... something else.
“Guess so,” I manage.
Her hand lingers on my shoulder a moment longer before falling away. I miss it instantly, which is ridiculous. Completely irrational. Absolutely true.
“Thank you,” she says. “For rebuilding the display. For believing in me. For not murdering Gabriel, even though I know you wanted to.”
“Still do,” I mutter, and she laughs.
The sound wraps around me like one of those ridiculous warm, sweet pastries she makes—the ones that melt on your tongue and make you forget you’re supposed to prefer protein. I want to capture that laugh, bottle it, keep it safe somewhere. Which is, again, ridiculous. I don’t do ridiculous.
Except, apparently, for Lena Reyes.
“You know,” she says, turning back to her work but keeping her eyes on me, “I couldn’t have done any of this without you.”
I shake my head. “You would’ve found a way. You’re stubborn like that.”
“Maybe,” she admits. “But I wouldn’t have wanted to. It wouldn’t have meant as much.”
And just like that, she’s stripped me bare. Cut through all my defenses with a few simple words, the way she always does. No one else gets away with that. No one else even tries.
No one else is Lena.
I watch her measure flour with practiced precision, her movements as familiar to me now as my own. Her bakery—no, her home—wraps around us like a living thing, warm and welcoming and full of possibilities. My chest feels strange. Too full. Too tight. Like something’s growing there that doesn’t quite fit yet.
