The kitchen looked like a bomb had gone off in a bakery. Flour covered every surface. Cocoa powder streaked the cabinets. Egg yolk dripped down the front of the dishwasher. Cake batter was smeared all over the counter. The three of us stood in the middle of it all, covered head to toe in baking ingredients, frozen like we’d been caught robbing a bank.
Cam’s gaze traveled slowly from the mess to his daughters to me, then back to the mess.
“We were baking a cake,” Alice offered helpfully, her voice small.
“Were you now?” His tone was carefully neutral, but the corner of his mouth twitched.
“It was an accident,” Audrey added.
“Several accidents,” I corrected. “In rapid succession.”
His eyes met mine and something sparked there. Amusement, maybe. Or exasperation. Hard to tell.
“Girls.” He crossed his arms, and both of them immediately straightened up. “Go wash up. Now.”
They didn’t need to be told twice. They bolted from the kitchen, leaving dusty flour footprints in their wake. Their giggles echoed down the hallway as they raced each other to the bathroom.
And then it was just the two of us.
Me, covered in cake mix, flour and cocoa powder, standing in the middle of his destroyed kitchen. Him, leaning againstthe doorframe in his work clothes, looking far to put together compared to my current state.
“So.” I gestured vaguely at the mess. “This happened.”
“I can see that.”
“In my defense, Alice started it.”
“Throwing a five-year-old under the bus. Classy.”
“I’m just saying, she threw the first punch.”
He pushed off the doorframe and moved closer, his boots crunching on spilled sugar. “And you, being the responsible adult, obviously tried to stop her.”
“I tried very hard.”
“Uh huh.” His eyes were glowing with amusement when he stopped right in front of me, so close I had to tilt my head back to meet his eyes. “You have flour in your hair.”
“You should see the rest of me.”
His gaze dropped, traveling slowly down, and my breath caught. When his eyes came back to mine, they were darker than before.
The air between us shifted, pulsed.
I don’t know what possessed me. Maybe it was the adrenaline from the food fight. Maybe it was the way he was looking at me, like he wanted to both laugh and do something else entirely. Maybe I’d just temporarily lost my mind.
I reached up and dabbed a finger full of cake mix right on his nose.
He blinked. Once. Twice.
“Did you just...”
“Yep.” I tried not to smile. “You had a spot.”
Something dangerous flickered across his face. “A spot.”
“Mm hmm.”
He reached past me, his arm brushing mine, and when he pulled back his finger was coated in flour. Before I could react, he bopped my nose with it.
