“First of all, Finley makes amazing stuff. It’s all good.” I shimmy my way into the booth, shoving my things over to the window before peeling off my coat. “Secondly, most of these people are my clients. Or have been.”
“You’ve worked with all these people?” He motions, both eyebrows raised.
“Not all of them, but they’re in my client demographic in one way or another. They all either have kids or grandkids or know somebody who does.” I shrug. “This is a great place to meet people. You know, discuss how cookies should be their own food group.”
I haven’t felt the hit yet, but I already miss the families that were beginning traditions with me. They took a chance on me when I showed up here without a name, and the floor already feels like it’s falling out from under me.
It will take a miracle to shoot all my sessions. Missing them will cost me the business I’ve painstakingly built.
This is a problem for future me, preferably after I’ve stuffed myself to the gills with sugar and carbs and can accommodate the emotional shift a little better.
“Speaking of which, maybe they’ve still got our order.” Aiden shrugs off his coat as we settle and slings it over the back of his side of the booth.
“You ordered for us? When?”
“When I was here earlier, waiting on you.”
I pull at the collar of my sweater, guilt washing over me.
A normal person goes straight where they say they’ll go. They don’t try to squeeze more time out of nothing and stop at theirphotography studio beforehand, then make the person they’re meeting get drenched in freezing water from a pipe.
There aren’t enough thank-yous.
“Stop stressing over there. It will all work out.”
I suspect Aiden’s idea of “work out” differs from mine, but I’m not going to push the issue. He came to my rescue, dragged Owen and a couple of other people to my studio, no questions asked, after I literally walked away from him yesterday on the farm.
I can’t decide if the nausea I feel stems from being hungry or feeling guilty that I’ve hijacked so much of his time this evening. The farm opens in a little over a week, and I know his to-do lists have lists.
“By the look on your face, I’d say it’s a good thing I ordered a bunch of snickerdoodles. You look like you need your favorite comfort food.”
My cheeks flush. “How do you remember that?”
“Believe it or not, there are a lot of things I remember.” He looks at me then, and there’s nothing casual or polite about it. “Some of them are inconvenient,” he adds quietly.
I meant it when I told him we should stay in the past.
Like he’d ignored every word I’d said, he walked onto the bus, all charming and dressed in flannel, and upended that plan completely.
And now, he’s saying things likethat.
I remember a lot, too, and each memory throbs, a wound barely scabbed over that still stings, even after all these years.
But I’m not convinced that’s the same kind of “inconvenient” he’s referring to.
“You sure ran out of here quick,” Meri, our waitress, says as she approaches, carefully sliding plates of cookies onto the table in front of us. She pauses to give Aiden a pointed side-eye, making me snicker.
Interesting.
“Somebody needed me.” He tips his head at me, as if that is enough explanation to excuse his abrupt exit.
She studies me for a moment and then shrugs. “Understood. Anything else I can get you?”
Now I’m genuinely intrigued about whatever this unspoken conversation is that’s happening right in front of me.
“Hot chocolate?” I ask. Forget calories, I want comfort food.
“Got it. Two?” she asks, eyeing Aiden.
