I nod, clearing my throat but determined not to let my courage falter. “Yeah, um. Oooh… okay,” I stutter before I gain my bearings. “But… you are going to kiss me, Owen Jones. Without a camera or an audience. Understand?”
“Soon,” he promises. Whatever that means. He slams open our door, letting in zero breeze and reaffirming my irritation with this heat.
“I say we use my birthday cake recipe. It doesn’t take long to make, and I have it memorized. That’s the winner, right?”
Owen is resoundingly silent. I catch the moment when his eyes go big before he turns around and makes himself busy, opening the single window over the sink.
“Owen?” I abandon my post and plant my hands on my hips. “Should we make my cake recipe?”
He studies the ceiling, the orchid, the mess we made on the floor, but the man who was staring into my very soul two minutes ago will not look me in the eye.
“Um…” His hand rubs against his jaw, sending small puffs of flour remnants into the air. “Here’s the thing, Babe…”
“What’s wrong with my cake recipe, Ruth?” Our usual cutesie nickname sounds far less sweet when I’m covered in flour, sweat, and frustration. I step into his space, but I’m feeling quite a bit less flirty than a few minutes ago.
Just call me Gretchen, y’all. Heat really does turn me into a monster.
Poking my finger into his chest, and only a teensy bit distracted by his persistent half nudity, I demand, “Honesty, remember?”
“Your cake is terrible,” he blurts out, like ripping a bandaid off a fifteen-year-old wound.
I scoff.
He kisses my pointer finger and smiles against it.
I bite his bare chest and growl like the animal that I am.
“Ow!” Owen jumps back, rubbing the bite mark I left behind. “I can’t believe you bit me!”
“I can’t believe you lied to me for years! Every birthday… every special occasion… the cake I made for the team on your Badger anniversary…”
“Terrible. Every single one.”
“But… but…” This can’t be right. He’s eaten every bite. “The guys ate it. They never said anything.”
“The guys were paid. Well.” He’s holding back a smile that I’d like to bite right off his pretty face. “I’m sorry.”
He doesn’t sound sorry, at all.
“I thought you liked them. The cake… the miniatures…” I feel weirdly dejected by this news. It’s not some secret recipe or anything. Just a simple recipe I found on the internet, wanting to make something homemade for his sixteenth birthday, the same year I gave him his first Bronco. But I feel foolish having given him something I believed was a quality offering… with a toy… every year since. “I thought…”
“Hey…” he squats down to my level. “I love them, Brooke. I love those cakes so much, you have no idea. And every time I get a Bronco from you… You’ve never even told me what they’re all about, but knowing you don’t give them to anyone else… I love them all, Brookey.”
“But they taste awful,” I whine. We have a competition to win, and I’m pouting.
“Well, I’ve never tasted one of the miniatures, but, yeah, the cakes taste bad.” He pecks my temple, then my cheek, then the tip of my nose. “But I do know Mom’s crazy cake recipe, and I think we could get it done before the time runs out.”
“Fine.” I let him pull me up to standing. “But is there anything else you’ve kept from me? Any life changing lies we need to confront right now?”
Owen winces, and I ready myself for what’s next. “There is one thing.”
He traces his bare foot in the dusting on the floor, unable to meet my eyes. I cross my arms over my chest and wait. We aren’t making a single morsel of cake until I get the whole truth.
“Ya know when we played theNewlywed Gamethat first day?”
I purse my lips.
“And they asked what I thought your best feature was?” He traces the lines of my mouth with his thumb.
