Seth was more out of sorts than he should have been as he prepped his pastries for the day.
Even with the soothing playlist blaring from his portable speaker, the kitchen felt quiet. Empty. Seth should have been grateful to have a moment to himself, but he missed his pouty vampire lurking in the corner and making puppy dog eyes at him. Seth even missed the way Riley watched his every move, like if he dared to blink, Seth might disappear in an instant.
Instead of disconcerting, the attention had come to feel…grounding. A tether so strong Seth couldn’t slip away even if he wanted to.
And he didn’t want to, did he? Not even close.
Seth had meant what he’d said to Riley when he’d told him to skedaddle—even a hot-as-fuck vampire looked ridiculous in Seth’s too-short pants. Riley had needed to go home and get some clothes that actually fit him.
But Seth had also convinced himself he needed a moment of breathing room to come to terms with an alarming fact: he was falling for Riley. Fallingin lovewith Riley. And it was happening too fast—waytoo fast.
But Riley had opened his heart up to Seth last night, offered it to him by telling him about what was surely the worst day of Riley’s life, and what was Seth to do but accept the bruised, battered offering?
He could keep pretending they were just dating, that flirtation and attraction were slowly building into something more. But the truth was that there was nothing slow about the way he was falling hard for this vampire. This man who was barely more than a boy. A boy who’d been so lonely and so scared and who had so much love he was aching to give.
Seth wanted to take all that love and give him even more in return. He wanted to hide away Riley’s heart with all its cracks and bruises and exchange it for his own, all soft and coddled and bright from a life well loved and so far well lived. He wanted Riley to know it was okay to want so badly and hunger so deeply, and that Seth would do his very best to make sure that aching emptiness never hurt him again.
Seth needed to tell him, of course. Riley seemed to be under the impression that Seth needed tolearnto care for him, as if that hadn’t been happening almost against Seth’s will since their very first encounter.
Riley deserved to know it didn’t take time and effort to love him. It wasn’t difficult at all. He wasn’t a monster or a burden. He was…
Well, he was Seth’s, just like he’d said. And while Seth had never given himself away to someone before—had never placed his heart completely in another person’s hands—he knew Riley wouldn’t take the responsibility lightly.
And neither would Seth. Because therewasa responsibility to loving Riley. He’d been through so much, Seth’s poor boy, and he deserved to experience some of the good life had to offer.
And Seth was going to give that to him, whether Riley thought he wanted it or not. Friends. A community. People who weren’t his moms or his boyfriend to care for and be cared for in return.
Seth was still smiling when Violet arrived at the bakery, about forty-five minutes before opening. He gave her a tour of the kitchen and explained the basics of his process, what he’d be doing in the back to prep ahead of time while she worked the register.
Then Violet helped him open the front, and he explained what tasks would need to be completed during closing. He took the information he needed from her so he could start paying her officially. His old boss had showed Seth the processes and paperwork required to hire someone already, back before he’d left Seacliff. She’d been insistent he wouldn’t be able to do it alone for long. It seemed she’d been right.
Violet lingered in the bakery after the haphazard training, sipping black coffee behind the counter while Seth served his first customers.
There was one he didn’t recognize, a man in a black suit who watched Seth with an intensity that had Seth wondering for a moment if the man was an incredibly poorly disguised health inspector. And then he remembered hehadseen this guy before, on the cliff with the crew in hazmat suits the other day. Maybe exclusively socializing with mysterious scientists had affected his people skills. The man wasn’t even the most socially awkward of Seth’s customers, so Seth brushed off the uneasy feeling and sent him out with a cheery smile.
Seth waited until the bakery was empty again to make his move.
“What do you think about a book club?”
Violet took a contemplative sip of her coffee before answering. “Here?”
“Yeah. Once a month, maybe.”
“What kind of books?”
Seth shrugged. He wasn’t much of a reader, honestly. That was more Riley’s thing. Seth was just going to be the evil genius using Riley’s hobbies against him to force him to socialize. But that seemed like too much of a mouthful to admit at the moment. “Not sure.”
Violet gave him one of her discerning looks. “I want veto power.”
“You’ll come?” Seth asked with surprise. He hadn’t taken her for the book club type. He knew she read—she must, if she wrote so much—but she didn’t seem like a joiner.
“If it’s not too lame.”
Seth absently greeted one of his semiregulars, a quiet guy somewhere in his early twenties who usually came in a few times a week. He had sleepy brown eyes and wore anime shirts and kept his tightly coiled black curls cropped short.
“You think other people will come?” Seth asked Violet under his breath. “I want Riley—I mean, I want usbothto socialize a little.”
“I can get you Luke,” Violet told him, her tone the same as if she were telling him she could procure him a particularly rare cut of meat. “He’s my uncle, you know.”
