CHAPTER ONE
Cruz
The early morning Montana sky spans above me like a dark blanket, and the highway into Huckleberry Springs from my house disappears beyond my headlights. I yawn, letting out a whoop to wake myself up more. Back in the day, I used to be up until the ripe hour of four in the morning, doing nothing productive and everything destructive. Nowadays, I’m snuggled in bed with a kitten or two by ten p.m. Who in their right mind would start work at this hour?
Elodie Palmer.
The pretty little baker who hides behind her glasses is already at the bakery. Word around town is that she gets up at three in the morning.
The pretty little baker also turns into the quietest woman in town when I’m around, no matter how hard I try.
The pretty little baker has burned my pride enough, so I’ve got to behave around her. I’m done making an ass out of myself.
Today, I’ll be nothing but professional. I’ll drop off the stash of spirits Lane gave me for the bakery to use in a collaborationwith the distillery we’re part owners in and continue on with my day.
I reach the buildings on the edge of town and roll through until I approach a brick building with timber accents and a white sign readingDee’s Sweetshanging above the door.
She told Lane to enter through the back, so I drive around to the alley. I’m supposed to be the contact for this collaboration between her bakery and our distillery for some local craft fairs, but she still goes through Lane. I’d be jealous, but she doesn’t look at Lane any differently than anyone else. Elodie Palmer is a reserved person with everyone, and as much as I want to be, I’m not an exception.
I park to the side of the door in case she’s got more deliveries coming. The clock blinks four o’clock. I’m a half hour early. I was too afraid to be late, so I got up before I needed to.
Getting out, I straighten my shirt and jeans. A piece of lint glows under the streetlamp on my shoulder and I flick it off. There. Professional.
No hitting on my little baker. Not anymore.
I lift the box that has a bottle of each type of spirit we make and a bonus bottle that I couldn’t resist including. As soon as I open the pickup door, a thumping beat vibrates through my body. From what I’ve figured out, Elodie lives on the second level, which can’t be that big with its peaked roof and the bakery below it. On the main level, the front with the counter and seating area is roughly half of the floor plan. The buildings next to her are closed and their second levels have businesses, not residential tenants.
IsElodieplaying music that loud?
Light floods onto the sidewalk from the open back door of the bakery. I ease through the screen door and step inside. I’m enveloped in a sweet, yeasty cloud. Trays line a long stainless-steel table pushed against an island. Heavy bass music fills the air.
I should announce myself, but I haven’t seen the elusive woman yet, and I’m drawn inside like a moth to a vanilla-scented flame. When I round the corner, I stop short and barely keep from dropping the box.
Elodie’s back is to me. She’s by a wall of cabinets, dressed in her normal baggy pants and oversized shirt. She’s also dancing. Gyrating, hip-thrusting movements that are raw and raunchy. A full-bodied expression of the real person inside the quiet baker.
Fuck me. I’m frozen. I knew she had curves that would make me salivate, but her punctuated movements pull her loose clothing tight. She’s a moving, pumping tease.
A tease who thinks she’s alone. I should turn around.
My feet don’t move. It’s like my boots are pasted to the floor.
“Ugh, yeah.”She pumps a hand in the air and grinds low to the floor, holding her apron out of the way.“Make me wanna come with you, grind with you, sixty-nine with you.”
My throat grows thick and swallowing is difficult. Hearing her say “sixty-nine” when she’s not counting out my change has upended my world. I grip the box of spirits with both hands.
Turn around.Me or her, it doesn’t matter. One of us has to put an end to this scintillating purgatory.
“Put it right here, baby, down there, baby.”She winds her way back up and drops low again, shocking me with the speed. The dark hair wrapped into a floppy bun on top of her head bounces as much as her ass cheeks.
The beat of music winds its way low in my body.Goddamn it,turn around.
The brain-body connection comes online. My boots finally move. I put my back to her.
“Elodie?” My voice is rough, thick.
The music drowns out my voice.
“I’ll make it good.”The sound of her shoes scraping on the floor.“Put it right here, baby, down there?—”
