“Probably,” I agree, but I don’t move either.
He kisses me one more time, quick and sweet, before stepping back toward his car, which is parked just a couple of doors down. “Text me tomorrow?”
“Yup.”
I stand on the sidewalk, pressing my lips together, and wave as he drives away.
It wasa good kiss. And it’ll get better from here, because that’s how things work. You don’t start out making stellar bread—or gnocchi, as the case may be—you learn as you go. You analyze the recipe and refine your technique. So it makes sense thatgoodkisses will lead togreatkisses, which will eventually lead to the kind of sex that makes us forget our own names if I’m patient.
Just look at the situation with Robbie. It’s been just three weeks since I decided to make a change, and I’m completely over him.
Or close enough that it doesn’t matter, anyway.
And yeah, we went through a shit period for a few days, but since I apologized last week, things have gotten better. We’re texting regularly again, and when we’re together, I can talk to him with none of the old sexual tension.
Or, like, almost none.
So, things are good. On an upswing. I just have to keep doing what I’m doing.
The only fly in the ointment is that Auden wants to take things slow. Which, yes, mightobjectivelybe the right approach to building a relationship that’s not based on sex, but issubjectivelykilling me because I’m horny as fuck.
I haven’t masturbated so much since I was seventeen.And let me tell you, being stuck with my hand and my own wayward thoughts while jerking off is… dangerous.
I blow out a breath and head into Watchfire, needing a distraction. The warm air hits me immediately, along with the smells of fresh bread, woodsmoke, and the garlic from tonight’s special, a spicy sausage flatbread.
Jana is working behind the bar tonight, and she greets me with a smile and an eyebrow wiggle. “Boss man! How was the date?”
Perky Halloran is just beside me, and his ears twitch like little gossip-seeking antennae.
“Wonderful,” I say firmly. “Auden’s a great guy.”
“Good for you, Ames.” Perky raises his wineglass in a toast. “To new beginnings and all that.”
I don’t know what he means—at least, I’d like to believe I don’t—so I change the subject. “Good to see you, Perky. Where’s your better half tonight?”
“If you mean David, I have no idea.” He sniffs and lifts his chin. “But I hope, wherever he is, he’s thinking about what he’s done andrepenting.”
A long-suffering sigh comes from the other side of the bar, and Perky’s husband shakes his head. “It was a book, Perky. Mafia romance isn’t your cup of tea, you said. One star, you said.Dee-Enn-Eff, you said! And the library was asking for donations, so…”
Perky shakes his head sadly. “Ames, I really can’timaginewhere David might be tonight, as I said… but if you do happen to see him at some point, perhaps you could tell him that not finishing a book is a temporary state—one I might change at any time when the mood strikes—whereas, being betrayed by my soulmate, by the man I loved and trusted above all others, is a permanent wound that will never be forgiven or forgotten?”
Jana meets my eyes and presses her lips together like she’s trying not to laugh. I don’t blame her.
Perky and David do this dance every few months, where David commits an unforgivable crime—I feel like the last one was eating Perky’s peanut butter cups at Halloween, and the time before that was him saying Jacob Elordi was hotter than Perky’s beloved Jonathan Bailey—and Perky launches into the drama stratosphere until David makes amends.
It’s funny because David’s as undramatic as they come—the man owns five different ties in the same shade of brown and has ordered the same soup-and-sandwich combo every Friday for years. But he’s gone along with it every damn time for literal decades.
“Soulmates don’t come along every day, Perky,” David points out. “You can’t just cast yours aside willy-nilly. We’re not as easily replaced as a secondhand copy ofImpaled by Love.”
“Imperiled by Love!” Perky says, seeming to forget for a moment that he can’t see or hear David. “Ames, please also tell David,ifyou see him, that a true soulmate would seek to understand what’s important to me andwhy.”
I nod and tap my temple. “I’ll make sure he gets the message.” I roll my eyes at Jana. “In the meantime, I’m gonna go get started on the bread for tomorrow.”
“Nope. Rocco already did it,” Jana says. “And before you ask, yes, he did it perfectly, and I checked the shaping myself.” She winks. “Your kids are all grown up, Dad. Go upstairs and relax.”
Great. The very thing I was avoiding. But now I haveno excuse not to do just that, so I give her a smile and a salute and head next door to the stairs that lead up to my place.
My apartment over the restaurant isn’t large. Back when the guests of the Abigail—the inn next door that my family’s owned for over a century—arrived in horse-drawn carriages, Watchfire was the stables, and the slant-roofed top floor I call home was where the groomsmen slept. When I renovated the downstairs into a restaurant, there hadn’t been a lot of money left over to renovate my apartment, so I’d gone for broke on my personal kitchen and left the rest of the space wide open to figure out later. There’s a living room area that’s really just a couch and a TV, a bedroom area in the back that’s a bed, nightstand, and dresser, with a cramped bathroom between.
