“Plans?” I huff. “What plans?”
“Relax, you’ve been busy falling in love, baking brownies, and you’re practically on your honeymoon. I didn’t want to bother you.” Wilby shrugs.
Birdie stands and heads to the coffee pot, pouring herself more coffee and another cup. She sets the cups before Wilby and heads to the fridge for creamer. “Wilby is an unofficial Bee now. He’s joined the hive.”
I open my mouth to say something when Cal walks in, hair damp from surfing and smiling at me as he crosses the room and dips hishead to kiss me softly.
“Still doesn’t look fake,” Wilby mutters.
“Oh, stop it. You know this stopped being fake a while ago. Cal and Silvie are in love.” Birdie smiles with approval as Cal holds me.
“What’s going on in here?” Cal asks, shaking his head at Birdie, not able to hide his grin.
“I tried to bake you a surprise,” I say.
He looks at the oven and back at me, and his smile softens. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“More like shouldn’t have done that,” Wilby mutters.
“I know,” I say. “But I wanted to.”
He leans down and kisses my temple like his kitchen isn’t a disaster, and I didn’t almost burn his house down. He looks like he couldn’t care less.
“It’s perfect,” he says.
“It’s charcoal,” I tell him.
“It’s the thought,” he says, pressing his forehead to mine. “And it’s very nice.”
Wilby groans behind us. “Why do they have to be so adorable and sickeningly sweet?”
Birdie smiles like she just won something. “They’re perfect.”
Cal wraps an arm around my waist and smiles down at me like I hang the moon instead of committing crimes against baked goods.
And I realize, standing in a smoky kitchen with a ruined pan and a man who looks at me like I’m magic, that I would absolutely set the world on fire for him.
Preferably just not his house.
I knock on Carly’s door, holding two cups of coffee. Extra cream for Carly’s with cinnamon sprinkled on top because I remember that’s how she likes it.
“Come in!” I hear from inside.
“Carly?” I call as I let myself in.
No answer. I step fully inside, the door clicking behind me when I stop short.
Donna Bennet is stretched out on the couch, smiling at me. “Hello.”
She says this like she’s just a normal person, not aNew York Timesbestselling author I’ve been reading since I was twelve. She’s my favorite author of all time and seeing her here just casually sitting in Carly’s living room is like having my two different worlds collide.
She looks just like the photo on the back of all of her books and from the few interviews I’ve seen of her. She looks incredible.
She’s wearing sunglasses pushed into her hair, and a giant, brightly colored tote bag rests at her feet. A laptop is propped open on the table next to her. She has a coffee mug in her hand.
She looks at me and smiles. “Oh, good,” she says. “You’re here. Come in.”
I just stare, my jaw dropped. Because this is the very woman whose books I stole from my mom’s bedside table in high school and from friends’ mothers. The woman whose name people talk about in any romance book conversations, the mother of all romance.TheDonna Bennett. In real life and on Carly’s couch in Coconut Beach.
