I rescued the box of assorted goodies from the passenger seat of my Tahoe and glanced back at the long driveway that led to the gray shingled two-story house lined with impeccably tended hedges and spring flowers. The lawn was freshly cut, not a blade of grass out of place, and the porch was furnished with a wooden swing and hanging pots of red geraniums. It was…cute. Not very lumberjack-ish, if you asked me.
I knocked on the door.
No response.
Most people were up by eight o’clock, weren’t they?Shit. Itwas Saturday. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d slept until seven, but I kept bakery hours, so what did I know? I supposed I could leave the box on the mat…or the swing. I didn’t have a pen on me. Maybe there was one in my SUV or?—
“You.”
I jumped, my pulse skyrocketing from zero to sixty in a nanosecond. “Christ! You scared me. What the fuck?”
Viggo leaned on his doorjamb with his arms crossed, giving effortless badass vibes. “I live here.”
“Right. Um…here, these are for you.” I foisted the box at him. “To thank you for being there for Freya and taking my call last night. I’m sorry I pestered you. And…anyway, thanks.”
“Donuts.”
“It’s an assortment of some new recipes I’ve been trying out. I didn’t know if you were a fruit guy only or a chocolate lover, but there’s a little of everything in there.”
Viggo inclined his head. “This is nice of you, but unnecessary. You’re going to make my thighs big.”
I barked a laugh, and of course I checked out his quads and might have even lingered a beat at his crotch. Not my intention, but he was right there and I was only human. “I think you can handle a few donuts.”
“Hmm. Do you want…coffee or something?”
“Oh, no. That’s okay.” I waved and stepped aside. “I need to get to the store.”
“Okay. Thank you. Good-bye, Dexter.”
I pushed at the door before he could close it. “One question.”
Viggo shook his head in bemusement, turning to set the box on a console table in his foyer. “What is it?”
“I read that pregnant women have to be mindful of skin products, like retinol. Too much vitamin A can be harmful to a fetus’s development. Would you happen to know if Freya is using retinol?”
He lowered his chin and aimed a steady WTF look at me. “How the fuck would I know?”
“I thought maybe she’d mentioned her skin routine?” Okay, thatwasweird.
“To me? For fuck’s sake. I’ll text her.”
“No, don’t bug her now.” I put my hand on his arm, ignoring the tingly feeling at the base of my spine. Crap, I knew what that meant, but I refused to give in to attraction. Not with this guy. “It’s early. I’ll ask her later today.”
Viggo typed a message on his cell. “You don’t want to bug her, but you don’t mind bugging me. How do you spell rentinol?”
“It’s retinol.” I spelled it for him, leaning into his space to make sure he got it right. I was treated to a raised brow and a whiff of woodsy soap or cologne. It took everything I had not to sniff the air around him.
Buzz buzz
“She says she’s not using rentinol. Only natural products and not to worry,” he reported.
“It’s retinol,” I corrected. “And technically, it’s natural. It’s found in animals and humans, but most skin care retinol is synthetic. Unless you buy plant-based, in which case…great. Do you think she’s using plant-based retinol?”
“Are you okay?” Viggo countered.
I raked a hand through my hair and blew out a stream of air. “Yes, and also…no.”
“So I see. Well…this much worrying isn’t good for you. If it makes you feel better, I will tell you something about Freya you might not know.”
