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I unceremoniously dumped the butter into the mixing bowl. Cream. With a frown, I poured both types of sugar into the bowl and turned the mixer on slow.

Immediately, the butter, forced into pieces by the stand mixer, began to get coated in sugar. I frowned into the bowl while Ellis watched.

“Something wrong?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know.” I turned the mixing speed up and watched as the butter continued to get itself coated in sugar and break into smaller lumps. Eventually, I had a concoction that looked like gritty butter chunks, rather than anything resembling a creamy texture. “I must be doing something wrong.”

Ellis chuckled and shrugged. “It doesn’t look good, I’ll give you that.” A moment passed. “Want me to ask Lena?”

“No!” I cleared my throat. “I mean, no. Thanks. I’ll… I don’t know, try to find a video online.” I pulled out my phone and searched up how to cream butter and sugar. “Ohh. The butter is supposed to be soft and cool to the touch. Not cold and hard.”

Ellis snorted and shook his head. When I glanced at him, his cheeks turned slightly pink, making me wonder what he’d been thinking about that was so funny. Was he laughing at me?

“Here,” he said, standing. “I think Lena keeps some softened butter out. That has to be close enough, right?” He came to stand next to me and slid a little butter dish across the counter before lifting the lid. “There you go. Soft butter.”

“But it’s not cool.” I poked the stick of butter gently and my finger came away with a dollop of butter attached to it. “See?”

Ellis grabbed a paper towel and passed it to me before speaking. “We can put it in the fridge to cool it off a little.”

“Okay.” My voice sounded skeptical even to my own ears as I wiped the butter from my fingertip onto the paper towel.

“Well, it’s that or you do the opposite. Take fresh butter from the fridge and let it soften on the counter. Or…” He glanced at the mixing bowl. “You can go with that mess.”

I shook my head and ran my fingers through my hair. “No, you’re right. We’ll do it this way.”

We moved our attention to the next step on the list—mixing egg and vanilla with the creamed butter mixture. Great.

I looked back to Ellis. “Now what?” I gestured at the instructions by way of explanation.

He shook his head again and sighed. “What am I going to do with you?”

Anything you want. The thought flew through my mind before I had a chance to catch it, but once it was there, heat flared deep within my gut. Instead of saying what I was thinking, though, I went back to Lena’s list of orders. “We can make this pie. How hard can a pie be?”

His eyebrows shot up. “Have you ever baked a pie?”

“Again, no.” But it couldn’t be too hard—could it?”

Ellis stepped closer and from the proximity, I could smell him. Soap and clean, fresh detergent. Maybe something else, too. Orange? Why would he smell like oranges? I had no idea, but his scent was doing something to me. “Why don’t we try something easier? Like a cake.”

“You can try a cake. I’m going for broke on this pie. Crust is first.”

I cleaned out the bowl for the stand mixer while Ellis gathered the ingredients for the cake, which honestly weren’t that different from the cookie bars.

We worked together quietly for a few minutes, passing ingredients between us, occasionally bumping hips or elbows. The first time it happened, I apologized, my cheeks burning with heat. Ellis waved away the apology, so I stopped apologizing for accidentally touching him.

As he worked on the cake, I created pie dough in a bowl, which I was really quite proud of. When I stepped back to admire my handiwork, I looked down and noticed flour covering my Henley.

“Ugh,” I muttered, brushing the flour off of my shirt.

“Leave it,” Ellis said, his tone leaving no room for argument. “You’ll just get yourself messy again later.” He cleared his throat and looked away before looking back at me.

With a slow nod, I watched Ellis get the cake ingredients mixed, admiring his competence in baking. I should have trusted him in the beginning. Asked for his help. What had I been thinking, assuming I could do Lena’s baking all by myself?

I shook my head to clear my thoughts away. It didn’t matter what I’d been thinking. What mattered was getting Lena’s orders in the oven and ready for the next steps—decoration and delivery.

Ellis had his cake batter ready before I had finished the pie crust, so he popped it into the oven to bake and then leaned his back against the counter to watch me finish. Something about the look in his dark eyes made me shiver, in spite of the warm kitchen.

I slid the crust into a glass pie pan, giving it a critical look. Before I could speak, Ellis said something.