The Deputies: 3 Novella Box Set (31 page)

S
he needed to come clean here with Drake. He’d apologized nicely and he deserved one as well. She wiped her clammy palms on her shorts and tried to find the right words. When she told him the truth, he would probably start running away as fast as he could.

“I’m sorry about things too. You see, I’ve kind of had a thing for you since we were teenagers.”

She waited, staring down at her sneakers. Her cheeks were warm with embarrassment and she wanted to dig a hole she could hide in. A grown woman shouldn’t have to admit stuff like this.

Drake sounded shocked. “Wow, that’s so cool. I never had any idea.”

Cool?

Her head jerked up and he wasn’t laughing at all.

“You were never meant to know. It was a silly schoolgirl crush, that’s all.”

That was the understatement of a lifetime. She’d planned their entire lives down to the most minute detail. She opened her mouth to explain that her passion for him hadn’t been some brief teenager phase but something much more. She settled back down next to him so she could tell him the truth.

“I–” Shouting from several feet away interrupted her train of thought. Jerard was waving at them and jogging closer.

“Hey, Drake!” The young man came to a stop, his face wreathed in a big grin. “I think I met my new parents. They’re really nice! The mom is pretty too. Come meet them!”

Jerard was tugging on Drake’s arm and the deputy chuckled at his exuberance. “That’s great. Just give me and Tori a few more minutes okay? Then I’m all yours.”

The boy quickly agreed and ran back down the trail disappearing in the trees.

“What I wouldn’t give for energy like that,” Drake groaned. “What’s their secret?”

Tori laughed at his wistful expression. “My mom used to say the secret was peanut butter and chocolate milk.”

“She’s probably right. I think that’s what I lived on when I was Jerard’s age. Those were the days.”

Today wasn’t the day for a full confession. He hadn’t acted like her crush was any big deal, and she didn’t want to mess with the positive vibe they had going. She’d figure out how to broach the subject again. Later.

“I guess we should head back.”

“Not yet. How about a kiss first? I’ve been thinking about those lips and it’s been driving me crazy.”

His lazy grin made her breathing erratic. What the man could do with just a smile ought to be illegal.

“I’m not a very good kisser,” she replied, her voice soft. He’d leaned in and she could smell his citrus scent mixed with sweat. A knot began to form in her stomach as he continued to move closer, his lips only inches from hers.

“I beg to differ. I think you do very well.”

His seductive tone and bedroom eyes all but did her in. When his mouth came down on hers, her lids fluttered shut and she lost herself in the magic of his kiss and his arms. If she was good, he was major league. By the time he was done, she was practically shaking in her tennis shoes with arousal.

The man was lethal.

“You make me forget that we’re in a public park,” she chided. “This is what got us in trouble on our first date.”

“You have a point there.” He leaned back and nodded. “The problem is we jumped the gun, and right into bed too. Maybe we should back up. Get to know one another. I’m not a playboy. I’m just an ordinary guy, Tori. Let’s see if you like me after spending some real time with me. I already like the woman you’ve shown me.”

She certainly liked the person he’d shown her today and when he’d helped clean up her store. But starting again? Could they really do that?

“Would it work? No sex until we get to know each other?”

The way she felt about him right at this moment didn’t bode well for keeping her hands off his yummy body in the future.

Drake grimaced. “It won’t be easy, that’s for sure. I’m very attracted to you. But I think we need to take a few steps back.” He smiled a slow, sexy grin that didn’t help her already galloping pulse. “Are you game?”

She could argue with herself until she was blue in the face but it wouldn’t change a damn thing. She liked him. She wanted to keep seeing him.

“I’m game. So what do we do now?”

“I hold your hand, very chastely of course, and walk you back to the picnic. Then tomorrow night, I pick you up and take you to the steakhouse for dinner. At the end of the evening, I will get no more than a goodnight kiss. How does that sound?”

Frustrating.

“Pick me up at seven?” she asked instead. If he could do this, so could she.

“Make it six,” he replied with a grin. “I get hungry after a long shift. Shall we shake on it?”

Drake’s hand was extended and she offered her own. His callused fingers were warm, his grip firm but gentle.

She was going to date Drake James and get to know the man he really was. She was ready to let go of her childhood fantasies and embrace reality.

Tori tucked her hand into the crook of Drake’s arm as they strolled down Main Street. Drake had picked her up right on time and even brought her a bouquet of flowers that had smelled heavenly. He’d opened the truck door for her and pulled out her chair. Dinner had been a leisurely affair with her learning about his time in the military and his job. In return, she had regaled him with tales of her time in New York, especially one of her eccentric pastry instructors. After dinner, she’d invited him down to the bakery to see the progress of the construction.

So far, “first date, take two” was going well.

“You look very pretty tonight. Did I mention that?”

“Only twice,” she teased. “Once when you picked me up and then again when we were in the restaurant.”

“I need to rectify my lapse immediately.” Drake laughed as she unlocked the front door to the bakery. “Let’s go for a trifecta. You look really beautiful tonight. Summer moonlight becomes you.”

She felt herself flush as she led the way inside. He was being very charming tonight, and it made it difficult to keep any emotional distance.

“They’ve made amazing progress. The kitchen is completely finished, and the front should be done by the end of the week. I’m hoping to open the weekend after that.”

Drake looked around appreciatively at the gleaming kitchen. Tori knew it was impressive. The stainless steel appliances and the walk-in refrigerator were only the tip of the iceberg. The gigantic island in the middle of the room included a marble slab for tempering chocolate and an oversized sink. It was her dream come true.

“This is really something.” He ran his hands over stone countertops and the gleaming ovens. “Very professional. It looks like you could make just about anything here.”

Drake pulled open the door of the pantry. “And you’re already stocked up. I didn’t even know you could buy flour in quantities this large.”

“I buy my flour in fifty pound bags. I go through it like water.” Tori laughed at his dismayed expression. “I’m projecting between thirty to forty thousand pounds of flour…a month.”

Drake’s eyebrows shot up. “A month? Holy hell, that sounds expensive.”

“It’s not cheap to open a bakery. I’ve been saving for years to do this. My entire life savings are at stake. It if fails, I’ll be living in a box out by the overpass.”

Tori said it calmly but it wasn’t far from the truth. If her bakery didn’t take off, she’d have to move back with her parents or find a job in another restaurant, probably in a big city.

“Somehow I think you’ll do okay. It looks like you know what you’re doing if this kitchen is any indication.”

“I can bake.” Tori hopped up onto the counter and gave him a big smile. “I assure you that if I made something you would remember it for the rest of your life. It would be that good.”

She was boasting but this was fun. An idea came to her and she hopped off the counter and headed to the stocked pantry. “I’m going to make you something. We didn’t have dessert at the restaurant so we can have something here. What do you want?”

“What can you make? I’m very particular about my desserts.”

She wrapped a white apron around her scarlet sundress and perused the contents of her shelves. “Chocolate? Lemon? Strawberry? I could make cupcakes. You could take them to the station tomorrow and give them out. Samples to help build a clientele.”

Drake spread his hands. “I love cupcakes. And lemon. How can I help?”

She tossed him an apron. “Put that on and wash your hands. We have work to do.”

She’d never baked cupcakes with a handsome man before and it was long past time. If she couldn’t have sex with Drake James, the second best thing would be to bake with him.

“All you have to do is squeeze the piping bag and the icing will come out. Apply it in smaller and smaller circles until it reaches a point. I like to do three of four of them.”

Tori expertly iced the first cupcake with a flourish. Drake scratched his chin, unsure as to whether he could do this without messing them up. He held the plastic bag and squeezed the icing on the cupcake, trying to emulate her movements. However, when he was done, it didn’t look anything like Tori’s. Instead it looked like a giant glob of icing on top.

“Shit,” he muttered under his breath.

Her hands covered his and his heart beat faster in his chest. She looked adorable with some flour smudged on her nose and her cheeks pink from the heat of the ovens. “My first iced cupcake looked much worse. Let me help you this time.”

The next two looked slightly better and by the third he was getting the hang of it. He did a few more but gratefully let her take over when she offered to finish. She iced the rest of the cupcakes at warp speed.

“Wow, you’re quick.”

“You have to be in this business. When I was working at the hotel, we were feeding hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people a night. I was constantly on my feet, constantly moving. Everything had to look perfect and it had to be done fast.” She handed him the first cupcake he’d iced. “I promise you it won’t taste any different than the ones I decorated.”

He pulled down the wrapper and bit into it, the cake still slightly warm from the oven. Lemon crème that Tori had injected into the center dripped onto his lip and he swiped at it with his tongue. The flavor burst onto his taste buds and he groaned at the balance of tart lemon and sugar sweet.

“Damn, this is so good. You really know what you’re doing.” He took another bite and then another, letting the flavor melt in his mouth. “You’re going to make a fortune.”

Tori tossed the last of the supplies in the sink full of hot, soapy water. She didn’t fee like running the dishwasher for just a few dirty things. “Few people get rich running a bakery. High-quality ingredients don’t come cheap and I don’t like to cut corners. No, I’ll be content to make a living at what I love. Have another.”

She pushed another cupcake toward him and he couldn’t resist. He didn’t eat sweets very often but when he did he really liked them. He’d be working extra hard at the gym to burn off the calories from tonight. An out of shape deputy couldn’t do the job the way it needed to be done.

“You told me about your time in culinary school but you didn’t say what made you become a pastry chef.”

He liked it when she talked about herself. She had a great sense of humor and she didn’t take herself too seriously. Add in the fact that she was smart and talented… He was feeling like he’d hit the veritable motherlode. She was everything he’d been hoping for in a woman but hadn’t thought he would find.

“I loved sweets and I liked to eat.” Tori swiped at the frosting with her tongue and he felt his groin tighten in response. Everything this woman did was sexy as hell. “One day I asked Mom to make some chocolate chip cookies. She was busy doing something and was slightly exasperated with us kids that day. There were three of us and it was summer. We were probably driving her crazy. So I made the cookies myself. They turned out pretty good too. The rest is history I guess. I liked baking things and when I graduated high school it was my dream to go to culinary school.”

“So you went to the big city,” Drake finished for her. He’d enjoyed her stories of her time in New York. She’d worked hard but still managed to have fun.

“I did. I missed home though. I was never meant to live in a place where you can’t see the sky and grass.”

“I missed it too when I was in Afghanistan. I missed everything about Corville. The people. My family and friends. Hell, I even missed the Montana winters.”

“Is that why you left the Army? You didn’t say earlier.”

“That was a big reason. I’d already talked to Logan about taking a job here when I got out. Dad had a heart attack and Mom wanted me to be near. When my time ended, I didn’t re-enlist. I was ready to come back to civilian life.”

Drake didn’t like to talk about the tremendous adjustment he’d gone through when he came back. Combat messed with a person’s head no matter how grounded they were.

“How is your dad?” Tori finished her cupcake and went to work on the dirty dishes in the sink.

“He’s fine. The doctor read him the riot act about his diet and smoking. He exercises more and eats better, thanks to my mom. He quit smoking and now he likes to garden to keep his hands busy. He may outlive us all.”