For the umpteenth time since he’s walked back into my life, I just sit and stare at Hayes. Wonder how he’s in my head and knows exactly how I’m feeling. First he connects the dots with my parents. How I don’t want to miss chances like they did. And now this. Understanding the numerous nights I’d sit stewing at home because Mitch made a big fuss about me spending too much time at the bakery. How I’d be miserable, sitting idly by while he perused the Wall Street Journal or New York Times. It’s like he wanted me to want to be with him more for his own ego’s sake, to know I chose him over my work, and not because he actually wanted to spend time with me.
Hearing Hayes say it only reinforces that it was right to end things with Mitch.
“Thank you.” My voice is soft, relieved that someone understands why I felt how I felt.
“There’s no need to thank me.” He shrugs as he sets his bottle down and stands up from his barstool. “Truth is truth, and I’m sorry you had to experience that particular truth. C’mon, I need to do something.”
I look down to the hand he holds out to me and then back up to the brown of his eyes. “Keep this up, Whitley, and I just might start to like you again.”
“You never stopped liking me.” The smile he flashes—one full of arrogance, amusement, and adoration—causes the parts that he’s awakened in me, the ones that wanted to be kissed, to roar back to life.
It’s just the fresh air and different perspective, Saylor. Get a grip.
And so I do just that—get a grip—but this time it’s by taking the hand he offers and following him without asking where we’re going. We walk through the lush grounds and laugh at silly memories I can’t even believe he remembers from our youth. We talk about Ryder and why he hasn’t settled down yet. About the project we rehearsed this morning. About my favorite flavor of cupcakes.
And in all our wandering, I become distracted by both the scenery and by him with his board short-clad hips and his tanned, chiseled chest. Why would I want to pay attention to anything else? So I let him walk in front of me for a while as I happily meander behind, not having a clue where he’s leading me.
I think about my parents. About their love. About how they only wanted the best for me.
They would have loved my bakery.
And
I know deep down that despite the heartache I had walking away from Mitch, my mother may have turned over in her grave if I had married him here at her dream destination.
Because she would have known—
always did
—what was best for me even when I couldn’t see it myself. Youthfulness often has a way of blinding you to truths.
And Mitch wasn’t what was best for me.
But Hayes on the other hand . . .
she always did have a soft spot for him
. I think she’d be smiling, knowing I’m presently enjoying her idea of paradise with him. That we’re burying the past so we can be friends. And that despite the heartbreak he caused me, she was right: he is the good guy she thought he was because he’s here trying to help me save face.
I’m distracted from my thoughts when a resort employee walks out of a fork in the path in front of us. She momentarily meets Hayes’s gaze, nods her head at him before smiling at me, and then makes her way down the path beyond us.
“So I have a confession,” he says solemnly, causing my feet to falter and my eyes to wander to anywhere but on him.
“Nothing good ever comes from those opening words.” I’m not sure why I’m already nervous about this. Why the single phrase has my pulse accelerating.
He chuckles but doesn’t respond before walking a few feet, looking back to me, and then disappearing the same way the resort worker had just come from. I follow him into this little alcove carved out of the thick, tropical foliage. Its fronds shade us from the sun overhead and partially obscure us from any other guests exploring like we were. “Sit.”
I narrow my eyes but oblige him after he sits down first. And I’m so fixated on the discord humming within me that I don’t notice the box on the bench until he picks it up. And when I do, my eyes immediately home in on the pink pastry packaging.
“Hayes?”
He doesn’t respond but rather opens the box so I can see a dozen lavishly decorated cupcakes inside. I’m so confused. What do cupcakes have to do with his confession?
“Just humor me, okay?” His dimples deepen with his smile.
“Sure.” I rub my hands on my thighs and wait.
“When I arrived the other day before you, I thought I’d be nice and go buy some cupcakes, have them in the villa as a little treat for when you arrived. Looking back, the idea was stupid since you are usually up to your elbows in cupcake batter and frosting, so why would you want more? But my God, Ships, they tasted like shit. Nothing like yours whatsoever.”
My laugh rings out. He likes my cupcakes. My ego has definitely been boosted. “So that’s your confession? That the cupcakes are horrible?”
“In a sense.” He nods his head and looks back down to the box’s contents. “But you see, I know how long your anger can last, and I don’t want you to be angry with me anymore. You can hold a mean grudge, Saylor Rodgers, and so I bought you these.”
He holds the box out to me and now I’m even more confused. My chuckle reflects my mix of emotions. “Let me get this straight. You don’t want me to hold a grudge against you, so you bought me a box of cupcakes you think taste like crap?”
“Yep.” His smile broadens and body shifts so his knee is on the bench and shoulders face me.
“Okay.” I laugh the word out, befuddled but amused. “But I’m not holding a grudge against you. I told myself I was going to come here and wash the slate clean. The past is the past, and it’s over and done with.”
He mulls the words over, the look on his face says he’s skeptical whether he really believes me or not, then picks up a cupcake and hands it to me. What in the hell is going on here? “Hayes?”
“Just hold it because while I think they may taste like shit, I do think they’ll be perfect grudge-busters.”
“Grudge-busters? What? I’m so confused right now. What the hell is a grudge-buster?”
“It’s this.” I bite out a yelp as he picks a cupcake up and smacks his hands together with a dramatic flair. Bits of cupcake and frosting fly everywhere, like a confectionary explosion. There are crumbs stuck to his chest, all over his board shorts, in his hair, on his lips that are open and laughing, and understandably, smashed all over his hands.
Probably exactly what I look like at the end of a long day.
“Are you crazy?” I shriek but the words come out in a vomit of laughter. To see a man, who always looks so perfect no matter what time of day, look like the mischievous little boy from my childhood makes my heart swell.
“Your turn.” Despite his tongue darting out to lick some frosting off his smiling lips, his tone is dead serious. And of course I hesitate, unsure if he’s losing it but then again with that smile on his lips . . . I know he’s not.
“Why? Can you just tell me why you want me to smash a cupcake in my hand—shitty tasting or not?” My eyes are wide, but my hands are itching to try it. Lips fighting the smile I can’t seem to help when I’m around him.
“Because spontaneity is the best kind of adventure,” he repeats the mantra from the other night. “And because it’s a grudge-buster.” He shrugs as if he’s making perfect sense and hopefully to himself, he is.
I stare at him long and hard, realizing he set this all this up with the resort employee delivering them to the spot for us and then leaving when she saw us. And if he’s gone through this much trouble, I decide to go for it.
Within seconds, my hands are a mass of frosting and cake. The fallout from the force of my smash has resulted in an equal number of crumbs landing on Hayes as they have me. And while I may not be sure why I’ve just smashed a cupcake between my hands, I’m not going to lie when I say that it did feel pretty damn good. Cathartic.
“Should we do another one?” Hayes asks, as he looks down to where he’s trying to remove a large chunk of chocolate frosting from his chest and only manages to smear it further.
I could help you get that.
With my lips.
And my tongue.
Holy hell, the thoughts have me shifting to abate the sudden ache of want in my core.
When his hand stills mid motion, I glance up from where I’m staring at it on his chest to find he’s caught me watching. There’s a flash of something darker in his eyes mixed with a glimpse of desire. The words on my tongue suddenly feel like molasses.
I blink my eyes and try to refocus on what he asked me.
Do I want to smash another one?
Yes, for obvious reasons. And no, because he’s trying to distract me for some reason.
“No. I’m good.”
“You sure?”
“Why would I hold a grudge against you, Hayes?” My wits have been restored. So long as I keep my eyes on his. Off his body. And
not
on his lips.
“I lied to you, Ships.”
Now there’s a definitive way to distract me from thinking about his body.
“Okay.” I stretch the word out as I wrack my brain for what he’s referring to.
“When I walked into Sweet Cheeks that first day, yes, I was picking up the order for my mom, but I lied about that being the only reason.”
“Hayes.” His name is a warning I don’t want to have to give.
“Hear me out.” His chocolate-smeared palms are up in the defensive position. I glare. “I came in with every intention of telling you I had talked to Ryder and knew what had happened. But when I saw you . . . shit, Say, I fumbled. It’d been years since I’d seen you. And when I did, everything about what used to be
us—our friendship, our love, our connection—
rushed right back like it was yesterday. Then you assumed. And I saw how hurt you were. How much your pride had been fucked with by Mitch and the jerks you thought were your friends. I heard it in your voice. It killed me, Say. Made me think of how bad I’d hurt you before and knew I couldn’t hurt you again. And then after I heard you talk about Mitch, about why you walked away, I realized what you needed more than anything was honesty. It seems you’ve already faced enough on your own, and the least I could do was be honest too. So, yeah, I chickened out that first day I saw you. Thought if you told me on your own terms then I’d feel better about it, and only then would I do this if you asked.”
His words fade off and I’m not sure what to feel. I want to be mad at him. Want to feel embarrassed that he’s known all this time, and yet I can’t be. How lucky am I to have a friend willing to see how much I was hurting and not want to add to it?
“Sorry.” He speaks the word with such weight that I know the apology is for so much more than just not telling me.
“Thank you.” The two words are a whisper while the new cupcake in my hand taunts loudly to be smashed. On Hayes.
Hayes nods his head, our eyes still locked, but my thoughts are completely consumed with the idea.
“Hey,” I say, voice soft, lips curved in mischief. “No grudges.” He lifts his eyebrows as if he’s shocked I’ve forgiven him so easily, and then he gasps when I land the first confectionary blow. One beautifully decorated chocolate ganache cupcake is smashed on the exact location I’d thought about licking only moments before.
He’s silent as he looks down to where my hand is still pressed against him, chocolate frosting the only barrier between us. I grind it in, slowly slide it down his abs, and then lift my hand to bring a coated finger to my mouth. His eyes lift from the aftermath of my assault to watch me wrap my lips around my finger and suck the frosting off it.
A myriad of things flicker through his darkening irises. What I assume is hunger and desire. Need and want. The same feelings that are rioting through me. I slide my finger from my mouth and run my tongue over the chocolate still on my bottom lip. His jaw pulses. His eyes hold fast. Sexual tension sparks when it just can’t.
I remind myself of all the reasons this is a bad idea. How in two days he’s going to leave and go back to his life in Hollywood, and I’ll return to my mixer and ovens and passion.
Alone
.
So I try to bring us back to the playful part of us. The neutral zone.
“You’re right,” I murmur, a taunting smile on my lips, and a scrunch of my nose. “Not enough cream.”
I more than notice Hayes’s expression: mischief to match mine, challenge, disbelief.
And it’s only a fraction of a moment, a split second of time where we let spontaneity take over, and the kids we used to be emerge. In a frenzy of activity, we both scramble up from the bench and grab the remaining cupcakes from the box. Our laughter floats around us like the rustle of the palm leaves in the breeze. We’re armed and ready for a cupcake war.
He strikes next. A pink frosted one that glances off of my shoulder. My yelp rings out above the waves on the beach. His footsteps behind me tell me he’s given chase down the pathway. I turn a bend where he can’t see me and dart in between a break in the hedge. Just as he passes me, I jump out and smash a vanilla frosted cupcake square against his back.
“Still a little shit all these years later, Ships.” He laughs out the insult as we circle each other like dogs with smiles on our faces, lungs out of breath, and intention in our movements.
“Hmm, you forget how fast I am, Whitley?” I lunge toward him, ready to strike, and he jumps back. We continue this dance until I take one step too many and he grabs my arm and twists me against him, my back to his front.
“I think you forget how strong I am.”
I don’t even have a second to prepare before he lands a cupcake to my collarbone. And with his body behind me and his hand against me, I definitely feel his strength. Using his leverage, he takes his hand and purposely smears the cupcake against my skin and bathing suit.
“You asshole!” I shriek in jest as I escape the confines of his arms and chase after him down the footpath.
He taunts me from ahead.
You’re such a wimp. You can’t catch me. How do you like them apples, huh, Say?
“You’re dead meat,” I call after him as we weave in and out of paths. I chuck a cupcake at him from behind, and it bounces off the back of his neck.