Chapter 14
Jeremiah
Nothing could have prepared me for seeing Zoe in my old t-shirt. My heart pounded against my rib cage as if trying to escape. The shirt nearly swallowed her up whole, but somehow that just made it even more attractive.
I’d utterly failed at keeping my interactions with Zoe minimal tonight. There was just something about her that sucked me right in and put me at ease. It was hard not to laugh and have a good time with her. Add Charlie into the mix, and I didn’t stand a chance.
“Looking good?”
I just about swallowed my tongue. Had I been that obvious in my staring? But then the heat from the open oven door reminded me that I had been checking on the cupcakes before she’d walked into the kitchen.
“I’m not an expert, so maybe it’s better if you check,” I managed to get out.
She rounded the island, then bent down to join me.
My body went rigid when her shoulder brushed mine.
I really didn’t trust myself with her so close and wearing my clothes.
She’d asked earlier if I was a guy who liked when a girl wore my jersey, and I totally was.
I used to adore seeing Sadie walking around the house in my clothes.
Apparently that wasn’t just a Sadie thing.
“I’d say another minute or so and then we’ll be good.” Zoe stood upright and closed the oven. “You know, besides the little icing debacle, you did really well.”
I laughed and shook my head. “Oh, you are such a bad liar.”
Zoe laughed, too. “I’m not lying,” she argued, leaning her hip against the island and crossing her arms over her chest.
I rested my hand on the counter, obnoxiously aware of how close it was to her and the mere foot of distance between us. Even if I had several inches on her, she wasn’t intimidated, her eyes just daring me to disagree again.
I wasn’t one to back down.
“I told you I wasn’t good at baking. That was always Sadie’s forte.”
“Did she have a favorite dessert to make?”
“Pies.” The answer came easily. “She enjoyed playing around with the crust and making different designs.”
Zoe gasped. “I’ve always wanted to try that, but we rarely get pie orders at the bakery. Some designs are so pretty that I don’t think I could bring myself to eat them. I would probably cry the first time someone cut into it.”
“She made sure to take all the pictures before serving it,” I said.
“I’d love to see them sometime if you still have them.”
Normally, I danced around talking about Sadie with people, mostly in hopes of avoiding the pitying looks directed at myself and, especially, Charlie.
I’d rather remember the wonderful things about Sadie and not the loss of her.
It was easy to talk to Zoe about her, though.
After the initial ‘I’m sorry for your loss’, she never batted an eye whenever Sadie was mentioned.
Instead, she was eager to learn more about her, and that warmed a part of me that had been frozen numb for years.
Charlie came scampering down the hall then, giant wet spots on her fresh pajamas from her hair. “Are the cupcakes done? They smell done.”
Zoe laughed softly as she took another peek into the oven. Then she grabbed an oven mitt and removed the two trays.
“They’re done baking, but we’ll have to let them cool before we can ice them.”
“Why don’t we put on a cartoon while we wait?” I offered before Charlie’s pout could make an appearance. It worked.
As if she’d been waiting for Charlie to settle down somewhere, Delilah came bounding into the living room and hopped right up on the couch next to her to receive nose scratches, which Charlie happily gave. I pulled up a kid’s channel and then passed the remote to Charlie.
“Zoe and I will be in the kitchen. We’ll let you know when the cupcakes are ready, okay?”
She was already distracted by the show, giving only a simple nod in acknowledgement. Confident that she would be sufficiently occupied, I returned to the kitchen to find Zoe loading up the sink.
“No way, Cupcake.” I shook my head adamantly as I joined her. “You already cleaned the counters after I made a mess. You are not doing the dishes.”
“But some of them are my dishes,” she argued.
“I don’t care. You’re helping us out.”
Her gaze just stayed locked on me. Zoe wasn’t one to back down either, no matter how big or small the challenge.
“Seriously.” I glanced toward the living room and lowered my voice. “The whole reason she got sent home the other day was because she’d made herself sick stressing out over this bake sale.”
Zoe’s whole demeanor softened, shoulders lowering as her own eyes moved in Charlie’s direction.
I rubbed the back of my neck. “Everyone was talking about baking with their moms, and she was the odd man out.”
“Oh, Charlie girl,” Zoe breathed out.
“My suggestion to ask you to help was the only thing that got her to smile that day. So, I mean it. Tonight is really important to her, and I cannot say thank you enough.”
Zoe relented and handed me the sponge. I gratefully directed my attention to the sink full of dishes instead of the look in her eyes, switching on the hot water.
“So, what got you into baking?” I asked after I’d rinsed out the largest bowl. “Did you always want to be a baker?”
Zoe settled in against the counter next to me, letting out a laugh, but there was an edge to it.
“Definitely not. I mean, I always loved desserts and enjoyed helping my mom bake around the holidays as a kid, but I never saw it as a career.”
There was only the sound of the faucet and clanking of dishes as she gathered her thoughts.
“My best friend, Jada, and I were roommates in college. She was always baking something in the dorm kitchen.” She picked up a tea towel and started drying the dishes I’d cleaned. “Once the off-season hit, I started to join her and realized how relaxing baking is.”
“You didn’t have any baking disasters like me?” I grinned over at her.
“Oh, I definitely did in the beginning,” she confessed with a reassuring smile.
There was hope for me yet.
“Jada opened up her bakery a couple years after we graduated, and it just made sense to work for her. Who wouldn’t want to spend all day with their best friend?”
I thought back to playing on the Cascades with Wesley. I missed working with my best friend and seeing him every day. He made everything more fun. Even those morning skates when Charlie had kept Sadie and I up all night.
“Sounds perfect to me,” I said.
While I worked on cleaning the last of the utensils, Zoe moved to check the cupcakes.
“Cooled off?” I asked, drying my hands with a paper towel.
She nodded with a smile. “Ready for icing.”
She headed off to get Charlie from the living room, the two of them returning within seconds.
Charlie climbed back onto her stepping stool and looked over the cupcakes eagerly.
I opened the silverware drawer to my left to grab a couple of knives for us to use, but Zoe stopped me with a hand on my arm.
“Absolutely not.” She looked utterly appalled as she eyed the butter knives. “You two are going to learn how to properly ice a cupcake.”
I tipped my head forward and raised my eyebrows at her. “You’re trusting me with the icing?”
“Possibly against my better judgement, but yes.”
Her lips tipped up on one side into a smirk, and my neck flushed warm.
“You have more faith in him than I do,” Charlie muttered behind us.
The chirping never ended.
Zoe made up two bags of icing that she called piping bags and then insisted that Charlie and I needed to be the ones to decorate the cupcakes so they didn’t look store-bought.
She helped Charlie first, guiding her hands to squeeze gently and move in a circular motion from the outside to the middle for the perfect swirl.
They repeated this for a couple cupcakes before Zoe supervised Charlie attempting one on her own.
She was a bit heavy-handed, but I doubted anyone would turn down extra buttercream.
Zoe’s eyes met mine over the top of Charlie’s head, and she smiled softly before tipping her chin toward my daughter and mouthing ‘she’s amazing’.
Having Zoe in my kitchen and seeing her with Charlie was not helping these new feelings that had been bubbling up. Feelings that had spent years dormant after I lost Sadie. Whether for my own protection or simply because my heart needed time to heal after being shredded into pieces.
It also had me questioning whether my rule about no dating was worth keeping.
And that scared the absolute shit out of me.
I hadn’t played the dating game since I was nineteen.
Dating as a thirty-one-year-old would already be vastly different from whenever I was a teenager without adding on the fact that I was a single father and a widower now.
I came with unique baggage that most men Zoe dated probably didn’t carry around with them.
But I hoped that was something we would be able to figure out together. Even just the little time we’d spent working on the women’s rec league had shown that we made quite a good team. Tonight was even more evidence of that. Surely it would transfer over into more personal matters as well. Right?
Zoe stepped around Charlie to join me with a fresh piping bag in hand, and I quickly shook those thoughts away. For now, at least.
“For me?” I asked, hand placed to my chest.
She tried to roll her eyes, but her amused smile gave her away.
I took the bag from her and held it poised over the bare cupcake nearest me, trying to recall what Zoe had just told Charlie to do.
In my opinion, I hadn’t used that much pressure, but the icing apparently felt different given how quickly it came rushing out, resulting in a giant glob.
Definitely not a perfect swirl like Zoe’s and still worse off than Charlie’s cupcakes she’d done on her own.
Zoe giggled softly under her breath.
“Here.” She placed her hands over the top of mine—which did not help my focus at all. “Just a slight squeeze as you move in a spiral.”
She applied the smallest amount of pressure to my fingers. I followed suit, hyperaware of how tight my grip was now. The icing came out much slower this time as Zoe guided me.
“And then ease up once you reach the middle and lift.”
Was it the prettiest cupcake I’d ever seen? Not by a long shot; lopsided from my first solo attempt. It would still taste good, though. Maybe I could convince the girls to let that be a sample cupcake for us to enjoy.
Zoe used one hand to move the cupcake to the side and replace it with a new one. I didn’t complain when she led me through decorating another. Hell, she could help me with all of them if it meant that she’d stay this close. I was drowning in her sweet cinnamon and vanilla scent and happily so.
Charlie had turned into a machine and had iced a majority of the cupcakes by the time Zoe and I finished up my fifth.
“Look at you!” I grinned, patting her on the back. “I’m impressed.”
Zoe looked over Charlie’s work with a smile of her own. “These are a lot better than how mine looked when I first started. I think Jada would hire you in a heartbeat.”
Charlie just preened under the praise. Probably more so from Zoe’s than mine. Not that I could blame her; I’d do the exact same thing if Zoe praised me.
Nope. I mentally shook away the images that followed that sentence. Not going there.
Having Zoe in my space was having more of an effect on me than I had predicted it would.
I could chalk some of it up to the fact that I hadn’t felt attracted to anyone since Sadie and wasn’t used to the sensation.
Or blame it on some primal instinct to find a mate to help care for my offspring.
No matter the reasoning, it didn’t mean the feelings weren’t there. Along with the desire to act on them.
Zoe stayed long enough to carefully place the cupcakes in Tupperware and pack up everything she’d brought with her.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Charlie bounced over to Zoe and wrapped her arms around her waist. It was going to be interesting getting her to bed tonight. The little tot was on cloud nine.
Zoe knelt down to give her a proper bear hug. “Of course! I had a lot of fun.”
Then she let go of Charlie so she could stand, adjusting her bag on her shoulder.
“Go get Delilah ready for bed.” I nudged Charlie. “Then it’ll be time to get your cute little butt in bed, too.”
She sighed, her shoulders drooping.
“Okay.” She gave Zoe a small, limp wave. “Bye, Coach Zo.”
“Goodnight, Charlie girl. Get some good sleep this weekend, so you’re ready for the game Sunday morning.”
The reminder of her game at least cheered her up enough that she left with a smile.
I walked Zoe to the door, my heart pounding a staccato against my ribs. If I’m ever going to make a move, now is the time, right?
“Thanks again. It really meant a lot to her,” I said instead.
“Of course. I enjoyed it. Mess and all.” She winked at me as she stepped out onto the porch. “See you Sunday!”
I just stood there, rooted to the spot in the foyer, and watched her make her way to her car. Am I seriously going to let this moment slip through my fingers?
Suddenly my feet were propelling me forward off the porch and down the walkway to her.
“Zoe!” I called out.
She paused and turned, a small crease between her eyebrows.
“Do you want to go to dinner sometime?” I blurted before quickly clarifying. “Without Charlie.”
A part of me was shocked by my actions while the other was impressed. I guess Wes’s words had stuck with me. If someone makes you happy, you’re allowed to move on.
Zoe did make me happy. I always found myself smiling around her even when that wasn’t her intention. She made Charlie happy, too, and that meant the world to me.
I wasn’t moving on, though. How could I ever “move on” from Sadie? Instead, I would be making more room in my heart for Zoe. If she wanted it, that is.
She hadn’t answered yet, and I grew jittery. The cold from the concrete soaked through my socks as I shifted back and forth on my feet. But then the corner of her lips ticked up before it turned into a full-blown smile. An endearingly shy one at that.
“Okay, yeah,” she answered, voice soft. “I’d like that.”
There was no hiding my dopey grin as my heart rate kicked into double time.
“Yeah? Okay, cool. I’ll um… I’ll figure something out and then let you know Sunday?”
“Sounds good. Goodnight, Jeremiah.”
“Goodnight, Zoe.”
I stood there, hands tucked in my pockets to keep away the chill as I watched her climb into her car and reverse from the driveway. She sent one last wave through the window, and I waved back.
It wasn’t until her car disappeared around the corner that it actually hit me.
I was going on a date.