Chapter 17
Lauralee
“I shouldn’t,” I say when Chris offers me another glass of wine. “I’ll be drunk soon, and that won’t get five hundred cupcakes frosted tonight.”
“Five hundred?” She states, “Good lord. Do you want some help?”
“I’ll get it done. I always do.”
She sets down the bottle. “Here I thought you were still living the high life, hitting Whiskey’s on a Thursday night while your old wingwoman was out here in the country growing babies. But frosting all those cupcakes makes me think I have it much easier on the ranch.”
I laugh. “I barely have a life these days. I don’t even remember the last time I went out, but here you are, a total badass superwoman. You always have been. Anyway, you never drank that much before the babies.”
“But I always had fun drinking with you.”
I reach across the table and take her hand, giving it a squeeze. “Cheers to that.”
Christine glows from happiness even when she’s not pregnant. More so when she is. I have nothing but love for my friend, even if I don’t get to spend as much time with her anymore.
However, Baylor has been a fun distraction. I glance at the far end of the table, where I find his eyes already on me. He takes a sip of his water and holds it up just enough for me to catch him silently toasting to me.
I try to keep my smile to myself so no one else notices, but when I look up, Chris’s eyes are glued to me. She glances down at Baylor and then at her husband. I swear she and Tagger speak a secret language through their eye exchanges that the rest of us aren’t privy to.
With a couple of fans positioned a few feet away, the strands that escaped my topknot tickle my face. I tuck them behind my ear and whisper to Daisy, “Come to Leelee.”
Daisy toddles to the side of me and raises her arms in the air. I lift her onto my lap and fuss with her adorable curls, hoping to mask the scent of betrayal that my friend is clearly smelling when it comes to her brother.
I look up, and say, “She’s so cute I can’t stand it. How is a being this perfectly adorable?” Unable to resist the urge, I kiss her cheeks and blow a raspberry.
Her hand pushes against my face as she giggles. “Leelee.”
Turning her around on my lap, she rests her back on my chest. Her mom grins with pride at her. “You’re looking heated, sweetie.”
Their dad had gone inside a while ago. We’re all sweating and overheating at this point. Daisy says, “Hot.”
When Christine stands from the picnic bench, she says, “I think we’re getting too deep into the summer heat for the fans to keep us cool outside.
Dinner at my house next time.” She pauses with her hand on her belly and takes a breath.
“I’m so stuffed. I probably shouldn’t have eaten that second straw berry shortcake you brought, Baylor. ”
He leans forward. Glancing at me, and then at her, he says, “Couldn’t let them go to waste.”
“They’re too delicious for that. It was so good, Laur.”
“Thanks.”
She presses the back of her hand to her head. “I think I need air-conditioning and some bad reality TV.” I hadn’t noticed how flushed her cheeks had gotten until she stood.
Tagger comes around and says, “I’ll drive you down to the house.”
She nods and comes to my side of the table. Giving me a quick side hug, she says, “I’ll see you tomorrow at the festival.”
I stand to give her a hug with Daisy planted on my hip. “Do you need anything?”
“Rest and to cool off. That’s all, but I am trying to talk Tagger into getting a chilling pool.”
He laughs. “We have a river less than fifty yards away. That ice water could cool off the Texas sun.”
She wobbles her head with an eye roll. “He’s not wrong. Maybe I need to go sit in the river for a bit.” Rubbing her stomach, she adds, “I think the air-con will do me right tonight. I’ll see you tomorrow, though?”
“Yes. Text me when you’re heading there.”
“I will.” She rubs my upper arm. “Thanks for coming out here.”
“I always love coming to see all of you.”
Tagger takes Daisy into his arms, then looks at Baylor as they head for the utility vehicle. “You hanging out or taking off?”
“I’m going to take off. I’m tired, but you owe me a game of basketball before I fly out again. ”
“You’re on.” Glancing at his son, he asks, “You coming with us, Beckett?”
“Can’t I stay with Uncle Baylor?”
Baylor leans over to his side, wrapping his arm around his nephew’s back. “Hey, buddy, since we have the festival tomorrow, I was thinking we could start on the fort on Sunday before I leave. What do you think?”
“Yesss.” He sits straight up on the picnic bench. “Dad gave me a hammer that’s all mine.”
“Make sure to have it ready.”
“I will.”
The UTV is started, but Beckett gets up in a hurry. “Bye.”
It’s so sudden that it makes me laugh. “Bye, Beck?”
He waves before dashing after the vehicle. Tagger stops just in time for him to jump on and sit in the back. As soon as they round the road leading to their house, Baylor turns to me, and asks, “Did you have a good time?”
Now I’m rubbing my belly. “I’m stuffed and glad I came. Thank you for inviting me.”
“Anytime.” Angling one leg free, he smiles the kind of smile that could make me fall head over heels if I’m not careful.
I really don’t want to be careful with him.
I could blame the wine, but I’m starting to think it’s just him.
He stands and walks closer to hold his hand out for me. “You ready to go back?”
I take it, and he pulls me to my feet. When I’m pulled against his chest, I whisper, “I’m ready.” I want to touch him so badly that I glance slowly to the right to make sure his dad isn’t watching. With the coast clear, I rest my hands on his chest. “Ready to pick up where we left off?”
Taking hold of my hands, he waggles his eyebrows. “Where’d we leave off, Shortcake? ”
I cock my eyebrow and grin. “Guess you’ll have to find out.”
“When you said I’ll find out, I was thinking you meant upstairs.”
“As soon as we finish frosting these last three hundred cupcakes, that’s where we’re heading.” With a frosting bag in my hand, I smirk at him. “I promise to make it worth the detour to finish these.”
“I’m going to hold you to that.”
He has a way of making me feel too comfortable to share this side of myself.
“Good. I was hoping you’d be holding me to several places.
” I start frosting down the row of twenty-five cakes, but add, “The bed. The wall. Maybe the peninsula.” Should I feel some shame?
Nah, it’s Baylor. From everything I’ve seen, he doesn’t judge people like that.
“I’m learning all kinds of interesting things about you.” He packs up the previous batch I already frosted and tucks the box in the fridge. “Can’t say I don’t want to learn more.”
I pause with the tip of the piping bag pressed to the next cupcake. I turn around to face him. “I want that, too.”
“You want to learn more about me?” The surprise in his tone catches me off guard.
“Of course. Why wouldn’t I want that?” Pressing his hands to the worktable between us, he looks at me like.
. . I don’t know what that look is. Happiness?
Curiosity? Flattered? And then it occurs to me.
It’s all those things. “What’s happened between us has been fast. I mean, look at you.
You obviously don’t have trouble getting women, and I’m no exception.
But I want you to know that although I see you as a sexy piece of meat—” His mouth falls open, making me laugh.
“Kidding. I’m kidding.” When our laughter dies down, I say, “You are very handsome, like ridiculously so, but that’s not what I like most.”
“What do you like most?”
There’s such a boyish charm about him in the moment, like he’s not some model of a man loose in Manhattan who’s given compliments all the time. We both know that’s not true. Women trip over themselves to catch his eyes, but I caught them.
I don’t feel special because of his attention.
I feel special because of how sweet he’s been to me.
He doesn’t hesitate to jump into the mix to make my life easier, to check on me if I’m feeling confused about what’s happening, or even willing to keep us secret so I don’t have to deal with the aftermath after he leaves.
I come around the table, setting my bag on the table on the way to him. Wrapping my arms around his neck, I confess, “I want to get to know you better. All of you, and who you are as a person, here and in New York City.”
His hands cover my hips, and he moves closer. The grin he was wearing flattens as his eyes drop to my lips. When his gaze slides up to mine again, he says, “I want to get to know you better as well.”
I’m kissed. My breath is stolen right when I take it, leaving me no choice but to steal it right back. It’s not deepened, but the pressure is perfect, wanting and controlled, sweet, but with passion.
When we part, my eyes flutter open to find him staring at me. “I’ve never known anyone like you, Shortcake, and I’ve known you my whole life. Seems like I’ve been wasting a lot of time on other women.”
“I wholeheartedly agree,” I say, smiling from the inside.
He taps my nose and kisses the tip. “But first, cupcakes.”
I groan.
It’s not like I usually mind frosting them. It moves fairly fast as a process. I just feel like we could find better ways to spend our limited time together. “But alas, cupcakes.”
Though it feels wrong to leave the strength of his fingers digging into my hips, and that expression on his face makes me feel like the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen.
I’m becoming addicted to the desire. How his pupils widen when I move closer, as if he needs to take more of me in, and that grin that I’m only privy to on occasion, usually followed by a kiss.
I slip from his hands and grab the piping bag again, but the smile stays right where he put it on my face.
“We’re moving quickly.”
“Do what you need to do. I’m in no hurry.”