Chapter Ten
Ben
It’s a Friday night rush, the kind where every table’s full, the bar’s three deep, and the ruckus voices compete with the clink of pint glasses and the sizzle from the kitchen.
Mark and Charlotte are darting in and out of the pass with plates, and I’m pulling pints, sliding tabs, and tossing back half-finished conversations with the regulars like muscle memory.
But my focus keeps drifting.
The big front windows face the street, and every time my eyes slide past it, I can’t help but take a peek next door. The bakery’s dark at night, but tonight the lights are on, spilling across the sidewalk.
Paige is in there.
I’ve been seeing her all week, flitting in and out during the day. Sometimes she’s got boxes balanced in her arms, sometimes she’s alone with a clipboard, sometimes she’s got that look like she’s talking to herself to remember a dozen things at once.
I don’t know what it is she’s doing exactly—painting, rearranging, stocking—but I know I’ve been watching.
Not that I’ve gone over. Not after the last couple of times we’ve been close. Breakfast with her family last week nearly knocked me off my axis, and every accidental brush of her arm or thigh lit up places in my brain and body that have no business reacting to Jason’s little sister.
I’m half-listening to a guy at the bar talk about his fishing trip, nodding in the right places, but I’m angled just enough to see a shadow move across the light on the sidewalk.
I saw her earlier, so I can picture her now. Her hair is pulled up tonight, the messy kind of bun that leaves her neck bare, her sleeves shoved up like she’s been working hard.
I grip the edge of the bar a little tighter than necessary.
It’s been years since she lived here, years of me hardly thinking of her at all, except in passing at the little girl with a harmless crush on me.
And now she’s right next door, close enough that I can hear the faint thud of something heavy being set down if the noise in here dips.
Close enough that if I wanted, I could step outside, walk twenty steps, and see her.
Which is exactly why I haven’t.
Because that crush isn’t quite so harmless anymore.
The last glass clinks into the rack, the smell of sanitizer stinging in the air. My shoulders ache from hauling kegs, running orders, keeping the chaos in check. Mark and Charlotte bailed half an hour ago, and now it’s just me and a quiet bar.
I wipe down the last section of bar, hang the rag over the sink, and fish my keys from my pocket. The front door gives a satisfying click as I turn the lock, the street outside cool and still.
I glance next door to see that the lights are still on. They’ve been on all night.
Maybe she’s not there. Maybe she left them on accidentally?
But no, I see a shadow cross the window a moment later.
I check my phone. 1:03 a.m.
What the hell is Paige still doing in there?
I stand on the curb for a moment, shoving my hands into my jacket pockets, eyes fixed on the front window. From here, I can’t see her. The windows are covered in some sort of brown paper, but there’s definitely a shadow moving behind it.
I should just go home. It’s none of my business. She’s a grown woman, capable of locking up her own damn place without me barging in like some overprotective neighbor.
But my feet don’t move toward my car.
Instead, I lean against the locked door of the Pint, watching the still-lit window. Maybe she lost track of time. Maybe she’s finishing something important. Maybe she’s exhausted and could use a hand.
Or maybe I just want an excuse to see her.
I rub a hand over my jaw, telling myself to get in the car and drive away. But I’m already stepping in that direction, closing the distance between us.
By the time I’m standing in front of the bakery door, I can hear faint sounds inside—a muffled thump, the scrape of something heavy sliding across the floor.
I hesitate, palm resting against the cool glass. My reflection stares back, and for a second, I consider turning around.
But then I raise my hand and knock.
There’s a pause inside—no more scraping, no more movement.
A second later, footsteps cross the floor, light and quick. The lock clicks, and the door swings open just enough for Paige to peek out. Her hair’s still pulled back, though quite a bit of it has fallen, a few strands stuck to her cheek, and there’s a faint smudge of paint along her jaw.
“Ben?” Her voice is soft, like she’s not sure I’m real. “What are you doing here?”
I glance past her into the bakery. Counters are covered—mixing bowls, open boxes, a couple of paint cans in the corner. It’s pure chaos.
“Was locking up next door,” I say, shoving my hands deeper into my jacket pockets. “Saw your lights on. It’s 1:00 in the morning, Paige.”
She blows out a breath and leans a shoulder against the doorframe. “Yeah. I lost track of time.”
My brow lifts. “Doing what? Rearranging the whole damn place?”
Her mouth curves like she’s fighting a smile. “Something like that. I’m taping the walls so I can paint tomorrow, but…well, it turns out I overestimated how much I can do in one night.”
I glance over her shoulder again and see long lines of painter’s tape running the length of the wall from floor to ceiling in evenly spaced intervals. “Have you been at this all day?”
“More or less.” She shrugs, but I catch the tired slump in her shoulders.
“Why didn’t you just call it a night?”
Her eyes flick away, toward the mess. “Because if I stop now, I’ll lose momentum. And I’m already behind where I wanted to be.”
I shift my weight, fighting the urge to step inside. “You’re going to burn yourself out before you even open.”
She smiles faintly. “I’ll be all right. It’s fun.” She winces. “Well, it was fun. Now, it’s just tiring.”
I nod toward the wall. “Want help getting the rest up? Then you can call it a night before the sun comes up.”
She hesitates, then steps back, opening the door wider. “All right. But only if you promise to do it exactly the way I want without any bitching or telling me it would be better this way or that.”
I huff out a quiet laugh. “I can’t make that promise.”
She rolls her eyes, but there’s the faintest hint of relief in her expression as I step inside.
The place smells like paint and sawdust. Two of the walls are already done, painted a soft, airy blue that makes the space feel open and bright even under the harsh overhead lights. The color is clean and fresh, like a spring sky after rain.
The other two walls are still bare, but long strips of painter’s tape run from floor to ceiling in evenly spaced lines, turning the surfaces into neat, geometric patterns.
I glance around, nodding toward the taped walls. “You going to use the same blue for those stripes?”
She straightens from where she’s crouched by the outlet, picking up a roll of painter’s tape. “Yeah. Same blue, alternating with white. It’ll be whimsical and cute—exactly the vibe I want for a bakery.”
“Whimsical,” I repeat, letting the word roll off my tongue like it’s in a foreign language.
She smirks. “Ugh, you’re such a boy. People are going to walk in here and feel happy. That’s the goal.”
I take in the crisp blue walls again, then the meticulous stripes she’s been laying out. “I can see it,” I admit.
Her smile softens at that, just for a second.
“Okay,” she says, holding out the roll of tape to me.
I take the roll from her, the cardboard core still warm from her hand. She steps closer, pointing to the already-finished section like she’s about to train a new hire.
“Okay, so the tape needs to be exactly seven centimeters apart,” she says, gesturing to the width. “No more, no less. If it’s off, even by a hair, I’ll see it every time I walk in here, and it’ll drive me crazy.”
I glance at her fingers, then back to the wall. “You measuring, or is this all by eye?”
“Measuring,” she says with confidence. “I have an extra ruler around here somewhere.”
She looks around at the chaos on the floor where there are lines of loose wiring, little rubber tubes in a variety of colors, some stray coffee cups scattered around.
“Here it is,” she murmurs.
“They’re going to clean all this up before they go, aren’t they?” I ask, looking at the mess left behind by the electrician.
“He said they would, yeah,” she says, handing me the ruler. “They finished in here, and they’re working in the kitchen now, so I’ll just have to wait to do any work in there until next week. But I’m free to work in here, so I thought I’d get a jump on it.”
I crouch beside her, bracing the ruler against the wall where the last strip ends. “Seven centimeters exactly, huh? Not six-point-nine, not seven-point-one?”
Her lips twitch. “Don’t start. I mean it—exactly seven. It’ll drive me crazy.”
“Got it.” I tear off a strip of tape, lining it up against the mark I’ve made. The adhesive rips free with a sharp sound that echoes in the quiet space, and I press it to the wall, smoothing it down so there’s not a single wrinkle.
She watches me over my shoulder like a hawk. “Make sure it’s perfectly straight all the way down. No wrinkles either, the paint will bleed. If it curves even a little, I’ll have to redo it, and I’ll be mad at you forever.”
I glance over my shoulder at her, grinning. “Forever’s a long time.”
My grin fades as I become aware of how close she is.
She’s leaned in, one hand on my shoulder. I can feel the warmth of her body at my back, the faint tickle of her breath when she exhales.
Paige must realize how close we are too because she freezes in place, so close I can see her pupils dilate.
“Good,” she finally says quietly, her voice near my ear. “That’s exactly how it should look.”
Then, quickly, she straightens and steps back, dropping her hand from my shoulder.
The absence of her heat is immediate, and my pulse is thudding in my ears as I watch her walk to the other wall to keep working.