Chapter 2 #2
“Anita.” I don’t offer a last name. Small towns talk, and I’m supposed to be undercover. “This place is incredible, by the way. I’ve been in town for approximately five minutes, and I’m already planning to move in here permanently.”
“Right? It’s the best spot in town. My family has owned it forever.” She gestures around with obvious pride. “We get slammed in the summer with tourists, but winter is quieter. More locals.”
“I can see why it’s popular.” I glance at the display case again, trying to decide where to even start. “Everything looks amazing.”
“Are you here for work or vacation?” Nina asks, leaning her elbows on the counter.
And that’s when I remind myself again that I’m undercover. I can’t just tell people I’m a radio host investigating workplace discrimination. That’s why I have a cover story already planned out.
“Oh, yeah, I’m here where I’ll do some remote work,” I say, keeping my tone casual. “My brother is actually joining me tomorrow on the first ferry. He’s the one with the job. I’m just, you know, coming along to help him get settled.”
The lie comes easily. But it makes sense. Siblings visiting together, one with a job, one just tagging along. Totally normal.
Nina nods, accepting this without question. “That’s sweet of you! What kind of work does he do?”
“Um.” I scramble. “Logistics. Marketing. Very boring.”
“Gotcha. Well, you picked a good time to visit.” She’s already moving on, bless her.
“Even in the colder months, there’s stuff to do.
We have an outdoor cinema that runs old movies.
Oh, and this weekend is the pie contest!
The whole town shows up. It’s basically an excuse to eat pie until you can’t move, and it’s amazing. ”
“Sounds incredible,” I say, and I mean it.
I study the menu board on the wall behind her, a massive chalkboard covered in elegant handwriting. There are coffee drinks, teas, hot chocolate with approximately seventeen different flavor options.
“Large mocha,” I say. “A peanut butter cookie. And—”
“Oh!” Nina interrupts, her eyes lighting up. “You definitely need to try our beignets. They’re famous. Everyone who visits in summer gets them. They’re basically the reason half our tourists come back.”
“Count me in,” I add.
“They’re life-changing,” Nina says seriously. “Trust me.”
She rings me up, and I pay, then head back to my table, already planning how I’m going to tackle all that food.
I’m still marveling at the café when I remember my other work that actually pays my bills.
So I pull out my laptop from my backpack and set it up, opening the file for my current project.
I have time to kill, as I’m not meeting the real estate agent for another two hours in front of the apartment to collect my keys.
I can get some more work on my illustration done. It’s half finished and absolutely filthy in the best way.
It’s part of my serialized webcomic, the thing I sell on Patreon to people who like their mythology with a heavy dose of romance and steam. The premise is simple: powerful Omega heroines meet gods and legends and proceed to turn every story on its head.
My current art is Norse mythology. Specifically, Loki.
The illustration shows Loki bound in shadows, his own magic turned against him.
He’s shirtless, because obviously, all those ridiculous muscles on display.
Dark hair falling into his eyes, that trademark smirk on his face even though he’s technically captured.
And standing over him, one bare foot pressed to his chest, is my Omega heroine.
She’s curvy and fierce, wearing a dress that’s been torn strategically to show leg, the skirt fluttering around her thighs.
Her arms are bound above her head with the same shadow magic, but somehow she’s the one in control.
The angle makes it clear that she let him catch her. This is part of her plan.
And Loki knows it. That’s why he’s grinning.
It’s dramatic, sexy, and morally ambiguous, and my readers absolutely love it.
I’m working on the shading for Loki’s abs, which is more difficult than it should be because I keep getting distracted by making them too perfect, when Nina appears with my order.
“Here you go!” She sets down a massive mug of mocha, the top piled with whipped cream and a drizzle of chocolate. The peanut butter cookie is the size of a small plate. And the beignets are even more impressive in person, four perfect squares absolutely drowning in powdered sugar.
“This looks amazing,” I say.
“It is,” Nina confirms. “Enjoy! Let me know if you need anything else.”
She heads back to the counter to help another customer, and I close my laptop for now.
I pull out my phone instead, angling it to capture the perfect shot of my food. And in the background, just enough of the café to show how gorgeous the space is.
I snap a few photos, checking each one. The lighting is perfect, golden and warm. The composition is balanced. The food looks like something from a magazine.
Perfect.
I open Instagram and upload the best shot, typing out a caption: Found the best café I’ve ever been to. These treats are dangerous. Send help.
No mention of where I am. Can’t risk someone connecting the dots between my radio show, my pseudonym, this investigation, and me just visiting a café and sharing photos. But the pic is too good not to share.
Then I post it and set my phone down, finally taking a sip of my mocha.
Oh my God.
It’s perfect. Rich and chocolatey. I take a bite of the peanut butter cookie and actually close my eyes. Chewy in the middle, slightly crisp at the edges, with that perfect peanut butter flavor that’s salty and sweet at the same time.
Then I reach for a beignet, picking it up carefully because the powdered sugar situation is already precarious. The moment I lift it, a small avalanche of white powder cascades onto the plate.
I bite into it, and it’s like eating a cloud made of butter and happiness. Light, airy, still warm from the fryer. The powdered sugar coats my lips, my fingers, probably my entire face.
This is dangerous. I could eat these every day and not get tired of them.
I devour the beignet first, then the cookie, and then half the mocha before I remember my phone.
Curious to see who liked my post, I check my Instagram, which is mostly food photos, some sketches of my comic work, and an embarrassing number of cat images from the local cat café back home. I have a decent following, maybe a few thousand people, but they’re not super active.
I refresh the screen.
Two hundred and fifty likes on my recent post.
I blink. Refresh again.
Two hundred and sixty.
What?
I open the post and start scrolling through the comments, expecting people to be talking about the café or the food.
WHO IS THAT GUY IN THE BACKGROUND
OMG LOOK AT HIM
I’m not even looking at the food anymore
Please tell me you got his number
My stomach drops.
Guy? What guy?
I zoom in on my photo, scanning the background. And there, caught perfectly in the frame behind my beautiful food, is a man standing at one end of the counter.
He’s tall. Broad-shouldered and muscular.
He’s wearing a black long-sleeved shirt that hugs him, showing off arms that suggest he lifts heavy things for fun.
Low-hanging jeans. Short blond hair that’s longer on top and shaved close on the sides.
And he’s staring at the cookie display like he’s making a very serious decision.
Oh, no.
I scroll through more comments.
I would climb that man like a tree
Where is this café? Asking for a friend. The friend is me.
That’s it. I’m moving to wherever this is.
Forget the beignets, I want HIM covered in powdered sugar
Someone find out who he is IMMEDIATELY
I’m watching the like count climb in real time. Three hundred. Three fifty. Four hundred.
“This is not happening,” I mutter.
But it is happening. My innocent food post is going viral because I accidentally photographed the most ridiculously attractive man in existence.
I’m frantically scrolling through comments, trying to figure out how to fix this, when a notification pops up.
Someone has tagged a person in my photo.
The tag appears over the mystery man’s face: @MasonGrey
My heart stops.
No. No, no, no.
If someone tagged him, that means he’s going to get a notification. Which means he’s going to see this post. Which means he’s going to see that I accidentally made him go viral.
I lift my head, scanning the café, praying he’s already left.
He hasn’t.
He’s sitting in a corner window spot with another crazy-handsome man, both of them with coffee cups.
The friend has longer brown hair pulled into a half ponytail, tattoos visible on his neck, and the same kind of built, muscular frame.
They’re talking, relaxed, completely unaware of the chaos happening on my phone.
Until Mason’s phone buzzes.
I watch in horror as he picks it up, glances at the screen, and goes very still.
His thumb moves, scrolling. His expression shifts from confused to surprised to amused.
Then his head snaps up, and he scans the café.
I drop my gaze immediately, staring very hard at my mocha like it’s the most interesting thing I’ve ever seen.
Maybe he won’t figure out where the photo was taken from. Maybe—
Our eyes meet.
Fuck.
He’s looking right at me. And based on the angle of the photo, it’s obvious I’m the one who took it.
I stare back down at my phone, face burning, and try to figure out how to remove a tag from Instagram. There has to be a way. There has to—
The sound of a chair scraping against the floor makes me glance up.
Mason is standing. He’s even taller standing up, easily over six feet. His friend says something I can’t hear, and Mason grins, shaking his head.
Then he starts walking toward me.
Oh God.
“Get over there, Certified Snack!” his friend calls out, loud enough for half the café to hear.
Several people laugh. Mason flips him off without looking back.
And then he’s at my table.