CHAPTER 10
EDEN
The bell over the door jingled again.
I didn’t look up right away. I was mid-pour, trying to angle the pitcher just right so I didn’t scald myself with the steam curling around my fingers.
“Good morning, Eden.”
I jerked, and the pitcher tipped too far. A stream of near-boiling coffee sloshed over the rim of the cup and straight onto my hand. “Shit—”
The heat hit a split second later.
I dropped the pitcher with a metallic clatter and yanked my hand back, coffee splashing across the counter and dripping onto the floor. My skin flared red almost instantly.
A sharp breath tore out of me as the sting bloomed across my skin. I blinked hard, fighting the reflex to curse again, and grabbed a rag with my uninjured hand, pressing it against the burn while the heat throbbed under the surface.
There was a sudden groan of wood, followed by the thud of shoes hitting the floor as someone vaulted the counter. Before I could even process it, strong fingers wrapped around my wrist, and the rag was pulled away.
“Eden,” Jagger murmured anxiously, his eyes dark with something that bordered on panic. He cradled my hand between both of his like it was made of glass, turning it carefully to examine the damage.
“I’m so fucking sorry,” he said roughly, all trace of his normal teasing tone gone. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I should’ve waited until you’d turned around. I’m sorry.” His thumb hovered just shy of the reddened skin, not quite touching it.
“I’m fi . . .” I started automatically.
The words stalled halfway out.
Jagger lifted his gaze from my hand to my face, and everything inside me went still.
We were close enough that I could feel the heat radiating from his body, close enough that the rest of the room seemed to recede, like the world had narrowed down to the space his hands occupied around mine.
His grip was careful and protective . . .
but it wasn’t the burn making my pulse jump anymore.
It was him.
The way his fingers wrapped around mine like he wasn’t planning on letting go. The way his jaw tightened like he was furious at himself. The way he looked at me, like I mattered in a way that felt irreversible.
For a long moment, neither of us moved. The shop noise faded into a distant blur. It felt as though we were standing inside something private and real and . . . entirely inappropriate. I realized, with a sudden rush of panic, that his touch was doing far more to me than the burn ever could.
I yanked my hand back as I remembered where I was.
“I’m f-fine,” I stuttered again, the words tripping over themselves.
My throat tightened without warning, and I hated that my eyes stung.
I pressed the rag back against my palm harder than necessary, focusing on the bite of pain because it was easier than focusing on the way my chest felt like it was splitting open.
Never once in my marriage had I felt anything like that, not even when things were good.
I didn’t feel it when Ryan touched me or kissed me . . . I didn’t even feel it when he told me he loved me.
I tried to remember if I had ever experienced that breathless, dizzying awareness with my husband.
Even on the rare nights he’d walked me to the bus stop, even when he’d tried to be attentive, there had never been that fierce, instinctive protectiveness.
I had believed Ryan saw me. I had believed that because we came from the same broken place, we understood each other in a way no one else could.
But I was starting to understand that we had just been surviving side by side. Not seeing. Not choosing. Just clinging.
And the cruelest part wasn’t that I hadn’t felt this before. It was that I had felt it now.
For one suspended, reckless moment, I had known what it was like to be looked at like I was the most important thing in someone’s life. To be held as if someone would break the world before they let it break me.
And I already knew I couldn’t experience that again.
There is a particular kind of ache in discovering something you never knew you were missing, only to realize it was never meant to be yours. It’s like being handed warmth in the middle of winter and being told you can’t keep it.
Now I had a measure for what was possible, and I would have to go back to living without it.
“You need to get out from behind the counter,” I said suddenly, my voice wavering at the edges. “You’re going to get me in trouble.” The pain I was feeling must have been obvious, because he actually flinched.
Only then did I become aware of the silence around us. The way conversations had stalled. The way customers were staring openly. Mara was by the pastry case, frozen in place. We had just made a huge scene.
As if summoned by the tension itself, the door to the back office swung open. Shelby, the owner of the shop, stepped out, already looking irritated. “Eden, what the hell is going on—”
She stopped when her eyes landed on Jagger. The color drained from her face so fast it was almost impressive. “Oh wow,” she breathed, smoothing a hand over her apron like she’d just realized she was wearing it. “Mr. Thatcher. I—I didn’t realize you were here.”
Shelby knew him?
Jagger straightened slowly, all his previous concern sliding back behind the arrogant smirk he usually wore.
Shelby’s voice turned syrupy. “Is everything okay? Do you need anything?”
I stared at her. In the three years I’d worked here, I had heard Shelby snap at suppliers, argue with customers, and once reduce a new hire to tears over a crooked pastry display despite the fact that our pastries were dry and tasteless and were rarely ever bought.
I had never, ever, heard her sound like that.
Was she going to start bowing to him? That didn’t seem too far-fetched with how she was behaving. And Jagger didn’t even look surprised.
Shelby’s gaze dropped from Jagger’s face to the counter and to the coffee still dripping onto the tile. Her expression changed instantly. “Eden,” she snapped, panic edging her voice, “what did you do?”
“What?” I asked, confused.
Shelby rushed forward, her eyes darting between the spill and Jagger as if she was assessing catastrophic damage. “Mr. Thatcher, I am so, so sorry. I don’t know what happened. Eden is usually very careful.”
“It’s my fault; I startled her,” Jagger said evenly.
Shelby waved that off, dismissing it as a misunderstanding. “Of course. Of course. I’m sure you didn’t mean to. Eden—” she hissed my name under her breath. “What happened?”
I was beginning to feel some whiplash from how she was acting. He was the one behind the counter. He was the one who’d vaulted the counter like an unhinged superhero. How was this my fault? “I dropped the pitcher,” I explained. “That’s it.”
Shelby’s eyes widened slightly at my tone, but she recovered fast, plastering on a brittle smile. “We will absolutely remake whatever you ordered, Mr. Thatcher. On the house. Obviously.”
“It wasn’t her fault,” Jagger repeated, sounding annoyed now.
Shelby gave a tight, anxious laugh. “Oh, I’m sure it wasn’t,” she said in a way that let me know she was definitely going to be firing me after this. My ears burned with dread.
Jagger’s jaw flexed. “She’s actually the best employee I’ve seen in a long time,” he said calmly. “And I would be quite disappointed if she wasn’t working the next time I came in.”
Shelby’s mouth dropped open as Jagger reached into his jacket, pulled out his wallet, and placed a crisp hundred-dollar bill on the counter beside the spreading stain. “For the mess,” he said.
My boss stared at it like it was sacred while he moved out from behind the counter. Jagger placed another bill on the counter once he reached the other side. “And for the disruption.”
Shelby swallowed. “That’s— Thank you. That’s very generous.”
Jagger didn’t acknowledge her, but he did give me one more loaded, lingering gaze before turning and walking toward the door. Conversations slowly resumed in hushed murmurs as the door swung closed behind him.
Shelby and I stood there, shoulder to shoulder, watching him cross the street. When he disappeared from view, she let out a breath she’d clearly been holding. “I hope,” she said quietly, still staring at the door, “you know what you’re doing.”
“I’m not doing anything,” I said immediately.
She turned her head slowly to look at me. “That,” she replied, not unkindly, “is what every woman says right before she does.”
“I’ll be right back,” I said suddenly, feeling like I had lost my mind as I darted toward the door and stepped outside into the harsh sunlight.
“Jagger,” I called down the sidewalk, my voice chasing him as he slid into the glossy black car waiting for him.
He immediately got out of the car at the sound of my voice, shutting the door without taking his eyes off me. “What’s wrong?” he asked, already crossing the small stretch of pavement between us.
The question hit harder than it should have. Nothing is wrong. Everything is wrong.
I stopped a few feet from him, folding my arms like that might keep my heart from trying to leap out of my chest. “You’re wasting your time with me,” I said firmly. “Completely. Whatever you think this is, whatever curiosity you’re indulging . . . it’s not going anywhere.”
His gaze held mine. “Is that so?”
“Yes,” I said. “I’m married. I’m exhausted. My life is complicated and not in a fun way. I don’t have space for whatever this”—I gestured vaguely between us—“is supposed to be.”
A car honked from somewhere behind me, but he didn’t look away.
“You don’t know me,” I continued. “You don’t know my situation. You don’t know what you’re stepping into. And I promise you, it’s not worth it. I’m not the fun time a guy like you is looking for.”
His expression didn’t shift.
“If you’re looking for something easy,” I added, swallowing, “I am not it.”
Something flickered in his eyes at that. “I’m not looking for easy or fun,” he said.
“Jagger, come on!” I snapped.
“I’m not,” he said firmly.