18. Talon
TALON
By the time Wren and I make it back to the bakery, my griffin is still humming under my skin.
That only happens when I’m deeply content or deeply agitated, and for once it’s not the second one.
I’m still a little dazed from having Wren in my field, in my sky, circling around me with his wings glowing in the late afternoon light while he laughed and called me magnificent like he didn’t realize what that word does to a man.
Or maybe he does realize. Maybe Wren knows exactly what he does to me every second he breathes in my direction.
He unlocks the front door while I carry boxes of fresh cherries for Mother’s order.
The bell jingles softly when he pushes the door open, and the familiar scent of sugar and bread and butter wraps around me.
It should settle me. Usually it does. Tonight it just makes me more aware that Wren is here with me.
Barefoot. Hair a little windblown from flying. Cheeks pink from laughing.
Mine. No. Not mine. We’re dating.
Wren flicks on the front lights, then spins to face me with his hands clasped behind his back.
“Come on.” I lead the way to the kitchen and set the cherry boxes on the counter. “Wash your hands,” I say.
He salutes. “Yes, sir.”
Oh, this might be dangerous.
He saunters off to the sink, and I busy myself pulling out ingredients before he can see me smiling.
I shouldn’t smile this much around him. It feels dangerous.
Like if I let him see too much of how happy he makes me, I’ll end up gutted.
That old fear still lives in my ribs. But every day with Wren makes it a little quieter.
I line everything up on the counter the way Grandma used to. Flour, sugar, salt, butter, the cherries, cornstarch, lemon, vanilla, almond extract. I grab the big silver mixing bowls and the pastry cutter, then pull down my favorite rolling pin.
Wren comes back and leans his hip against the counter. “You look different in here when you’re not working.”
“What do you mean?”
“Relaxed.” His voice is quiet. “When you’re baking for work, you get all serious and grumbly. Right now you look... happy.”
I glance up before I can stop myself. “I am happy.” The words leave my mouth too easily.
Wren blinks, like he wasn’t expecting that from me. Then his whole face softens into something so sweet it makes my stomach drop.
“Good,” he says. “I like seeing you happy.”
My griffin preens. I clear my throat and point at the counter. “We’re making tart dough first. It needs time to chill before we use it.”
Wren gives me a solemn nod. “What do we do while it chills?”
“I’m sure we’ll think of something.” I wink.
Wren’s eyes go wide, and there’s a soft smile on his lips. “There he is.”
“Who?” I look around.
“My Talon.”
Something in my chest gives a dangerous little twist. I decide not to think about it too closely.
“Come here,” I say. “Pay attention.”
“I’m always paying attention to you.”
My hands stop on the butter.
Wren realizes what he said a beat too late and blushes. Actually blushes. It starts high on his cheeks and spreads down his throat. It’s so unfairly adorable that I almost forget what I’m doing.
“I meant,” he says, clearing his throat, “in an educational capacity.”
“Of course.” I chuckle before I can stop myself.
He pokes my side. “Don’t laugh.”
I arch a brow. “Hands on the counter where I can see them, troublemaker.”
His mouth drops open. “You can’t say things like that and expect me to behave.”
“I absolutely can when you’re in my kitchen.”
“Your kitchen, huh? I thought it was Wick’s.”
I step closer until there’s only a sliver of space between us and put my hands on either side of him against the counter. “My kitchen.”
Wren’s breath catches. His pupils blow wide, and suddenly the air between us feels syrup thick.
I’m not even trying to flirt. I don’t think I am, anyway. But Wren looks at me like he wants to climb me like a tree, and the thought goes straight to my cock.
He wets his lips. “And if I misbehave in your kitchen?”
I lean in just enough that my beard brushes his cheek. “Then I put you to work.”
Wren shivers. My griffin roars his approval. I force myself to step back before I do something reckless, like kiss him senseless against the flour bin.
“Dough,” I say roughly.
“Right.” He grips the counter and smiles at nothing. “Definitely listening. Extremely focused on dough.”
“You’re ridiculous.” I snort.
I show him how to whisk together the flour, sugar, and salt. He does that part easily enough, but then I cube the cold butter and dump it into the bowl.
“This is the important part,” I tell him. “You want the butter to stay cold. That’s what gives you the flaky layers. If it melts into the flour too fast, you lose the texture.”
Wren stares at the bowl like it’s a puzzle. “So if I heat up the butter, I ruin the tart.”
“Exactly.”
He puts a hand over his heart. “You think I can heat up your butter?”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. He grins like he’s won, then reaches for the pastry cutter. “Tell me what to do.”
I move beside him and guide his hands on the handle. “Cut the butter into the flour until it looks crumbly. We’re looking for pea sized pieces.”
Wren presses too hard immediately, flour puffing up over the counter. He coughs as a cloud hits him square in the face.
I laugh. I can’t help it. It bursts out of me, louder than I expected.
He narrows his eyes, then deliberately swipes his fingers into the flour and streaks a line across my forehead. I wipe at it and cock a brow.
Wren lifts his chin. “That’s what you get.”
I grab the bag and dust a little over his shoulder. He pats both hands in flour and presses them to my cheeks.
The flour fight lasts all of ten seconds before I catch both his wrists and pin them gently to the edge of the counter. His eyes go wide. The room goes still.
“Behave,” I say.
Wren’s voice comes out soft. “You make that very difficult.”
I should let him go. Instead I hold on for one second too long, because I like the feel of his pulse jumping under my fingers.
Then I clear my throat and step back. “Finish cutting the butter.”
Wren smirks. “Yes, sir.”
He knows exactly what he’s doing.
He’s terrible at the pastry cutter. He either attacks the dough like it insulted his mother or pauses every few seconds to ask if it looks right. Eventually, I crowd in behind him and wrap my arms around him to show him the motion.
My chest presses to his back. His wings shiver where they’re tucked close, brushing my forearms through the slits in his shirt.
“Gentler,” I murmur near his ear. “Like this.”
Wren goes absolutely still.
I probably should too, but his body is warm against mine and he smells like that winter honey scent that drives me half feral. I guide his hands through the movement, cutting butter into flour in slow, steady passes.
“See?” I say. “You don’t have to be aggressive with it.”
He nods, breathless and I don’t know if it’s our closeness or something else.
I nudge his shoulder. “Keep going.”
When the butter is right, I have him drizzle in ice water a spoonful at a time. He pokes the dough like it’ll attack him.
“How do you know when it’s enough?”
I take a handful and squeeze gently. “When it holds together like this.”
Wren watches my hand, intent in a way that makes me think he’s not really looking at the dough anymore. His gaze drifts to my fingers, then my mouth.
He laughs and goes back to the dough. We split it into two discs, wrap them, and tuck them in the fridge. While they chill, I pull the cherries closer and set him to pitting them. That turns out to be a mistake.
Cherry juice gets everywhere. Absolutely everywhere.
Wren looks down at his stained fingers. “I’m not sure I’m very good at this.”
“You’re doing well, just messy. My grandma used to say the messier the more love it contained.” Why the hell did I say that?
Wren nods and takes it in stride.
We work side by side, shoulders bumping, while I talk him through the filling. Cherries, sugar, lemon zest, a squeeze of juice, cornstarch, a little vanilla, a tiny splash of almond extract. He leans over the bowl to smell it and makes an indecent noise.
“Smells so good. This is what summer should always smell like. You and me in the kitchen making cherry tarts.”
That sounds perfect, and I want that too.
Wren laughs, then rises onto his toes and kisses me.
It’s soft at first. Just a press of his mouth to mine, sweet and slow and cherry scented from all the cherries he had to taste just to make sure they were good.
I melt into it before I can stop myself, one hand landing on his waist while the other braces on the counter beside him.
He tastes like sugar and summer and Wren. My favorite combination, apparently.
When he pulls back, I chase him a little before my brain catches up.
Wren grins when he meets my eyes. “I’ve been wanting to do that a very long time.”
I kiss him again.
This time he laughs into my mouth before hooking his fingers into the front of my apron and hauling me closer.
The kiss turns warmer, deeper, but still sweet.
Nothing frantic. Nothing like the hunger that’s lived in me for weeks.
Just Wren, kissing me like he has all the time in the world and wants to spend it here. With me.
When we finally part, I rest my forehead against his and breathe.
“We still have to finish the tarts,” I murmur.
Wren hums. “Do we? Your mom and sister were kind of assholes. We could save the tarts for ourselves and eat them in front of them.”
“That would be mean.” But I can’t stop the laugh.
I slide my hands to his hips and squeeze. I kiss the corner of his mouth. We could keep kissing for a little longer.
“Maybe you’re right,” Wren says.
I smile against his lips. He’s so damn sweet.
We roll out the crusts together once the dough is chilled.
I show him how to flour the counter properly, how to turn the dough between passes of the rolling pin so it doesn’t stick, how to ease it into the tart pans without stretching it.
He tears one by accident and looks horrified until I show him how to patch it with scraps.
“Thank you for saving me.” He pecks a kiss to my cheek and we go back to filling the tart pans.
Once the shells are filled, I teach him how to make the lattice top. His first few strips are uneven and one of them snaps in half. He curses in Fae.
I bark out a laugh. “What was that?”
“An insult to the strip of dough and all its ancestors.”
“Remind me never to get on your bad side.”
“Oh, I’d never curse you.” He carefully lays another strip across the tart.
By the time the tarts are assembled and brushed with egg wash, the counter is a disaster. Flour everywhere. Cherry juice on both our aprons. A smear of butter on Wren’s forearm. The kitchen has absolutely seen cleaner days.
But the tarts are beautiful.
Wren stares at them on the baking tray like we’ve performed a miracle.
“We made those.”
“We did.”
“Well, you mostly made those. I made sure the cherries weren’t poisoned.”
“You did more than that.” I bump his shoulder with mine. “You did good.”
His smile goes shy in a way I’ve only seen a handful of times. “Yeah?”
“Yes.”
I slide the tray into the oven and set the timer. The bakery falls quiet around us, all warm lights and sugar scented air and the soft hum of the refrigerators.
Wren leans against the counter beside me. “What do we do while they bake?”
I think about all the things I want to do while they bake. None of them are appropriate for the middle of the bakery.
So I choose the safest option.
I hook my finger through the belt loop of his jeans and tug him between my legs where I sit on one of the prep stools. He laughs softly and settles there without hesitation, hands landing on my shoulders.
“We wait,” I say.
“For the tarts?”
“For the tarts.”
“And not for you to kiss me again?”
I look up at him. “Both.”
Wren smiles. It’s softer than I’ve ever seen him. “That’s a much better answer.”
Then he bends and kisses me while cherry tarts bake in the oven behind us. For the first time in my life, I have everything I’ve ever dreamed of. A handsome man in my arms willing to bake with me.