Chapter 8
Maurice insisted on taking their uneaten dinner with them. “We’ll be hungry later.”
“I have food in my refrigerator,” Amelie argued.
He cocked an eyebrow. “Yogurt and salad?”
She grimaced. “Yeah, but it’s healthier than burgers and fries.”
“I’ll take the burger and fries. You can have the yogurt and salad.”
Mimi brought the container and their bill.
When Amelie reached for the check, Maurice snatched it away before she could get her fingers around it. “My treat.”
“But it’s your job to protect me, not to pay for my meals,” she said. “At least let me pay for half.”
“You can get the next one. Especially since you probably won’t be eating this hamburger anyway.”
“You have a point.” She nodded. “I’ll get the next one.”
He liked the idea of sharing another meal with the pretty baker. “By the way, having dinner with you doesn’t feel like part of the job.”
Her cheeks flushed a pretty pink. “Is that a good thing?”
“Absolutely. At least for me.” He slid the burgers into the container and dumped all the fries in with them. “Ready?”
She nodded. “I could use a good night’s sleep. I’m sure you can, too. Are you sure you don’t want to go to your room in the boarding house tonight?”
Had she lost her mind?
“After Schulz’s warning, I’m sticking to you like gum on a hot sidewalk,” he said with a wink.
Amelie laughed out loud, then snorted. She slapped a hand over her nose and mouth, her eyes wide.
He touched his hand to her cheek. “Glad to see you can laugh. You should do it more often.”
“Minus the snort, maybe,” she agreed.
“No,” he said. “Keep the snort.”
“Gum on a hot sidewalk?” She chuckled and hooked her hand through the crook of his arm as they left the diner.
They’d walked to the diner before the sun had set. During the time they’d been inside, dark had since settled over Bayou Mambaloa. Cicadas and frogs had begun their nightly rivalry, battling to be the loudest creatures of the night.
Maurice shook his head. “Anyone who thinks they’re moving to the country for peace and quiet hasn’t lived in the bayou.”
“I like the sound. It’s like the steady hum of life after the town rolls up its sidewalks for the night.” She leaned into Maurice and let her hand slide down to grasp his.
For a moment, he stiffened, realizing she was on his right side and the hand she’d reached for was severely scarred and missing a finger. The one mutilated by phosphorus in a battle where he’d failed to save his fiancée and had subsequently ended his career.
Amelie didn’t flinch from the texture of his scars. She held his damaged hand as if it were the same as the undamaged one and continued walking alongside him.
When she didn’t react, he relaxed. Through all the work they’d done together to restore the bakery after the break-in, she’d never treated him as if he were disabled or incapable of doing anything a man with two normal hands could do.
Other women had recoiled at the ugly scars. Not Amelie.
With no pressing deadline, no reason to hurry, Maurice was content to take his time walking the few blocks.
He walked slowly down Main Street toward the bakery, marveling at how different it was from all the other times he’d walked down the same street over the past two years.
He felt a sense of belonging. Like this was his town. Bayou Mambaloa was becoming his home.
What had changed?
It was the same street. The same shops and businesses. The same diner, bakery and yoga studio he’d passed hundreds of times before.
That night, the difference wasn’t where he was but who he was with.
Yes, he’d known Amelie as the baker who made the best pastries he’d ever had. Until he’d offered to see her home from the Crawdad Hole, he hadn’t really known the woman behind the Baked with Love apron.
She was smart and sexy, a baker, chef, businesswoman and entrepreneur.
More than that, she welcomed strangers into her bakery like family, eager to smile and talk with them. She lived her logo and baked everything with love. Love for the process. Love for the combination of ingredients and love for the people who would enjoy the finished products.
Just being around her energy, optimism and gregarious personality made Maurice feel more alive than he had in a long time. Like the sun had finally pushed through the clouds.
When they climbed the steps to her apartment, Amelie paused before unlocking the door. “Thank you for helping me get my shop in order so quickly and for dinner tonight.”
He held up the container. “A dinner you didn’t eat.”
She smiled up at him, starlight reflecting off her eyes. “I had a few bites.” She laid a hand on his chest and lowered her voice. “How about we warm up...the leftovers and...finish what we started?”
Her words melted into his soul like honey on a hot biscuit. His mind shot past the food in his hand to the kiss she’d initiated the night before. Maurice’s gaze dropped from her eyes to her lips, and all logic evaporated like rain in the desert.
“Screw the leftovers,” he growled, as he dropped the container, gathered her in his arms and crushed her mouth with his.
Her hands on his chest slid up to lace behind his head, bringing him closer, her breasts pressing against his chest.
When he traced the seam of her lips, she opened and met his tongue with hers in a searing caress. Maurice forgot where he was, forgot the world around him and how to breathe.
When his body reminded him that air was good, he raised his head and dragged in a deep breath.
Amelie leaned her forehead against his chest, her fingers curling into his shirt. “I lied.”
He chuckled and tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. “About what?”
“I told you I wouldn’t try to kiss you again.”
“And yet, you did.”
She leaned back, her pretty brow furrowing. “Look. I’m attracted to you, and I think you’re attracted to me.”
Maurice couldn’t help himself. He brushed his lips across hers. “I think that was obvious the last time this happened.”
She poked a finger at his chest. “You’re not into commitment, and I’m totally okay with that. So, what’s keeping us from having unfettered, gratuitous sex?”
When Maurice opened his mouth to respond, Amelie pressed her finger to his lips.
“Don’t try to make things complicated. It’s just sex.”
He bit the tip of her finger, fisted his good hand in her hair and leaned down until his lips hovered over hers. “I have a feeling that making love with you will never be just sex, and everything about what I feel when I’m with you is destined to be complicated.”
“Less talk.” She hooked her hand around the back of his neck. “More action.”
Then he was kissing her again, desperate to chase the shadows of the past from the present with her.
When he came up again for air, his pulse thundered through his veins, driving heat to his extremities.
Instantly hard, he pressed her back to the door and leaned the evidence of his desire into her belly. “And yes, I’m attracted to you.”
“Oh, good.” She laughed breathlessly. “I’ve wanted to do that since last time.” When she raised her face to him, her hand slipped the key into his. “Can we take this inside?”
He palmed the key and leaned in for a quick brush of his lips across hers as he fit the key in the lock like he wanted to fit his cock inside her.
He twisted the key, shoved open the door and swung her inside. Once over the threshold, he kicked the door shut behind them.
What had started as a peaceful walk along Main Street quickly escalated into a frenzy of motion as they stripped off their clothing while crossing the living room floor.
Maurice yanked off his T-shirt, toed off his boots and ripped open the line of buttons on his jeans.
His breath caught and held as Amelie shoved her jeans over her hips and down to her ankles.
She stepped free and kicked them into a corner.
Then she backed toward the bedroom with her hand on the hem of her shirt.
“Are you coming?” she teased. In brutally slow motion, she dragged the shirt up and over her head and flung it toward Maurice.
Standing in only her bra and panties, she reached behind her back and released the hooks on her bra. As the straps slid down her arms, she raised her hands to hold the cups in place.
Then she spun, dropped the bra, raced for the bed and leaped into the middle, laughing.
Maurice followed at a slightly slower pace and stopped as she rolled to her side, exposing her naked breasts, so plump and tempting.
She traced one of her fingers across her hip, stopping to tug at the elastic band of her string-bikini panties. “See?” she said, her voice husky and sexy as hell. “Completely uncomplicated.”
“Oh, sweetheart, you have complicated written all over you.” One determined step at a time, he closed the distance between them. He halted near the bed, pulled his wallet out of his back pocket, plucked a condom from inside and tossed both the wallet and the condom packet on the nightstand.
Amelie gave him a saucy wink and dragged the elastic over her hip and down her thigh. “I’ll even remove the strings, if you like.” Every move, every expression taunted him, coaxed him, enticed him to take what she so freely and joyfully offered.
The guilt, having faded over the years, finally eased, releasing him from the chains of his failure and loss. “We’re really doing this, aren’t we?”
Amelie’s eyes narrowed as she studied him, a hand coming up to cover one breast. “If that’s what you want.”
“Oh, I want,” he said, his body on fire with need and raging desire.
When he continued to hesitate, she swung her legs over the side of the bed, reached for the waistband of his jeans and slid her hands between the denim and his butt cheeks.
“Are you sure? Or do you need a little more convincing?” Her hands closed around his cheeks and squeezed.
Then she pushed his jeans off his hips, slid the denim down his thighs, her hands caressing his legs on the way down.