Chapter Four
Bells jingled as I tugged open the heavy glass door of KC Donuts.
It was a cute little donut shop that always gave the feel of stepping into a time capsule, only one that smelled like sugar and freshly fried dough.
“Morning, Jessa!” Mrs. Calloway greeted as I stepped into the shop.
KC Donuts had been one of the original storefronts constructed on Rosewood Avenue back in the day, and even if Mrs. Calloway didn’t mention that as frequently as she did, that fact could still be deduced by little more than a glance.
It was beyond dated. Every piece of furniture was likely as ancient as the shop itself.
“Good morning, Mrs. Calloway!”
She waved a hand at me. “How many times do I have to tell you? Call me Kimberly.”
Admittedly, the place did have a sort of vintage charm that made the cracked tiles and peeling paint feel almost nostalgic. I figured that was likely a key part of what helped the place survive as long as it had. That and the donuts.
“Right. Could I get half a dozen glazed donuts?”
“You sure can! Anything else?”
“That depends.” My gaze swept over the donut display case. It was old, but impeccably clean and filled with the most mouthwatering display of donuts. “What’s the flavor of the day?”
Kimberly’s face lit up. She had such a beautiful smile. While her hair was dark gray and her frail body was covered with wrinkles, her smile was that of a child’s. Bright and unabashed.
“Clara thought up today’s recipe. Let me go grab her for you.”
“Oh no, that’s okay—”
“Nonsense. She needs to learn how to talk to customers, anyway.”
Then she was gone. Vanished back toward the kitchen where they made all their donuts.
I had been frequenting the little donut shop since I signed the lease on The Prologue over half a year ago.
In all that time, I had hardly exchanged more than a few words with Clara, Kimberly’s granddaughter.
From what I could tell, she seemed more comfortable working in the kitchen than up front behind the register.
“Hello?” a soft voice asked as she stepped out from behind the big kitchen doors.
“Hi,” I replied awkwardly. It felt like we were two kids who had been set up on a playdate. “I was asking your grandmother about the flavor of the day,” I explained.
“I see.” Clara stepped up behind the front counter. “Today it’s a stuffed donut. Cream and blueberry jam on the inside, a blueberry frosting on top.”
“Sounds great. Can I get two?”
She nodded and picked up a pair of tongs. “Will that be all?”
“Yep.”
The tension was almost unbearably thick.
She punched something into the register, but as her gaze drifted up to me, her fingers slowed.
“How is your competition going? With that loud boy who owns the shop beside yours?”
I wasn’t surprised in the slightest that even she seemed to already know about my competition with Liam.
Gossip in Briarvale always seemed to spread like wildfire.
What I really clung to were the words she used to describe Liam—a smile stretching across my face at the thought that someone else seemed to find him as obnoxious as I did.
“Good,” I said confidently. “He’s going down.”
For the first time, a ghost of a smile seemed to play on Clara’s lips as well.
“I’ll be rooting for you,” she said, sliding the box of donuts toward me.
“Thank you.” I handed her a twenty. “Keep the change.”
Her eyes lit up, and that smile grew a little. “Thanks!”
I made my way toward the shop’s door, turning back as my fingers brushed the handle to say, “Come by The Prologue sometime.”
Clara nodded. “I’d love to.”
I wasn’t sure why—I had never felt this way before—but I had a feeling that Clara and I could become good friends.
Perhaps because she and I seemed to be the only women on the planet able to resist Liam’s idiotic charm.
Either that, or because her deep brown eyes seemed to almost shimmer with kindness.
I relished the feel of sunlight on my skin when I finally left the shop. Running a bookshop was far more work than I ever anticipated it would be and my workload had only increased since Liam had declared what our first competition would be.
It had been a few days after agreeing to reignite our rivalry when Liam approached me again. Since he had floated the idea of competing again in the first place, he felt it was only fair that he got to decide our first competition.
I was more than a little apprehensive.
Odd didn’t even come close to describing how this entire situation felt.
To be a grown woman competing with him again.
This time in a far more structured way. I couldn’t exactly say that I minded it, though.
If I were to admit the truth to myself, I may have been able to accept the fact that I had been yearning to compete with him again.
Liam’s idea for our first competition was a simple premise: whichever shop had the most sales at the end of the month would be declared the winner.
It was easy. Almost too easy. So easy that I was sure Liam had some sort of plan up his sleeve.
That didn’t matter, though. All that mattered was that I would be the one to win.
Even with a grand plan or a few tricks, there was no way that Liam could win.
The Prologue’s primary purpose was to sell books.
The Galaxy Gamers Cafe was more of a space where people came and played games.
There were a few sales racks with games and little trinkets, but even so, there was no way that Liam could beat me from that alone.
There wasn’t a single outcome in which I would not get the most sales.
Guaranteed success or not, Liam Ashford would never catch me with my guard down. With him, it was do or die—go big or go home. Even if I had it in the bag, I would still give it my all.
An all too familiar voice pulled me straight out of my thoughts, “What brings you here on this lovely morning?”
I was so close. Just a few shops down from making it safely inside The Prologue and avoiding him altogether.
“None of your business.”
Liam’s eyes sparkled with mischief. “Are those donuts?”
I hugged the boxes a little closer to my chest. “Not for you.”
“Come on. Can’t I have one? What are you going to do with all those, anyway?”
He was slowly coming closer and closer.
“Once again, none of your business.”
Liam held a hand to his chest dramatically. “You’re so mean, Jessie.”
“How many times do I have to tell you to stop calling me that?” I gritted.
His subtle steps closer and closer had landed him right in front of me, inches away. I clutched the donut boxes like a shield.
“Maybe if you ask me nicely, I’ll consider it.” His words and the lack of distance between us had my heart rate picking up a little.
I scoffed. “In your dreams, Ashford.”
An unreadable emotion flickered across his face. “Don’t I know it,” he teased.
“You’re disgusting.” I stepped to the side and quickly made my way around him.
“You’re the one who said it!” he argued with a laugh.
I could hear the soft sound of his footsteps trailing behind me.
“Don’t follow me.”
“What? Now I can’t even walk in the direction of my store.”
I rolled my eyes, but didn’t respond. Engaging would only encourage him to keep going.
As we approached The Prologue, he spoke up once more. “So I can’t even have one?”
My pointed gaze shifted toward him and that infuriating grin painted across his face. “No.”
“What if I say please?”
“Buy your own donuts.”
“What if I say pretty please?”
I could feel that familiar rise of annoyance bubbling in my chest. I hated the fact that, deep down, I knew that I had missed this. “Go away.”
“How about—”
I lifted open one of the boxes and threw a glazed donut at him. He caught it.
“Thank—”
“Don’t thank me. Just go.”
Liam’s smile widened. “Sure thing, Jessie. See you.”
I walked into The Prologue without so much as another glance in his direction.
Primarily because, for some humiliating and impossible reason, my face was flushed with the slightest hint of warmth.
“Donuts!” I heard a bubbly voice call out the moment the door shut behind me. “Donuts! Donuts! Donuts!” The chant continued until The Prologue’s barista, Lily, was standing before me.
She practically snatched the boxes out of my hands. “Ooh!” She squealed. “Glazed and—oh my gosh—what is this?”
“Blueberry with jam and cream,” I explained before taking the smaller box back. “And I grabbed those for me,” I said, letting out a giggle.
“Fine,” she said with a dramatic sigh. “I suppose glazed will have to do.”
Lily raised the box over her head and called out into the shop, “Everyone, Jess got us donuts! Come grab one and say thank you!”
Donuts had been a weekly tradition for me since I signed the lease on The Prologue, but once I hired Lily and my two cashiers—Autumn and Damien—I decided to extend that tradition toward them.
Mumbles of thank-yous filled my ears as they grabbed at the donuts.
“You’re welcome, guys,” I said with a smile. All the Liam-induced irritation had been washed away in an instant. “Let’s make this a great week!”
* * *
I had both expected and hoped that it would be a while before I saw Liam again. There weren’t exactly any reasons for us to interact aside from our competition. If I had any choice in the matter, we would keep our interactions to a bare minimum.
Unfortunately, the whole him-owning-the-shop-next-door thing meant that I did not have any choice in the matter.
After the donut incident, I survived precisely one hour before I saw him again.
I was right outside The Prologue, a thick posterboard tucked beneath one arm, and dragging a metal chair behind me with the other. I had spent the entire night before designing it—a poster advertising the first few events that The Prologue would be hosting.
Events would be the best way to promote more sales.
The best way to decimate Liam in this competition.
I knew that it was a little bold, taking on even more responsibilities when The Prologue had barely been open for a week.
But hosting events had always been something that I planned to do—the competition simply sped up my timeline.
It felt a little embarrassing to allow my artwork to see the light of day. Even if it was mostly writing and a few little drawings of books and coffee mugs bordering the edges. But after spending hours working on it, I felt that it looked decent enough to hang up in the front window.
I only wished that I had invested in a stepladder. Taping the heavy posterboard was already a bad enough idea; it seemed that no matter how much tape I added, it wouldn’t stay up. Doing it while also haphazardly balancing on a cheap metal chair felt like a recipe for disaster.
Disaster did, in fact, strike. Only, it was in the form of a hesitant, loose grip settling on my waist rather than me crashing down onto the pavement.
“Need some help?” Liam asked.
“Get your hands off me, Ashford,” I said, ignoring the way my entire face felt like it had been caught on fire. I focused on the tape, plucking off another long, useless piece, willing myself to pay no mind to the hands that were still on my body.
I could hear him scoff behind me. “No way. You’re asking to get hurt, balancing on your tiptoes on top of a chair.” If it wasn’t Liam of all people, I may have thought that I heard a hint of concern in his voice.
“I’m barely more than a foot off the ground.”
“Better safe than sorry,” Liam said with a teasing lilt to his voice.
“You are so annoying,” I groaned. “What are you even doing out here anyway?”
He fell quiet for a moment before saying, “I saw you through the window.”
I allowed his hands to stay where they were until the poster was secure, but not a moment longer.
The second I was finished, I promptly swatted them away.
Liam held out his hand for me as I turned to climb off the chair, an offer I ignored, opting instead to hold onto the back of the chair as I stepped down.
Once on solid ground, I took a few steps back, admiring my work. The poster didn’t look half-bad. The thousand layers of tape on each of the corners weren’t the most professional look in the world, but it would have to do.
Liam stood beside me, his gaze fixed on the poster as well. “You’re really pulling out all the stops, huh? This wouldn’t have anything to do with our competition, would it, Jessie? Are you scared that you’re going to lose?”
“No,” I snapped back a little too quickly. “No,” I repeated, calmer this time. “I want this place to thrive. Is that a crime?”
Liam snickered, “Not a crime.” His gaze continued to scan over the poster. “That does look pretty good. Do you think you could make me one for my shop?”
“No,” I replied plainly, eliciting a breathy laugh from Liam.
“Fine. Well, at least sign me up for that latte art class. Sounds interesting.”
“Not happening,” I told him, grabbing hold of the chair. Liam never ceased to amaze me with how easily he could aggravate me. It was as though every word that fell past his lips was designed to get under my skin.
“Hey,” Liam called out to me as I began to walk away. I slowed my steps, but didn’t turn around to face him. “Want to give me the grand tour? I haven’t really seen the place yet.”
“Nope.”
“Okay. Well, will you at least tell me why you decided to hang your poster outside? What if it rains or, I don’t know, gets a little windy?”
I slowly turned, narrowing my eyes at him and his mile-wide grin. “Why wouldn’t you say something sooner? You know, like maybe before you put your hands on me?”
My cheeks felt hot with embarrassment. I had no idea why I didn’t think to hang the poster from the inside of the window.
In truth, my thoughts had already been preoccupied with how nervous I felt to display something that I had created at all.
It felt absolutely humiliating to be called out on such a silly thing, even more so by Liam of all people.
Liam shrugged, a smirk now tugging at his lips as he replied, “I like it when you look at me with those angry eyes.”
At that moment, I decided that the day when Liam Ashford finally lost to me and had to move his shop far, far away would be a very wonderful day.
I groaned. “Will you get out of here?” My voice was rich with frustration as I marched my way back to the poster.
“And let you climb back on top of that chair? Yeah, I don’t think so.”
Before I could yell at him, Liam reached up and plucked the poster down. I snatched it from his hands, muttering a quiet, “Thanks,” before turning away and continuing to drag the chair back into the shop.
“Consider it a thank-you for the donut. Now we’re even—” I heard him say right before the shop doors shut behind me. I could tell that he took great amusement from our exchange. He always did.