CHAPTER thirty-four #2
I wipe my hands on a dish towel and cross the entry hallway, trying and failing to keep the bounce out of my step. Through the storm door, amber eyes meet mine. Elias stands there with a quiet smile that pulls one from me in return.
He looks unfairly good in the simplest way: white t-shirt stretched across his shoulders, black jeans, and that silver chain catching the sun at his collarbone.
I unlock the door and swing it open. He steps inside, leaning down to press a kiss to my cheek—brief, polite, but charged enough that I know if we were alone it wouldn’t have ended there. His restraint only makes me want him more.
“Hey, rockstar,” I tease, grinning.
“Hey.” He pushes a hand through his hair in that unthinking way that sends butterflies fluttering into my belly. That’s when I notice the white box in his hand and what looks like a Chantilly cake inside.
“Is that for me?” I ask, batting my lashes in exaggerated hopefulness.
“It’s for your mom, actually.”
That answer makes me smile wider than if he’d said yes. “How did you know that was her favorite?”
“You told me.”
I blink at him.
“I did?”
He just nods.
I must’ve mentioned it in passing and forgotten. He hadn’t.
“How do you remember everything?” I ask, genuinely curious.
“I don’t. I just remember everything you say.”
And just like that, my smile is back and impossibly wider than before.
I lace my fingers through his and lead him toward the kitchen, pulse quickening as we round the corner.
My mom looks up from the table where she’s working, her hands mid-motion over a bowl of lima beans.
“Hi, Mrs. Hendrix,” he says, offering her the white bakery box. “I brought this for you.”
The lid lifts slightly as she takes it from him, revealing the delicate swirls of cream and berries inside. It’s beautiful, almost too perfect to eat.
“Oh, thank you, darling. That’s my favorite.” Her smile softens as she studies the cake. “It looks incredible. Where did you find it?”
Elias hesitates just long enough for me to glance at him. When he answers, his voice is quieter, more vulnerable.
“I made it.”
My head snaps toward him. Shock floods through me—he made it?
“That is so thoughtful of you, thank you,” My mom says warmly, her eyes crinkling at the corners. She gestures toward the empty chair across from her.
“Come sit down. We’ve got lima beans to peel.”
We settle at the table, working in an easy rhythm, the quiet punctuated only by the soft snap of pods splitting open. After a few minutes, curiosity gets the better of me.
“How didn’t I know you were such a baker?” I ask, glancing over at him.
Elias chuckles, that low, warm sound I can’t get enough of.
“You’d think after I made ‘the best chili you’ve ever had,’ you wouldn’t be so surprised.”
“Fair point,” I admit with a grin. “Actually, it makes total sense. Baking is all precision, it fits right in with your control issues.”
He snorts, and even my mom laughs, shaking her head.
“Did one of your parents teach you?” she asks.
My chest tightens at the question. I brace myself for him to withdraw—the way he usually does whenever his parents come up, but he doesn’t. His hands keep moving, deftly shucking bean after bean as he answers.
“My mom taught my brother and me,” he says. “She always said it was one of the most useful skills we could learn, but she was never much of a baker.” A pause, barely perceptible.
“After she passed and I moved in with Cody’s family, his mom taught me how to bake.”
The picture forms instantly in my mind—a younger version of him, flour on his cheeks, laughing in someone’s warm kitchen long before the tattoos and shadows settled in. The image is so tender, it makes my chest ache.
“That’s lovely,” she says gently. “I’m sorry to hear about your mother.”
“Thank you,” Elias replies. His tone is even, but there’s something beneath it—nostalgia, maybe, or longing.
“Cody never had the patience for it, so… it ended up being our thing.”
I watch him closely as he speaks, and it’s there in the pause between his words—how much he misses that connection, even if he’ll never admit it out loud.
The creak of the screen door swinging open pulls everyone’s head toward the sound. My dad steps in, cheeks flushed from the heat outside, and mutters under his breath, “Son of a bitch.”
My mom glances up at him. “What happened?”
“Something’s wrong with that damn grill.” He holds up his hand, thumb and forefinger pressed close enough to pinch air. “I’m this close to tossing it off the deck.”
Elias pushes his chair back with a scrape, brushing his palms on his jeans.
“Mind if I take a look, Mr. Hendrix? Maybe I can help.”
For a second, my dad studies him—expression unreadable—before the corner of his mouth lifts in a restrained smirk.
“Sure thing.”
They head back out, my dad leading the way. Just before the door swings shut, Elias glances over his shoulder and catches my eye. That crooked smile lingers for a heartbeat before he disappears outside.
Through the glass doors, I watch them: my dad standing with his hands braced on his hips, Elias crouched low beside the grill, tools spread haphazardly around him. Their voices are muffled, blending with the chirp of bugs.
Ten minutes later, the door creaks open again. Elias steps back inside, wiping a line of sweat from his brow with the heel of his hand, a faint streak of soot smudged across his knuckles.
“I’m guessing, since the grill didn’t go flying over the deck, you guys got it working?” I tease, raising an eyebrow.
“Yep,” my dad says, clapping Elias on the back with a grin. “You’ve got yourself a regular Mr. Fix-It here. Appreciate it, son.”
He shrugs, humble as always. “Happy to help.”
The next few hours blur in a warm hum of activity.
Elias moves easily through the house, offering help before anyone even asks.
He slips into the rhythm of my parents’ home like he’s always belonged here, chopping vegetables beside my mom, hauling trays out to the deck for my dad, laughing softly at their teasing.
By the time the rest of the crew filters in, the sun is already dipping low, the backyard bathed in honeyed light. The picnic table groans under platters of sides and desserts, Elias’s cake sitting right in the middle like it’s the guest of honor.
He stations himself beside my dad at the grill, black apron looped around his waist, flipping burgers with a confidence that makes me grin. Smoke curls into the evening air, carrying the scent of charred meat and sweet barbecue sauce.
Across the yard, I’m stuck mediating a chaotic round of cornhole: Cody and Grady versus Jasper and Sasha.
“Step up your game, punks!” Cody shouts, chest puffed out despite the fact that he hasn’t landed a single bag in the hole all night. Grady groans dramatically beside him.
Laughter ripples through the yard, easy and unforced, the kind that settles deep.
When we finally gather around the long table, plates piled high, a hush falls over the group.
It’s not silence exactly—just a comfortable lull, punctuated by clinking forks and murmurs of thanks.
I glance around at them all, this makeshift family of mine, and something warm swells in my chest. For a moment, I can almost believe this is how it’s always been—that they’ve always been here, always been mine.
A nudge at my elbow pulls me back. Elias leans closer, voice low so only I hear.
“You okay?”
I turn to meet his eyes, a smile tugging at the corner of my mouth as I slip my hand beneath the table, resting it gently on his thigh.
“Couldn’t be better.”
The next morning, I wake to the low mumble of voices drifting up through the floorboards—soft laughter, the clink of utensils against metal.
For a moment, I lie still in the familiar cocoon of my childhood bed, disoriented by how the years seem to collapse here, as if I could be seventeen again.
But the clock on my nightstand blinks 9:15, pulling me back to now.
I peel myself from the warm tangle of blankets, splash cold water on my face, run a brush through my hair, and pad barefoot down the stairs toward the sound of commotion.
The sight waiting for me in the kitchen nearly knocks the air from my lungs.
Elias stands shoulder to shoulder with my mom at the counter, a frilly yellow apron streaked with flour tied haphazardly over his usual black shirt.
His sleeves are pushed high on his forearms, muscles flexing as he stirs a bowl of batter, and for reasons I refuse to examine too closely, the sight sends a sharp rush of heat straight through me.
I pause in the doorway, leaning silently against the frame, just watching.
He doesn’t see me, but somehow he knows I’m there—the way his shoulders shift, the way his head lifts just slightly.
When he turns and catches my eye, his whole face softens into that smile, the one that feels like it’s meant only for me.
“What’s going on in here?” I ask, stepping into the room, matching his grin.
“Oh, good morning, sleepyhead,” my mom teases, barely glancing up from the skillet she’s manning.
“Elias decided to show up early and cook breakfast for us.”
“Did he now?” I say innocently as I round the island and press a quick kiss to his cheek. He hums under his breath, barely pausing his stirring, and I slip onto a barstool, content just to watch.
They move around each other with an ease that shouldn’t feel possible—my mom giving instructions, Elias following her lead like they’ve done this a hundred times.
The scrape of whisk against glass, the sizzle of bacon, the smell of something sweet rising warm and golden in the oven—it all blends into a kind of simplicity that tugs in your heart.
And when I catch a flicker in his expression—something tender, almost wistful—I can’t help but wonder if this reminds him of his own mother. Or of Cody’s. Of the kind of mornings he’s spent years missing.