When she stretched to reach something on an upper shelf, Gideon was distracted by how the chef’s coat lifted and hinted at her curves underneath. Eight years had turned Calla from a girl into a woman, and he wasn’t immune to that fact.
“Have they caught him?”
“I have no idea.”
She went to her table and started working on more bells, ignoring him completely.
Gideon stood there and watched. Part of him felt ridiculous, because she was right. She was a thirty-year-old woman with her own business, who had lived in this city almost as long as she’d lived back in Texas. He could see that she was fine. Better than fine.
But he’d promised Nathan, and he didn’t take that promise lightly. Gideon owed Nathan, big-time.
She stopped working again, smiling at the people outside as she winked and closed the window. Then she turned on him.
“Gideon, you’re distracting me, and I can’t afford—literally—to be distracted right now. You can tell Nathan I’m fine, I carry pepper spray and I’m as careful as I can be. I have a business to run, and people counting on me. I’m behind schedule after having to redo the cake that was destroyed the other night—which took two twenty-four-hour days to finish, by the way. I barely made it. Now I’m behind on this one, too, and you’re not helping.”
Gideon backed off a little, seeing the strain and the exhaustion that he hadn’t caught before. She was stressed, probably afraid, but like the other members of the Michaels clan, she wasn’t one to back down.
“When is this one supposed to be done?”
“Three days. I need to deliver it Christmas Eve, for a Christmas Day wedding, and it’s not going as well as I’d hoped. I guess I’m distracted, but I keep messing up the carvings, and the first batch of batter didn’t come out right.”
“There was nothing wrong with that sample you just handed out, believe me.”
“This one was good. I need to do it three more times now. I need forty-eight bells, and then I need to bake the base they will rest on. Then decorate.”
Gideon looked at the bells on the counter. There were eight.
“It took me the last six hours to do these.”
“You need to spend thirty more hours at this?”
“I should be able to make it, but it will be close, assuming no more goofs. Or distractions.” She looked at him pointedly.
Gideon considered for a moment and stepped forward. “Maybe I could help.”
Her eyebrows lifted, and she coughed out a laugh. “Are you hiding a culinary degree up your sleeve?”
“I do a lot of wood carving. How different can it be?”
Her lips fell apart, her expression shocked. “Are you kidding?”
“No. I mean, why not? If I can help you carve bells, that will speed things up for you, right? You can bake more cake while I do the carving. Consider it my apology for bugging you.”
“These have to be done just so. It’s cake, not wood.”
“Let me try one. You might be surprised.”
“No. You’re just trying to find a way to stick around watching over me.”
“Is that so bad?”
“Is this because we kissed once? Do you think you have some kind of special influence over me or something?”
“Do I?”
She crossed her arms over her front. “It was a long time ago, and it was only one kiss. I’ve kissed a lot of other guys since then.”
Gideon wasn’t sure he liked that idea, but shrugged.
“Fine. I’ll make you a deal. Let me try one bell, and if I botch it, I go home, tell your family you’re fine and leave you be. If I do okay, I’ll stick around and help. At least for today.”
“They can’t be okay, they have to be perfect.”
“Okay. Then if I do perfect, I can stick around.”
“Why are you pushing this? Why not just go?”
She sounded exasperated, but he knew he had her on the ropes.
“Because I owe Nathan. He saved my hide a few months ago, and frankly, I wouldn’t even be standing here if it weren’t for him. He asked me to do a simple favor for him, and I agreed. I’d like to keep my promise, even though it’s clear that you’re okay.”
She stared at him for several long moments, her shoulders dropping as she pushed a block of cake across the table, relenting.
“Fine. It’s a deal. You suck, you leave. Wash your hands, put on some gloves and let’s see what you can do.”
CALLA WATCHED GIDEON study the block of cake as if wondering where to start. He looked at her drawing, her cake plans, and then at the bells she’d done already. He didn’t say a word.
Ever since she’d met him on the sidewalk, her heart hadn’t settled down for a second. He had beautiful hands. Rough from the carpentry work that he did off hours, but nicely shaped. Masculine. They seemed too large for the delicate block of cake, but he was gentle, too.
The thought sent a shiver down her spine.
She hadn’t thought she’d ever see him again. They’d shared a kiss eight years ago. She’d still been a virgin then, and she’d wanted more, but he’d backed off.
She’d only met one guy she liked in culinary school—Max—and she’d thought he’d be the one, but he had run as fast as he could in the opposite direction when he’d found out about her untouched status. He’d said he couldn’t take that responsibility.
She’d been home for a month that summer with one goal on her mind—to change that status before she went back to the city. Gideon had appeared to be an excellent solution to her situation. They’d had sparks from the moment they’d met, and she’d wanted him. That had been new to her, too.
She’d walked with him across the field down by the old barns under the auspices of showing him around the ranch. She’d assumed they were on the same page—that he wanted the same thing she did. She’d known he was attracted to her. She’d been experienced enough to know that—and to try to take advantage of it.
When he’d kissed her, she’d known she’d made the right choice. His lips had melted her like candle wax at the first touch. His hands on her back, where he’d dragged his fingers back and forth along the skin under the band of her jeans, had set her on fire for the first time ever.
How could she ever forget those hands?
He could’ve had her right there and then, and oh, she had wanted him to do just that. But he’d stopped, made some vague excuse about it not being the right time or place and kissed her once more, lightly, before he’d walked back to the party. Alone.
Twice rejected, still a virgin. What Gideon had done was even worse than what Max had done. She’d been willing, warmed up and ready. She’d wanted him. She’d chosen him. It had been her first real attempt at seduction.
And he’d walked away.
It had taken awhile for the bruise on her ego to heal, and eventually she’d even had to give Gideon credit for doing the right thing. Kind of.
He’d been a few years older, wiser, and he was her brother’s friend. His reasons were better than Max’s, or at least nobler. Still, at the time it had