In the Weeds (Lovelight #2)(53)

I blow out a noisy breath. That’s what I’m looking for, I think. A little rest. Something slower. I’m so tired of everything else.

Stella watches me carefully. “It’s okay to want different things,” she says. “People change. You’re allowed to change. Doing less doesn’t make you less.”

Seasons change and so do we. I wonder if Stella made the banner that hangs in the center of town.

“Nice shirt,” Layla calls, a laugh hidden in her voice. I look down at the oversized flannel tied in a knot at my waist and pluck at one of the buttons.

“It’s comfortable,” I say.

“Mmhmm.”

“It’s really soft.”

“I’m sure it is.”

Not as soft as the look on Beckett’s face, though, when he helped me slip the material over my shoulders, his knuckles grazing the inside of my arm and then my collarbone. Mine, that look had said, possession in the nimble work of his fingers against the buttons. But then he had cleared his throat and looked away, staring at his mug of tea like it held the meaning to life.

I have no idea what he wants from me, if he even wants anything from me at all.

Stella studies me with a knowing look. “Have you talked to him?”

“He knows I have his shirt.”

“That isn’t what I meant and you know it.”

I haven’t. What could I possibly say? That night in Maine was one of the best nights of my life. I want to keep sitting on your back porch.

Every day we spend together, I only like you more.

I can’t. There’s still too much to figure out. I’m confused about work and that confusion is bleeding out, jumbling up the rest of me.

Specifically my feelings for a very handsome and very stoic farmer.

Our conversation is interrupted by a knock against the thick glass of the front door. Caleb Alvarez edges the door open and pokes his head through, the rest of his long body lingering on the small porch. Dark hair, bashful grin. Eyes only for Layla.

“You open for business yet?”

Layla waves him in from behind the counter, tongue between her teeth as she finishes piping her flowers. “Always for you, Deputy.”

Caleb straightens and slips through the door, a pleased blush high on his tanned cheeks. He gives us a wave and a sheepish smile that causes twin dimples to blink to life in his cheeks. Stella and I sigh in unison. “Told you to call me Caleb,” he calls to Layla.

“Your cake will be ready in a sec,” Layla offers. “Help yourself to a coffee while you wait.”

Caleb ducks behind the counter to the coffee pot and Stella leans closer to me, hiding her mouth with the back of her hand. “This is the third custom cake he’s ordered this month,” she whispers. “I think he’s gained fifteen pounds.”

I take in his trim body, legs crossed at the ankles as he leans against the counter and stares at Layla like she’s made of sugarplums and fairy-dust. Maybe all those calories are going right to his gigantic heart. I grin.

“Has she noticed?”

The smile slips from Stella’s face as she shakes her head. “She’s so used to men treating her like garbage, I don’t think she recognizes when someone has genuine interest in her.” She sighs and rubs a fingertip across her eyebrow. “I’ve got faith in Caleb, though.”

So do I, if Layla’s laugh is any indication. It bursts out of her at something he quietly murmurs over the countertop, an answering grin blooming on his handsome face.

I narrow my eyes. “Does that mean you’ve got money on Caleb?”

The last time I was here, I stumbled upon a town-wide betting pool with odds on Stella and Luka making it official; a surprisingly organized and efficient white board in the back of the firehouse with scribbled names and amounts.

Stella snickers. “Luka does.”



I eat oatmeal chocolate chip cookies until I have to unbutton the clasp of my jeans, reclined in the back kitchen across three sacks of sugar. I make a moaning sound as Layla walks by with a tray of brownies, a small square dropped neatly on my chest.

“You’re gonna kill me,” I groan.

“Death by chocolate.” Layla drops the tray on the large metal island in the middle of the room and wipes her palms against her apron. “There are worse ways to go.”

I sit up and watch as she cuts the brownies into perfect two-inch squares, her movements graceful and efficient. The whole day I’ve watched her spin around this bakehouse like a dancer, every single movement a step in an elaborately choreographed routine.

“You moved to Inglewild when you finished college, right?”

Layla hums and nods, reaching for some plastic wrap at her elbow. “I met Stella our freshman year at Salisbury. I decided to move here on a whim, really. Not much of a plan.” She presses the back of her hand across her forehead, fingertips covered in dark chocolate. “I lived with Stella for a while. We shared a tiny apartment above the service station. I’m pretty sure I smelled like oil and grease for six months straight. Beatrice hated it.”

“Ms. Beatrice?”

“Ah, yeah. I worked at the cafe for a while. She taught me everything I know about baked goods.”

Huh. I had no idea. I’m guessing Ms. Beatrice kept her shortbread recipe to herself. Layla’s eyes narrow in a secret smile, her pink lips curled at the edges. “I know Beckett gets cookies on the side. It amuses me to watch him sneak around.”