Need You for Mine (Heroes of St. Helena)(28)

Humiliating moment complete, Harper closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths, trying to get the burning red embarrassment to recede from her cheeks. It didn’t help.

“I bet this will make it better.” He held up his bag with two fingers and shook it. Harper could hear a pastry tumble around. The grease stain on the side of the bag told her whatever was in there was frosted. The size of the bag said there was more than one.

Maybe cupcakes? Or a dozen cookies? She was an equal opportunity consumer when it came to baked goods, but cookies were her favorite. Especially ones with enough butter to stain a bag. But this bag made her uneasy, because this bag felt like a bribe.

“What’s going on, Adam?” Her gaze fell to his chest when she asked, “And why did you kiss me?”

“You looked like you needed to be kissed, and dumbass wasn’t perceptive enough to see that,” he said in a tone that had Harper looking up and, holy smokes, Adam was looking back.

It wasn’t the look she expected—it was protective and hungry, if not a tad bit confused.

Welcome to it, Harper thought. Two minutes ago, she was so focused on Clay’s chaste kiss she had convinced herself he was going to ask her out. Now she couldn’t seem to remember why she wanted to go out with him.

“He needed to know that it wasn’t you missing out on something amazing. It was him who was missing out.”

“Oh,” she whispered, her stomach clenching a little. “I thought you kissed me as payback for, you know . . .” She waved her hand at his fly and groaned. God, she was so awkward. “So you kissed me to save me from embarrassment?”

He chuckled lightly. “You really need to work on reading signals, sunshine.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Exactly,” was all he said. Then his posture shifted, and so did that easygoing smile. “Now that we got that taken care of, want to explain to me why you keep blowing my game?”

“What are you even talking about?” she asked, although she had a bad feeling she already knew, and silently debated whether to just fess up. She knew it was the right thing to do, even had a pretty good idea he was already in the loop, but wishful thinking held her back.

For all she knew, she was misreading signals again. And he was just there to confront her about Emerson playing hardball with her catering skills.

“Because of you, there will be a huge sex deficit,” he said, sounding genuinely concerned.

“If this is your idea of how to charm me into forgiving you so Emerson will cater Beat the Heat, then I gotta tell you, your game-sucking has zero to do with me.”

“That came out wrong,” Adam said and ran a hand down his face, and at least two days’ worth of stubble, which made him appear sexier and somehow vulnerable. Two things that had her pausing.

Adam didn’t do vulnerable. But the longer she looked at him, the more she wondered what was wrong. The life’s-a-beach ladies’ man was gone and in his place was a worn soul.

“I came here to apologize about the other night.”

“It all worked out,” she said. “And thank you for apologizing. It really means a lot.”

Adam nodded, a single jerk that was male for welcome. But when Harper thought he’d walk off, he continued to stare. At her. Not saying a word, until the silence grew and Harper felt more tingling. This time it was from unease, twisting around in her stomach.

“Now, you want to tell me why everyone seems to think we’re dating?” he said, and that twisting went Category 5.

“Not really. I’m good.”

He laughed softly, then moved forward until she felt enveloped. And for one ridiculously stupid, amazing moment she thought he was going to kiss her again. Not the hard smack to the lips he’d given her a moment ago, but a gentle, languid kiss that would have her knees melting.

It had been so long since she’d had a good public knee-melting that she found herself swaying closer. Their bodies brushed and she realized she’d stopped breathing.

“Even if I said I brought you a present?” He opened the bag and held it beneath her nose.

Harper closed her eyes and breathed in mouthwatering vanilla and rich cinnamon. Knowing it was a bribe, and refusing to give in, she shook her head. “Even then.”

He pulled one of the cookies out of the bag—a confetti cake batter cookie, her favorite—and took a bite, moaning, the big jerk. “You sure? There’s plenty.”

Cursing her weakness, she reached into the bag, telling herself that sometimes a cookie was just a cookie. Only then she realized that the bag was full, busting at the seams with enough cookies to feed a small army—or her entire class—and she knew the gesture was so much more.

She looked up and Adam gave a shrug which came off as more boyish than dismissive. “My mom used to bring cookies to my Mighty Mites meetings when I was a kid. So when I saw the sunshine-painted sugar cookies, I grabbed extras.”

Harper’s heart rolled over and showed its soft underbelly. “Thank you. That was very sweet.”

“Sweet enough to tell me why Nora Kincaid posed the question on Facebook about why my status still says single?”

Harper hesitated.

“I guess I can always just go see Nora.”

“No, wait.” Nora Kincaid ran the gossip rag in town. It was hosted on Facebook, all of the photos were amateur, but her word was golden. The last thing Harper needed was Nora catching wind that there was more to the story.