Page 106 of A Taste of Vanilla

Marley returns to the kitchen. “Of course she is.”

I can’t afford to not open because I screwed my best friend’sbrother.

I look between my two friends.

“Yes,” I say again, mostly to myself. “We’re opening.”

Because the day has already gone sideways before seven in the morning.

And Bitter Bloom, like me, has survived worse than awkward heat distribution.

eight

. . .

Agatha the Oven Chooses Violence

HALSTON

By eight o’clockin the morning, I have learned three important things.

One: It’s impossible to open a bakery after discovering your anonymous one-night stand is your best friend’s older brother.

Two: Muffins do not care about emotional devastation. They either rise or they don’t, and my banana batch has risen beautifully despite being baked in what Warren has called “an uneven heat environment.”

Three: Marley King is capable of being furious, protective, embarrassed, and hungry at the exact same time.

The last one is the least surprising.

Marley sits at the table closest to the pastry case eating the scone her brother brought her with an expression that makes me a little scared.

Oliver sits across from her with a mug of black coffee he stole from my pot, one ankle propped against the opposite knee, looking far too comfortable for a man who has just witnessed the collapse of several social norms.

“You look smug,” Marley tells him.

Oliver doesn’t look up from his phone. “I’m rarely smug.”

“You’re literally always smug.”

He sighs. “I’m usually correct. People just constantly confuse the two.”

“Were you correct when you let my brother leave your bar with my best friend?”

Oliver’s eyes find hers, his phone dropping into his lap. “Are we doing this again?”

“Yes.”

“I did not let anyone do anything. Halston is a grown adult; your brother is physically impossible to remove from a room without equipment; and I provided verbal opposition numerous times.”

“You provided water.”

“And verbal opposition.”

I set a tray of chocolate chip cookies in the case harder than necessary. “Maybe we can discuss literally anything else?” I ask.

They both look at me.

“No?”