Just Can't Forget You: Oakland Hills Short Story 2 (Oakland Hills #3.5)(10)

No such luck.

“Time for a break,” he said directly behind her.

His rich voice melted her more effectively than an hour with a massage therapist. She turned, saw the tray in his hands, and dropped her spade.

“Oh, my God. What is that?”

“Just a little something I whipped up,” he said.

Furiously wiping her hands on her jeans, she stared. A pitcher of iced tea with lemon—nice. But also thick slices of chocolate cake. The shiny kind, with layers of something creamy. “You just whipped that up?”

“Well, yesterday. I like baking. It helps me relax.”

“You seem plenty relaxed already,” she said.

“I do a lot of baking.” Smiling, he set the tray on a small table.

Too tired to be witty, she looked at her hands—and was horrified at the thought of touching his beautiful sweet concoctions with her grubby fingers. His beautiful… sweet…

Oh, lord. “I need to clean up,” she said. Did she ever. “Be right back.” She jogged across the patio and inside to the bathroom, where she scrubbed her hands under the water and gazed at herself in the mirror. Smudges of dirt graced both her chin and her left temple. Her damp hair stuck to her cheeks.

She looked awful, but he didn’t seem to mind. If anything, the tension between them was as thick as ever.

She finished up and rejoined him outside, accepting the plate he handed her. “So, what do you call this?”

“Flourless chocolate and hazelnut cake layered with white chocolate mousse, frosted with chocolate ganache,” he said.

“You’re kidding.”

“You’ll be doing me a favor by helping me eat it.”

She slid the fork into the chocolate glaze. “You are kidding.”

“I get tired of eating alone.”

As she closed her lips over the mouthful of chocolate cake, she met his gaze, surprised to see he was dead serious.

Her heart skipped a beat.

How was any woman supposed to resist him? How could she not seriously consider grabbing the moment?

Well, not just the moment.

“Do you like it?” he asked. He actually looked unsure.

She slid the fork out of her mouth. Swallowed. “Who wouldn’t?” she asked.



Around five, Eduardo decided they’d both worked enough for the day. She’d eaten his cake, but he didn’t believe she wasn’t also craving something more substantial. He massaged his shoulder, fighting a smile.

Her behavior around the couple yesterday had convinced him she was single, which had been his first concern, even if she had some lingering feelings about Blondie.

Now he could tackle the details. Turn on the charm. Convince her to go out with him. They could talk about plants, if that’s what it was going to take.

He strode over to the patio and rested the shovel against the condo’s stucco wall. “Thanks for letting me help you today.”

Wiping her brow, she rose to her feet from where she’d been kneeling in the dirt, marking out curved garden beds with a black hose. “Who am I to argue with a helpful guy?”

He walked over to her. “I don’t know. Who are you?”

“Nobody special.”

He could see her pulse dancing in her throat. Working close to her all day had taught him how to read her a little better.

Good nervous.

“We’re done working for the day,” he said. “I’m taking you to lunch.”

“It’s almost five.”

“Dinner, then.”

She looked away. The wind whistled through the trees overhead. “I need to put my tools away.”

“I’ll do it.”

“No, I have to do it.”

“All right,” he said. “I’ll wait.”

She took off her hat and pushed the hair out of her eyes with the back of her hand. “Look, Eduardo, I’m a different person than I was then. I don’t want to be that person, you know? I don’t even like to think about it.”

He couldn’t let her turn him down now. Each moment they spent together was showing him how shallow his relationships had been with other women. Why he’d always held back, protecting a part of himself, fearing they’d never understand him.

“All the more reason to go with me to a great tapas place,” he said. “It’s on San Pablo, next door to a yoga studio with pictures of flames in the window, which doesn’t seem like such a selling point to me, but—”

“I know it. I live only two blocks away, actually,” she said, “but I can’t—”

“Please.” He took her hands in his, wanting to share that small contact again. Her hat bunched up between their fingers. “I don’t remind you of the past. You didn’t even recognize me. This is about right now.”


He stopped breathing during the long pause that followed. Finally, she said, “I have to go back to the nursery first. Then you can come by my place. I’ll text you my address. We can walk.” Her hands slipped out of his as she turned and began cleaning up the yard.

When her back was to him, he tilted his head back and let out a long breath.





9


THIS WASN’T WHAT MELISSA HAD planned. Dinner with the client after a day of sweaty side-by-side laboring—no. Dressing up for a man who had known her at her weakest, craziest worst as a troubled teenager—not the plan.