Inside, he surveyed the decimated trays. There was a single muffin remaining. Before anyone else could grab it, Holt bagged it up and tucked it away.
“You hiding our wares?” Jonah asked.
“Nope. Just saving it for Cayla. Thought it would be a nice thank you for her help with getting the word out about today on social media. Obviously it worked.”
“I’ll say. The apple oatmeal bars were a little slow, but everything more or less flew off the shelves.” Brax made a notation on the pad he carried. “If we continue to get crowds like this, we’re going to need to majorly bump up our inventory. I have one more batch of bars and another of muffins about to come out of the ovens.”
“We’re still a novelty. No guarantee they’ll come back,” Jonah said.
“Oh, son, we’ll come back.” The rusty voice came from a grizzled old dude in an ancient Army jacket at one of the four-tops. He sat with a trio of equally old guys who all had the look of former military. There was nothing left but crumbs on their plates.
Jonah smiled. “Think so?”
“Know so,” said one of the others.
“But you really gotta get some coffee.”
Holt exchanged a look with his friends. “We’ll add it to the list.”
* * *
Cayla letthe measuring tape snap back and carefully sketched out the main space of the office. Once she’d cleaned up and refinished it, the sideboard she’d snagged at the flea market last month would go perfectly along that entry wall, with some kind of cute display that included business cards and portfolios of the events she’d put together. The used file cabinets she’d scored had already been wrestled back to the tiny bedroom she was using as an office. Clients wouldn’t be back there, so there was no sense wasting a lot of time on prettying them up. Maybe if she got motivated, she’d repaint them or add some contact paper to cover up the rust spots. For now, her efforts needed to go toward the public spaces.
Wandering toward the front window, she mused over whether she should be on the lookout for a secondhand sofa and chairs for client meetings or if a dining table would be better. The sofa would be cozier but having a table to spread out photos and samples might be more practical. And probably a table and chairs would be kinder to her budget. She’d keep an eye out for a used set she could spiff up. Then she could put up a large magnetic marker board along that wall to capture ideas. Yes, it could work. She made more notes, enjoying the bump of pleasure she always felt at making plans and seeing the path to bringing them to fruition.
Her eyes shifted to look out the window, up the hill toward the bakery. There was an area she didn’t know how to make plans and certainly couldn’t see the path forward. She’d missed the soft opening this morning. But they’d had an in-service day at school, and she’d had to sort out what to do with Maddie so she could make her meeting with a prospective client who wanted to plan an engagement party for her daughter. Thank God for Mama. She’d taken Maddie to work at the library.
Guilt prickled. She’d been leaning on her mother an awful lot lately. Not that Donna ever seemed to regret it. She adored her granddaughter, and Lord knew the feeling was mutual. But Cayla felt as if she was abusing the help. Like she was supposed to be able to juggle everything on her own. Maybe she just wanted to be able to give that example to her daughter so Maddie wouldn’t be sucked in by some manipulative, controlling, sociopathic asshole when she grew up. Then again, wasn’t the lack of a strong male figure in her own life part of how she’d been taken in by Arthur?
Cayla’s gaze fixed on the flash of silver tin roof—all she could see of the bakery from here. Her thoughts were full of Holt. She’d meant what she’d told him last week. She wasn’t auditioning a replacement father for Maddie. But it was hard to see how good he was with her and not wish for someone like that in her child’s life. And it was hard for the woman to look at a man like him and not remember exactly how long it had been since she’d been touched.
Not that he was volunteering. Despite the behavior that might easily be construed as interest in something more, the word he kept tossing about was friends. She valued her friends, even if she seldom got to spend the kind of time with them she’d like. And as Holt’s friend, she’d promised him she’d be at the opening. Feeling guilty, she pulled out her phone and thumbed out a text.
Got tied up with a client meeting this morning. How did the soft opening go?
Those three little dots began dancing a few moments later.
Holt: It went great. They wiped out everything.
Cayla had no idea how much the guys had made, but that definitely sounded like a success. She tapped a reply. Everything?
He sent back a picture of the completely empty bakery cases. Only a few crumbs remained on the trays.
Cayla: Wow. Now I really regret missing it.
Again with the bubble indicating he was typing a response.
Holt: No worries. I saved you a little something.
Oh, that was so sweet of him. She wondered what he’d snagged for her and if he’d specifically grabbed something that he’d baked. What did it say if he did?
As the front door opened, she smiled. “And what good deed did I do to merit personal delivery?”
But it wasn’t Holt who came through the door.
It was Arthur.
Cayla froze, as if staying still would somehow make her invisible. She was dreaming. Caught up in some kind of nightmare inspired by the latest letter. Because there was no way that her ex-husband was standing here in her office space. And if it was a nightmare, she could wake up.
Oh please God, let me wake up.
“Hello, Cayla.”
At the sound of that voice, smooth and cultured and so intimately familiar, fear bloomed hard and fast, an invasive vine twining through her body, squeezing, squeezing, until she was rooted, quivering, to the spot.
Why was he here? How was he here? He should have been serving multiple sentences in prison.
Thank God, thank God, she hadn’t brought Maddie to work with her. Nothing was more important than protecting her child.
Swallowing against the cotton in her mouth, Cayla had to fight to keep her voice steady. “What are you doing here?”
His lips curved into a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. They were so cold, so flat. Had they always been so lifeless, or was this a product of prison?
“Not expecting to see me? I had good luck with my last appeal. All my convictions were overturned, and I’m a free man, ready to take back my life.”
Cayla heard what he didn’t articulate. Ready to take back my wife. Because she’d been a possession to him, and the legalities of a divorce—particularly one he’d fought tooth and nail—wouldn’t change that in his eyes. Blood roared in her ears, and she struggled to breathe. Desperate, she slid her thumb over the face of her phone, still open to Holt’s text, hoping beyond hope she managed to hit record for a voice text.
“You can’t be here, Arthur.” She moved her thumb again and felt the faint vibration of a text sending. She didn’t dare take her eyes off him to check to see if she’d recorded anything at all. She could only pray that Holt got the message and understood it for the SOS it was.
That false smile didn’t waver. “I’m just coming to check in on my wife.”
“Ex-wife.” Even as she said it, she could see the flare of temper in those cold, cold eyes.
“I’m also here to meet my daughter.”
Pure, abject terror washed through her. She’d do literally anything to keep him from Maddie. “You aren’t getting anywhere near my daughter.”
“Come now, there’s no need for this hostility. I have a right to get to know my child.”
Before she could formulate a reply, the door opened again and Holt stalked through. Cayla met his eyes over Arthur’s shoulder. Here, too, was chilled fury. But it was so very different from her ex-husband’s. This was a warrior ready for battle, and at the sight of him, the grip of panic eased a fraction. She knew on a deep, instinctive level that he’d keep her safe.
Stepping past Arthur, Holt slid an arm around her. The warmth of his touch melted some of the ice in her veins. “Who’s this?”
Desperately grateful for his presence, and for the fact that he was a big, imposing badass, Cayla leaned into him, as much because her legs didn’t want to support her anymore as to play along. “This is Arthur. My ex-husband. He was just leaving.”
The smile had faded, his pale gold eyes taking in Holt’s proprietary arm around her. Something ugly seemed to slither beneath the bland expression on his face. “I’m not here to cause trouble. I’m just here to see my daughter. And who, exactly, are you?”
Before she could come up with any kind of response, Holt was speaking. “I’m her current husband, and you have no rights here.”
Struck dumb by this announcement, Cayla could only watch Arthur. For a few seconds, the bland expression crumpled, those glacial eyes sparking with something vicious before he got himself under control again. “We’ll see what the courts have to say about that. Be seeing you soon, sweetheart.”