Then the sounds of the bakery rushed back in, and I realized what had just happened.
“Rowan, you cannot just kiss me in the middle of my bakery,” I hissed as I stepped back, brushing my hands over my hair which had been messy before all of this.
I had tried to sound stern and pissed off, but it obviously didn’t work since Rowan was grinning with a twinkling gaze.
“I think he just did, sweetheart,” Tina answered for him, sounding amused as she poured milk for a latte.
I glanced over to Tina, who not only sounded amused but looked it too. Her own green eyes were sparkling with warmth. Which was definitely uncharacteristic since she wasn’t exactly known for being warm and fuzzy with anyone but her wife.
She had been cold and straight up hostile with Nathan.
Apparently, she already approved of Rowan. Which made no sense. Tina was a hard woman to impress, and she certainly wouldn’t be swayed by masculine good looks. Yet there she was, eyes shining, not threatening Rowan with her eyes or words.
I turned my gaze back to Rowan. “I need to work,” I informed him, my cheeks still flaming with the heat of his attention, lips burning in response to his kiss.
“I’ve got it!” Fiona sang, pushing past the both of us to situate herself at the counter, serving customers.
I had no idea where she’d been, and I hadn’t even seen her approach. I was both thankful and resentful for her presence. This was far too much attention from Rowan in a concentrated amount of time. I wasn’t capable of coping with this.
Rowan took Fiona’s presence as an opportunity to gently grasp my upper arm and lead me to the kitchen.
It smelled like apple and cinnamon since I had decided to make my fall loaf, full of spices and drizzled with local honey right out of the oven. It went amazing with warm apple cider or a pumpkin spice latte—with pumpkin syrup made in-house.
I was going to tell him that he couldn’t come behind the counter and kiss me. That I was overwhelmed right now and wasn’t ready for a relationship… or whatever the heck this was. But he spoke first.
“I’m takin’ you to dinner,” he declared.
His hands were no longer on my upper arms, they were on my hips. It was hard to concentrate with them there, but for the life of me, I wasn’t capable of stepping out of his grasp.
“W-What?” I stuttered.
“Dinner,” he repeated. “Tonight. Carlisle’s. Seven.”
Carlisle’s was the fanciest place in town. For good reason. The chef, and the restaurant’s namesake, Carlisle, had owned some fancy restaurant in New York, was rich and famous, and a huge star of the culinary world. Then he stepped out of all that, for reasons the town’s busybodies loved to speculate on—but had never got to the bottom of—and came here to Jupiter to open his restaurant.
The food was out of this world. They didn’t take reservations; it was first come, first serve. It was always packed. No matter what.
“You want to go on a… date?” I asked him.
“Want to fuck you,” he replied bluntly.
My body jerked with a shock that was not even a little bit unpleasant.
“Want to fuck you,” he repeated, his grip tightening on my hips as his eyes dropped to my lips. “Had to stop myself from doing it last night. And this morning.” His eyes lifted, looking behind me to where the sounds of the bakery were filtering through. “And right now,” he added.
Sex in public has never been a fantasy of mine. I was a shy, private person who didn’t much like being the center of attention. But right now, I was ready for Rowan to fuck me in my kitchen with an entire bakery of people a few feet away.
“But,” he gritted out. “Wanna do things different with you. Wanna take you on a date. Give you what you deserve. Show this whole town you’re mine.” He lifted his hand to brush my cheek. “And then, I want to show you you’re mine.”
My stomach flipped as I sucked an unsteady breath through my mouth.
Rowan was regarding me intently. “If that’s what you want.” It wasn’t exactly a question. More like him verbalizing a forgone conclusion.
I couldn’t speak. I was too busy trying not to melt into a puddle at his feet. Or try to climb him like a tree.
“I’m pretty good at reading people, Nora,” Rowan murmured. “Really fucking good at it. And I’ve made it my business to read the subtleties of your expressions over the years.”
Another stomach flip. My heartbeats stuttered.
“In addition to that, you were pretty fucking enthusiastic this mornin’ and a few minutes ago,” he continued. “So, I’m rather confident that you want this too. Us,” he clarified. “But I’m gonna need to hear it from that pretty mouth of yours.”