Mixed Signals (Lovelight, #3)

by B.K. Borison

“You can tell me what you need, and I’ll give it to you.” I add another kiss higher, light and easy, right over her underwear. She tilts her hips up with a sigh. “I’ll be happy to give it to you.”

“If I’m going to fuck you, Layla,” the words grind out of him, rough and tight, “it won’t be because of any lessons or arrangements. It’ll be because you want me and I want you.”

“I don’t know if I can do that, Layla. I don’t know if I can do that and not want you.” The look on her face cleaves my heart in two. “It’ll fade with time. I promise. It always does.”

“I’ll still see you?” Her bottom lip brushes mine and my whole body jolts. “Monday, Wednesday, and Friday?” If that’s what she needs. If this is all she’s ready for, if this is how I prove to her that I’m exactly what she deserves to have, then I’ll be the best damn customer the bakehouse has ever had.

It’s my favorite place for a midafternoon nap. Or an emotional breakdown. Take your pick.

“That’s the trouble with falling in love. It’s a messy, ungraceful stumble into a whirlwind of chaos. It doesn’t always feel good. It’s a fall.”

“You just have to trust that the person you’re falling with is smart enough to catch you before you hurt anything important.”

She’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. The most beautiful thing I ever will see.

“Did you want to see me?” She bites at her bottom lip. My hope deflates like a sad little balloon. “Oh, ah.” I glance over my shoulder. Maybe I’ll wander through the trees and keep going. Past my Jeep and into the fields. Let Mother Nature do as she will.

“This whole time—I think I’ve been falling in love with you,” she tells me. “I didn’t recognize it because I’ve never felt it before. And when I did, when I realized, I kind of freaked out. I’m still kind of freaking out about it. It turns out the thing I wanted most is pretty scary when it comes down to it. You’re going to have to be patient with me.” “I can do that,” I grit out, voice thick. “I think I’ve been falling in love with you for a while, Layla. One butter croissant at a time.”

cutout from Baltimore Magazine with one of the pictures they featured. My favorite picture. In it, Caleb is sitting at that little table in the corner with a flowery teacup in his hand, legs splattered with mud and dirt, face exhausted. But he’s looking at me with such tender affection I feel it like a kiss against the back of my neck. A knuckle under my chin. In the picture, I’m behind the counter and he’s at the table. He’s looking at me like I’ve hung the damn moon. I think I have forty-seven copies of that magazine.

I spent a long time looking for the right kind of love, only for it to walk right through the front door of my bakehouse every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.