Drop, Cover, and Hold On (The Improbable Meet-Cute, #4)

by Jasmine Guillory

Whenever she walked inside, he would turn to look at her, and the scowl on his face got at least 50 percent scowlier.

Didn’t she remember when she’d come back to tell them that they’d accidentally given her three pastries instead of two? She went back to the bakery and tried to pay for the third one after she’d realized what had happened, but he’d just barked “Never mind!” at her and turned away. He’d made mistakes like that a bunch more times, but she never bothered to tell him anymore, even though she sort of worried that his bakery must be losing a ton of money if he was messing up that much.

Maybe those extra pastries were because he was trying to fatten her up so he could eat her, like a fairy-tale villain.

She smiled back at him, for just a half second, before she caught herself. And then she just stared at him. “Are you flirting with me? Here? Now?” Was she imagining this? If not, he had to be concussed or something. He shook his head, and then winced a little. “No, of course not. That would be ridiculous, to try to flirt with you when we were trapped inside my bakery after an earthquake while I was bleeding from a head wound. I would never do something like that.” And then a glimmer of a smile appeared in his eyes. “But if I was, is it working?”

“I wasn’t giving everyone free stuff. I was giving you free stuff. Because I fell for you that first moment I heard you laugh that day.”

I guess I gave you a dirty look when I did. I didn’t mean to—my face just does that sometimes.”

“I hope you have a good idea, because right now I’m sitting here, alone in my bakery with the woman of my dreams on Valentine’s Day, with a box full of pastries that I saved for her in the hope that she would come in today and they’d be waiting—”

You usually come in Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, so I thought I’d see you today. At least, I hoped so.”

“Do you have any idea how many times I’ve dreamed of this?” he said in her ear. She shook her head as she looked at him. “So many times,” he said. “But the reality is far better than my imagination.”