Recipe for Love (Jupiter Tides #1)

by Anne Malcom

My name is Nora Henderson, and I am currently having a pulmonary embolism.

“Nora, do the muffins have peanuts in them?” a voice asked, interrupting visions of what my funeral might look like. I thought it would be small but well attended. The flowers would be white. Lilies. Or roses. At the church down by the water, even though I wasn’t a particularly religious person. It was pretty there. A nice place for a funeral.

It was only after I’d packaged up the men’s orders that I realized Fiona had deftly distracted me from my pulmonary embolism that had never really existed in the first place.

You couldn’t not notice a rugged Adonis walking into a rather girly bakery. It shouldn’t have been possible for a man with that much testosterone to walk into a bakery decorated to look stunning on any and all social media feeds. Not with the neon signs. Soft pinks. Delicate teacups. Artful lattes. But he walked in here. Every day. Well, not every day. He didn’t come on weekends. Except that one time three weeks ago when he came on a Saturday.

His midnight hair escaped from the baseball cap he always wore. He took it off whenever he made it to the counter, a gesture that was oddly old-fashioned and one of the many little gestures of his I loved. Like how he glowered at everyone as a default but winked at small children if they were behind him in line, and opened the door for everyone.

Eyes sharp, angular, strikingly green. So green they glowed. But only when she was having a good day. They fucking changed color. It sounded insane, but it was true. When she was happy, excited or whatever, they glowed a vibrant emerald. When she was having a bad day, when she wasn’t happy, they were duller, almost hazel.

And today, when she’d started fucking babbling about some TV show, the apples on her cheeks seemed to grow larger, making her freckles look darker against her skin. It had almost spelled the end of me.

Especially now that she wasn’t wearing that fuck’s ring. Now that I wasn’t in danger of spending fifteen to life in a state penitentiary for killing him after laying his hands on what was mine.

And she was mine. Whether or not she was wearing that ring. I knew that was fucking insane since I barely knew her, but I felt like I did. I knew that she was shy, that she showed every single emotion on that face of hers. Knew she blushed easily. That she smiled at children. Knew that she donated all of the leftover baked goods to the homeless shelter at the end of every day. That she was soft-spoken and a little goofy. Knew that everyone in town fucking loved her. That she was a goddamn treasure in this town. I knew that she had no fucking clue just how indescribably gorgeous she was.

“It must’ve been bad since you made the Crisis Cake,” she observed. “It’s a peanut butter cake with double chocolate frosting,” I countered, chewing my lip. Fiona rolled her eyes. “That is the Crisis Cake.” She pointed at the cake stand.

“I understand that you’re cleaning,” she huffed. “I just don’t understand why you’re cleaning since we mop every day and scrub that floor once a week. Which we did yesterday. Beyond that, when you’re not baking, you’re running around cleaning like a toddler on cocaine.”

My body let itself be whirled around because I was frozen in shock. I hadn’t heard Nathan round the island—on account of the Italian loafers he wore—and I certainly hadn’t been expecting him to grab me. The grip itself was much too tight. Much tighter than I’d thought his soft, manicured hands were capable of.

Not thinking, I turned, intent on getting as far away from Nathan as possible. Unfortunately, amidst my fight or flight response, I forgot that I had left the cabinet open, and I ran right into it.

“Nora—” “Get the fuck out of my fucking house,” I snarled at him, my voice unrecognizable. Nathan paused for a split second.

Though I was a neurotic hypochondriac, I had a rather high pain tolerance. I’d broken my arm once, and no one believed me because of the hypochondria, so I was forced to go to school for a week with a broken arm. And run our school’s cross-country race. I actually came in second, the one and only time I had run because it was forced upon me.

Fiona, being Australian, used the ‘C’ word daily, which, apparently, was the norm for those hailing from the Southern Hemisphere. She’d also educated me on the use of it. A ‘soft T’ was meant to be some kind of compliment, like “he’s a good cunt,” and the ‘hard T’ was meant as an insult, like “he’s a fucking cunt.” This was certainly a ‘hard T’ moment.

I couldn’t. Not when Rowan’s eyes found mine. For the life of me, I couldn’t tell what his expression or posture might’ve been in the seconds before I lifted my head and presented my bruised face to him. Usually, those eyes were warm, inviting. But seeing them right then, I couldn’t believe that they were capable of being anything but two glittering holes of fury.

“Who did this to you?” Rowan’s nostrils flared, his jaw was set in a rigid line. I blinked at him, unnerved at the pure menace in his tone.

SLAY

He made this known by rounding the counter in a handful of quick, powerful strides and advancing on me. I was entirely unprepared for him to break the barrier between us and come into my space, therefore, I didn’t have time to escape.

Rowan didn’t stop, his hand grasping my upper arm in a firm, purposeful but not painful grip before he began to drag me toward the kitchen. Or he would’ve had I not let out a little whimper of pain.

“Take off your sweater,” he said quietly. He may as well have roared it for the impact it had. Although his tone was velvet smooth, it was threaded with pure fury. The fury that shone in his eyes, that made the cords of his neck stand out, made his hands fist at his sides.

“No,” I snapped. He blinked slowly, once, regarding me. The fury did not dissipate, not in the slightest. The air seemed to vibrate with it. “Nora.” My name came out through clenched teeth. “Take off the fucking sweater.”

“Rowan,” I seethed right back. “Do not order me to take off pieces of clothing like you have the right to.” His body jerked. “Oh, I have the fucking right,” he said, voice low.

“You have a black eye.” He motioned to my face. “I’m aware,” I told him. “A black eye,” he repeated as if I hadn’t spoken. “And because this town is a huge fucking gossip mill, I know that yesterday was the day you were supposed to marry that piece of shit.”

“Yesterday, when I saw you, that perfect skin was flawless,” Rowan continued, voice threatening, posture tight. “Today, the day after your scheduled wedding day, that perfect skin is marred. And you just yelped in pain when I touched you. Which leads me to believe that that,” he nodded to my face, “is not your only bruise.”

“If I take off my sweater, you’re not allowed to call the police,” I informed him for reasons unknown. Rowan’s jaw stiffened, and there was a long pause before he finally nodded.

What I was expecting when he saw the bruises, I didn’t know. Maybe some kind of outburst. Swearing. More of the glowering, the glittering fury. But none of that came. Instead, an impossibly gentle, barely there touch ghosted over the skin of my upper arms.

One of those fingers found their way to my chin, tilting it upward so I was no longer staring at the sweater bunched in my hands. My eyes got lost in his. “Tell me what happened, cupcake,” he murmured softly.

“You’re gonna stay here,” he said once I was done. “Gonna finish out your day. Not gonna do that alone.” He jerked his head to where the counter was. “Your spitfire Australian friend is gonna stay. Probably Tina too. I’m gonna come back, either here or your house.”

Rowan’s eyes went melty again. He did not move. His fingers were still gently brushing my arm, my chin cradled in his other hand. His delicious scent was imprinting all over me, and I was either having a mini stroke or a mini orgasm… Maybe both.

“Rowan,” I said in not much more than a whisper. “Yeah, cupcake?” “What is this?” His mouth turned upward ever so slightly before he leaned in and kissed me gently on the forehead. When he pulled back, our faces were inches apart. My heart thrummed. “This,” he murmured, eyes glued to mine, “is the beginning of us.” Then he just turned and walked away.

Im gagged

“Where we goin’?” he asked. I looked to my best friend. “We’re going to fuck up the piece of shit who laid hands on my woman.”

“This is the beginning of us.” The words bounced around in my head over and over, making me feel warm, jittery and absolutely freaked out all at once.

She pointed at me. “You don’t. You don’t realize that every single man in this town would jump over their grandmother’s corpse to get a date with you.”

“And I know that you don’t need a man to do that work. But…” She played with a loose thread on one of my expensive pillows that should not have a loose thread. “The muscular man who has been staring at you like a lovestruck teenager, who quite obviously finds your weirdness ridiculously cute, who wants to rip your clothes off and do very bad, very good things to you, and who is out there somewhere, defending your honor.”

“What are you doing here?” I finally asked. “I’m stayin’ here,” he declared in a gruff tone. My eyes would’ve popped out of my head if I were a cartoon character. Since I wasn’t one, they just bulged in disbelief. “What?”

I focused on the dog, who was tilting her head at me inquisitively. “Yes, I allow dogs in the house,” I replied, still staring into those curious eyes. “I’m not a monster.”

“I’m going home to listen to the new Taylor Swift album and eat an entire rotisserie chicken,” she chirped.

ME AF

“No,” I frowned. “We’re talking about you. Not staying here. Nathan is not a problem.” All twinkling and smirking ceased. “He’s not,” he shifted his position. “I watched his taillights leave town limits less than an hour ago.” I blinked at him several times. “Excuse me?” “Watched while he packed a bag then watched him get in his car and leave Jupiter.”

“Wait, you drove him out of town?” I asked. “You literally drove him out of town.” It wasn’t quite a question because the intensity in his eyes told me he wasn’t bullshitting, nor did he strike me as a man prone to hyperbole.

“You need to sit over there.” I pointed to the pink barstool. Rowan did not look to where I was pointing. He continued to look at me. Which just wouldn’t do. “Why do I need to sit over there?” he asked, his tone smooth. Deep. I swallowed, battling both arousal and discomfort. “Because this is my kitchen, and I can’t have a man in my kitchen.” He raised his brow. “Not very progressive of you.”

“I’m in your life because I want to be in your life,” Rowan answered, still not breaking his devastating eye contact. He took a step forward. A small one. But any closing of the distance between us caused my throat to constrict and the boob sweat to intensify. “You tell me that you want me to leave, that you really want me to leave, and I will,” he offered in a low, throaty voice.

“But walking into my house and announcing you were staying here was… subtle?” I asked, putting a hand on my hip. Rowan was smiling now. I didn’t like it. Or actually, I did. Which was the problem.

When he was done, he wiped his hands on a kitchen towel and turned back around. I think I fell half in love with him right then, standing in my kitchen, drying his hands on my kitchen towel.

His hands were clenched by his sides, so tightly the cords in his forearms were protruding. His posture was rigid, tight. The expression on his face could only be described as hungry. Ravenous. And I was the feast he was craving.

“Nora,” he ground out my name as if he were grappling for control. “You need to get out of this room right now.”

oh my god

I missed my brother terribly for a second. Like a missing limb. Of course, the distance between us always hurt, but there were moments when I felt incomplete, like I made a terrible mistake, moving so far from him. But I’d done it because I’d had to. I couldn’t be in the same city as that woman. And for whatever reason, Ansel couldn’t leave her. She had her hooks in deep.

He approached me before I registered what was happening. And when I realized what was really going on, I backed away on instinct, not because I was scared… exactly. “Nora,” he murmured, caging me against the back of my car, his warm, muscled, impressive body pressing up against mine.

“You want me to kiss you or not, cupcake?” The ground rocked underneath me as the question bounced around in my head. I scrambled to grab a hold of it so I could keep it, revisit it later, file this moment away. “I would very much like for you to kiss me,” I said, so quietly I wasn’t certain he’d heard me. Apparently, he did because the second the words were out, his mouth was on mine.

He took action. Purposefully coming around the counter, he passed Tina at the coffee machine heading straight for me. “What are you—” I didn’t have time to ask the rest of that question since he was kissing me. In the middle of my bakery. With witnesses. Like, a lot of them.