Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 112762 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 564(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 376(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112762 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 564(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 376(@300wpm)
“I reckon we’re above the opening to the ground floor.”
At least that meant if the elevator suddenly crashed, it wouldn’t kill us. “I take it you’re okay with confined spaces?”
“They don’t bother me.”
I studied his face as he turned it to me. “I suppose little does. Bother you, I mean?”
Walker shrugged and agreed. “Not much.”
A man of few words. I tried to bite my lip against a smile, and his gaze dropped to my mouth again. A muscle ticked in his jaw, and he looked toward the door. “How’s Callie?”
The question surprised and gratified me. The only people I’d seen Walker soften toward were kids, Callie being one of them. It made me wonder why he wasn’t married with his own brood. Sure, I knew from Monroe, and from what I’d witnessed myself, Walker was a bachelor who seemed to like his life free of complications. Including complications of the female variety. The man seemed only to be interested in a one-or two-night stand.
Casual was his middle name.
My gaze drifted down his body, and my skin heated. I’d like to know what it was like to do casual with Walker Ironside.
“Callie’s good,” I answered. “Wonderful, in fact. She spent most of the summer getting up at the crack of dawn with me to bake.” After selling my cakes and pastries at a school fair and then the Christmas fair, I’d gathered a small group of loyal clientele in the year that we’d lived in Ardnoch. They regularly placed orders for special events, and word was spreading about my baking. I had a real hope that at some point, I might quit housekeeping to run my own bakery. Except for the small array of baked goods in Morag’s the village deli, and a few of the cafés, there wasn’t an actual bakery here. “She’s my patient helper and way too understanding for her age.”
“What do you mean?”
I shrugged. “Being a single mom … I can’t always get the balance right. We have to rely on each other and on friends. Some kids might be a brat about the fact that their mom needs someone else to pick them up from school, but she goes with it.” I relied on Regan Adair, the wife of the second-eldest Adair brother, Thane, to pick Callie up from school and keep her at her house until I finished work. Regan’s stepson, Lewis, was Callie’s best friend, and the Adairs were the kindest people who offered help because they knew I needed it. As much as that pricked my pride.
Walker scowled at me. “You’re not the only parent who has someone else collect their kid from school. You’re doing fine, Sloane. Better than fine.”
His words lapped over me like warm water on a chilly day. “Thanks.”
He gave me an abrupt nod.
I nudged him, and he glanced at me sharply, almost suspiciously. So wary and bristly. It made me want to cover him in kisses. “Thanks for calming me down. I owe you cake.”
Walker eyed my mouth again before he looked away.
Huh. Maybe he wasn’t completely immune to me.
“You don’t owe me anything,” he grumbled. “But I won’t say no to one of your cupcakes. Or that pie thing with the chocolate you made for the Christmas fair. Or your strawberry tarts. Hmm. What made you get into baking?”
I grinned, pleased he loved my baking so much. “I started as a cheap way to keep Callie entertained, and I got really into it. I loved how therapeutic it was and how the more I learned and got better, people reacted to it. Cake makes people happy, and I like making people happy.”
The corner of his mouth turned up at that.
I wanted to kiss him so badly.
“I’ll rustle something up for you as a thank-you for distracting me. Maybe I could bring it over on Saturday.” It was pushy, I know. But I was getting kind of sick of lusting after the guy without doing something about it.
Before Walker could reply, the speaker mounted inside the elevator near the buttons crackled. “This is Bruce from maintenance. You folks all right?”
Walker stood in one fluid movement and pressed the button to reply. “All good. How’s it going out there?”
“Good. Found the problem. You’ll be out in less than a minute.”
A strange mix of relief and disappointment that we’d been interrupted filled me. Relief won out, however, as I stood up as the elevator shook to life and we felt it pulling us downward once more.
“Thank God.”
Walker glanced over his shoulder at me, but said nothing.
Then suddenly we slowed to a normal stop, and the doors opened.
Two smiling men stood outside it, one who I assumed was Bruce.
Walker gestured for me to step off first, and, no lie, I practically ran out. “Thanks!” I waved at the maintenance guys who grinned back.