“Sorry, like I just told your fiancé, we’re booked until the end of the year. You might want to try the Bake House.”
“I already tried them,” I sigh. “And he’s not my fia—”
The line goes dead. I jab at my phone screen with a frustrated groan that echoes around my cottage living room.
That’s the fourth bakery I’ve called within a fifty-mile radius, and every time they’ve mentioned a fiancé. It took two very confusing conversations and peering out my window at Eli seated on a poolside chaise, his phone glued to his ear and a Post-it pad balanced on his knee, to realize he’s been calling every bakery within a fifty-mile radius, too. Apparently he’s claimed the task, even though it’s on my portion of the list.
Kind of. I took some creative license, but the cake flavors are on my list, which basically means finding a new one is, too.
I punch in the number of the last bakery, my gaze pinned on Eli while the line rings. He’s off his phone now, so he’s either beat me to this one or didn’t find it. His attention is fixed on something neon pinched between his fingers—a Post-it note, folded into one of his paper rings.
It’s a moment of familiarity, but since we got to Blue Yonder twenty-six hours ago, there’s little else that’s been familiar about him. Bodysnatched Eli Mora is thriving.
And he’s messing with my head.
Though I have plenty of legitimate things to think about, I’ve instead spent the past day trying to figure out what’s with him. Alien abduction? Demon possession? Some of it fits the profile, among it that moment in the car yesterday and the way he called me Peach, like I was still that person to him.
But I don’t think demonically possessed people have weekly therapy appointments, or go on what I’m starting to think of as The Adam Apology Tour, or throw therapy-speak at their ex-girlfriends about their hyper-
independence issues when they’ve spent the past five years not talking about anything that mattered to or hurt them.
I size him up as he tips his head back toward the sun, eyes closed. Maybe he’s been exorcized. Maybe he’s lost a demon. Did Luce move on and get replaced by a human being? Did Eli get a coveted VP promotion, one he’s been striving for, or—least likely—has he decided to find some work/life balance?
Whatever it is, it’s terrible timing for him to be so present and so incredibly in my way, despite our agreement yesterday to do the opposite. He’s quite literally been everywhere I am: accepting hugs from Laurie’s four siblings and their various progeny yesterday; a looming presence behind me while we toured the grounds to review the week’s work with Adam’s aunt, Julia, who’s taking on the role of site coordinator; walking up the steps of his cottage, within inches of mine because the other two are still being renovated, because of course they are; brushing past me on the main patio outside the tasting room where we gathered for dinner last night, his hand a quick but indelible press on my back; passing down my favorite bottle of Chardonnay not five seconds after I’d sipped the last dregs of my glass.
And now, beating me to every Napa County bakery.
After five years as a ghost, these twenty-six hours of Eli’s potent awareness of me and the world around him feels like a solid wall I keep running into. The newness of this Eli, how closely it echoes the old Eli, is so disorienting that I can’t focus.
But I have to.
“Icing on the Cake, how can I help you?”
The chipper voice on the other end of the line sucks me out of my Eli haze. I’m proving my own damn point.
“Hi!” I say, matching their tone. “This is a long shot, but I need a cake for a wedding next Saturday and I was wondering if you could help me out.”
“Ooh, yes.” The person on the other end sounds delighted, a positive sign, until they continue, “Your fiancé called a few minutes ago. I’m so
sorry for your trouble.”
“He’s not my— you know what, that doesn’t matter.” I force a breezy laugh. “Do you think you might be able to help?”
“I’m hoping so. My boss is out today, but I texted her your situation and she asked me to set up an appointment for you on Tuesday. You’re all set for two p.m.”
Relief and irritation tangle together. “Thank you so much. We’ll see you Tuesday.”
I hang up and rise to my knees, leaning over the arm of the loveseat to press my face against the window screen. I stare at Eli, strategizing ways to calmly tell him to back off my list and honor our agreement.
But then he stands and my thoughts fall off a cliff. I absorb that he’s wearing light blue swim trunks seconds before he pulls off his black T-shirt, revealing acres of golden skin, a flash of gold against the nape of his neck.
My mouth instantly parches. I haven’t seen him shirtless for years; he’s filled out, especially since Nick and Miriam’s wedding. He looks good. Gorgeous.
I used to be so well acquainted with that body that sometimes it felt like mine. I knew every blunt curve of it, every hard plane. I knew where his skin would shiver from a ticklish spot, where it would shiver from pleasure. His shoulders look even broader bare, the wings of his shoulder blades flaring as he tosses his shirt aside. I used to dig my fingers into that spot right there, run them in soft, whirled patterns as he fell asleep.
A face pops into my line of vision. “Great view, right?”
I scream and roll off the loveseat, my ass hitting the hardwood floor so violently that my teeth rattle. “Jesus, Cole!”
His cackle rolls in through the window as I crawl over. “You obviously think so, at least.”
I push my hair out of my face, giving him an incendiary look. If you looked up the definition of asshole, Cole Cooper’s handsome face would be plastered there. Adam’s older cousin and the director of sales at Blue Yonder is a tall and rangy white guy, with a wide smile and deep brown eyes that trick everyone into thinking he’s a puppy. In reality, he’s a
barracuda. He’s responsible for ninety-nine percent of the trouble we got into here, and likely one hundred percent of the Cooper family’s collective heartburn.
“I wasn’t staring at him. I was glaring at him because he’s being a shithead.”
Oh dammit, my mouth formed words before my Eli filter could catch it. Even here, where our relationship is known in the most sanitized way—we dated, we broke up, we’re friends—Eli and I know to play up the friendship angle. It’s especially important now, when anyone could shoot off a text to Adam saying Eli and I are rumbling.
I’d place Cole at the top of that Most Likely To list.
On cue, his eyes light up. He glances over his shoulder, dark blond hair ruffling in the breeze. “What’s our boy done now?”
I bite back a groan. “It’s nothing. We both have tasks for the week and he took over one of mine.”
“Ah,” he says with a sage nod. We stare at each other before his face breaks into that switchblade smile of his. “Well, let’s go ask him about it.”
“No.”
But it’s too late; he’s already striding away with an infuriating spring in his step.
I scramble after him. The courtyard is nestled in the U-shaped space between the four cottages, with the pool and a collection of navy-cushioned chaises serving as the central gathering spot. Beyond a border of lavender plants, an old picnic table sits at the perimeter of the vineyard. I don’t have to look to know my initials are still carved into the tabletop alongside Eli’s and Adam’s.
Cole’s already at the edge of the shimmering pool, hands in the pockets of his khaki pants. Eli’s gaze moves from Cole to me, some of the understandable Cole-related irritation bleeding out of his expression.
“Georgia thinks you’re being a shithead, E,” Cole says. Eli’s eyebrows fly up. “Oh?”
I let out a sigh that comes from the depths of hell. “I didn’t say that.” Cole’s eyes sparkle with mirth. “You absolutely said that.”
“Well, I didn’t mean it.”
“You said it but you don’t mean it?” Eli asks.
“I meant it,” I amend, “as a term of endearment.”
A grin curls at his mouth as he squints up at me. “Yeah, I’ve heard that’s a real up-and-comer for endearments.”
I give him a pleasant smile in return, with lots of teeth. “Right up there with buddy.”
“And what did I do to deserve shithead over buddy?” He stands to his full height, pushing his hair back from his face, and for a second I’m fully bamboozled by the water running down his chest.
“Tuesday,” is all I can say.
“Tuesday?” he repeats, oblivious to the sexual riot he’s causing inside me.
I grasp for two brain cells to rub together. “We have a bakery appointment on Tuesday.”
His eyes flash with surprise. “We do. How’d you know?”
“Because I was calling bakeries, too.” I keep my voice even, well aware Cole is avidly watching our conversation. “Or getting all your sloppy seconds, more accurately. I just got off the phone with the one we have an appointment with.”
“Okay,” he says slowly. “Is that a bad thing?”
I cross my arms. “Is doing double work ever a good thing, especially on our timeline? We agreed we’d stick to our lists. The bakery was on my list.”
He frowns. “No, it wasn’t.” “Yes, it was.”
“Your list said find new bakery since the other one blew up in our faces?” he replies, running a hand over his mouth, leaving it damp. “That would be very psychic of me.”
“That revisionist history is very adorable of you,” I volley back cheerfully. “My list has the cake flavors on it, which is nearly the same thing.”
Now I get a flash of teeth, a tiny, triumphant grin. “It sure does.”
“Hey.”
His grin turns wide and intensely beautiful. “You walked right into it.” After a beat, he adds a silky, “Buddy.”
Cole’s been watching this exchange with a growing smile. Now he gestures between us. “Hold on, is this really about a bakery, or is this an ex- lovers’ quarrel? Did one of you slip up and fall into the other’s bed last night and expectations weren’t met?” He widens his eyes at Eli. “Did you not give Georgia the good D?”
“Hello?” I exclaim. “You can’t say that.”
“I’m going to get out of this pool and kill you,” Eli states, propping his elbows on the concrete currently burning the soles of my bare feet.
Maybe this is hell.
“So you did give her bad D,” Cole says triumphantly.
“He never gave me bad—” I cut myself off so suddenly my body sways, my cheeks flaming at the choked sound Eli makes and the laugh Cole lets out. My gaze clashes with Eli’s and it’s sparks, memories that are quick and molten.
I whirl on Cole. “Speaking of dicks, you can’t talk like that. Eli and I are friends.”
Cole’s attention stays on Eli. “Who are also exes.”
“Years ago,” I insist. “We’re good friends. We’re great.”
Cole raises an eyebrow at Eli. “That’s your assessment, too? You’re great friends?”
His tone is oddly knowing, and I glance at Eli, whose expression stays blank when he says, “The greatest.”
Cole’s “hmm” is amused.
“Glad we got that settled.” I turn to Cole. “We haven’t seen you in years, Cooper. Maybe give us a minute to reassimilate ourselves to your personality before you start acting familiar, okay?”
“But I am familiar,” he says, rocking back on his heels with a smirk as he gestures to Eli. “At least with that one. I’ve seen Eli several times over the last year and a half, in fact.”
I blink. “You have?”
Cole strolls over to a chaise, tossing aside Eli’s towel and shirt so he can stretch out, ankles crossed. “Yep. First time was when I was in New York for a conference last year, then back again to visit a friend. Not long before that wedding you came out for, right, E?”
“Why ask me when you clearly know the timeline?” Eli says evenly, backstroking away.
“For the drama,” Cole replies, grinning. “Anyway, I went back this past April for the same conference and this kid managed to find time in a schedule that seems fucking lonely and ultimately meaningless, but hey, what do I know?”
He’s not wrong, but my hackles go up anyway. Eli must’ve given him some indication of his unforgiving schedule when they met up, and his heart’s in the right place, but Cole has the delivery of a swift punch to the face.
“Are you arriving at a point sometime soon?” I ask, clocking Eli’s mutinous look.
Cole’s eyes narrow, looking at me like the protectiveness bubbling in my chest has flooded my expression, too. Lifting a shoulder, he plucks up the paper ring sitting on the table, inspecting it. “The point is, I am familiar with our favorite shithead. Eli’s a good listener. Hell, so am I.” At this, his gaze sharpens, finding me. “Guess that means me and E are great friends, too.”
“That’s very precious,” I say. “But that doesn’t mean you get to say sensationally inappropriate things.”
“That’s, like, seventy percent of my personality.”
Eli swims over to the edge of the pool, his gaze fixed on Cole. “Did you just come over here to be a pain in the ass or was there a point to your visit?”
“Yes,” Cole replies. “Which one?”
“Both, and speaking of precious—” Cole flicks the paper ring into the air, right at me. I reach for it on instinct, letting out a breath when it lands in my palm, whisper-light. “Did you make that?”
I close my hand around the ring. I won’t be sharing that history with him. “No.”
Cole’s gaze drifts from me to Eli, staying on him. He offers a soft, “Ah.” Eli pinches the bridge of his nose. “Approach your point swiftly.”
“Right,” Cole says, snapping his fingers. “Georgia, my mom wanted to get your eyes on her big-ass checklist if you have a minute. She’s up in the office.”
“I’m on it,” I say, grateful for a reason to extricate myself from the torture of a half-naked Eli and Cole, full stop.
He grins, folding his hands behind his head. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep your boy company.”
“I wasn’t worried.”
“And I’m fully planning on drowning you,” Eli adds. Cole just laughs. That’s a situation for those two to figure out. “See you, shithead.”
“Endearment?” Cole calls.
“Derogatory,” I call back. Eli’s laughter follows me up the path before it’s cut off by Cole’s low murmur.
I force my curiosity away. Whatever’s happening between them isn’t my business. I can’t get distracted by the overwhelmingness of this brand-new Eli Mora. It’s already wrapping around me like a vine, and there’s nothing I want less than to get caught up in it, especially on land where vines are meant to grow.
