I’d done wrong.
So, I needed to make it right.
First step of that was snickerdoodles. I made a lot of good things, but I thought that perhaps, my snickerdoodles were the best of all. Slightly crunchy edges, fluffy center, perfectly even coating of cinnamon and sugar.
They were the ideal olive branch.
Perhaps even more so than brownies.
“Right,” I said with a firm nod, shifting my burden and pulling open the door.
I slipped through the front room, usually filled with boisterous college-aged co-eds, heading for the space in the back. The quieter, chill hangout space I’d stumbled upon during my first visit was where Brooke had her spot, where Kace and Brent worked the bar.
It was nearly seven, and I slipped through the opening into the back, quickly spotting Kace and the tats swirling over his forearms. He was leaning over the bar, and I watched as he deposited a soda on a coaster next to Brooke then a kiss on the top of her head.
She barely noticed, her fingers were moving so rapidly on her keyboard, and I hesitated just a few feet into the room, not wanting to interrupt her flow.
Instead, I shifted to Brent’s end of the bar, eyes searching and . . . not finding him. Rather than seeing my sexy, Idris Elba look-alike with the smile that made my knees melt and my heart skip a beat, a tiny and I meant tiny woman stood in his spot. She was maybe five feet, and that was a definite maybe, but I could feel her confidence even from across the bar.
Small but mighty.
She glanced up, saw me, smiled, and set down the rack of glasses that I knew were heavy enough to strain even the muscles of Brent and Kace. But she didn’t look strained, not in the least. In fact, she looked utterly self-assured in a way that was envious. She came over. “Need something to drink?”
Shit.
“Oh—I’m—no—I’m—” I shook my head, sucked in a breath, and tried again. “Sorry. I’m actually just looking for Brent.”
Curiosity in her dark brown eyes. “He’s not in tonight.”
Was his back still bothering him? Or was he avoiding me?
Probably both.
“Oh.” I mean, I knew that. He wasn’t there, and she was working his side. “I just—”
“Anabelle, this is Iris,” Kace said. “She and Brent are dating. Anything she wants to drink is on the house.”
“No, I couldn’t—”
“Got it,” Anabelle said. “Nice to meet you. What are you drinking?”
“I—um—”
Kace’s head tilted to the side. “You good?”
“Yeah, I haven’t talked to Brent today, didn’t realize his back was still hurting.” Not a lie. Not a lie. “I should go . . . um . . . check on him?”
Yes, I was having trouble forming sentences. Yes, I’d said the last phrased like a question. No, I wasn’t above beating a hasty retreat to save face at this juncture. Which was better than the alternative. Namely, me blurting out that I wasn’t dating Brent because I was a giant screw-up and—
Go.
I spun then realized I might as well leave the cookies, because if I didn’t, I would probably eat them all and end up too big for my clothes.
And still feeling like an asshole.
“Here,” I blurted, shoving the platter onto the bar. “Snickerdoodles. Enjoy.”
Then I spun again, starting toward the exit.
“Brent chose a strange one,” I heard Anabelle say. “A good one, I think, based on the sheer volume of baked goods on this plate, but still a strange one.”
“If she keeps bringing cookies like these, she can be as strange as she wants,” Kace said, and at the door to the hall, I peeked over my shoulder to see he had already peeled back the plastic wrap and was shoving snickerdoodles in his mouth like it was his last day on Earth.
A group of giggling women pushed past me at that moment, one declaring in a loud voice, “Heather, you will not get me drunk tonight. I have to go home and—”
“Do Colin!” another woman in the group interjected.
They began cackling, continuing to tease the first woman, so I couldn’t hear what Anabelle said in response to Kace.
But I did see her reach for a cookie.
They couldn’t fix everything, but apparently, they could help people look beyond my strangeness.
I’d chalk that up to success.
Mostly because I didn’t have anything else going for me.
Two more days went by.
Two days of me showing up at the bar with baked goods—cinnamon rolls and chocolate custard hand pies.
Two more days of no Brent in sight.
At least I was able to play off my disappointment when I strode into the back room, determined that this time I would make good on my apology. That this time I would see him and make things right.
But he wasn’t there.
Though each time, Anabelle was, and it turned out, I was right. She was confident. And funny, with a quick wit that I couldn’t begin to match, but one that somehow didn’t make me feel dumb.
Instead, she mostly had me laughing like a loon.
Which was a good thing, because I was feeling more guilty and miserable as the week went on. I knew Brent had the next two nights off, and because I didn’t know where he lived but had been pretending, in the most oblique terms possible, that everything was fine between us, I couldn’t exactly ask Kace for his address.
Kace probably couldn’t give it to me anyway.
Employer-employee confidentiality. Was that even a thing?
“And then I told him that just because I’m Filipino doesn’t mean I’m the resident expert on all things Asian,” Anabella was saying, drawing my focus back to where it should be. On her and the conversation we were having during one of her spare moments.
“I thought all Asian countries were the same,” I deadpanned.
Then panicked, thinking she hadn’t gotten the fact that I was deadpanning and—
She
