muttered curse words to herself in the kitchen where she created things like the cupcakes he’d seen just that morning.
They’d been freaking caterpillars. Of course, you had to buy three cupcakes to get the full caterpillar—head, middle, and tail. Which was brilliant marketing, in his opinion. They had been done in bright colors and each head cupcake had sported a huge smile. Now he wondered how many fucks Jocelyn had dropped while making those brightly smiling cupcake bugs.
She set the canister of brown sugar down on the worktop with a thunk and a frown. “Buttermilk,” she muttered again, sounding irritated. “Eggs, butter, cocoa, soda, salt, sugar and… flour! Fucking flour!”
He chuckled at that, but when she looked up with a frown, he quickly lifted his cup to hide his mouth. She narrowed her eyes but turned to stomp into the pantry, retrieve the flour, and return to the work area.
Grant didn’t know what was going on, but she surely didn’t usually have this much trouble baking every time she tried. She might be Zoe’s best friend, but Zoe couldn’t afford to pay someone who took this long just to gather ingredients.
Jocelyn started measuring and mixing, but she stopped after adding three ingredients and swore.
“Son of a bitch.”
Grant couldn’t hide his laugh this time.
She looked up and scowled at him. “You’re very distracting.”
“I’m the problem here?”
“Do you really think this is how it usually goes when I bake?” she asked.
“What just happened?”
“I just added the buttermilk to the flour and soda.”
“The recipe needs buttermilk, right?” he asked.
“It does. But not now.”
“Oh.” He didn’t understand.
“The texture of the cakes depends on how you mix the ingredients together. I can’t just add the wet ingredients in with some of the dry now and then more later.” She sighed. “Ugh!” She grabbed the bowl and turned to the sink, dumping the contents and washing them down.
“Can I help?” Grant asked.
“Can you be less hot and stop watching me, like you’re imagining me doing this naked?” she asked.
“Um… no,” he finally said. “At least not the last part. For sure.”
She shook her head. “Maybe we should have sex first. Then I can come back down and bake later. I’ll be a lot less flustered and distracted then.”
Grant pushed away from the doorframe and crossed to where she stood. He set his coffee cup down and crowded close to her. “Well, one, we’re not going up anywhere. I’m taking you right here, in this kitchen.”
Her lips parted and her breathing sped up. “Oh.”
He nodded. “From the first second I met you, you’ve had flour on your cheek or sugar in your hair. You smelled like cake the first time you fell into my arms—and the second, for that matter—and I’ve had some very specific and erotic images of you, sugar and flour, and lots of bare skin since then.”
She wet her lips and stared up at him, her eyes wide. “Like… what?”
“Like my flour handprint on your sweet ass,” he told her bluntly and honestly. “Like your nipples coated in sugar. Like icing and batter streaked over your tits and stomach and ass and clit.”
Her pupils dilated, and he wondered if he’d gone too far. He barely knew this woman. Just a minute ago he’d been shocked to hear her say the word fuck. Maybe she wasn’t the type he should be saying tits and clit to.
“Holy hell, yes,” she said breathlessly.
Or maybe she totally was. His body went hot and hard and he leaned in. But he didn’t kiss her. “Mix up some batter, Jocelyn,” he practically growled.
She wet her lips and nodded. “Yeah.”
“But I think maybe you need a plan B for whoever it is you’re baking for tonight. Because that batter isn’t going to make it to the oven. And you’re not going to have much time between now and tomorrow morning.”
“I was thinking about trying something new for her. But I have cookies in the freezer I can give her.”
Wow, he loved that needy, husky tone in her voice.
“Excellent,” he told her.
Jocelyn stood, just staring up at him. Well, at his mouth.
“Jocelyn?”
“You should call me Josie.”
“Why?”
“That’s what my friends call me. People who know me well. And… you’re going to know me well.” She gave him a sexy-but-shy smile.
“I am,” he agreed. “Very well. But Jocelyn fits you.”
“Josie doesn’t?”
“Josie is cute and sweet,” he said with a nod. “It fits. But Jocelyn is gorgeous and sexy and makes your eyes darken.”