Owen smirked, amused.But I was scandalized.
“Tani!”I admonished.
He chuckled as he scooped eggs onto a plate.
“Morning, sunshine,” she said, never taking her eyes off Owen.“Your boyfriend is sexy when he’s cooking.”
Heat flooded my cheeks.Owen froze long enough to give me a sideways look of mild curiosity.Like he was waiting to see what I’d do with that word—but he didn’t rescue me.
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I said, too quickly.
And I wasn’t even sure what we were other than in serious like with each other.
Owen’s smirk deepened.Still not helping.
“Sure,” Tani said brightly.“Whatever you say, chica.”
“Don’t you have some place to be?”I snapped.
She huffed.“Fine.”
And then she was gone in a puff of pink fairy dust.
“Sorry about my fairy,” I muttered.
He handed me a cup of coffee.“She doesn’t mean any harm.”
And we both avoided the wordboyfriendlike it was a loaded gun.
Willow sat at the kitchen door, her tail curled around her, like she was waiting for her next meal.Owen grabbed a box of cat treats and shook several into his hand.The cat was on her feet, tail flipping in the air.He put them in front of her.
I dropped into a chair at the table.
“What do you have there?”He eyed the paper in my hand as he placed two plates.One in front of me.One next to me.
I slid it across to him.“I found this in the cash register.It’s Alice’s handwriting.”
He sat, leaned back in the chair with the paper in his hand as he studied it.
“Alice wrote this?”
I nodded.“I don’t know where it came from.”
I watched him with an ache in my chest I hadn’t expected.Like this could be any normal morning between the two of us.If there was an us.
“But this isn’t English,” he said.
“You noticed that, too, huh?”I scooped up eggs with my fork.
“Bring it to Mrs.Rollins.Maybe she can read it.”He slid it back toward me with his calm efficiency.
I nodded.I broke a piece of bacon in half for something to do with my hands.But that word kept turning over in my head—boyfriend.I didn’t know why.I wasn’t ready for that.But I wasn’t ready to let him go, either.
When I moved to New York, I was prepared to leave behind everything.The town, my parents, Alice.Him.I’d had a long stretch of homesickness as I poured my heart and soul into the magazine job.I had friends, yes.I had a live-in boyfriend, too.But it all felt… empty.And now, here, back in town sitting with Owen at my breakfast table it felt… different.Warm.Happy.
I wasn’t sure what to do with that.
“What is it?”he asked, as though he sensed my internal spiral.
