Page 16 of Jinxes and Drumsticks

I press my lips together to keep from smiling too much and making her feel embarrassed. “Of course we’re getting you a sweet treat. What kind of man do you think I am? Did I hear right? We want pastries?”

She nods eagerly and the sweetest smile brightens her face. If I don’t get to marry this girl, I’m going to throw things.

“Come on. There’s a place that sells really good cake over here,” she says, taking my hand like she didn’t even have to think about it. I let her lead me into a bakery packed with people. The whole place is decked out in creams and pinks, with pretty cursive typefaces everywhere. Lillith looks adorably out of place as we stand in line and wait for our turn. She’s a raven feather in a sea of cream ribbon and lace. Iridescent and mysterious in a gentle way I find hard to describe.

“Lots of late night eateries around here,” I say.

“Yeah,” she says. “It’s all the vampires in the city, you know?”

“Vampires? Is that right?”

“Biggest population of them outside of Transylvania!” she says.

I let out a low whistle. “Wait a minute...when you said a sweet treat, you didn’t mean me, did you?”

“Guess you’ll have to wait and find out,” she sing-songs as we finally make it up to the counter.

“Honestly, you could drain my life force any time and I’d probably say ‘thanks, babe,’” I tell her. Then I order one of every pastry for her.

“Damien!!” she balks as I pay for them.

“What?” I ask, as if I’m oblivious to the... oh... two hundred dollars I just spent on cake.

“I’m not going to be able to eat all of those.”

“What do you mean you? I ordered these for me. I already got dinner, you want me to get your dessert too?”

Her mouth drops open with such a shocked, offended expression that I worry some idiot may have ACTUALLY done something like that to her before. “Holy shit, I’m kidding! We’re sharing them.”

“I still won’t be able to eat half,” she says.

“Four dudes and an enby can definitely crush whatever you don’t eat,” I say, accepting my card back from the cashier. “Don’t stress about it.”

We step off to the side to let the next person order while two workers tag team loading up all the glossy pastries and fluffy cakes into branded boxes. “Damien, let me pay for half,” she says.

“Absolutely not. I have no idea what your wallet looks like and I don’t want to know,” I say. “We got an advance for our next batch of records, it was a not-insignificant amount of money, and I want to spoil you.”

“Still...” She shifts between her boots uncomfortably.

“Lillith,” I say, smoothing a hand over the small of her back and pulling her against me. “You know what’s obnoxious about getting a bunch of money right when your band is starting to make it?”

“What?” she asks.

“Well, it usually comes with sponsorships. I’m sponsored by Zildjan for my cymbals, Remo for my drum heads, SJC for my drums and DW for my hardware. Now that I have all the money I could ever need to buy gear, I literally don’t have to anymore. Let me spend some money on you. And before you get upset about it, yes I will be buying you any book you want from the bookstore,” I inform her.

“Suddenly I don’t want to go there,” she says.

“You’re a liar. Luckily, you’re also a total smokeshow, so I’m going to let it slide.”

She snorts a laugh just as the workers behind the counter hand me a large bag with two stacked boxes inside. I order another ride before she can insist on skipping the bookshop. While we wait for the ride to show up, we open up the pastries and figure out which one Lillith wants to have now, and which ones she wants to take home for later.

She chooses an Earl Grey tiramisu and starts eating it as I redistribute the pastries between the two boxes.

“You don’t have to do that right now,” she says after she swallows a bite of her sweet treat.

“I didn’t know if the bookshop would be weird about outside food,” I say as I ponder a round pastry that needs to go into a rectangular space.

“Maybe, but, like—I mean, you could do it at my house,” she says.