Perfect. And now someone was out front. How was she going to explain East and her being here together overnight?
Wait. This didn’t even need an explanation. East cared about her. Everyone would assume she’d needed help with some big order or something. Simple as that.
She slowly got up, adjusted her mangled dress, and peered around the corner from the back prepping station toward the entrance. There, right above the Closed sign, was her mother’s snooping nose as she tried to look into the shop window.
“Natalie!” Knock, knock, knock. “Natalie Elizabeth St. Clair, I know you’re in there,” her mother called.
Great, her mom had hunted her down. Not that it was a hard feat to accomplish, since she’d been doing it Natalie’s whole life. She was the only daughter of the renowned southern belle Lemon-Anne St. Clair, and her mother made it a special priority to ensure Natalie was on the debutante path of all things a lady should be.
Too bad Lemon-Anne got an awkward, nearsighted daughter with apparently not a sexy gene in her body. At least until last night. East had made her feel more than sexy. He had made her feel wild. Free. Like a woman.
He’d also made her see red and pissed her off to no end. And what was worse, he was still here.
Yeah, that thing about East’s presence not needing an explanation… She wasn’t ready to test that out.
“East!” she whispered harshly. But he just lay there, asleep in nothing but a bit of frosting and a smile, and covered by nothing more than her pie cloth. Which, judging by the way the scrap of pastry mat was distended, was hiding what she now knew to be a very impressive cock.
She couldn’t help but to appreciate him for a second—a sexy, strong man surrounded by tall rolling trays of cupcakes.
Knock, knock!
Appreciation time was over.
“East!” she whispered again. He just stayed asleep, with one meaty arm thrown over his eyes, and his rock hard abs slowly rose and fell on even breaths. Even his cock grew harder. God, was there a soft thing about the man? This was bad. Very, very bad.
“Natalie!” her mother said again.
Fuck, fuck, fuck!
Using her foot, she shoved East’s leg the rest of the way into the back room and shut the door gently. Leave it to the aggravating man to sleep like the dead when she needed him to get the hell out.
She paused only to adjust her dress the best she could and brush the now crusty frosting off of her. Fat chance she could make herself presentable, but her mother wasn’t leaving. So she did her best to fix her hair while making her way to the front of the shop.
One deep breath…then she opened the door.
“Hello, Mother.”
Her mother took in her appearance and clearly wasn’t impressed. “What on earth have you been doing in here?” she said in horror.
“Uh…baking. Large order, so I was up late,” she fibbed.
Lemon-Anne let herself in, sidestepped Natalie, and took in the top of the display case, which looked like a cupcake massacre had happened there.
“I see,” her mother said with a stern scowl. “You can’t throw a fit every time you don’t get a little cake perfect. If you’re going to be in this ridiculous business, you might as well be professional about it.”
It would be like her mother to assume she’d thrown a fit. It was also ironic that Natalie’s perfectionism was in large part placed on her by the great Lemon-Anne. But for now she would shut her mouth and just try to get her mother out of there before East stumbled out half asleep and, God forbid, half naked.
“I need to get back to work, Mom, so what can I do for you?” Natalie asked.
“So, I’m to understand you ran out on your date last night to come bake instead?”
Between the frosting and her sad-looking dress, Natalie couldn’t really deny much. But she definitely had to deny the East part of her night. Her mom loved East like a second son, and that was kind of the problem. The guy was forbidden territory in every sense.
“The date went fine, but, like I said, I had some stuff to catch up on.”
“I heard at my ladies’ group this morning that you stood up poor Charles.” Her mother sauntered around. Her light pink purse hung from the crook of her arm as she rubbed her thumb and first finger together as if there was something sticky between them. “Not to mention, you didn’t respond to my messages last night. Not a kind way to treat your mother.”
“I responded,” she said. It had only been once, but that counted. “And it’s not true that I stood up Charles. I showed up to the date, I just didn’t stay the whole time.”
Her mother looked horrified by her admission, but Natalie had been bored out of her mind and hadn’t even felt like she’d been on a date. At least until East had come around and annoyed the hell out of her.
“Well, it’s still rude, Natalie, and honestly, if you want to get a man to stick around, you have to first stay for the whole date.”
“I know, Mom. But you and I have different opinions on the role a man plays in my life.”
“Well, be that as it may,” she said, dismissing Natalie’s words. “You need to settle down.”