Page 29 of Nightmare’s Playground

“Four hundred,” she said.

“What?”

She nodded to the cooling tray. “Four hundred pumpkin spice donuts. Every day. Do you know how many donuts four hundred is?”

“Four hundred?”

She rolled her eyes. “I heard through the grapevine you were a smartass.”

My brows shot up. She’d been asking about me?

Before I could ask her why, she was yapping away again.

And she didn’t stop.

She talked about a shipment of organic spices that was supposed to arrive on Tuesday but never did. And how she’d had to drive two hours to a certified organic spice market and pay triple just to get through the week.

Then she rattled on about some chick who worked for her named Hannah and her boyfriend, who was apparently a loser, which she had strong opinions about.

Then she told me all about her brindle English Mastiff named Murphy that she’s had since he was a pup, how he was getting up there in age, and she feared one day soon she’d have to make a hard decision she wasn’t sure she could make.

On and on she talked while working a ball of dough into smaller balls of dough.

I was only half paying attention to what she was saying, too hyper-focused on the vein that ran the length of her forearm.

I told myself to stop staring at her, to find something else to look at, but I couldn’t take my eyes off of her.

She was too beautiful.

And that’s when it hit me.

I was in love.

The forever and ever amen kind of love.

“—and I told her, if a man can’t see that you’re the whole package, you need to leave him in the dust.” Feeling my eyes on her, she glanced up. “You’re quiet.”

“I’m always quiet.”

“True.” She wrinkled her nose. “You’re usually quiet somewhere else, though.”

I grunted.

She wasn’t wrong; however, the thought of being anywhere that she wasn’t now felt abhorrent to me.

She stared at me for another long moment, then shook her head. “You’re acting weird.”

“You’re acting weird.”

I’m sure it did seem like I was acting weird. I’d gone from avoiding her at all costs to being unable to take my eyes off her.

“Wackadoodle,” she whispered as she turned and headed for the dolly parked by the walk-in with fifty pound bags of flour stacked on top.

“Whoa!” I called out when she bent to grab the first one.

I was up out of my seat in a flash.

“Move, baby.”