Donuts and Handcuffs
PROLOGUE
*** Two Months Earlier ***
I’m always early when I’m nervous. At the moment, I was freaking out about my meeting with the real estate agent. This time it was much more than my usual twinge of nerves that someone might somehow see through me and find out who I used to be. This meeting was about my future. My hopeful new, independent life with nothing but sunlight. No more lurking shadows.
It might not have been a good omen that the sky was currently firing gray rain and sleet at me as if this were a shootout.
As I jumped a deep puddle while careening around the corner of the sidewalk, the toe of my boot caught, and my face was headed for the concrete at such a speed I realized I was about to be in a gigantic amount of pain. There was no way I could lift my hands to shield my face in time. Remember the drills of my childhood, I dropped. Silently falling into a forward shoulder roll, I soaked my coat in the process but propelled all of the force forward so that I wasn’t injured. An echo of a voice in the back of my mind reminded me that you can’t run away if you’re hurt.
I stood up from the somersault, holding the wall of the stone building for support as I spun around to make sure nobody saw that. A large man was directly in front of me, in the shadow under the awning, not two feet away. Since the alcove was only about four feet across, there was nowhere for me to go.
“What the hell was that?” His deep voice sounded shocked. As he stepped closer, I saw his blue jacket with some sort of insignia. The back of my mind automatically screamed for me to run.
“Are you okay, miss?” he asked kindly. “That was an amazing tumble.”
“I’m fine,” I said quickly.
He stepped a bit closer, and I cringed away into the darkest part of the shadows. But the look in his eyes was gentle. He wasn’t expecting any trouble. He was concerned. “How did you learn to roll like that?”
I tried to fake an innocent little giggle. “Just lucky, I guess. Didn’t want to fall on my teeth.”
The rain was hammering on my side, and any reasonable person would have stepped farther in from the curb, so I did, edging closer to a man in the dark who was some sort of authority or security. It was unnatural.
My breath stuttered in my chest as I looked up at him, but not from the cold. He was gorgeous. His face was utterly hypnotic. Those warm eyes were looking straight through me. He smelled like the forest, or maybe it was just the rain beating down on both of us. I’d never kissed a total stranger in my life, but the desire to lean closer was hard to fight. It was like being in a trance.
I knew I’d been lonely for a very long time, but the urge to kiss someone came out of nowhere. Perhaps I was far more stressed out today than I had realized, since I had so much riding on this meeting. It was likely just the adrenaline rush.
But then my eyes lowered slightly and I saw through the shadows to the collar of his uniform. Then the tag on the front. He was a police officer. My blood ran colder. Gut instinct made me need to move, and I lurched back a bit, wobbling, but his thick hand gently rested on my shoulder.
“Easy, miss.” His deep, resonant voice was carefully quiet, as if he were afraid to frighten me. “You’re okay, just catch your breath.” It took a few seconds for my heart to slow down and my vision to clear. He wasn’t holding on to question me, he just didn’t want me to fall again.
“Are you alright?” he asked gently. “Do you need help?”
“I’m fine,” I said quickly. “Thank you.”
“You’re freezing,” he said, pulling me another few inches farther from the rain, up against the dark doorway, but also still close to him. “Let me take you to the station for a coffee to warm up.”
There was no way in hell I could set foot in there. “I’m meeting my real estate agent here in a few minutes. She’ll let me inside.”
“Okay,” he said hesitantly, “But it’s just across the street if she’s late.”
Maybe he could see that he was making me nervous, as he suddenly grinned, turning from a huge, intimidating cop into an adorably handsome man. “Your earrings. You’d better not wear those if you go over there.”
Reaching up, I touched my earlobe, completely forgetting what I was wearing. Tiny pink porcelain donuts. My laugh startled me. It also seemed to amuse him, and I was surprised by how happy that made me.
A blue and white cruiser rolled up in front of us and a shiver ran through me. Hopefully, he didn’t notice.
He looked at me with genuine worry. “I hate leaving you here alone and cold. Please, go warm up if you’re waiting longer than a few more minutes. Just pop in and tell them that Officer Hill owes you a coffee.”
An order from a cop had never been so sweet, and the way he looked at me was sending all sorts of weird, conflicting signals through my nervous system. “Okay. Thanks.” I wished that I had more to say. Watching him get into the car was the first time in my life I was sorry to see a police officer leave.
PROLOGUE
Dear Universe,
You know I always try to be a good guy. Throwing that breathtaking girl practically into my arms when I’ve been alone for so long was either a cruel joke or a kick in the pants to start looking for a girlfriend.
I don’t think I’ll ever stop dreaming of those sweet, bright blue eyes. Her dark, glossy hair with little cinnamon highlights. Her cute nose that twitched when she seemed nervous.
Please, let me see that girl again. Leaving her there in the cold nearly caused me physical pain. If this was a test to see if I was completely over my ex, it certainly worked. I’m ready to attempt to date again. I think. Probably. Please throw a nice, normal, sensible girl my way, and I swear I’ll treat her like a princess.
CHAPTER ONE
One of the many things I love about baking is the constant heat of the oven. I’ve always felt like I was part lizard. Cold blooded. Teachers used to want to send me home from school, and doctors always treated me like I was delicate and sickly. I seemed to be fine, my skin was just always cooler than normal people.