30. Mattias

Iwas on cloud nine all morning. Showing Connor how to scramble eggs was silly as hell, but apparently there were, in fact, simple things about cooking breakfast that he didn't know. When to add the salt, how slow to cook them... well, all the stuff I had learned in culinary school, as opposed to at my grandparents' elbows as a kid.

The stuff your average home chef didn't know unless they spent their lives watching the food network.

He also didn't know that bacon cooked best, with the least random grease pop burns, in the oven. That, at least, I'd learned from Grandma when I was a kid, because she'd always done it that way for the inn. It never burned from contact with the pan, and she could cook two whole sheet pans at once, which was important when all the rooms at the inn were full. People could go through a surprising amount of bacon, and there was only so much a single frying pan could hold.

These days, the inn was rarely at capacity, and certainly never in April. It was just Connor, Grandma, and me we were cooking for. Well, and whatever Peanut could extort out of us, no matter how much I told Connor the dog didn't need any more bacon.

So we still went through a fair amount of bacon, really.

Peanut was slithering on his belly like a snake, staring up at Connor with giant chocolate "I'm the cutest puppy" eyes, so I decided to distract him from the tragedy of the dog's imaginary starvation.

"So Connor is thinking about moving in," I told Grandma.

Connor dropped his fork, staring at me, his eyes round.

I'd told him she was going to be thrilled. What the heck was he worried about?

Indeed, she clapped her hands in front of her chest, her whole face almost glowing with joy. "Oh honey. I'm so glad." She shot out a hand and grabbed Connor's in hers—just as it was about to slide under the table and give the dog the bacon he was begging for, for the record—squeezing it tight. "You belong in Cider Landing. At the inn. I'd been hoping one of these times you'd see it and stay. Some people are just... a part of this town."

Connor's whole face went slack, clearly surprised, though I didn't know what he was surprised at. I'd told him she would be thrilled to have him move in. I'd told him she adored him. And yet, every time it was proven to Connor Darling that people liked him and wanted him around, he seemed surprised.

How odd.

He'd never really talked about his childhood, but I didn't have the feeling his parents had treated him like he was worthless, or convinced him of it in other ways. So I didn't know why he didn't realize how perfect he was. How amazing.

But he was moving to Cider Landing. To the inn.

So I was going to have plenty of time to show him.

Grandma had a meeting with her quilting club after breakfast, so we drove her over there, dropping her off and then just turning and driving. I should have gone back to the inn, been present and open for drop-ins to check in if they wanted, but it was a rare thing, someone just dropping by the Cider Inn at random, especially in the off season.

In the summer, sure. No one came to town in April.

No one but Connor Darling.

I leaned on him in the car. "Let's get lunch."

He looked down at me, amusement in his eyes, and quirked a brow. "We just had breakfast, Mattias. You really want to go get lunch right this minute?"

"I do," I agreed, a plan forming in my mind. "We'll go back to the inn, put out a back later sign, and make a picnic lunch. Then we'll go have a picnic in the park until it's time to pick up Grandma this evening. We'll just... spend the day being us. Together."

Maybe it was my imagination, but his eyes seemed to light up at the idea.

It was really starting to sink in, though, and I believed it. Connor really liked me. Really liked spending time with me. Connor was actually planning to move to Cider Landing. Was this the slowest romance of all time, us taking years to get together, or the fastest ever, where we went from five miles an hour to sixty in one night?

And whichever it was, was that okay?

"That sounds amazing," Connor said, smiling down at me. "Even if I think you're just trying to get me right back into the kitchen to teach me some more things. I promise, I know how to make a sandwich, even if none of mine are as good as the one you make on that ciabatta with the chicken."

I grinned at him. "One ciabatta chicken sandwich, coming up. It's not hard. Well, unless you're making the ciabatta from scratch, but we've already got a loaf in the kitchen, so we're solid."

He blinked at me, slowly, as though something I'd said was confusing. "You... make that bread? You make it?"

It was my turn to laugh at him. "Bread isn't born, Connor. It's not made with magic. Someone's got to make it. And the ciabatta is clearly your favorite, since it's the first thing you grab whenever you have a choice, so I make it when I know you're coming."

"You make bread," he repeated, like the very idea of making bread was a revelation.

I shook my head at him, struggling to keep from doubling over with laughter. "Everyone was making sourdough a few years back, remember? Their own sourdough starters, all the info on instatok or whatever social media it is bored, trapped people turn to for entertainment?"

He seemed to consider that for a moment, then nodded, but he still looked suspicious. "But you make the ciabatta. It's... it's different. It makes the best toast ever. Hot and fresh with butter and jam..." he trailed off, staring into space and clearly fantasizing about bread.

My bread.

Yeah, I thought maybe we could make this thing work.