Half Baked Hearts | ✔

21. I'm Also A Person

Nessa stood in front of the mirror, taking in her outfit at every angle. We were in her room, Daisy and Kara included. The three of us were called over for an emergency. Which meant helping Nessa pick out something to wear for her first official date with Lorenzo.

"I think that one is the winner," Kara said, from her spot on the floor. She hadn't even looked up from her phone. Daisy hummed in agreement as she fanned herself with one Nessa's romance books.

We'd been trapped in her room for almost an hour while Nessa tried on everything in her closet. She must've really been nervous about the date. Picking cute outfits was second nature to her, but at that moment it was like she'd never gotten herself dressed before.

"Really?" Nessa frowned, running a hand over the dress. "You don't think it's too cutesy? I don't know where he's taking me. He's an outdoorsy type. What if he wants to go hiking?"

Daisy stopped fanning herself, eyes wide. "Hiking on the first date? Major red flag."

Nessa turned to her, arms crossed. "How is that a red flag?"

While the two of them went back and forth, my phone buzzed with a new message. It was Nate, wanting to know what I was doing. I looked up, watching Nessa pull out yet another outfit from her closet.

Being held hostage by Nessa, I replied.

He replied back immediately, Need me to cause a distraction so you can escape?

I got some firecrackers I can use

And I wanted to talk to you about something

Last night flashed in my mind. The softness of his lips, the way he looked at me after. I felt like one of those women in that smutty romance Nessa forced me to read. The PG version, of course.

"What's got you blushing?"

I startled, forgetting I wasn't alone, and dropped my phone in my lap. The three of them were staring at me. Daisy and Kara looked amused. Nessa wore a smug smirk because she was the only other person in the room who knew about my kiss with Nate.

Daisy and Kara were cool, I liked them, but I didn't want to tell them about the kiss. Nate kissed me to cover up the fact that we were snooping. It felt like a real kiss to me, though. I also thought my kisses with Kai meant something. Obviously, I wasn't the best judge of character.

"It's nothing." I picked up my phone, standing from the floor. "Nessa, wear the dress and remember that Lorenzo is the lucky one in this situation because he gets to go on a date with you."

As I headed for the door, she stopped me. "Where are you going?"

"Cake Me Up," I told her. "Aunt Mimi needs me."

Her eyes squinted, seeing right through my lies. I threw her a smile, waved to the girls and left.

♡ ♡ ♡

Nate was at the park where I told him to meet me, sitting under one of the trees. I hopped off my bike, leaning it against the tree before sitting next to him in the grass.

He was, as always, playing his Switch, the sound of some epic battle music coming from it.

"If you wanted to talk about your video game addiction, I'm afraid I can't help you. But I'm sure we can find a professional."

He looked up at me then, and my heart stopped beating for a second. His kind eyes, his lopsided grin. He was killing me slowly.

"I can quit at any time," he said, dropping his game in his backpack and pulling out a small laptop.

That prison site on Aunt Mimi's laptop popped into my head. I'd forgotten about it, my mind occupied with another event from that night. I shook the memory of the kiss out of my head and tried to focus. "Last night, when I was in my aunt's room, I found a website where you can look up inmates on her laptop."

Nate's brows bunched up. "Who was she looking for?"

"Don't know," I shrugged. Then I remembered something else from yesterday. "Actually, Lynn mentioned something about Aunt Mimi owing some bad guy's money. It was years ago, but if she still owes them maybe that's why she doesn't want to be all over social media. Or national TV."

It all made sense. Aunt Mimi was probably in hiding.

"What? She's afraid these guys are going to find her if her business gets too successful?" He asked, his eyes glued to his laptop as he typed something.

"Maybe. Maybe she was on that site to see if the guys had been locked up?" I thought out loud.

"Or she could've been looking to get on that show, Love After Lock-Up." He looked up then, wearing a smirk. I went to swat his arm but he caught my hand, holding it in both his. Electrical currents shot through my arm. He looked unfazed, like we held hands all the time. "Either way, you don't need your aunt to do Bake-A-Palooza."

"What are you talking about?"

He let go of my hand and picked up his laptop. The Bake-A-Palooza web page was up. "I went over the eligibility requirements last night and you don't have to be a professional baker to sign-up. Amateurs are welcome." He tapped the screen where it said just that.

Doing Bake-A-Palooza on my own? I'd always imagined my aunt by my side as we represented Cake Me Up.

I shook my head. "I don't want to do it without my aunt. Besides, I'd still need a partner and I'm just one person."

"I'm also a person."

I looked up at him, barely able to keep a laugh in. "No offense, but you've only ever made cookies and there were more eggshells in them than chocolate chips."

"First of all, I one hundred percent take offense by that," he said, slipping his laptop back into his backpack and pulling some Tupperware. "Second, I've been practicing." He pulled back the lid, revealing chocolate chip cookies.

My gaze shifted from the cookies to him. "And you made these from scratch, not a roll of cookie dough?"

"Wow, really?" He tried to look offended, but there was a smile trying to break through. Like he knew I was about to eat my words. Literally. "Just try one."

"Hope you know the Heimlich maneuver," I said, grabbing a cookie. "Just in case there's an eggshell."

His lips quirked up into a smug smirk as he watched me take my first bite. The cookie was delicious and he knew it too, his smirk grew as I chewed. He wasn't kidding when he told my aunt he was a fast learner.

"It was okay."

He laughed, seeing right my lie. "That's it? Just okay?"

I shrugged, moving to take another bite of the cookie. Nate snatched it from my hand. "You don't want to eat the rest of that since it's so bad."

I couldn't stand him. "Okay, they were good." He grinned triumphantly. "But, knowing how to bake simple cookies won't get you on a national baking competition."

"Well, you got until the end of the month to train me."

Was I truly considering entering a baking competition with someone who only started baking a week ago? He was able to pick up the skill pretty quickly.

He was also a good kisser. Not that it mattered at that moment.

His dark eyes watched me intently, waiting for my answer.

Whether it was the idea of doing Bake-A-Palooza or possibly getting to kiss him again, I agreed to his proposal.