Page 57
They flew in yesterday for the festival weekend, and Monty’s mom’s cat café grand opening in town. Having them here makes Wilmington feel even more magical tonight.
“This is amazing, Maggie,” Kendall says softly as she carefully hugs me around the waist to avoid the frosting on the front of my apron. “I’m so proud of you.”
Emotion catches me off guard so quickly I nearly ruin a tray of cookies because there was a time when all of this felt impossible.
Not just the business but happiness and the feeling of building a life that finally fits me.
“This morning she threatened to decorate the cupcakes with candy corn before I intervened,” Theo says with a grin.
“Ugh. Candy corn is disgusting,” Kendall declares.
“It’s not Halloween without candy corn. It’s festive,” I point out.
“It may be festive, but still tastes like eating a candle,” she argues.
Monty snorts while Theo shakes his head beside me, smiling despite himself.
God, I love him.
That realization still sneaks up on me sometimes.
Not because I didn’t know before, but because I spent so much of my life believing Theo would never feel the same way about me. That he would never want a live-in girlfriend, much less spend every minute he’s not at work with me.
And yet here we are. He volunteered to hand out pumpkin spice lattes from my food truck on a Friday night.
A college girl at the counter accepts her drink from him and whispers loudly to her friend, “Oh my God. He’s like book boyfriend hot.”
Theo doesn’t let it slide either. He whispers back, “My beautiful girlfriend thinks so too.”
I laugh so hard I nearly drop the cookie tray.
Outside, the live band shifts spooky songs while more people flood the street for the nighttime parade that’s about to start.
Then suddenly, the haunted house music playing from the speaker inside my truck cuts out completely making me frown. “That’s weird.”
Theo reaches over and turns down the espresso machine.
The truck goes oddly quiet.
Kendall immediately looks so excited she may explode.
Monty looks like he’s trying not to smile.
Suspicion causes goosebumps to pop up on my arms.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
Theo turns toward me fully then, and the entire noisy festival around us somehow fades away.
The glow from the lights catch the sharp edges of his handsome face while the ocean wind blows through his brown hair.
And the way he’s looking at me right now, like there’s nowhere else in the world he would rather be, it wrecks me.
“You know,” he says quietly, “I used to think happiness was something you might be able to find but only if you planned for it carefully. But then you came along…”
My chest tightens and tears burn my eyes.
Oh no.
