Hole-Hearted by Sam Burns

Author:Sam Burns [Burns, Sam]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: gay romance
ISBN: 978-1-64405-770-4
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Published: 2019-08-18T16:00:00+00:00

LUCE WAS up with the sun despite the stress of the night before. It was a bit like Christmas morning.

He really wanted to unwrap this particular gift.

Instead of letting himself worry about the hole or the handsome man coming to fix it, he busied himself making the kołaczki filling. By the time the doorbell rang, he was pureeing the apricots, so he felt accomplished.

He stopped to check the mirror in the hall before answering the door. He wasn’t a vain guy, but it would be just his luck to answer the door with pureed fruit smeared across his face. Astonishingly, he was having a good hair day, and he wasn’t covered in food.

With a scowl, he gave his reflection advice that he suspected he was about to ignore. “Don’t act like a hormonal teenager.”

His reflection didn’t answer, so at least he wasn’t hallucinating.

Luce flung the door open with too much force, and it almost rebounded back into him. He tried to pretend it hadn’t happened, and Darren, who was apparently better at pretending than he was, seemed not to notice.

He gave Luce that smile that made his knees melt. “Ready for me to get to work?”

“You have no idea,” he answered and tried not to sigh. Four seconds in and he’d already forgotten his advice.

Darren laughed. “Good. I went out and grabbed what I needed at the hardware store, and I’m good to go.”

“Do you need—”

Fortunately for Luce, who had no idea how to finish that question, Darren shook his head. “I just wanted to give you a heads-up to let you know I’m here. I’ll get to work on the garage side and knock in there if anything needs your input.”

Luce nodded and watched Darren stride back to his shiny truck, which he’d backed into the driveway next to Luce’s car. It looked good there, where Alan’s Audi had always looked showy and out of place in front of his old country farmhouse.

He shook the thought off and headed back to his kitchen. Somehow, despite the sexual tension that was choking him, he managed to lose himself in the baking.

Every year his receptionist professed shock about a doctor baking, but he found it wonderfully meditative. He had the recipe memorized from a childhood of making them with his mother, and all he had to do was follow the motions that were almost second nature. The tools in his kitchen were a lot better than the ancient ones his mother had used too.

As he pulled the last batch of cookies out of the oven a few hours later, he realized he hadn’t heard anything from Darren. Well, he’d heard pounding and crunching for a while, and some noises he didn’t want to consider in relation to his home, but the man hadn’t knocked or leaned in to speak to him.

He dusted the first finished cookies with sugar, set them on a plate, and made an extra cup of coffee.

The area was surprisingly quiet as he headed out of the kitchen. He peered into the dining room and suppressed a shudder at what he found.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.