Chapter 1 - The Seven Words She Whispered When She Thought Nobody Was ListeningAt 2:13 in the morning, Saraphina Malone whispered seven words she had never said aloud to anyone.
“I just wish somebody would choose me.”
She thought the bakery was empty.
She thought the only things listening were the ovens, the sourdough starter, and the battered walnut rolling pin that had belonged to her mother.
She was wrong.
Twenty feet away, hidden by the shadow of the walk-in cooler, one of the most feared men on the East Coast stood absolutely still.
Dominic Corsetti had come to the Golden Hour Bakery because his restaurant was missing two loaves of sourdough.
Instead, he heard a woman confess the kind of loneliness money could not buy away.
And for the first time in years, Dominic had no idea what to do with the truth.
The Golden Hour Bakery never really slept.
It sat on a cracked commercial block in East Philadelphia between an auto-body shop and a narrow warehouse that had been vacant so long nobody remembered what had once been stored there.
During the day, the neighborhood looked tired.
After midnight, when the traffic faded and cold air settled over the alleys, the bakery became its own world.
Fluorescent lights hummed above steel tables.
Mixers groaned.
Ovens breathed heat into the room.
Flour floated through the air like pale dust.
And in the middle of it all stood Sarah Malone.
Almost no one called her Saraphina anymore.
She was twenty-five, five-foot-seven, full-figured and strong, with broad shoulders, generous hips, dark curls that refused to stay beneath her faded blue bandanna, and brown eyes that always looked a little more awake than the rest of her face.
Four years of lifting fifty-pound flour bags had built strength into her arms.
Four years of twelve-hour night shifts had put shadows beneath her eyes.
Four years of taking care of her father had taught her how to keep moving even when every part of her wanted to stop.
Her father, Arthur, had congestive heart failure.
Her mother, Claire, had died four years earlier after a short battle with cancer, leaving Sarah two things she considered priceless.
A thin gold necklace with a tiny wheat pendant.
And a dark walnut rolling pin worn smooth from thirty years of use.
That rolling pin sat beside her every night.
Sarah was shaping sourdough when she felt the corner of the invitation in her apron pocket.
She tried to ignore it.
She lasted eleven seconds.
Then she pulled it out.
Gemma Malone and Tyler Brennan request the pleasure of your company...
Gold lettering.
Heavy cream cardstock.
A suburban address.
An engagement party.
And beneath Sarah's name, one small line that had somehow become the most humiliating thing she had looked at all week.
And guest.
Blank.
Sarah rubbed her thumb across it.
She had done that so many times the paper was beginning to gray.
She hated herself for caring.
Gemma was her cousin.
They had grown up together.
Gemma had always been beautiful in the effortless way Sarah had believed counted more when she was sixteen.
Blond, slender, polished, socially gifted.
Sarah had never disliked her own body enough to wish herself into someone else's, but she knew how the world categorized women.
Gemma entered rooms and people wondered who she was dating.
Sarah entered rooms and relatives asked how her father was doing.
Gemma was romantic.
Sarah was dependable.
Gemma was exciting.
Sarah was good.
Sarah had slowly learned that being called good could become a prison when people stopped imagining you wanted anything for yourself.
She shoved the invitation back into her apron.
“You're bread,” she muttered to the dough. “You don't have these problems.”
The back door opened.
January air ripped through the kitchen.
Sarah kept working.
“Door,” she called without looking up. “Unless you're trying to refrigerate the entire building.”
The door shut.
Heavy footsteps crossed the concrete floor.
Then came a man's voice.
“I'm looking for whoever handles the Corsetti account.”
It wasn't loud.
It didn't need to be.
There was something in the man's tone that suggested he had spent most of his life expecting rooms to reorganize themselves around him.
Sarah gave the dough one final fold.
“That's me.”
She looked up.
And had the immediate, inconvenient thought that the man was enormous.
He was at least six-foot-four, perhaps taller, broad across the shoulders, dressed in dark jeans, heavy boots, and a charcoal work jacket instead of the suit she would have expected from someone connected to Corsetti's.
His black hair was cropped short at the sides and longer on top.
A thin scar ran beside his right jaw.
Stubble darkened his face.
His hands looked rough, his knuckles marked with faint old scars.
A gold crucifix rested at his throat.
Under the pushed-up sleeves of his shirt, dark tattoos curved over powerful forearms.
He wasn't conventionally friendly.
He was something more unnerving than that.
Still.
Controlled.
Watching.
Sarah dusted flour from her hands.
“The delivery left hours ago.”
“It was short.”
“How short?”
“Two sourdough loaves.”
She crossed the room, pulled the carbon copy of the delivery ticket from a metal spike, and slapped it onto the table.
“Seventy-two pieces.”
His eyes dropped to the paper.
“I counted every one before Charlie loaded the van.”
“You're certain?”
“Yes.”
He studied her.
Sarah crossed her arms.
“If you're accusing me of stealing two loaves, at least be creative.”
Something nearly happened at the corner of his mouth.
Not quite a smile.
But close.
“They weren't stolen.”
“Then?”
“I don't know.”
“Congratulations.”
His eyebrow lifted.
“For what?”
“For coming all the way here and successfully confirming that you don't know something.”
The bakery seemed suddenly quieter.
A man who looked as if he'd been carved out of granite stared at a flour-covered baker who had just mocked him.
Most people would have apologized.
Sarah didn't.
She had spent too many years learning that fear and respect were not the same thing.
The man's gaze shifted to the loaves cooling on the rack.
“Those.”
Sarah followed his eyes.
“Those aren't for you.”
“I didn't say they were.”
“You were looking.”
“I look at things.”
“So do cats.”
He actually smiled.
It was brief.
Unexpected.
And devastatingly attractive.
Sarah immediately disliked him for possessing such a smile.
“What's your name?” he asked.
“You didn't introduce yourself.”
“Dominic.”
“Dominic what?”
He paused.
“Corsetti.”
Sarah's hands stopped moving.
The name meant something.
Not to her personally.
But enough to make the air change.
Everyone in Philadelphia knew the Corsetti name.
Restaurant empire.
Nightclubs.
Real estate.
Shipping.
Security companies.
A family whispered about in places where people lowered their voices when discussing money.
And rumors.
Always rumors.
Sarah looked at him again.
“You're him.”
His expression became unreadable.
“Apparently.”
She swallowed.
“Then why are you here yourself?”
“I wanted to see who makes our bread.”
Something about the answer unsettled her more than the surname.
“Why?”
“Because my chef likes it.”
Sarah blinked.
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
She looked toward the empty delivery rack.
“The two missing loaves?”
“I'll pay for them.”
“Your chef won't get charged.”
“I don't care about the money.”
“Then what do you care about?”
Dominic stared at her.
For a second, Sarah had the strange feeling that he wasn't looking at her body, her face, or even the bakery.
He was looking at something underneath all of it.
“Consistency,” he said.
“I'm consistent.”
“So I noticed.”
He took two steps toward the rack.
Sarah's heart accelerated for reasons she refused to examine.
Dominic picked up a wrapped loaf.
“May I?”
“You're already holding it.”
He studied the crust.
Then he looked at her.
“You bake every night?”
“Every night.”
“When do you sleep?”
“When I have time.”
“When do you have time?”
“I'll let you know.”
Again, the almost-smile.
Then Dominic noticed the invitation protruding from her apron.
He said nothing.
Sarah realized he had seen it.
She pulled it free.
For some reason, she suddenly felt embarrassed.
He glanced at the gold lettering.
“Wedding?”
“Engagement party.”
“Yours?”
The question was so direct that she laughed.
“No.”
He looked relieved.
That should not have mattered.
It did.
“Family?”
“My cousin.”
“Are you going?”
Sarah hesitated.
“I don't know.”
“Why?”
“Because I don't have a guest.”
Dominic was quiet.
Sarah wished she'd never answered.
She turned away.
“Can I help you with anything else?”
He didn't immediately respond.
Then he said, “You should go.”
She looked over her shoulder.
“What?”
“To the party.”
“That seems like an odd amount of interest for someone who came here looking for bread.”
Dominic held her gaze.
“You looked sad when you read the invitation.”
Sarah felt exposed.
“I wasn't sad.”
“You were.”
“You don't know me.”
“No.”
He put the loaf down.
“But I know that look.”
Something in his voice changed.
It was softer.
Older.
“I've worn it.”
Sarah didn't know what to say.
Dominic walked toward the back door.
He stopped before leaving.
“Keep the two loaves.”
“I thought they were missing.”
“They're not.”
She frowned.
“What?”
He opened the door.
“I took them.”
“You what?”
He looked over his shoulder.
“I took them from your delivery yesterday.”
“Why?”
“I wanted an excuse to come back.”
Then he stepped outside.
Sarah stood frozen.
She stared at the closed door.
Then at the two loaves on the rack.
Then at the invitation in her hand.
“Unbelievable,” she whispered.
From the corner, the old refrigerator clicked on.
Sarah looked toward the door again.
For the first time in years, she had the uncomfortable feeling that something in her carefully controlled life had shifted.
She didn't know what.
She only knew it had started at 2:13 in the morning when a stranger heard the truth she had been too ashamed to say aloud.
And Dominic Corsetti wasn't the kind of man who heard something like that and simply forgot it.
He had spent his life taking care of problems.
Now he had discovered a woman whose biggest problem wasn't money.
It was that nobody had ever chosen her first.
May you like
Dominic intended to change that.
He just didn't yet understand how dangerous proving it would become.
Related Stories
