Page 76 of Perfectly Grumpy

Bart shoots him a look over his shoulder. “I’ll let you have it when we’re done.Ifthere’s any left.”

I lean against the counter. “What are we supposed to do now?”

“Is there another flour alternative here?” He scans the ingredients left, but none of them will replace the one ingredient we need. His gaze shifts to Abby as she carefully sifts flour into a bowl.

He turns to me with a calculated smile. “How about when they aren’t looking, I borrow the flour?”

“You mean…steal?”

“I prefer reclaiming shared resources. Perfectly legal.”

The kitchen is a whirl of activity as couples measure, mix, and stir. Bart and Abby are working on some kind of cupcake recipe—no surprise there—while Dad and Patty make a pineapple upside-down cake. On the other side of us, Olivia and Jake whip up brownies. Even the uncles have joined forces, baking a secret recipe they’re not revealing until the end.

I notice Bart passes the flour to Dad, but he’s adamant about keeping it on his side of the kitchen.

“I tried the nice-guy approach. Didn’t work,” Tate whispers. “Any other suggestions to distract them?”

I hold up the egg carton. “How about a little accident? You create a scene, I’ll snag the flour while they’re panicking.”

His face lights up. “Brilliant.”

Tate pulls out the last three eggs from the carton, cradling them in his hands, before he casually walks past Bart, intentionallybumping into him. Two eggs smash to the floor while another lands in their mixing bowl.

“What are you doing?” Bart glares down at the mess on the floor, next to his foot.

“Oh, man, sorry about that,” Tate says, putting on his sad dog expression. “Didn’t see you there.”

Abby spins around, shocked when she sees the egg in their bowl. “Bart, there’s eggshell in our cake mix!”

As soon as she starts fishing the pieces out, I move fast—snatching the flour from the counter.

“We can’t have any shells in our batter. We have to start over!” Abby says.

Bart glares at the egg splattered on his flip-flop. “And you got it on my foot.”

Tate shrugs. “Well, maybe it’ll distract from those hairy toes.”

Bart’s face turns bright red, and I clamp a hand over my mouth to keep from laughing.

Tate wipes up the mess while I quickly measure the flour before they notice it’s gone. When Tate returns, he’s trying to hold back a grin as he bumps my shoulder. “Good job, baking partner-in-crime. What do you want me to do next?”

“Stir the cake mix,” I say, scooting the bowl toward him. “I need to find some more eggs since you sacrificed ours in the flour heist.” He grabs the wooden spoon and starts stirring way too fast, sending a cloud of flour into the air, coating his shirt like fresh snow.

“Slow down!” I laugh. “You don’t need towearthe flour.”

He wipes his shirt with one hand, then rubs his forehead. “You know, if I had more time to practice, I could get into this baking thing. Less physical than hockey, and at the end, you get a treat. Seems like a solid deal to me.”

I glance over and notice flour dotting his forehead and glasses.

“Hold still,” I say, reaching toward him.

He stills as I slide the glasses from his face, my fingertips grazing his temples. In that moment, the air betweenus changes. Without the barrier of his lenses, his dark eyes seem to see straight through me.

I grab a clean rag and carefully wipe them off. For a beat, neither of us says anything. The kitchen hums around us with the clatter of mixing bowls and the scent of warm vanilla.

“You know,” Tate says quietly, “there aren’t any cameras around, and this isn’t about my PR, for once. It probably doesn’t matter if I’m dirty.”

I tilt my head. “Well, we can’t have you looking ridiculous in front of the judges.”

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