Sterling Heat

<p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>Having a baby in a bakery gives new meaning to taking the bun out of the oven.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)> </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>I'd been in Curmudgeon Bakery for one of those lemon baby-Bundt cakes I'd been craving since I found out I was pregnant.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)> </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>The draw had nothing to do with the baker himself. Tall tatted and edgy looking more like a biker than a man who makes baked goods. I hardly knew him other than taking a tumble in a rainstorm in front of his shop . . . and then tossing myself at him after he rescued me.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)> </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>We shared a moment but it's not what you'd think.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)> </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>Months later he delivered my baby among his cookies and cakes. </span><em style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>Talk about a second chance encounter</em><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)> </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>Then he whips up a plan to pretend to be my baby's father and everything heats up from there.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)> </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>My body.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>My heart.</span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>My willingness to accept a perfect stranger's kindness despite him telling me over and over he isn't who I think he is. </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)> </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>I beg to differ. </span></p><p><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)> </span></p><p class=ql-align-justify><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(34 34 34 1)>He's that sugary drizzle on a citrus-flavored guilty pleasure that's bad for the hips but together-him and me and baby-we're the perfect blend of ingredients that might do all our hearts some good.</span><span style=background-color: rgba(0 0 0 0); color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> </span></p><p><br></p><p><br></p>