Tessa frowned. “What’s wrong with that?”

He grinned. “I may be eighty, but”—he dropped his voice—“my parts are still in working order.”

Okaayyy. That was TMI. “Have a nice night.” She shook her head as he left. “Great,” she said to herself when she was alone. “Even the eighty-year-olds around here have a better sex life than I do.”

Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that she’d arrived at the bakery at four thirty this morning and had been so busy she’d forgotten to eat lunch. She snuck a chocolate croissant from the case, the one sweet thing her mother would allow in the bakery because it was still bread.

The bell tinkling again caught her mid-chew. Wow, two customers in a row—the busiest they’d been in ages.

Turned out her excitement was unfounded as she looked up to see Sam Donovan, her ex-fiancé, stroll in.

He still wore his shirt and tie, no doubt just finishing his day at the candle factory. He looked a little tired, his thick hair tousled, as if he’d been raking his fingers through it during a stressful day in the accounting department.

In the past, she would have asked him how his day was. And if he was hungry. Listened to him discuss complicated problems in the accounting department as he got them off his chest. And his rumpled overworked-executive look would have made her heart flutter a little.

But not anymore.

“Hey, Tessa.” He flashed what she read as a guilty smile and pushed up his glasses. “How’re you doing?”

“Great,” she said with a forced smile. Could he not see he was the only customer in the shop? Even after a year, she still had to curb the urge to hit him on the head with a stale baguette. But she knew in her heart that even that wouldn’t install any sense.

“It’s still busy as ever over there.” He hitched a thumb over his shoulder to indicate the candle factory across the street. “I have at least another hour of work. Mr. Brighton’s cracking down, dumping all kinds of extra projects on me. It really sucks. Can I get a ham and cheese?”

She didn’t know why he came in here multiple times a week, clearly expecting her to soothe his worries, give him reassurance, and sympathize with his grievances. And pretend that they were still friends.

As she assembled the ingredients for his sandwich, she practiced calming breathing. It was easier to serve him and get him out of the bakery as soon as possible, because their town wasn’t big enough for her to handle more than one massive feud.

She’d grown up with her family giving the cold shoulder to the Castorinis next door, and that had been uncomfortable and awkward for as long as she could remember. She’d vowed never to let that happen with anyone in her own life.