That night’s shift stretched on forever.

All Seungwan wanted was to be at home with Joohyun. He settled for texting with her before she went to bed.

He made sure that she was locked up tight for the night, that she was feeling okay.

And he told her to call him in the morning before she headed to the bakery.

As soon as he got off shift the next morning, that was where he went. He headed back in that same door he had headed in the day before. 

This time she didn’t kiss him on the mouth with any kind of urgency, but she gave him a sweet kiss on the cheek when he told her he just needed to see her again before he went to sleep.

“I’m feeling better about what happened,” Joohyun said. “You can go home. Get some rest.”

Seungwan searched her face, then nodded. “Hey, how about I have a bubble bath waiting for you when you get home this afternoon?”

“Oh, yes.” Her eyes lit up. “I was actually going to ask you if I could use your bathroom. I ordered some fancy bath stuff. It’s sitting in a box in my office.”

Something about how she said that hit him squarely in the chest.

She didn’t need to ask him if she could use the upstairs bathroom.

They needed to revisit the terms of how they shared the house.

The only reason he didn’t use her shower was because it was actually inside her bedroom.

The bathroom upstairs didn’t have that same privacy limitation, and he wouldn’t care if it did. 

Seungwan didn’t want to invade her personal space.

Joohyun was welcome to use his all she wanted, but he could hardly say that. It didn’t feel right, some murky boundary that felt dangerous and forbidden.

He wasn’t sure what would be worse, if she started to spend more time in his space and things stayed platonic between them, or if he invited her to use it and she politely declined.

Those were the two options.

It wasn’t like she was going to magically fall head-over- in lust with him after all this time.

Seungwan didn’t do it for her, and the deal they had was that he accepted that in order to have the rest of her, which was pretty wonderful.

The door opened and a customer came in.

Joohyun nodded her head to the back. “Can you grab the bath stuff on your way out? It’s sitting in a Sephora box on my desk.”

“Yep.” Seungwan headed through the open archway that led to the kitchen.

Because Joohyun preferred her customers to be able to see the baking magic in progress—and smell it, too—she kept the kitchen absolutely pristine, but her little office was jammed full of papers and plans, a bit of a rabbit’s burrow of long-ranging plans that may or may not ever happen.

Seungwan liked the way Joohyun thought of everything, mapping out many different potential outcomes.

She planned way down the road, nothing left to chance, because there was always another plan to pivot towards.

The more he got to know her, the more he realized just how deeply her divorce rocked her—in part because she would have had long-term plans with her husband, too.

Seungwan groaned to himself at the obviousness of the thought. Of course she did. That was what marriage was.

Nothing but long-term plans with the love of one’s life. It would have rocked anyone to realize that wasn’t a mutual feeling. 

But Seungwan would bet that Joohyun had had it all planned out. Kids, maybe. Toddlers with homemade cookies in their fists, saying thank you ever so politely before shoving the crumbly perfection into their sweet little mouths.

How many would Joohyun have wanted? She’d never said a word about that.

Seungwan wouldn’t ask. It seemed off limits—for now. Down the road, though, he wanted to know.

He hoped they were building the kind of relationship where they might share confidences like that.

The door chimed, another customer coming in, and he grabbed the brown cardboard box.

At home, Seungwan had a quick shower, then cleaned up the bathroom so his stuff wasn’t all over the counter, and then he fell into a deep, dream-filled sleep.

When his alarm went off six hours later, he sent Joohyun a text letting her know he was up, and asked her to give him a heads up when she was coming home so he could run the bath for her.

In the meantime, he assembled everything she might need to pamper herself.

Her fancy bath items, two fresh towels, a candle for mood lighting, and a waterproof speaker that hooked up to his iPad, which he set on the counter. 

As soon as Joohyun texted back, Seungwan put the plug in the tub and started running the water, only to realize he didn’t know her preferred temperature. So he called her.

“I’m just leaving the store now,” she said to a backdrop of street noise.  

“Great. Uh, how hot do you like your baths?”

“Super hot. Boil me like a lobster hot.”

Good thing he had asked, because that sounded painful, and wouldn’t be what he’d have done by default. “Got it.”

“You don’t need to do this,” she said, her breath chopping a bit like she was walking quickly.

“I want to. You’ve been working hard.” 

“Well, I’m lucky then. And I’m two blocks away now.”

Seungwan adjusted the water temperature, then let it keep filling while he went downstairs.

When Joohyun came in, she gave him a tired smile. “You’re a gem.”

I want to be more than a gem. But there was no point in thinking like that, so he shoved that thought deep down where it belonged. “The tub is filling. I’ve set out everything you need.”

Seungwan felt awkward following her upstairs, so instead of retreating to his own room, he grabbed a book and stretched out on the couch.

He was well into chapter two when suddenly the quiet of the house was pierced by a panicked shriek from upstairs.

Seungwan was halfway up the stairs when Joohyun screamed his name, and he skidded to a stop outside the bathroom door. 

“Are you okay?”

“The mouse! It’s back!”

He grabbed the door handle, then paused. “Do you want me to come in?” 

“Seungwan!”

Seungwan took that as a yes. Throwing the door open, he tried desperately not to look at Joohyun, curled up at one end of the tub, her s barely covered by one arm and her knees pulled up to her chest.

Her hair was piled on her head, wet tendrils sliding down her neck. 

And he would have popped a hard-on right there if she didn’t have a look of panic on her face. No, not panic, exactly. Something else. Wild exasperation.

“I’m ing ,” Joohyun exclaimed.

Seungwan was very aware. “Yep.” 

She threw her non--protecting arm in the direction of the toilet. “Get it! I’m not chasing a mouse !”

He grabbed a towel and lunged for the little rodent, but it was faster than his arousal-dulled reflexes.

Each toss of the towel fell short, and then the mouse was gone, a flash of brown zooming under the tub.

Seungwan dropped to his knees in a desperate attempt to follow it, but there was no point. 

“What is wrong with you?” Joohyun laughed. “You suddenly have two left-feet and are all thumbs.”

Seungwan reared up, desperate to get out of the bathroom suddenly, but all he could see was her flushed face and her swollen s pressed against her arm. “What’s wrong with me? You’re not wearing anything. All I can think about is following those drops of water as they slide over your skin, chasing them with my fingertips and my, my...” He trailed off, realizing what he’d just said.

What he had just admitted to.  

Her eyes went wide.

The tap dripped, and suddenly there wasn’t enough oxygen in the room.

Joohyun called his name as he spun out of the room, as he stomped down the hall and slammed his bedroom door.

Then he threw his back against it with a heavy thud and sank to the floor.

Joohyun couldn’t breathe.

She needed to follow him.

She needed to get out of the tub, go downstairs, get dressed, and then they could talk. 

Or not get dressed. Just go down the hall and let him chase water droplets all over her skin. That option made her pulse sizzle dangerously.

But she couldn’t do that, because she couldn’t handle what would come next.

The fallout, the mess. The inevitable dissolution of her second marriage because she wouldn’t be enough.  

Seungwan wanted her? What had happened to their agreement that their relationship was platonic?

Joohyun pulled the plug to drain the tub and climbed out, her legs shaking.

She grabbed the towel without really seeing it, dried off as much as she could, then wrapped it tightly around her torso.

In hindsight, she should have brought her clothes up here to change.

She shouldn’t have screamed when she saw the mouse, and she should not have called for Seungwan. That was mortifying on so many levels.

When she opened the bathroom door, the hallway was dark.

So was Seungwan’s bedroom.

No light appeared under his door. She hadn’t heard him go downstairs, but he could have crept out. He had skills. 

Her heart sank and she quickly padded downstairs, dashing to the safety of her own room. No more baths. Only showers for her.

Joohyun pulled on a pair of sweatpants and a tank top, and then for good measure layered a long-sleeved tee on top of that and pulled on a hoodie.

Layers were good. Layers were protection. Then she put on her face cream, combed her damp hair, and gave herself a stern look in the mirror.

Go and find him. 

She peeked out the front window. His jeep was still in the driveway, so chances are he was upstairs in his bedroom with the lights out, hoping the dark would erase what had just happened.

Heart pounding, she climbed the stairs again and knocked on his door.

He didn’t answer. 

“Seungwan,” Joohyun said softly. “Can I come in?”

“Nope,” Seungwan growled. It sounded like he was right there. 

“Why not?”

“Because I’m sitting against the door and I’m not moving.”

“Okay.” She sat down, too. “Can we talk like this?”

“I don’t know if we should.” 

“Because you’d rather keep things from me?” Joohyun winced as soon as she said it. She didn’t want him to think she felt antagonistic about this situation. They were in this together—or so she hoped. “I want to talk. About anything.”

And everything. 

Joohyun hated the idea that Seungwan was keeping things from her, but not for the same reason she hated secrets in her first marriage.

She knew deep down, with intense clarity, that if he was hiding attraction to her, it was for her own good.

Because she’d told him they could only