“That’s a big cake.”

Amelia looked up from her work to see Tyler standing in the doorway of the kitchen. She was surprised to see he’d shed his suit today and was wearing a snug-fitting green T-shirt and a pair of worn jeans. It was a good look for him, reminding her of the boy she knew in school. “That’s an understatement. It weighs over a hundred pounds.”

He whistled, strolling into the kitchen to stand beside her and admire her handiwork. “Pretty impressive. Does it taste good?”

She frowned at him. “Of course it does. It’s my special lemon–sour cream cake with a fresh raspberry-and-white-chocolate buttercream filling.”

“No real chocolate?”

“This is the South,” she said. “Chocolate is for the groom’s cake, which, fortunately, I do not have to make. The groom’s aunt is making him one that looks like Neyland Stadium at the University of Tennessee.”

Tyler nodded thoughtfully and eyeballed the bowl with leftover raspberry filling. “What are you going to do with that?” he asked.

Amelia sighed and went to the other side of the kitchen to retrieve a plastic spoon. “Knock yourself out,” she said, holding it out to him. She waited until he’d inhaled a few spoonfuls of icing. “What brings you by today, Tyler? I really need to get this finished. I’ve got several hours of prep work ahead of me for tomorrow when I’m done with this.”

He swallowed and set the bowl aside. “By all means, continue working. Primarily, I came by because I haven’t seen you yet today.”

Amelia smiled and climbed up onto her stepladder to pipe the top tier. “Once we’re living in the same place, that won’t be a problem any longer.”

“Speaking of which, I also needed to let you know that you have a new address.” He reached into his pocket and dangled a set of keys. “These are yours. I also have a gate opener for your car.”

“Wow, your people move quickly. Is everything really out of my apartment?”

“Yep. I even had Janet go by and clean once everything was gone.”

Amelia nodded thoughtfully and went back to piping the cake. She was keeping her apartment for another month, but the odds were that she wouldn’t move back. As they’d discussed, she would either stay with Tyler, or she would get a new place big enough for her and the baby. He’d been right—her apartment was too small. It was easier to just get everything out now instead of having to go back and get the rest later.

“Janet also went to the store with the list you put together and stocked the pantry and refrigerator with food. And she got all the necessary cleaning supplies to keep the house shipshape.”

Amelia was going to like this Janet. While she loved to cook, cleaning was at the bottom of her list. The industrial washing machine in the kitchen made it easier to clean up here, but keeping up with cleaning her apartment had always been a burden. She’d developed a process of immediately cleaning up anything she did as she did it to avoid having to deal with it later. She’d never lived with anyone else, but she assumed that would make it exponentially harder to manage.

“Sounds great. Hopefully I’ll get to see what the house looks like before I collapse facedown in the mattress tonight.” She had a long list of things that had to be done before she went home today.

“Don’t you have anyone to help you in the kitchen?”

At that, Amelia chuckled. She added the last flourish to the top tier and climbed down the steps. “Not really. We bring in a crew of servers the day of the wedding, but I’m pretty much on my own until then.”

“What about the other girls? They don’t help you?”

Amelia pushed the cart with the cake over to the walk-in refrigerator. Tyler rushed ahead of her to pull the door open and she slid it inside. “It’s Friday afternoon,” she said, stepping out and shutting the door behind her. “Natalie is in headset-and-clipboard mode, counting down to the wedding. She’s probably meeting with the officiant and the musicians right now to go over the schedule. She will be coordinating the rehearsal, then the rehearsal dinner. Bree will be with her, taking pictures. Gretchen is currently in the reception hall setting up tables, laying out linens and doing all the decorating she can do in advance. When the rehearsal is over, she’ll start decorating the chapel and lobby. They would help me if they could, but we all have things to do.”

“What a circus,” Tyler observed with a shake of his head. “I don’t recall our wedding being this complicated.”

“Yeah, I know,” she replied, her tone flat. “Unfortunately, the circus is necessary for a beautiful, smoothly run wedding day. We’ve got it down to a science.”

Amelia picked up her tablet and pulled up her task list for the afternoon. At the top of the list was prepping a hundred servings each of filet mignon, chicken breast and salmon to marinate overnight. She pulled out a large plastic tote and started mixing up the steak marinade.

She kept expecting Tyler to make noises about leaving, but he continued to hover a few feet away. Whereas she normally didn’t mind company, he was a distraction. A glance at his smile, a whiff of his cologne, and she’d likely slice off her thumb. Dumping in the last ingredient in the marinade, she turned to him. “Tyler, honey, you don’t need to stand around and look at me. I’m sure you have something more important to do today.”

Tyler leaned against the counter beside her and shook his head. “No, I don’t. I’m here to help you. I’m no chef, but I’m another set of hands. Tell me what you need done.”

That was the sexiest thing she’d ever heard. She resisted the urge to throw her arms around his neck and let him take her against the industrial refrigerator. Fridays were a day for work, not play. Instead she took a deep breath and decided where they should start first.

“If you insist.” She pointed to a sink on the opposite side of the kitchen. “Scrub up in the sink and grab an apron off the shelf. When you’re ready, glove up and grab the beef tenderloins from the refrigerator so we can get them broken down into portions.”

If he was going to be a sexy distraction, he could at least be a useful one.

Six

“If I never see another potato, it will be too soon.” Tyler opened the front door of their new home and held it for Amelia to step through ahead of him.

“You were a trouper. Thank you for all your help today.” She looked down at her watch. “Home by eight. I think that might be a Friday-night record.”

He followed her into the kitchen, where she dropped her purse on the breakfast bar and slipped out of her coat. She hopped on one foot, then the other, pulling off her shoes with a happy sigh.

“All your things are in the master suite,” he said. Tyler had had to make a command decision when the movers arrived, so he’d given her the nicest room on the main floor and hoped that at some point they would share it.

Amelia followed him, shoes in hand, down the hallway to the master suite. The new bed dominated the formerly empty space, with a green-and-gold embroidered comforter in place. They continued into the master bathroom, where a door led to the walk-in closet.

“All your clothes are in here,” he said. “Everything that was in your dressers is in the built-in armoire here. All your shoes are in the cubbies there.”

Amelia slipped her sneakers into an empty slot in the shoe display and nodded. “Thank you for taking care of all of this. Since it’s all handled, I think I might take a bath in the big whirlpool tub. It might help me relax after a long day. Just not too hot, right?”

He remembered his sister saying something about that because she’d found out she was pregnant with his niece right before her fifth-anniversary cruise. No drinks, no hot tubs! What a vacation, she’d lamented. “I think so. I know hot tubs are bad, but they keep the temperature up. The bathwater, especially with the jets running, will cool over time.”