Pure Connections

Chapter 12

      The ding of her thirty-minute timer drew Jennie's attention to the oven, and she abandoned the whisk in her hand to check on the cinnamon rolls. Her eyes burned with signs of intermittent sleep, but the soft music streaming from the loft's entertainment system was just upbeat enough for her to forget that she'd crawled out of bed—and Lisa's arms—at an ungodly 4 a.m.

      Not to mention what she'd done next.

      She would've deleted the message, if not for the inordinately prompt seen that had popped up within seconds of it being sent. And now that she thought about it, she should've deleted it anyway—it had been well over four hours with no reply.

      Pushing the thought back, she pulled on an oven mitten, diverted by the tray of pillowy golden-brown rolls filling the air with a burst of buttery-cinnamon. Her mouth watered. The track skipped to a song she identified as one of Lisa's favorites—"Heavy" by Powers—though Jennie hadn't heard it before this week. Even so, she'd found herself taken by its catchy beat and relatable lyrics. She transferred each cinnamon roll to a wire rack, letting them cool as she returned to the mix of confectioners' sugar, cream, and vanilla she'd been whisking to a glaze.

      Her mind drifted to her afternoon with Lisa yesterday—their conversation as they walked the streets of Little Italy, their sit down for cannoli and strawberry gelato, the kissing. So much kissing. On the sidewalks. Against Lisa's car, inside her car. Between, regrettably, separate showers, then later in bed. And while Jennie was glad they'd graduated beyond the just-friends playacting, being able to kiss Lisa whenever she liked, as often as she liked, was the brand of exquisite torture that left her permanently aching for something she hadn't physically experienced with another person in months.

      Eight months.

      Not that she'd been counting.

      Besides, this was unlike her. She rarely ever found herself in a tangle of conflicting emotions. She much preferred to deal with whatever she'd found herself confronted with the moment a situation arose, but having a younger sister who lived in the same city was something she'd been trying to avoid for years. And if things with Lisa weren't so new, so unexplored, Jennie would be processing her apprehension in a way that required no clothes and a lot less baking.

      A knot coiled in her stomach at the thought. Craving something she'd never experienced was a strange concept. Not that Chu and Wendy had never relayed their experiences with no scarcity of detail. Not that Jennie had never seen... Videos. She stilled her hand with the whisk, half contemplating crossing the open floor plan to the living room. A few minutes on the sofa, aided by her perfectly capable imagination could take the edge off. Sure, it probably couldn't compare to having someone else's hands—Who was she kidding? Lisa's. It probably wouldn't compare to having Lisa's hands on her, but Lis was still asleep and—

      "Morning."

      Jennie jumped, the whisk hitting the side of the bowl and tumbling to the polished concrete floor, leaving behind an artistic pattern of glaze worthy of MoMA. She flattened a palm against her racing heart, releasing a breath as she turned in the direction Lisa's voice had come.

      Lisa grinned—the audacity—as she made her way toward Jennie, still dressed in the loose cropped tank and joggers she'd slept in. Half her hair had been caught in a messy knot atop her head, leaving the rest against her shoulders, and her face held traces of water she'd apparently missed in a quick dry. She stopped in front of Jennie, biting down on a smile. "I forgot you startle easily."

      Jennie's mind unraveled the hidden reference in a snap—six months ago, Sydney International, Jennie's jolt backward when she'd looked down and realized she'd been holding Lisa's hand long after their initial introduction. Still, she looked Lis dead in her gorgeous cognac-colored eyes as she insisted, "I didn't startle."