Kissing Lessons (Kissing Creek) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Discover more Amara titles… Just a Little Bet

  The Wedding Date Disaster

  Hooked on You

  The Wedding Deal

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2020 by Stefanie London. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

  Entangled Publishing, LLC

  10940 S Parker Rd

  Suite 327

  Parker, CO 80134

  [email protected]

  Amara is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.

  Edited by Lydia Sharp and Liz Pelletier

  Cover design by Bree Archer

  Cover photography by Asier Romero, popcorner, Staras, and blamb/Getty Images

  ISBN 978-1-64937-084-6

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  First Edition November 2020

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you for supporting a small publisher! Entangled prides itself on bringing you the highest quality romance you’ve come to expect, and we couldn’t do it without your continued support. We love romance, and we hope this book leaves you with a smile on your face and joy in your heart.

  xoxo

  Liz Pelletier, Publisher

  To all the learners and collectors of weird and wonderful facts.

  Chapter One

  Fact: you are twice as likely to be killed by a vending machine than a shark.

  “Who’s missing a phone?” Audrey Miller held up an older-model iPhone with a cracked glitter case in one hand while she fished around in her handbag for her car keys. “And someone left the faucet dripping in the bathroom. Oliver, I think that was you.”

  The first day of school for her younger siblings was always chaos. There were costume changes to be assessed, bags to be packed, and nerves to be calmed in an extra level of insanity that Audrey was thankful only happened once a year. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her youngest sister, Deanna, skid across the tiles in her socks, blond ponytail flying as she made a grab for her backpack. It had a hole in the bottom that Audrey had been meaning to sew up for weeks now.

  Mental note: don’t give her anything valuable to carry until the backpack is patched.

  Not that there was much chance of that happening. Firstly, Deanna was about as responsible as a Labrador puppy left alone with a tasty pair of stilettos. Secondly, the Miller family didn’t own much of value.

  “That’s mine.” Middle sister Georgie sailed past and grabbed her phone out of Audrey’s hand. “Can I borrow your battery pack? I forgot to charge mine.”

  “I reminded you last night.” Audrey looked up, her car keys still nowhere to be found. Georgie stood there, an expectant expression on her face. At seventeen, she was in a phase where she wanted to date and go to parties and generally act like an adult but without taking responsibility for any of it.

  Audrey had never been given that option—not even when she was a teenager.

  Rolling her eyes, she gestured for Georgie to go ahead and grab the battery pack from her bag. She had bigger concerns than her phone dying. Namely, if she couldn’t locate her car keys, then her siblings would be late for school and Audrey would be late for work. And she might live among chaos at home, but nobody outside would ever see that. Being late was totally unacceptable.

  “Oliver! I said turn that damn faucet off.” She marched up the narrow hallway of their cramped house, knocking on her younger brother’s door as she went past. She should never have gotten him those noise-cancelling headphones for his birthday. Not only had they maxed her credit card out, but now he was even more lost in his own world than before.

  As Audrey reached the bedroom she shared with her sisters, she spotted her keys poking out from underneath a silk scarf on the middle of Georgie’s bed—aka the bottom of the bunk she shared with Deanna. What on earth were they doing there?

  “We leave in two minutes!” she called out as she headed back down the hallway. “No exceptions. If your ass isn’t in that car before I start the engine, you’ll be walking.”

  Oliver emerged from his bedroom, ducking to avoid knocking his head on the doorframe. He might be the exact age as his twin sister, Georgie, but that’s where the similarities ended. Georgie was the shortest of all of them, and Oliver was six foot two and still growing like a weed.

  “RIP my food budget,” she muttered. The kid already ate like a horse, and it was only getting worse.

  Snatching up her bag, she took a final glance around the room. The kitchen was a bit of a mess from the morning’s cereal bowls, but otherwise it wasn’t too much of a disaster zone. Well, so long as you ignored the overflowing recycling bin and the pile of laundry she’d dumped onto the couch while Deanna demanded she find her missing lucky socks.

  “Miller family, roll out!” She held the door open as the kids trooped past her, the twins’ heads bowed toward their cell phones as they tapped furiously with their thumbs. “Oliver, Georgie, Deanna… Where’s Jane?”

  Georgie snorted and lifted her head for the briefest second. “She left for college a year ago.”

  Oh yeah. Audrey shook her head as she locked the front door. She was so hardwired to count to four when checking on her siblings that she’d momentarily forgotten Jane had already flown out of the nest. Flown all the way to Duke, in fact, and was living her best life far away from Kissing Creek, a town with a stupid name and an even stupider reputation for celebrating all things romantic.

  “All present and accounted for. Let’s go.” Audrey hoisted her bag up onto her shoulder and caught Oliver mock saluting her out of the corner of her eye.

  She unlocked her car, affectionately known as Big Red. Not because at one time in the mid-nineties it had been a vibrant shade of vermilion, but because it had big red rust patches on both back panels. Sure, it wasn’t pretty. But Big Red was about the most reliable thing in Audrey’s life, and she’d drive the damn thing until the wheels fell off.

  “What’s our fact for the day?” Deanna asked as she took her place in the front seat beside Audrey. That was always the rule: littlest kid gets the front seat on the first day of school.

  “Oh no, I forgot to look up a fact.” Audrey started the engine and eased the car away from the curb.

  “No, you didn’t.” Deanna stuck a bony elbow into Audrey’s side. “Tell us. We have to learn.”

  “Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do at school?” Audrey glanced at her little sister, trying to hid
e the smirk tugging at her lips. She was a miniature version of their mother—with her chipper personality and thirst for knowledge. Deanna even resembled her, with long blond hair and blue eyes so big she looked like a cartoon character.

  Audrey had also inherited the long blond hair, but instead of blue eyes she’d gotten a rich olive-green from her dad. She’d also skipped out on her mother’s naturally lean figure, too.

  “It would be if the teachers actually knew anything,” Georgie chimed in from the backseat with her signature teenage drawl. “I don’t know where they find half of those idiots, I swear.”

  Audrey narrowed her eyes at the rearview mirror. She couldn’t fully disagree, since there’d been a number of teachers with questionable education skills back when she was a kid, but she didn’t want Georgie scaring Deanna off on her first day of high school.

  “You’re right, Dee. I do have a fact.” Distraction—that was her go-to technique.

  Deanna pumped her fist into the air. “My brain is ready.”

  Oliver chuckled from the backseat but didn’t look up from his phone. Georgie listened on with interest, however. Despite her attachment to electronic devices and her generally sullen attitude, she was a sponge for information.

  “You’re twice as likely to be killed by a vending machine than a shark,” Audrey said. She’d looked up that fact first thing that morning, when the house was still quiet and she’d had her coffee and breakfast in a rare moment of peace.

  “No way.” Deanna wrinkled her nose. “How does anyone get killed by a vending machine?”

  “Darwinism?” Georgie joked.

  “Actually, she’s kind of right,” Audrey replied. “There was one guy who shook a vending machine so hard it toppled over and crushed him to death.”

  After debating the silliest ways to die—top contenders included peeing on an electric fence, trying to hand-feed an alligator, and driving with your eyes closed—Audrey pulled Big Red up to the high school drop-off zone. Oliver and Georgie slid out of the back, eager to be away from the embarrassing car as fast as possible. Deanna stayed put for a moment, biting down on her lower lip as she watched the students streaming into the school.

  “Don’t be scared. You’ll have a great time.” Audrey kissed the top of her head. “Look, Celeste is here. Why don’t you catch up to her so you can walk in together?”

  Deanna’s eyes lit up at the mention of her friend. “Good idea.”

  She slid out of the seat and hoisted her backpack onto one shoulder, slamming the door behind her. It was warm out already, the sun making her hair look like fibers of spun gold. At the last minute, she turned around and leaned in the open window of the passenger’s side.

  “I like your fact, by the way. Morbid, but interesting.” She grinned before darting off into the crowd.

  That was their routine. Every morning, Audrey would come armed with a fact, and Deanna would give her an assessment. Georgie and Oliver would both act like they didn’t care about the ritual, but she knew they secretly enjoyed it. Even Jane, when she’d lived at home, had joined in.

  Their life wasn’t perfect by any means—they all missed their mother like hell, and they missed the man their father used to be. And they lived in the shitty part of town in a house made for a family half their size. But they were happy…and that was the thing that mattered most.

  Switching her focus to the day ahead, Audrey followed the trail of cars exiting the drop-off zone and headed toward job number one: Kisspresso Café.

  All people who lived in Kissing Creek would come to understand an important thing about their hometown. A place with the word “kissing” in its name can’t not capitalize on romance. Because aside from sex, there’s no greater marketing tool than love.

  That’s why almost three-quarters of the stores in town either had a romance-themed pun for a name or featured some kind of kiss mark and/or heart in their business logo. There was the fancy donut shop with the kiss-themed flavors: chocolate smooch, raspberry snog, and frenching vanilla. They’d even had a limited edition one called ‘too much tongue toffee’. Then there was Italian restaurant Mille Baci (a thousand kisses) and the auto repair shop with the slogan: kiss-proof your car!

  For someone who didn’t believe in the whole happily-ever-after thing, it was a daily reminder of what Audrey saw as false advertising. But she’d never considered moving away. Kissing Creek was her home, and she had a duty to make sure each and every one of her siblings had the best possible trajectory in life. Which ultimately meant donning the cutesy pink polo shirt with the Kisspresso Café's logo, complete with embroidered red lip print, and tying a red waist apron over her jeans several days a week.

  Truth was, she liked this job. Audrey had little time or budget for personal passions, but one she did indulge in was coffee, so her job as a barista ticked both the passion box and the money box. Plus, the Kisspresso Café was right at the edge of Harrison Beech College, which meant, for a few hours each day, Audrey could pretend she was a full-time college student without any worries in her life.

  “One vanilla latte, one cappuccino, and two pink passion white chocolate mochas.” Lana called the orders in her usual singsong voice from the front counter as she slid the empty takeout cups along the bench toward Audrey. “And a puppyccino for Ralf.”

  “Ralf is here?” Audrey peered around the pastel-pink espresso machine to look out the front window. Ralf was a Saint Bernard who loved the staff at the café. His owner, Andy, was a retired professor and a regular customer.

  “Yep, and don’t even think about running that drink out to him. It’s my turn today.” Lana folded her arms over her chest, and Audrey pouted. “I need to live vicariously, okay? The only pet I’m allowed in my dorm room is of the chia variety.”

  Audrey snorted as she picked up the single-shot portafilter and set it under the grinder with one hand while reaching for the milk jug with the other. “They still make those?”

  “Sure. I have one shaped like Groot.” She grinned.

  Despite there being only five years’ age difference between them, it felt more like a decade. Or two. At twenty-six, Audrey wasn’t like most people her age—she worked two regular jobs, took odd jobs where she could, cared for her siblings, made sure the household bills got paid, and took night classes at the college to stop her mind from going to goop. Lana, on the other hand, worked a scant fifteen hours a week, often came into work hungover, and thought that trying to budget for a pair of Lululemon leggings was life’s greatest challenge.

  “Also, Jamie told me to mention that we have to crack down on people fraudulently using the college staff discount,” Lana said. “If they look too young to be a professor, then we have to ask to see their faculty card.” She hovered by the espresso machine, waiting for Audrey to finish making the puppyccino so she could take it outside. “Apparently we’ve been scammed on multiple occasions.”

  “Really?” Audrey wrinkled her nose.

  She totally understood that many college students didn’t have much spare cash. But if that was the case, why order coffee at Kisspresso? They could go to Dunkin’ Donuts and get a coffee for two bucks instead. Or use the facilities in the student lounge. And Audrey might have been raised poor as dirt, but stealing was stealing…even if it was only a dime. Scamming a local business run by someone who gave plenty to the community was not cool.

  “Yeah,” Lana said, bobbing her head. “Jamie told us yesterday and asked us to fill in everyone who wasn’t rostered.”

  “Duly noted.”

  Audrey waited for the espresso shot to finish and tapped the portafilter against the edge of the knock box, releasing the used grounds. Then she poured milk into the little silver jug and began to froth it, ignoring the thermometer attached to the side and instead gauging the temperature by how the jug felt against her palm. Audrey was an excellent barista, and she didn’t mind saying that, because she had proo
f in the form of customers who wouldn’t buy their coffee unless she was the one behind the machine.

  Lana bounced on the balls of her feet, her gaze flicking to the front window, where Ralf was sitting in his usual spot with Andy. Rolling her eyes, Audrey fetched the whipped cream canister from the fridge and squirted some into their smallest paper cup.

  “There. Now stop hanging around me like a bad smell.” She shoved the cup toward Lana, who took off to go and see her favorite four-legged customer.

  Audrey worked quickly, filling the drink orders and getting into the flow of her job. She’d read a book once that said job satisfaction came from believing that your role had a purpose. To Audrey, seeing her customers take that first sip, a smile on their lips—seeing them take a moment for themselves amidst their chaotic day—that made her feel like her job had a purpose. Sure, she wasn’t curing cancer or putting criminals away or helping people make their lives better. But, in Audrey’s opinion, the little moments mattered in life, too.

  And that’s what she did—she gave people little moments of joy.

  “Vanilla latte,” she called out as she poured the milk into one of Kisspresso’s signature bright pink cups, moving her hand back and forth to create a perfect leaf on the latte’s surface. “And a cappuccino.”

  As she was finishing up the pink passion white chocolate mochas—menu items that were better categorized as desserts than beverages, in her opinion—the café’s door swung open. Only it wasn’t Lana returning from her doggy visit. Oh no, this was a customer whom Audrey definitely hadn’t seen before.

  She knew that for a fact, because if the human form of every one of her sexy fantasies mashed into one perfect man had ever walked through the door before, she would have noticed.

  He made his way to the front counter, raking a hand through his overlong hair as he surveyed the pastry cabinet. Interest rippled through the café like an electrical current, with most female heads and a few male heads turning in his direction. The man ran a hand over his clean-shaven jaw, fingers long and slim like those of a piano player.