“Cruise!” She hops over and wraps her arms around my waist. I hang on for dear life and land my lips over hers.
“Looks like you’re next!” A stocky man with dark hair and a bulbous nose whacks me on the back. He’s dressed in white from head to toe and flips a chef’s hat on, thus completing his baker’s attire. He looks official in every way and, oddly, slightly familiar. I turn to find Lauren and Ally standing there as Cal takes his place by his future bride.
“So what can we do for you guys?” The happy baker mock shoots Lauren and Cal. It’s only then that I spot an entire film crew cueing up their equipment, and suddenly the picture comes into focus. This isn’t just any bakery and that’s not just any baker—it’s the Cake Chief. I’ve seen enough of Molly’s food porn to identify the celebrity chef.
“Isn’t this great?” Kenny whispers. “We’re going to be on television.” She bounces on the balls of her feet as if she’s waited her whole life for her close-up.
Morgan struts in with his hair slicked back, his dimples etched into his face, looking every bit the made-for-TV stud. He nods hello before wrapping an arm around Ally.
“What the hell is this?” I whisper to Kenny. I’m almost certain I’m about to get ambushed with some piece of shit news because that’s just how my day seems to be rolling.
“Lauren and Cal are picking out their wedding cake.”
“And what are we doing here?” I wouldn’t mind if she said the same. Now that would most definitely brighten my day.
“We’re here for moral support.” She touches her finger to the tip of my nose, and I lean in and bite it playfully. I’d much rather be offering Kenny some moral support in the bedroom. God knows with her brother, the coital cop, hovering, this entire facility is off limits.
One of the crew shines a spotlight on us, and before we know it the camera is on and panning the room in our direction.
Chef Vito introduces himself to Lauren and Cal, and they briefly rattle off their wedding plans.
“And how about you?” The happy baker turns to Ally and Morgan, and their faces bleach as white as flour. I give a little smirk, glad to be front and center to witness Morgan having to face a pressing question about his relationship, and on national television no less. I bet his balls are sweating right about now.
“I don’t know.” Surprisingly, Morgan doesn’t look rattled at all by being put on the spot. “I think we’ll make our own cake.” He bears into the overgrown baker, ready for a standoff.
Vito turns toward Kenny and me, and the camera follows suit. Crap. The ultrabright light blinds us—making my balls break out in a sweat.
“How about you two?” I can hardly make out Vito’s face in the shadows. “Any wedding bells going off in the near future?”
Kenny opens her mouth to say something, then quickly closes it. Great. Poor thing is ashamed to admit it because nothing seems to be going right for us in that arena. Well, I’m about to turn this ship around.
“Yes,” I say it loud and clear. “In fact, we’re getting married Christmas Eve in an intimate yet beautiful ceremony.” I reach for Kenny’s hand and look directly into her sweet eyes. “And every gentleman on the planet can eat their heart out because someway, somehow I’ve convinced this gorgeous woman to spend the rest of her life with me.”
Kenny grazes her milk-white teeth over her lips and my balls rattle around in my boxers, begging me to find the walk-in refrigerator where we can be alone for a few minutes. The old Cruise Elton wants to come out and play, screw Morgan Jordan and the sterile routine he’s implemented in my life. Not that sleeping with Kenny has been sterile. It’s been anything but. And I’d be lying if I said I don’t miss the naughty meet-and-greets our erogenous zones shared just about everywhere but our bedroom.
“Christmas Eve?” His eyes squint with delight. “Let’s get a cake rolling for you!”
“Let’s do it,” I hear myself say.
“Really?” Kenny’s entire person glows at the idea. Maybe a cake is just what we need to get going in the right direction.
“Yes, really.” I rub my arm over her shoulders. “We’re already here. Why don’t we pick out our perfect wedding cake?”
Lauren and Ally both high-five Kenny as we begin our confection-filled journey.
The girls start walking through aisles and miles of display cakes until Lauren whips out a sketch from her purse.
“I was thinking something edgy, yet timeless,” she pants. “Something no one’s ever done before. Something that can never be replicated and yet will spawn a thousand oh-so-close knockoffs.”
Vito stares down at Lauren’s design. “I have just the thing. I’ve never seen it done, and I predict once this show goes live, every bride worldwide will be clamoring for one of these.”
“My God, what is it?” Lauren pulls him in by the apron, and it takes some muscle before Cal can gently pluck her away.
“A seven-layer goji berry and gold fleck filling—with a sprinkling of confectioners’ sugar.” He closes his eyes and kisses the tips of his fingers.
“Gold? I want!” It speeds out of her. “God, I want that!”
I pull Kenny in a little tighter in the event Lauren decides to start wielding her stilettos at the poor unsuspecting crew. I’ve been around Lauren long enough to know she pretty much gets what she wants. That cake was hers the minute precious metals were brought into the cake mix.
“And for you?” Vito bows toward Kenny, and his chef’s hat tumbles right off, exposing the tiny bald spot on top of his head.
“Just something simple.” Kenny shakes her head at me like I shouldn’t refute the idea.
“No, no.” I wag my finger. “We only get one wedding cake. I want you to get whatever your heart desires. If you want real butterflies cascading up and down twelve tiers, then by God that’s what I want, too.” I press a kiss over her lips. I meant every word.
“Okay.” She touches her chest and her face turns a bright shade of pink. “Actually, I sort of like this one.” She points to a pale-blue cake covered in a smooth layer of fondant, with tiny white flowers dotting their way to the top in a lacy pattern.
“It’s beautiful,” I say. “It reminds me of your eyes.” No joke, and suddenly I’ve got tears in mine too. The camera is pointed right at me, ensuring that I’ll look like a pussy on national TV, and right about now, I really don’t give a rat’s ass.
“Then that’s the one.” Vito turns to the camera. “And in a few short weeks we’ll join these two couples on their special day when the Cake Chief takes their wedding to . . .”—Lauren jumps in beside him and they both shout—“the next level!”
The spotlight goes out and my balls finally stop sweating. A member of the crew whips out a clipboard and has us sign legal waivers to appear on the show.
“All right.” Vito whips off his apron. “Let’s get to the office and jot down all the fun details.”
By fun details I’m guessing he means dollars and decimal points.
Lauren steps in. “We’ve already squared up. We’ll wait for you guys up front. You want anything? Chocolate cake to go? A box of doughnuts?”
Kenny shakes her head and so do I. Right about now I doubt we can afford either.
We follow Vito to his office, where he dons a pair of thick-framed glasses and suddenly morphs into the chief of finance while whacking the keys on his overgrown calculator. It burps and grinds until it spits out a receipt, which he hands over to me with a shit-eating grin on his face.
“Now”—he starts sharply—“I take all your major credit cards. I need the balance paid in full. You won’t believe how many fools we get who try to fake a wedding just to get on TV. After a while, we do a little digging and come to find out they don’t even have a venue reserved.”
I swallow hard as I take the receipt from him. About a dozen rows of numbers flow down to a series of numerals that I don’t even know how to read. Fuck.
“Four hundred and fifty?” Aw, hell, it’s probably a b
argain. I reach back to get my wallet and my pocket is noticeably bare. Shit. I glance over at Kenny. “I didn’t drive.” I mouth the words every man dreads to form: “I forgot my wallet.”
“Oh, it’s no big deal.” She whips out her credit card and hands it to the master cake chief himself. “And four hundred and fifty is a bargain-basement price,” she assures me. “This is going to be fantastic!”
The Cake Chief clears his throat. Why does this suddenly feel like a mafia-inspired shakedown? “It’s forty-five hundred.” Vito takes Kenny’s card and swipes it before we can process the horror. “Declined.” He frowns into his machine. “You got another?”
I’ve never been so relieved by a rejection in my life.
“No, actually.” Kenny shakes her head while her face glows beet red. “That’s the only one I have with me.”
Crap. Now I feel like a sack of shit.
“I’ll try again.” He swipes the card and shakes his head. “It’s coming up stolen.” He plucks out a pair of oversized scissors and proceeds to cut the damn card right in half—and I’m only a little sorry he did it.
“Oh no, wait!” Kenny puts her precious fingers in peril while wagging them before the scissor-wielding maniac, and I gently pull her back. “But it was a misunderstanding! They’re sending out a new one.”
“It’s my fiduciary duty as a business owner to destroy stolen plastic. It saves the next hardworking mom-and-pop from getting stiffed.”
“But that was my card.” Kenny sags into her seat, defeated.
He leans in and points behind him. “It makes good TV.”
We glance up, and to our horror a tiny camera points down at us from high up on a bookshelf.
“You can’t use this footage.” I pull Kenny in close, reassuring her I won’t let it happen. But with my luck I’ll have no fucking control over this, either.
“I can and I will,” he refutes my theory. “You signed waivers. It’s all mine.”
“You’re going to humiliate us on television.” Kenny can’t get the words out without hyperventilating.
“No one’s getting humiliated.” He holds his hands out as if he’s about to stop traffic. “People eat up stories like yours all the time. Young couple—down on your luck . . . What’s not to love? We’ll even show up on the big day with a free cupcake, because that’s the kind of guy the Cake Chief is. It’ll be fantastic. Just wait and see. Everyone loves a good old-fashioned tale of hardship. You’re gonna be a hit.”
Great.
Kenny and I are making our couple’s debut as a human interest piece—a tale of fiscal failure, and on our wedding day at that.
I can’t let this happen.
I’ve got one trick up my sleeve I haven’t tapped yet, and I was sort of hoping I wouldn’t have to. Guess I’ll have to swallow my pride and have a chat with dear old Dad.
I glance over at Kenny and give a weak smile.
I’d swallow all the damn pride on the planet for her.
9
PUT A RING ON IT
Kendall
We say good-bye to Cruise, Morgan, and Cal in the bakery parking lot. Lauren was nice enough to buy them each their own box of confections before we drive wherever it is Ally is taking us in a last-ditch effort to save my sex life.
“Trust me,” Ally says as we step into the sleek, cosmopolitan shopping mall, with its overabundance of glossy white flooring, mirrored walls, and impressive escalator systems that span three stories. “You’re guaranteed to have a wild time once we stock up on a few extracurricular basics. Not that Morgan and I have ever had to resort to anything like this.”
Resort? I don’t ask what “this” might be. For one thing, I’m not even remotely interested in my brother’s sex life. I’d rather run my neck through a table saw than try to imagine what Ally’s bedroom antics might or might not be like. And second, I’m afraid “this” will be revealed sooner than later.
Ally walks at a decent clip, and both Lauren and I have a hard time keeping up with her. Obviously, “this” either closes soon or has an abnormally short shelf life, much like the sexual shenanigans Cruise and I once partook in.
We bypass a lingerie shop, and Lauren and I exchange looks. I would have bet both my boobs that’s where we were headed.
Lauren gasps and squeals.
“What?” I jump a little at her unexpected enthusiasm.
“I know, right?” Ally hops to her side. “Am I a genius or what?”
“God”—Lauren’s face brims with something just this side of ecstasy—“this is going to make chapter seven the most delicious chapter of all.” They fall into a fit of cackles.
“Hello? Still clueless over here.” I wave my hand over Lauren’s face, trying to defuse the look of unrequited nirvana, but I can’t seem to do so. “What’s going to make chapter seven the most delicious chapter of all? Are we going to have cake sex?” Because, if we are, calories be damned, I’m one hundred percent on board.
“No.” Lauren shoos me with her hand, trying to evict the idea from my brain. “You’re going to have deviant sex with the naughty professor just the way God intended.” She points over to a dark-looking cave tucked all by itself in the corner.
The store windows are covered with brown paper and the door is shielded with bars, like it might be closed. It doesn’t even have a sign—all I see are three giant Xs where the store name should be.
Three Xs . . . Does that stand for poison or . . .
I suck in a breath. Triple X!
“This is perfect.” I interlink arms with both Ally and Lauren as we bum-rush the tiny X-rated establishment. Of course we can’t all fit through the door at once, so we sort of trip in sideways and untangle our limbs rather indelicately in the process.
Some seriously funky lounge music blares from the speakers, and the red-and-black-checkered carpet in combination with the low lighting and rows and rows of chains dangling from the ceiling gives this more of a demented dungeon appeal than it does a mall crawl.
I take a good look around at all the contraptions neatly stocked and compartmentalized for the pervert on the go. God, is it even legal to be here?
Lauren pulls me further in and we scuttle through the little shop of sexual horrors. To my surprise the aisles are all neatly marked: sex toys, vibrators, women’s toys, men’s toys, lubrication, adult entertainment, and last but not least—kinky pleasures.
“Women’s toys.” Ally yanks me to the left.
“No”—Lauren pulls me to the right—“kinky pleasures.”
Lauren wins the tug-of-war and slightly dislocates my shoulder in the process. Nevertheless, I dutifully follow her down an aisle cluttered with plastic paddles, riding crops, restraints, clamps, and—dear God, get me out of here, it all looks so damn painful.
“This is exactly what we need.” Lauren wheels an abandoned cart over and starts filling it with items as if they’re all free.
I have to stop her and quick, or I’ll need some of those whips to keep the creditors away. There’s no way in hell I can afford all this corruption and debauchery.
“Actually”—my throat goes dry—“I’m just looking.” Never before have I been so thrilled to have my purchasing power revoked, and on television no less.
“Consider it my treat.” Lauren rips up and down the aisles like a woman carnally possessed.
“And this, for sure.” Ally hands her a round rubber ring that hardly looks as if it can fit on my wrist.
“What the hell is that?” I take it from her.
“Cock ring.” She snatches it back and pops it into the cart.
“No!” I try to pluck it out but Lauren slaps my hand away. “No cock rings.” It comes from me weakly because deep down I know this is one cockfight I’m not going to win.
“Face it”—Lauren says as we follow Ally into the next aisle—“a cock ring might be the only thing that makes your love life worth reading about.”
“Crap.” I hate it when she’s right.
“Wh
at are your thoughts on Ben Wa balls?” Ally asks, hovering over the sinful selection.
“What are those?” I peer over her shoulder as she holds up a pair of overgrown marbles.
Ally holds up a finger. “You put them in your—”
“No.” I’m quick to cut her off. “And no to the rest of this crap.” I pick up a long rectangular paddle that boasts of its fur-lined pleasure strip. “I’d hate for you to waste your money on any of this, Lauren.” Or more to the point, her father’s.
“Not to worry,” she’s quick to assure. “Trust me, Penny”—she gives a little wink—“you’re well worth the expense. I’ve just expanded our distributors. You’ve got one of the fastest-growing serial novels out there. If this keeps up, I smell the Forbes list in your financial future. But not right away, so I wouldn’t go maxing out your credit cards just yet. The money is sort of slow in coming. But the subscriptions are through the roof. You have no idea how big we’re going with this. But everything is riding on chapter seven. If you knock this one out of the park, you’ll be on the verge of superstardom. In fact, I’ve got you lined up to speak at three different sorority houses. Penny and Cruz are shaping up to be the country’s next favorite naughty couple.” Lauren pulls me in by the shirt with the look of psychotic determination igniting in her eyes. “Cruise Elton and his vanilla sexcapades will never know what hit him.”
I glance into the cart and give a weak nod at the fur-lined paddle.
Something tells me I will.
“You went shopping.” Cruise looks wild-eyed at all the bags I’ve managed to schlep in.
“Actually yes, just a couple things.” I hesitate saying they’re gifts from Lauren. God forbid he thinks Cal used any of this stuff, or all of chapter seven will go to hell. “I was thinking you might like them.” I glance around for signs of his sister. “Is Molly here?”
“She’s on a date.” He says the word date like it’s a four-letter word—which it is, but that’s beside the point.
“With Kurt?” Speaking of which, we’d better hit the sheets so I can pump out something to give Molly’s “date” to edit for me. We’re on a tight production schedule, and we really don’t have time for Cruise to be lounging around and scrolling on his laptop through God-knows-what. There’s sex to be had and dollars to be made once I convert said escapades into a functioning storyline, and of course all roads lead to paying off my precious Vera and perhaps pitching in for a bouquet or two. Who knew my wedding was capable of bringing me to my knees—quite literally?
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