by Abby Knox
Having His Cake
Big Easy Shifters: Book Two
Abby Knox
Copyright © 2020 by Abby Knox
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
First edition published 2018
Edited by Aquila Editing
Proofread by Kasi Alexander
Cover Designer: Mayhem Cover Creations
This second edition is re-release is dedicated to the lady who taught me everything I know in the kitchen, and the one who still makes everywhere she is feel like home: my mom.
Having His Cake
Part two of the Big Easy Shifters
By Abby Knox
Vann West is a globetrotting celebrity New Orleans chef. He has everything from superhero good looks to a fangirl in every port. But now, he’s only got eyes for one female, and a powerful need for some Big Easy comfort food.
GiGi DuGray a hardworking local cafe owner and pastry chef extraordinaire. A sassy little kitten with big dreams, she’s got no time for local golden boys, but always time to feed a hungry wolf that comes calling.
When they meet as humans, it might be more than just a party on the taste buds. There might even be a little blood. Most definitely, there will be icing. Strange things happen when the beasts are hungry.
Having his cake is the second installment in the updated and revised Big Easy Shifters series (formerly titled Her Big Easy Wedding). These titles are fun, quick reads full of heat, alpha males, strong-willed debutants, rich daddies, claws, fangs, and happy endings!
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Epilogue
About the Author
Also by Abby Knox
An excerpt from book three…
Chapter One
GiGi
The new moon made the silvery panther shape almost invisible as it stalked its prey through the bayou, tracking it to a bend in the waterway.
There’s no way out for you now, scaly friend, she thought. In one direction was a tangle of reeds. The other way were the cypress trees. The gator may be amphibious, but its speed was no match for magical cats. If the gator turned around, it had to go right past GiGi and her waiting fangs.
Darkness and invisibility doubled the advantage of the predator. The big cat’s huge, noiseless paws followed the lines in the mud, right up to the edge of the murky water. The gator had slithered into the black, but the feline could see in the dark; her eyes made out the bulbous silhouette of the reptile’s midsection. GiGi’s patience always won out in the end.
She wasn’t like the rest of the DuChamp panther clan. She was willing to wait for just the right moment to strike. Her cousin Rosemary enjoyed the tussle, splashing headlong into the swamp, into the bushes, chasing out her victims. She loved to run after them, she liked the scratching and biting and the athleticism of the adventure. What worked for Rosemary didn’t work for GiGi.
GiGi waited in the shadows and used the skills given to her by the shifter curse: sight, smell, hearing, and silent stalking. The others enjoyed lovingly teasing her for waiting on the most succulent gator, the fattest rabbits. But GiGi took it all in stride. She favored taste over the thrill of the hunt. As a professional chef and a lover of food in general, she knew better. Even in her panther form, her personality stayed on brand, and her patience always paid off. The flavor is in the fat, she would remind them.
On that night, she waited for who knows how long on the gnarled roots that served as her hunting perch. The frogs croaked, the insects buzzed. She’d leave the frog legs to the others; she wasn’t a fan.
She willed the gator to turn just the right way, making it easier for her to pounce. This way, chunky boy. Give up now. You’re mine.
Finally, the gator turned. GiGi pounced. A splash, a feral roar, a swatting of a leathery tail against the rushes that sprouted from the water, it would be over in seconds. Fangs the size of human fingers sank into the gator’s tender neck muscle, rendering the creature lifeless quickly and efficiently. Her claws sliced as cleanly and effortlessly as she prepared perfect cuts of meat in her kitchen.
GiGi ate her fill that night, satisfying the panther until the next new moon. She left the bits she didn’t like and trotted away to the meeting spot where she would wait for the rest of the family. The scavengers would have a royal feast, thanks to her.
The shift back into her human form happened uneventfully in the early morning hours. The family’s secret treehouse blended in with nature and provided a convenient cover in the unlikely event that there were any humans around in this remote, boggy wetland. The family knew how to keep its secrets locked down.
On the way back into the city, GiGi watched Rosemary swiping through a dating app she had just downloaded to her phone.
“Ooh, here’s one for you, GiGi,” she said, flashing her phone screen.
GiGi laughed. “I thought you set that up for you, not me.”
Rosemary nodded and kept swiping. “I did, but you know, none of them feel right to me. I guess when I see the one, I’ll just know.”
Rosemary had very romantic ideas about meeting the perfect guy. GiGi was a lot more cynical about it.
“I hope you included ‘Favorite food: raw gator. Favorite hobbies: shifting into a panther every new moon and stalking the bayou for prey.”
Rosemary laughed. “That might work.”
GiGi admired her cousin, who had no fear and always said exactly what she was thinking and feeling. She was sure when Rosemary saw the man of her dreams, she would know it.
For GiGi, carrying around the secret family curse of being a shifter, diving into the dating pool was as murky as a swamp.
GiGi had given up any idea of a serious relationship a long time ago when she’d gotten married to her café.
“Married” was the word she jokingly used to refer to her work. The café had been her dream, and she was achieving it. Owning an eatery was not just a full-time job. She knew when she’d signed the lease on this building that for the next few years, until she would be able to hire a full-time manager she could trust, she would be eating, sleeping, breathing GiGi’s Café.
She instructed the driver to drop her off at the café rather than her house; there was always work to do. And she found herself not tired, and not looking forward to her empty house.
Chapter Two
Vann
I’m hungry, and in the best city in the world to fill my belly.
It’s not easy to work out a contract that allows me to come back home to New Orleans once a month to “check in on my flagship restaurant,” but if they want Vann West, this is the deal.
Neither the show
runners nor my manager need to know my restaurant runs itself just fine, and I barely check in at all these days. The only reason I come home once a month is so I can be with my pack on the full moon. If I have to live with this curse, I don’t want to be anywhere else when I wolf out.
It’s the safest thing to do — hunt as a pack — because when shifters don’t have clear memories of events that happen during their growly and furry times, things can get out of hand. The pack — Ash, Gavin, Bobby, Pen, and Ash’s dad, JB — all hunt together and keep each other safe.
At least, that’s the main reason I tell myself I keep returning home once a month to feed. My gut tells me there are other reasons, other scents I’m more and more in need of all the time.
Adults like to talk about how nice it feels to go home to their mom’s or grandmother’s house on Christmas or other special occasions. That no matter how old they get, it feels like going back to the womb. Some say the comfort makes them feel like they’re nine years old again. New Orleans is something like that.
But it’s more than a cozy feeling. It’s that womb-like feeling times a thousand. Something or someone else keeps bringing me back, and it’s not just the pack.
It’s probably nothing more than food, I tell myself. There’s never been a quicker way to my heart…
Chapter Three
GiGi
Rosemary works fast when she sets her mind to something. Can’t believe I’m sitting here planning the menu for her engagement party only a few weeks since she set her sites on finding a mate.
Working late as always after an extra-busy night at her cafe, GiGi was extra tired from the crop of unusually ornery customers. She chalked it up to the full moon.
Realizing she hadn’t stood up and moved around in a while, she decided to haul out the trash. Once outside, one of her regular back-alley customers padded up toward her in the alleyway. His fur smelled a bit rank, but his gorgeous eyes made her smile. She preferred this character over one or two of her regulars, even though he didn’t pay and was an equally lousy tipper.
“Hi there, Buster. Hungry?” GiGi had already set aside scraps for her furry friend. She knelt in front of the hulking gray creature and set down a bowl of the leftover giblets from the night’s menu. “Not much of that stuff left for you tonight, Buster. The hipster foodies are eating organs these days if you can believe it.”
Buster ignored her as he chowed down but allowed her to stroke his neck and speak to him as he gobbled up the innards. She gazed at his silvery fur, his massive size, and contemplated the full moon. She entertained herself with the idea that the creature was here for her—that maybe, in some fantasy world, this was one of those wolf shifters, like Ash. And that maybe under all that fur lurked a person who was attached to her for more than food.
But no, that was highly unlikely. No shifter in his right mind would allow himself to hunt around human beings. It wasn’t safe. Just an unusually large stray, she told herself.
“I hope you like your new bowl. I know it’s crazy and you’re not my pet—you’re a wild animal and incapable of being anyone’s pet—but I couldn’t help myself from going into that cute little pet store down the street.”
She looked behind her, but it sounded as if her sous chef was still trying to get the rusty bucket of a dishwasher to work. The last thing GiGi needed was for a pregnant employee to peek outside and have the liver scared out of her at the sight of a wolf at the back door.
GiGi was barely making enough to cover the expense of having a full-time sous chef, but breaking even was the way it was going to be for the foreseeable future. Hopefully, Uncle Lionel’s investment would hold out until she started turning a profit. GiGi had not wanted to accept his offer in the first place, but as an unknown in the business and fresh out of culinary school, it was too tempting to pass up. So she’d left her job as a line cook and took the leap.
“No niece of mine is gonna spend her best years waiting for her big break,” he’d said. This investment came at a price, as her sense of responsibility forced her to oversee every last detail of the café’s operations and work until her back ached, day in and day out.
“You’re nice company, Buster,” she said, stroking the wolf’s neck. “I feel like you get me. You should come around more than once a month. I’m too busy to have a pet at my place, so this is a nice arrangement, even if all you’re interested in is hog intestines. No rabid squirrels for you tonight.”
The wolf polished off the entrails and looked back up at her, licking its chops. She smiled at how much like a domesticated dog he appeared and behaved like, sometimes.
“Oh!” she said, laughing as the wolf’s eyes bored into her. “I almost forgot. I did save you something special.”
GiGi took out a foil-wrapped package from her pocket. Instantly the wolf’s wet nostrils were flaring, and a tiny whine erupted from his throat. “Oh, you smell that already?”
She laughed. “Here you go, stud. But shush, don’t tell the sous chef, she would freak if she knew I was doing this with the leftover squab.”
The wolf downed the bird in seconds and then licked GiGi’s fingers clean. Then licked her face. GiGi laughed again. “You know, for a ferocious beast, you sure are sweet on me.” The wolf licked her whole face in one swipe. “All right, calm down, Buster. That’s all I got.”
She stood when she heard footsteps coming toward the back of the restaurant, and then a voice. “GiGi, did you already bleach the cutting boards? I told you, let the crew do that.”
GiGi stood and glanced at the door and called over, “Yeah, I know, but it takes two seconds and I was right there. I can’t help it.” She turned back to the alley. The wolf was gone. There was no sign that he had even been there. The full moon lit up a damp, empty alleyway.
She sighed. Her big, terrifying gray pet was gone again.
The first time GiGi had seen the wolf in the alley, about a year ago, it had scared the shit out of her. But now they were best buddies. As much as someone like her could be friends with a huge, blue-eyed stray dog that was more wolf than a domesticated house pet.
GiGi looked off into the darkness and said, “See you next month, Buster.”
Chapter Four
GiGi
GiGi barely registered what her cousin and best friend Rosemary was saying. She much preferred catering intimate gatherings; the din of that night’s engagement party rattled her eardrums.
She would do anything for Rosemary, and Rosemary never did anything small or quiet. A rooftop engagement party in the French Quarter with live music and an open bar defined Rosemary and Ash in a nutshell.
GiGi was good at rolling with the punches for her Rosemary, and the advance paycheck for catering tonight’s shindig was going to come in pretty damn handy. Maybe she could go all out and buy a fancier chef jacket for special events, rather than this one she wore tonight that was starting to fray at the edges.
As for her cousin Rosemary, she would never allow herself to appear in public in anything torn or frayed or the least bit worse for wear. Tonight’s getup was especially remarkable, which would have been a point of conversation had it not been for Rosemary’s lamenting about her father not being in attendance, nor Pen, Ash’s longtime friend. It was difficult to take Rosemary seriously while she was wearing a dress entirely made out of Mardi Gras beads.
Rosemary, slightly buzzed from some signature drink that Ash’s bartender friend Bobby had concocted for the night, was saying something about Pen having misgivings about merging the two families, and how that somehow affected her even more than her own father’s overtly terrible behavior when it came to his daughter marrying a wolf shifter. GiGi couldn’t hear half of it over the noise of this party.
GiGi had little experience in relationships or even friendships outside of the DuChamp family to which she belonged. So she nodded and smiled and tried to change the subject by reminding Rosemary to eat something. Her food always seemed to distract Rosemary from her troubles.
For no
w, it worked. “GiGi, these beignets are amazing,” Rosemary said with a mouthful of the delicious fried pastries, powdered sugar drifting down into her cleavage.
GiGi had also created mini-king cakes for tonight’s event, and cookies in the shape of wedding rings. For something savory, she had baked homemade sausage and goat cheese inside mini pancakes. All of which she fed to Rosemary, requesting feedback as if she needed it.
She knew from the way all of her appetizers were disappearing as fast as she and her sous chef and extra help could refill the serving trays that her food was a hit tonight.
GiGi smiled and shouted at her cousin over the din. “Rosie, I’m so happy for you and Ash, I had to create something new for tonight. I hope you like everything.”
Rosemary hugged her, her face ecstatic with having experienced all of the flavors GiGi had brought that night. “I want you to do the cake for the wedding. Will you do it? Ash and I will pay whatever it takes to get it done. It’s got to be insane, and only you know what I like.”
GiGi expected nothing less. “Absolutely. Anything you want. It would be an honor, and I’ll do it as my gift to you.”
Rosie shook her head. “We’ll argue about that later. And since we’re in a bit of a rush to plan this thing in five months, can I lock down your people to do the catering as well?”
