Not Your Average Vixen: A Christmas Romance

by Krista Sandor

  “Here’s what we’ll do. I’ll rotate the turntable, and you can hold the spatula just like this, and then the cake will be done,” she instructed.

  “I get to finish the cake?” Carly asked, eyes wide.

  Bridget nodded. “You arrived at the perfect time. Are you ready?”

  The little girl glanced at Soren. “Are you watching, Uncle Scooter?”

  Her surly wolf’s expression softened. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world, kiddo.”

  The tenderness in his voice sent a shiver down her spine, and she exhaled a shaky breath.

  Focus!

  “Here we go,” she said, swiveling the turntable as Carly applied another thin layer to the bottom tier.

  “I’m doing it!” the girl exclaimed just as the door to the bakery flew open.

  “Thank goodness, you’re not closed!” a panic-stricken woman cried, pressing her hand to her heart.

  “I’m sorry, but the bakery isn’t open. The shop went out of business. We’re only using the space temporarily,” she answered as Carly handed over the spatula.

  “Could you use the space temporarily to help the Kringle Cares Foundation?” the distraught woman asked.

  “I’m sorry, but I don’t know what that is?” she answered.

  “We work with children with special needs, and today is our holiday celebration. We have dozens of families here to take part in the activities in the town square. This year, with the Cupid Bakery closing, we ordered sugar cookies from another bakery in Denver, but I just learned that they lost our order, and now we don’t have any cookies to share with the families.”

  How awful!

  “I’m so sorry to hear that,” Bridget offered.

  “We’re in a bind. It’s not Christmas in Kringle without sugar cookies. What do you say? Can you help us out?” the woman asked, her eyes pleading for assistance.

  Could she pull it off?

  “How many cookies do you need?” she asked.

  “At least twelve dozen sugar cookies—and we need them in less than an hour. The kids look forward to them every year.”

  One hundred forty-four cookies in under an hour!

  Bridget swallowed past the lump in her throat. “That’s a lot cookies to make in a short amount of time.”

  “The children look forward to eating cookies after they go ice skating, and I hate to disappoint them and their families,” the woman added.

  Bridget twisted the tie on her apron.

  In all honesty, she’d never been totally in charge. There was always a safety net. If something awful came out of Gaston’s bakery, he would have been the one to take the brunt of the criticism. Sure, he would have let her have it, too, but until this moment, the buck had never officially stopped with her.

  She glanced around the bakery, calculating exactly what she needed to pull off prepping and baking one hundred and forty-four cookies in less than an hour. Her pulse kicked up. Flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, eggs, butter, milk, vanilla extract. Everything she needed was there.

  And instantly, so was the spirit of her grandmother.

  What would Grandma Dasher do if she were here?

  The answer was clear.

  Her parents and grandmother believed in volunteerism and charity. And above all else, extending a helping hand to those in need.

  Yes, they would have been proud of how she’d provided for Lori. But had Garrett been right? Had she twisted her situation into an excuse to shy away from her dreams and hide behind the guise of sacrifice?

  Was there more to the lowly assistant baker and the girl who’d never pushed past her limits?

  It was time to find out.

  Bridget lifted her chin. “We can do it. Let your group know that they’ll have their cookies in less than an hour.”

  The woman clapped her hands. “Thank you! And can you deliver them to the pavilion in the Kringle Square?”

  “Absolutely,” she replied as a heady rush of resolve coursed through her veins.

  The woman released a sigh of relief. “You’re an angel! Thank you! I can’t wait to let everyone know,” she said, then hurried out of the shop.

  The door slammed closed, and Bridget felt all eyes fall on her.

  “How will you make all those cookies?” Lori asked.

  Bridget brushed her hands together, removing the bits of dried frosting.

  It was vixen baker time.

  “It’s going to take all of us to get this done in under an hour. Who’s in?” she asked, surveying the group.

  “Me, me, me!” Cole and Carly chimed as Lori and every Abbott raised their hands.

  “What about you?” she said, eyeing Soren.

  “What about me?” he asked with a cocky grin that, God help her, made her toes curl inside her boots.

  “Are you in?”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  The air crackled between them. The banter was back.

  “No, sir, you do not have a choice. Take out your phone. We need holiday music, STAT.”

  Soren bit back a grin but followed orders like a good soldier, and she took on the role of cookie captain.

  There was no going back now. It was cookies or bust time!

  Soren tapped on his cell as Bing’s voice rang out, and she started calling out orders.

  “The wedding cake goes in the refrigerator. Russell, that’s you, and then you’re on dish duty.”

  Better to keep the handsy uncle busy.

  “Yes, ma’am!” the man called, snapping to it.

  There was no time to lose.

  She and Lori whipped up the royal icing and the cookie dough as the Abbotts, plus her sexy scrooge washed up. When the group was ready to go, she assigned them to teams. There were Abbotts rocking rolling pins, Abbotts cracking with the cookie cutters, and Abbotts icing and applying sprinkles.

  Like a finely tuned machine, the cookie assembly line hummed as everyone sang and swayed to the beat.

  “Cole and Carly! Let’s see your dance moves. We need to add plenty of good holiday vibes to our cookies,” she called as she applied a dollop of frosting.

  The kids busted out their moves as the adults chuckled.

  “We’re running low on sprinkles,” the judge called, shaking a near-empty container of the tiny multicolored balls.

  “Let me see what I can find,” she replied as she wiped her hands on her apron.

  She searched the shelves and spied a canister up high near the back of the shop. Stretching to reach it, she pushed onto her tiptoes but stilled when a presence came up behind her, and a tingle ran down her spine. She’d know this energy anywhere.

  “Allow me,” came the sexy rasp of the man she could not figure out.

  He’d joined in the cookie assembly as if he actually cared—and maybe he did, or perhaps he was pretending, playing the dutiful best man in front of the Abbotts. Either way, she had to keep her guard up. The highs and lows with this cat-eyed Romeo could give a gal whiplash.

  She glanced over her shoulder. That Soren sex tractor beam was downright irresistible—especially when he was wearing an apron.

  “Sprinkles,” she breathed, because that was all her sex mushed brain could come up with.

  “Sprinkles,” he replied.

  Perfect! They had one word between the two of them. That would get weird fast.

  She parted her lips, not sure what would come out. Perhaps, she’d repeat sprinkles when Carly giggled.

  “What is it, honey?” Grace asked her granddaughter.

  “Uncle Scooter and Birdie have to kiss,” the little girl chimed.

  “Why would you say that?” Soren asked, his cheeks growing pink.

  Carly pointed to the ceiling. “You’re under the mistletoe.”

  She glanced up and, yep, there was mistletoe.

  “It looks fake,” Soren said with an uncharacteristic hoarseness to his voice.

  Was he nervous?

  “Fake or real, if you get caught under the mistletoe, you have to kiss.
It’s Christmas rules,” the judge offered with the hint of a grin as the rest of the Abbotts egged them on to offer up a kiss.

  “I didn’t see the mistletoe. That’s not why I came over to help you,” Soren said without a smirk or a glare.

  “I didn’t notice it either,” she whispered back.

  “Go on, Birdie! Tame the beast!” Tom teased.

  “I could take your place, Scooter,” Russ offered, throwing her a leisure suit Larry leer.

  “No, you couldn’t,” Soren said softly, for only her to hear, as his breath tickled her lips.

  Her pulse hammered. Her heart felt too large for her chest. His nearness sent her body into overdrive.

  Just one kiss.

  One little peck.

  That’s it.

  Nothing more.

  She could restrain herself. For Pete’s sake, there were children in the room!

  The bakery faded away as his sandalwood scent mingled with the cookies, carrying her off into holiday horniness. She fluttered her eyes closed, so ready to have his lips pressed to hers, if only for a moment when the door chime cut through the pre-kiss mistletoe haze and a Santa and Mrs. Claus lookalike combo entered the bakery.

  The man looked around the space as if he’d come upon an old friend, then wrapped his arm around the woman.

  “It’s a Christmas miracle, Agnes!” he exclaimed.

  Bridget stared at them. The pair seemed oddly familiar. Maybe she’d seen them last night when she was baked—and not in the good cookie way. Or perhaps, they were interested in purchasing baked goods.

  But those notions vanished when she glanced back at Soren.

  Wide-eyed, the color had drained from his cheeks. The man looked as if he’d seen a ghost as a prickle spider-crawled its way down her spine; and she was sure of one thing.

  There was more to this couple than two people on the prowl for sugar cookies.

  11

  Soren

  No!

  It couldn’t be!

  Had he lost his mind?

  It sure as hell felt like it.

  Bridget Dasher and those damned brown eyes of hers were driving him insane. That had to be it. The pendulum swinging between wanting to throttle her while simultaneously having every cell in his body screaming to hold her in his arms and never let her go had turned out to be the precursor to a one-way ticket straight to a padded cell.

  His gaze bounced between her petal-soft lips and the couple who sauntered in off the street, like ghosts of his not-so-distant past.

  He blinked. At least he had control of his eyelids.

  Had he accidentally eaten those damned pot gummy bears?

  Was he straight-up stoned? Was he about to start conversing with eggs like his baked vixen had last night?

  No, he’d thrown the gummy bears into the trash after they’d returned to the mountain house. As of right now, aside from feeling drunk off a misplaced Bridget Dasher momentary fascination, he was completely sober. And that’s never a good thing when you’re ninety-nine percent sure you’re hallucinating.

  “Wait a second,” Bridget said as she broke away from him and headed toward the couple. “I recognize you two. It’s an honor to meet you,” she added, hurrying around the counter to the front of the shop to greet the couple.

  Not just any couple.

  Agnes and Ernie Angel, whose acquaintance he’d made only a handful of days ago when he’d thought more about banging their attorney than bailing out their business.

  The couple whose livelihood he was in the process of liquidating.

  And then it hit him.

  He owned Cupid Bakery.

  He’d never thought of his acquisitions as anything more than assets. It never occurred to him to visit or even think about a purchase as something tangible. To him, they were simply line items on a spreadsheet.

  But through some insane Christmas plot twist, the Angels had landed literally on his doorstep.

  “Everyone, these lovely people are Agnes and Ernie Angel. They’re the owners of the Cupid Bakery chain—the bakery we’re making cookies in right now,” Bridget said to the group with a wide grin.

  Ernie shook his head. “That’s not quite accurate, miss.”

  Bridget frowned. “It’s not?”

  “No, dear, that gentleman over there in the apron owns the bakeries now,” Agnes said, throwing him the sweetest of smiles as she pointed a gloved finger at him.

  “What are they talking about, Scooter?” Scott asked.

  Soren scanned the room and found all eyes on him.

  “About that,” he began, only to have Tom’s sister cut him off.

  “You must be mistaken. Scooter’s a businessman. He doesn’t own a string of bakeries, do you?” Denise asked, pinning him with her hawkish gaze.

  He cleared his throat as he descended into holiday-scented hell.

  “That’s a complicated question,” he answered as Denise raised an eyebrow—not for a second falling for his legalese.

  “This is your bakery, Uncle Scooter?” Carly asked, coming to his side.

  What was he supposed to do? Lie to her?

  Shit!

  And what was he supposed to say? These two sweet old people didn’t keep up with the times and couldn’t maintain the financial demands of their life’s work?

  He patted Carly’s shoulder. “Technically, I own Cupid Bakery along with Ernie and Agnes Angel. I, however, have a larger stake and can act unilaterally.”

  “Uni-what?” the little girl replied.

  He started to give her some bullshit answer when Bridget’s jaw dropped.

  “You’re kidding? This has got to be a joke!” she said, clearly having put the pieces together.

  He loosened his collar. Damn, it had gotten hot in here.

  Feeling his cheeks heat, he held Bridget’s gaze. Sure, she’d given him side-eye, rolled eyes, and glared at him more times than he could count. He’d liked all that—their usual tête-à-tête, toe to toe, Birdie versus Scooter battle of wills. But this look, this look made him want to crumple up into a ball. Yes, she was angry, but he could deal with anger. This look cut straight to the bone. Visceral disgust burned in her eyes like nothing he’d ever seen—or felt.

  Aside from his connection to the Abbotts, he hadn’t felt all that much in many, many years.

  And this was why he didn’t allow business to become personal.

  He squared his jaw.

  He’d spent a lifetime closing off his heart and muting his emotions.

  She would not get to him. He simply wouldn’t allow it.

  “It’s no joke at all, young lady. I’m surprised to see you here, Mr. Rudolph,” Agnes said, still smiling as if she weren’t about to lose everything.

  Bridget gasped. “You make them call you, Mr. Rudolph?”

  He threw up his hands. “That’s just what they call me! I don’t make anyone do anything!”

  “Besides buy their business out from under them to make a buck,” she threw back.

  Holy holly and the ivy hell! The mittens were coming off this vixen!

  “We know of your bakeries. There used to be one by us in Boston,” Lori said, throwing a worried glance at her sister.

  If he didn’t want her to marry his best friend, he’d be grateful she’d taken the microscope off of him—at least for the moment.

  Tom nodded. “We wondered what happened when it closed suddenly.”

  Soren glanced at the ovens. Maybe it was cooler in there because it had become blisteringly hot in this shop.

  “I run an outreach center for homeless teens, and Cupid Bakery always donated baked goods to our center,” Denise added.

  What he wouldn’t give for about two hundred of Tanner’s “special recipe” gummy bears. And even that probably wouldn’t be enough to improve this shit show.

  He’d never had the different parts of his life intersect like this in one giant cookie-infused cluster fuck.

  He’d done a damn good job compartmentalizing his
life. His parents existed in a box. A box he tried like hell never to open. His work occupied another. His friendship with Tom and his relationship with the Abbotts were completely separate from those realms. He’d incorporated a very specific set of behaviors for work and shutting out his parents—the two places where he couldn’t let his guard slip, not even for a second.

  It wasn’t that hard.

  Not anymore.

  Not with Fiona Traeger and Palmer Rudolph.

  The divide between himself and his mother and father had happened gradually, like a crack in the ice. Slowly, one year of no contact turned into two, and two into four. And then, when he’d graduated from college only to look out into the crowd and see Grace, Scott, the judge, Russell, and Denise clapping as he received his diploma, he’d realized that the separation from his parents was complete. The unwanted child was no longer a child. He was an island unto himself, and this reality was mutually accepted by all parties.

  It boiled down to this: Soren Christopher Traeger Rudolph was a ruthless man. But with the Abbotts, he was Scooter. The gangly kid they’d known since he was fourteen.

  But who was he to Bridget? What box did she fit into?

  She was supposed to be a fling, a fleeting romance on the periphery of his life. Instead, she straddled both worlds.

  Soren or Scooter, she knew them both.

  No one had ever bridged that divide.

  And no one ever could because it would never work, would it?

  All eyes were back on him. He needed to say something.

  “What brings you to Kringle, Colorado? I thought you lived in Vermont,” he asked coolly.

  If this wasn’t a Santa-sized mind fuck, he didn’t know what was. But he couldn’t reveal how affected he was by this twilight zone situation.

  “I’m not sure if you know this, Mr. Rudolph, but Ernie is a member of the Fraternal Order of Bearded Santas. We have many friends who reside in Kringle now,” Agnes answered.

  Of—freaking—course, Ernie was a member!

  Was every dude with a real white beard part of this club?

  “We had a little extra time on our hands this holiday season, and our friends invited us to stay with them in Kringle. We’re here through Christmas Day, and then we’ll head back to Vermont to see our children and grandchildren,” Ernie finished.