Sweet Surprise: Romance Collection

by Wanda E. Brunstetter, Kristin Billerbeck, Kristy Dykes, Aisha Ford, Birdie L. Etchison, Pamela Griffin, Joyce Livingston, Tamela Hancock Murray

  “I’ll do that. Maybe I’ll even get up, cut a piece, and then taste it while you’re doing your segment. I’ll have to make sure I don’t feel superior over the other viewers, since I have a pie that was personally prepared by the beautiful woman showing Penny how to make it.”

  “You can call me beautiful all you want, but that won’t let you cut the pie sooner.”

  Gil hung his head in mock shame. “I guess you saw right through my attempt to butter you up?”

  Laughing, Monica put her hand on his shoulder and steered him toward the door. “Enough about cutting the pie right now. It’s not ready yet. Now go home before I change my mind and take it back.”

  Gil opened the door and paused. “Thanks for the pie and for a great evening. I had fun catching up on old times with you.”

  “Me, too.”

  “We should…do this again, sometime?”

  Monica tilted her head to the side. “Are you trying to get me to bake you more pies?”

  “No. I mean, anytime you want to give me a pie, I won’t turn it down, but I’m saying I have fun with you. I can’t talk to a pie. I miss you a lot more than I realized.”

  “Same here.”

  A long silence passed while neither of the two moved.

  Was he going to try to kiss her good night? Monica couldn’t decide if she should push the door open to signal that the evening was over or lean in to invite a kiss.

  Gil moved a step closer and hugged her. It wasn’t a terribly romantic embrace, since he was balancing a still-warm pie in one of his gloved hands, but it worked for Monica.

  She inhaled the scent of his cologne, mixed with the aroma of pie, and relaxed.

  She didn’t know how he felt, but she wouldn’t mind giving the relationship another chance.

  He ended the hug, waved good-bye, and left Monica standing there, watching him get into his car and drive away.

  Monica reluctantly closed the door and got ready for bed. She would have liked to call her mom or a friend and analyze her evening with Gil to determine if he had given any indication that he wanted more than friendship right now, but she didn’t have time.

  If she wanted to do a good job in the morning, she needed lots of rest tonight. The analysis would have to wait.

  Chapter 7

  G il got up an hour earlier than usual to get ready for work and watch Monica on St. Louis Morning.

  Keeping his word, Gil had not touched the pie last night, but his mouth watered as he went to the kitchen to cut a slice.

  Gil put the pie on a saucer and turned on the TV just as Penny Phelps introduced Monica.

  He watched as Monica went through the motions of mixing the ingredients and Penny chatted and asked questions.

  I am so fortunate to know her, and even more fortunate that she wants to be friends again after all that happened, Gil decided.

  Remembering back to their hug from the night before, Gil wondered how she would have reacted if he had kissed her. The thought had crossed his mind, and he had almost followed through with action. But at the last moment, Gil had ruled out more than a hug, mostly because it would have been incredibly awkward to attempt a kiss while he held a pie in one hand. But the next time he saw her, there wouldn’t be any pie….

  When they reached the part of the recipe where Monica produced an already-cooked pie out of the oven twenty seconds after putting in an uncooked one, Gil chuckled. Having grown up around the restaurant business, he had always found the illusion of speedy cooking on TV shows quite funny.

  Finally, Monica cut slices of pie for herself and Penny.

  “Oh, I can’t wait to taste the famous Pie Rack sweet potato pie,” Penny gushed. “I’ve always heard so much about it, but this is my first time to actually have some.”

  Gil mirrored Penny as she put some on her fork and took a generous bite.

  As soon as the dessert hit his taste buds, he realized that the grimace Penny had on her face was involuntary—because he was making the same face.

  Spitting the pie onto the plate, Gil tried to figure out what had gone wrong with the recipe.

  Penny didn’t fare much better. “Water!” she croaked, as Monica looked on with a stricken expression on her face. Utterly confused, Gil watched as Monica finally tasted the pie herself. Unlike him and Penny, Monica did manage to swallow the bite, but it appeared to take a great deal of effort.

  Gil took the uneaten pie back to the kitchen and got ready to leave. He didn’t know how long Monica would remain at the studio, but wherever she was, he planned to find her and do what he could to help.

  Monica rested her head on the steering wheel and cried, not caring if anyone saw her. Penny Phelps had been good-natured about the whole situation, and she assured Monica that the “Hidden Treasures” segment would still air. In fact, the crews were coming in two days to get some footage.

  “Mistakes happen,” Penny said. “I’m just sorry it was live and I wasn’t able to pull it off more convincingly.”

  As soon as she had tasted the pie, Monica understood exactly what was wrong. Mentally retracing her steps, she realized that in her haste to transfer the ingredients to smaller canisters, she had poured salt into the sugar container.

  Any other day, she probably would have caught the mistake before it went too far, but because she was so flustered after catching Gil in her bookkeeping files, she hadn’t even noticed.

  Gil.

  Monica sat up and wiped her eyes, remembering her dad’s warning.

  “No good can come of this.”

  He had been right. Now Monica even doubted that Gil was telling the truth last night. Accidentally. “Ha! The big liar,” she said bitterly.

  Her cell phone rang, and the caller ID read GILBERT.

  “Calling to rejoice in my failure?” she said to the phone. “Forget it. Pretending to help me and then trying to sabotage me behind my back does not count for friendship.” She turned the ringer to silent mode and ignored the call.

  Thoroughly embarrassed, Monica pulled herself together and drove to her parents’ house.

  Chapter 8

  A n hour later, having been comforted by her mother and encouraged by her father, who diplomatically refrained from any I-told-you-so statements, Monica headed to The Pie Rack, feeling better emotionally, but mentally more confused than she had ever been when she’d arrived.

  Looking in the rearview mirror and noticing that her makeup was a little less than pristine, Monica realized she’d been so flustered after the recipe demonstration that she left her makeup bag at the TV station.

  There was no way she felt like showing her face there any time soon, so she decided to make a stop at the pharmacy to replace a few basics.

  A woman on a mission, Monica swiftly gathered up mascara, lipstick, powder, neutral eye shadow, and headed to the checkout line.

  All of the lanes were crowded, with at least four people waiting. Monica quickly perused the customers’ shopping baskets and moved to the line where people were purchasing the fewest items.

  While she waited, she thought about the conversation she’d just had with her parents. Strangely, they both found the pie-tasting mishap quite comical, and despite the potential image problem the appearance might cause for The Pie Rack, they both seemed to doubt Gil had deliberately tried to make her ruin the recipe. Though they both seemed concerned that he had accessed The Pie Rack budget spreadsheets, they both agreed to give him the benefit of the doubt that it had truly been an accident.

  “But he took a pie home, too,” Monica protested. “If he was really my friend, he could have at least tried to warn me before I went on the air.”

  “I thought you told him to let it sit overnight. Maybe he still has yet to taste it,” her mother suggested.

  Gil’s repeated calls to her cell phone also polished her parents’ opinion of his character.

  “At least give him a chance to explain himself,” her dad advised. “If he’s as wonderful as you described him the other day, he j
ust might be feeling pretty terrible right about now.”

  “I doubt he would keep calling if he’d done something untoward. About now is the time you’d expect someone like that to quietly slink out of sight.”

  Monica had agreed to give him a chance to explain, but right now she didn’t want to think about it. All she wanted right now was to hurry up and get out of the store, so she could reapply her makeup and go to work without looking as bad as she felt.

  The woman in front of her in line turned around and said, “I can’t believe this is taking so long. What are they doing up there, anyway?”

  “Tell me about it,” Monica nodded in agreement. “I have to get to work pretty soon.”

  The woman shook her head and turned back around. With nothing better to do, Monica examined all of the impulse-buy items strategically placed on both sides of where she stood.

  The lady in front of her turned around again, as if she wanted to continue the conversation, but Monica pretended to be engrossed in reading the copy on a package of scented hand sanitizer. She wasn’t trying to be rude, but neither did she feel much like making small talk.

  Although Monica made no move to converse with her, the woman still kept turning around intermittently to glance at her, and she wondered if there was something hanging out of her nose. There was nothing worse than having people stare at you without saying anything.

  “Monica, isn’t it?” the woman said.

  Startled, Monica looked up at her. “I’m sorry?”

  “Your name is Monica, isn’t it?”

  Monica nodded, although she couldn’t ever recall having met this woman before in her life.

  “I knew I had seen you somewhere before. I’m Leeda Adams.”

  Monica blinked. The name didn’t ring a bell, either.

  The woman must have realized that Monica had no recollection of ever meeting her.

  “I’m Gil Butler’s cousin. We met once when he brought you to a family dinner.”

  Monica could remember the event itself, but not Leeda in particular. Ten years had passed since then, and Gil had about a million cousins. Well, not really a million, but at least twenty or thirty.

  “So how’s business for you? Pretty good, I hear, ever since your family ran off with the better location and left Uncle Amos and Aunt Melinda in the lurch.”

  Monica felt herself growing angrier by the second. First, Gil had indirectly ruined her TV appearance, and now his cousin wanted to accuse her family of initiating the dissolution of the partnership.

  Monica didn’t have a chance to defend herself because Leeda kept going. “You know, Uncle Amos always said your family would get what you deserved someday, and if it hasn’t happened yet, it will sooner or later, because God don’t like ugly, that’s for sure.”

  Monica was taken aback by such a harsh statement. Had Gil’s family really told people that her family cheated them? The nerve of them! The exact opposite was more honest.

  Trying to keep composed, she answered, “I really don’t think you should be commenting on matters you don’t know anything about.”

  The line was finally moving now, and thankfully, Leeda’s items were already being scanned.

  But that didn’t stop her from throwing out another nugget of wisdom. “Oh, I know enough, all right, and I know one thing for sure, as long as you let it keep festering, it’ll just get worse. What you reap is what you’re gonna sow. What you need to do is get together and at least talk it out. And it seems to me a little apologizing might be in order.”

  Likewise, Monica thought. Wouldn’t it be nice to hear Amos say sorry to Dad for greedily taking the most profit and leaving us to start over financially? Or maybe Gil would like to explain why he was really snooping in my files.

  The checker moved swiftly, and within moments, Leeda and her platitudes were gone. And not a moment too soon. Monica didn’t know how much longer she could remain civil.

  As soon as she finished paying for her purchases, Monica went to her car, reapplied makeup, and thought about her promise to let Gil explain himself.

  For the rest of the short drive to The Pie Rack, she fussed under her breath about the nerve of Gil’s cousin.

  By the time Monica pulled into the parking lot at work, she had calmed down considerably, but there was no way she was calling Gil right now. Leeda had told her that Amos wished The Pie Rack would fail. Was he bitter enough that he’d stoop so low as to send Gil to make it happen?

  No, she wasn’t going to be calling Gil back anytime soon. The last thing she wanted to do was hear his smug voice right now.

  Monica entered the building and graciously accepted the sympathetic glances and pep talks from The Pie Rack employees.

  On a normal day, she might stick around out front and chitchat with the waitresses or go back to the kitchen to make small talk with the bakers, but today she did neither. Instead, she went straight to her office.

  No sooner than she had gotten situated at her desk, someone knocked on the door.

  “Come in!” she called.

  The door swung open, and Gil stood in the doorway.

  Chapter 9

  A long silence passed between them. Monica wondered who had sent him back to her office. As soon as Gil was gone, she intended to find out and have a long talk with that individual about respecting her privacy.

  Gil held a vase of roses and he stood still. His usual confidence was gone, as if he could sense that she didn’t want him there. “Can I come in?”

  Monica wanted nothing more than to tear into him about the accusations his cousin had just made, but just before she opened her mouth, she remembered her parents’ advice and pushed aside the impulse to jump to conclusions.

  He’d better do some pretty fancy explaining, she told herself.

  Gil came in, and Monica fully expected him to take a seat in one of the chairs in front of the desk.

  He surprised her completely by putting the vase on her desk, then coming around to her side of the desk and bending down to give her a hug. Although at first she wanted to pull away, Monica didn’t. She rested her head on his shoulder and hoped he was being sincere. All of the old feelings she’d experienced after their break up came flooding back, and Monica realized that what she really wanted was to find a way to make sense of this whole mess.

  Despite what had transpired ten years ago, and regardless of what his cousin said, the last thing she wanted was to lose him again.

  “How are you?” he asked quietly, pulling away from the hug and taking a seat in a chair.

  “Completely mortified. It’s not every day you make a pie so nasty that Penny Phelps spits it out on live TV.”

  “I wish I’d tasted the pie last night. At least I could have warned you about it.”

  Monica could tell he was sincere, and her earlier misgivings melted away. “At least you kept your promise.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help remedy—” Gil was interrupted by Monica’s cell phone ringing.

  Monica checked the caller ID and groaned. It was Adella. Her menu presentation was later this afternoon, and Monica didn’t know if she had the resolve to handle Adella’s personality after all that had already happened. She wondered if Gil might be willing to handle that meeting by himself. All he really had to do was show Adella a list of potential dish choices.

  “Hello?”

  “Monica, this is Adella.” Her tone was clipped and very somber.

  Monica wondered if the room was abnormally hot, or if she was just getting nervous. “Hi, Adella. We’re still on for the meeting this afternoon? Three o’clock?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “This morning, I was awakened by several phone calls from friends who saw you on St. Louis Morning and told me I was making a big mistake to let you cater my engagement party.”

  “Adella, I can explain that. We had a mix up with some ingredients, and that’s why the pie I used this morning didn’t taste right. I can assur
e you that nothing like that will happen for your event.”

  “Well…” Adella hesitated, and Monica glanced at Gil.

  He seemed to be getting the gist of the conversation, and he looked worried. Now that he was counting on this job, Monica wanted to do everything she could to make sure it didn’t get pulled out from under them.

  “You do realize our contract was contingent upon you finding another company to provide the dinner menu, right?”

  “Yes, I’m aware of that, and I have found a partner. We’ve actually written out several sample menus that we were going to show you this afternoon, and I think you’ll be more than happy with—”

  “Hold on, that’s my other line.” Adella clicked over and left Monica on hold. But today’s music was more along the lines of contemporary jazz rather than the swoony love songs of a few days ago.

  Although Adella’s frequent switching to another line annoyed her to no end, Monica took the opportunity to quickly explain the seriousness of the situation to Gil.

  “I’m sorry I was such a klutz. The last thing I wanted to do was lose this job for us,” she told him.

  “Don’t worry, I doubt she’ll actually fire us, because that would mean she’ll have to go back to the drawing board.”

  Monica nodded in agreement. “You’re right. But now she’ll feel like she can ask for ridiculous concessions, and we’ll have to give them to her.”

  Gil shrugged. “That’s the beauty of this business. The customer is always right, so you have to be willing to go the extra mile.”

  “Your dad always said that,” Monica said, remembering.

  “Yeah. He still does. I think it’s his motto. My mom says she’s surprised those weren’t my first words.”

  Adella clicked back over. “Here’s the deal. I will be willing to reconsider if you set up a complete menu tasting for me and Byron.”

  “So you’ll come in this afternoon and pick a sample menu, and then we’ll set up another date for you to taste everything?” Monica clarified.

  “No, the meeting for this afternoon is cancelled. I want you to cook all of your sample menus, and then we’ll come in and taste everything and then pick the menu we want for the party.”