The Emma Wild Mysteries: Complete Holiday Collection Books 1-4 (Cozy Romantic Mysteries with Recipes)

by Lin, Harper

  I got up from the couch, feeling my stomach jiggle. Whenever I gained weight, it all went to my stomach. It was easier enough to hide under loose-fitting shirts, but my work required sexy, tight-fitting dresses.

  “Sure is hard to be a celebrity,” Mirabelle teased. “I’ve got to go home for dinner, but I’ll pick you up tomorrow for the bake-off.”

  “Good night.”

  I went upstairs and took that long overdue shower and felt refreshed.

  When I got out of the bathroom, I listened to some Ella Fitzgerald in my room and relaxed for awhile.

  After a week of incubation, trashy TV, heartbreak and boredom, my life was getting back its motion again. Things were speeding up all around me. The reporter, the bake-off, and the baby shower. Okay, so it wasn’t exactly a lot. Not compared with my work life. Touring really took a toll on you. So did interviews and photoshoots and walking the red carpet. Not to mention getting chased by the paparazzi in your sweats.

  I took out my notebook and started writing down ideas for Mirabelle’s baby shower. I would invite only our closest female friends and hold it at this house. I’d make a banner that was a cutout of a baby-bottle with spilt milk. “Mirabelle’s Baby Shower” would be written in the milk. There should be at least five baby shower games, like who could suck the beer out of the baby bottle fastest and guess the mystery chocolate in a diaper taste test.

  Planning this baby shower excited me more than talk show appearances, awards parties and photo-shoots that I was beginning to wonder when I’d ever want to go back to work.

  By nature, I was simply a creative person. The celebrity thing was never really a goal. I had always wanted to sing, or to create. And now, I wanted to make the invitations to the shower by hand. I was pretty good at paper crafts, and I planned on making a pop-up card, where a baby would be springing out of of a card shaped like an egg when the egg opened up.

  In the back of my closet, I found my old box of craft supplies. There were construction paper, tape, stickers, doilies, goggly eyes and all sorts of other random knick knacks that I had kept from when I used to do crafts when I was young. And by young, I meant up to my late teens.

  Even now, I think that if given a piece of paper and some scissors, I’d be happy for hours. I was a big kid at heart, which was why I wanted to have kids of my own soon.

  In two hours, I managed to get eight invitations finished. I drew different expressions on each baby’s face for a personal touch.

  Mirabelle was going to have a son, but she wanted the shower to be gender-neutral. She didn’t believe that only girls liked pink and boys like blue. She wanted to be an open-minded parent who raised her son without conditioned gender preconceptions, so she didn’t mind if we bought “girly” toys or pink things.

  She felt this way because she had been a tomboy growing up but was reprimanded for liking boy’s toys, which she thought was unfair of my parents.

  I wondered if I was going to have children of my own anytime soon. For awhile there, I imagined myself marrying Sterling, settling down in Hartfield, being a stepmom to his two little girls, and having more kids of our own.

  But now it looked like I would have to start at square one. I haven’t heard from Nick, even though his film shoot had wrapped. Maybe now that he was back in his Hollywood lifestyle of film shoots and press junkets, settling down with a family didn’t matter as much as he claimed it did. My fears were probably realized: he had been chasing me only when I had broken up with him. Playing hard to get—even though I wasn’t playing—could get a guy to do some crazy things sometimes. Maybe after some time away from me, he came to his senses.

  I sighed as I made my ninth baby card. For now, I would just play with Mirabelle’s baby, and live the family life vicariously through her. She did the same thing with my celebrity lifestyle, enjoying the perks like attending parties with me sometimes and staying in posh hotels. Maybe I could just enjoy playing with a cute baby without all the work that came along with being a mother.

  The thought cheered me up when the doorbell rang again. I hoped it wasn’t Aaron, back with another load of questions about my love life.

  I went downstairs, still wearing my fluffy purple robe and matching slippers. Nobody else was in the house. It was Friday, Mom and Dad’s date night, when they wined and dined and enjoyed each other’s company. It was sweet really. No wonder their marriage had lasted over 35 years.

  I looked through the peephole again.

  Yikes.

  It was Sterling, looking really handsome even through the warped peephole.

  “Emma,” he said. “I know you’re there. Can you please open up?”

  “Just because I’m here doesn’t mean I have to do anything,” I said.

  “Please, it’s been a week. Can we talk?”

  “Talk about what?” I said.

  “About—you know what about.”

  I flung the door open, not even caring that my red hair was still wet, or that I wasn’t wearing anything underneath my robe. Since Sterling was intruding on my time in my space, he would have to deal with it.

  His eyes went wide at the sight of me, then he looked away when he found himself staring.

  “May I come in?” he said.

  “Fine. But you’re not getting any tea or coffee.”

  He stepped in. His coat was covered with snowflakes and I resisted the urge to wipe them off as I would have in the past.

  Sterling sat on the couch, which made me avoid it. I sat on the sofa instead.

  “So talk,” I said.

  “About last week,” he started uncomfortably. “It wasn’t what you think. Sandra and I were not getting hot and heavy in the offices all the time. That day, she closed the doors and the windows and just sort of started kissing me.”

  “Out of nowhere, she started kissing you? Isn’t that considered sexual harassment or something?”

  “Yes, well, I admit I wasn’t entirely innocent. I didn’t exactly fight her off.”

  “Right. I noticed. You looked quite comfortable from what I could tell.”

  Sterling sighed. “I don’t know what to say. This might sound really lame, but I was under a lot of stress that week.”

  “And you wanted to blow off some steam?”

  “Sure, we get along and she flirts with me sometimes, and she is attraction, but I want to be with you. I have to admit it was difficult when I couldn’t see you last month. It was a sort of blow to the ego that you had to think about whether you wanted to be with me or your ex-boyfriend. As far as I was concerned, you were going to choose Nick. He was the one who left town.”

  “But I wanted to be fair,” I said. “You said you were willing to give me the space. I had just gotten out of a breakup and I was confused.”

  “So was I,” Sterling said. “I just felt rejected, and when Sandra showing me attention, I was flattered. I know it’s no excuse, but…”

  He didn’t know what else to say. This was what was so aggravating about Sterling sometimes. He had a difficult time verbalizing how he felt. He was hurt because of the whole situation with Nick, and he took solace in the first brunette co-worker that shoved her firm bosoms in his face.

  And I wasn’t having it.

  “Look Sterling, I know this was a difficult situation, but I’m looking for someone who wants to be with me and only me. You say that you do, but your actions say that you don’t believe we have a chance. And I’m starting to think that we don’t either. I’m looking for someone who’s secure with himself and won’t hook up with floozy co-workers if things are not going well in his relationship.”

  “Emma, I’m an idiot. I didn’t think I had a chance.”

  “You said you were going to fight for me this time. But you never do.” I shook my head. “No, I can’t see us working out in the long-term. Being hurt by you once is enough.”

  Sterling’s expression dimmed. “It’s not as if Nick is innocent. You don’t think he’s with his co-star?”

  I pressed my
lips together and didn’t answer.

  “Just because you’ve never caught him, doesn’t mean that he’s been loyal.”

  I met Sterling’s grey eyes. I couldn’t believe that he would deflect this to Nick.

  “This has nothing to do with Nick,” I said. “Whatever he’s doing doesn’t concern me. I never said that we were together. Maybe he is with his co-star now, or maybe not. But when we were together, he was always faithful to me. I know that.”

  Nick just wasn’t the type to cheat. Sure, other woman wanted him to, but he was brought up well. Nick was a mama’s boy and treated women with respect. Now that I thought about it, Sterling’s parents divorced because his father skipped out on the family to be with another woman. Did the apple fall far from the tree? Sterling was also divorced. Maybe he didn’t know the first thing about how to make a marriage work.

  I just couldn’t risk giving up my career to be with someone who might not be worth it in the end.

  “I’m sorry, Sterling. It’s over. I hope you’re happy with Sandra. I think you two have more in common anyway.”

  “Emma…”

  I looked at him again expectantly, but he had nothing to add to that.

  “I guess it was never meant to be anyway,” Sterling finally said. “You have this huge career, and I’m just a small town detective. It was never going to work.”

  I nodded coldly. “It wasn’t. You’re right.”

  He stood up and made his way to the door. I sat where I was and watched him leave without another word.

  When he left, I cried. But only a little.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  By the time Saturday rolled around, I was in a much better mood. If I wasn’t a judge, maybe I would’ve even entered the bake-off. Baking was relaxing, but I hadn’t had much time to do that for the last few years. Once in a blue moon, Nick and I used to bake apple pies together in our New York apartment. In fact, Nick had done a lot of baking with his mother growing up, which I always thought was sweet.

  The first round of the contest was in the early afternoon. The contestants brought their cupcakes to Hartfield High’s gym, which was set up with tables, and the judges would just have to taste them and announce the four finalists. The rest of the day was spent socializing and eating the rest of the cupcakes.

  Mirabelle picked me up in front of the house. She was looking very lovely in a black knitted dress and black heels under her winter coat. We drove off to the high school. The reason the contest took place there was because they had a cooking classroom with six ovens that we could use for the Sunday portion of the contest when the finalists had to bake on the premises.

  Aaron was in front of the high school when we pulled up. Like the big city hipster that he was, he was carrying an extra large cup of coffee, from the Chocoholic Cafe no less. Mirabelle approved.

  “What’s that you have there?” she asked him.

  “The Chocolate Americano,” Aaron said. “I’d never had an Chocolate Americano before.”

  “It was Emma’s invention,” Mirabelle said proudly.

  “Really?” It was the most impressed I’d ever seen Aaron. “This is amazing. Grammy winner and coffee genius.”

  “You just add some chocolate to it,” I said. “No biggie. Adding chocolate to anything makes it better.”

  “Hence, the Chocoholic Cafe,” said Mirabelle.

  “Genius Family,” said Aaron.

  The three of us went inside the gym, where many of the long tables were already full of cupcakes.

  “We’re going to try all this?” I exclaimed. There were at least forty contestants.

  This was my first bake-off at Hartfield. They only started this tradition three years ago, and I’d missed every single one of them. Part of the reason I wanted to stay in town was probably to do stuff like this, which I never got to anymore.

  Aaron must’ve read my mind.

  “No wonder you don’t want to go back to New York,” he joked.

  When all the contestants sat down, Mirabelle went up to make her opening speech.

  “Welcome to the third annual Hartfield Bake-off. It’s a privilege to have you all here today. As you know, the winner receives a romantic getaway to Hawaii for two, courtesy of our sponsor, Sunstream Travel. You’ll also get the coveted Chocoholic Cafe VIP card, which is good for one year’s worth of free hot chocolate at my cafe.”

  She introduced the judges, and we each got up on stage. People snapped pictures, and a few people screamed my name, but this was a mild audience compared to my sold-out concerts. The pictures would end up in the town paper, although they could make its way to the tabloids and the internet.

  The contestants were all different ages, and there were almost as many males as females. I had assumed it was going to be mostly old ladies, but I was wrong. My dad wanted to enter, but he couldn’t because there was a judge in the family.

  Mirabelle announced that we would be doing our first round of blind taste tests soon and for them to please prepare their entries by cutting their cupcakes into four pieces, placing them on a tray and writing their entry number on the blank tag that they were given and place it next to the cupcake.

  After that, we tried over forty cupcake samples. Not all at once of course. We each tried five at a time, and selected the two we liked the most. That we did eight times until we had our top sixteen. Then the judges compared notes. The cupcakes that were favored by two or all of the judges got a pass into the top eight. If we disagreed, we had to try the ones the other judges picked and decide on the best ones.

  Once we had our top eight cupcakes, then we really got down to business in choosing the top four. Most of the cupcakes were delicious. Each judge had their preferences in regards to flavor. I loved red velvet, and the other judge, Mike, who was Mirabelle’s baker, was an expert in anything chocolate. The third judge, Sylvia, preferred anything original. The lavender cupcake got her vote.

  Some were dry, some were ultra light, some were heavy on cream, some were enormous and some were half the size of what cupcakes should be. In the end, we chose four great cupcakes: vanilla, strawberry, lavender, and chocolate Oreo. They didn’t taste artificial, the frosting were rich and the cakes were moist but fluffy.

  When we announced the winners, they went up the stage to receive their finalist ribbons.

  Lena Mumson, a brunette in her 30s, looked very smug about the win. She had made the scrumptious lavender cupcakes with the lemon frosting.

  Cherry Anderson, a pretty girl with honey blonde corkscrew hair, had made the fresh-tasting strawberry cupcakes with fresh strawberries sticking out on top of the whipped cream frosting. She grinned from ear to ear and she bounced up the stage.

  Demi Lauriston, a bottled blonde, had made the vanilla cupcake. She went up the stage carrying her youngest son in her arms. I gave boy’s little hand a high five when he passed by.

  Larson Davies, a slightly tubby man in his mid-thirties, had made the chocolate Oreo cupcakes, to my surprise. He wore a soccer jersey and looked more athletic than the baker type. His Oreo cupcakes were amazing. There was even a “surprise” melted Oreo at the bottom of the cupcake.

  The four posed for a picture together after shaking our hands. Cherry had squealed when she shook my hand, saying that “Cornflower Blues” was a favorite song of hers and that she loved me. I gave her a hug.

  “So that’s our final four,” Mirabelle said into the mic. “They’ll be back tomorrow afternoon for the final cake bake-off. Remember, a romantic getaway to Hawaii is in the stakes, as well as free hot chocolate for a year! Now let’s divide up the rest of the cupcakes and share it amongst the crowd. Let’s party!”