by Zoe York
He pulled out his phone. “Me? How about you? Are you ready for a Kincaid family gathering?”
She didn’t think it was possible for her pulse to jump even more, but at the thought of facing his brothers again, this time with a surprise, we’re married announcement made her feel faint. “Yep,” she whispered. “Bring it on.”
He fired off a group text, then picked up the chainsaw. “Might as well put this away if we’re going to have company.”
“Do I have time to bake cookies?”
She did, because Josh was in the middle of something at the garage, so the brothers didn’t come over until late afternoon. And she didn’t just make two kinds of cookies, she also finished unpacking some of her things that would make the living room feel like home—her basket of throws for curling up on the couch at night and her small bookcase with her favourite books about baking and business.
Adam stashed the rest of her moving boxes neatly in her bedroom and closed the door just as Will and Josh pulled into the drive. He came into the kitchen to give her the heads up, then pulled out his phone and video-called Seth.
Isla was keeping herself busy with putting on coffee and assembling trays of cookies, but she was keenly aware of how it played out in the living room. It was a small house, so it wasn’t hard to eavesdrop.
“Who else is here? There’s a strange car in your driveway.” That was Josh.
Isla bit her lower lip to keep from laughing.
From Adam’s phone, Seth—who had already seen her briefly, when Adam initiated the call—broke that part of the news. “It’s Isla. She’s in the kitchen.”
“How do you know that from the other side of the lake?” That was Will.
“Because I’m smarter than you,” the pilot said.
She couldn’t keep a chuckle in at that. Brothers. “I’m in the kitchen,” she called out. “Making cookies.”
It was a thin attempt at distraction, but it worked for the five minutes before Owen and Kerry walked in, and they had bonus family members with them. Adam’s niece, Becca and her toddler son, Charlie. “Surprise!”
“What are you doing in town?” Adam asked as Josh and Will abandoned the cookies to descend on Charlie, who Isla hadn’t met before, but Adam had told her all about.
He was pretty cute. Definitely worth picking over the cookies.
As Becca explained they’d come home for a week while her boyfriend was in hockey training camp, Adam and Isla had a tiny moment of eye contact. He gave her a confident smile, and nodded.
It’s going to be okay, his eyes said.
She nodded back. And then as one, the entire family turned to Adam. “So what’s the problem?”
Isla didn’t catch who said that, but she’d seen the text message he had sent them earlier that day. He’d asked them if they could come over together because he had something he wanted to tell them. No mention of there being a problem. She stepped closer to Adam, so he could feel her presence beside him.
Owen gave her a half-smile. “Is that why you’re here? Moral support because it’s been a rough couple of weeks?” He gestured to Adam, who still hadn’t answered the original question. “This one has a lot to prove.”
“Not to me.” It slipped out before she could catch it, but Isla didn’t regret being straight with Adam’s brother. This was the whole point—might as well not mince around it. So what if she’d originally planned to show it more than just lay it out in three sharp words?
Owen curved an eyebrow high in surprise.
But she wasn’t done. She slid her fingers around Adam’s hand, hoping nobody noticed that she was shaking. She squeezed tight.
He squeezed back. “Actually, Isla and I have news. We eloped yesterday. We got married at Toronto City Hall, and—”
“Oh my God,” shrieked Becca, who hadn’t even yet been properly introduced to Isla. That didn’t stop the younger woman from shoving her way through the group of her uncles and wrapping her arms around both Isla and Adam at once. “That’s so wild, you guys. You eloped?”
Isla laughed. “Yep.”
“We haven’t even met, and we’re family now?” Becca shifted her attention fully to Isla. “Hi. I’m Becca.”
“I’m familiar,” Isla murmured. “Your uncle is a big fan of yours.”
“The feeling is mutual, so if you break his heart, I’ll have to kill you.”
Isla blinked. “I’m not planning on that…”
Becca grinned. “Excellent. Welcome to the family.”
Behind her, Owen rolled his eyes. “Well, if my daughter has deemed this unexpected news to have her approval, then…”
“We aren’t asking for anyone’s approval,” Adam pointed out. And then he pulled Isla away from Becca, and wrapped his arm around her as if to say, watch what you say around my bride.
That’s what Isla imagined it meant, anyway. She liked the idea of that. “We’re really happy,” she said to everyone, trying to be reassuring. She didn’t know any of them well enough to read their expressions, except Owen’s concern was projected loud and clear. So she locked her gaze on him as she leaned into Adam. “I know this is a surprise, but we have our reasons.”
Adam nodded. “The thing is, we’ve been talking since the summer about what it might be like for Isla to come here and open a bakery. It’s been a bit of a whirlwind, but that’s exactly what she’s going to do, and we decided to get married to make it easier.” He beamed down at her, playing the part of an adoring husband to perfection. “And I couldn’t be prouder.”
“The cafe.” Josh pumped his arm. “Called it.”
Adam laughed and glanced at his brother. “You did nothing of the sort!”
“I totally did. I told you about it when you mentioned she was a baker the first time.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“It was in a group text!” The mechanic looked to the other brothers, but they all shrugged in unison.
On Adam’s phone, which Kerry was holding now, Seth shook his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell.”
“You’re all jerks,” Josh muttered. “But that’s not going to stop me from welcoming Isla to the Pine Harbour Small Business Association.”
Will leaned in and mock-whispered, “That’s not a real thing.”
Isla had whiplash from the conversation. “Uh…”
Josh didn’t seem perturbed. “I’m trying to get it going.”
Will rubbed his chin. “And how is that going so far?”
“We’ve had some challenges.”
“Nobody wants to be associated with the random guy who lives above his garage?”
“I’m a social media celebrity.”
“You keep saying that like it means something.”
Isla grabbed her phone. “Do I search for you by your name or by the garage?”
Josh winked at her. “She knows it means something.”
“Well, I have seventy-nine people who follow my Instagram account, so anything more than that is…” She trailed off as his Instagram account loaded. And looked back at the Kincaid clan. “He actually is a social media celebrity, you guys.”
“I keep telling them. They aren’t impressed.”
“I’m impressed. Count me in as part of the Small Business Association.”
He grabbed a cookie. “Excellent. We accept dues in the form of bartered goods. Bring cookies to our next meeting.”
It was barely dinner time by the time they all left, but Adam sagged against the front door after closing it. “I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for bed after that.”
Isla collapsed on the couch in the living room, which she’d made as pretty as she could, and they hadn’t even sat in there. They’d just all crowded into the kitchen and talked over each other for two straight hours. “They’re a lot.”
He followed her onto the couch, sprawling in the other corner. “And how. But that went okay, didn’t it?”
She laughed out loud. “We survived?”
“Well, yeah. T
hat’s my standard for okay.”
It wasn’t her place to criticize his family—and she saw how much they loved him. She just… Well, what she could do was be positive with Adam. “I think we both deserve more than survival as the bare minimum. It’s why I’m here. It’s why we’re doing this, right?”
“Absolutely.” He gave her a tired smile.
She pulled two afghans from her basket and tossed him one. “Do you want to watch something on TV? Veg out and be brainless for a bit?”
“That sounds perfect.” He closed his eyes. “And if I fall asleep, you can just leave me here.”
She watched him for a long moment, then turned on the TV.
He didn’t open his eyes again, and she let him sleep, because he was right. It was perfect.
Chapter Ten
Two weeks later, Isla woke long before dawn. Her phone told her it was half past four in the morning, and she was foolish to lie there in the dark, grinning to herself. She’d be dragging by the end of the day, and in the weeks to come there would be enough early mornings like this that she should sleep in while she still could.
But she couldn’t, not today. Today was the day she got the keys to her very own bakery. She had so much work to do, and she was so excited.
An ugly whisper of doubt tried to intrude, that it would be hard, maybe too hard. Maybe she couldn’t do it. But she wasn’t making any room for that voice in her mind. Not now. Not ever again, but especially not today.
The house was quiet and dark, but as soon as she flipped the light on in the kitchen, she heard footsteps above.
“Did I wake you?” she asked when Adam shuffled in, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
“Nope.” He scrunched up his face. “Yep. But only because I was sleeping lightly, apparently. I can sense the excitement. So what’s on our agenda for today?”
Our agenda. Not hers. Theirs, shared, together.
“You don’t need to come with me,” she said. To be polite.
He accepted the mug of coffee she handed him, then leaned against the counter. “When I bought this place, I didn’t tell anyone until it was a done deal. So if you want to do it all on your own, that’s cool. But it’s a really big deal, and I can…I dunno, take pictures for your Instagram?”
An excited grin split her face wide open. “Maybe you can come with me to get the keys, and then I’ll hang out in the cafe by myself for a while?”
That’s exactly what they did. When Catie texted to say the keys were ready to be picked up, they walked over to the salon together, travel mugs full of coffee, and bundled up against the early morning frost.
Then they crossed the street and she let herself in.
It had been thoroughly cleaned and left in turnkey condition. Anne Minelli had been eager to hand it over, and then she did it with a lot of care. Her heart ached a little, for reasons hard to name. Part of it was that this had been someone’s dream for a long time, and nobody else had wanted it.
Isla wanted to honour the spirit of her agreement in buying this place, because she did want it. Desperately.
This was her dream, although she would change it radically. Most of the tables and chairs would go to make room for longer lines and display tables of packaged cookies.
Silently, she walked through to the kitchen, Adam close behind. She checked out the ovens, the walk-in fridge, the stainless steel work counters. All as they had been when she’d walked through it when her offer had been accepted.
When she turned around, Adam was looking at the fire alarm system, because of course he was. “This is a bit outdated,” he said, pulling out his phone. “I want to upgrade you to a different system that better integrates with local emergency services.”
Those complicated feelings inside her rose and lodged in her throat. She nodded. “Thanks,” she managed to get out.
“I’ll leave you to it. How long do you think you’ll be?”
“A few hours.”
“Text me if you need anything.”
And just like that, she was alone in the future Bake Sale! to make purchase order lists, to estimate baking capacity, and dream for the future. What purchases she might be able to afford in six months and a year, to make the business even better.
It had been a long time since she’d been in charge of anything.
She liked it a lot.
She’d missed it.
It was early October now. Just over two months until Christmas. She sketched out a calendar. If she opened around Halloween, that would be an obvious treat-oriented event to theme a bake sale around. But could she get the storefront up and ready by then, with the necessary inspections and business licenses?
She would try.
And in the meantime, she could use the kitchen for her back-up plan, something Isla already knew how to do.
The first official appearance of Bake Sale! on the Bruce Peninsula was planned with three days’ notice and announced to nobody. It was the Saturday of the long weekend for Canadian Thanksgiving, the final holiday of the year for many cottagers in the area, and Isla had secured a table at the Pine Harbour farmer’s market.
Adam had to work, so she couldn’t even be sure to have a friendly face appear. It didn’t matter, she told herself. This was research and product testing, and both of those were done on a cold audience.
She started small. Her table at the market featured her 25-cent chocolate chip cookies and her oversized, extra gooey Rice Krispies squares, as well as two seasonal offerings, apple raspberry cupcakes and a pumpkin lace cookie. Nothing too fancy. None of the higher priced tarts she loved to make but hadn’t figured out how to make profitable in the city.
Business was slow at the start of the day. Her signs grabbed eyeballs, but she was surrounded by home-baked goods. Traffic picked up mid-morning with a couple of families returning for more cookies, because their children had eaten them all before they left the market. And those customers were also the first to ask her when her shop was opening.
“I’m not sure yet,” she admitted as she handed over business cards. “Please follow me on Instagram and I’ll announce it soon.”
But at the end of the day, she didn’t have any new followers.
So much for that being an easy way to connect with the community. By the time lunch rolled around, she realized it would be much more effective if she had an actual opening day planned that she could promote. Live and learn. Instead of being disheartened, she booked her table again for the following weekend, and left, determined to have flyers for an actual opening day when she returned.
Which meant she had to pick a date and stick with it. Nothing like pressure.
The next week passed in a flurry of inspections and eighteen-hour days. She barely saw Adam, who worked and slept and then worked again, until he came home Friday morning looking exhausted after yet another twenty-four-hour shift.
She was about to head out the door to start prepping for her second kick at the local farmer’s market, but that wasn’t pressing. “Are you going to crawl right into bed, or do you want some breakfast?”
He sat heavily at the secondhand table they’d found for the kitchen and waved off a cup of coffee. “But if you’re making something to eat, I wouldn’t say no to that.”
She put some mushrooms on in one pan, then whipped up some eggs in another. “You want to know the real secret to being a chef?”
He gave her a tired smile. “What?”
“Butter.”
That made him laugh, as she’d intended.
A few minutes later, she slid an omelette in front of him. “Can you talk about your shift? And do you want to?”
“Yeah. And maybe. It was…” He took a big bite of mushrooms and made a pleased face as he chewed and swallowed. “This is great.”
“Thanks.”
“It was a night of a lot of callouts. That’s all. Nothing more to really talk about, but there wasn’t any time to rest. I’ll sleep well today.”
“I’ll be quiet when I come back.
”
“You never bother me. You’re fine. How long will you be at the bakery today?”
“Probably most of the day.”
“Can I have dinner waiting for you when you get home?”
Now it was her turn to look pleased. “Sure. Text me when you wake up and I’ll come home then. We can cook together if you want.”
By late morning, she had her chocolate chip cookie dough in the fridge, her cupcake icing was done and in piping bags, and the Rice Krispies squares were made and cooling in trays. She took a break from the kitchen to sit in the front of the store with her Thermos of coffee and go through the deliveries that had just arrived.
She was most excited about the brightly coloured acrylic paint she’d ordered to paint the Bake Sale! sign on the front window. To make it easy on herself, she hung up her travel banner sign on the inside of the window, so all she needed to do was take a chair outside and trace the exact same lettering on the glass.
As she was assembling her painting supplies, two women knocked on the front door. Isla recognized one of them from across the road.
“Can we come in?” Catie Berton asked as she opened the door and they stepped inside. “Oh wow, look at how bright and open it is in here now!”
The other woman held out a bouquet of flowers. “These are for you, a welcome to the neighbourhood, if you will. I’m Olivia Minelli.”
Isla extended her hand. “Isla Petersen. Nice to meet you. Are you related to the previous owner of the cafe?”
“Daughter-in-law. But I’m here in the capacity of an enthusiastic community member. I have two little kids and having a new bakery in Grandma’s old shop is very exciting to them. Do you have an opening date planned?”
Isla’s hands shook as she waved them over to her pile of deliveries. “One of these boxes has my flyers in it…” She dug it out. “There’s been so much to do, but I’ve decided to just go for it. Here, you get the very first handout. I’m opening at the end of the month, and this weekend and next weekend, I’ll be at the farmer’s market on Saturdays.”
