Courtship of the Cake

by Jessica Topper

  “We’ve been here one day. You need to chill out.”

  “Did you hear her? She’s impossible. Always has been. God. What made me think—?” The clock in the hall downstairs struck ten. Breakfast service was officially over, and all we had were a bunch of hurt feelings to show for it. “Whatever. Never mind.”

  “That was kind of a low blow you dealt her,” I said quietly, even though I didn’t quite understand the half of it.

  Nash sputtered a laugh. “Believe me, she’s going to react far worse when she finds out what’s swimming in my gene pool.”

  “Maybe I can talk to her. Girl to girl,” I said.

  “Quinn’s never been a girl.” Nash smirked. “She’s been Queen Quinn her whole life and she’s always done whatever she pleases. And you heard her last night. She won’t even let me cross the street with Logan. This is going to take more than a week.”

  “So we stay longer,” I said, although the thought of lingering around Mick for longer gave me the sweats. “Start right here.” I pointed to the corner of the room where Nash’s own favorite Gibson sat, delivered with the rest of our things.

  “What. You want me to serenade her?”

  “No. Show Logan how you play. Show him how to play.”

  “I don’t know if I can,” he admitted, defeat cluttering his voice.

  “I’ve seen you perform for kids.”

  “Yes, but not for my kid. And the stakes are higher,” he reminded me.

  It was true; but he had nothing to lose and everything to gain by trying.

  • • •

  “Quinn?” I knocked on the door downstairs. “Can we talk?” No answer. I gently rattled the knob.

  “You won’t find her in there.” Even with his towering frame and motorcycle boots, Bear was just as stealth as Bacon the cat. “That’s the owner’s closet.”

  “The what?” I turned back to the door, certain it had been the one she’d used. Then again, the old house had a lot of them.

  “Owner’s closet. All inns have them. See?” He pointed higher than my line of vision. “Dead bolt on the outside. It’s where proprietors keep personal stuff they don’t want guests to see.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “Growing up in a bed-and-breakfast, you get used to lots of closed doors. As kids, Quinn and I would play hide-and-seek, slamming the doors on empty rooms to throw each other off our trail.” Bear leaned against the door, casually crossing his arms as if he was just chatting about the weather. “But my mother always kept the owner’s closet locked. Although she did open it for me once.”

  “Yeah?”

  “It was all just a jumble of stuff. You know. Quinn’s report cards, my trophies. Stuff like that. Normal people stuff.” Bear’s dark, wise eyes belied his earnest, simple tone. I understood what he was getting at.

  “Too precious to part with, I guess?”

  “And too personal to be out for show.” He cleared his throat. “Give Quinn some time. She’s not used to letting anyone in.”

  “Can I ask you a question, Bear?”

  “Sure.”

  “It’s about Logan’s . . .” I drifted off, not sure to refer to it as “hearing” or “deafness.” I didn’t want to come across as nosy, or offensive. But it was clear both Nash and Quinn needed a liaison. “Can anything more be done to help?”

  “He wasn’t an ideal candidate for cochlear implants. He was born with very little auditory nerve on one side and none on the other side. And even if he had been?” Bear gave a shrug and a little smile, as if it were anyone’s guess.

  “Think he can learn to play that guitar?”

  Bear rolled the question over in his mind. “It’s not a matter of if he can. It’s whether he would want to. Would a blind person necessarily want to paint a picture, if he could never see it?”

  The thought had never occurred to me. “Maybe if he wanted to show others the beauty he created?”

  Bear grinned. “Then I think Logan’s been waiting to show his dad all kinds of stuff.”

  • • •

  I marched back upstairs to room twelve, half expecting to find it empty. Or Nash, packing up his stuff. Instead, he was sitting on the bed, gazing out the window with the Gibson on his lap.

  “I’ve got a favor to ask, China Doll.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I need you to teach me how to sign some letters.” He threw the guitar strap over his shoulder and met my gaze.

  “The alphabet?” I asked.

  “No. Just E, A, D, G, and B. For now.”

  “Sure.” I smiled. “And Nash?”

  He raised his brows my way.

  “I’ll go get the school supplies. And how about you leave the wedding details to me, okay?”

  “Gladly. Thanks.”

  “Just earning my keep,” I said, before realizing I had echoed Mick’s very words from breakfast. Luckily, Nash had turned back to the guitar and didn’t see the blush creep over my cheeks. I thought of the look on Mick’s face at the party yesterday when Sindy asked me how Nash had proposed. While it hadn’t exactly been a lie, our arrangement was growing teeth by the minute, and I hoped it didn’t come back to bite us in the ass.

  Mick

  SIN AFTER SIN

  Even the usual bakery hustle couldn’t keep my mind off Dani. I managed to burn the fuck out of myself with a carelessly pulled pan, earning yet another scar to add to the collection. This one, ironically, right above my burnt heart.

  Every time one of my staff slid the cases shut up front, a dull thump would echo in my chest. Not even the roar of the commercial coffee grinder drowned out my thoughts of her, as Sindy brewed pot after pot and dished out her gossip with the locals.

  Everyone wanted to hear about Nash Drama, back in town to claim his key to the city. My aunt, of course, was more interested in talking about his bride-to-be.

  “You know what they say!” My aunt winked to every woman who walked in. “Behind every successful man . . .”

  “Is a burlesque dancing queen, stealing the show?” I asked, kissing her cheek. “Get back in the kitchen, will you?” She shimmied back, but not before dropping the hint that she would love to bake that cake when the time came, and had told Dani to come drop in “anytime.”

  The thought of Dani in my bakery, eyeing my goods, left me with such an aching hard-on, I had no choice but to relegate myself to doing inventory all day, safely out of the public eye. Christ. She had been in town for one day and everything was in an upheaval.

  You can play games with the people you love. But don’t play games with their heads, Mickey. Or their hearts. My mother’s words came sifting down from the pantry shelves, as if they had been hiding up there behind the big tins of baking powder. Sindy might say I was too young to remember her words, but I could hear them, spoken in her tender voice, just as clearly as I could hear her reciting lines from my favorite children’s book, over and over again.

  What about my head? And what about my heart?

  People assumed I was a playboy, but I was only protecting what had been left behind.

  Don’t hate the player, Nash had bragged. Hate the game.

  For years I had resented Nash for up and leaving Quinn like he did. And for leaving Bear. And me. And this town. But now that he was back, and now that he had Dani . . .

  I needed to jump into the game. The only way I knew how.

  “Judas Priest, where’s my pocketbook?” Sindy grumbled. “I told Walt I’d stop by the Super Fresh on my way home but I’ll be danged. Where is the darn thing?”

  A text from my uncle popped up on my phone. Tell your aunt to make like a goose and get the flock outta there. I’m starving!

  She’s asking Judas the whereabouts of her pocketbook, I thumbed back. Sindy pawed through the pantry like a hungry raccoon, the rings of mascara around her e
yes widening and narrowing in frustration.

  Tell your aunt her pocketbook is on the bed where she left it this morning because she was too busy gabbing about the Nash boy’s wedding, the next text read, followed by what looked like a grocery list of contraband, dietician-forbidden foods.

  “Tell me what you need, and I’ll do the shopping,” I told my aunt. “Go on home to Uncle Walt.”

  Armed with a shopping list from Sindy that was slightly more PC for a diabetic, I left the shop. I was grateful to get away from those four walls and my thoughts, despite the rush-hour-like clog down the main drag. As I drove at a slow crawl past Jenkins Auto Body, I saw Bear directing a flatbed tow and grinning like he had won the lottery.

  Dani’s van had arrived.

  • • •

  “Kale, salmon, walnuts . . . let me guess. You’re baking an omega-three fatty acid cake?” Dani peered down the conveyor belt as the items from my aunt’s grocery list sailed by.

  “With goldfish cracker sprinkles.” The garnish was the one item from my uncle’s list. I figured he deserved a little treat after all the superfoods my aunt forced him to eat. He liked a snack that could smile back at him. “Top-secret baking ingredients.”

  “I’ll take them to my grave,” Dani solemnly swore, plopping the plastic divider down between my groceries and hers. It was an everyday, innocent gesture . . . made ludicrous by the fact that we had mingled a lot more than just our sundry items in the past.

  She looked smoking in a slim black skirt, sling-back sandals, and a pale blue shirt that hugged her voluptuous curves and nipped in at her tiny waist. A world different from the running shorts and T-shirt combo earlier, and the flowing sun-goddess dress from breakfast. She was like the array of glittering impulse items decorating the shelf above the conveyor belt: so tempting. I gritted my teeth and swallowed hard. Was it wrong to want to bite those pearl buttons right off her blouse? Those lucky, lucky buttons.

  “And I see you’re on the fad diet of pencil shavings?”

  “You know it. If I get hungry in between meals, I just huff a little of that rubber cement, and I’m good to go.” She laughed, gesturing at the meager amount of school supplies she had scavenged. “Shelves were pretty bare at the office supply store, so I came down here. The town must be preparing for the academic apocalypse.”

  I glanced at the list, for no better excuse than to lean in close. There were still many items yet to be crossed off. “Tissues, Ziplocs, and Purell? Is this for a classroom or an episode of Dexter?” My joke earned me a jostle and an amused batting of those ocean-sized blue eyes and their long lashes. “Pretty sure there’s a black market for your plastic folders with prongs and pockets.”

  “Seriously? ’Cause I found plastic folders with pockets, and plastic folders with prongs, but none with both. Maddening.”

  “Yeah. We’re gonna have to cross state lines for those.” I would gladly go on the lam with her, leaving a trail of loose-leaf paper behind us, and erasers to throw everyone off our scent. “Don’t forget to label everything after. Double points for that.”

  “I think this was Quinn’s way of testing me . . . I mean, us. Me and Nash,” she added quickly. “Initiation by fire.”

  Her last comment gave me the feeling her groom-to-be hadn’t exactly told her the history of the Half Acre.

  “Paper or plastic, Mick?” An everyday, innocent question . . . but the flirty tease in the cashier’s voice made it as bold as your place or mine?

  Christ. Miller wedding. Salted caramel cupcake tower. Black minidress. Pearl necklace.

  No forgetting that pearl necklace.

  “Amber.” I read her nametag aloud. “Hi. Plastic is fine.”

  She scanned and bagged my items with lightning speed. “George and Holly are back from their honeymoon in Maui. We should totally all go out sometime.”

  I gave a noncommittal nod, keeping my eyes on the register display so Dani wouldn’t think I was trying to take “checkout” to the next level.

  “Oh, look at that. Sixty-nine cents is your change.” Amber practically poured the coins into my hands with a giggle. “My favorite number.”

  “Oh, hey, Mick. Are you shopping for my foodgasm?” Sarah-with-an-H had parked her cart behind Dani. Fabulous. All the ghosts of my one-night stands past were piling up on lane nine. With Dani trapped in the middle.

  “I made some white chocolate cheesecakes this morning,” I said. I hadn’t called her about them. But I wished I had, to save myself from this public conversation. “Back on the menu.”

  “Mmm,” Sarah enthused. “I’ll be sure to come in”—she checked her watch—“in an hour or so.”

  “Keep the change, Amber,” Dani said crisply, and gave my ankles a nudge with her shopping cart.

  “That wasn’t what it looked like,” I supplied, following her out to the parking lot.

  “No? Looked to me like you put the ‘fresh’ in Super Fresh.” Dani hauled the bags from her cart and dropped them into the passenger seat of the Porsche.

  “She’s just interested in my cakes,” I insisted, blocking her between my body and the open passenger door.

  “You sure about that, Mick? Because she was basically counting down the minutes to orgasm.”

  “Foodgasm,” I corrected. She’d have to lean into my arms if she wanted to close the door. Or climb over the gearshift in her short skirt. It was a winning proposition for me, either way.

  “Whatever lets you sleep at night,” she said. “Move, please.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  She placed her thumb on the panic button of the key fob and raised her eyebrows.

  “I meant I don’t sleep at night. Not since New Orleans.” Fuck it. Not exactly the conversation I wanted to have in the Super Fresh parking lot. But at least we were alone. “Not well, anyway.”

  “Well, I no longer dream,” she stated. “Not since New Orleans. Guess we’re even.”

  Dani

  SPIN DOCTOR

  I had left the Half Acre to get Mick out of my mind, and I wasn’t even safe at the supermarket, for God’s sake. Those women were practically throwing themselves at his feet, yet he had the nerve to pull the whole innocent act.

  Music met my ears as I pushed through the front door. Logan and Nash were sitting in the front room, on the curved window seat in the turret. They had a notebook between them, and guitars on their laps. Logan’s facial expressions were changing with each note Nash demonstrated, his mouth moving along with the cues.

  “C . . . yeah, you got it, kid. Now G.” Nash tapped the letter in the notebook, and Logan lifted his hand just long enough to demonstrate the letter before moving it back to tackle the guitar neck. His hand was small for the frets, but his fingers were long and promising. Just like his father’s.

  “Check you out.” Nash grinned, licking his lips. “Very sexy secretary.”

  I grimaced, smoothing down the pencil skirt I had changed into before leaving for the store. “I prefer my own clothes, but a deal is a deal.” Riggs didn’t want it to look as if Nash had pulled me right off the festy circuit. But his assistant must’ve been channeling some eighties MTV fantasy, as every outfit that had been delivered was a cross between Van Halen’s “Hot for Teacher” and the sexy librarian gone wild from Adam Ant’s “Goody Two Shoes” video.

  Mick had certainly done a double take in the checkout aisle. The thought of his eyes roaming approvingly gave me a one-two punch of excitement and guilt in my gut.

  I wondered if he noticed I had chosen my blouse to match his eyes.

  I spread my bounty of school supplies out on the Persian rug and went to work labeling each piece, as Mick had suggested. If Sharpie-markering Logan’s name twenty times on quarter-inch #2 pencils scored points with Quinn, I would gladly take one for the team and huff the fumes.

  I remembered my excitement with the start of
every school year on Long Island. The nip in the air come nightfall, and the leaves performing their annual drop-and-clog ritual into the swimming pool. I loved pulling out cozy warmer clothes and debating with Laney what we’d wear that first day of school. She’d left me a voice mail that morning, but I hadn’t gotten back to her yet. Jax had been uncharacteristically quiet, considering he usually texted me daily.

  “One, two. One, two,” Nash conducted in time, and Logan proudly strummed two simple chords. Hugging the body of the acoustic against his tummy, he practically thrummed along with it. The excitement was palpable.

  I smiled and resumed my labeling, remembering the thrill of cracking into blank notebooks. Relishing the idea of a fresh start, the endless possibilities to do well.

  Nash began to accompany him, taking it above and beyond with a melody to his son’s simple backbone. I noticed Quinn standing in the doorway, watching, as Nash’s nimble fingers tackled the frets and he began to sing, barely moving his mouth, brow creasing as he held the last word of each line.

  Wasting away

  Waiting to be found

  Hard to find the words

  When I can’t hear a sound

  Lost in the fray

  Stumble to the ground

  Cannot be heard

  When you’re not around

  Logan hit an off note, and Nash winced. I glanced back toward the doorway, but Quinn was gone.

  “Rome,” I murmured. “It wasn’t built in a day.”

  This was certainly a start.

  • • •

  I spent the afternoon reading up on Nash’s condition, and ironically, ankylosing spondylitis tended to worsen during periods of inactivity. So much for Riggs’s bright idea of taking Nash off the road to calm him down. He needed exercise and movement, and luckily, we had an eager ten-year-old ready to test out his father’s running legs. After dinner, Logan, Nash, Mick, and Bear played Frisbee and horseshoes out on the lawn, under the watchful eye of Quinn. Sindy came and joined us at the fire pit later; the consummate guest, she had even brought her own skewer.