Meant to Be Mine (A Porter Family Novel Book #2)

by Becky Wade

  Celia pulled on the white mesh net and glanced at the mirror that hung in the hall wall near the back door. She resembled a Los Angeles gang member.

  After washing her hands, she arrived at Jerry’s side. He handed her a tool that looked like a mini ice-cream scooper and the two of them began to place balls of cookie dough on trays.

  “Do you like to bake?” he asked.

  “Very much.”

  And with that, Jerry’s conversational needs seemed satisfied. He’d brought Hulk Hogan to mind because he sported the kind of mustache that went up one side of his mouth, crossed over the top, and went down the other side.

  When they finished, they slid the cookies into the oven.

  “Now we’ll move on to sheet cake.” Jerry riffled through a small rectangular recipe holder and handed Celia a weathered recipe for Texas sheet cake. She spread it carefully on the counter to study it.

  Jerry began collecting the ingredients they’d need.

  “What kind of baking schedule do you usually follow?” Celia asked.

  “We always make the donuts first thing in the morning before we open. During rush hour, Donetta works out front. I help her when she needs me, and when she doesn’t I clean up back here. After that, I take a break for breakfast at McDonald’s. Then I come back and make cookies. Every other day I also make sheet cake.”

  “Got it.” Celia started measuring out flour, trying to convince herself of the amazing fact that she worked here now, in Cream or Sugar’s peaceful kitchen on Holley’s old town square. They’re paying me to do this. To bake, something she’d do—and regularly did do—for free.

  Celia was happily scooping cocoa powder into the bowl when she heard female laughter from the front of the shop followed by the deep rumble of a man’s voice.

  Her turncoat heart picked up speed as Ty entered the kitchen on his crutches, Donetta following close behind.

  “Good to see you, Jerry.” Ty nodded at the older man.

  “Hi there, Ty.”

  Ty’s attention settled on her, the teasing in his eyes making them an even brighter shade of blue. “Nice hairnet.” He wore a weathered navy baseball hat and carried a huge bouquet of amber-colored tulips.

  Celia would have said, “Scram!” or “No civilians allowed!” or “I’ll shove this hairnet where the sun don’t shine!” if Jerry and Donetta hadn’t been in the room. “Hello.” She tried for a smile that hopefully looked wifely.

  “Congratulations on your first day of work.”

  “Thank you.” She’d told him about her new job because she needed him to pick Addie up from kindergarten each weekday afternoon, then take care of her at the gingerbread house until she got off work.

  He moved to her, then bent to kiss her cheek.

  Celia froze. He was taking advantage of their eyewitnesses to do things she wouldn’t let him do in private.

  “No touching!” she whispered.

  “Hmm?” he breathed near her ear. “I can’t hear you.” He kissed the sensitive spot where her jaw met her neck, then straightened.

  He should be embarrassed to put on a show like this in front of Jerry and Donetta, who were doing a shabby job of pretending not to be fascinated. Instead of embarrassment, Ty seemed highly entertained. Confident as ever. He may not have the DNA for embarrassment.

  “These are for you.”

  She accepted the flowers. “They’re beautiful.” His impossible sixth sense had once again led him to exactly what she liked best.

  Jerry removed a vase from a cupboard and filled it with water for her. “Here you are.”

  She thanked him and arranged her tulips. It seemed more absurd than ever that this larger-than-life man should be her husband. No wonder Donetta, Jerry, and the rest of Ty’s groupies were curious about the oddity of his wife and child. She was too normal for Ty. She’d shown up with Addie out of the blue. And the two of them lived separately from Ty. If she hadn’t lived through it, their situation would perplex even her.

  “You can put me to work while I’m here if you want to, Donetta.” Ty said to the older woman. “I come cheap.”

  “You’re not lifting a finger in my kitchen,” Donetta replied, “No, sir. Are you hungry, though, Ty? I’ve got a cinnamon cake donut with your name on it.”

  Celia hid an eye roll.

  Care to sit down, Ty? Pillow for the small of your back? Footstool? How about we all wave palm fronds at you to keep you cool?

  “You know me,” Ty answered. “I’ve never said no to a donut.”

  Celia arrived home from work that afternoon to find Addie sitting on the edge of her bed and Ty lounging on the rug, his back against her bookcase. Addie was brushing Aurora’s hair while rhapsodizing about Grace, her new kindergarten friend. Snow White sat on Ty’s leg brace. The rest of the princesses lined the edge of Addie’s dresser, like a studio audience.

  “Hello, everyone.”

  “Hi, Mom.”

  Celia crossed to Addie and hugged her.

  “Where’s the hairnet?” Ty regarded her with lazy humor. He still wore his baseball cap.

  “I left it at work, thank you very much.”

  “Well, that’s no fun.”

  “May I speak to you for a minute?”

  “’Course.” He began to lever himself up.

  Addie looked back and forth between them with interest.

  This time, Celia knew better than to lead Ty into the dangerous territory of her bedroom. She took him to the back stoop and closed the door behind them. Heat thumped the top of her head like a drumstick might a snare drum.

  “Have you taken a look at that Snow White Barbie?” Ty asked. “She’s stacked.”

  Celia didn’t let herself smile.

  “Can’t imagine you approve of Addie playing with dolls that look like that.”

  No, she didn’t. Objectified female body image and all that. “Surprisingly, that’s not why I asked to speak to you.”

  “No? Did you want to speak to me about hiring a painting team to redo your house? ’Cause I’ll pay for that in a heartbeat. Whenever I’m in there I feel like I’m standing inside a box of crayons.”

  It bothered her that in some strange way, Ty’s ribbing made her delight in her paint choices much more complete. She drew herself up. “First, thank you for picking Addie up and bringing her home today—”

  “Did you just say thank you? To me?”

  Despite herself, she did smile then. Raising a hand to shield her eyes from the glare, she squinted up at him. “I guess I did. Believe me, it didn’t come naturally.”

  “I’ll just bet it didn’t.”

  They held eye contact across a drawn-out pause. Her attention dropped unbidden to his dimple, then his lips. “Um . . . so it went okay? Picking Addie up? She didn’t miss me or feel anxious or anything?” Guilt and second-guessing were constant companions to motherhood.

  “Nope, it went fine.”

  “Good.”

  He hooked his thumbs into the handholds on his crutches. “You can start in on me now about visiting Cream or Sugar today. That’s why you asked me out here, right?”

  Freaky mind reader! “Well,” she conceded, “yes.”

  “You might want to start with how the bakery is your place of business. Then you can tell me that you need to concentrate while you’re there and my presence distracts you because of your crush on me—”

  “I hotly debate that—”

  “—and then you can go on to say that I’m part of your personal life, and you don’t want your personal life overlapping with your professional life.”

  “It’s true. You do belong in my personal life and not my professional.”

  “Which sounds sort of promising.” He tilted his face a fraction, which sent the shade from his brim cutting across his features at a different angle. She could see the faint scar on his cheekbone. “I want to be a bigger part of your personal life.” His features turned serious while he stared at her. “I’m crazy about you.”

&nbs
p; No stammering or apology.

  Her mouth went dry.

  “I think about you all the time,” he said. “I know why I shouldn’t want more. But I do.”

  A terrible and treacherous longing softened her heart. The emotion reminded her just how much she’d loved him once. If she hadn’t loved him quite so much, he wouldn’t have been able to hurt her as deeply as he had.

  She cleared her throat. “Like I was saying. Since Cream or Sugar is my place of employment, I’d appreciate it if you’d keep your distance.”

  “Whatever you say, sweet one.”

  “Really?”

  “I live to please.”

  Ty left fifteen minutes later. An hour after that, Celia and Addie readied themselves for a trip to Brookshire’s for groceries. When Celia lifted her keys from her purse, a familiar weight clunked against her palm. With disbelief, she peered down at a peace sign key ring. An identical sibling to its predecessors.

  Give Peace a Chance III.

  On Celia’s first day of work, Donetta and Jerry had stayed with her the entire shift. Jerry had explained the kitchen’s routines. Donetta had taught her how to operate the cash register and rattled off a string of do’s and don’ts.

  On Celia’s second day of work, the Rangers were playing a one o’clock game at the Ballpark in Arlington. Thus Jerry and Donetta, dressed in matching Rangers T-shirts, pulled out at ten sharp.

  Except for the chewing of the trucker putting away jelly donuts at the corner table, quiet settled around Celia. For a few moments, she simply absorbed the details of the bakery. She was now in charge of Cream or Sugar.

  As customers drifted in, she waited on them with perhaps a little more perkiness and appreciation than necessary. Everyone asked if she was new in town and introduced themselves.

  She brewed fresh coffee because the old tasted like swill. She cleaned the shop’s front window. She wiped the counter and tabletops. She fantasized about all the things she wanted to bake in the kitchen and all the updates she wanted to make to the front room.

  About an hour after she’d taken command of her new domain, Ty sauntered through the door. No crutches. Noticeable limp. He ignored Celia completely, wasting the perfectly good glare she was trying to give him.

  Two female friends sat together, sharing a square of sheet cake. “How are you doing?” he asked them as he passed by.

  They both startled to attention at the sight of him. “Doing well.” Big smiles. “You’re Ty Porter, right?”

  “Yep.”

  They gushed over him for five minutes straight. Celia knew, because she timed it.

  “Let us know if we can get you anything else,” Ty said, finally moving away from the pair.

  Let us know?

  “How about you, ma’am?” he asked the little old lady drinking decaf. “Can I do anything for you?”

  Poor thing. She was too frail to handle his lady-killer smile. She tittered, blushed, and thanked him profusely, even though he hadn’t done anything.

  He walked to the end of the display case, raised the wooden slab, and continued around it like he owned the place. He stopped in front of Celia, tall and lean in a gray NASCAR T-shirt, jeans, and his alligator boots. The lack of crutches and the jeans meant he’d been to the doctor that morning and his bulky brace had been exchanged for something slimmer.

  She pitched her voice low. “Do you remember our discussion yesterday?”

  “Perfectly.”

  “Then what happened to staying away from here like you said you would?”

  “I didn’t say I’d stay away from here. I said ‘whatever you say,’ which isn’t the same thing at all.”

  He was going to send her to an early grave! She drew in air to let him have it—

  “Shh.” He motioned with his head. “We have customers.”

  “We don’t have anything. You don’t work here.”

  “I’m going to help you. I like this place.” He shrugged. “There’s donuts.”

  “No.”

  “’Course there’s donuts.” Laugh lines feathered out from his eyes.

  “No, you’re not going to help me.”

  “Yes, I am.” He smiled like someone who knew they held the winning card. His arms crossed over his broad chest, which pulled the soft cotton tight over his muscled shoulders. “If you have a problem with it, then take it up with Donetta.”

  Celia ground her teeth.

  “Donetta loves me,” he said.

  If she could have bested him physically, she’d have pushed him out of the shop like a tractor pushing garbage.

  “Think for a minute,” he continued. “If I’m working out here, then you’ll be free to go in the kitchen and bake things.”

  “I’m not leaving you out here alone! I’m responsible for this place when Donetta and Jerry are gone. I’m going to stay out front and do the job I was hired to do.”

  “Don’t trust me?”

  “Nope.”

  “I’ll prove to you that you can.”

  And with that, he stayed. And stayed. Despite her protests.

  He chatted with everyone who came in Cream or Sugar’s door. He served up donuts and coffee with his trademark easygoing humor. He went out and brought back lunch for Celia, then insisted she take a break to sit and eat. Fifteen minutes before kindergarten was scheduled to release, he left to go pick up Addie.

  Shoot, she thought as she watched him walk away. He exasperated her, but illogically, that did not make her immune to him. Quite the opposite. The bull rider was sexy. Even with the limp. Maybe made sexier by the limp.

  “You can’t fall for him,” she murmured. She refused to put herself through that heartbreak again and doubly refused to put Addie through it. Their daughter watched their every move like a teal-glasses-wearing hawk. Besides, as far as Celia knew, Ty was just biding time with her until Tawny became available.

  Tawny was far more desirable than she was—any fool could see that. And Ty, despite the good ol’ boy shtick he sometimes aimed at people, was no fool.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  The next day Ty showed up again at Cream or Sugar. And the next. The number of female customers who frequented the bakery between the hours of 11 a.m. and 2:45 p.m. began to skyrocket. Tawny, who’d acquired a sudden love for chocolate chip cookies, was among them.

  Without Celia’s blessing or permission, a pattern established itself. Ty arrived at Cream or Sugar two or three hours after Celia did, depending on his physical therapy schedule. He left in time to collect Addie from school. During their time together at the shop, he made Celia laugh, he made her want to throw herself into his arms, he made her want to pull her hair out.

  Every rare once in a while she’d glance at Ty and catch him staring at her. Staring at her with such hungry intensity that her body would flare with heat. Then she’d blink, and he’d turn away to answer a customer’s question, and she’d convince herself—or almost convince herself—that she’d imagined it.

  He even came to Cream or Sugar on Saturday. Celia had regretted her need to work on Saturdays for Addie’s sake. As it happened, though, Addie had a ball at the shop. Ty pulled a stool in front of the cash register for her to stand on, then taught her how to ring up customers. Addie peered at everyone in her solemn way, bloomed under their praise, and somberly smoothed the dollar bills before placing them carefully in their slots in the cash register’s drawer.

  Celia sank into an auditorium seat for her second Sunday worship at Meg and Bo’s church feeling oddly worried and hopeful at the same time. All week long bits and pieces of last week’s sermon had stitched through her memory, reminding her of the grace that waited . . . that refused to go away.

  This time around she half expected Doogie Howser to preach a sermon that would make her feel terrible and unworthy. It would almost come as a relief, in a way, if that happened. She could write off last week’s message as an anomaly and go about her life, content that she’d come to the right conclusion about Christianity the fir
st time.

  But no.

  Meg and Bo’s pastor spoke again of God’s love. He talked about his Savior with such simply spoken passion and gratitude that a lump of emotion formed in Celia’s chest.

  “Princess Jasmine is, as we know, very benevolent.” Mother and daughter were curled up in Addie’s bed. Sunday night dimness enfolded them, softened by the pink glow of the princess night-light. “After her marriage to Aladdin, she decided not to sit around on her royal rump.”

  Predictably, Addie giggled. Five-year-olds could be counted on to laugh at silly words for body parts.

  “There’s not much career satisfaction in sitting around. A woman can only eat bonbons and shine her jewels so much, right?”

  “Right,” Addie replied loyally.

  “You see, Jasmine had noticed that there wasn’t as much access to clean water out in the desert as she would have liked. This bothered the princess, because she wasn’t only about beauty and wearing skimpy I Dream of Jeannie clothes—”

  “Huh?”

  “Sorry, over-your-head reference. Jasmine was independent and didn’t have to wait around for a man to come and fix the situation with the water. No, indeed. She gathered together a group of like-minded volunteers, and they dug wells so that everyone could stay hydrated.”

  “After digging wells did Jasmine go to a ball?” Addie looked at Celia hopefully.

  “After she’d completed a hundred wells, a sultan from a neighboring province threw a ball in her honor.” As Celia detailed the dresses, the tiaras, and the ladies’ pointed slippers, Addie’s eyelids grew weightier.

  At length, Celia’s words drifted to silence. Ordinarily she tiptoed out at this point and went to work straightening the house or catching up on email or folding laundry. Tonight, though, she carefully rested her head next to Addie’s.

  The two of them were safe here in their little house. She still had debts to get out from under, and her relationship—or non-relationship—with Ty constantly unsettled her. So much so that insomnia continued to wake her one or two mornings a week. Neill and her other neighbors had the baked goods to prove it.