I put my hand on the catalogs and took a deep breath. “Okay, we’re here for a reason. It’s time to strategize. We’ve done great already with weddings and special orders this year, but we have several more events to go, including the Lake Pendle Strawberry Festival.”
Brady pointed at me. “We should start there.”
Amber agreed while she swiped another brownie. “July tenth is only a month away, and you haven’t even told us what the cupcake would be for the bake-off.”
“It’s a closely guarded secret,” I said, shaking my head. “You know that.”
“True, but if I’m going to help you, I need to know what it is,” Brady reminded me.
I blew out a breath at the thought of him helping me at the bake-off. I spend every day baking with Brady, but the festival atmosphere always changed the charge in the air. It was going to be so much temptation working that close to him for hours. He was all male from his perfectly styled blond hair, his chiseled cheeks covered in a tightly capped beard, and a gym physique that didn’t quit. He had muscles in places I didn’t know you could have muscles. I glanced down at my less than muscular body. Some would say I was fluffy. Some would say the nickname fluffy cupcake fit me to a T. Well, at least Darla McFinkle thought it did.
My hips loved cupcakes, and my ass loved Brady’s artisan sourdough. Since I hated working out and got most of my exercise running around the bakery, lifting heavy pans of cupcakes out of the oven, and walking up and down the thirteen stairs to my apartment, that didn’t help my non-bodybuilder physique. In hindsight, my choice of professions may not have been the best one for my body type. C’est la vie, as they say
“Haylee?” Amber said, and I snapped my head up to stare into their confused faces.
“Sorry, I got lost in my thoughts for a second there.”
Brady was staring at me with intense concentration as if he could see right through me and into my soul. Like he could read my thoughts and know that I was lusting after him like a dopey girl making puppy dog eyes. It was making me uncomfortable, and I wanted it to stop. I grabbed the iPad and opened the photo app, moving the brownies aside so I could set it in the middle of the table.
“I give you the fluffiest of fluffy cupcakes.” I motioned at the image like Vanna White, revealing twenty-five thousand dollars.
Two heads leaned into the table to stare at the image on the screen.
“Stats,” Amber said without taking her eyes off the iPad.
“Time to make,” Brady added, his assessing gaze sweeping across the cupcake in a way that kept me hot and bothered in a way I liked far too much.
“A strawberry cream cheese cupcake, filled with a light strawberry crème filling, topped with a whipped strawberry sorbet icing, and garnished with a cream cheese stuffed strawberry dipped in chocolate.”
Brady sat back and rubbed his hands together. “Oh, it sounds like a winner to me.”
Amber agreed with a nod since she was chewing on another brownie already.
“How are you going to make a sorbet icing, though?” Brady asked. The confusion in his voice was evident as he thought about the heat of a July day.
“I won’t be making it out of sorbet, but it will taste like sorbet. I’m going to make a test batch this week, and you can tell me what you think.”
Amber raised her hand and waved it around wildly, dragging a laugh from both Brady and me with her silliness. He rested his hand over mine for a second and leaned down to make eye contact. “It’s already a winner in my book. I know the judges will feel the same way, cupcake.”
I fought hard not to roll my eyes at the man sitting next to me. His constant habit of calling me cupcake was disrespectful as my employee, but no matter how many times I asked him to stop, he never did.
“It’s going to be stiff competition this year,” Amber said, sipping from her coffee mug. “Darla is entering the bake-off, too.”
This time, I did roll my eyes. I rolled them so hard Brady grabbed the back of my head.
“Don’t lose those beautiful brown eyes back there,” he ordered possessively.
I swallowed before I responded, hoping my voice didn’t shake when I spoke. “Oh,” I said, waving my hands in the air, “look at me shaking in my boots with fear. Do you think Darla will ask Jerry to be her assistant?”
Amber almost choked on the swallow of coffee in her mouth. “I hope not. You don’t want to look at his creepy face all afternoon.”
Brady dropped his hand to rest in the crook of my elbow and glanced between us. “I dated Darla for about two and a half seconds, and I can promise you, you have nothing to worry about.”
Amber and I recoiled in horror. “You what now?” I asked, my voice filled with venom. “You dated my archenemy?”
Amber and I leaned in, waiting for his answer. He leaned back and held up both hands in the don’t shoot position. “It was before I knew of your history together. A guy I knew set us up when I first got to town.”
“Why haven’t you mentioned this before?” Amber demanded, her disgusted tone of voice saying volumes.
He motioned at the two of us without words.
I held up my hand, and we leaned back to give him space. “Fair point. I just can’t imagine anyone willingly dating her.”
“I only went to avoid upsetting my friend. I was new to town, and he was trying to help me out, but I knew she wasn’t my type.”
“Not your type?” I repeated, and he nodded. “She’s five-ten, one hundred and ten pounds, blonde-haired and drop-dead gorgeous. I had her pegged as your exact type.”
“I’m not into girls who are high maintenance,” he said, savoring another bite of brownie. “I also prefer women who are a little bit,” he motioned around with his hand, “less made up, have a little meat on their bones, so they don’t poke me with their hips, and have something between their ears other than cotton balls, if you know what I mean.”
Amber and I bit back our laughter at his parting shot. “You’re saying Darla is a scarecrow?”
“Let’s just say the date ended for me when she thought Jane Austen was a dress designer.”
Amber crumbled in on herself with laughter, and I had to cover my mouth to keep from doing the same, but my eyes radiated glee. “I’m not laughing at you, I swear. I’m laughing at your accurate assessment of Darla.”
He held up his hand and shrugged. “All I can say is, I hadn’t been in Lake Pendle long, so I claim a lack of knowledge of the landscape and its people. Of course, Darla always acts quite put out whenever she sees me now.”
Amber waved her hand at him. “Doesn’t matter. Darla is put out by anyone not willing to put her on a pedestal and carry her around.”
I sat up and shook out my arms. “Okay, enough about Darla. Are you ready to hear some new ideas for the bakery?”
Amber and Brady rubbed their hands together and nodded. “Wow us,” Brady said with jazz hands.
Nervously, I brought out the first catalog, which was dog-eared on several pages. I didn’t know if I’d wow them, but I’d be happy if I could convince them that my ideas would be worth the extra work in the long run. More than all of that, when I opened the first dog-eared catalog page, and Brady’s eyes lit on the products, I hoped he’d understand that I saw him as a valuable part of the team here. Maybe I couldn’t say those exact words, but we needed him at The Fluffy Cupcake.