“Two glasses of wine and I’m liable to tell you who won.”
“Okay, then I won’t get you drunk.” I laughed along with him, although the thought of a giggling Brody having to lean on me to stand up and whispering Drag Race secrets in my ear had my jeans getting tight. What I wouldn’t give for Brody to get up in my space like that.
A particularly icy blast of wind bearing new snow caught us, but instead of grimacing, Brody held his face up to the sky and stuck out his tongue, catching a snowflake and then side-eyeing me again.
“Stupid, I know, but the first snow, it’s like a thing I do.”
A thing. Probably with his family or his friends. A thing I’d never done because snow isn’t always pretty in New York City. After a few days it turned to slush, was gray and wet, and when it froze it was treacherous. Still, I copied what he did. I loved that he laughed because his laugh was just this fucking awesome sound that stripped me of all my inhibitions. He gripped my arm and held me upright as I began to slip. I could kiss him. I could pretend to fall. I could—stop now!
Chapter Four
Never make plans with croissants. They’re so flaky.
Justin
“So, you signed all the forms then?” I blurted as we drew closer to the hotel, knowing that this was a nice safe thing to comment on. I wanted to talk to him about all kinds of things, but right now my social well of things that didn’t include hashtags and acronyms was low.
“Yeah, so many forms. I’m excited about the show. You?”
“Definitely, I’ve been looking forward to it since they approached me.” Woot, I made an entire sentence and finished on a question. Go me!
“I loved the tiramisu muffins you posted on your channel last week, and in the spirit of the baking comrades, I’d love to steal the idea.” He waggled his eyebrows but was that him trying for evil stealer of ideas or for cute? Cute was definitely winning.
“You can have it. I stole it first.” I was so ridiculously proud when he huffed a laugh.
“It’s not exactly stealing though is it when you’re inspired by someone. But I have to say your Instagram is cool. I check out your stuff all the time and comment too.”
“I haven’t seen you on there.” Shit. Why did I say that? I sound like a crazy stalker.
“Oh, you wouldn’t because we have the company accounts that my sister looks after, but my private account is just that, and it’s in a different name.”
I wish I’d known he followed me, then I could have done something. But what? What could I have done? Messaged him? The account he used wasn’t in his name, he’d just said that, so how could I have found it to message Brody himself? His company Instagram didn’t connect with me, and my social media strategy was a delicate balance, and who I followed was a carefully planned game. Following Bakes by Brody might be seen as me endorsing a particular celebrity or brand that he was working with. I had to look out for number one, reinforced by Erin, whom I paid to keep a strict eye on my brand. With her team behind me, I was going to pull in more money than I would need to hit that final target. The one I’d set where I would never have to worry about money again. After all this, I decided to change the subject back to baking.
“I loved the galaxy cake you did in the final of your season.” I probably sounded lame, although it was true. The cake had been genius, right on trend, and I was a fan of taking baking off in other directions.
He wrinkled his nose, and I wanted to kiss him.
Take a step back.
“Thank you, I was super proud of that one.”
“I tried to make it, but the colors weren’t right, and it didn’t hang upside down quite the way I wanted it to.”
“It was hard to get it to hang. The secret is in the hidden discs.”
“Yeah, it wasn’t just that, I had the discs okay, it was the bake itself. The texture lacked something, and I ended up throwing it in the garbage before it fell off the hook. The last thing I need is for my pathetic copy to end up on a celebrity Nailed-It issue right next to your perfection.”
I could hear the self-derision that dripped from my every syllable and waited for him to run in the opposite direction. I personally thought that Brody was a creative genius, and right from day one everyone said he would win season four. Even though season four ended up being the hardest season of them all, he’d sailed through nearly every round, aside from bread week in the blind challenge where he’d not used enough yeast. Even that mistake he’d carried off so easily, laughing at his stupidity, and making it through on taste alone and his other two bakes. If that had been me, I’d have thrown the non-risen shit out of the window and hoped it didn’t kill a passing tourist taking photos on a studio tour.
Why am I even here? I have no chance. I’m going to look stupid. I should change the subject before I blurted out that posting the cake was in the hope that he’d notice and maybe contact me.
“We all have days like that.” He certainly didn’t run as I expected him to. “I saw you mentioned the cake on your Instagram again last week. Thank you, Justin, it meant a lot that you did that. I got a couple of people approaching me for birthdays, with that and the promo from the Lomax cake, I’m booked through to fall next year.”
“That Lomax design was stunning.” Betty Lomax was a singer and actress and she’d married Stinn-G the multimillionaire rapper. Images of the cake had blown up on social media. Formed from cascading sponges, it was covered in intricate and delicate sugar lace, the same design that’d covered the bride’s dress. Brody was a baker in capital letters. He didn’t need set managers tidying up his messes as I did. He probably did everything himself.
“Thank you, it was a favorite of mine. But I loved the galaxy birthday cake as well.”
We walked a little farther in silence, and then I thought of the perfect conversation starter.
“Is your husband staying here with you?” Whatever I felt for the guy, whatever this crazy pull to be near him was, I wasn’t going to act on it with a married man. “His proposal was pretty special, being on the show and all.”
“You mean the proposal that overshadowed the one successful thing I’d done on my own?” Bitterness and sarcasm dripped from his words.
“Uhmm… ”
“Shit,” he said and stopped walking as he kicked at the snow that’d formed a ridge. “Sorry, ignore me. No, he’s not here, and I’m in the hotel on my own. We’re actually getting a divorce. Getting? We’re minutes away from it being final. I have the papers to sign. But I haven’t done it yet because doing that would be me admitting that I hadn’t worked hard enough on my marriage, but I will sign them.” There was a lot of emotion in his voice as he blurted all that out, and I regretted asking. He was pale as if he’d exposed the worst truth of his life.
“I’m sorry,” I murmured, and I was sorry because he looked destroyed. I really wish he’d been on social media so I could get a glimpse of who he was. All I knew was that he created the most amazing cakes for celebrities and that he’d gotten a six page spread in U.S. Baker, and now I knew he was getting a divorce which clearly wasn’t public knowledge.