Courtship of the Cake (26 page)

LOVE STINKS

Not surprisingly, breakfast was lightly attended the next morning. The Jeep had been emptied of its drunken cargo, I observed out the window. I wondered who had come to their senses first.

Logan was the first one down, soon followed by Bear and his acoustic guitar. Yawning, I worked on autopilot. PB&J for Logan, a quick scrambled mess for Bear and me, and a hearty spinach and cheese egg strata that could withstand sitting around waiting for the others.

“So. No key ceremony today, huh?” Bear strummed the strings absently with his thumbnail.

“No key ceremony.” I sipped my coffee.

“Bummer. Think they'll stick around?”

“Dunno.”

Bear began to strum and tap, striking up a familiar beat. “Got a tribute tonight. Freeze Frame.” He smiled expectantly, waiting for me to guess. When I didn't, he started to sing.

Mick wants Dani

Nash wants Quinn

Bear wants Angie,

We just can't win.

“Dude!” I silenced the strings with a grip to the guitar neck. “Not cool.”
Was it that obvious?

“I'm just messing. And hey, it rhymed.” He turned to Logan and signed as he said, “Mom wanted me to remind you, you have Randy Jenkins's birthday party at Sky's the Limit Trampoline Park today. Go shower the stink off you, kid.”

Logan grimaced, clearly insulted. His fingers poked and jabbed at the air as he skipped out of the kitchen. Bear just laughed.

“What did he say?”

“He said
I
stink, like Angie's tacos.” Bear bit his lip. “Damn straight. Her two-for-one tacos are the bomb diggity.”

I put my hand over my eyes, took another sip of coffee, and shook my head.

“So it's the J. Geils tribute tonight. You coming?” Bear began strumming again, singing the “yeah, yeah” chorus of “Love Stinks,” one of the band's two hit songs.

“Maybe.” I figured with only two hits, it was bound to be an early night. “Gotta get to work now.”

I was a little disappointed Dani hadn't shown her face. I figured the other two needed to sleep it off, but she was probably avoiding me. I left her a note under the coffee mug she liked to use.

1pm— James wedding cake consult

I hoped she'd get the hint.

REVEL AND REVEAL

My heart played Nok Hockey in my chest as the bells above the midnight blue door of Mick's bakery greeted me.
Great, Dani. Way to salivate, like one of Pavlov's dogs, at the mere thought of him.
And that was even before checking out his cake samples.

“Tell him I said
gracias
!” Angie Vega bustled by me with a bag and a wink. No doubt Mick's “standing order” for her had stood to its full attention when she was in the room. She was all curves and smoky softness, from the makeup rimming her dark eyes to the tanned cleavage, riding high. I pushed a hand through my curls, thinking they must look like the fuzz on a newborn chick compared to Angie's voluptuous waves of thick, raven hair.

“Hey! Dani, right?” It was the hipster with the brow ring.

“Yes . . . I've got”—
a date
—“an appointment with”—
destiny
—“Mick.” I swallowed hard.

Oh, for God's sake, Dani. It's just cake.

I got a grin in return. “He said to send you on back.”

I followed his long, outstretched arm in the direction he was pointing,
and wound my way past tall, intimidating baking racks and stainless steel ovens. Mick's team of worker bees were turning out muffins, cranking out cupcakes, and touching down torches to the tops of crème brûlée.

Mick was standing in the middle of all the chaos, a pastry bag gripped in one hand, twirling out fat lilac flowers across the top of a small round cake. It was hypnotizing to watch as he steadily worked from the innermost petal out to create rose after rose in perfect bloom. The tip of his tongue poked through his lips in concentration, and his legs splayed as he leaned to finish off the entire cake, sides and all in the lush, decadent design. Something about a guy like Mick turning out an ultra-feminine work of art was beyond hot. I thought back to our banter about his phallic-looking mask; it was no wonder he was confident in his manhood.

I waited until he stepped back to inspect his work before commenting, not wanting to startle him.

“Does it taste as pretty as it looks?”

He glanced up, tongue still peeking out. “I was just thinking the same thing.” He frowned in the direction of one particular flower, and gave it a final touch-up with the star tip. “Sadly, I wasn't invited to the party to find out. It's for a bridal shower tomorrow.”

“Zena's?” I asked, remembering the girls gossiping at the Boo-hoo Breakfast.

“Yeah.” He sounded surprised. “Have you met her?”

“No, but . . .” Julia's comment about Mick popping out of the cake came to mind, and I giggled. “You know women when they get together. They talk.”

His brows went up, and I felt heat creep up my spine, which had nothing to do with the temperature of the commercial ovens cranking behind me. “They're brutal, I'm sure. Don't believe a word they say. Especially if it's about me.”

“Didn't you feel your ears burning?” I teased.

“Not half as hot as your cheeks must be right now.” He moved past
me toward the sink, but not before dotting one with a squirt from the tip of the pastry bag.

“Hey!”

Before I could wipe it off, he leaned in for a quick kiss on my cheek. To the rest of his staff bustling by, it probably looked like an innocent greeting.

“Yep.” He licked his lips and grinned. “Tastes as pretty as it looks.”

“Cheeky bastard.”

“That's one thing you can call me.” He looked down at the computer printouts I had clutched in my hand. “Oh, good. You brought some ideas with you. Come back here and sit; we'll have a look.”

He tossed the spent pastry bag into the sink, and I followed him to a table set up in the back. A laptop running a continuous slideshow of cakes sat in the center, but he quickly shut it. “Let's see what you brought, and then I can pull up some recent similar examples.”

I slid in beside him, our knees bumping under the small space. “It's a little less chaotic back here,” he explained. “If I'm out front, well . . .”

“Everybody wants a piece of you?”

“Yeah. Something like that.” He smiled, and picked up my first sheet. I had hastily clicked around on a few websites this morning, just so I wouldn't show up empty-handed. Now I was embarrassed, as his eyes glossed over the run-of-the-mill, safe, and staid choices I had made. Especially after seeing the labor he had just poured over the petal-covered cake. I glanced back at it. What I had brought in was an insult to his imagination.

“I think of your lips every time I twirl out a rose like that,” he said nonchalantly, as if he were talking about the price of butter these days. “Every time, ever since.” He set down the sheets. “You've no idea how the mind tends to wander, when you do a job that keeps the hands busy.”

“You're wrong,” was all I could manage to muster. So many times, I hadn't even realized an hour massage had passed, because I'd been so fixated on the past. That one night with Mick had expanded me,
exposed me, to so many possibilities and missed opportunities. But I couldn't give this guy the satisfaction of knowing. WWDD? In the past, Dani would do what she does best: let them walk away without a fight so they can see their folly later. Or do the walking herself. Until now. What was it about Mick Spencer that made me want to change my tune, and sing a sweet song of surrender?

“Sorry to interrupt, but there's a lady out front.” Saved by the Brow Ring. “And she doesn't want to speak to anyone but you.”

“Is she a regular customer?”

Mick's employee shook his head. “I don't recognize her. But she's—” He laced his hands and arced them over his torso until they met the waistband of his stovepipe jeans.

“With child?” Mick ventured a guess.

“Very.”

I turned my eyes back to the cake images I had printed out. This was either business, or it was . . . personal. Very personal. Either way, I was here to look at cakes. Wedding cakes. I needed to start acting more like a blushing bride and less like a jealous lover.

“Thanks, Tom. Tell her I'll be right there.”

Mick scraped his chair back, and I felt the loss as his knee moved away from mine. “Never a dull moment,” he murmured apologetically.

I fixated on a scrumptious four-tiered creation, its squares stacked asymmetrically, until my eyes watered. “I'll bet.”
Pull it together, Danica
, I warned myself. I felt as off center as the cake in the photo.

“Come with me.” His voice was barely above a hush, and when I glanced up at him, he was smiling. “I'll bet it's a gender reveal.”

“A what?” I asked, following him to the front of the shop. I expected to see someone standing in nothing but a trench coat, waiting to flash us. But instead, an elegant and very pregnant woman waited, wearing a tailored pinstripe maternity dress and fidgeting nervously with an envelope in her hand.

“It's okay,” she addressed Tom, “if he's with another client, I—”
The woman broke into a relieved smile when she saw Mick. “Oh my God. You haven't changed a bit, Mick Spencer!”

There was that bashful half smirk I was growing addicted to. “Well, I sure as hell can't say the same for you, Jenna,” he joked. “No more homecoming queen banner.”

She rolled her eyes skyward. “Please. My mother still has my room set up as a high school shrine. It's all there. Were you in the middle of something?” she ventured, casting a curious glance at me. “I'm sorry for barging in.”

“Oh, my appointment can totally wait,” I assured her. Judging from the mound straining at the sash of her stylish dress, I had a feeling she didn't have much longer to go.

“Dani James, Jenna Humphreys.”

“It's Humphreys-Blair now. We hyphenated. What a beautiful ring, congratulations!” She looked wistful as she half shook, half inspected my hand. “I can't even wear mine, my hands are so swollen.” Turning back to Mick, she pleaded, “My mom's hell-bent on throwing me a huge, tacky baby shower here in town, now that I'm in my eighth month. But Vince—my husband—and I really wanted an intimate reveal party in the city. So . . .” She anxiously tapped the envelope against her hand. “We compromised. I told her we'd do it small and in her backyard, but only if you would do the cake and surprise us.”

“I would be honored.”

Mick grabbed an order sheet and took down all of her details for when, where, and how many servings needed as I looked on. “Whatever style you decide is best,” Jenna said, then glanced at me with a smile. “He was my lab partner in high school. I totally trust him.”

I grinned at the image of Mick in a white lab coat and safety goggles, and decided he looked hotter in the white chef's coat. Way hotter.

“I was in charge of lighting the Bunsen burner and I never once caught her hair on fire,” Mick joked. “And her hair was huge back then, so not an easy feat.”

“You wouldn't know it now, would you?” Jenna patted her sleek chignon and laughed. “You were also my hero when it came to frog dissecting, yuck.”

She pressed the envelope to her enormous belly for a moment, then with a big breath, handed it over. “Just you and the doc will know. And the little sweet pea him- or herself, of course.”

“I'll guard the secret with my life.” He put a hand over his heart. “Lions' honor.”

“Go, Lions,” she laughed, shaking an imaginary pom-pom on her way out the door. “Rah-rah! Thanks, Mick. Nice to meet you, Dani.”

“Best of luck,” I called.

Mick turned the sign on the door from Open to Closed and tucked the envelope into his pocket.

“What are you doing?”

“We close for a couple hours in the afternoon on Saturday,” he explained. “Day shift left, night shift hasn't come in yet. Tom, my manager, went to lunch. Now, where were we? Oh yeah, styles.” He led the way back to where we had been sitting. I stared at him. “What?” he asked.

“Aren't you curious at all? About what's in the envelope?”

“Of course. But right now I'm more curious about you. Am I really supposed to believe”—he shuffled my printouts around on the table—“these generic, impersonal examples you brought today are what you want?”

Busted.

“You can believe anything you want,” I mumbled. “It's just a party. It's just a cake. Isn't it the ‘ever after' part that really counts? Why place such significance on one day?”

“Because sometimes all it takes is one day,” he said quietly. “Or in some cases, one amazing evening.”