Chapter Three
Cake decorating, in the best of circumstances, was a hit or miss affair. On a sweltering summer day with the air conditioning broken and back to back delivery deadlines, it was a climb-the-wall, hijack the heartbeat, fondant meltdown pandemonium at Leanna Rivera’s Bumblebee Bakery.
“Let me have all the pink,” Leanna’s friend, Jolie Becker Cassidy, leaned eagerly over the cake decorating table. “I’m making the cutest baby sneakers for Terri’s cake.”
Jolie was a slim redhead who favored pink from the foundation of her makeup to the tips of her manicured fingernails. Being a makeup artist should have familiarized her with the entire gamut of coordinating colors, and she did well for her clients, but pink was the only shade for her and her two-year-old daughter.
Thank God, little Sophie Lauren Cassidy was a glowing pink ball of health, and a girl. But knowing Jolie, she loved pink so much she would have dressed a Rocky Knute Cassidy in pink football jerseys if her baby had been a boy. And yes, that was the name she and her husband, Ken, had chosen.
Meanwhile, Leanna’s walnut-colored skin was more often than not dusted with flour and powdered sugar, and she favored darker magenta lipstick and a sultrier look for her nights out.
Leanna unpeeled a cool ball of pink fondant and patted it over the powdered sugar board. “I’m running short of the Rose Petal color, so try not to waste any.”
“Hey, who says you get to hog up the pink?” another good friend, Nikki Chu, protested Jolie grabbing the entire batch. “I need it for my batch of cupcakes.”
“Not all vaginas are pink,” Jolie countered, pointing at a batch of undecorated cupcakes due at a bachelor’s party.
“I’m making dicks,” Nikki shot back. “And I already have a batch of brown, black, and tan ones.”
Nikki was a petite Asian woman who hovered around five feet even. She and Leanna were the last of her group of friends still single and unaccounted for.
Leanna wiped sweat off her forehead and rolled out another layer of pink fondant. “Don’t make them all pink. We don’t know if Terri’s having a boy or a girl.”
Both women gasped and shot shocked expressions at Leanna while making sputtering sounds. “We’re making dicks and pussies for the baby shower?”
Of course, their dirty minds would go the wrong direction.
Leanna put her hands on her hips. “I meant the booties, rattles, and ribbons, you dunces.”
Terri Martin Slade was their pregnant and about-to-pop friend who wanted to be surprised whether her unborn baby was a boy or a girl. Jolie, lover of all things pink, rooted for the female gender, while Nikki, Jolie’s ex-roommate and Leanna’s current roomie, went around painting blue dicks everywhere, mainly to get under Jolie’s skin. Nikki claimed artistic license despite earning most of her income as a photographer and travel blogger.
But Leanna wasn’t complaining. Her chief cake decorator had been deported, and his two assistants disappeared after the latest immigration raid. Her two besties were filling in the blanks, helping her make cake babies, along with vagina cupcakes and schlong jellyrolls.
“Go ahead and use up the pink,” Nikki sniffed. “I’m betting Terri’s baby, boy or girl, has a testosterone level to rival Axe Salvadori’s. I’m making a baby blue enough to be a Smurf for the cake topper.”
The mention of Axe Salvadori, the owner of Club Rachelle, a popular nightclub and watering hole in town, made Leanna’s heart contract. For some unexplainable reason, she was insanely attracted to the standoffish man who never flirted with any of the women who crowded his nightclub, famous for being a hangout for bikers and other tough guys.
“You better get busy with the cupcakes for Nick’s bachelor’s party,” Jolie shot back. “How about a few blue pussies? I bet there are quite a few where Axe is concerned.”
“Spare some pity for us single girls.” Nikki pursed her lips and snuck a glance Leanna’s direction. “Maybe we can score the Bad Boys for Hire by how they eat the cupcakes.”
“That’s a contest I want to judge,” Jolie chortled. “Hey, Leanna, think Axe will let us film an eat-a-pussy-cupcake competition?”
“I’m not going to be around for the bachelor’s party,” Leanna said. “Why don’t you two work it out with him?”
“I think I will,” Nikki said. “We could ask Rex Carter to go in on the prize money. It’ll be a win-win for Bad Boys for Hire, Club Rachelle, and my travel blogging business. For you too, Leanna, if you’re around for the photobombs.”
Leanna stopped in front of the electric fans before turning to the ovens to check on the cakes. Business was booming because everyone in San Francisco wanted to make statements with their cakes and baked goods, and Leanna had no qualms writing whatever her customers wanted on their sheet cakes. The latest trend in genital cake decorations were even more lucrative.
But the news from Mexico wasn’t good, and she had to find an excuse to go on vacation during the middle of the peak graduation and June wedding season—both straight and gay. She didn’t have the heart to let her buddies know she couldn’t even attend Terri’s baby shower. They’d never forgive her.
Leanna, Nikki, Jolie, and Terri had been best of friends from their preschool days in the Busy Bumblebees dance class. Over the years, they’d kept in touch on and off—mostly on, except for the year Leanna spent “abroad” doing studies in Mexico.
The oven opened with a puff of steam. Leanna pulled out the cake pans and set them on racks to cool. She blinked sweat from her eyes and bit her lip, wondering how she’d get away. Maybe she’d drive the delivery van and let Denton work the counter to get the customers used to her not being around.
Denton was Nikki’s younger brother, a fresh college graduate looking for real-life business experience. He could also be trusted to keep secrets from his sister, as evidenced by the fact he knew Nikki was adopted, and she was oblivious. He was a suck-up, and he’d dish out whatever bull his boss needed him to broadcast.
The voicemail had been urgent.
