Janice stood to go. “Chloe, I know Meredith is happy you’re home. She plays down herissue,” Janice whispered the word, “but I know she’s comforted by your presence. So, with Bob and Donna gone, who hired you? Who owns Haven’s now? I’ve not heard a word and I’m on the town welcoming committee.”
“Don’t you know? The bakery was bought by—”
Sam scrambled from his booth and stood behind Janice. Waving his arms he mouthed,No, no, no. He’d told everyone that he didn’t want Frank to know he was co-owner of Haven’s. Perhaps he should.
“—um, a man out of Atlanta. Rick or Mick or something.”
“Well, call me if and when he comes to town. I’d like to give him an official Hearts Bend greeting,” Janice said. “Oh, one more thing for the cake. No fondant. Just buttercream frosting, please.”
Sam followed Chloe to the office after Janice left. He received a text from Rick and held up his phone. “Rick is calling Bob and Donna to see about the recipes.”
“Doesn’t help me today.”
“Just make a cookie. Give them away for free. I’ll cover the cost and square it with Rick.” His phone pinged a reminder. “I have to go. I’m on Zoom with SportsCenter in a couple of hours. Need to get home.” He turned for the door. “Hey, if you want to fix up the place some, you can. We always set aside a few grand for updates, paint, and new supplies. I’ll get our business manager to email you the details. And Janice kind of ambushed you. Thanks for agreeing to make Frank’s cake.”
“More like she ambushed you. Besides, a cake for Frank’s party will be great for the bakery. People must wonder what it will be like around here without Bob and Donna. Especially now that we don’t have the TCFC recipe.”
“I have a feeling Haven’s Bakery will be even better,” Sam said. How could it not be with Chloe LaRue in the house?
Her smile eased some of the ache in his knee, the same smile he’d loved when they were fifteen and hanging out at his house around the pool. When she’d shared her recipe for lemon poppyseed bread with him. When she’d called his bluff with that dare to jump from the roof into the pool. They’d laughed a lot back then. She’d been the balm to the wound of his parents’ divorce.
On his way home to Nashville, memory after memory surfaced of the shy, dark-headed girl, lost in a world of emo, and the summer he realized he wasn’t as impervious to love as he had once believed.
Chapter 5
As the week passed without the famed Triple Chocolate Fudge Caramel cookie, Chloe tried every possible combination of chocolate, fudge, and caramel in her vast baker repertoire. And Rick had reported no luck at getting Bob to return his calls. Either the Mortons were out to sea for an extended fishing trip or when they’d retired and sold Haven’s, they’d dusted the flour from their hands and not looked back.
Chloe had thrown herself at the challenge. When nothing was deemed good enough, she’d even called Gaspard Dupree, her old pastry mentor, for ideas. Everything he suggested earned a curled lip from Ruby.
“Darling, we’re simple folks from Hearts Bend, Tennessee, not fancy, schmancy people from Paris, France.”
Last Friday, Chloe gave away her version of chocolate chip cookies—which were amazing, if she could be so bold. They were well received, especially being free and all, but no one in Hearts Bend was calling to put a fresh batch on reserve. Fair enough. But what was she going to do this week? She’d quizzed Ruby and Laura Kate, even a few customers, until Ruby threatened to strangle her, and Mrs. O’Shay’s friends avoided Chloe and turned their backs to her.“We don’t know! Stop asking.”
Nevertheless, she was developing a special bond with the crew as they found themselves in a cookie crisis—complete with frustrated and clipped answers.
So now here she was on a Thursday morning, still with no recipe, fighting the urge to knock her head on her scarred wooden desk. Searching for this recipe was beginning to feel like she was trying to catch fireflies with oven mitts. Fruitless, pointless, and a little ridiculous.
“Are you going to try again?” Ruby leaned against the door, twisting a dish towel. “Tomorrow will be the second week without them cookies. I’m not saying for sure, but I thought I heard talk of an insurrection in the grocery checkout line last night.”
“What?” Chloe sat bolt upright. “Please tell me you’re joking.”
“Of course I am…sort of…maybe…yeah, for sure I’m joking.”
“Ruby, don’t mess with me. Look, I’m shaking.” She held up her quivering hand, which she tried to convince herself had nothing to do with the four cups of coffee she’d already swallowed. This cookie thing was robbing her of sleep. She’d called Donna after Sam texted the number to her only to learn she kept all the recipes in her head. Oh yes, there was a recipe box…somewhere…but she’d not used it since the Reagan administration.
“Okay, then just tell me what’s in the cookie and roughly, if you could, the ingredient measurements.”
Donna had laughed.“A little of this, a little of that, sweetie. Flour, of course, and butter. Cocoa and, oh! The secret is my homemade caramel sauce. After ten years, I started to believe the darn things made themselves while I slept.”Then Chloe heard Bob in the background telling her it was time to go—the special at the Golden Corral started in ten minutes.
So Chloe now spent each afternoon mixing up every version of a caramel sauce she could think of to add to a chocolate fudge cookie base only to see the disappointed expressions of her taste tasters—Ruby, Laura Kate, Mr. Petrella (who came in every day for his coffee and donut), and the afternoon counter girl, Robin, if she managed to clock in on time. (Hint: She never did.) She even gave away free samples for honest opinions. But not one recipe compared to Donna’s.
Despite the devastation of the TCFC demise, the bakery was doing well. Chloe was doing well. She’d made basic versions of donuts and crullers, muffins and fritters. Laura Kate told her the few Haven’s secrets she knew for cakes and pies—a little vanilla here, an extra dash of cinnamon or nutmeg there. If Chloe didn’t get it right, no one said anything. In fact, one customer said, “Just like Donna’s.” That pinched just a bit if Chloe was honest. Because…her skills were just a touch better than Donna’s.
In other news, Janice Hardy loved Chloe’s ’60s-themed cake ideas: a classic Mustang, a Schwinn bike with a banana seat, or an Etch-a-Sketch. But the woman had insisted on something reflecting her husband’s favorite hobby. She’d chosen a four-layer chocolate and vanilla golf-based cake that promised to be a showstopper for Frank Hardy’s sixtieth birthday party in another couple of weeks.
“Chloe, my goodness, you have a gift. I never tasted such creamy icing.”
Chloe had designed a clever golf course made of frosting and piping. She planned to teach Laura Kate some advanced techniques when they did the actual decorating.
