She sounded like she was joking, but Case saw a genuine glint of budding panic in her eyes. Not only had Lydia never stepped foot in Sweet Indulgences, she wasn’t used to getting any lower-case sweet indulgences, period. Having a whole truckload of them dumped on her at once had to be overwhelming. Any second now, a lifetime’s worth of self-sacrificing practicality might reassert itself, and she’d decide that she should grab the nearest cupcake and call it a day.
Case didn’t want that to happen. Lydia deserved better, and it was past time someone made sure she got it.
Sohegrabbed the nearest cupcake—which actually wasn’t a cupcake at all, but some kind of powdered-sugar-dusted cookie with a raspberry jam heart stamped into it—and handed it to her.
“Here. We start here.”
That hint of panic on the horizon disappeared, and Lydia gave him a warm smile. She broke the soft, crumbly cookie in two and passed him half.
“We both have to try it, or it’s not much of a wedding cookie tasting, is it?”
“Good point.”
“I like the heart,” Lydia said, giving the sticky jam a delicate tap with her finger. Then she licked it clean, something which made Case’s mouth instantly dry up. “The jam’s good on its own, too.”
“Sure,” he said hoarsely. “I love jam. Jam’s great.”
He shoved the cookie in his mouth before he could do any more rhapsodizing about the excellence of jam, and—God. Okay, thiswasexcellent jam. It deserved all the praise he could possibly heap on it, even if he’d really been talking about the sight of Lydia’s eyes half-closing in pleasure as she licked it off her finger.
Even without that tantalizing visual in mind, though, the cookie was delicious. It was sweet and buttery, and the contrast between the powdered sugar and the tart raspberry jam added the perfect, lingering finish.
Case had never been much of a wine guy, but he would happily talk about aftertaste and light undertones of flavor when it came to this cookie. Damn.
“I agree with whatever your face is doing right now,” Lydia said solemnly. “Polly? What are these little sandwich cookies with the jam hearts on them?”
“Linzer cookies,” Polly said at once. “Good choice, and the hearts are cute for a wedding. I’ll put some in a box for you.”
“So that’s it?”
“No,” Case and Polly said at the same time. She gave him a “you go ahead” hand wave and went back to her ledgers.
Case cleared his throat. At this point, he would technically be more than happy to eat nothing but linzer cookies for the rest of his life, but he didn’t want Lydia to walk out of here having only triedonecookie, even if it was an exceptional one.
“We probably want an assortment,” Case said. “That has to be the fun of having something smaller than a wedding cake, right? Variety?”
Lydia considered this and then nodded. “That makes sense. Want to try a macaron?”
Polly had given them a couple of the brightly colored French cookies, so Lydia took a lemon one while Case took a pistachio.
These were instantly approved as additions to their wedding order, and they added vanilla, salted caramel, and matcha ones into the mix too.
Polly had terrific cream horns and eclairs, but Lydia reluctantly vetoed them as being potentially messy enough to put her dress in danger. She didn’t want to try to scrub pastry cream out of velvet, and Case could sympathize with that.
Lydia wasn’t wild about the baklava, but when she saw how much Case liked it, she insisted on adding a couple pieces to their order. He did the same thing when it came to the triangular poppy seed turnover-style cookies that he was lukewarm on but she clearly loved.
“They’re hamantaschen,” Polly said, wrapping a few up in wax paper. “Usually I only serve them during Purim, but I got a whim and made a batch this morning. Now I’m glad I did.”
Finally, they tackled the cupcakes. Polly had a few that were mini, but most of them were approximately the size of Case’s head. Bigger, even, since they came with enormous caps of buttercream frosting.
Lydia scraped most of the frosting off hers, but Case tried his as it was. He had to confess that even though it would probably send him into sugar shock, it might be worth it. Nothing compared to the linzer cookies and the baklava, in his opinion, but this cupcake came pretty close. They requested a couple of mini chocolate cupcakes, and when Polly saw the heap of frosting Lydia had left on her plate, she insisted they take a couple of dense, deliciously spicy-sweet gingerbread cupcakes that only had squiggles of royal icing on top.
“Are we even going to be able to carry all of this out of here?” Lydia whispered to him as she watched Polly cheerfully box everything up for them.
“I’m very strong,” Case said, with as much dignity as someone who’d pigged out on buttercream frosting could possibly muster. “I’m sure I can lift it.”
“That’s good. And obviously carrying something so heavy will burn all the calories we just consumed, leaving us open to consuming even more.”
“Exactly. That’s science.”
