Train guy’s stony expression didn’t budge as Richard rose and tugged his suit coat into place. “Don’t bother,” Richard said with a sniff. “I’ll serve our guests stale bread before I’ll serve them anything from here.” He linked his arm with hers and addressed Dora coldly. “You’re a dinosaur, and sooner or later a meteor’s headed your way. Enjoy extinction.”
He steered Josie toward the exit, but before they sailed through the door, she glared over her shoulder at the man behind the counter. “Thanks a lot. Guess we had to handle this one on our own.”
The tinkling of the bell over the door punctuated her words, and then she and Richard were on the street and hustling down the sidewalk. Once they’d turned the corner, Richard jerked to a halt, his body trembling.
“The whole time we’ve been planning our wedding, I’ve been braced for something like that. Was expecting it even. But when it actually happens…”
She pulled him into a hug. “Let’s go back and tear that place to the fucking ground.”
He gave a small sob and wrapped his arms around her to squeeze back. “I wish. I wish we could.”
He sounded so resigned that Josie’s heart ached. As awful as that scene had been for her, she couldn’t even begin to understand the pain it had caused her friend. So she kept her arms around him as his tears fell.
Once his breathing had returned to normal, she asked, “What do you want to do now?”
Richard exhaled hard. “Do you have time to get coffee and start researching other bakeries?”
“Absolutely. There’s a coffee place a few blocks over.”
They’d walked several steps before Richard sighed. “What a damn shame. That hazelnut filling was to die for.”
Three
The slamming of the door echoed through the bakery as Erik Andersson pieced together the influx of information he’d absorbed in the past two minutes.
First he’d received the shock of his life when he’d recognized the funny, smart-mouthed redhead from the L at the tasting table. Then his oh-so-helpful brain had pointed out that she looked just as good in stretchy black pants and a fleece as she did in her tight suit the night before. Then there’d been the brief, unexpected pang when he thought she was there to pick out a wedding cake with her suit-wearing fiancé. And finally, she’d started shouting, which reminded him that as hot as she was, she was exactly the kind of woman he’d tried to avoid his whole life.
It was enough to make him long for the safety of his kitchen. But this time he couldn’t walk away. He’d avoided this discussion for too long.
“What just happened?”
Dora’s color was high on her round cheeks as she collected the tub of dishes and marched behind the counter. “Nothing. Nothing at all. Just a pair of look-but-don’t-buy types. I asked them to leave.”
She brushed past him and moved to the back where she scraped the cake remains into the trash with angry motions while Erik turned over what he’d heard.
“Dora,” he said slowly, “how often do you turn people away?”
She didn’t meet his eyes. “Not often. Just couples who aren’t…”
His stomach roiled as he waited for her answer.
Finally Dora lifted her nose and announced, “If I don’t approve of someone, I don’t have to take their money. It’s my right.”
Goddammit.This was worse than he’d thought.
Dora had hired him as her head baker five months ago, and within a few weeks, his discomfort with her constant negativity had bloomed into full-blown loathing of her closed-mindedness about certain “people and lifestyles” as she put it. But he’d finally landed his ideal job after half a year of grunt work in some of the worst kitchens of Chicago, so he’d kept his head down and his earbuds in and did his best to ignore his boss unless she spoke directly to him. He’d told himself he could endure just about anything if she truly was as close to retirement as she swore she was when she’d hired him.
This though? This was too fucking far. How many people had she turned away since he’d started working for her? Muttered comments were one thing, but to actually refuse to bake for someone? Dammit, he shouldn’t have spent so much time drowning her out with music. He should’ve paid better attention. Bile burned the back of his throat.
“My business, my decisions.” She interrupted his thoughts, and when he didn’t respond, her voice sharpened. “Are we going to have a problem, Erik?”
He lowered his brows and shook his head. Nope. No problem he couldn’t solve.
“Good.” She pulled her ever-present notebook out of her pocket and flipped to the newest page, muttering the whole time. “My baker doesn’t say more than twenty words a day, and this morning he decides to use them all to question my business judgment.”
Her eye roll made it clear what she thought of his opinions, and he clenched his jaw. She really didn’t know the first thing about him.
Dora plucked a printed sheet from the counter. “Here’s today’s schedule. How are you coming with the Parker-Wilson cake? Get me a sketch for the design they requested by noon.”
