Love and Cupcakes Read online

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The author makes no claims to, but instead acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the word marks mentioned in this work of fiction.

  Copyright © 2013 by Susan Bishop Crispell

  Grateful acknowledgement is given to Beth Waters to reprint portions of lyrics from “Spun Sugar,” music and lyrics by Beth Waters. Copyright 2003. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

  Love and Cupcakes by Susan Bishop Crispell

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States of America by Swoon Romance. Swoon Romance and its related logo are registered trademarks of Georgia McBride Media Group.

  No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Edited by Georgia McBride and Erica Rose

  Published by Swoon Romance

  Cover designed by Su Kopil

  For Mark, my one.

  For Karen, my sister and friend.

  one

  Jaclyn Pace braced a hand on the roof of her car as the air sweetened around her, making her vision go fuzzy. The sharp bite of espresso and the sugary scent of dark chocolate and caramel pressed hot against her skin. It lingered in her lungs until she could almost taste the steaming drink topped with swirls of whipped cream.

  The overpowering smell wasn’t because the town of Sugar, Georgia was shrouded year-round in a faint scent of spun sugar, which clung to clothes and wove into hair so the townspeople smelled like they’d just come from a circus, but because someone nearby had a craving for something sweet that was too strong for Jack to ignore.

  She exhaled slowly through her mouth and willed the dizziness to pass. After a few seconds, the scent melded back into the cool morning air. Her skin was still prickly when she slammed her car door shut. She scowled at the empty street. Whomever had hijacked her senses was long gone.

  Bits of rock and dirt crunched under her feet as she crossed the parking lot. Her business partner’s bicycle was chained to the rack he’d installed behind their cupcake shop. It was a little past eight. He wasn’t due for hours. Jack trailed her fingers over the cool carbon steel rod that linked the curved racing handlebars to the main frame. The gold-star sticker she’d pressed onto it last year after he won a regional race was still there. Now, a piece of tape curling at one edge, held it in place.

  She pushed through the door to a ruckus of metal on metal, a heavy thump followed by a guttural moan of frustration. A spoon whizzed by her head. It pelted the wall and clanged to the floor to join a pile of other spoons and whisks and spatulas of varying sizes.

  “Useless heap of junk,” Graham Hollingsworth grumbled and pinged another spoon off the oven’s front door. It followed the previous arc, coming to rest at Jack’s feet.

  She picked it up and held it out to him. “This yours?”

  Graham looked up, a thin scruff of dark stubble rioting across his jaw. He scratched at it then ran a hand through his already frazzled hair. Despite baking for a living, his body was lean and hard from hours spent bicycling around town each day. “Yeah. Sorry,” he said. He took it from her, his long fingers grazing hers, and set it on the table.

  “You and the oven having a dispute?” she asked. She failed to suppress a smile.

  “More like an all-out war. Damn thing ruined everything I put in it last night. Literally turned everything into stupid little puffs of charcoal.”

  Black fingerprints streaked the front of his apron. His dark eyes narrowed as he turned back to the oven. Soot marks the size of golf balls marred the walls where, she assumed, he’d thrown the ruined cupcakes against it before moving on to the utensils. The trashcan emitted a fetid trail of smoke that preserved the crispy orbs in a mass grave.

  Jack shook the can to see just how many casualties had occurred. Her best estimate was four dozen. “Please tell me you haven’t been here all night.”

  At six foot two, he had a solid five inches on her. Dropping his hands to the table, he hunched over so he was at her eye level. His smile was weak. It pulled to the right, making him look at once sheepish and defiant. “I rode around the loop a few times,” he said, referring to the mile-long crosshatch of streets that made up downtown Sugar. “At four,” he added.

  “Graham, go home. I’ll get Danny over here to take a look at it. There’s nothing you can do until then. Get some sleep.” She pulled his windbreaker from the metal hook by the door and thrust it at him. His chest was solid and warm when her hand pressed against it. She shoved to get him moving.

  After he was gone, she settled into the office. The room was small enough for her to touch the sidewalls with both hands, palms flat against its boring white walls. Spare clipboards hung at the ready. Blank papers clutched in the metal grips awaiting the next order. Shuffling a stack of to-be-filed paperwork from the top of one filing cabinet to the other, Jack unearthed the phone. She punched in the number for the repair man.

  His resigned chuckle on the other end of the line when she identified herself made her wince.

  “Oven still giving you trouble, darlin’?”

  “It has more bad days than good lately,” Jack said.

  “I’m real sorry about that. I can make it by there tomorrow, say around four.”

  The air still smelled charred. It scratched her throat when she breathed in deep. “Is there anything I can do to get you here any earlier, Danny?”

  “If you cut me a deal on my grandkid’s birthday party next week, I can be there by noon.”

  Jack weighed the need for a working oven against the lost revenue and sighed. Rock, meet hard place, she thought. She forced a smile, hoping it would keep her words from sounding as bitter as the air tasted when she agreed.

  ***

  The stubborn scent of burned cupcakes was replaced by the Chanel No. 5, which breezed into the shop on a gush of air that was cool and sticky-sweet. Jack couldn’t decide which made her head hurt worse. Melanie Bray swept toward the counter in three-inch peep-toes and a red trench coat cinched tight at her waist. Her heels echoed on the scuffed wood floors. “Hello, Jaclyn,” she sang. Her voice fluttered up an octave. The sunlight streamed in behind her, catching the red undertones in her auburn hair.

  Jack smoothed her hands over her apron. She pulled her face into a smile. Not a part of the Sugar social scene, she received a nod and smile in place of Melanie’s customary half-hug.

  “Oh, I hope something’s not burning back there,” Melanie said, wrinkling her slender nose. She rushed on without waiting for an answer. “Blake’s working from home today. I left the twins with him so I could get a couple things done in peace. I love them, but some days I need a few minutes to myself, you know?”

  “Yeah,” Jack agreed, though she didn’t. “The twins have got to be at least three by now, right?”

  “Four, next month.”

  “That doesn’t seem possible.”

  “I know. One day they’re sweet little boys sleeping half the day away, and the next, they’re taking turns riding the dog around the front yard.” Melanie held onto vowels like they were cherished friends, extending one syllable into two. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with them.”

  “Bring them in if you want and we’ll give them a free birthday cup. Or better yet, have Blake bring them in and you can enjoy some peace and quiet at the house while he deals with the sugar rush.”

  “That’s sweet of you, Jaclyn. I think I’ll tak
e you up on that.” Melanie’s wavy hair bounced when she laughed. “It’s funny that you remember how old they are when half the time Blake tells people they’re two.”

  Jack gave her best customer-service smile. “That’s what I’m here for. So, what can I get for you?”

  “Oh, nothing, thanks. I was just in the neighborhood and thought I’d pop on in and see if everything is set for the Twilight.”

  Jack didn’t need to look at the paperwork tucked into the clipboard hanging in the back. She and Melanie, the chair of the annual Twilight Criterium nighttime bike race, had been over the order enough times that Jack knew it by heart.

  “Eight hundred cupcakes for April twenty-third. It’s been on the books since January. I’ve got your sketches taped up on the board in the back, and Graham rides his bike to work every day, rain or shine or hailstorm, so the race is always on his mind. You’ve got nothing to worry about.”

  “I know. It’s just that this is my first time chairing the race. I want everything to be perfect. Do you think that the designs we discussed will really wow the crowd? I have no doubt they’ll taste fantastic, but can Graham manage the look? I need them to be knock-your-socks-off good.”

  Unsure whether she should be offended, Jack straightened. In bright-teal ballet flats, she was still an inch taller than Melanie. “They’ll be fabulous.”

  “I know. I know they will.” Melanie shifted her weight and rested a hand on her cocked hip. “I love what Graham can do, Jack. That’s why I came to you in the first place. We’re so lucky to have him here in Sugar. You’d think with his talents that he’d be off in Atlanta or some other big city wowing everyone. Not that it isn’t nice of him to stick around here and help you try to make this place work, but I’m sure you have to be thinking that he’ll want to go someplace a little busier, more noticeable. I just hope he stays long enough to finish the Twilight job. I mean, you’re under contract with me, so he’d honor that, right?”

  If Jack hadn’t been worried about the same thing, she might have laughed. Instead she ratcheted her smile up a notch and said, “Business is just fine. We’re not going anywhere.” Her cheeks felt like small rubber balls, round and tight.

  “That’s good to hear. But please don’t hold it against me if I check back in a few more times before race day just to make sure.”

  Shit. We’re screwed. Struggling to keep her face calm, she said, “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

  Melanie flashed a blinding smile before striding to the door.

  Jack raised her hand to wave but let it fall back to her side with a slap when Melanie walked out without saying a word.

  Mind racing, she grabbed the laptop from the office in the back and booted it up. She clicked on QuickBooks and ran a profit-and-loss statement for the past six months and a current balance sheet. Though she had a good idea of where the shop’s finances stood, seeing the dwindling numbers staring at her from the screen caused the knot in her stomach to tighten.

  She hit print and the printer rumbled to life. With the shop empty, every click and squeak of the wireless wonder filled the silence. She opened the Excel spreadsheet she’d created for potential business and scanned the twenty or so quotes she’d given out in the past month. If she landed half of them, Crumbs might make it another few months. She printed the spreadsheet, too.

  She’d always thought the combination of her ability and Graham’s talent would be enough to make them succeed. Now she wasn’t so sure. She drummed her close-cut nails on the counter. Sighing, she straightened. Then she sighed again as a customer entered.

  The air vibrated. It pressed against her, warm and sweet. The rush of cream cheese frosting knocked her back a step. She reached for the counter and let the cool of the wood seep into her skin. She held her breath for one second, then another until she was sure she could stand on her own.

  When she looked up, Mrs. Thomas was staring at her with narrowed, blue eyes. The only wrinkles on the old woman’s face fanned out from the edges, making her scrutinizing look feel even more intrusive.

  “Are you okay, dear?” Mrs. Thomas asked.

  “Yes, I’m fine. Just a little dizzy.” When she sucked in another breath, the scent of the cupcake lessened a degree or two. Red velvet, red velvet, red velvet, went through her mind until the scent vanished completely.

  The old woman gave her a pitying smile—the one she reserved for the mentally disturbed and the help.

  She wasn’t sure which Mrs. Thomas thought she was. Just to be safe, she didn’t reach for the flavor she knew the woman wanted. “What would you like today?” she asked.

  “That red velvet’s been calling my name this morning.” Mrs. Thomas pointed to a cupcake in the middle of the tray. “I could hear it from miles away and just had to come in and get it,” she said.

  Jack removed the spongy cake and set it on a square of butcher paper.

  “Oh, may as well make it two. That one’ll be lonely if I take it away from its friends.”

  “We can’t have that,” Jack said. She pulled out another one, set both in a box, and tucked in the cardboard flaps. “No one wants a lonely cupcake.”

  Mrs. Thomas traded a few bills for the box. “How’s Harper, dear?”

  Jack hadn’t talked to her sister in months. Yet Mrs. Thomas was the second customer that morning to ask about Harper. One more and her sister might be Beetlejuiced into existence.

  Shaking her head, she laughed. Then she gave her standard response. “Oh, you know Harper. Always off to the next big excitement.”

  Anyone who did know Harper knew enough not to question any further. Unlike Jack, Harper had always chased after dreams blindly, running from what she saw as a rut waiting to happen without so much as a “see ya.”

  “It must be so nice for her to be off doing what she loves. Good for her.” The woman waved with her free hand and headed out the door.

  “Some rut,” Jack said to the empty shop. She pulled two elastic bands from her wrist and secured her dark hair into knots, one on each side of her neck. She surveyed the business she had planned out, sweat over, and built from scratch.

  The front room of Crumbs Cupcakery was small, intimate. Three tables occupied the right side with two built-in bars pressed up against floor-to-ceiling windows on both sides of the door. The gray wainscoting on the bottom of the walls accented the teal paint on top. The combination of serious and playful suited the atmosphere of the shop and the confections it served.

  A short glass wall on top of the counter separated the kitchen from the customer area. Behind the glass, row upon row of cupcakes stood on the counter like suspects in a police line-up, just waiting to be picked out. Swirls of icing in fuchsia, icy yellow, lime, caramel, dark brown, and white topped vanilla, chocolate, and red velvet mounds.

  Running a bakery hadn’t always been part of the plan. It hadn’t, in fact, even been a blip on her middle-management radar until her older brother had married three years earlier and Graham had wowed the reception with an eclectic assortment of cupcakes. Barely fifteen minutes after the bride and groom were whisked away under a shower of lavender petals, Jack had a business plan sketched out on a cocktail napkin. It took her another month and a half of near-constant pestering to convince Graham that opening a cupcakery in Sugar was not only a good idea financially, but one that would make them both happy.

  She picked up the reports from the printer. She grabbed a yellow marker and headed back out front. Scanning the daily totals, she winced. Only eight days of the previously month beat the minimum revenue goals. Five were slow enough that they might’ve made more money being closed.

  She set aside the spreadsheet and concentrated on the list of potential business. She highlighted the most promising jobs she’d quoted. She would call the prospective customers later and check if they’d made a decision yet.

  ***

  Graham’s hair smelled like charred cake. Even with his window cracked two inches so the cold air raked across his face and tugged the already
messy strands into a frenzy, he couldn’t shake it. He wondered if that was what Jack dealt with daily—smelling things she’d rather ignore. Feeling things she had no control over. He grunted out a bitter laugh at the irony. While Jack felt everything from everyone, his desires were so tied to the legend of Hollingsworth men who are supposed to meet their soul mate at first touch, he could never be sure if what he felt was real. He cranked the radio to keep his mind off the smell. And off Jack.

  It worked. For a few miles anyway.

  But her husky laugh and easy smile that haunted his dreams, were always pushing at the edges of his mind. And it took all of his concentration sometimes to keep from losing himself in the mere thought of her.

  By the time he snapped out of his latest reverie, he was on the outskirts of Atlanta, pushing eighty to keep up with the other traffic that swerved and dodged and merged across the lanes of I-85 like a choreographed dance. His exit was next. He tucked his truck behind a jacked-up Wrangler, avoiding its back bumper by a couple inches. He slowed as he made his way up the exit ramp. Two cars behind him jockeyed for position in the right lane. The losing driver blasted his horn and gave the winner the finger.

  Working his way through a mile and a half of strip malls and four traffic lights, Graham turned into the hippie-chic section of town. Boutique clothing stores with two hundred-dollar sandals and five hundred-dollar dresses that wouldn’t come down past mid-thigh on a tall girl jutted up against antique markets hawking vintage furniture and distressed picture frames. The glass-front shops gleamed in the sun. Artistic metal bike racks—a three-foot pole with two half-circles attached to the top—were staked in the sidewalk every third building. Each one had at least one bike chained to it. Most had two.

  He envied the owners as he pulled his truck into a spot. He fed the meter and muttered, “Damn oven,” as he calculated the time and money he’d wasted so far because of it. But until he could find a way to come up with the fifteen grand to buy the replacement he’d had his eye on for more than a year, he’d have to make do.