That voice definitely sounded like Grant’s. The bastard.
Still, Dax was grinning as he headed for his very impractical 1960 MGA Roadster in Old English White with black leather interior and classic silver wire wheels. It wasn’t a terrible replacement for a white horse.
He plopped his dark gray felt Frank Sinatra fedora on his head—the thing had seriously been worn by Frank in the movie The First Deadly Sin—and headed for his hotel.
Practical wasn’t his strong suit, it was true. But maybe the cake-pop goddess could use a little more impracticality in her life. In his experience, that was true for about 96 percent of the adult population in the United States.
He was just the guy to help.
1
“Is that a bouquet of cake pops?”
Jane was staring at the small silver metal bucket that had a dozen sticks poking out from it. Each stick had a red or white ball on the end. She felt a mix of resignation, amusement, and horror.
It was, indeed, a bouquet of cake pops.
Dammit.
“Seems to be,” she agreed with her friend and coworker, Max.
Max plucked one out of the bunch—they were close enough friends that he felt safe touching her sweets without permission—and bit into it. “Damn, these are good. Must be Zoe’s.” He grinned and took another. He popped the whole thing into his mouth.
“I found that putting a whole one in your mouth at once makes it hard to talk,” she said absently, thinking back to three nights ago.
She should probably be sick of cake pops by now, but she wasn’t. She so wasn’t. That was in part because her best friend was magical in the kitchen. It was also because cake balls now made her think of flirty, charming millionaires.
Max grinned around the cake. “When you’ve got a ball in your mouth, talking shouldn’t be your first priority.”
Jane snorted. She should have been expecting that. She clearly wasn’t fully focused this morning. “Well, you know more about having balls in your mouth than I do. It’s been a while.”
Max swallowed and wiped a hand over his beard to brush away any crumbs. “Yeah, well, I’ve gotta drive to find balls. You could have a set just by walking down the street.”
Being an openly gay man in a small Iowa town did have its drawbacks. Primarily that Max was in a very small minority.
Jane loved him like a brother. She did, sometimes, wish he had more of a filter though. He had an active, fun sex life he enjoyed immensely. And told her about in great detail. Which made her incredibly jealous. She loved sex. She wanted to have more of it. She just needed no-strings-attached sex and that was as hard to find in her small Iowa hometown as openly gay men.
The guys here who were her age wanted to settle down. They wanted wives and kids. Most of them already had jobs they were going to hold until they retired. They had homes. Many of them had farms and livestock, and a social life, and support network made up of family and friends they’d had since grade school. They just needed a wife to plug into the equation.
That’s what people did here. They settled down. Made lives. Raised families. Jane had no desire for that. She was plenty settled down with her father’s illness and trying to help her little sister not follow in the footsteps of their stepmother and stepsister. She didn’t need a husband. She definitely didn’t need children. She needed no more people who needed her.
But sex? Yeah, she kind of needed that.
Okay, she very much needed that.
“I want to go with you next time you drive to find balls,” she said to Max. “I need long-distance balls. The local balls, while plentiful, are way too serious.”
Max eyed the cake-pop display. “Did you send yourself this bouquet?”
Jane’s mouth dropped open. “I wouldn’t do that!” But her protest lacked conviction. She would do that. She’d just never thought of it.
“You’ve been substituting sugar for sex for a while now,” Max said. “Thought maybe you’d graduated to substituting cake balls for real balls, since we’re on the topic.”
She started to protest again but then looked at the cake pops. It wasn’t a terrible idea.
“No,” Max said. He grabbed the container of cake pops and held it out of her reach. “That’s a terrible idea.”
It was annoying how he could read her mind at times. A lot of the time, actually.
“Is it?” she asked. She started to reach for one. “I’m not so sure.”
“It is,” he said.
“You’re just afraid I’ll put on weight,” she said.
He looked her up and down. “Lady, I love your curves. Every man who meets you loves your curves. I’m not one bit worried about that.”
She smiled. She’d never been skinny. Or even thin. She had boobs and a butt and hips and, well, a deep and abiding love for baked goods. She’d never been apologetic about it either. She ran but not for her weight—though it did give her more wiggle room for treats—but because she was scared of getting sick like her dad.
The doctors assured her his progressive neurological condition, which they didn’t even have a specific name for, was most likely caused by pesticides and other environmental factors rather than genetics. But she couldn’t shake the anxiety around it. Or the idea that while she didn’t work directly with the chemicals like he had, she’d grown up in the area where they used those chemicals on the fields and knew they were in the air and probably in the water.
Exercise and eating well and all that seemed like a good idea whether his illness was because of genes or environment. So she ran. And ate vegetables. And then didn’t feel one iota of guilt about her daily dose of sugar and fat from Buttered Up.
“I’m more worried you’re going to forget how great the endorphins from sex feel,” Max was saying, pulling her away from her thoughts and back to the topic at hand. “And you’re going to be content with the sugar high instead.”
She nodded. “The sugar high is nice.”
“It’s nothing like the high that comes from a good hard fucking,” Max told her bluntly.
Jane sighed. It was true. She had vague memories of that being true anyway.
“So yes, I’ll take you with me next time,” he said. “But if you didn’t send yourself these cake pops, who did? Zoe? Please tell me it wasn’t Zoe. She does not need to be supporting this addiction.”
“She’s thrilled Hot Cakes employees can now buy from her,” Jane said. Maybe Zoe had sent them. That actually made a little sense. “Maybe this is a little advertising gimmick. Send these over so everyone here sees them, and a few people sample them and talk about how amazing they are.” That was actually a great idea.
“Oh, okay,” Max said, putting the bouquet back down on the break room table. “But that means you can’t eat them all. You should leave them here for other people to taste. It would be good for her business.” Max even put the second cake pop he’d grabbed back into the bouquet.
Because of the rivalry between the Lancaster and the McCaffery families, Hot Cakes employees had been banned from buying from Buttered Up, the local bakery. Wedding, birthday, and other special occasion cakes, along with muffins, scones, and other everyday bakery items had to be purchased in the next town. And they were nowhere near as good. But Hot Cakes was now under new management.
The new owners had rescued the company from closing its doors, had saved over three hundred jobs, and were, more or less, considered heroes in the town. Two of them were also hometown boys. One was Zoe’s brother, Cam. The other was the man she was madly in love with, Aiden.
It had been a rocky few weeks.
Now, though, the bakery ban had been lifted, and things were starting to improve. The guys really seemed intent on making things at Hot Cakes better. Not just business-wise, but also for the employees.
As Zoe’s best friend, Jane had Aiden’s ear and she’d been taking advantage of that. Now they just had to wait to see if the guys could pull off this big makeover.
Considering they
had, more or less, accidentally become millionaires and learned all about business management as they went along, Jane had her doubts.
But she was keeping those to herself.
Mostly.
“Though,” Max mused, “it seems she should have sent a sampling of all her cake pops, right?”
Jane frowned. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, if Zoe wanted to use this to advertise, why not send a bunch of different flavors? Why are they all red velvet?”
Jane’s gaze flew to the bouquet, and her heart flipped in her chest. “They’re all red velvet?”
“Yep.” Max picked another one out of the bunch and bit into it, then held it up.
It was definitely a deep-red cake, surrounded by a white icing coating. Jane groaned. Those were not from Zoe.
Dax Marshall had figured out who she was.
It wasn’t like it would have been hard to find out or would have taken long at all.
She just hadn’t been convinced he’d care enough to try.
Or what he’d do with the information once he had it.
The cake-pop bouquet was nice. And funny. She felt her mouth tipping up at the corner.
“Is there a note or anything?” she asked.
Max turned the bouquet and then reached into the middle. Jane felt her heart rate pick up as he withdrew a card.
“See you in my office at one. Looking forward to—dot, dot, dot—working with you.” Max lifted his gaze. “What the hell is that about?”
“There’s actually a dot, dot, dot before working?” Jane asked.
“Yep.” Max turned the card to face her.
Why did that ellipsis make her feel a little warmer?
“You’re going to Aiden’s office at one?” Max asked. “You should tell him the dot, dot, dot thing makes that seem dirty. I’m sure he didn’t mean it that way, but that’s definitely how I read it.”
Jane did too. She snatched the card from Max’s hand. “It’s not from Aiden.”
She wasn’t sure she should share that information, even with her best work friend. Dax was their boss, but he was here temporarily just to get things with their new ownership smoothed out. He’d be going back to Chicago. He was a computer geek. A game designer. He went to Comic-Con on behalf of their gaming company. He was originally from California. He owned a fedora that had once been worn by Frank Sinatra in a movie.
Yes, okay, she’d looked him up after their tête-á-tête at the party.
So he was her boss, but he hadn’t done anything wrong she supposed. Him being a little flirty with her was okay as long as she was okay with it.
Which she was. She definitely was.
He was not in possession of local balls. He wasn’t going to be taking her to Sunday dinner with his mom and grandma on date three. Yes, that had happened to her. He also wouldn’t consider a tailgate party and hometown football game a date. That had also happened to her. Nor would he think they should roll out of bed on Saturday morning after a night of not-too-terrible sex to do farm chores. She wasn’t above getting a little muddy or feeding chickens. It wasn’t that. It was that she’d really just been in it for the sex and maybe some pancakes in the morning. Feeding chickens together seemed, stupidly, more serious than pancakes.
Dating guys she’d known forever in her hometown was tough.
Dax Marshall was… none of the above.
And she didn’t want to date him. At all.
But she wouldn’t mind eating cake pops in bed with him.
“Who’s it from?” Max asked.
“Dax Marshall.”
Max lifted a brow. “Oh.”
Of course he knew who Dax was. Dax had been at the town hall that preceded the party the other night.
“He’s hot,” Max said, nodding.
Jane sighed. He was. “And funny and charming,” she added.
“And he knows about your cake addiction?”
“He does.”
“You’re in huge trouble,” Max decided.
Yeah, that’s what she figured.
But maybe Dax Marshall could be the kind of trouble she needed. Fun trouble. Sexy trouble.
And most importantly, temporary trouble.
At one, Jane stopped at the desk outside the suite of executive offices. There were six. The Lancasters had been all about big, fancy offices. She had no idea which one Dax was using.
There was a new woman standing behind the reception desk today. She was watering the plant that sat on the tall filing cabinet just to the side of the receptionist’s desk, and Jane actually stopped in her tracks as she took the woman in.
The woman was stunning. She had long, dark hair and curves like crazy. And she was celebrating those curves. She was dressed in a fitted white sweater with tiny pearl buttons that started just below a not-inappropriate-but-very-tantalizing glimpse of cleavage. She had a thick black belt cinching her waist above a pink skirt that flared out, hitting just below her knees. On her feet were pink wedge heels with a huge white bow above the toes. Most interestingly, her long hair—which had to hang nearly to her butt when let loose—was up in a high pony tail with a pink scarf wrapped around her head and tied in a huge bow. She also wore horn-rimmed glasses. In pink.
For a second, Jane felt like she’d possibly stepped into the 1940s.
The woman looked over just then. “Oh, hi! You must be Jane.” She gave Jane a big smile, setting the watering can down.
Jane blinked and made herself cross the space to the receptionist desk. “Yes. Hi.”
“I’m Piper.” She extended her hand.
“Hi. Jane. Obviously.” Jane took her hand, feeling stupid. She wasn’t used to going to executive offices or introducing herself by handshake.
That just wasn’t necessary when you knew everyone you worked with and had worked in the same place since you’d been sixteen. She’d been hired by filling out online paperwork, showing up at the factory one day after school, saying “sure” when Bruce, the then foreman, had asked if she could work every day from four to eight, and then going to the women’s locker room to change into her Hot Cakes polo shirt with her jeans. She’d trained on the job for about a week, and then she’d been a full, regular employee.
“I work with the guys in Chicago,” Piper explained. “I was technically hired to be Ollie’s executive assistant, but I help all the guys. Between you and me, I keep things organized and on schedule.”
Jane gave her a little smile. “It’s nice to meet you. Did you replace Sandra?” she asked of the former receptionist.
“Oh no.” Piper waved that away. “Sandra is in her own office.” She pointed at one of the doors. “She’s doing everything she normally does. She’s still working closely with Whitney and is helping a lot with the transition. I’m here to… keep the guys in line,” she said. Her pink lips curved into a warm, sincere smile. “No one else should have to deal with them. Especially when they’re in this state.”
“This state?” Jane asked.
“All excited and wound up about a new project,” Piper said. “They’re brilliant, and they all have big hearts and mean well, but honestly, when they get together on something like this, they’re like a bunch of twelve-year-olds with too much sugar and too much allowance money.” Her expression was a mix of affection and exasperation. “They do big things. And to do big things, they have to think big and be willing to take risks. But someone”—she pointed to herself—“has to say things like, ‘That’s going to take three weeks even if we pay triple and call in favors,’ and ‘You tried that four years ago and it was horrible,’ and ‘If you do that, I’m quitting.’” She lifted a shoulder. “I’m the voice of reason.”
Jane laughed. She liked Piper. The woman obviously knew the guys well and cared about them. But she was also clearly under no illusion that these handsome, charming, rich men were perfect.
“So Sandra’s job is very intact. My job responsibilities are very specific—babysit the hot millionaires and keep Oliver’s feet on t
he ground. At least some of the time.”
“Oliver is the biggest problem?” Jane asked, entertained and intrigued.
“Oliver is definitely the biggest problem,” Piper said. “He’s the dreamer, and he hates the words ‘no’ and ‘can’t.’ The rest of them are at least slightly reasonable.”
Jane couldn’t help herself. This woman clearly knew these guys well, and if she was going to get a scoop, this was the perfect opportunity. She opened her mouth to ask, “Dax too?”
But before she could say it, Piper added, “Well, except Dax, I guess.”
Jane snapped her mouth shut. She should not be this interested in Dax Marshall. She just shouldn’t. Maybe it was because Piper had just filled her in on Ollie a little, and Jane already knew Aiden and Cam.
Of course, she knew nothing about Grant.
And she definitely hadn’t been Googling Grant or Oliver last night. Nope, her searches had all been about Dax.
“Dax—Mr. Marshall—isn’t reasonable?” Jane asked, really hoping she sounded even one tiny bit casual. She didn’t think she did. She was pretty sure she sounded as casual as a little girl bouncing on her toes and asking Santa, “You brought me a puppy? For reeeeal?”
Piper gave a little laugh. “No, that’s not a word I’d use for Dax.” Again, her smile was clearly affectionate. “Dax is an enabler of the first order for Ollie. He loves big ideas. He loves big plans and adventures. All Oliver has to do is say is, ‘Hey, do you wanna…’ and before he’s even done asking, Dax is saying, ‘Hell, yes!’”
Jane smiled. Then frowned. “So he’s a flake?”
Piper looked surprised by Jane’s comment. “No. That’s not the right word. He’s… fun. Spontaneous. Always up for something new. And he makes sure the other guys have fun and don’t work all the time.”
“Ah,” Jane said. “He’s the life of the party.”
Piper smiled. “Yes.” Then she frowned, clearly realizing Jane hadn’t meant that as a compliment. “Dax is the one who makes sure things stay balanced. The guys work really hard. They’re very driven. Without him, they’d all have ulcers and insomnia and no personal lives.”
Forking Around (Hot Cakes Book 2) Page 2