by Kari August
“Oh, I see what you mean.” And Ned did. He sighed softly. What could he say? But, Clarence, it nearly ruined the special bond between us. Yikes, no. That sounded too needy and sensitive. So he kept his mouth shut, and Clarence was soon snoring softly.
Ned turned over and punched his makeshift pillow. Perhaps if he had found his soul mate—God, he hated that word, but it did fit—that one special person that would give his life meaning, he wouldn’t even be contemplating trying to regain a close relationship with Clarence right now.
Lindsey. There was just something about her. . . . Ned punched his pillow again, determined to think about something—or at least someone—else.
Ned walked into the cabin the next day in a more upbeat mood. Being outdoors always had that effect on him. Clarence trudged in behind him and, heading for the stairs, declared, “After a hot shower, I’m sacking out. That was exhausting, Ned.”
“Come on, admit it. You enjoyed yourself.”
Clarence glanced back and gave a tentative smile. “All right. It was a great trip. But the next time the two of us do something together, it’s going to be at my club in Florida.”
Ned smiled. “Which one? The old one or the new?”
Clarence grinned. “The new one, of course.” He raised his hand for another high five.
Ned obliged eagerly and briefly watched Clarence climb the stairs.
“It’s a relief you’re back safely, Ned.”
He turned to respond to Dickie in the kitchen, but gaped in astonishment at the view. There were bowls filled with dough, bags of sugar, and sticks of butter everywhere. Aunt Elle was pulling a tray out of the oven even though cookies were already piled high on every available inch of counter space. Dickie was drying his hands on his apron and looked as if he had dusted himself with flour from head to toe.
“What’s going on here?
Aunt Elle blew a breath upward to get a curl off her face. “Why don’t you explain, Dickie?”
Dickie smiled smugly. “It’d be my pleasure. Well, you see, Ned, it occurred to me that we ought to sell Elle’s cookies on Dougie’s Kitchen Korner, and when Charlena called and offered her father’s assistance in arranging our network debut—”
“What?!” Ned suddenly didn’t want to hear any more. He plopped down into the closest dining room chair and held his head in his hands. “Please tell me you didn’t just say what I thought you said.”
Dickie walked over and patted Ned on the shoulder. “Now, don’t worry, Ned. Elle and I have things in hand. We don’t have to be on Dougie’s show for a few weeks or so. We’ve got plenty of time to make enough cookies.”
Ned looked up. “Let me get this straight. You and Aunt Elle are going on—”
“You and I, Ned, are going to be on the show.”
Ned shook his head vigorously. “Oh, no. Absolutely not. I’m not going on that show.”
Dickie frowned, but then shrugged. “Fine. Suit yourself. I can always go on the show by myself.”
Ned began pounding his head on the table.
Dickie smirked. “That’s the oddest habit you have, Ned.”
Chapter Fifteen
Reality hit home as soon as the next afternoon. Clarence and Elle had just said their good-byes when a preliminary contract came from TBN. Ned started reading it, while Dickie watched intently.
“Holy shit! You can’t do this. Assuming the shortbread meets approval, do you know how many cookies you need to make before the show?”
Dickie shook his head. “Five hundred?”
“Not even close. They’re expecting a thousand units of each type delivered before the show, and a capability to produce three thousand more after the show.”
Dickie’s eyes widened.
“And that’s not all. I was reading the regulations and rules this morning about selling from a home bakery. Even if it were possible to bake all those cookies in Grandma’s old oven here, you still could not use the same space to cook your own food. We’d have to go out for every meal, and we certainly can’t afford that. Plus you’ll need to take a course given by the Colorado agricultural department on food-handling precautions. I’m not even sure if and when you’ll get inspected. Each state and local jurisdiction has its own unique requirements. I don’t know what this means, since you would be selling in a different state.”
Dickie rolled his eyes. “Now, Ned. Remain calm. I’m sure you’ll be able to handle all the legalities in time—”
“Don’t be so sure about that.”
Dickie shrugged. “If worse comes to worst, we’ll just have to pay off those in charge.”
“Oh, no. I’m not getting in trouble with the bar over this!”
“But, Ned, you know we could use the money, and since you don’t seem that anxious to get a real job, this is perfect.”
Ned frowned. “But how are you going to bake all those cookies with Elle leaving because of her charity?”
“I’ll find some help. Isn’t there a bigger kitchen we could use?”
“You mean a commercial kitchen?”
“I don’t know. Is that what I mean?”
Ned blew out a breath. “Yes, that’s what you mean. And yes, we might be able to find a bigger kitchen in Estes Park. Perhaps some restaurant that’s gone out of business. But it will have to be one that rents for super cheap.”
“See, we’ll make this work.”
Ned shook his head. “I really don’t know about that.”
It took a couple days to resolve their first issue. While Ned tried to handle the legalities, shipped sample cookies to the production studio, and checked into the cost of special packaging for the cookies, Dickie visited the few available kitchens in the surrounding area. Most were either too expensive or had just been leased by other interested parties. Finally, at the end of the second day, Dickie walked up to a building on the outskirts of town with faded, peeling paint and a sign partially falling down that read: The Tacos, Tortillas, and Mama Mias Shack. With a name like that, no wonder they went out of business. He knocked on the door where the owner had said he would meet him.
A flabby, middle-aged man with a few days’ growth of beard answered. He scratched his belly while asking, “You Mr. York?”
Dickie nearly gagged after catching a whiff of his breath. “Yes, I am. Could I take a look at your kitchen for rent?”
He opened the door wider and made an expansive gesture with his arm. “It’s in the back.”
Dickie walked around a serving counter and wanted to turn and strut right on out the door again. The place was a dirty mess and would need an extensive scrubbing and clearing out of trash before it could be used. The only saving characteristic of the place was that the appliances looked more modern and larger than Grandma Sally’s. He cleared his throat. “Everything in working order?”
“Right as rain.”
Dickie was puzzled. “You mean right as my leg.” That was how the expression had gone in his time.
“Huh?”
Dickie forged on. “So the ovens work. How much are you willing to negotiate on the price of a monthly lease?”
“Weeelll, I don’t know. I’ve got a lot of people interested in renting.”
Dickie just bet he did. “We need the kitchen immediately, and will handle the cleaning of it, but we expect a third less in monthly cost.”
“Deal.” He shook Dickie’s hand, agreeing too readily. Oh, Lord. Dickie realized they were paying too much.
The next issue was one of practicality. They were unable to buy all their ingredients at the Estes Park stores. There simply was not enough in stock, so they had to take time out to head to a restaurant supplier out of town. But luckily, before they left for Denver, Dickie ran into Cody, whom he had last seen causing trouble across the aisle at Richard III. Cody readily agreed to help out in the kitchen—he could always use more spending money.
By the time all the necessary preliminaries were done, Dickie had very few days left to bake. Ned tried to renegotiate the contrac
t so that they had more time to deliver the cookies. He met firm resistance. TBN never let a first-time company get away with not supplying at least a full thousand up front. It was considered too risky a venture for them. Ned arranged for shipment to be made at the last possible moment—the morning before the show. Dickie worked at a frantic pace with Cody, often late into the night, and even got Ned to drizzle caramel and fudge sauce over the cookies one afternoon.
Then fortune’s wheel took a definite downward turn.
It was late the final afternoon before all the cookies were due to be shipped to the network in the morning. They had only about a hundred more of each kind to bake. They needed some more sugar.
While Cody finished packing up what was already baked, Ned and Dickie tiredly headed over to the local grocery. Pleased the store had restocked, they loaded up the remaining bags of sugar on the shelves into their cart. The redheaded clerk was handling checkout again.
Ned gave her his card. She swiped it and then declared after a minute, “It’s not working. Do you have another card we can use?” She crossed her arms after handing back the card, and pursed her lips impatiently.
Ned asked anxiously, “Could you try it again?”
She sighed loudly, swiped it again, and then said, “This usually happens when there are insufficient funds.” She started tapping her foot. “Comprende?”
Ned turned red and told Dickie they needed to talk outside. He pushed the cart to the side and motioned for Dickie to follow.
Once seated in their car, Dickie asked, “What’s going on, Ned?”
“I guess I spent the last of my credit limit ordering expensive plane tickets to the network studio and making a hotel reservation this morning. The package supplier also demanded half up front. Everything just cost so much for us to even get started. And there’s more we need, besides money for the sugar. There’s the issue of transportation to and from the airport, spending money, food. . . . God, I knew I was getting close to bottom, but I didn’t think this close. I’ve cleared out my savings account. I’m broke. We’re broke. We’re completely broke.”
Dickie gazed at Ned in horror. “You mean that’s it. End of baking? But we haven’t completed the initial order.”
Ned leaned back against the headrest. “I’m sorry.”
Dickie frowned, not knowing what to say.
Ned groaned. “I’ve failed. . . . Failed you. Failed in life. Failed in love. Failed in everything.”
Ned hit the steering wheel with his palm. “I should have been looking for another corporate law position all along. I’m an idiot to think I could change my life. For even hoping for a change. For running and ignoring the realities of living. I mean, it wasn’t that my life was so bad before. I just had wanted . . .”
Dickie waited. “What, Ned?”
Ned looked at Dickie intently, but then merely shook his head. “It doesn’t matter anymore.” He turned on the car and shifted gears. “Let’s just head home. There’s nothing we can do now.” Ned started to back out of the parking space, then turned to Dickie with a smirk. “While we wait for me to find another fantastic job, perhaps we can make some cash selling the cookies we’ve made at a bake sale. Wouldn’t that be fun?”
Dickie suddenly realized he had been so concerned with his own affairs that he hadn’t understood the full extent of Ned’s unhappiness with his own life. They needed to talk. “Ned, turn off the car.”
Ned obeyed and looked over. “What?”
Dickie swallowed. “Perhaps I should signal to Herman to send me back. Get out of your hair once and for all. That would help, wouldn’t it?”
Ned shook his head vigorously. “No! What if you ended up in hell after failing to repair your reputation? I don’t need that to worry about.”
Dickie pursed his lips. “You know, Herman could have been making a mountain out of a molehill. God has probably already decided my fate.”
“You really want to take that chance?”
Dickie paused, and then shook his head. “I guess not. At least, not yet.” But he realized the threat of hell ever after wasn’t the only reason he wanted to remain. He had such a feeling of unfinished issues. Of course, there was the risk of losing all that money from TBN that could be used to help repair his reputation, salvage his pride, and honor the York family name.
But when Dickie thought further about it, he realized that Ned needed his help. His support. He had come to truly care and like this Plantagenet cousin of his, and he didn’t want Ned potentially going through life so discontented, not only in his work situation, but in love and life in general. No, he would stay in this century, but with a new and better added focus: He would stay and help Ned.
First problems first—the sugar. “Why don’t we just borrow some money from Aunt Elle?”
Ned shook his head. “We wouldn’t get it in time. You need to be baking tonight for the shipment early tomorrow morning. Besides, banking transactions are already done for the day.”
“So you have absolutely no more money left?”
“The remainder is in investments that I made for when I quit working. You know, when I’m older.”
“You mean when you quit working as a park ranger.”
Ned stared out the front windshield. “Did you ever dream of something as a kid and then realize as an adult that it had its issues?”
Dickie chuckled softly. “Sometimes I wondered whether the peasants had an easier life than I had as king. You know, fewer worries, fewer responsibilities, less pressure all the time.”
Ned nodded. “Well, park rangers have to deal with government funding issues all the time, obnoxious tourists, and trying to get by on their paycheck.”
Ned paused; then his face brightened. “I just had never thought of breaking into my funds because of the penalties involved. But let’s do it! That money can tide us over for a good long while. I should be able to get us some funds by tomorrow afternoon. And that way . . .” He shook his head and smiled. “Let’s do it.”
And that way Ned could keep from making any important life decisions? Was that what he was going to say? Ned needed a good talking-to, but Dickie realized right this moment was not the time, so he continued. “But for now we need some immediate cash to buy sugar for baking tonight.”
“Correct.”
“Where are your goldsmiths so we can make some kind of trade? You know, like Las Vegas Rick on channel three hundred?”
“You mean a pawnshop? There aren’t any in Estes Park. Besides, it would take too much time to figure out what to pawn and to find a shop nearby.”
“Then let’s borrow from one of your friends in Estes Park.”
Ned blushed. “Uh . . . I don’t have any here.”
“Well, don’t feel bad about that, Ned. You only just moved to the place.” Dickie bit his lower lip in thought. But he had made a friend here. Could he—would he—really stoop so low as to ask him? Dickie blew out a long breath. Well, his pride had survived becoming a household servant and cook, harassment from the sheriff, and attending an absolutely humiliating play. Surely he could do this. “Then I guess our only option is to ask Cody if I can borrow some money.”
Ned’s mouth dropped open. “The kid who helps you in the kitchen? He doesn’t look as if he has a penny to his name.”
“Well, let’s just hope otherwise.”
Chapter Sixteen
Lindsey tried to plaster a confident smile on her face as she walked past the receptionist into the office of head of personnel. This would be her third interview at a clothing design firm. She had completed her coursework and was ready to take on the fashion world. The problem was, they were unwilling to take her on. She had sent her résumé to close to thirty different firms—all over the world—and had heard back from only three. It didn’t matter that she was an intellectual genius, that she might have natural design talent, that she would be a hard and dedicated worker. The fact was, she had no previous experience, other than classes in design, and with the economy the w
ay it was, firms were unwilling to invest in an unknown.
The very basic entry-level positions she had been offered at her first couple of interviews wouldn’t pay her bills, and, of course, there was no guarantee that she would be given the chance for promotion at either firm. Unless this current interview panned out, it looked as if her dream of designing clothes was going to go up in smoke.
That would probably please her parents, who were wary and disapproving of this career choice, but it would devastate Lindsey. Because what was she going to do then? Continue her job as managing administrator for the Clear Richard III’s Name Society? She inwardly grimaced at the thought. Such a lofty title for such a modest, unfulfilling position.
Besides sending out reminders for meetings and handling membership applications and dues, the only managing she had been doing was breaking apart silly squabbles between board members. Heaven help her the occasional times she was asked to attend one of their meetings—and not just listen through the door. It was beyond the realm of tolerable.
But what could she do with her degree in history? She certainly didn’t want to teach, and didn’t think she had the patience it required, not that there were many positions available anyway. The fact was, a good many of her fellow history grads were serving food in restaurants or standing behind a bar. They were actually envious of her position at the society. If they only knew.
A half hour later, Lindsey nodded good-bye to the receptionist. She tried to look cool and assured, but felt anything but. This time she hadn’t even been offered an entry-level position. They would get back to her tomorrow if they were interested.
She just knew they wouldn’t.
She returned to her small, empty apartment, kicked off her shoes, and lay down on her bed, though it was only early afternoon. She sighed loudly. She felt like a ship in the doldrums. The fact was, she wasn’t progressing in any aspect of her life, not just her work situation.
Sure, it still annoyed her when her mother mentioned the word “marriage,” but the truth was, Lindsey also had a yearning for a significant other in her life—more so since her kind-of date with Ned York. Before their unfortunate encounter, she had always considered herself an independent type of individual. Perhaps she had only been fooling herself.