by Bella Cruise
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Which of these invite styles do you like better?
I click between the links she’s sent. They’re hardly any different. One is a design full of loops and curlicues in blue and grey. The other is more loops and curlicues in green and silver. Neither does a thing for me, but then, I’ve never had much of an eye for this sort of thing. Give me flavors over Pantone shades any day.
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They both look fine.
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You must have a preference!
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Honestly, Gin, my mind’s on other things.
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Uh oh. Is this about Cal again?
I roll my eyes. Of course Ginny called me after that disastrous double date at Lenny’s to get the dish on what happened. And while she did her best to listen sympathetically, at the end, she insisted that Cal couldn’t have meant anything by it.
It’s not like his business is an evil plot to take your business down, was what she’d said, which stung a little. I never said it was! Cal McKenzie is no Lex Luthor, plotting to take down Superman. I think what’s happening is a lot more mundane than all of that. He just doesn’t think about who he’ll stomp on on his way to world domination. Okay, so maybe I do think he’s a little bit like Lex Luthor.
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. . . what if it is?
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You gotta let it go. I don’t care how hot he is. It’s not healthy for you to be so fixated on him.
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This isn’t because he’s hot, Ginny, I swear. Rock N Roll Cakes is a graveyard right now. How would you feel if you were about to lose your business?
There’s a long pause, and I know that I’ve hit Ginny where it hurts. If she cares about anything, it’s her wedding planning business. She lives for all the flowers, chaos, drunken uncles, and feuding in-laws. She’d be lost without it. So I know she gets how I feel, watching my livelihood slip through my fingers.
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I’d be devastated, Jules. Completely and utterly devastated.
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I know. I am.
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There’s got to be a reason why they’re all flocking to him.
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I keep thinking the same thing. But it was nothing special at the Grand Opening. Pretentious decor and steel girders. The place left me cold. Sure, the cupcakes were okay, and Cal’s a celebrity, but there’s got to be something else going on there.
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Drugs in the drinking water?
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LSD for everyone! But seriously, if only I could find out what makes Mecca Cakes so irresistible, maybe I could pull things together before I have another month in the red.
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. . . hmm, I have an idea.
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Hit me with something brilliant, Ginny, because I’ve got nothing.
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Give me forty minutes. I’ll cancel my lunch date with Luke and be right over.
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Oh boy, I can’t wait! :D
#
Just under an hour later, I’m Googling Cal again, deep into some blog post speculating about his sex life, when the bakery door opens with a flourish of bells.
“Hey, Ginny,” I say, without looking up from my laptop. But then I hear a voice, falsely deep, rumble out from beneath the brim of a fedora.
“My name’s not Ginny. It’s Gin . . . ella.”
I glance up, and gasp back laughter. It’s not the Ginny I know, that’s for sure. She’s wearing a powder blue trench coat and a grey curly wig with a hat down low over her face. And I think she’s got a pillow tied to her waist underneath it all, because suddenly, Ginny Austen has doubled in size.
“Gin . . . ella. Can I get you a cupcake?”
“I’ll take a baker’s dozen, dahling.” I can’t tell if her accent is supposed to be Southern or European. “Give me thirteen of those Pink Ladies you’re so famous for.”
“I think you mean Pink Surprises,” I say. It feels a little weird to box up thirteen cupcakes for my best friend—even weirder to charge her for them. But at this point, I’ll take every sale I can get. Ginny slaps a twenty down on the counter, then casts her head back and lets out a wild peal of laughter.
“You’re weird, Gin,” I say. She pulls a paper grocery sack out from her trench coat and puts it on the countertop. It’s packed full of wigs and costume pieces.
“Not weird, dahling. Brilliant. I figured, what would my good friend, Juliette Rockwell, do in a time like this? I knew she would hatch something downright diabolical. Why, such a situation calls for nothing short of a stake-out.”
I eye the pink curly clown wig at the top of the pile.
“Brilliant, dahling,” I say, flashing my eyebrows. “Brilliant.”
#
Man, I wish Ginny Austen was around when my last relationship had fallen apart, because she sure knows how to make a girl feel better. Fifteen minutes later, Ginny—still dressed in a wig, fedora, and trench coat—is balanced on the handlebars of the Rock N Roll Cakes bike as I stream through downtown Key West. I’m wearing a pink clown wig, sunglasses, and a fake leather biker jacket with chains dangling from the shoulders. Just call me Juliette O’Gilligan, I guess. We look ridiculous, but in a place like this, we hardly garner second glances. It helps that the sidewalk outside Mecca Cakes is packed. There’s a huge truck making a delivery out front, too, with workers lugging out bags of flour. Everyone is distracted. Somehow, no one notices the two insane broads in bad wigs. I chain up my bike amid the chaos, then join Ginny beside the front door.
“This is redonk, Gin, I love it.”
“Anything for a friend, dahling.”
She tiptoes inside. I follow her into the expansive space of steel and wood, and for a moment, I can tell that she’s distracted, her head cast back, almost losing both her fedora and wig.
“Wow, it’s gorgeous.”
I bite the inside of my cheek. “You think?”
It’s the real Ginny who answers me now, the wedding planner who is used to seeing the potential in spaces. “I’d love to hold a reception here. The acoustics are great. I don’t know how he’s managed to have cathedral ceilings without more echo. And all this natural light . . . the photos would be gorgeous.”
“Down, girl,” I say. And then I see him, standing behind the counter, arguing with one of the flour delivery girls. He’s red-faced and furious, and he hasn’t seen us yet. I grab Ginny by the arm and pull her behind one of the massive armchairs.
“There he is!” I squeal. I feel like I’m in middle school again, chasing Chris Michaelson, my first-ever crush. But back then, I had a flat chest and dandruff. Not a pink wig and falsies. To be honest, I feel a little like a superhero in this get-up. No wonder Mrs. O’Gilligan is so damned irrepressible.
“Damn, he’s hot,” Ginny whispers, watching him from afar. I elbow her.
“You’re almost a married woman.”
“I’m engaged,” she says, winking at me. “Not dead.”
“We should check out the menu,” I say, standing slowly, carefully, my back turned to Cal. “Figure out what makes this place so great.”
“You mean besides the fantastically hot, famous owner and the tremendous space?”
“Yes,” I say firmly, “besides that.”
This time, I take Ginny’s hand in mine as I stalk across the huge space of the bakery. We slip into the end of the line, where I pick up a menu.
“Take it with you,” Ginny whispers as I scan it. “We don’t have
time . . .”
She’s looking nervously over my shoulder, but I’m too busy taking note of the pastries that Cal’s been cooking up. I note that he’s added pastelitos to the menu, Cuban pastries. Makes sense—if he can do them right, he’ll draw a big crowd of Cuban patrons. I’ve never had the cojones to try cross-cultural pastry sales.
“No really,” Ginny whispers, “we should get going.”
I glance up. That’s when I see Cal stalking toward us. He hasn’t seen us, not yet. But he will soon . . .
That’s when those green eyes fall on me. I freeze, standing still as a mannequin. For a moment, Cal only looks confused. And then something clicks behind his gaze. He recognizes me! Time for me to get out of there, fast.
There’s the men’s room door to my left, but I don’t imagine that I’d fit in well in my grandma-biker-clown get-up. And there’s a door marked EXIT about twenty yards past that. In my panic, I forget all about Ginny, and rush toward the exit door. I lean my weight against it, and step inside a narrow alleyway. There’s piled up cardboard. A dumpster. And Cal McKenzie, following me.
Damn.
“Juliette Rockwell,” he says. “Where in the world did you get those tits?”
Almost instinctively, my hands go to my falsies. They’re made out of balloons filled with pudding, a trick Ginny showed me in middle school. Damn. Damn! Guess I’m not the superhero I thought I was.
“Publix,” I say, trying to sound breezy, but I’m half-mortified and half-infuriated.
“And your hair. A pink perm is quite the look on you.”
“Thank you,” I say curtly. I’m feeling trapped in the alleyway. I can see Ginny, watching in the door beyond Cal, but I wave her away. I don’t need her to bear witness to my shame. Cal glances over his shoulder, his eyebrows raised. Then he crosses his muscular arms over his equally muscular chest. He looks stern and a little annoyed.
“Don’t know what you want from me, Juliette. I’m no psychologist, but from this side of the alleyway, you’re starting to look a little unhinged.”
“I just wanted to check out your business model. You did surveillance on me. It’s only fair.”
“I had Angelique Google your website. I didn’t dress as Harpo Marx and do a song and dance in your dining area.”
“My . . . internet was down?” I offer. I feel like a dumb kid who was caught with her hand in the cookie jar. Cal takes a few steps forward, until I’m pinned up against the brick wall. I wonder if he’s going to kiss me again. I feel the heat of his body, feel my back arch in anticipation. His arms are on either side of me, trapping me. They’re so strong. He smells so good.
But instead of kissing me, he murmurs to me in a low, angry voice.
“For someone who claims to take her business so seriously, you sure don’t look it. Maybe if you grew up, you’d sell a few more cupcakes.”
“Whoa whoa whoa!” I say, holding up my hands. No way I’m going to let a guy like Cal talk to me like that. “I didn’t ask you for business advice. Just because we made out once—”
The corner of Cal’s mouth lifts at the memory. “We did a fair bit more than that, Jules.”
“Whatever.” I tear my wig off. I’m not going to let Cal know how good his hands felt on me, not now, not here. “It was no big deal.”
He lifts his hand, nudging my chin up so that our gazes meet and our lips nearly touch. I can practically taste him. I lick my lips.
“You seemed to like it at the time.”
I can’t deny it. Can’t deny him.
He’s so fucking sexy, glowering over me with that stern expression. And all at once, the memory of his hands against my skin, snaking down my body, burns hot inside me.
I know it’s a bad idea. I know I should stay away. I’m furious at him, after all. He’s robbing me of my business and my self-control and my panties. I’m righteously pissed off.
And that just makes it all the more delicious.
I grab his shirt and pull him toward me. His lips crash into mine, spicy and sweet, his hands tangling in my hair. I moan against him, loving the pressure of his body against mine, the sharp tug against my scalp. I pull away, still clutching his shirt, glaring at him and his infuriatingly perfect green eyes. “Fuck you,” I growl, before pulling him back.
He trails kisses down my neck and I gasp. “Not until you beg for it,” he says, his breath hot against my skin.
I shiver. I’m aching for him, despite how angry I am, despite every instinct screaming at me to push him away, grab my falsies, and run. Instead, I grab his jaw, drawing him back into our kiss, hungry. He backs me into the alleyway’s brick wall. I tilt my hips to meet his, feeling his hardness between all the fabric between us.
“You seem to like it now,” he says, grabbing my legs. In response, I wrap them around his hips, pressing into every inch of his body I can reach. He’s rock hard, his cock hitting me in all the right places. I’m wet and soft, desperate.
“Actually you love it,” he breathes.
He sounds so smug. I could kill him right there and then, if my body wasn’t trembling, my legs tightening around his waist. He rips open the lapels of my biker jacket, pinching my nipple. I inhale sharply, arching my back.
“You irresistible asshole,” I gasp, snaking my hands through his dark hair and drawing him closer to me.
“And they say I’m the one with the temper,” Cal says, with that awful, perfect, self-satisfied smile. In one move, he slides his fingers under my waistband, forcing my underwear aside.
His thumb circles my clit and I melt against him. He plunges a finger into me, then another, his rhythm teasingly slow. I move my hips in time with him, but in response he only slows more. “Beg for it,” he growls.
He slides my pants down, and I’m shaking, exposed and starving before him. When he kneels before me, I can hardly stand the anticipation. I bite my lip, doing my very best to stop myself from giving that fucker when he wants, but when I feel his breath right where I need it most, I can’t help myself. I cry out.
And it only gets worse from there.
He swirls his tongue around my clit, teasing. Pleasure jolts through me in waves. I slam against the wall, dazed. Somehow, he knows exactly how I’d like to be touched, without asking. His body understands mine. But before I go over the edge, Cal pulls away and glances up at me, his eyes darkening. “Well?” he asks.
“Please,” I pant, hating myself but unable to resist the thought of his cock buried inside me.
“Please what?”
“Please fuck me.”
Cal gives a throaty chuckle, obviously enjoying seeing me like this. The jerk. “Why didn’t you ask sooner?”
He stands, just about to take off his belt when—
“Jules!” comes a voice from around the corner.
Ginny.
Goddamnit.
Fuck. I try to catch my breath and smooth my hair down.
Cal’s eyes don’t leave mine. “Shame,” he says. He takes a deep breath, regaining his composure and smug attitude as he buckles his belt. “How do you feel about a rain check?”
“Goddamnit, Cal.”
“You can visit my store anytime,” he says, smirking. “But next time, leave the granny get-up at home.”
And just like that, he pulls his body away from mine, brushes himself off, and stalks off down the alleyway, slamming the door behind him.
I’m still shaking after he leaves. It takes me a minute to catch my breath and straighten the wig back on my head. Part of me hates the fact that I let him get under my skin like that. Another part of me—the physical part of me—knows how much I loved it.
“Jules, what are you doing back here?” I look up. There’s Ginny, wig slightly askew. I fake a cool smile.
“Hey Gin, how ya doing?”
“Okay.” She frowns slightly, suspicious. “I saw Cal follow you. Is everything okay? Did you get the intel you needed?”
Ahem. I didn’t quite get everything I needed. Goddamn that irresis
tible, infuriating Scotsman. “Oh yeah,” I tell her. “I really grilled him for information.”
More like grinded him for pleasure, but it’s not exactly a lie, right? Ginny smiles.
“Great. We can go back to your shop and exact our revenge.”
A light bulb goes off. Revenge. Well, if Cal’s going to handle me like that, I can handle him roughly, too. But I’m going to hit him where it hurts.
No, not his balls.
The shop.
“Follow me, Ginny,” I say, and stalk down the alleyway. She follows dutifully while I approach the flustered flour delivery girl, who is looking apprehensive about going up to Cal with her clipboard.
“Hello, dahling,” I say, offering her my hand. The girl shakes it, looking confused. “I’m Angelique Sutton, Cal McKenzie’s business manager. Cal’s just changed his mind about the delivery. We have a big promotion coming up. We’ll need 1,000 pounds of flour, not 100.”
“Are you . . . sure?” she asks uncertainly. I can see her skepticism, but also her relief at not having to talk to the Cake Nazi himself. I mean the Cake Master. I give my head a firm nod, feeling the wig bob on top of it.
“Positive. You don’t want to feel his wrath, dahling. Surely.”
“Okay,” the girl says. She offers me a clipboard. “You’ll need to sign for it, though.”
“Of course, dahling. Of course.”
I grab the pen and sign Juliette at the bottom of the page, then surround my name with hearts and stars. And the most tactful drawing of a huge middle finger flipping the bird. The girl takes it without looking and disappears into her truck. I watch her surface with the first of dozens of bags of flour.