While Anna performs her magic, I sit in my office most mornings working on the business end of things – invoices, accounts, ordering supplies, etc. – although I do help Anna out in the kitchen when necessary. Today I’ve got other work on my mind. The fall semester at the University is starting in a few weeks, and I want to start preparing my Intro to German Lit class. It’s my first time teaching the course and I’m ecstatic. I will now be teaching two classes at the University, and I’ve got my fingers crossed that someday, somehow, I’ll be taken on as a full-time professor. I don’t even care about tenure and all that. I just want to be able to do what I love full-time. And yeah, German literature is my passion. I may be a nerd but in German that’s cool, right?
“Hey.” Anna peeps her head in. “Detective Hottie’s here and asking for you.” I look at my watch in surprise. I was totally absorbed in Thomas Mann, Hermann Hesse, and Günter Grass and had no clue the bakery had even opened. I start to protest that I’m too busy to take a break, but Anna cuts me off at the pass. “Get your butt out there. After that kiss the other day, you owe it to him.”
“Callie?” I hear shouted from the kitchen and look up to see Ben approaching my office. “Sorry,” he says and looks sheepish. “I don’t mean to intrude in your private area, but I’m in a hurry and I had to see you.”
I totally don’t start glowing at those words. Nope. Not a glimmer. Anna takes off, and Ben’s large size dominates my doorway. “I just wanted to see if you wanted to go to dinner with me tonight.”
“Darn it, Ben,” I say in frustration. “Why do you keep asking me out?” I sound like a total brat, but I’m frustrated. I know there’s no way this man wants to date me. Why would he? I’m short, overweight, and a total nerd.
Ben’s kind eyes turn hard. “Because I like you Callie. When are you going to get that through your thick head?”
“Are you really going to make me say it?” I stand and place my hands on my hips, totally annoyed that I have to say out loud what everyone is thinking, what everyone knows.
Ben’s eyes soften, and he cocks his head to the side as if he’s confused. “Say what, sweetheart?”
I roll my eyes and throw my hands in the air. He’s going to make me say it. “You’re out of my league,” I growl out.
Ben’s head whips back as if I slapped him. He takes a moment to re-group before leaning forward and whispering. “Is that really what you think?”
Another eye roll. At this rate, my eyes are going to get stuck. “Look at you.” I point up and down at his gorgeous body. Then, I point to myself. “Look at this.” I shake my head. “Nope. Not even in the same division.”
Ben prowls to me and grabs me before pulling me into a hug that should be uncomfortable with how tight he holds me, but instead feels like a warm blanket has wrapped itself around me. “When are you going to get it through your thick head that I think you are the most beautiful woman in the world? I’ve been waiting a year for you. I watched your jerk of an ex treat you badly and kept my mouth shut; knowing you had to be the one to end the relationship. It nearly killed me, honey. Watching someone hurt you.” He shivers. “It was hell.” He releases me from his hug but grabs my chin and forces to me to look in his eyes. “There’s no one but you. I only see you, and you are the most beautiful, sexy, intelligent creature I’ve ever seen.”
“Ben,” I sigh because I’ve got nothing. How do I respond to that?
He leans down and gives me a quick kiss. “It’s okay. You don’t have to say anything. I know your ex did a number on you. I’m going to help build you back up.” He steps back. “Starting tonight. I’ll pick you up at seven.” And with that, he’s gone. I’m still trying to form words of protest.
Anna rushes in. “So, what did he say?” She’s quivering in excitement.
“Apparently, we’re going to dinner tonight.” I shake my head and clear the fog. “Oh wait, that doesn’t work. We have pole dancing class.”
Anna is not easily deterred. “What time’s he picking you up?”
“Seven.”
She claps in excitement. “No worries. We’ll do class and then we’ll come back here and get you ready.” I don’t like the sound of that. At all.
♥♥♥
Although I claimed after Dolly accused me of keying her car that I’d never go back to the pole dancing class, somehow Anna has managed to convince me to give it another go. There may have been a bit of bribery involved as well. What can I say? I hate getting up early on Sundays to open the bakery during the school year. I’m dragging my feet as I close the bakery. I may have promised Anna I’d go to the class, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.
“Stop stalling,” Anna shouts. “And I don’t want to hear any whining. If I can go to class after Dolly threw herself at me,” she shivers, “then you can go as well.”
I reluctantly follow Anna through the kitchen to the alley behind the bakery. She grabs my arm and starts to skip down the alley. Have I mentioned that Anna is a bit crazy? “How can you go back there? Aren’t you worried she’s going to kill you for keying her car?” Because Anna totally keyed Dolly’s car while I was complaining to management about Dolly. Who else could it possibly be?
Anna stops and stares at me. “You think I keyed Dolly’s car?”
“Well, yeah.” At her hurt look, I’m quick to add. “I don’t think less of you or anything.”
She shakes her head and continues towards the fitness studio. Walking instead of skipping this time. “I didn’t key that trollop’s car. Trust me, if I had done it, everyone would know. They’d probably write songs about how epic my car keying was.”
I giggle and decide to drop the subject. We walk the rest of the short distance to the gym in silence. I follow Anna into the locker room. I don’t even bother to make a comment about the sports clothes Anna insists I wear. It’s not like anything I say will change her mind anyway. We quickly change and walk into the studio. Dolly sees me enter and throws me the meanest look she can muster. I should probably quiver in my boots, but then again, I’m barefoot.
“Come on, hussies! Get to your poles!” Dolly’s enthusiasm is once again forced. I have to wonder if she’s got a genuine bone in her body. She turns on the music and Pour Some Sugar on Me blares from the surround sound speakers.
Dolly tones down her obnoxious comments during the class. I like to think that my complaint has had some influence on her, but that’s probably wishful thinking. Her instructions are actually pretty good when not cushioned in nasty remarks about the women in the class. I feel like I’m making some progress.
Huh. Who would have thought that?
Until my hands are coated in sweat that is and instead of gripping my pole, I can’t get purchase on the thing, and I slide down it landing in a heap on the floor. I quickly look for Dolly. I don’t really care if anyone else notices my lack of grace. It’s not like pole dancing is a skill I’m worried about acquiring. Lucky for me, Dolly’s playing around with the speakers. I quickly, well as quick as my sore body will allow, get to my feet making sure to wipe my hands vigorously on my yoga pants before trying to grab the pole again.
I hear a giggle from my side and glance over to see Anna checking me out. She’s gracefully twirling around her pole. She doesn’t pause in her dancing as she winks at me. No wonder Dolly hit on her. Anna is grace and beauty in a tiny package.
The rest of the forty-five-minute class passes without any further slip-n-slide incidents on my part. I sigh in relief when Dolly cuts the music off and tells us she’ll see us next week. My legs protest as Anna and I walk to the locker room. I throw on a sweatshirt and shove my things in my gym bag. I never shower here. I don’t really need any up close and personal time with the beauties from our pole dancing class or the other young things that frequent the fitness studio. My self-confidence can barely take the new clothes and pole dancing class as it is.
I’m surprised to see Anna throwing her things in her bag as well. “Aren’t you going to shower?”<
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She shakes her head. “No way. I’m escorting you home and helping you get date-ready.”
I gulp and try to shake off the fear that grips me at those words. “That’s okay,” I say with false brightness. “I’m good. Go ahead and shower. I’ll see you tomorrow.” I try to walk past her, but Anna grabs my wrist. For a tiny thing, she’s surprisingly strong.
“Please, like there’s any way I’d let you get ready for a date with Detective Hottie without me.”
That’s exactly what I was afraid she’d say.
Chapter 6
Tell the negative committee that meets inside your head to sit down and shut up
Feeling all kinds of dirty and grimy, not to mention stinky, I immediately jump into the shower when we get back to my apartment. I’m rinsing my hair when Anna reaches her hand into the shower and hands me a straight razor. “What’s this for?” I peek my head out of the curtain and glare in the general direction of her fuzzy outline, although I probably just look like I’m squinting.
“So you can shave the female bits.”
“I’m not going to let Ben get in my pants!” I shout, indignant.
Anna sighs and shakes her head. “Of course not. It only took you a year to say yes to dinner.”
“Hey,” I’m shouting again. “I had a boyfriend for the majority of that year.”
Anna snorts. “Boyfriend? A real boyfriend wouldn’t have treated you like he did.” She doesn’t give me a chance to respond. She leaves the bathroom making sure to shut the door on her way out. I should have shut and locked the darn thing before getting into the shower.
What the heck. I go ahead and trim up my ‘female bits’ as Anna calls them. I don’t go for a completely shaved look because that’s just eww. I put some extra conditioner in my hair to get it to feel super soft. My hair may be straight, but it’s really thick, and I usually have to fight my comb to get it detangled. I take my time rubbing lotion into my freshly shaved legs when I finally leave the shower. I am usually the throw-my-hair-in-a-ponytail and put-on-some-lip-gloss kind of girl. Working part-time at a bakery and trying to get my PhD before I turned thirty didn’t exactly give me much time for worrying about how I look. And it’s not like I have any more time to work on my personal style now that I’m running the bakery full-time and teaching classes on the side.
I make my way out of the bathroom into my bedroom and stop dead. Anna has laid an outfit out on my bed, but there’s no way I’m putting that on. It’s a dress I bought for a formal occasion at the University. I’d lost a good five pounds as I’d been working all hours of the day and night on an edit of my dissertation. I felt pretty good about the black dress that hugged my curves until my boyfriend Greg saw it and shook his head. “You probably should put some kind of cover on or something, Callie,” he commented. “You look like a cow.” The night went downhill from there.
I shake my head at the memory and turn to grab something from my closet, but Anna’s waiting for me. She’s somehow maneuvered my armchair in front of the closet and there she sits reading a magazine as if she doesn’t have a care in the world. “What the begezus are you doing?” I have to work hard to control the bitterness in my voice. She knows about the Greg-incident with the dress.
Anna turns the page of her magazine and shakes her head. “Either you wear that dress or you go naked.” She shrugs and keeps her eyes glued to the article she’s pretending to read. “I guess you can wear your stinky gym clothes.” Another shrug. “Whatever.”
“Can’t we at least talk about this?” I beg.
Anna slams her magazine shut and gives me the stink eye. “Now? You want to talk now? I’ve been talking to you for years, telling you how sexy and beautiful you are. But do you listen to me? No! You listen to Greg.”
“He was my boyfriend,” I defend.
Anna shakes her head sadly. “No, sweetie, he wasn’t. He was a guy who dated you on and off for two years. A guy who took advantage of you.”
My hands start to shake. I do not want to hear this. “Please, Anna, not now.”
Anna stands and moves to the bed. She grabs the dress and shoves it towards me. “Wear this and I’ll drop it. For now.”
Darn. I walked right into that one. I nod and grab the dress. It’s just a stupid dress, right? I quickly shimmy into the dress. After that, Anna expertly does my make-up. After I put on the pair of strappy sandals I bought to go with the dress, I’m ready. And just in time, too. My alarm clock reads 6:55 p.m. I walk into the living room to the sound of the doorbell.
Anna jumps up. “I’ll let Ben in and then I’ll head home. See you tomorrow.” She doesn’t wait for my response. She’s already half-way down the stairs. I stand by the open door and wait for Ben to ascend the stairs. He lumbers up the steps but doesn’t raise his head until he’s at the top. He takes one look at me and stops.
“Wow. Just wow.” Ben blinks quickly and shakes his head. “Sorry, you totally caught me off guard.” Before I can glare at that statement, he continues. “You always look beautiful, Callie, but now? Now you are just plain gorgeous.” He leans down and gives me a quick kiss. Then, he grabs my hand and places it over his heart. His heart is pounding. “You feel that?” I nod. “That’s what you do to me. I don’t want to hear any more of this junk about me being out of your league, hear?”
I think I nod, but I’m not paying attention. I can’t believe how wonderful he feels. He hasn’t released my hand, and I take a moment to pet his muscles. He’s so hard. Is that normal? Despite just coming out of a long-term relationship, I feel completely inexperienced. Before my ex, Greg, I only had one other boyfriend in high school. I’m not sure Charles even counts as a boyfriend. We spent hours and hours together in the school library and went to prom together, but we never did anything more than a few kisses which were more experimental than exciting in nature.
“Did you know it takes nine muscles of the chest and upper back to move your upper arm bone?” I ask as I continue to caress Ben’s very firm, very sexy chest.
Ben growls and steps away from my hand. I look up in surprise. “Sorry. I tend to spout stupid trivia when I’m nervous.”
He lets out a breath and stares at the ceiling for a long moment. Finally, he seems to come to some sort of decision and turns his chocolate gaze on me. “You didn’t say or do anything wrong, honey. I just don’t think I can control myself if you continue to touch me like that.”
My mouth drops open. “Oh.”
Ben shakes his head and chuckles. “Yeah, oh. You have no idea what you do to me.” He grabs me and pulls me out of the doorway before shutting the door. He puts his hand out, and I drop my keys in his palm. He locks my door, and we head out.
Once we’re in the alley behind my apartment, I look around for Ben’s car but the alley’s empty. “I didn’t bring my car, sweetheart,” Ben answers my unspoken question before grabbing my hand and pulling me through the alley. “I thought we’d go to that sushi place down the road. That one you love.”
“How do you know that?”
Ben smiles down at me but keeps walking. “Sweetheart, I know everything about you.” His eyes scan my body. “Well, almost everything.”
We reach the entrance to the alley and join the people walking on the sidewalk. Ben slows down and looks at my shoes. “You okay walking?”
I nod. Although my sandals are most assuredly the sexiest pair of shoes I own, they’re still tame in comparison to what most women would wear on a date. The heel is only an inch or two, and the straps keep my feet safely secured. Ben keeps our fingers entwined as we walk the short distance to the Sushi Shop restaurant.
When we enter the Sushi Shop, the waitress immediately runs over to us. “Hi, Callie! I don’t have a take-out order for you.”
I start to respond to her, but Ben beats me to the punch. “We’re eating in tonight.”
The waitress turns her gaze on Ben, and her mouth drops open. Although Mikki is as American as they come, her Dad is Japanese and that’s obvio
usly where her lack of height comes from. I’m only five feet five inches tall and I tower over her. She has to take a step back to look up at my date. “Let me show you to a table,” she finally says. Ben chuckles and follows her to a corner table. I see Mikki quickly move the reserved sign to another table, but she just shakes her head at me when I start to protest.
We’re in a corner booth which means that Ben is sitting kitty-corner to me with his thigh pressed against mine. My heart flutters, and I wonder how I’m going to survive dinner. Mikki’s back handing us our menus before I can get my mind to catch up to my body. “Ready for school to start?” I ask her but then quickly turn to Ben to explain. “Mikki was in my Intro to World Lit class last year.”
Ben smiles at her. “What did you think of Callie’s teaching?”
Mikki beams at him, clearly not as intimidated with the giant now that he’s sitting. “She’s awesome! I’m taking her Intro to German Lit class this semester.”
That’s news to me. “You are? That’s not a requirement for a science major.” Mikki is studying biology and hopes to also get her PhD.
She shrugs and smiles at me. “You inspired me.” Her face blushes slightly, and she hands us our menus. “I’ll be back in a few.”
I start perusing my menu, but I feel Ben’s eyes on me. “What?”
He smiles at me and leans in to give me a quick kiss. “I knew you were an awesome professor. You kick butt at everything you do.”
I shake my head. “Not a professor yet,” I mumble.
“It’ll happen.” Ben doesn’t give me a chance to start an argument and instead opens his menu. “I’ve never had sushi. What should I order? And don’t forget, I’m a big guy. I need lots of food.”
I set my menu down. “You’ve never had sushi? Why’d you bring us here then?”
Never Trust a Skinny Cupcake Baker (Death by Cupcake Book 1) Page 3