Delicious

by Lori Foster, Lucy Monroe, Sarah Little

  Thirteen

  “Mona? Mona!” Dan banged on Mona’s kitchen door. At first, he had knocked hesitantly. He wasn’t sure if she wanted to see him—well, he was pretty sure she didn’t, but he had to make sure she was OK.

  Then he heard a blood-curdling scream and a crash, and now he heard what sounded sort of like a donkey getting its tail pulled. But unless the nature of her curse had really changed, it was Mona crying. She must be hurt. What if her hand was caught in the blender? She had gorgeous hands; she had talented hands. He had to save her.

  He pounded on the door, louder this time. “Mona! Are you dead?” Her responding wail told him she was still alive, but she definitely wasn’t answering the door. He panicked. Something was really, really wrong and he had to get in there to see what he could do. He had never felt this surge of protective adrenaline before. He had always imagined that if he ever saw a burning building, he would call the fire department and stand politely away from the danger. But hearing Mona wail like that made the hairs on his neck stand up and made his blood run faster through his veins. It gave him power and physical confidence. He pushed his shoulder into the door; it didn’t budge. There was silence in the kitchen, and then a less loud but no less painful moan. He backed up, then went at the door with all his might. There was a crack and the door flew open, and he landed on his knees on the kitchen floor.

  “Dan?” The voice was wobbly, but it was Mona, standing over him with one of the biggest knives he’d ever seen.

  He held his hands up.

  “What are you doing here?”

  He stood, took in her messy clothes, her red, puffy eyes, the streaks that her tears had left on her flour-strewn face, but didn’t go any closer. She was still brandishing that knife.

  “I thought something was wrong. Your truck wasn’t downtown, and it’s always there by nine-thirty.”

  “So you broke down my door?” She put the knife on the counter and wiped her nose with a paper towel.

  “I called first.”

  Her chin wobbled and she shook her head. He didn’t know what she meant by that, but she was crying again. He went toward her, and when she didn’t back up, he pulled her into his arms and absorbed her shudders with his body.

  “You ruined everything,” she said into his chest.

  “What?” He loosened his hold so she could look up at him.

  “Everything tastes terrible and it’s all your fault. It must be.”

  He couldn’t imagine anything that she baked ever tasting terrible. She moved with such confidence and grace and besides, he’d tasted her apple cake. It was perfect.

  “You don’t believe me,” she said, a wary look on her face.

  “No, it’s just that . . .” But he didn’t believe her. Maybe it just wasn’t as good as some other things she had made, and maybe that was because she was tired because he had been making love to her instead of letting her do her job.

  “Here.” She thrust a bowl of what looked like dough into his hands. “Taste.”

  He peeled back the plastic wrap, pinched off a piece, and confidently popped it into his mouth.

  If Mona wasn’t so depressed, she would be laughing her head off.

  “It tastes fine,” Dan said around a mouthful of raw pie crust.

  But his face told her a different story. He smiled at her while he still chewed. He looked like he didn’t want to swallow it.

  She handed him a paper towel.

  “It’s not fine, Dan,” she sniffed.

  He spit the crust into the towel, then wadded it up and tossed it in the trash. “How is it supposed to taste?”

  “It’s supposed to taste buttery and a little sweet.”

  “It’s not supposed to taste like burnt coffee?”

  “It’s not funny!” she said when she saw him smile.

  “You’re right, it’s not. OK, let’s whip up another batch. I’ll help.” He started rolling up his sleeves.

  “That’s just it! It’s your fault it’s ruined in the first place!”

  “What? I didn’t touch it, I swear!”

  “But you’re the only thing that’s different. Everything else was exactly as I’ve done every other full moon. No new ingredients, no new recipes, same schedule. The only difference is that I slept with you. It must be your fault!”

  “But I thought everything was going so well last night,” he said. “I thought that on many levels.”

  “Yes! Last night it was fine, then I woke up this morning and everything tastes like something died in it!”

  “It’s not that bad.”

  She gave him an eyebrow.

  “I mean, it’s inedible, but it doesn’t taste like something died.”

  She threw up her hands. “It doesn’t matter what it tastes like. Like you said, it’s inedible. I can’t sell this. I can’t bring this to my customers. It’s all completely unusable. If you hadn’t come over and been so nice and sweet and sexy and then said that stupid stuff to me in the morning—”

  “What stupid stuff? That I love you?”

  She stopped. That was it. That was where it all went bad. “Yes. If you hadn’t said that, I would be in the center of town right now having one of my best days of the summer!”

  “Fine, I shouldn’t have said it, since it clearly freaked you out. But I still feel it, Mona. I fell in love with you last night.”

  “Well, stop it!”

  He laughed, but it wasn’t the kind of laugh that sounded like he thought she was being funny.

  “Believe me, if I could, I would, since you obviously don’t feel the same way!”

  No, she thought. That’s not true.

  “Listen,” he said, taking a deep breath. “Let’s just try another batch. What have you got to lose, right?”

  “Dan, there’s no way that can work.”

  “Come on, just one more. What do we need? Eggs? Butter.” He started to gather up ingredients from the refrigerator.

  “No, I’m not wasting perfectly good butter on a pie crust that’s not going to taste right.”

  He ignored her and continued to pile stuff on the counter. “What else goes in here? Flour?” He grabbed the bag of sugar and plopped it next to the flour.

  “Dan . . .”

  “Is there sugar in pie crust? I’ve never made it before, so you’ve got to help me here. What else? What’s this?” He held up a bottle of vanilla extract. “Does this go in there?”

  “Dan.”

  He opened it and sniffed it. “Whoa. OK, probably some of that, right?” He picked up the baking powder, brown sugar, honey, all kinds of things that didn’t belong in a pie crust, and started piling them on the counter.

  “Dan!”

  “What?” He leaned into the bottom cabinet and pulled out a mixing bowl.

  “I’m afraid!”

  He came up quickly, knocking his head on the shelf.

  “Are you OK?” she asked when he didn’t say anything.

  “No. My head hurts and the woman I love just told me she’s afraid of baking.”

  The knot in her stomach twisted and clenched, and then eased a little. It wasn’t panic. It wasn’t anxiety that Dan would be too good to be true. It was fear. Fear that he was perfect for her, and that her life was about to change.

  “Oh, my God,” she said, and she flopped onto the kitchen floor.

  “Mona?” He got on his knees next to her, a small circle of flour marring the jeans she’d just noticed.

  She threw her head into her hands. “It’s not your fault,” she said.

  He pulled her hands away and held on to them until she looked up at him.

  “It’s my fault,” she said, finally meeting his eyes. And she saw it there, the confusion, the concern, and, most of all, the love. “It’s my fault this got all messed up. It’s my fault, because I love you, too.”

  A zing went through her, like a tiny lightning bolt, and Dan flinched a little, but he didn’t let go of her hands.

  “What was that?” he as
ked.

  “It’s back,” she said.

  He just looked at her, confused and in love. She loved looking at that face. How blind she was not to realize that before. Her fear had blinded her to the truth. Dan believed her about her curse, he stayed out of her way when he had to, and he was there when she needed him, even after she completely rejected him. He was addicted to routine and a little uptight, but he was steady, and he was willing to miss a morning of work to come kneel in the flour with her while she got her head out of her butt and realized that she loved him back.

  She was cursed, but, it turned out, she wasn’t stupid.

  “I think you just said that you love me,” Dan said, squeezing her fingers. “And then I think you electrocuted me.”

  “I feel better now,” she said, and she stood up and pulled him with her. “I think I’m back. And I really want to kiss you right now, but I have a ton of baking to do.”

  “OK,” he said, finishing the job of rolling up his sleeves. “Baking now, kissing later.”

  She grabbed the neck of his shirt and pulled him to her. “Just one kiss first.”

  “Just to seal the deal,” he said, and then he didn’t say anything else because her mouth was covering his and her arms were around his neck, and he lifted her and spun her around. Then he put her down, and they got to work.

  Fourteen

  Dan had really wanted to drive. Mona said she thought if his clients saw him driving a pink food truck, they might rethink his reliability and it would be bad for business. He could tell she just really wanted to drive the truck herself. That was OK; he would wait for his chance.

  It was just after five, and what little rush hour Delicious had was basically over. But Dan watched the side mirror, and it seemed like every other car they passed turned on its blinker and made some dangerous traffic maneuver, and now they had a line of cars following them back downtown. A pink pied piper. Of pie.

  He held on to the dashboard as Mona swerved into her spot, right across the street from his office. He glanced into the food part of the food truck, but it looked like the bakery was pretty secure. Of course; Mona knew what she was doing. He took a quick look over at her, her tongue pushing into her lip in concentration. He smiled. He loved this woman.

  When they were in the spot, she unstrapped her seat belt and looked over at him. “Ready?” she asked.

  “Just tell me what to do,” he said, unbuckling himself and following her to the back of the truck.

  They had baked all afternoon. Well, she did most of it, but she coached him on kneading and filling, and he put himself in charge of pulling hot things out of the oven after the third time she reached in without an oven mitt. And they tasted. Everything, from the apple pie to the apple cheese tarts to the top-secret pie (which was really just a mixture of leftover fillings from other desserts) tasted perfect. Light and homey and sweet. They probably looked a mess. Mona’s hair was tied back in a kerchief, although she did have on a clean apron. Dan’s shirt had long ago bitten the dust, and he was wearing the pink Apple of My Pie shirt she had given him the night before. He never went out without being polished and pressed, but now his jeans were covered in flour and bits of fruit. He didn’t care. They had done it. He was proud of her, and proud that he’d helped.

  And now they were going to sell some pie.

  Mona swung the side window out, her arms strong and sure as she hooked the latch. There was already a small crowd gathered outside, their faces anxious.

  “Mona! Where have you been?”

  He wasn’t sure who said it, but that was the general chorus from the crowd.

  “Sorry,” she said, shrugging. “Kitchen snafu. But better late than never, right?”

  “Do you have any of those little tart things?”

  “My mother-in-law is in town! I need pie!”

  “What have you got that will go with roasted chicken?”

  “Don’t be mad, but I’m going to say that I baked it.”

  Mona laughed and worked. No, she didn’t work. She was a whirlwind, boxing up orders and slinging them out to people, taking money and stuffing it into her apron. All the while, she kept up a steady banter, greeting customers by name, carrying on whole conversations that Dan didn’t think he could do even if he wasn’t also trying to slice a cake.

  She was amazing.

  And he was in the way.

  But he didn’t want to leave. He wanted to watch her, watch the power that coursed through her as she worked. It was similar to the power he felt rolling off of her in the kitchen, that controlled mania that produced meltingly tender pie crusts, but this was a little less intense, a little more familiar. So he just plastered himself to the inside wall of her pink food truck and soaked in some of her energy.

  He could stand there, watching her make people happy, making herself happy, for the rest of his life.

  Forever.

  Mona turned. She thought Dan might have snuck out. She wouldn’t have blamed him—she had kept him from his office all day, and he was wearing a pink shirt. But there he was, leaning against the only counter space he could have leaned on that would keep him out of her way. He smiled at her, and some of the manic energy she felt when she’d first opened the hatch dissipated. So she smiled back.

  “Dan! There you are, I thought you’d died!” Mrs. Harris was leaning over the counter, her eyes on the inside corner of the truck.

  “Hi, Mrs. Harris,” he said, giving her a weak wave. “I’m fine.”

  “Well, you could have answered your phone!”

  Mona saw him pat his pockets. “I don’t have my phone.”

  “I know! You left it on your desk! Hi, Mona,” she said, turning to Mona with a sweet smile. “What have you got tonight?”

  “Are you the one who sent him over to me?” she asked

  “Well, I may have suggested . . .”

  Ha, suggested. Mrs. Harris knew exactly what she was doing. And for that, Mona would be forever grateful.

  “OK, I forgive you,” she said, handing her a white baker box. “Classic apple pie. Last one.”

  “Last one?” said Dan, coming forward to stand next to her. “We made a dozen of them!”

  “It’s a hot item.”

  “We’ve only been out here for ten minutes!”

  She looked at her watch. It was more like half an hour, but she wasn’t going to argue. He looked too shocked and impressed for her to argue.

  “Gotta move fast to get what you want,” said Mrs. Harris, winking at them.

  “Weird,” said Dan, just quietly enough that only Mona heard.

  Mona leaned into him; she didn’t know why. She just needed a little reassurance that he was real.

  “She’s right, though,” he said, putting his arm around her.

  “Mrs. Harris is always right,” Mona said. Mrs. Harris waved on her way back across the street, her pie clutched firmly in one hand. Mona squeezed Dan’s hand, then moved away to help the next customer in line.

  “No,” he said. “This time she’s really right.”

  “Right about what?”

  “About moving fast to get what you want.”

  “Well, I may have lied. There’s still one apple pie back there—” Mona turned to show Dan her secret pie stash, where she had been saving one pie for them to share later, a reward for all of his hard work. But she stopped, because Dan wasn’t standing where she had left him. Instead, he was down on the ground in front of her. On one knee.

  “Dan,” she whispered. “What are you—”

  “I want you,” he said, reaching for her hand. “I love you. I know it’s fast, and I know it’s crazy, but it feels so right, why shouldn’t we?”

  “Why shouldn’t we what?” she said, glancing at her now-curious customers.

  “Marry me.”

  “What?”

  “Yes!” said the crowd.

  “Marry me. I don’t want to waste another minute being too uptight to see what’s in front of me. I don’t want to let my dum
b preconceived notions deprive me of the biggest gift I have ever been given. That’s you, Mona. You’re not cursed, you’re gifted, and I want to spend the rest of my life appreciating how wonderful and talented you are.”

  “Do it!” someone from the crowd shouted.

  “Dan! This is crazy! We can’t—”

  “Why not?” Another shout from the crowd.

  “Because,” she said. Because every gift she had ever been given was a curse in disguise. But . . . maybe she had it all wrong. Maybe Dan was right, and her baking was a gift, and the conditions that came with it just meant she should treasure it, treat it preciously. And he was a gift, too. God, it was so cheesy, and she couldn’t believe those words had even come out of his mouth. But he wasn’t wrong. He had come to her rescue when she didn’t even think being rescued was a possibility. He was a mild-mannered, orderly superhero. In khakis.

  They were good together; they could only get better.

  “Answer him, would ya?”

  “OK,” she whispered.

  “OK, you’ll answer him, or OK, you’ll marry him?”

  Dan stood up and punched the latch out of the window. It slammed shut in the face of the crowd.

  “Sorry about that,” he said. “I didn’t mean for this to be so . . . public.”

  “Did you mean for this to happen at all?”

  “No. I never in a million years could have imagined someone as perfect for me as you are,” he said. “I don’t think I have that kind of creative capacity.”

  “But here I am.”

  “Here you are,” he said, taking her hands. “And here I am. What do you think?”

  She looked at him, his eyes clear as the summer sky, and she knew she would always have this from him. Openness. Honesty. Love.

  “OK,” she whispered.

  “As in, OK, you’ll marry me?”

  She nodded. “OK, I’ll marry you.”