by Confetti
‘Thanks for the offer, but I don’t think so. Jerome, the hotel manager, is very apologetic and has promised to come up with something for the cake-cutting ceremony. But, do you know what? He actually had the cheek to suggest a cardboard model and Photoshop! He changed tack pretty sharpish when he saw the look of fury on Mum’s face. She asked why the hotel’s chefs couldn’t come up with something, but they’re working flat out to clean the kitchen and feed the guests. It’s a miracle none of the cooking equipment was affected so, after everything has been washed and sterilised, we can at least still have the wedding reception here on Sunday.’
‘I’m really sorry, Imogen. Can’t your wedding planner sort something out for you? Isn’t this the kind of thing she should be used to troubleshooting? I bet she’s got loads of ideas and contacts.’
‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But Mum, as usual, was right about Fleur Markham. She hasn’t even turned up at the hotel yet. One of the waiters let slip that she’s famous for her unreliability – now he tells us! I’ve tried to call her a few times but she’s not answering her mobile. Mum thinks Jerome and Fleur have some personal history because she caught them arguing down by the gazebo last night when she was out with Brad for another of their romantic moonlit strolls. If that’s true, you’d think they would keep their squabbles to themselves until the wedding is over. Mum’s paying Fleur a hefty fee for her services, to make sure everything runs smoothly and every detail is perfect. So far, I don’t think she’s delivered anything we can’t do ourselves! I think we can kiss goodbye to the kaleidoscope of butterflies Mum wanted – but to be honest, I’m not sure that’s a bad thing.’
Imogen attempted a rueful laugh but instead burst in tears.
‘Everything is going wrong. I knew Alex and I should have stood up to Mum and insisted on an intimate ceremony at home with a few close friends, instead of coming out here. I just wanted her to be happy, to be involved in the organising because I knew how much she would miss Dad. Perhaps Alex and I should cancel the whole thing. Maybe this is a sign…’
‘Imogen… Imogen, please don’t say that. It’ll all work out fine,’ Millie reassured her, her heart pounding out a symphony of sympathy for the distraught bride-to-be who should by rights be relaxing on a sun lounger with a pina colada instead of stressing over the wedding arrangements.
Millie flicked a quick glance to where Ella sat, sipping her Blue Mountain coffee, her brown eyes widening as she listened intently to the unfolding saga. She gave Millie a smile and a nod of approval.
‘Look, I have an idea. When you feel up to it, why don’t you come over to the villa with anyone who needs a bit of distraction and we’ll spend the remaining three days of the Chocolate and Confetti course baking up a storm? Ella and I have made dozens of wedding cakes in our time. I can’t promise you a brigade of sugar-paste butterflies or a froth of lavender-flavoured buttercream roses, but I’m sure we can produce something to wow your guests.’
‘You and Ella are offering to bake me a wedding cake by Sunday?’
‘Yes. And I’ve got a suggestion for the wedding favours too. How does three dozen wedding-themed cake pops sound? We can mould them into miniature bride-and-groom shapes. My friend Poppy showed me how to decorate them with coloured chocolate melts and they look amazing. We’ll wrap them in cellophane, tie them with colour-co-ordinated ribbons, and your guests can take them home as souvenirs.’
‘Wow! That sounds fabulous. Do you think it’ll work?’
‘I’m sure of it.’
‘You are really kind to offer to do this, Millie. I’ll have a chat to Alex and Mum and we’ll be right over. A day filled with manic baking is exactly what I need to settle my nerves. Thank you, thank you, thank you – from the bottom of my heart.’
‘It’s a pleasure.’ Millie sighed as she placed her phone in her lap and met Ella’s gaze.
‘I take it we’ve just been promoted from luxury cookery course presenters to deliverers of confectionary dreams?’ Ella expelled a deep belly laugh that made Millie smile too. ‘Well, we’d better get cracking on a shopping list. I’ll give Denise a call and she can source whatever we need in Castries. I’ll ask Henri to drive up there and collect everything during his lunch hour. There’s just one thing I’m confused about, though.’
‘What’s that?’
‘What in sweet heaven’s name is a cake pop?’
Millie laughed. ‘It’s a mini ball of chocolate cake on a stick – a bit like a lollipop – dipped in melted chocolate and decorated with, well, with anything you want really. You can mould them into a variety of shapes to create miniature birds, fish, hearts and flowers. I’ve made a batch for a Christmas party before that included snowmen with top hats and these fabulous mini Christmas puddings with sprigs of holly.’
‘Okay. I think I’d better leave that side of things to you. Denise and I will get cracking on creating the best wedding cake this side of the Caribbean. I assume you realise that it’s going to take every spare minute of our time to pull this off. You certainly know how to live a high-octane life, Amelia Harper!’
‘Oh no, what catastrophe has Manic Millie visited upon us today?’ asked Zach, who had caught Ella’s last few words as he arrived on the veranda with Binks, who had a moth-eaten ball clenched in his jaw.
‘Nothing to do with me this time.’ Millie laughed.
‘Where is everyone? I thought today was chocolate savouries day? Have you frightened your students away with all the culinary clutter?’
Zach grabbed a deckchair next to Ella and helped himself to one of the croissants. He tore it into two pieces, catching the crumbs on a plate, and popped one half in his mouth before tossing the other half to a very grateful Binks.
‘As a matter of fact, Zachary Barker, Millie has just come to the rescue of our bride-to-be by offering our services to bake the most important cake in a woman’s life!’
Zach rolled his eyes at Ella and would probably have scoffed if it had been Millie who had uttered such an outrageous statement. ‘I know you’re both totally obsessed with all things chocolate and sugar-related, but don’t tell me that cake is in any way an essential part of anyone’s life.’
‘It is when it’s your wedding cake!’
‘What do you mean? Surely Imogen hasn’t asked you to make her wedding cake four days before she’s due to say “I do”?’
Millie explained as succinctly as possible what had happened at the hotel kitchen. As she was speaking, a sudden flame of doubt ignited in her abdomen. Was Zach right to be sceptical? Could she really pull this off? Her heart had gone out to Imogen when she’d heard the obvious distress in her voice and she hadn’t had time to think through her suggestion properly. Whilst she had made celebration cakes many times before, she hadn’t made one since… well… since her own engagement. That cake had sat, in all its sugar-coated majesty, on a china pedestal in pride of place in the middle of the village hall where her party was being held – never to be cut. In fact, thinking back, she wasn’t entirely sure what had happened to it. The most likely explanation was that her mother had spirited it away so as not to have it in the house as a constant reminder of her abandonment.
‘She has, and Ella and I intend to deliver the most fabulous cake we can!’
‘Oh no, Binks my friend. We’d better take cover! I dread to think what maelstrom of culinary mania is about to be visited on Claudia’s pristine kitchen today,’ Zach teased, a twinkle of mischief in his mahogany eyes and the cute dimples appearing to bracket his lips.
‘Oh my God! Claudia! I’ll have to call her to tell her what’s happened. Do you think she’ll object to what we’re going to do, Ella?’
‘Of course not, dear,’ chuckled Ella. ‘She’ll be proud of us. It’s exactly what she would have done herself. Ignore Zach.’ Ella gave him a mock-stern glare. ‘So what if there’s a little bit of chaos if it means the work gets done? It’s not as though we’ll be pressing his kitchen in the lodge into action, is it?
‘
Heaven forbid!’ exclaimed Zach, genuinely horrified at the thought.
Millie thought of the immaculately kept cabin that was Zach’s temporary home whilst he cared for the cocoa plantation in his colleague’s absence. Every time she set eyes on the place it became less like a land-based dwelling, more like a wooden steamer, moored on stilts against the backdrop of the lush splendour of the rainforest. Zach was probably one of the tidiest, most methodical people she had ever encountered – therefore her complete opposite. She smiled when she thought of her tendency to produce clutter and clumsiness and Zach’s regular exasperated assertions that she could bring chaos to an empty room.
But their differences didn’t stop there. Despite having grown to accept the leaden skies and rain-soaked streets of Oxfordshire and London, she still continued to crave the long, sunshine-filled days of Provence where her mother had been born and where she had spent a carefree childhood. Yet a close second in her hit parade of desirable locations had to be the Caribbean, and St Lucia in particular – an island of such beauty it whipped her breath away.
‘Okay, well, I can’t sit here chatting all day.’
Millie had to supress a giggle when Zach pushed back his chair, picked up his plate and carried it into the kitchen where he rinsed it, dried it with one of Claudia’s signature tea towels, and returned it to its allotted space in the cupboard next to the fridge. She also noticed that his meticulous tendencies extended to his attire, but despite his immaculately ironed lilac polo shirt and pristine black jeans screaming sartorial fastidiousness, they also served to enhance his attractiveness and once again she felt a flutter of desire in her lower abdomen.
Zach called Binks to heel then paused on the steps leading down to the pool.
‘I know I’m probably going to regret saying this, but if you need any help with the washing up at the end of your bake-a-thon today, you can count me and Binks in – especially if there’s going to be a selection of tasty titbits on offer for the workers.’
‘Thanks, Zach, that’s very kind of you,’ said Ella before Millie had the chance to refuse – not that she had any intention of doing so. She knew they were going to need all the help they could get if they were going to have any chance of success.
‘Right, I’ll leave you to get organised,’ smirked Zach. ‘See you later. I’ll bring my own rubber gloves.’
Millie watched him go, her eyes fixed on his muscular thighs and the way his jeans moulded his buttocks, not to mention the impressive bulge of his biceps from his daily workouts around the plantation. However, what was uppermost in her mind was how, despite his propensity to tease her at every opportunity, whenever he and Binks were around she felt lighter, more energetic, and happy. Against all her expectations, she realised that her feelings for Zach had morphed from friendship into something altogether more vibrant and she was enjoying every minute of her new-found lust for life and the people in it.
Chapter Six
‘Hi? Millie? Is it okay to come in?’ asked Imogen, her voice tight with repressed emotion.
‘Of course, of course. Let me introduce you to Denise, Ella’s best friend and fellow Caribbean cook extraordinaire. She’s very kindly agreed to come over to the Paradise Cookery School for the day to help Ella make a start on your wedding cake.’
‘Hello, Imogen, it’s good to meet you,’ beamed Denise from her position behind the demonstration bench, her hands thrust deep in a bowl of flour. Modelling her attire on the colours of the St Lucian flag, Ella’s best friend had clearly been bestowed with a large slice of the body-confidence pie. Her hair was hidden by a gold, blue and black striped turban and, like Ella, she too favoured bold-is-beautiful necklaces. She exuded jollity, and despite having dropped everything to come to Ella’s rescue, there was not a trace of stress on her smooth, wrinkle-free face.
‘Hi, Denise. I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you’re all doing this for me.’
Millie’s heart gave a flip of sympathy as she saw Imogen gulp down her emotions and offer them a grateful smile. Smudges of tiredness had appeared beneath her eyes, which were suspiciously pink from the tears she had inevitably shed since she had received the upsetting news about the hotel’s kitchen fire.
‘It’s no problem at all, my dear,’ said Ella, gathering Imogen into her arms, her multi-coloured bangles jangling around her wrist as she gave her a bear hug before resuming mixing the cake batter. ‘I’m so sorry about what happened to your wedding cake, I hope the hotel is investigating the cause?’
‘Jerome has promised to report back to Alex as soon as he can. Mum’s acting like a whirling dervish: issuing orders, demanding answers, making lists, checking what still needs to be done before Sunday. She’s even found the address of Fleur’s office in Castries and has arranged for Brad to drive her over there so she can give her a piece of her mind. I wouldn’t like to be anywhere in the vicinity when that conversation happens. Karen and Gracie are going to spend the day printing off some of the photographs Carla’s taken of me and Alex and turning them into bunting for decorating the gazebo, so I’m afraid there’s only me, Carla and Harriet as your willing apprentices – just point us in the right direction and we’ll get to work. I know that the best thing for me to do at the moment is to keep busy.’
‘Okay. I think you should be on wedding cake duties so that Ella and Denise have an idea of the sort of design you’d like. Denise called in a favour and she’s managed to get a whole carton filled with fresh flowers to decorate the table and cake stand. Ella’s suggested a triple-tiered chocolate cake coated with fondant icing in white chocolate, milk chocolate and dark chocolate decorated with chocolate flowers and hearts.’
‘Oh, that sounds perfect.’ Tears glistened on Imogen’s lower lashes as she snatched up an apron and set to work in between Ella and Denise sifting the flour and cocoa.
‘So, what do you have planned for us, Millie?’ asked Carla, strolling into the kitchen after snapping a few extra photographs of the Pitons from the villa’s veranda. ‘You know, I don’t think I’ll ever grow tired of looking at this view. It has everything a professional photographer could wish for: the azure of the ocean, the emerald of the forest, the elegant sweep of the bay, the terracotta roofs of the town nestled below the majesty of the Pitons. I can totally understand why Claudia has called this The Paradise Cookery School.’
‘Come on, Carla. We’re supposed to be helping Millie with the baking,’ chastised Harriet, collecting her hair in her hands and tying it back with a band.
‘Okay, so we’ll be spending the day making cake pops. We need to whip up a few chocolate sponge cakes first. When they’re cool, we’ll crumble them, add frosting and mould them into shape on these sticks. Then we’ll pop them in the freezer for an hour or so before we decorate them.’
‘What on earth are cake pops?’ asked Carla, slotting her hair behind her ears and pushing up the sleeves of her turquoise T-shirt.
‘I think it might be best if I just showed you.’
Millie scrolled through her phone until she found an image of wedding-themed cake pops displayed in a painted flowerpot covered with confetti. Half of the cake pops had been decorated as a bride, the moulded chocolate cake dipped in white chocolate with a painted veil and finished off with a tiny pearl necklace. The other half represented the groom, complete with top hat and a cute pink bow tie.
‘Oh my God – they are gorgeous! Why haven’t I discovered cake pops before now! They look too good to eat. Ah, look, there’s a cake pop poodle. It’s adorable. Oh, and is that a goldfish with a crown? Oh, Carla, we’ve got to make some of those heart-shaped ones, too, and a few of…’
‘Hold on,’ interrupted Millie, laughing at Harriet’s enthusiasm. ‘We’re making these for Imogen and Alex’s wedding guests. We’ve got thirty-six to make, wrap in cellophane and tie with colour-co-ordinated ribbons. If we have any time at the end, we can experiment with other shapes.’
The three girls spent the next hour whipping up a dozen sponge cakes to form
the interior of the cake pops before crumbling them into a large bowl and adding melted chocolate and chopped hazelnuts.
‘Gracie would absolutely love to do this,’ declared Carla.
‘She’d probably make a better job of it, too. No offence, Carla, but your bride and groom combos look like a pair of boobs.’
‘Do you think?’ laughed Carla, squeezing the lumps of cake mixture on the end of her lollipop stick into pointed twin peaks.
‘Okay, that’s forty. We’ll pop them into the freezer to harden and we’ll decorate them later. So, what do you want to make with the mixture we have left?’
‘I want to make Gracie one of those cute pink owls,’ said Harriet, pointing to the photograph on Millie’s phone.
‘And I’m going to make Greg one of those sharks,’ grinned Carla. ‘Perfect!’
Imogen joined them and they indulged in a session of creativity and laughter, like a group of primary school children let loose on the craft table. They rolled the cake mixture into spheres the size of golf balls, stuck in a lollipop stick, and then sculpted them into a myriad of shapes.
‘I used to love working with play dough when I was a child. It’s so therapeutic. You know, all it takes is a couple of hours of baking and the stress and worry of this morning has melted away. So what if we haven’t got a traditional fruit-filled wedding cake covered in marzipan and royal icing? It’s not the end of the world. In fact, don’t tell Mum I said this but I think I prefer the cake Ella and Denise have made.’
‘What are the guys doing today?’ asked Millie, tossing a tea towel on top of the pile of washing up waiting for attention on the end of their workstation.
‘They’re hiking up Gros Piton then spending the afternoon at the Sulphur Springs indulging in a mud bath. Alex did offer to go to Castries with Mum and Brad, but Mum didn’t want him to miss the expedition. He’s been looking forward to the hike since Greg booked it. They’re expecting us to join them at The Blue Orchid in Soufrière for cocktails when we’re finished here.’