Josie folded her arms. “You told me to park it on the square.”
She pressed her lips together for a moment. “And now I’m telling you to move it.”
Josie touched Eric’s arm. “Want to ride with me?”
“You’ll do just fine on your own, Josie,” he said breezily.
“I was hired to do hair and makeup, not drive a van around Amish Country. I don’t remember anything like that in my contract.”
“Move the van, Josie,” Rocky said, sounding as if she was losing her patience with the younger woman.
Josie climbed into the van and carefully backed it onto the street. At least, she knew enough not to drive it directly across the square. Truth be told, for someone who professed not to have been hired to drive, she sure did whip that vehicle around with the ease of someone driving a Prius. If she ever tired of fancying up faces, she could make a living driving semis.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Aiden whispered to his mother a second time.
“I thought you would have already known, Son, you are a sheriff’s deputy, after all. You know almost everything before I do.” Juliet didn’t modulate her voice, speaking loud enough for everyone to hear.
“I didn’t know,” Aiden said.
“Son?” Eric asked me in a hushed voice.
“Juliet is Aiden’s mother,” I said.
“You call the deputy Aiden?” Eric whispered to me.
“It’s his name,” I said.
“Uh-huh. I’ve never known you to be on a first-name basis with a police officer before.”
“This is Harvest, Eric, not New York.”
He grinned. “Sure. If that’s your excuse.”
“I can’t wait to hear more about the production,” Juliet said. “But I must run. I have a meeting with the reverend about the live nativity. It will be spectacular.” She wiggled her fingers at the entire group. Jethro snorted loudly, and the polka-dot pair hurried off.
After his mother had gone, Aiden shook his head. “I’ll need to talk to Margot about this,” Aiden said, directing his comment to Rocky.
Rocky smiled as if she knew that she had won the argument. “You do that.”
Aiden held up the permit. “Can I keep this?”
Rocky shrugged. “Go ahead. I have other copies.”
Aiden pursed his lips. “I’m sure you do.”
Chapter 3
Aiden folded the permit and tucked it into the inside pocket of his department jacket. “It says on the permit that you have permission for filming. What exactly will you be filming?”
Rocky clasped her gloved hands. “I’m so glad you asked. I’m sure you have heard of Sharp’s Sweet Kitchen.”
Aiden’s brow furrowed. “I’m afraid I haven’t.”
She threw up her hands. “How is that possible? It has only been on the air for a month and it is already the number-one-rated cooking reality show on cable television.”
“I don’t have a lot of time to watch television,” Aiden said.
This made Rocky scowl. I think the last thing a television producer wants to hear is that someone doesn’t like to watch TV. I guess I make the same face when people tell me they don’t like chocolate.
She recovered quickly, and her television smile was firmly back in place. “The show is about Eric’s life and work as the top pastry chef in New York. In the various segments he makes pastries and desserts for special events, his dates, and for parties. It shows the inner workings of his business. It shows the people who work with him and the people in his life.”
There was an elevator pitch for you. It was clear that Rocky was well practiced at the craft of pitching. I supposed she had to be in her business.
“The show is going so well that the network saw an opportunity to produce a Christmas special. Since it is already December, we don’t have a lot of time to throw it together to make our airdate of December twenty-third. There is a lot on the line as you can imagine, so everything must go seamlessly. Making our airtime is our number one priority.”
“Okay,” Aiden said. “But why here in Harvest? Wouldn’t it have been easier to film the Christmas special in New York?”
“Perhaps, but the Sharp brand is bigger than the city. It’s global.”
I made a garbled sound, something between choking and a bark of laughter. Neither Rocky nor Aiden paid me any notice.
“Viewers need to see Eric outside of the celebrated city haunts,” Rocky went on. “They need to see that he is at home in the country, that he’s a man with a heart.”
That was debatable.
“The Midwest is a major demographic and comprises a sizable part of TV viewership—our advertisers are particularly keen on connecting with all of America.”
Right. So it was a matter of what they could sell. I knew that TV was driven by commercialism, but it was quite another matter to feel as if I was getting dragged into this exploitation, even if I had been wondering a wee bit about how we could capitalize on some of the free publicity for my maami’s business.
Rocky flung her arm in the direction of Swissmen Sweets. “We knew from the papers that Eric had this connection to Amish Country, and I thought it would be a gold mine. What better place could there be for Sharp’s Sweet Kitchen Christmas special than in Amish Country? It was my idea, and the network went over the moon for it just like they did when I pitched Eric’s show at the very beginning.”
“I’m sure there are a lot of better places for your special,” Aiden said.
Rocky shook her head. “Nonsense.” She waved her hand around. In addition to talking fast, New Yorkers sure spoke with their hands. It was a habit I’d picked up too. “Look around us at this square, the shops, that big white church, and the gas lampposts. This place is like a Norman Rockwell postcard. Add in the live nativity and the Christmas Market and our viewers will be swooning to learn more about this adorable village and the people who live here. It’s the perfect set for a cooking reality show. I couldn’t have planned it better myself.”
I glanced around the square. Although I had never noticed it because I had been coming to Harvest ever since I was a young child to visit my grandparents, I realized that Rocky was right. The apple trees and gazebo were wrapped in white and blue twinkle lights, greenery and red ribbons adorned each gas lamppost, and glittering glass ornaments hung from the fir trees. A giant wreath sat just below the church steeple. It was like a Norman Rockwell postcard or like the inside of a snow globe, I realized as giant snowflakes began to fall.
Rocky smiled at the snow as if the heavens had opened up to make her “set” even more perfect for Eric’s show. “Amish is hot right now,” she said. “It has been for a while, but the trend doesn’t seem to be dying away. People in the big cities are craving a simpler country life even if they wouldn’t last more than three seconds outside their area code. The grass is always greener somewhere else.” Her voice caught for a moment.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
She smiled. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”
Because she sounded for a second there as if she was about to cry, but I didn’t want to embarrass her by saying so.
“We plan to capitalize on that,” Rocky said. “Plus, the story was already there because Bailey and Eric’s breakup got so much media attention. People want to see them back together, and we need to capture their reunion on film.”
And there it was . . . the catch.
The spidey sense that had been prickling along my arms since the moment Eric strutted through the sweetshop’s door, it was all leading up to this.
I didn’t dare glance at Aiden. I hated to think about what he must think of all this. Not that we had done anything other than toy with the idea of dating. He worked long, unpredictable hours as a sheriff’s deputy, and I had been focused on inching the candy shop into the twenty-first century. There hadn’t been much time for either of us to even broach the topic, and it seemed whenever one of us was ready and willing to give it a go, the other was
not.
“It’s all here,” Rocky continued. “The charming small town, the sense of community and family. Second chances at love. You know, the feel-good family stuff that TV watchers like to gobble up while ignoring their own families.”
I was speechless. It was as if I’d eaten a peppermint gumdrop and it was lodged in the back of my throat.
Rocky made a slashing motion with her hand, causing her hair to swish over her shoulders. “If we are going to capitalize on that story, we have to do it now, before viewers forget. The American audience has the attention span of a gnat. We must hit them hard with something until they are ready to move on to the next thing, and we always have to be one step ahead with new ideas. It’s the nature of the business.” She stepped back and made a frame with her hands, putting Eric and me in it. “Celebrity Chef and World-Class Chocolatier drawn apart by work rekindle their romance over authentic sweets at Christmas, putting what really matters first this holiday.” She smiled at the image she’d described. “Can you see it or what?”
“I’m sorry, Rocky,” I said. “But to get that angle you would have to include me, and I have no interest in participating. If you have permission from Margot to do some kind of Amish Christmas special with Eric here in Harvest, go for it, but please count me out if Eric and I have to . . .” I trailed off. I was too embarrassed to say anything more because of Aiden’s proximity. Could this situation get any more humiliating for me?
She opened and closed her mouth for a moment as if registering the shock of my words. “But . . . but Eric said that you were on board. He said he spoke to you.” She scowled at Eric.
Eric held up his hands in surrender. “Rocky, I never said I talked to Bailey about this. I just told you that it wouldn’t be a problem, and it won’t. Bailey is always there when I need her.” He grinned at me. “Right, Bai?”
My face felt impossibly hot. I should have stayed inside the candy shop when everyone else rushed outside, but no, my curiosity won out and now I had to listen to a TV pitch about Eric and me rekindling our romance.
“Surely there is something we can do to change your mind. The network has given me some money that I can offer you,” Rocky said, seeming to have regained her composure.
“I don’t want your money. Filming in Swissmen Sweets is one thing, although I still need to speak to my grandmother about that, but lying about my relationship with Eric is completely another.”
She snorted. “Please, everyone wants money. Don’t pretend that you are any different because you live some simple Amish life now. I know the Amish aren’t as good and wholesome as they claim to be.”
Wow. That was a rather rude and sweeping statement. I turned. “I need to get back to work.”
As I made my way across the frozen grass toward my candy shop, my phone buzzed in my pocket. I removed it and found a text from my best friend, Cass, in New York.
Incoming! Eric is headed to Harvest to film his reality show. Danger. Danger!
Too late, Cass, far too late.
I was just crossing the street back to the safety of my candy shop when I heard the click of high heels on the pavement behind me. I turned to see Rocky running toward me.
I stopped on the sidewalk and waited for her, only because my grandparents had drilled politeness into me as a very young girl again. Otherwise, I would have bolted.
Rocky’s heels scraped on the sidewalk, and I pulled up short when she stopped next to me. “Listen, I can be flexible. Let us shoot in your shop, and you and Eric rekindling anything is off the table. We need you in this special. Without you, there is no logical reason for Eric to be here.”
I bit the inside of my lip as I thought again about all the business Eric’s show could bring to my shop. I had just launched an online store, but we had very little traffic on it as of yet. This could change everything for us.
“Eric needs this. The network needs this. I need this.”
I frowned. “Why?”
She sighed. “Let me be completely candid with you. When we chose to have Eric do a show, the fact that he’s a loud and critical perfectionist pastry chef was attractive, but things have changed in the television business, and we have to soften his image so that viewers like him again. The angry chef is all well and good for a few episodes, but soon viewers become fatigued by it. My theory is because they deal with too many people who behave that way in their real lives. That’s where you come in. Who better to soften Eric’s image than the beautiful and wholesome proprietress of an Amish candy shop?”
I opened my mouth, but for once I couldn’t think of anything to say.
“If we don’t turn this around, Eric’s show may be canceled, and I’d hate to think I made a mistake turning down other opportunities to be his executive producer.”
“And Eric and I could just be, what, friends on the show?”
She smiled. “Of course. We will leave it at that. Talk it over with your grossmaami.” Her gray eyes were earnest and almost wistful. “And think on it overnight. I’ll be by myself in the van tomorrow morning, close to seven. I like to be at work before everyone else just to make sure everything is in its place and we’re ready to go. I know it’s early, but that is the best time to come over in case you want to discuss this without anyone else around, including Eric.”
She turned and hurried back across the street in the direction of the van before I could ask her why she had said grossmaami to find out how she knew the Pennsylvania Dutch word for grandma.
Chapter 4
I chewed on my lip and texted Cass back, telling her that Eric was already here, before I opened the door to Swissmen Sweets. The show would be a great opportunity for the shop, and if Rocky was telling the truth about taking my rekindled love with Eric off the table, it would be silly to turn it down. There was just one catch. Swissmen Sweets wasn’t my shop. It was my grandmother’s, so it wasn’t my call to make.
I was about step inside when an orange blur shot out through the door of the candy shop. “Nutmeg,” I cried, realizing immediately that it was my orange tabby, who’d recently decided that he wanted to be an escape artist. “Nutmeg!” I called again as the cat dashed down the narrow alley that separated Swissmen Sweets from the pretzel shop next door.
I let the front door close as I went after the cat down the alley. I knew where he was going. Nutmeg wouldn’t be hard to find, but it was beginning to snow harder and I was afraid of his catching a chill.
As I came around the back of the pretzel shop, I saw the figure of a man disappearing around the other side of the building. The figure was far too small to be sturdy Abel, whom I would expect to see behind his family’s store.
Another person was behind the shop as well. Abel’s youngest sister, Emily, stood there as the snow fell around her with Nutmeg cradled in her arms. This was where I had expected to find the little cat. Nutmeg had been her pet before he belonged to me. She had given me Nutmeg when Abel and her older sister, Esther, forbid her to keep a pet. Nutmeg still liked his visits with his first mistress, and he and I had always looked forward to Emily dropping by Swissmen Sweets each day. Lately though, Nutmeg had to go to the Eshes’ shop to see her because she no longer came to mine.
Two months ago, Emily had been an invaluable help to me in a candy competition. I’d really needed her support throughout the competition, especially after I found a dead body. At the end of the competition, she had asked me for a job at Swissmen Sweets so that she could get out from under the thumb of her restrictive sister, Esther. I had seriously considered it because I could use more help around the shop, and I’d promised her that I would speak to my grandmother about it. Then my grandmother’s cousin Charlotte ran away from her very conservative Amish community and needed a job and a place to stay. It made sense that Maami wanted Charlotte and not Emily to work at the shop. I would have loved to have Emily too, but we couldn’t afford to hire two people.
When I told Emily our decision, she had been heartbroken and started avoiding me. Although her f
amily’s pretzel shop was right next door to Swissmen Sweets, she hadn’t come to the store in weeks to visit Nutmeg.
I wished there was a way I could make it up to her, but nothing could change the fact that we didn’t need two candy shop assistants, and my grandmother seemed so much happier now that Charlotte was with us full time. Maybe if business increased as a result of my being a part of Eric’s show, that would change. I pushed that thought to the back of my mind. It was Maami’s decision, not mine.
“Emily! It’s nice to see you,” I said as brightly as I could. Part of me wanted to ask about the Amish man I had seen leaving, but I knew that would be pressing my luck. It would be a breakthrough if Emily just said hello to me. As much as I wanted our friendship back to the place it had been when I’d first moved here, I wasn’t hoping for much more than a “hello.”
I realized I wasn’t even going to get that much as she set Nutmeg down on the cold pavement and turned her back to me. Nutmeg stared up at her and meowed. Clearly, the little cat was confused by the way she was snubbing both of us.
“Emily, I think we should talk,” I began.
My words spurred her into action, and she ran to the back door of her family’s shop, threw it open, then disappeared inside.
Nutmeg meowed at me.
I bent to pick him up. “It’s okay,” I told the cat with a knot in my stomach. “She will come around eventually,” I said, not knowing if that was true.
I carried Nutmeg around to the front of my shop and through the front door. When we went inside I brushed the snowflakes from his fur before setting him on the floor. Charlotte and my grandmother were behind the doomed candy counter again as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened that morning.
My grandmother smiled at me brightly. “Bailey dear, you are back. How are your friends?”
“I think they are all right. Aiden has his hands full, I’m afraid. I guess Margot has given the TV crew a permit to film on the square during the Christmas Market.”
Premeditated Peppermint Page 3