He pressed his lips together in thought. “It depends on how long Mr. Montgomery is willing to give me before he pulls his offer and walks away.”
“Could you talk with him… give me…” I did some quick math in my head. The last episode of Bake it or Break it aired in five weeks. Then I would know if I had won the five hundred thousand or not. “Eight weeks?” I asked, hopeful. “I will know in eight weeks if we will have that money in hand.”
He patted the top of my hand. “Eight weeks is fine with me. I will talk to Hardin and see if he’ll agree to wait that long.”
I shook my head back and forth. “Why do I know that name? Hardin Montgomery?”
Mr. Levy sat back in his seat and sighed. “Heir to Montgomery’s Department stores. Trust me, I’d much rather sell to the town than some bigwig in a suit.”
“A monkey suit,” I muttered. “So why the hell is he developing Targets and Starbucks when he could be building a Montgomery’s?”
“There are no specific stores listed in his proposal. He might be telling us one thing in meetings, then once it is zoned for retail, the city has no say over what stores go in there.” Mr. Levy shrugged. “But what do I know. I’m just an old man trying to sell my land so that my wife and I have a nice little nest egg for retirement.”
“I’m not out to ruin anyone’s retirement, Mr. Levy.”
He smiled kindly at me, standing and gathering his to-go cup of coffee and briefcase. Extending me his hand, he said, “Trust me, I’d much rather see the mill go to the town than to some bigwig in a suit.”
“That makes two of us.”
I watched Mr. Levi exit Elsa’s diner. Beyond him… past the parking lot and across the street, I caught a glimpse of Elliott entering Latte Da.
Red hot rage surged in my veins when I saw him. I was already pissed about Hardin Montgomery usurping my meeting, but add to that my anger about Elliott filming us secretly and airing our sexy swim on national television? Oh, hell no. Today was not the day to mess with me. I grabbed my purse and all but ran out of the diner and across the street toward him. “Elliott!” I shouted.
He grinned at me and held out his hands. “Hey! Elaina! Great news about the votes, huh? We didn’t even have to fudge the numbers on that one. You won that vote fair and square. When are you planning to move in to the residency center?”
Was this guy for real? “Do you seriously think I’m here in front of you to shake your hand on a great first episode after the stunt you pulled?”
His brows pulled together. “The stunt I pulled?”
My eyes narrowed. “Don’t play innocent. You and your crew followed Neil and me to the lake and filmed us… being intimate.”
“Well… yeah,” he stated. “It’s a good thing, too. Your numbers weren’t going to win without that.”
“My numbers? You literally showed my ass on television and you think I’m worried about my ratings with America’s viewership? I mean… is that even legal?”
He crossed his arms, giving me a strange look. “You were having sex in a public place. The contract you signed stated that we can film you in any public place and within the common areas of your homes for the next five weeks.” He shrugged unapologetically. “I have a job to do, Elaina. And you have a million dollars you want to win. It’s all part of the game.”
“This isn’t a game, Elliott. It’s my life. I could be fired for something like that. Public indecency—”
He scoffed as I said that. “Isn’t your dad your boss?”
I gulped. “Yes. But—”
“Would your father fire you?”
“Maybe. If there were enough complaints.”
Only… I didn’t think that was true. I had no doubt my dad was fielding all kinds of calls today and hadn’t mentioned a word to me. But if I was anyone else, would I have already been fired? Probably.
“You son of a bitch!” Neil’s voice boomed from across the street, and I saw him framed in the center of the Beefcakes doorway. He hauled ass across the street toward us, and even though I didn’t care much for Elliott, I was truly afraid for his well-being in that moment. As Neil raced toward us, I stepped in front of Elliott, whose face dropped, draining to the color of a crumpled tissue. “I want your ass in a vice and your head on a platter!” Neil yelled.
“Neil, calm down!” I held my hands out to stop him, and even though I could tell he was still fuming, he gently brushed his knuckle down my cheek.
“Calm down? After what he—”
“I know. Believe me, I know. But look at him,” I threw Elliott a pitying glance over my shoulder. “One punch and you’ll kill the little twerp.” Seriously, Neil was like twice his size. His fist alone was half the size of Elliott’s face.
Neil’s mouth quirked when I said that, but he didn’t quite laugh.
I took a deep breath and spun to face Elliott, making sure to maintain a barrier between him and Neil. “We won’t sneak away to lose the cameras anymore,” I said.
Elliott’s brows lifted, but he didn’t dare take a step closer to me. He was as far away as he could get, with his back pressed to the Latte Da storefront window. “You won’t?”
I shook my head. “But you need to award us some privacy. No cameras or microphones in the bedrooms of our homes.”
Neil’s scowl deepened. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed the twenty-four-hour cameras you put up in my home, too.”
My eyes widened. “They did what?”
Neil nodded, not taking his eyes off Elliott.
Elliott rolled his eyes, throwing his hands up in frustration. “It’s in the contract. Seriously, does no one read what they sign anymore?”
“Remove the ones in our bedrooms,” I repeated. “The rest can stay.”
He blew out a breath and took a sip of his iced coffee. “Fine.” He rolled his eyes. “I’ll send Ben, our lead camera operator, over to disconnect the bedroom cameras today.” He held out his hand to me to shake. “Then will you finally move into the residency center?”
I slipped my palm into his and shook it. “Yes.”
“And you’ll be at the shoot today? We can’t pause our filming schedule if we’re going to manage to stick to a weekly episode.”
I nodded. At this point, I didn’t have much of a choice. I had eight weeks to win that money to buy the mill or give up entirely.
And it would be a cold day in Hell when I admitted defeat to Hardin Montgomery.
This week of filming was different than last. There were actual judges in the room watching us compete on a challenge that the other couples had filmed a long time ago… weeks ago. And I couldn’t help but wonder how the other couple, even with a broken foot, backed out of the show. Those contracts we signed were iron clad. Or so I thought.
There was an older woman with big—and I mean big—black framed glasses and shiny silver hair. She was short with a pixie haircut and sharp features. The other judge was a much younger, very attractive woman in a tight blue dress with straight black hair that fell halfway down her back. And the third judge was a man… older than me, maybe in his forties. He wore a trendy suit with a colorful tie and spoke with a British accent. Their version of Simon Cowell, if I had to guess. Every show had that one judge who was harsh no matter what.
The second woman exhaled loudly and brushed her fingers through her glossy, black hair. “Why do we have to do another five weeks of this?” she grumbled. “Can’t they just… I don’t know… start the show with less couples than we had?”
Behind her, Elliott and Ben exchanged eye rolls and did a silent game of rock, paper, scissors, as an effort to determine who had to deal with her, I imagined. But before either of them could determine the winner, Elaina spoke up beside me as the makeup artist finished brushing peach-colored blush across her cheeks. “Then they’d have one less week for air time,” she said. “They’d still have to fill that with something.”
The complaining judge rolled her eyes. “What are you? Some sort of math wiz.”
/> “It’s hardly arithmetic wizardry, subtracting one from five,” Elaina snorted sarcastically.
I snapped my head to her and widened my eyes. “This is the judge, Lainey,” I whispered. “Can we try not to get on her bad side?”
She pressed her lips together contritely and winced. “Sorry,” she mouthed.
“Ready?” Ben asked, sliding the camera into position.
We both nodded, and I tried hard to ignore the sweat covering my palms and the thrum of my rapid pulse against the base of my jaw. Shit, I was nervous. I was never nervous. Not since my first competition, back when I was twenty-two.
“Great,” Elliott said. “So, luckily we filmed a lot of the intro stuff while you guys were in hair and makeup. Literally, all we need now is the competition.”
Elaina’s fingers found mine, and she curled them around my hand, giving it a squeeze. “Do we get any sort of hint before we start?”
Elliott crossed his arms and shook his head. “Unfortunately, no. None of the other contestants had any hints. But… um… you know, it’s hard going blindly into something.” He gave us a pointed look before spinning around to finish setting up.
“Blind,” I whispered.
“What the hell could that mean?” Elaina said.
I glanced down at the table of ingredients and shook my head. “Blindfolded? Are they going to make us bake something blindfolded?”
Elaina’s mouth twisted. “That… that would be impossible, right?”
I shrugged. It seemed damn near impossible. “Okay, look… if that’s the game… then you should know, you can identify liquid measurements on the glass cup by feeling the raised numbers on the outside. Count up to the cups you need and put your finger on the inside, pouring slowly until you feel the liquid hit your finger. For measuring hard components, fill the cup, then run your finger across the top to brush off the excess. It’ll be an exact measurement.”
Her mouth dropped briefly, before tipping into a grin. She bit her bottom lip, swallowing a giggle. “How do you know so much about baking blindfolded?”
I shrugged again. “I watched a lot of Ratatouille,” I joked. She laughed louder, and that sound was the most beautiful noise I’d ever heard. “In truth… I don’t know… you just learn weird tricks in a kitchen. Look, we don’t have a lot of time. But you should know, my oven is old. And sometimes we need to bang on the door to get it to heat up—”
“Okay,” Elliott called out. “Ready to get started?”
Shit. I hadn’t gotten through half of what I needed to if we were going to be baking blindfolded.
Everyone nodded as the makeup artist went around powdering our faces one last time. Elliott shifted behind the camera. “And… action.”
“Welcome back, you two,” Savannah Newport, the host of the show best known for her celebrity gossip spots on the Today Show, grinned at us, and her smile was a blinding shade of white that only the best money could buy. “Today’s challenge is a tough one.” Was there ever a time they didn’t say that? “You two will have to work together as one… and I don’t mean that figuratively. Neil, you will be Elaina’s eyes for her. And Elaina, you will be Neil’s arms for him. We need you each to put these on.” She stepped forward, handing me earplugs and handing Elaina a blindfold. “Elaina, if you’ll stand behind Neil and put your arms through as if your arms are his… and Neil, we will be tying yours behind your back.”
I sucked in a sharp breath as two crew members started situating us… pressed against each other. Her breasts brushed my back as she got into position, and I felt my libido wake up. God, not now. This was not the moment to be distracted by how sexy she was. A million dollars was riding on this. Then again… maybe that distraction was part of the point for this challenge.
“We have to bake like this?” I asked.
Savannah nodded. “We need you to bake one dozen cupcakes for a child’s birthday party, designed to look like a certain blue puppet who loves cookies. Use any recipe you have in your arsenal. Neil, you can talk to Elaina and instruct her on how to make the batter, what ingredients to add, when to stir and how to bake and decorate the cupcakes. But you cannot use your hands. And once we put the earplugs in, you will likely have a hard time hearing if she has any questions. Likewise, Elaina if you remove your blindfold, you’ll be disqualified. Judges… anything to add?”
The older woman spoke up first, and I felt Elaina shift to look around my shoulders at the judges. “We are looking for good teamwork,” she said, pumping her fist.
“And a delicious end result,” the British judge added.
“That also has the professional presentation you would need to sell to a kid’s birthday party.” The supermodel, who somehow landed a judging position on this show, added.
Savannah turned back to us. “Any questions?”
I shifted my foot where we were tied together like a three-legged race… only… no, it was a two-legged race… with four legs! This felt… it felt impossible. Truly, literally impossible to bake like this. I glanced back, stealing a look at Elaina whose face had turned a ghostly shade of white. Now, she was nervous, too.
Cookie Monster cupcakes that Elaina could bake easily without being able to see?
Okay… easy. I’ll do a basic vanilla cupcake with chocolate chips inside. Blue buttercream frosting which she hopefully can decorate somewhat resembling the muppet… and we’ll put a chocolate chip cookie in his ‘mouth.’
“No,” I said, my voice sounding small, and behind me, I felt Elaina shake her head no along with me. The crew stepped forward and put the blindfold over Elaina’s eyes.
“You have ninety minutes to complete your challenge.”
I gulped. Shit. I had no idea that the challenge would be this… well, challenging.
The crew slipped the earplugs into my ears, and the world around me went eerily silent. I saw, rather than heard the host’s mouth say: Go.
And we were off.
My shoulders were wedged in Neil’s armpits. I was blindfolded. At one point, I could have sworn I brushed a hand accidentally over the front of Neil’s pants and felt his arousal. So, either baking with blindfolds and earplugs was the weirdest kink I’d ever heard of… or my body being pressed and bound against his was turning him on.
I swallowed thickly. Frankly, it was turning me on, too.
The quick tips Neil had given me before we started were helpful. It made pouring the measurements he was shouting—quite literally shouting because of the earplugs (I winced every time he gave instructions)—much easier.
I had no idea how much time it took for us to finish the chocolate chip cookie cupcake batter, but it didn’t feel like very long. Maybe fifteen minutes? Twenty?
“Okay,” Neil spoke/shouted. “There’s a cupcake tin and liners to your left. Start lining them and then we’ll pour the batter.”
I grabbed the plastic wrapped liners and tugged at the plastic seam. Dammit. They were hard to open. I felt around the counter top for scissors and my fingertips accidentally hit a measuring cup, sending it flying off the edge of the counter. It hit the hardwood floors with a deafening shatter, and I flinched, burying my face momentarily in Neil’s back.
“What are you looking for?” Neil asked.
I mimicked the visual of “scissors” with my pointer and middle finger like the game of rock, paper, scissors we had seen Elliott playing earlier with Ben.
“Shit,” Neil grumbled. “They’re across the room.” He was quiet a moment, and we were probably both thinking the same thing. Was it worth the effort and time to try to walk across the room tied together like we were? Instead I held the plastic up to his mouth. Normally, if I were alone, I would just bite the plastic and tear it open. Neil seemed to understand what I meant. He wrapped his teeth around the liner and tugged, only I wasn’t holding on strong enough and he wrenched the cupcake liners from my hand.
“Crap!” I said aloud.
A laugh tore from my throat, and I felt his body bouncing with laugh
ter as well.
“It… it fell on the floor,” he said through his laughter. “We’re going to have to go get it. Step with the right foot first.”
I hugged him from behind, my laughter quieting as we took the first step. So far, so good. Then the next step. And the next.
Neil stopped walking. “Okay,” he said. “I’m going to bend over at the waist so you can grab it.”
He bent down… only, he’s so much taller than me that I lifted off my feet onto his back and screamed at the feeling of being blindfolded and suddenly without two feet on the ground anymore.
“Stop!” I cried out. “I can’t bend over like that with you in front. I’m not tall enough.”
But he didn’t stop bending over. Right… because he couldn’t hear me. Dammit, this was hard. Instead, I flailed my arms in front of his face, and he must have gotten the picture because he stood back up.
“Okay,” he said slowly, stretching the vowels out longer than necessary. “I don’t know why that wouldn’t work, but I’m going to assume based on your muppet flail that something went wrong. What if we both squat?”
Again, there was no point answering him since he couldn’t hear me… but I didn’t think that would work either. Not with how our legs were tied together at the quads. I reached up, pinching his chin, and shook his head no from side to side.
He laughed and kissed my knuckle gently. “Okay, no to that, too.” He paused. “I have an idea.” He turned us ninety degrees to the side and slowly started bending sideways. I followed him, reaching my hand the floor and feeling around for the liners. “To the left,” he said, grunting. Clearly, he wasn’t as flexible as I was. I shifted my hand to the left and still felt nothing. “Your other left,” he snickered, and I flipped him off before shifting to move the other way. “Classy, Lainey. Real classy.”
Aha! There it was. I felt the plastic brush my fingertips and grabbed them. Without thinking, I moved to stand up quickly… too quickly. Faster than Neil was moving.
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