by Nina Lindsey
“Is the chocolate tested here too?” Cora asked.
“The chocolate test kitchen is located one floor above.” Henry pointed to the ceiling. “This is where we test and create all the other candy. Right now we’re working on different varieties of ribbon candy and taffy.”
Polly had learned and practiced a lot of the techniques in class, but this was the first time she’d ever been in a real candy kitchen and lab. Henry explained all the different processes as they walked around, and soon her hand began to hurt from scribbling so many notes.
“He’s coming!” One of the chefs hurried up to Henry, her whisper loud enough for everyone to hear.
Polly looked up from her notebook, sensing a palpable excitement rippling through the air. Her fellow students shifted and murmured with interest.
“What’s going on?” she asked Cora, who shrugged.
“Oh.” Henry looked disconcerted. “I wasn’t expecting this, but it seems the CEO is about to pay us a visit.”
Intakes of breath rose from the culinary students. An excited flutter went through Polly. She’d never even seen one of the Stone brothers, much less met any of them.
“Mr. Stone often stops by to check on our progress,” Henry explained, “and you’d better believe we hear about it if something isn’t up to speed. Not that that happens often,” he hastened to add.
The two chefs hurried to make sure their stations were in order. Anticipation heightened the air. Polly found it rather thrilling. The Stone brothers were legendary, and it felt like everyone was waiting for a rock star to arrive.
Henry started explaining the process of making taffy. Polly scribbled notes about water and glucose, watching out of the corner of her eye as the far door opened.
A tall, dark-haired man clad in a beautifully tailored navy suit and tie strode into the kitchen, a leather binder in one hand. Aside from his strikingly handsome appearance, he had an aura of utter control and self-confidence that made her heart leap in a way that it only had once before.
Polly froze.
No way.
No. Freaking. Way.
Her breath shortened. The excitement in the room intensified. All the women stilled with awe and admiration at the sight of the intimidating Mr. Stone.
Or, as Polly had called him, Mr. Hottie.
Chapter 4
This couldn’t be happening. Two days ago, Polly had not drunkenly kissed the man who would prove to be the CEO of Sugar Rush. She had not vomited all over his designer Ferragamos or whatever kind of shoes they were. She most certainly had not made inappropriate suggestions about feather pillows and a four-poster bed.
Except that she had.
Oh, mother of all that was holy. She wanted to die.
She tried to hide behind Cora and prayed to every god of every religion since the beginning of time that Mr. Luke Stone would not find it necessary to stop and greet her tour group.
Henry was still rambling on about taffy, but Polly had stopped listening. She watched CEO Stone. He took his time walking around the kitchen, stopping to speak to the chefs and examine the contents of two large mixers. His expression was inscrutable, his eyes sharp, his bearing controlled, as if he not only expected deference, but demanded it. He reminded her vaguely of a king who had deigned to visit the peasants.
Then he started toward her tour group.
She glanced at the clock. Could she somehow manage to fake a sudden illness?
“Hello, Mr. Stone.” A flash of nervousness crossed Henry’s face as he extended a hand. “These are Gordon Andrews’ Confectionary Technology students from Hartford Community College in Rainsville.”
“Ah.” Luke Stone’s dark gaze swept over the group. “I like people who are interested in the science of sweet things.”
A few of the girls giggled.
Polly’s heart raced wildly. She tried to duck farther into the group, keeping her head bent so low her chin smashed into her neck.
Go away, Mr. Hottie. Just go away. Nothing to see here.
“Why don’t you introduce yourselves?” Mr. Stone asked. “I’d be interested to know your culinary ambitions.”
Polly had to get out of there. She maneuvered backward a few steps, figuring she could dart from the back of the group and make a run for it before anyone noticed she was missing. Her back hit the wall of Gary, a two-hundred-pound soda pop aficionado who was channeling his passion into fizzy candy.
She muttered an apology and tried to scoot around him, but he was standing against the blending table and blocking her emergency exit route.
“Hey, Gary,” Polly whispered, poking him gently with her pen. “Could you scoot over just a—”
“Why don’t you go first, miss?” Luke Stone’s voice swept over her like a hot breeze.
She startled, feeling his gaze land on her with the precision of an arrow. Exactly the way she’d felt it at the Troll’s House. Right before she’d—
Okay. She’d put herself out there the other night because she hadn’t wanted to hide out in a basement any longer. She wanted to be brave. Hiding behind large Gary wasn’t exactly brave. Besides, CEO Stone might not even recognize her, given that she was wearing a white apron with her hair hidden beneath an ugly plastic cap.
She took a deep breath and lifted her head to meet his gaze, which was even more penetrating under the bright kitchen lights.
“I’m Polly Lockhart,” she said, proud that her voice sounded steady even though she was shaking inwardly.
“Polly,” he repeated, his deep voice wrapping around her name as if he could taste it. “And why are you taking Confectionary Technology, Polly?”
“It’s a course requirement for the Culinary Arts certificate,” she explained. “I own a bakery called Wild Child and want to…um, upgrade it.”
More like keep it from going under completely, not that he needed to know that.
He held her gaze for an instant longer than was necessary. An electric current passed between them. Her whole body flushed, as if she’d opened a hot oven fragrant with the scent of cinnamon sugar cookies.
“I’m Gary Findley,” Gary announced beside her. “And I’m all about—and I mean all about—soda pop, so I’m into learning about how to incorporate soda into candies and maybe even chocolate.”
Relieved, Polly listened as her fellow students introduced themselves, and the venerable CEO’s attention shifted away from her.
“So have any of you worked at a candy company?” Mr. Stone asked, after all twelve students had introduced themselves.
Most everyone shook their heads in response, except for Ron, who had worked at a chocolatier’s.
“Well, then.” Mr. Stone set his leather binder on the counter and removed his suit jacket, revealing a beautifully tailored gray shirt that fit his broad chest and shoulders to absolute perfection.
Polly’s mouth went dry as she remembered—despite one too many birthday cake shots—exactly how his chest muscles had felt under her hands.
“Let’s get into the details, shall we?” Mr. Stone rolled up the right sleeve of his shirt.
Every female eye—and a few male eyes—snapped to the revelation of his forearm, lightly dusted with dark hair and corded with muscle. Polly remembered him leaning over the pool table, stretching his forearm out to position the shot…
“Excuse me, sir?” Henry sounded a bit baffled.
“Take them on a tour of the lab,” Mr. Stone ordered. “Then when you’re finished, they can learn about the manufacturing process.”
“Yes, sir.” Henry hurried to do his boss’s bidding, ushering the group toward the door that led to the adjoining laboratory.
“Miss Lockhart.” Mr. Stone pointed with his chin at Polly as he rolled up his left sleeve. “Stay here.”
Faint irritation rustled inside her, momentarily quelling her nervousness. Luke Stone was obviously a man accustomed to being obeyed, but she didn’t like his assumption that she would simply do whatever he said.
“I might
want to go there.” She tilted her head toward the taffy-pulling machine.
A smile tugged at his mouth as he approached her, his voice lowering to that deep rumble that felt like a caress.
“Oh, I’ll take you there,” he murmured.
“Did you require my assistance, Mr. Stone?” A plump chef approached. “I was just getting started on the ribbon candy.”
“Thank you, Martha, but I’ll take care of it,” he replied smoothly. “Why don’t you all take a break?”
“Thank you, sir.” Martha wasted no time heading toward the locker room.
As her fellow students and the other chefs left the kitchen, Polly found herself alone with Luke Stone. He took a pair of plastic gloves from a box and handed them to her before pulling on a pair of his own.
“So you want to make candy, Polly,” he said.
“Um…sure,” she replied feebly, unable to prevent a rush of heat at the idea of making candy with Mr. Luke Stone.
“This is the mixture for ribbon candy.” He turned off the heat beneath a kettle on the stove. “Sugar, water, and glucose boiled together before blending.”
He poured the sticky mixture onto a small cooling table beside the stove and added strawberry flavor before starting to roll it. Polly couldn’t help glancing at his muscled forearms, the way they flexed and shifted with his movements. They had been the first thing she’d noticed about him the other night.
Well, maybe the second thing. A watch encircled his right wrist, but it was a plain analog kind with a leather strap—not a fancy Rolex like she’d expect a man of his wealth and status to wear.
She stood beside him, unwillingly entranced by the easy grace of his movements as he lifted the heavy mass of candy, folding it back onto itself several times to allow the flavor to penetrate evenly. He explained the technique as he worked, added a layer of vanilla, then sliced the candy and pushed one half toward her.
“Roll it into a log,” he said.
As Polly started rolling her section, she watched Mr. Stone surreptitiously. He sure knew what he was doing. He rolled, layered, pinched, and cut with quick, efficient movements. Because he was obviously strong and experienced (well, of course he was), he finished with one batch before she was even rolling hers out for the second time.
“I didn’t know the CEO could make candy,” she remarked.
“I’d never ask any of my employees to do something I couldn’t do.”
“You mean you know how to do everything?” she asked.
He arched an eyebrow. “Everything.”
A shiver traveled down her spine.
“So where did you learn all these candy-making techniques?” She sounded a little breathless.
“At the company factory in Berkeley,” he replied. “My grandfather insisted we all started working on the floor when we were teenagers. I spent three years learning the manufacturing techniques before moving into packaging and sales. Making hard candy was always my favorite part.”
“Was it also your favorite to eat?”
“Definitely. My go-to treats were hard candy and Swirl Pops.” He rolled out the candy again. “When I was a kid, I once told my father he could pay me for my chores in Swirl Pops. But he wanted me to learn the value of money, so I ended up with a check like everyone else. Which I promptly spent in the gift shop.”
Despite his tailored suit and commanding demeanor, it was not difficult for Polly to imagine him as a bright-eyed boy eager for candy.
“Swirl Pops were my favorite when I was a kid too,” she said. “Especially strawberry. And Honeybee Toffee. Oh, and those little chocolate bites…what were they called?”
“Nibblers.”
“Nibblers! I loved those. Do you still make them?”
“They’re one of our top sellers in the chocolate division.” He glanced at her, warmth softening his hard features for an instant. “You have good taste.”
Polly smiled. After they worked in compatible silence for a few more minutes, she gathered the courage to address the elephant in the candy kitchen.
“So this is weird, huh?” She tried to eke out a casual little laugh. “I’m really sorry, you know, for how I acted at the bar, not to mention pleading with you to…oh, God.”
Embarrassment crawled up her neck. She felt him looking at her again and because he really had been nice to her the other night—not to mention an incredible kisser—she held on to her courage and glanced at him.
Zing! Electricity coursed through her the instant their eyes met. He watched her with an inscrutable expression that at least didn’t seem to convey reprimand or, worse, disgust.
“What were you doing there anyway?” she asked. “At the Troll’s House, I mean. Shouldn’t a man like you have been somewhere fancier?”
Amusement flickered in his eyes. “Probably. I like the Troll’s House because no one knows I go there.” He paused, his gaze narrowing slightly. “People know my name, but they don’t know who I am. I’d like to keep it that way.”
“Okay.” It took her a second to realize the underlying implication of his remark. “You don’t think I’d run around telling people, do you?”
He didn’t respond. Polly stared at him. She suspected women hit on him all the time, but the whole gorgeous, masculine package of Luke Stone combined with the fact that he was the CEO and owner of a big candy company…well, even she could see why women would go after him like he was the grand prize in the game of He’s Mine.
Still, Polly wasn’t above being insulted by the implication that she would ever play that game. She moved closer to him, lifting her head to look him in the eye and trying to ignore the yummy scent of him.
“Frankly, Mr. Stone, I don’t care who you are,” she said. “Do you really think I’d post all over the Internet about kissing the CEO of Sugar Rush in the back of a dive bar? For what purpose? To publicly shame myself for drinking too much and hitting on you? Or to brag about it? Or to blackmail you into…”
Her voice trailed off as something flashed in Luke Stone’s eyes—something quick and bitter. Though Polly had no idea of its source, something inside her responded with a hard, intense pull of understanding. Because that look was exactly the way she’d felt after her mother died. Betrayed.
She stepped away from him, her irritation draining a bit.
“You must be a Capricorn,” she remarked.
“A what?” He took off his gloves and tossed them into the trash.
“Capricorns have a tendency to want to control their environment and everyone around them,” Polly explained. “That appears to be a very apt description of you.”
She didn’t tell him that Capricorns were also masters of self-control, which also seemed descriptive of him if their little interlude at the Troll’s House was anything to judge by. She, on the other hand, had blatantly exhibited the Sagittarius traits of excessive enthusiasm and bluntness.
Mr. Stone looked at her as if she were the oddest creature to ever cross his path.
“A Capricorn,” he repeated.
She peeled off her gloves. “Am I right?”
“Yes, but…” He shook his head, as if something about her astrological knowledge both amused and baffled him. “Look, Miss Lockhart, my point is that I have to protect both myself and our company.”
“Well, you have nothing to fear from Polly Lockhart, big bad owner of the Wild Child Bakery,” she said dryly, dropping her gloves in the trash. “I’m no danger to you, though I am ready to throw a bunch of doughnuts at you right now.”
The darkness faded from Luke Stone’s expression, to be replaced with another glimpse of that warm amusement that had Polly tingling from her head to her toes. She put her thumb right at the crease between his eyebrows, pressing to smooth it out.
“You’re much better looking when you’re not frowning,” she said.
Actually, he was dangerously sexy when he was frowning, not that she was about to tell him that.
Before she could pull her hand away, Mr. Stone grabbed
her wrist, wrapping his fingers around it like a manacle. Her breath caught. A sizzle lit through the air. He rubbed his thumb slowly across her pulse. The light touch had a devastating effect on her senses, causing her head to spin and her knees to weaken.
She swallowed hard, unable to look away from him. In the brightness of the kitchen lights, his eyes weren’t the pitch-black she’d thought they were at the bar. No, they were a rich, golden brown, the color of caramelized sugar and dusted with flecks of gold.
“So how did the CEO of Sugar Rush find the Troll’s House?” she asked. “I mean, did you just stumble on it one night and decide to make it your haunt?”
“Pretty much. No one bothers me there.”
“Except drunken birthday girls who attack you in the hallway,” Polly remarked.
A smile tugged at his mouth. “Guess it was my lucky night.”
Pleasure swept over her, shadowed by a twinge of regret. If she’d been at the grocery store and run into “Mr. Hottie from the Troll’s House” again, if he were a mechanic or an accountant or a construction worker…well, maybe they could go on a real date and find out if their encounter was the start of destiny.
But given who he was, and who she was…
“Did you mean it?” he asked, his voice low.
“Mean what?”
“That you were at the bar looking to have fun.”
Heat rose to her cheeks, but she wasn’t about to deny the truth. “Sort of.”
His mouth twisted. “Sort of?”
Polly glanced uneasily around, though the kitchen was empty.
“I was out with a friend for my birthday,” she said. “And I was trying to get out there more, yes, not that my motive is any of your business.”
“On the contrary.” He moved closer to her, his eyes hardening with a distinct sense of possessiveness as his voice took on a rough tone. “It became my business the instant you kissed me. And then it became my business even more when you threatened to hit on another guy if I didn’t kiss you again. And then it became only my business when you begged me to take you home.”
He was still loosely holding her wrist, his fingers at her pulse, and she knew he could feel the quickening of her heartbeat.