“As you wish. Let’s quit standing around blathering, Lariat, and hit the bricks.”
Eleven
“Good morning, darling,” Chena Steward greeted Lariat the moment we walked through the door of her bakery. Lariat responded with a quick embrace and had to stand on his tiptoes to land a peck on Chena’s cheek. She was a tall, thin woman in her early thirties with short, jet black hair. It must’ve taken a lot of time and hair gel to make her hair look as wild and unruly as it did. The style made “bed head” look tame, and it was surprisingly attractive on her. If I had tried to pull off the same hairstyle, I’d have Stone calling me “Minnie” or asking if I’d stuck my finger in a light socket.
I could detect pock marks on the woman’s face, despite the thick layer of makeup. Chena had apparently suffered from severe acne as a teenager. Lariat mentioned on the walk over that the former All-Collegiate basketball star had played power forward for the Kansas State Lady Wildcats during her three-year stint in college. She’d dropped out after her junior year and gone on to study at the Kearney Culinary Academy, fifty miles southeast of her hometown of Atchison.
Like Rockdale, Atchison was a small town and pretty much everyone who lived there knew everyone else. This was especially true for people whose occupations brought them together frequently: for instance, a habitual criminal and a bails bondsman, a celebrity and a plastic surgeon, or a wedding planner and a cake decorator. With that in mind, it wasn’t surprising Lariat and Chena were well-acquainted.
Men can sometimes be pretty ignorant when it comes to a woman’s emotions, and Lariat was a prime example. The longing in Ms. Steward’s eyes and her demeanor indicated she clearly wanted to form a closer, more intimate bond with Lariat Jones. Lariat, on the other hand, didn’t seem to have a clue about the depth of her desire. His hug and peck on her cheek were given out of habit, I was sure. He probably kissed the cheek of every woman he interacted with, from his dental hygienist to the lady who bagged his groceries at the local supermarket. As a matter of fact, he had greeted me the same way less than a half-hour earlier, and I was under no delusions he harbored any romantic feelings for me, despite the sexual innuendos that dripped off his tongue like excess saliva.
Chena still wore a love-struck look on her face when Lariat introduced her to me. “Chena, this is my client, Lexie Starr. We’re here about the Van Patten nuptials on August twenty-fifth. As we discussed over the phone, we don’t have a lot of time to sit on our thumbs, so we’d like to get the wedding cake ordered this morning.”
“Van Patten, as in Andy Van Patten?” Chena asked.
“Yes. That’s the one.” I replied with pride, even though she’d addressed Lariat when she asked the question. Curious, I asked, “Do you know Andy?”
“Not personally. One of his groomsmen, Gunnar Wilde, is my ex-fiancé. As I’m sure you know, Andy owns the ranch next to Gunnar’s. Gunnar, incidentally, broke off our engagement after Andy introduced him to Mattie Hill, who I believe is also in the wedding party.”
“Yes. She’s my daughter’s maid of honor and her closest friend.”
“Really?” she asked. “How interesting.”
I didn’t know what else to say. I hadn’t liked the expression on Chena’s face as she’d spoken. However, considering the difference in height between this former basketball star and Gunnar Wilde, I had to think his new girlfriend, Mattie Hill, was a much better match for him. Gunnar barely surpassed my height by a couple of inches, and I felt like “Jeff” to Chena’s “Mutt” as I stood next to her. Even though Chena probably only viewed Lariat as potential rebound material, I felt as though she and him would make a better pair than she and Gunnar. If you think you can use Lariat to make your ex jealous, Chena, you have another think coming, I thought. Gunnar is totally smitten with Mattie. He thinks of you as a dodged bullet.
I mused silently as Lariat chatted with the cake decorator. Since moving to Atchison over a year ago, Andy had been renovating the old farm house on the cattle ranch he’d purchased. Working on the house and taking care of the livestock filled most of his waking hours, so he’d made few new friends in the area.
After becoming acquainted with Gunnar, Andy had introduced his new neighbor to Wendy’s best friend, Mattie Hill, and the two couples had gone out on a double-date. Gunnar and Mattie had clicked immediately, and were growing closer with each passing day.
Wendy had chosen a co-worker, Sara Short, as her second bridesmaid. Sara was employed at the county morgue as a forensic scientist, and she and Wendy had bonded over their work since Wendy’s recent appointment as the county’s head medical examiner. When Andy had needed a groomsman to offset Sara, he’d asked Gunnar to fill the position. Sara and Gunnar, Bubba and Mattie, and Wyatt Johnston and Veronica Prescott rounded out the designated wedding party. In my unbiased opinion, a finer group of individuals would be difficult to find.
As my daughter’s best friend, Mattie was almost like a second daughter to me. She spent as much time at the inn as Wendy. Understandably, wherever Mattie went, so went her current boyfriend. Gunnar had made it clear to me during an exchange one day over coffee that he’d felt blessed when he met Mattie and couldn’t break it off with his previous girlfriend fast enough, whom he’d never mentioned by name. Referencing the old Roadrunner cartoons, his actual words were, “I felt like the roadrunner who’d barely missed being crushed to death by an oversized anvil falling from the sky.” This was not something I wanted to share with Gunnar’s former fiancé, however, so after Chena begrudgingly mentioned Gunnar’s new relationship with Mattie again, I simply replied, “I’m so sorry about your broken engagement.”
“Oh, yeah. I’m sure you are.”
Chena glared at me while tugging on her left ear lobe. I suddenly felt very uncomfortable with the idea of her being involved in any way with Wendy and Andy’s impending union. “Maybe it’d be best if we didn’t…”
Lariat turned and glared at me. He excused us for a moment and whispered to me, “Do you have another cake decorator in mind who isn’t already booked solid for the entire month of August?”
“Well, no, but—”
“Neither do I. I assure you that, despite her connection to a member of the wedding party, Chena will do an exceptional job on the cake and you won’t be disappointed. There’s no reason she and Gunnar will even have to cross paths. Don’t let something like this screw up a beautiful wedding.”
I consented, knowing his assertion was no doubt correct. We rejoined Chena and I said, “Okay, let’s get down to business.”
“All right.” Chena motioned us toward a couple of chairs positioned in front of her desk. She pulled a price list from the top drawer. “As you can see, the base price is five-hundred dollars for a three-tiered, single-flavored basic wedding cake.”
“Five-hundred dollars?” I asked. Even though I knew I was comparing apples to oranges when it came to wedding cakes, I thought back to the sixty dollars I’d paid in total for two sheet cakes, chocolate and yellow crème, when I married Stone. Granted, I’d purchased them from Pete’s Pantry, our local grocery store, and there were no fancy designs or decorations on them whatsoever. However, our guests had gobbled them down just as much as they would have the five-hundred dollar cake Chena Steward proposed to deliver.
“Yes, five-hundred dollars. Is that a problem?”
“Um, no, but what do you mean by ‘base price’?”
Chena frowned and crossed her arms over her chest. “This is not a one-size-fits-all type of business, ma’am.”
“Yes, I understand that, but—”
Chena sighed. “Five hundred covers the basic three-tiered cake. There’s an additional fee if you want a premium flavor, such as red velvet. Fondant is costlier than the classic butter cream icing. Hand-piped lacy designs are more expensive than decorating the cake with ribbons or flowers. There is a set charge for delivery, set-up, utensils, and so forth. And, understandably, there’s a fee for expedited services if the cake is ordered less than thirty days before
the event. Since there are only twenty-six days until the wedding, that fee will be added to the base price.”
“Naturally,” I replied dryly. “And the fee for ‘expedited services’?”
“Only an extra hundred dollars.”
Only an extra hundred? I wanted to ask if she normally began baking a wedding cake a full month prior to the ceremony, but knew I couldn’t pull it off without sounding sarcastic, which of course is exactly the way I’d have meant it. Lariat had warned me Chena Steward was not the cheapest baker in town, but was the only one we’d be able to hire at such a late date. I didn’t want to disappoint my daughter, so I held my tongue and replied as pleasantly as I could. “Yes. I understand.”
“One-hundred dollars for expedited services is actually quite reasonable,” Chena said defensively. My incredulous expression had clearly given my true feelings away. Again, Chena pulled on her left ear lobe as she spoke.
“I see. So am I to understand that your justification for charging an ‘expedited services’ fee is that you need to begin preparing this cake immediately, even though the ceremony is still twenty-six days away?”
I’d tried to remain congenial, but my tongue had a mind of its own. Her defensive reaction had rubbed me the wrong way and caused me to feel defensive, as well—about her unwarranted defensiveness. Suddenly, I completely understood Gunnar’s falling-anvil remark.
“Of course not! That’s not the point!” Chena tugged on that poor ear lobe again, which appeared to hang quite a bit lower than the right one from all of the stretching it endured. In anger, she repeated herself. “That’s not the point!”
“Just out of curiosity then, what is the point? Twenty-six days seems like plenty of notice to prepare a wedding cake that isn’t needed until August twenty-fifth.”
Chena snarled as she spat out her response. “I do have to purchase the necessary ingredients and decorating paraphernalia in advance, you know.”
I swore I saw spittle shoot from her mouth and land on my shirt sleeve. I instinctively swiped my sleeve against my denim jeans and tried not to gag. I’d have to remember to toss the shirt directly into the washing machine when I returned home.
I looked up and spoke as calmly and collectively as I could. “Wal-Mart is open 24/7. Jot down a list of the items you need and I’ll pick them up and deliver them to you this afternoon. That way, you’ll have twenty-five days left over from your allotted time for last-minute shopping.”
Lariat suddenly looked up from his feet, which he’d been staring at throughout our heated exchange. His eyes were wide, as if just noticing his right shoe was from a different pair than his left. I could tell he was afraid a cat fight was about to break out right in front of him. I had no intention of engaging in a physical confrontation with anyone, but I also wasn’t going to let some too-tall, two-bit cake decorator take advantage of me. I felt confident Lariat would defend me should Chena decide to slam dunk me into the oversized trash can next to her display counter.
I couldn’t shake the feeling Chena was being vindictive because Wendy’s maid of honor had snatched Gunnar, Chena’s ex-fiancé, out from under her pitchfork. It fleetingly crossed my mind that Chena might feel compelled to tamper with the cake batter in order to exact revenge. The rest of the wedding guests who might partake of the cake would just be considered unfortunate, but necessary, collateral damage. I shook the silly notion from my mind.
I looked squarely at Lariat. “Perhaps it would be best if we looked into other options before we make our decision.”
The wedding planner spoke in a voice so low I had to lean in toward him to hear what he had to say. “Like I already told you, she’s our only option. Trust me, if I had another, I’d have considered it first. For that matter, if I had enough space to personally take on a cake-decorating business, I would. But as you saw this morning, I don’t have the luxury of a chef’s kitchen.”
I shrugged my shoulders and shook my head. I did have a chef’s kitchen. Could I take a cake-decorating class and attempt to make the wedding cake myself? No, I couldn’t. I routinely left bread in the toaster until it was black as tar and smoldering. I couldn’t be trusted with something as important as a wedding cake. Wendy would be horrified if I even suggested baking the cake myself. “Oh, all right. Guess we have no choice but to bite the bullet on this one.”
I had been skeptical of Chena Steward from the moment I’d laid eyes on her. Her ghostly white complexion reminded me of a vampire that couldn’t tolerate sunshine, and her rail-thin body looked as if she had never eaten one bite of cake, or anything else that contained more than a gram of sugar. I’d always found it hard to trust extremely skinny bakers, cooks, or chefs. In my opinion, hiring an ultra-thin baker is akin to investing your life savings with an investment broker who’d just declared bankruptcy for the third time. Of course, that could just be my jealousy talking.
Lariat turned his attention from me, whom he’d clearly deduced was a lost cause, to the cake decorator. “Chena, is the expedited service fee really necessary? I can’t imagine you’d want to lose a potential client or get a reputation of gouging customers.”
Chena let out a dramatic sigh and looked toward the ceiling in absolute silence. She appeared to be asking the powers-that-be for enough patience to deal with the difficult customer in front of her. “Oh, all right. I’d hate to pass this opportunity up. Therefore, I’ll forego the last-minute fee this once since it is only a few days over the thirty-day cut-off period.”
That’s mighty big of you, I wanted to say. Instead, knowing this woman was our only option short of me taking cake-decorating lessons, I uttered, “Thanks. I appreciate the kind gesture. The kids are operating on a limited budget for this event, so I’d like to―”
Without letting me finish my remark, Chena asked, “Do you have any idea what the average cost of a wedding is these days?”
“Um, well, no. Can’t say that I have that statistic on the tip of my tongue.” I didn’t say so out loud, but I would have wagered that fact would be on the tip of Stone’s tongue had he been there. He would’ve surely read or heard the statistic somewhere and, like everything else, stored the information into the steel trap of his brain.
“The average cost of a wedding is upwards of thirty-three thousand dollars.” Chena gave the answer with a self-righteous smirk.
“Holy crap! Thirty-three thousand? For a wedding? Seriously? That’s plum ridiculous. The average cost of my two weddings came closer to twelve hundred!” I exclaimed in shock.
Once again, I knew I shouldn’t compare apples to oranges. My first wedding occurred back in the dark ages and was hardly elaborate even by 1985 standards. The second took place on Stone’s property with a handful of our closest family and friends present. I’d worn an attractive but simple dress, and had only my daughter and Andy standing up for us. A simple reception followed the exchange of vows. It had been an inexpensive, but beautiful, affair.
“Those weddings must have been real dandies,” Chena replied after a derisive laugh. I didn’t appreciate her sarcasm, but was unable to come up with a fitting retort.
“Okay, ladies. There’s no time for chasing rainbows.” Lariat seized the moment and clapped his hands, lest the pause in our contentious discussion was short-lived. “Let’s decide what kind of cake we want for Wendy and Andy’s reception and get it ordered so we can make our eleven-o’clock appointment with the florist.”
Chena and I both nodded in reluctant agreement as we stared into each other’s eyes, not wanting to be the first one to blink or look away. This was not the auspicious beginning I’d been hoping for. Finally, I took the high road and lowered my gaze.
“Okay, fine,” I said. “We’d like a simple triple-layer, white cake with minimal frills and extras. Pretty, but not elaborate. Like I said, we are trying to keep costs down as much as possible so Andy doesn’t have to get a second mortgage on his cattle ranch to finance their wedding.”
“Okay, then. That’s good. That’s very go
od, Ms. Starr,” Lariat said in an obvious attempt to calm me. He had correctly sensed that my last remark was a jab at Chena’s prices. Before the cake decorator had a chance to reply, he pointed to the form attached to the clipboard in front of her. “Did you get that? Maybe you should write it down before you forget.”
With a huff, Chena said, “She’s chosen to order a plain white cake for the most important day of her daughter’s life. Who could forget that? Trust me, I won’t forget.”
Lariat grabbed my arm before I could poke Chena Steward in the eye with one of the sample cake knives laid out on the bakery’s front counter. He briskly steered me toward the door, and, over his shoulder, said, “I’ll get with you later on the price.”
There had to be tiny puffs of smoke floating out of my ears as we exited the bakery shop. I was surprised Lariat didn’t mention it because I could distinctly feel the heat blistering my eardrums. Perhaps he had noticed but decided not to stoke the still smoldering embers.
As we made our way down the sidewalk toward Lily’s-in-Bloom Floral Shop, located three blocks down the street, I wondered if Chena had taken her frustration out on her left ear lobe. She reminded me of a woman who could have been a defendant in the Salem witch trials, and I felt certain she was already visualizing in her mind the voodoo doll she was going to create in my likeness.
Later that evening, I turned on my computer and researched the cost of wedding cakes. Having never ordered a wedding cake from a professional decorator before, I thought Chena Steward’s prices were outlandish, way beyond what one would expect to pay. I soon discovered her prices were no more than the average going rate for a three-tiered decorated cake. I felt a momentary sense of embarrassment for the way I’d behaved in the woman’s shop. I wrote my behavior off as an overreaction to sticker shock and vowed to restrain myself from responding like that in the future. I’d just have to learn to accept the high cost of getting hitched in this day and age and pray I’d never have to help plan another wedding again in my lifetime.
Marriage and Mayhem (A Lexie Starr Mystery, Book 7) Page 8