Lynda smiled. “Of course. Have at it.”
After I got everything set up, I looked over at Landon, who was glaring at me.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
He gestured to the cupcakes in front of him. “I’ve got like a dozen cupcakes sitting here, and you’re taking entirely too long to set your phone up.”
I smiled and then focused back on Lynda. “We’re ready.”
She chuckled. “Going from left to right, we have our classic vanilla, chocolate, strawberry and cream, pink champagne, lemon, red velvet, and marble. In the bowls, you have our top three bestselling buttercreams. Left to right again is white chocolate mousse, Italian meringue, and then the cream cheese.”
“Damn, they all sound good.” Landon picked up his fork and was about to dig into the vanilla when Lynda continued speaking.
“Now, when we spoke the other day, you mentioned you didn’t have a theme or your colors yet.”
“Correct,” I said, also picking up my fork.
“Do you know approximately how many guests?” Lynda asked.
I gave a little shrug. “Well, if it were up to me, it would be a small event. Family and close friends.”
Landon looked at me. “Really? You want a small wedding?”
I nodded and smiled. “I think so. You?”
He grinned. “Yeah, something small and intimate.”
Lynda cleared her throat. “You haven’t spoken about this yet?”
I quickly turned my head from Landon to Lynda. “Well, we’ve spoken about venues, picked the date, and that’s about all.”
Lynda’s eyes moved down, and she gasped. “Your ring!”
I held out my hand so she could inspect it.
“It’s stunning.”
“Thank you so much. Landon bought it from an antique store in Italy. He’s been holding on to it for two years.”
Lynda gasped. “How romantic!”
I nodded. “I know.” I had already taken a picture of the ring and posted it on Instagram. Let’s just say, Landon earned a lot of brownie points. My followers were already in love with him.
Clearing his throat, Landon asked, “When are we actually tasting the cake at this cake…or cupcake tasting?”
Lynda chuckled. “Go ahead, dig in.”
With a wave of my fork, I said, “Let’s do the vanilla with the chocolate mousse.”
Landon winked. “Sounds good, Emme. Can’t go wrong with vanilla.”
I gave him a nod and we moved on until we had tasted every cupcake with each of the frosting options. My stomach pleaded for me to stop.
“Do we have a favorite?” Lynda asked as I finally sat back and put my fork down.
“Are you not going to finish your cupcakes?” Landon pulled my plate over to him and started to eat the leftovers.
I snarled my lip. “How can you even put any more of that in your mouth?”
He shrugged, shoveling more in. “Told you, I didn’t eat lunch in preparation for the goods.”
I laughed and focused back on Lynda. “I think I like the pink champagne with the white chocolate mousse. Landon, what do you think?”
He was shoving a piece of lemon cake with cream cheese buttercream into his mouth. He pointed at it and rolled his eyes up to the heavens.
“You like the lemon and cream cheese?”
He nodded. “It’s so damn good.”
I smiled and looked at Lynda.
“You could always do cupcakes along with the cake,” she said.
“Or the groom’s cake could be the lemon with the cream cheese,” I replied, opening my notebook and making a few notes.
Landon froze. “Wait…are you saying I get my own cake?”
Lynda and I turned and looked at him as I said, “If you want your own cake.”
Those blue eyes lit up like it was Christmas morning. “You mean, like a cake I can have decorated any way I want?”
I laughed. Lynda held up her hand, clearly having dealt with many a bride who’d allowed their husbands to have a groom’s cake, but hadn’t allowed them to pick the type of cake or design.
Before she could shatter Landon’s dreams, I quickly replied, “Yes. The groom’s cake is all yours. The flavor, the style, colors. It’s all yours.”
A slow smile spread across his face. “It’s got to be a car. Maybe a fifty-five Ford truck. Or we could even do a race car.”
I glanced around to see if anyone else heard how hard and fast my heart was beating. Landon wasn’t acting. He was dead serious.
“Do you like cars?” Lynda asked.
Landon laughed. “I used to race in NASCAR, and I own a restoration shop here in town.”
She lifted her brows. “Oh, well, isn’t that nice!” Then she turned back to me. “Now, Emmerson, tell me who your wedding planner is, and I’ll be sure to mark her name down.”
“Um, that would be me. I’m planning the wedding.”
Lynda raised a single brow, looking displeased. Okay, why in the world would she have a problem with a bride handling her own wedding planning?
“Is that going to be a problem?” I asked.
“No! No, of course not!”
I plastered on a fake smile. “Good. You see, I plan weddings for a living, and honestly, I cannot imagine anyone else doing any of the planning for me.”
That made Lynda sit up and take notice. “Do you now? What’s the name of your business?”
“Serendipity Wedding Planning,” Landon said with a proud smile on his handsome face. I reached over and wiped off the icing that was on the corner of his mouth. Without thinking, I sucked the icing from my finger and watched Landon’s eyes hood with lust.
I moved in my seat in a sad attempt to ignore the way my lower stomach now pulsed with a desire that only the man sitting next to me could satiate.
Lynda smiled. “Oh, I’ve heard such wonderful things about Serendipity Wedding Planning. What an honor to have you here as a bride!” She quickly launched into a speech about deposits and time frames as Landon leaned over and whispered in my ear, “We need to leave. Now.”
Then he stood up. Fast.
I stood, too, as did Lynda.
“What’s wrong?” I asked. “You look like you’re about to…”
My voice trailed off as I realized I’d seen that look on Landon’s face before. We were only around twelve and ten, camping with Hailey and Noah out in the backyard of our folks’ place. We had each packed our own dinner that night, and it was obvious that Landon and Noah had grabbed whatever they thought sounded good. Landon had eaten a bag of chocolates, half a stick of smoked cheddar cheese, at least five Slim Jims, and some olives that Hailey had brought, not to mention an entire bag of M&Ms. Thirty minutes after eating all of that, he got sick and threw up in the tent.
After that, Hailey insisted that Landon had to pitch his own tent while the rest of us shared. I couldn’t really blame her; after all, Landon had thrown up all over his sister. To this day, he still can’t eat olives, claiming that one had gotten stuck in his nose when he was throwing up so hard.
“Oh no.” I quickly grabbed my phone, but I didn’t stop recording as I placed it on the table and then yanked the stand down and shoved it into my bag. Landon moaned, and I knew we had precious seconds left before he threw up.
“Now, did you want to think about doing a donut wall?” Lynda asked in a panicked voice. She either thought she was about to lose our business, or she had somehow not heard Landon moan.
He groaned even louder.
“Lynda, I’ve got to get him out of here before he gets sick.”
Laughing, she waved her hand to dismiss me. “I’ve seen plenty of men eat a lot more than Landon did. He’ll be fine. Did you want to think about booking, maybe putting a deposit down?”
Landon started to sway.
“Landon, are you okay?” I asked, reaching out to steady him.
He shook his head. “I’m seriously going to throw up.”
Lynda finally realiz
ed what was happening. We had a code red on our hands.
“We’ve got a puker!” I said, quickly looking around for anything that Landon could throw up in.
“No! God, no! Not in the shop!” Lynda cried out.
“Landon covered his mouth while I searched frantically. There was a canvas bag hanging over the back of the chair he’d been sitting in. I grabbed it, opened it, and nearly pushed Landon over as I thrust it up near his mouth. Not a second later, he was throwing up.
“Oh…oh dear…oh no.” I turned to see Lynda standing there, her mouth over her hand.
“No, no, Lynda. Walk away. Run! Close your eyes and sing Christmas songs!” I shouted. Landon sounded like he was throwing up his right lung.
“I’m going to be sick.” Lynda turned away and rushed through the small eating area toward the back of the bakery.
“I hope she makes it to the bathroom,” I whispered and then turned back to see that Landon was only dry heaving now. “You should have eaten lunch. All that sugar probably put your body into fight-or-flight mode.”
He groaned.
“Done?” I asked.
“I think so,” Landon replied, sitting back down in the chair. “I’m glad no one else was in here, or I’m pretty sure that would have been bad for business.”
I tied the handles together to close the bag and tried not to gag myself. A younger girl came rushing out.
“Lynda is throwing up in the bathroom!” she shouted.
“I know. Landon—I mean, my fiancé—ate too many cupcakes. Do you happen to have a trash bag and a dumpster I can throw this out in?”
The young girl’s eyes went from the bag to Landon to me. She looked like she wanted to gag too. “Yeah, let me get a bag. And the dumpster is around on the side of the building; you can toss it in there.”
After everything was cleaned up, and Lynda and Landon had recovered from their episodes, I told Lynda I would be in touch. Even after all of that, she seemed pretty excited, and I felt kind of bad that I wouldn’t actually be ordering any cakes from her. At least, not for a December wedding.
When we stepped outside, Landon drew in a deep breath and exhaled. “I blame you for that.”
“Me?” I asked as I stopped to look at him. “How on Earth am I to blame for you eating entirely too many cupcakes?”
“You got me all excited. First with the groom’s cake—which, by the way, I want lemon and the cheese cake buttercream frosting. You can do whatever you want for the main cake.”
My heart jumped slightly as a small little bloom of something started in my chest.
“Then that little stunt with the icing and sucking it off your finger. I damn near dragged you into the bathroom to fuck you right there.”
I gasped, my lips slightly parting. “That would have been fun.”
Landon looked at me and then pointed. “See? See what I mean?” He grabbed my hand, and we started toward his truck.
“What are you doing, Landon?” I asked.
“Taking you to my place.”
“I drove!” I said, starting to laugh.
Landon stopped and looked at my car parked in front of his truck and then back at me. “Get your ass in your car, and meet me at my house.”
“You just got sick, and you want to go back to your place and have sex?”
Landon walked around his truck, opened the driver’s door, and said, “Yes, I feel fine now. See you in a few minutes.”
I stood there, stunned, as Landon started his truck and then pulled out onto the street and headed off in the direction of his place.
With a chuckle, I pulled out my phone and noticed it was still recording. Thank God it wasn’t live. I took a picture of the outside of the bakery, opened Instagram, and typed, “Went for a cake tasting session today with Landon. Let’s just say you shouldn’t skip lunch before eating cupcakes, and you really shouldn’t wipe icing off of your man’s lips. More to come…”
With a smile, I slipped into my car and headed over to Landon’s house.
The garage door to Landon’s place was open, so I pulled in. It was one of those three-car garages, so Landon could park his truck in it, and also allow another car to park inside. His house wasn’t over the top, but it wasn’t small and quaint like mine. It was just over three-thousand square feet, and besides his kitchen and bedroom, Landon mostly hung out in the large game room or in the theater room he had built above his massive garage.
I got out of my car and walked toward the door that led into the mudroom of Landon’s house. I hit the button to shut the garage door, and then took a deep breath before slowly letting it out. I wasn’t entirely sure why I felt nervous, but my stomach was all aflutter. It wasn’t like we hadn’t slept together since the other night at our folks’ ranch. Any time we were alone, we seemed to be either making out or making love. But we hadn’t been to Landon’s place yet.
“It’s all the sugar,” I whispered as I walked into the kitchen and glanced around. Landon’s kitchen was beautiful. My mother and his mother both helped him design and decorate it when he’d had the house built. Hailey had actually lived in Landon’s house for about six months after it was built, when Landon was still racing. She made lots of use of his gourmet kitchen. The colors were soft whites and grays, with an island so big you could fit twenty people around it.
Okay, maybe ten.
The large kitchen was flanked by a breakfast nook that overlooked the ten acres of land Landon had built on. Floor-to-ceiling windows showcased the view, and I had to stop and look at it every time.
As I walked by the formal dining room, I laughed. It sat empty because Landon refused to buy another table. He said the one in the kitchen worked fine.
The large family room was part of the huge, open layout and contained a brown leather sofa and loveseat, as well as the recliner. With a grin, I tucked the idea of sex in that recliner away for future use.
Landon’s house was two stories, with four bedrooms upstairs and the main bedroom downstairs, and a smaller bedroom right next door. At the time, Addie had suggested that Landon use it as a home office for the restoration shop, but I knew she longed for it to be a nursery someday.
I paused, staring down the hallway at that room. As I made my way toward it, my heart started to beat faster in my chest. Once I stepped inside, I looked around. Landon hadn’t made it his office. It sat empty, and for some crazy reason, I let my imagination run wild as I pictured it having a soft blue theme, with decorations of baby animals and flowers and even race cars placed throughout the room.
Exhaling, I walked over to the oversized window that looked out onto the backyard. I leaned against the windowsill and closed my eyes as I got lost in a dream.
“Emme?”
I let out a small scream at the sound of Landon’s voice, and I spun around, my hand over my heart. “God, you scared me to death!”
He smiled and my insides melted.
“I didn’t mean to scare you. I heard you come in. What are you doing in here?” he asked, walking up to me and brushing a stray piece of hair back from my face. I tried not to let it show that my body was trembling at the slightest touch from this man.
Letting out a soft chuckle, I replied, “I haven’t been to your place in so long, I was surprised to see this room still empty. I thought you were going to use it for an office?”
Landon looked around the empty room with its soft beige walls. Then he shrugged. “I don’t know, I just usually work up in the game room or in the living room. I didn’t really see the need to make this into a room I won’t use.”
I nodded, knowing I shouldn’t ask the next question. “What do you plan on doing with it then?”
He shrugged. “Nothing. I mean, I’m sure someday I might need it, you know, for a kid’s room or something.”
And there went my ovaries. They exploded into a million pieces. Yes, sign me up for filling this room with little Landons, please.
I shook my crazy thoughts away—then paused for a moment. Wh
y were they crazy? We loved each other, we were in a very physical relationship, and we were fake engaged. Or were we? With Landon giving me his demands for his groom’s cake, I was feeling more and more confused. I was also clearly moving way too fast with my thoughts. And possibly my feelings.
With a smile I asked, “How do you feel?”
Landon looked into my eyes, and my knees went weak at what I saw in his baby blues.
“I can’t stop picturing you sticking your finger in your mouth and licking that damn icing off of it. I want to roll my body in frosting and have you work your tongue all over me.”
Okay, that made me have to clench my thighs together. “Or I could drop down right here and work my tongue on something else.”
Landon’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. Then he shook his head. “No, not in this room.”
I laughed. “Why not?”
“Just not in this room, Emme.” He took my hand in his and nearly dragged me out of the empty room. He turned to the left, and before I knew it, we stood in the middle of his massive bedroom.
With a wicked smile, I reached out and started to unbutton his jeans.
“Emme, you don’t have to…”
“I want to.”
He closed his eyes, and I could tell he was already picturing it. That made me feel so powerful. I wanted to bring this man to his knees with my mouth.
Landon had already taken his shoes off, so after I slid his pants down his legs, he kicked them off and away from us. I looked at the large bulge in his boxers and groaned.
He didn’t wait for me to remove them. Moving faster than I had ever seen him move before, he had the boxers off and flying across the room in seconds. I had already dropped my purse on the kitchen counter when I walked in, so I slipped my heels off and pulled my cream silk blouse out of my navy dress pants. I was glad to see I hadn’t gotten any frosting or cake on the outfit. I’d had to meet with one of my couples before I met Landon, and I hadn’t had time to go home and change first.
Landon helped me take my shirt off, and I noticed how carefully he draped it over a chair that sat in one of the corners of the room. He did the same thing with my pants. Then he turned and licked his lips, letting his eyes trail over every inch of my body.
Fool for You Page 17