Page 26 of Cut The Cake

Alexis looked so sad that Jenny had to work hard at resisting the urge to pat the young woman’s arm. Doubling down on her own determination to make light of the situation, she pushed an extra measure of self-confidence into her voice. “We’re going to make this work. I’m sure we can find something just as good.” She traced a finger down the list until she reached a particularly fruity Moscato. “This.” She pointed to a wine that had been served at a cocktail party she and Kay had recently attended. It had tasted like summer in a bottle. “This one right here will be fine.”

“Really?”

“I’m positive.” Pricey enough to impress their guests, it would pair well with the chocolates.

Relief flooded Alexis’ face. “Okay. Where should we deliver all this?”

Jenny’s forehead scrunched. “To the bed-and-breakfast on Union Street, I guess. I want to assemble the gift bags myself.”

Well, not exactly. But the labels she planned to put on the bottles had been engraved with the names of the happy couple. She couldn’t let anyone see them before the wedding.

“Whoa!” Ashley or Alexis—she’d lost track again—held up a hand. “Do you know how much space you’ll need?”

Jenny slowly blinked. Assembling the gift bags hadn’t seemed like such a big deal when there were only fifty guests. Now there were more. A lot more. She ran the numbers. Twenty cases of wine would fill her suite from the floor to the ceiling. “I guess that won’t work, huh?”

The twins shook their heads in unison. “Then there’s the not-so-little problem of moving the bags when you’re finished with them. How are you going to get them to the Captain’s Cottage?”

She closed her eyes. The odds were against her having enough time between now and the wedding to center a label on each bottle, place it in a gift bag along with a box of chocolates, and finish it off with tissue and ribbon. Plus, she’d still have to run up and down the stairs of the B&B like a madwoman, ferrying the completed favors to the trunk of her car. She’d need a truck to do the job right.

She nibbled her lower lip while she considered possible solutions to the problem. Settling on one, she texted Alicia. When the event planner not only agreed but seemed delighted with the opportunity to help out, Jenny gave the twins two thumbs up.

“Have everything delivered to the Captain’s Cottage,” she said at last. The supplies could remain there until right before the wedding. After the rehearsal dinner, she’d press Kay and her bridal party into an assembly line. Working together, they’d finish the job in no time. She stifled a laugh at the thought of Karolyn and Chad applying labels and stuffing tissue into bags. Seriously, though, it was the least the two of them could do for their own wedding.

The very least.

Walking out of Favors Galore a few minutes later, Jenny patted herself on the back. Things in the gift shop hadn’t gone as smoothly as she’d hoped, but she’d been able to put Nick’s advice to good use. As a result, no one had broken down in tears or fainted dead away at the thought of adding another two hundred guests. From where she stood, that was progress.

But thinking of Nick sent her gaze straight toward I Do Cakes. After the chocolates she’d sampled at Favors Galore, she’d more than met her sugar quota for the day. Still, the bakery drew her like a magnet, and she couldn’t quite explain why.

Not true, she corrected as images of a certain dark-haired baker flashed before her.

Her face warmed. She’d been thinking about Nick a lot. Certainly more than she should, considering the short time they’d known each other, and how everything he thought he knew about her was a lie. When he’d stopped by the bed-and-breakfast last night, she’d had the strangest desire to confide in him. To tell him the real reason for her presence in Heart’s Landing.

She couldn’t, of course. Not until after the wedding. Once the truth was out and everyone understood why the identity of the real bride and groom had been such a closely guarded secret, maybe then she and Nick could be friends. Maybe even more than that. But not now. For the next three weeks, no one could find out she was only pretending to be a bride-to-be. Not even Nick.

Nick eyed the ingredients arrayed on the wooden counter in the kitchen of I Do Cakes. Bins of dark cocoa, flour, and sugar lined up behind a box of baking soda on his left. On his right, a carafe of bitter coffee joined a bowl of cracked eggs and a tin of oil. In between lay the rest of the equipment and flavorings he required for the chocolate-and-peanut-butter cupcakes that were his second biggest seller. Would Jenny enjoy this cupcake as much as she had his others? He hoped so. Satisfied that everything he needed was within reach, he measured flour into the hand-cranked sifter he’d inherited from his grandmother and turned the handle. He nodded his approval at the white shower that drifted down into the mixing bowl.

The bakery’s back door swung open and shut. Hurried footsteps announced the arrival of his assistant well before Jimmy burst into the room. The freckles across his pale face nearly popping with excitement, the young man snagged an unfrosted cookie from a cooling tray. “Have you heard the news?”

Nick smiled. Jimmy loved gossip almost as much as he loved baking. “I’ve been buried in work all day. How’d the delivery to Food Fit For A Queen go?” He’d received their urgent request for hundreds of miniature pie crusts this morning.

“Fine.” Jimmy shrugged, as if the entire staff hadn’t spent the day on the project. “But you should have been there. It was pandemonium. One of Janet’s clients hired her to cater a dinner for fifty. Only, this morning, she sprang the news that the guest list had jumped to two hundred fifty. That’s why they needed the mini-crusts. For the hors d’oeuvres. To serve that many, they’ll make them up ahead and stick ’em in the freezer.”

Nick gulped. Guilt burned in his stomach and moved up until he was reasonably sure it tinted his face. It stood to reason that Jenny’s larger guest list would impact most of the other shop owners in town. The moment she’d told him about needing a bigger cake, he should have made some phone calls.

“She’s going to make it, though, isn’t she?” Janet and her staff had built a sterling reputation for meeting the needs of every bride. For special brides like Jenny, they tried even harder.

“Yeah, I guess.” Jimmy helped himself to another cookie. “Just makes you wonder why a bride would do that, doesn’t it?”

“Add last-minute guests?” Nick sifted cocoa powder into the mix. He’d asked that question a time or two himself.

“Mm-hmm.”

“I guess there could be any number of reasons. Pressure from parents who’ve attended the weddings of their friends’ children and want them to share their own kid’s happy day.” Somehow that didn’t sound right for Jenny, though. “A fiancé who insists on inviting his business associates.” He hoped that wasn’t the case.

“All I know is when I get married, I’m gonna have a big party at the Captain’s Cottage and invite every one of my friends. We’ll have us the best seafood boil you ever saw. Five years later, people will still be saying, ‘Remember when Jimmy got married?’”

“You have everything planned out, do you?” Nick suspected the boy’s fiancée would have a thing or two to say about his ideas, and none of it good. He hadn’t met a single bride yet who said, “Oh, yes! Let’s cover my beautiful gown with a huge bib adorned with a bright red lobster.”

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