Page 7 of Sugarplum

Chapter 4

Yep, it was the same house from the website. The only thing different was that the house looked a bit more dilapidated than it had on the site, and there were no roses, just dead vines circling the porch railing as if they'd been there for a long time and had no plans to leave.

The ride on the snowmobile, sitting behind a man who could only have been designed by a gaming artist, had cleared my head some. He parked his machine, and, again, I used his shoulders to climb off. He followed.

"How are you feeling now?"

"A little better."

He pushed his gloved fingers beneath my chin and lifted my face to his. The vision of a long, deep kiss drifted through my head. And there it was again. The dizziness. But this time it was purely due to the man in front of me and not the uncanny, impossible to explain coincidences.

"There's more color in those cheeks, so that's a good sign." He lowered his hand, and before I knew it, he'd taken hold of mine. He led me up the stairs to the porch. It was one of those quaint, old-fashioned wraparound porches, complete with a hanging swing and two rockers. Even though everything was covered with ice and snow, it was easy to imagine people enjoying a summer afternoon on the porch sipping lemonade.

Holt stomped his snow-coated boots on the welcome mat. The entire porch shook with each step. I couldn't hold back a laugh.

"Yeah, I figure one day I'm going to push a hole right through the planks." He opened the door, and a warm almond fragrance ushered out. It was the sweetest and most mouthwatering aroma I'd ever smelled.

We stepped inside and into an entryway that looked as if it was straight out of the nineteenth century with floral wallpaper and a thickly carved entry table. Even the light fixtures were from an earlier time.

I took a deep breath of the sugary fragrance surrounding me. "Oh my gosh, what is that? Am I in heaven? That's it. That explains everything."

Holt waved me inside. "O.K. then, snow angel, the real heaven is waiting in the form of a fresh cupcake. Just head down that narrow hallway, and you'll find the bakery."

"Wait, aren't you going with me?"

"I've got to pull your car out of the snow before it gets completely buried. Coco is probably in the bakery right now. She'll take care of you."

I watched as he walked out, leaving a glittery trail of snow behind him as he went. It reminded me of a scene in Hell's Rangers when Ziggy Holt kills a wraith and its silvery blood follows him back to the shadow lands.

The door shut behind him.

"Holt, is that you?" a friendly voice called from down the hallway.

"No, he just walked out," I called back.

"Oh, Jen, you made it."

I stood stock-still trying to decide if I'd actually heard my name. It wasn't possible but then impossible seemed to be the order of the day. I headed in the direction of the voice and quickly found myself standing in a charming bakery where cute tables had been set with antique chairs, white lacy tablecloths and flower filled vases. Pink roses, in fact. Like the ones on the website.

A long glass counter gleamed beneath a row of pendant lights. Its shelves were overflowing with pastries and cakes of every shape and color.

I heard movement in the next room, the kitchen I could only presume because that was where the delicious smells seemed to be starting from.

A woman walked around the corner holding a tray of cupcakes. "Here, let me help you with that." I rushed toward the woman, who had come round corner looking slightly hunched and gray with age. But by the time I'd circled the counter to help what I thought was an elderly woman burdened with a heavy tray, she turned out to be a beautiful, young woman with shiny dark hair and sparkling eyes. The hunched shoulders and stooped posture were gone, as if wiped away by a digital artist's magic eraser.

I lowered my hands. "Oh, I'm sorry. For a moment I thought you were—" I stopped talking, not sure where I was going with it.

The woman smiled graciously and placed her tray on the counter. It was filled with rows of shiny pink cupcakes. Each tiny cake was topped with pink and purple sugar crystals.

She wiped her fingers on her apron and stuck out a hand that was most definitely the hand a young woman. "I'm Coco, the innkeeper." She motioned toward the tray. "And baker. Please help yourself. They're sugarplum."

I took a step back as if someone had just popped me in the stomach. "The website. It was you. But how? How do you know me?"

Coco leaned down and pulled a stack of white napkins from under the counter. The faint smile on her face assured me she wasn't going to divulge any of her secrets. "Let's just say, I know when a heart needs a little mending. And yours needed it. You have been focused on the wrong man. You spend your day creating fantasy characters. It's time you created a little fantasy of your own." Before I could find any words to respond, she held up a cupcake. "Give them a try. I haven't made sugarplum cupcakes in decades. It's sort of an old-fashioned flavor. I'm surprised a young, hip girl like you even knows about it."

I took the cupcake from her hand as I quickly tried to calculate how it was possible that she hadn't baked sugarplum cupcakes in decades when she couldn't have been more than three decades old herself. It was another mystery unsolved, but since it was starting to hurt my head thinking about it all, I decided to give it a rest and try the cupcake.

Like everything else in the place, it was magical. A hint of vanilla in a fluffy cake that surrounded a smooth, fruity filling and the frosting was pure buttery bliss. The sugar crystals on top added just the right kick.

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