Page 21 of Fa-La-La-La Faking It
“One thousand percent sure. Do you have a specific kind of cake in mind?”
Maple shook her head. “Not at all. You’re the expert. We’re leaving all the cake details completely up to you. Is that okay?”
“Music to my ears.” Adaline beamed.
She already knew exactly what she wanted to do. It was kind of a lot, but with a little bit of luck and some help from Gram, Adaline knew she could pull it off.A lotwas her comfort zone, after all.
“So how did it go last night after I left?” Maple cast a purposeful glance at Jace in all his flannel-clad glory. “Was it awful?”
“It was fine,” Adaline lied. Much to her confusion, it had been nice. Fun, even.
Maple’s eyes narrowed. “You’re being uncharacteristically vague.”
“We decorated the tree and, as I explained in the email to you and the rest of the Comfort Paws board this morning, he suggested the hot chocolate stand as an alternate fundraiser.” Adaline busied herself with refilling the container of marshmallows, even though it was already almost filled to the brim. “That was it. There’s really nothing else to tell.”
“Nothing at all, huh?” Maple tilted her head. Did she realize she was beginning to look like she was questioning someone on the witness stand? Maybe she’d picked up that particular facial expression from her lawyer parents.
“I made gingerbread.” Adaline shrugged. “He seemed to like it.”
Why was she elaborating? Maple was certain to get the wrong idea.
Sure enough, her eyes grew wide. “Youbakedfor him.”
Adaline’s face went warm. She tugged at the collar of her red Comfort Paws hoodie. “I’m a baker, remember? It’s what I do.”
“You could have served him anything you had on hand, but instead you baked something special.”
“The dough was already chilling. I overcooked the cookies. They were barely edible.” On the contrary, they were perfect, as evidenced by Jace’s satisfied moan the second he bit into one of the cookies.
If last night’s restlessness was any indication, Adaline would be hearing that breathy noise in her sleep for weeks.
“Oh, please. You never overcook anything.” Maple filled a cup of cocoa for a customer who then dropped a ten-dollar bill in the donation jar. Cha-ching! Then she turned toward Adaline, eyes dancing beneath the twinkle lights. “I think you might actually like him, and you’re afraid to admit it.”
Adaline prepared a cup of hot chocolate for a little girl who collapsed into giggles when she bent to pet Fuzzy and the Cavalier licked her cheek. Once the child’s mittened hands were wrapped around a steaming paper cup topped with a candy cane, she skipped off to rejoin her parents in search of the perfect tree.
“Well?” Maple prompted.
“I donotlike him.” Adaline snuck another glance at him as he heaved a massive pine tree onto his shoulder and carried to a waiting vehicle.
His dark hair was dusted with snowflakes—a rarity in the Texas Hill Country, which made the town square seem charged with holiday magic. Jace had brought Christmas with him when he rolled into town. Whenever a branch snapped off one of his trees, he picked it up and presented it to one of the kids on the lot, pretending it was a tiny pint-sized Christmas tree, like in the classic animated Charlie Brown film. Bent and broken, but still beautiful in its own special way.
Jace Martin was borderline charming. Perfectly likable...
Not to Adaline, obviously. But she could see the appeal. For other people, that is.
“I don’t even know him,” she said in an effort to emphasize her point.
“Exactly!” Maple whisper-screamed. They really needed to stop talking about Jace. Someone was sure to overhear, and if that someone turned out to be Jace himself, Adaline might have to close her bakery and move to another town clear on the opposite end of the Lone Star state. “He’s obviously not the same person he was in fifth grade. None of us are. You thought you knew him, but you don’t. So it’s perfectly okay to like him.”
She made it sound so simple and logical, but Adaline’s emotions were like a wadded-up bundle of Christmas lights. She didn’t know where one feeling ended and another began. And some of the secret thoughts she’d had about Jace certainly weren’t logical, especially the ones involving mistletoe.
“Is it perfectly okay to loathe him too?” she asked, pinning Maple with a glare.
“You said he was nice to you at the senior center yesterday. He gave you a Christmas tree last night and helped you decorate it, and now he’s sharing his tree lot with Comfort Paws.” Maple’s mouth twitched. “He also bears a striking resemblance to the hot Brawny paper towel guy. Surely you’ve noticed.”
Adaline had eyes. Of course she’d noticed. She was pretty sure Lady Bird and Fuzzy had noticed too, considering both their tails wagged like crazy every time Jace came within ten feet of the gazebo.
“Does my brother know you have a thing for the Brawny guy?” Adaline laughed, and her breath hung in the air in a cold puff of vapor. “Your secret is safe with me, so long as we can stop talking about Jace for the rest of the night.”
