Page 44 of Cupcake
Seventeen
The weather was beautifuland the day was bright and warm. I was ready to get my cupcake wars on, but first, we had to sit through a boring preliminary bake-off where the top three teams were chosen for the final round tomorrow.
“What do you think, can the dream team take them?” he asked with his lips near my ear.
I shivered where I stood by the mixer and tried not to melt into a puddle of sex on the floor. Brady had that effect on me every single time he got too close to me.
“I’m not even worried. Nice idea with the Hostess Cupcakes. Simple, nostalgic, and fun.”
“True, but they wouldn’t be from The Fluffy Cupcake if they didn’t have a twist,” he said, winking at me while he finished mixing the frosting.
I busied myself with preparing the finished cupcakes for filling and icing while keeping my eye on the other entrants. There were seven, some teams, some individuals, and all of them were scrambling to finish their cupcakes in the ten minutes we had left. Some had just taken them from the oven, which meant their frosting was going to be a drippy mess when presented to the judges. Since we weren’t allowed to make the same recipe twice, we saved the Berry Sinful ones for tomorrow and used the classic chocolate cupcakes to secure our spot in the top three today. Blocking the other teams, especially Darla, who was working alone, from seeing what I was doing, I grabbed the pastry bag and piped in the filling. Brady then expertly iced the cupcake with the chocolate dip icing and piped on the white squiggle. We only needed three cupcakes, so when they were finished, I checked the clock. We had three minutes to spare. While everyone else was running around like desperate chickens avoiding the chopping block, I calmly set the three cupcakes in front of the judges, smiled, chuckled at a joke Mr. Samson told me, and then walked back to my station to help Brady clean up.
Daggers hit my back, and I turned to see Darla glaring at me like I was the devil incarnate. It had been a week since her tirade in my bakery, and she had been smart enough to stay away. I suspected if Darla didn’t get into this bake-off, my peace would end here. She’d have nothing to lose then, at least in her mind. Except if Darla showed back up in my bakery, Brady would have her arrested. She didn’t believe I’d do it, but I knew without a doubt that he would.
We loaded the dirty dishes and bowls into a bin and set it on the cart. Brady pushed it over to the area marked for storage while we waited for everyone else to finish. We’d load it in the van later and take all the dishes back to the bakery to wash. The way Darla was eyeing Brady on his way back to our table told me she was plotting how to steal him away from me. The last few weeks ran through my mind and brought a smile to my face. He was way too addicted to my cupcake for that to work, but she was delusional enough to believe she could. When it came to what Darla thought about herself, she was every man’s dream.
“Stop obsessing about McFinkle,” Brady said out the corner of his lip while we waited for the judges’ verdict. “She’s not even worth the thought you’ve given her in the last three minutes.”
“I’m just worried she’ll do something stupid, and you’ll have to kick her ass.”
He snorted with laughter, his eyes twinkling with amusement. “I don’t hit women, but I’m not afraid to throw her out of the bakery by her ear. Your ass, on the other hand, I’d happily grasp, if we weren’t in public.”
“My ass and I thank you,” I said, laughing, which only seemed to make Darla angrier. “She really can’t stand to see other people happy, can she?” I asked, a fake smile on my face.
“People like that usually can’t because they aren’t happy. She doesn’t want anyone else to be either.”
“Bakers, we have reached a decision,” Mr. Samson said from the judges’ table. “While all the entries were fantastic, the rules say we have to trim the teams down to three. With a delightfully light sponge cupcake, Darla McFinkle will move on to the final round.”
Clapping ensued, and Darla preened like a beauty queen accepting her crown. It took everything I had to keep from rolling my eyes, but the judges were watching.
“After submitting a wonderful strawberry creamsicle cupcake, Team Barton will be on to the final round.”
More clapping and I swallowed around the lump in my throat. There was no way the owner of the cupcake business wasn’t going to make it to the final round, was there?
“The final entrant, offering a beautiful throwback to our childhood with their strawberry filled Hostess cupcake, is Team Fluffy Cupcake!”
