Page 20 of Craving

“What’s up?” Camilla tried not to fidget. She was thirty-four years old. She was a business owner with seven employees. She didn’t make as much money as her siblings or parents, but she’d accomplished it all on her own. She hadn’t had any help to pay for culinary school. She hadn’t had a college fund or a down payment for a house or the thousands of pats on the back her siblings got. She’d had to get herself out of a bad relationship, start over, and make hard decisions.

Still, she’d succeeded, all due to her own hard work and a very stupid loan. Camilla was independent and strong and intelligent.

But in this house, she felt small and fat and unworthy.

“Your mother and I are worried about you, Camilla.”

She bit back the huff that wanted to come out. “Oh?” It was best not to react too much, not to say more than she needed. This, she’d learned a long time ago.

“How long are you going to keep chasing this baking project? I drove by today and I saw the window, Camilla. It looks like you’re running a drug den. Is that really the image you want to present to this town?”

A slap across the face would have hurt less. From her mother, she expected insults. From her father, she expected nothing. His criticisms were worse than his usual apathy.

“Excuse me?”

“Camilla, be serious. What are you doing with your life? You’re a Fox. You should be aiming higher than selling a few cakes. Serving people. Cooking for them.” He spat the words.

“What, so serving and cooking for people isn’t a valid pursuit?” The words felt hot as they rose up her throat. She clenched her hands into fists. They’d had this argument a thousand times, and she knew there was no point in rehashing it. But she couldn’t help the words from coming out of her mouth. “I fail to see the problem, Dad.”

Her father’s jaw clenched. He took a deep breath, then spread his hands. “Look. If you enjoy spending time in a kitchen, that’s fine. But do it at home, at least. One of my old associates has a son. He just started his own law firm, and—”

“No.” She stood up. “Are you serious right now? My business isn’t prestigious enough for you, so you’re trying to marry me off to one of your friends’ kids?”

She wanted a family, but not like that. Not as some consolation prize for a failed life of her own.

“You can’t possibly call what you do a business, Camilla.”

“I make money, don’t I? The Sweetest Thing is registered with the state, isn’t it?” Anger wound through her chest. “I do payroll every week. I pay taxes. I have a five-year lease on the building zoned for commercial use. If that isn’t a business, what would you call it?”

“You don’t even have a home, Camilla. I would call it a hobby, and it’s time for you to grow up. I made over two hundred thousand dollars in my first year of business. How long does it take you to bring that much money in for yourself, Camilla? You’ve been doing this for over a decade. It’s time to give it up.”

“You sold luxury cars with a sticker price that cost as much as a down payment on a house,” she said through clenched teeth. “I sell cinnamon buns.”

Her father spread his hands. “That’s precisely my point, Camilla.”

She would not cry in front of her family. Not today. Not after the lows of the broken window and Frankie’s visit, not after the high of Fred and Nadia’s call. Not when she’d have to go home and face Marlon with a blotchy face if she gave in to the urge to shed her tears.

“Goodnight, Dad,” she clipped, then walked right out the door and drove away.

SEVEN

The only thing that could fix Camilla’s black mood was sugar. Sugar, butter, flour, and chocolate chips. Copious amounts of each one, shaped into humongous, face-sized cookies, filling the house with the scent of happiness. She flew through the front door and called out a, “Hello!” but got only creaks and groans from the old house in response.

Marlon wasn’t home.

That was fine, even if it did send a twinge of disappointment through her gut. It was for the best, really. Camilla needed to brighten her mood before she could face him.

She slammed her grocery bag onto the kitchen counter and got to work. The first thing she did was brown her butter, because that was the secret to complex, delicious chocolate chip cookies. She swirled the pan and inhaled the nutty smell of the foaming butter, and the muscles in her back began to relax.

Her hands moved on their own, through motions that had been practiced a thousand times. Baking was a beautiful mix of precision and art. It called to Camilla’s innate attention to detail, and it had the added benefit of creating something delicious at the end of it all.

It wasn’t exactly eating the baked goods that Camilla loved so much, although she couldn’t deny she had a sweet tooth. It was the whole process of creation that appealed to her. That, and sharing. She loved having other people eat her treats, loved seeing their faces light up.

All her family’s insults about her business, about her eating habits—they ignored precisely what she loved about what she did. She liked giving. She liked feeding people and making them feel at home, even if they were thousands of miles away from it.

Tonight, the only face that would light up would be her own, and that would have to do. She felt more at home here, in a house she’d slept in for only a few nights, than the mansion she’d lived in for the last two years of high school, or the apartment she’d shared with three roommates for years, or the home she’d tried to make with her creepy predator of an ex-boyfriend.

By the time she was folding chocolate chips into her cookie dough and sticking the whole thing in the fridge to chill, Camilla felt calmer.

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