Page 19 of Whisking It All

“I want the truth. Why are you really here?”

“What do you mean?”

“Is it just about the money? Because if you’re just here to con some more cash out of dear ol’ dad—”

“What the fuck?” She took a step back, her breath coming faster as her own anger built. “First of all, not that it’s any of your business, but he was willing to transfer the money without me ever setting foot in this God-awful town. I’m the one who insisted on working for it. Why would you even—”

“You haven’t come back here in seventeen years, Tessa. Why now?” he asked, crowding her again.

“I needed to sign the paperwork for the trust.”

“Ethan would have come to you.”

“I—I needed a job.”

“Get a different one,” he snarled.

“I want to know him, Jamie. He’s all I have left. I…I want this time with him.”

“And then what?” he asked, his voice low, his face so close to hers she could feel his breath on her cheek. “You disappear for another ten years?”

“Why the hell do you even care?”

“He’s my best friend!”

“He’s my father!”

Jamie stumbled backwards a step, scraping his hand over his face, and watching her like she might suddenly sprout snakes from her head and turn him to stone.

She planted her hands on her hips and stared him down. Getting into a screaming match with her father’s best friend wasn’t going to help anything. “I don’t like this any more than you do, but Ethan wants us to work together on this festival. It’s important to him, and I don’t intend to let him down.”

“Me either,” Jamie said, though the furrow of his brow and tight set of his lips made it clear that he thought they’d both already done so.

“I’ll help you build a menu, but I expect equal input and full billing as the pastry chef for the festival.”

Jamie nodded, and she thought, just for a moment, she saw the disdain in his eyes melt into a grudging respect. “Done,” he said, pushing past her and back towards the kitchen.

Tessa called after him, “You won’t regret this.”

“I already do.”

Chapter 7

DiceDiceBaby: What is this show’s fascination with honeycomb?

WhiskyBusiness: Have you tried it?

DiceDiceBaby: No. It’s toffee right?

WhiskyBusiness: Pssh. Sending you a recipe now.

Tessa tapped out the few instructions from memory as the nervous contestant on the screen waited for the judges’ reaction to her latest confection. Honeycomb was easy enough to make and a trained chef like DiceDiceBaby would be able to follow her shorthand.

DiceDiceBaby: Thanks. Recommendation for how to serve it?

WhiskyBusiness: I like to mix it into ice cream. That’s how they serve it in New Zealand, but they call it hokey pokey there.

DiceDiceBaby: When were you in NZ?

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