Cakewalk: A Calhoon Small Town Romantic Comedy Read online

  “Yes. You should apologize and take responsibility, but don’t take any more shit from her than you deserve. I don’t care if she has a following. She can’t go around treating people like crap.”

  Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen. “Sure, Court. Don’t worry about me.” With that, I left through the back door.

  Chapter 3

  Jade

  I really hadn’t talked to Madison face-to-face ever since I left home for college. All her other friends had left for greener pastures a year before me. I was the last holdout since I had opted to take a gap year to sort out some things I was dealing with.

  So when I had told Madison that I was accepted into GSU, she crumbled to the ground and openly cried. It didn’t matter that I reassured her I’d be back in between semesters, and especially once I got my degree.

  Why she wouldn’t leave this town like all the other young adults, I wasn’t sure. It wasn’t like she had a family business to take over, or a sick family member who needed her care. She just straight up wouldn’t leave town, and refused to ever tell me why.

  Well, whatever her reasons, she wouldn’t have much of an excuse to be mad at me anymore since I was officially here to stay in Calhoon.

  That was forgetting the fact that I destroyed her cake, though. A whole new, and this time valid, reason to be mad at me.

  I squeezed through the alley and headed back out to the sidewalk to find Killian, the young owner of the haberdashery, hosing off the pink mess in front of his store. He was looking as spiffy as ever, with his vest suit and twirled up mustache making him look like he just stepped off a 1920s steamboat.

  Like me and my sister, he had inherited his father’s business and was keeping the memory going. The old folks around here loved that he could tailor their clothes and shoes to be both comfortable and stylish, giving them the individualized attention they couldn’t find elsewhere. This was probably one of the few towns where such an old-timey concept could actually be profitable, given all the retirees with disposable income.

  He waved at me with his free hand as he swept the hose back and forth, sending my sister’s murdered cake into the gutter. “I see you’ve made a mess of my sidewalk.”

  “Sorry. I was going to clean that up.”

  “Not a worry. This little mishap is already the talk of the town, and I’ve had a few extra customers come in this morning just to hear about it.”

  I rolled my eyes. This town was starved for any kind of excitement, wasn’t it? “Did you see it happen?”

  Killian shook his head. “No, but nobody needs to know that.”

  Good. No witnesses to tell my sister who exactly crashed into me. “Then what’s the story you’re telling them if you didn’t see it?”

  “I’m telling everybody you were attacked by Patches. It’s believable enough.”

  I laughed. “Patches strikes again.” Patches was the much-storied raccoon who was blamed for just about every knocked over flower pot, rummaged trash can, or missing holiday decoration in a ten-mile radius. Only three Calhoonians had allegedly witnessed the one-eyed rascal in the flesh, though.

  “Yes, I’ve opted not to go for the more salacious story, as a friend.” Killian raised an eyebrow.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Well, I saw Mr. Reed walking by with pink frosting all over his pants just a few minutes ago.”

  Mr. Reed? Then I realized he was referring to Griffin, the “Mr. Reed” of Reed Enterprises. The multi-million dollar corporation my sister wanted to burn to the ground.

  I had known Griffin’s last name all along.

  And apparently nothing got past Killian.

  “Wait, are you threatening that you might tell others?”

  He looked appalled. “Of course not! I just want to know the fine details at your earliest convenience.”

  Ugh, it shouldn’t have surprised me. This town’s most valuable currency was gossip. But I supposed it wouldn’t hurt to confess my feelings to someone. “There’s not much to tell. Except I got to see him without his shirt on. And he seems pretty nice. But don’t tell anyone I said that, or else it’ll get back to my sister.”

  Killian locked his lips with an imaginary key and tossed it over his shoulder. I could see why all the old grannies and grandpas found him so charming.

  With that, I hopped over the spray of water and hightailed it to Madison’s boutique.

  Once I reached her storefront, I was greeted by a “Closed” sign. “What?” I said out loud, peering into the windows to see that all the lights were off. Madison was having her grand opening at noon. Where else could she be?

  I looked back down the sidewalk, where Killian was finishing up with the hose. I rushed back toward him and asked, “Did Madison pass by earlier?”

  “Yeah, actually. I think she went inside the cake shop just as you slipped out of the alleyway.”

  I inwardly grimaced at my epically bad timing, then booked it back down the sidewalk. I did not need her and my sister going at it this morning. While Madison was a formidable woman herself, Courtney would give her such a verbal smackdown that she’d probably have to delay the grand opening just to recover.

  We may have been ex-friends, but I didn’t want her big day ruined—at least not worse than it already was.

  I skidded to a stop in front of the cake shop and rushed inside to find both Madison and Courtney giving each other a staredown, arms crossed, eyes narrowed. They looked like two cowboys waiting for high noon so they could whip their pistols out and settle things once and for all.

  But I was the one who Madison had a beef with. My sister didn’t need this drama.

  I started, “Madison, the person you want to yell at is me.”

  Madison shook her head, not sparing me so much as a glance. “I don’t deal with small fries. I’m talking to your manager.” She brushed a stray black curl out of her eyes, glaring harder at Courtney.

  “Did my manager tell you that you’re getting a refund and a replacement cake?”

  Madison finally slid her eyes over to me, but remained facing my sister. “I was just telling your sister how nepotism like this is why towns like Calhoon are dying off. We need higher standards if we’re ever going to be relevant again. We need people like me. I didn’t inherit my business. I built it from the ground up.”

  “That’s admirable, Maddy, but if it weren’t for my sister and me, this store would be closed down. Would Main Street really benefit from having yet another empty storefront?”

  Madison shook her head. “Of course not. And I think your sister is more than qualified to carry the torch. But you? Not so much.”

  Courtney took a step forward, towering over Madison. “As I was explaining to you,” she said past gritted teeth, “it was an accident.”

  “And so was the coffee Jade spilled on Mrs. Springfield’s handmade sweater. And so was the cupcake Jade dropped that Mr. Rodney’s lactose-intolerant poodle ate—that poor creature! And so was—”

  I butted in, “All right. So what do you want, Maddy?”

  She spun around to face me now. “First off, stop calling me Maddy. It’s Madison to you now. And second, I want you fired. You’re dragging your sister’s business down, and she doesn’t have the heart to tell you. She was doing just fine before you came crawling back a few months ago.”

  “Out of my store,” Courtney ordered Madison. “You’ve really crossed the line.”

  I stared down at my feet, noticing a bit of frosting on my left white sneaker. “She’s right, Court.”

  Courtney’s head whipped around. “What?”

  “Despite my best efforts, I’ve been doing nothing but creating more work for you. I think there’s another way I can help, but it involves me staying out of the store.”

  Madison nodded and gestured a perfectly manicured hand at me. “For once, I agree.”

  My sister’s hands balled up into fists. “Jade, we don’t have to give in to this emotional terrorist. She may have clout online, but she’s goi
ng to burn through this town’s good will before she knows it.”

  Madison gasped.

  I let out a breath and shook my head. “It’s all right. Remember that one girl who gave you her resume about a month ago? Hire her in my place. She was much more qualified than me, anyway.”

  My sister said nothing, just stared.

  “I mean it. Madison is right. Me working here… It’s pure nepotism. I went to college for a different dream—and it wasn’t to bake cakes. That’s your passion. I can help some other way.”

  “I can’t afford to hire a part-timer, though. You know that.”

  “Actually,” I started, and what I was about to suggest was as much a surprise to me as it was to anyone else, “I might have a new tenant for the apartment upstairs. Would that cover the costs?”

  My sister’s eyes grew distant as she did the math. “I mean, sure.”

  “Then it’s settled. I quit. Hire that girl, Court. I’m going to go find that tenant.” I paused to smile at Madison. “Thanks. This is the kick in the ass that I needed.”

  As much as she didn’t want to see a smile on my face, she had gotten what she wanted. All Madison could do was mutter under her breath, then storm off past me. She probably was off to make some kind of deriding post on social media, or maybe a snarky review, but so what?

  I noticed then that my sister was staring at me. And then I remembered who that lifesaver of a tenant was. “How about you let me handle renting out the apartment?” I suggested. “You have enough on your plate.”

  “We can’t really charge that much for the place,” Courtney said, already forgetting all about Madison. “It’d probably only cover forty hours a month for the part-timer.”

  “I’ll see what I can negotiate,” I insisted. “Just let me handle all of it, okay?”

  Courtney gave a shrug and a huff. “Fine. I can’t believe I just fired my sister, though.”

  “You didn’t fire me. I quit, remember? Now, get back to your cupcakes.”

  With one last semi-suspicious look, Courtney turned and disappeared into the kitchen. She was going to find out who the tenant was sooner or later, but as long as I could hold off the discovery for a few months, maybe that’d be enough for her to get things running smoothly again.

  I just had to hope Griffin was still in the market for a tiny ramshackle apartment above a cake shop.

  Chapter 4

  Jade

  Griffin met me in the alley behind the store around noon. He had a new phone and new attire, though this time he was wearing a casual T-shirt and jeans. When I looked him up and down, he stated, “What? I had a meeting this morning. I don’t always dress up.”

  He wouldn’t be hearing any complaints from me. Not with those tattoos and muscles on display. “So, uh, funny story,” I began.

  “The last time you told a ‘funny story,’ it was to your sister, and it was about throwing her cake at me.”

  “I didn’t throw it, okay? I thought we agreed that you ran into me. But anyway, I’m out of a job.”

  “Your sister fired you?”

  “No, no. I quit. I wasn’t doing her any favors. Quitting is actually the biggest favor I’ve done for her in a while. But it doesn’t really work out unless…” I just now realized that my entire brilliant plan depended on Griffin’s cooperation, and maybe a bit of pity.

  “Unless what?”

  “Well, now she needs the money to hire someone. And I was thinking she could get that money from renting out the apartment upstairs.” I nodded up at the metal stairs that led to the separate apartment on the second story of the brick building. “And you needed a place to rent, right?”

  Griffin squinted up at the rather neglected exterior of the apartment. If only he saw the inside—then he’d really be having second thoughts. “Oh. I hadn’t planned for it all to happen… today.”

  “Yeah. I sorta didn’t plan on quitting either. I’m not a very good planner.”

  He looked at me with very serious eyes. “What about you? Don’t you have your own bills to pay?”

  I hadn’t even thought about myself until now. “Oh. I’ll figure it out. I need to make sure my sister’s all set first, though.”

  Griffin pulled out his wallet. “How much is the rent? I’ll pay up now so she can hire somebody immediately.”

  “Wait, don’t you want to look at the place?”

  He waved me off. “I’ve been in worse places, I’m sure.”

  Griffin Reed, CEO of a multi-million dollar company, in worse places? I doubted that. “The rent is… err…” I had no idea what exact number would leave my sister in the green if she was to hire a part-timer.

  “How about three thousand per month? Would that cover it?”

  I gaped. That’d cover a mansion in this town. “There’s no need to overpay.”

  “I’m paying for convenience. Though I don’t usually carry that kind of cash on me. I can pay part of it now and get the rest to you by Monday.”

  I was too flabbergasted to put up a fuss. “S-sure?”

  “Email me the lease agreement at your convenience and I’ll have it signed straight away.” He proceeded to ramble off his email address as I fumbled to put it in my phone.

  “Okay,” I said after typing it in. “But just one thing. Could you try to stay incognito while coming and going from the apartment? My sister’s too busy to probably even notice, but I’d like to be careful.”

  “You still haven’t told her who I am?”

  Duh! The plan is to never tell her! “I’m going to try to ease her into it. Eventually. Maybe by the end of this century, if her mood is right.”

  Griffin shrugged. “All right. I take it I’ll have to move in under the cover of night?”

  “That would be prudent, yes.”

  “It’s starting to dawn on me that you’re being serious.”

  “Oh. I’ve been serious this whole time. I thought that much was already clear?”

  Griffin whistled. “She must really hate my guts.”

  I nodded. It was more like she hated his father, but I doubted she’d see the difference between the two—if there was a difference. Even I wasn’t sure what Griffin’s plans for the Marketplace Square development were yet.

  “So that’s settled,” Griffin continued. “Now, about your newly unemployed status…”

  I cut him off right there. “I’m all set. I’ve got a place to stay for now, so I have time to figure out my next move.”

  Griffin shrugged. “If you insist. But with the economy the way it is, especially here…”

  I crossed my arms. He wasn’t wrong, but…

  “I can offer you a position within my company. I could use somebody with local knowledge and contacts to help me navigate a few things.”

  Yeah, that’d go down really well with my family and friends—the few I had left, anyway. “I appreciate the offer, but I’ll have to pass.”

  He nodded. “I understand. I should be going. I have a few things to arrange now that I have a place to stay.” He opened his wallet and handed me five crisp hundred-dollar bills. “The down payment, as we discussed.”

  When I froze at the sight of the cash as it laid precariously on top of my palm, he stepped forward to close my hand securely around the money himself. His hands were rough and warm against my skin, and the image of him running those fingers down my back and onto my hips flashed through my mind.

  My cheeks were on fire as I pocketed the money and pulled out a key chain, fiddling with it to get the apartment key free. “Here. For your stealthy occupation tonight.”

  He accepted the key with a humorous glint in his eyes. “She’ll be none-the-wiser, I promise.” With that, he headed off through the back alley, perhaps to that limo I imagined.

  Or maybe it was a fancy imported sports car.

  Or, ooh… What if it was a motorcycle? He did have those tattoos.

  Stop it, Jade. You’re drooling.

  It was fun to fantasize, at least.

 
Chapter 5

  Jade

  Despite my very dramatic exit from my job earlier in the morning, I accompanied Courtney during the last thirty minutes of closing. I wasn’t even sure why she bothered to stay open until 5pm, as customers started dwindling by 4. But there was always a nice, chill vibe during that closing hour, and I wouldn’t miss it after the hectic morning I had.

  Courtney was part way through cleaning off the surfaces, which I had tried to help her with minutes before, only to be shooed away. “You no longer work here,” she had said, so instead I paid for a cupcake and watched her from Griffin’s chair.

  Sure, he had only sat there once, but I’d never think of it the same way again. “Did you call up that girl who left the resume a month ago?”

  Courtney nodded, a big smile on her face. “Suzy, and yes, she’ll be starting Monday. Turns out she was waiting this entire time for a call back from me. She’s very passionate. She said our mother’s the one who got her baking in the first place, when she was only five. She said the petit fours left that much of an impression on her when she was a little girl.”

  “Wow. Twelve years ago? Yeah, this place was still hopping back then.” The mill had closed twenty years ago, but Calhoon managed to keep the success going until a decade later. If only my mother knew how quickly things would die off after that.

  “I think I might have an apprentice in her. No offense to you, but you don’t have the baker’s equivalent of a green thumb, whatever that is.”

  “A sweet pinky?”

  “Yeah, that.” Courtney laughed, then pointed the Windex bottle at me from behind the counter. “But you do have a knack for getting people to part with their money.”

  “Only if it’s for a good cause.” She was right, though. Some of the most fun I’ve had was helping set up local fundraiser events back when I was a teen. On top of helping with those events, I helped grow the online presence of many local charities, helping expand their outreach. I had hoped to learn even more tools of the trade in college, though sometimes all it felt like that I got out of that was more debt.