Fake It Till You Bake It(21)

“Busy boy,” she said casually. “I’ve had a few exes like that.” She shrugged. “Fun for a while, but then…”

He so did not want to hear about her previous relationships. “What do you say I give you a baking lesson? I do know how to bake, you know.”

Her lips curved again. “That got to you, huh?”

Yes. “Nicholas is the lead baker, but we all bake. We have to in order to keep this place going.”

Her pretty, chocolaty brown eyes twinkled with excitement—and challenge. “Then show me what you know.”





Chapter Six


Jada loitered while Donovan gathered the necessary ingredients and equipment to make cupcakes. She’d never given it much thought, but now she knew. A guy who knew what he was doing in the kitchen was hot as hell. But that was just a general observation. Nothing to do with Donovan specifically.

She turned in a slow circle to survey the kitchen, which took up a large portion of the back of the building. A light and bright area filled with multiple stainless steel counters. Clean, high-end equipment. Donovan and his business partners had obviously spared no expense.

A grunt had her eyes returning to her new boss. Just because she noticed the way his biceps flexed in mesmerizing fashion, thanks to the polo’s short sleeves, meant nothing. That little crease that appeared between his eyebrows as he concentrated wasn’t cute at all.

“What?” she asked.

Donovan’s head was bent low. He pointed at her feet. “What are those?”

“Shoes.” Very cute shoes, actually. Jimmy Choo sandals, to be exact.

“They’re heels.” Uh-oh. Stern Principal had reappeared. His frown deepened. “We work in a bakery. We’re on our feet all day.”

Her morning had gone well, all things considered. She would not let him get to her. She used her friendliest tone. “I thought about that, so I wore my most comfortable wedges.”

They were only three inches. She usually stuck to a minimum of four inches, but concessions and all. She’d already relented enough. Donovan had instructed, through Grams’s assistant, that she wear a plain white button-down shirt and either khakis or black pants. She’d gone with slacks because who in the world owned, let alone wore, khakis. Eww. The shoes were a must.

She loved clothes, but she absolutely adored shoes. They took any outfit from good—or, in this case, positively boring—to great and gave her an extra boost of confidence whenever she looked at her feet.

“I’m assuming wedges is a synonym for heels.” He didn’t look or sound impressed by her ingenuity.

“More type than synonym,” she said, wiggling her hand back and forth.

His frown deepened, which she hadn’t thought was possible. What was his deal?

“Don’t worry. I’ll be fine. I mean we all can’t pull off plain black sneakers with two-inch soles.” Oops, she hadn’t meant to add that last part.

He shot her a look that clearly said he was tired of her shit, but luckily said nothing more about her footwear. Good, because the shoes were starting to bother her just a little. But she’d never admit it, not to him anyway. Yes, she was used to wearing heels, but usually she had breaks here and there or could count on a chair magically appearing, but today, not so much. But at least the black wedges were cute.

He strode over to a tall cabinet, reached inside, and pulled out two brown aprons with the store’s logo emblazoned on them, then returned to her side. “Here you go.”

Their fingers brushed as they completed the transfer. She studiously ignored the frisson of heat that raced up her arm at the contact and the way she drew in a breath at his closeness. The way her fingers trembled as she tied the apron strings around her waist under his intense gaze. “Not sure brown is my color.”

“You look fine.” He turned away before she could process the compliment, if she could even label his statement as such. He sounded almost resentful.

“Thanks. I think.”

A beep chimed through the air. Donovan dug his phone out of his pocket and stared at the screen for a few seconds, his face going blank, the ticking muscle in his jaw the only sign he wasn’t as calm as he appeared.

“You okay?” It wasn’t her place to ask—she barely knew him—but she recognized when someone was being affected by something he didn’t want to affect him.

He slid the phone back into his pocket. “Never better.”

She didn’t believe him, but again, she didn’t know him, so she simply nodded.

He rubbed his forehead like he was trying to erase whatever thought was crowding his brain, then pointed to the bowls on the table in front of him. “Let’s start with something simple. Vanilla cupcakes are our biggest sellers, even as boring as they are.”

Jada froze. Should she be flattered or horrified that he apparently remembered every word she’d said to him?

He shot a quick grin her way. She exhaled. He wasn’t going to hold that quip against her. Okay, starting now, she’d do better and stop messing with him.

He pulled a tablet out of a drawer underneath the table and tapped on it a few times. “I’m pulling up the recipe so you can follow along more easily,” he said by way of explanation.

Jada offered up a tight smile. He might ask her to read the recipe. She’d been dealing with her dyslexia forever and wasn’t ashamed of her diagnosis, but she never knew how people would react to it. Then again, no one could be as bad as her parents. “How did you get into baking?” she asked to distract herself.