Cupcake Queens Read online

  “No.” Lie. I did know that, but I wasn’t going to admit it to him. No matter what I said, I knew he was going to do the same thing to me regardless.

  “Well, I’m very sorry Ceecee. I must shut you down. And because of all the work that must be done here, I’m afraid I need you to vacate the premises.” He smiled and held his hands out to the side as if to say, what are you going to do?

  “But…” But what? I didn’t have anything to follow that up with. Not when I knew he was going to do this the first chance he got. I couldn’t even ask him to pay me back for the last time I had Theresa work on the water.

  He couldn’t know I hid it all from him. Especially not now that he had a large bill on his hands that he could probably try to force me to pay.

  “I’m very sorry. And tell you what, because you have been such a wonderful tenant all these years, and in the memory of your mother, I’m going to give you a week to remove all your things. I’m sure you have many office and kitchen items you’ll need in your next space. Bye now.”

  McCarthy waved a hand over his head as he walked out the door, letting it close behind him without looking back at the disaster he left.

  Well, if I was going to be out of here in a week and he was going to be on the hook for the last power bill since workers would be in here, then I was going to make the most of it.

  I went from living in the dark to having the lights on all the time and the heat up to seventy-five.

  But even at that temperature, I spent the rest of the day cold and in bed.

  After a night of almost no sleep, I heard the chime above the front door and hauled myself out of bed to tell them to go away.

  Campbell stood in front of the counter looking at the cases with a confused expression on his face.

  “Are you really not making anything for these right now?” he asked, pointing to the cases as I got to the counter and leaned on it.

  “Nope. Why would I do that when I’m supposed to be out of this shop in six days?”

  His mouth dropped open and he pinched his whole face together. He looked like he had been shot.

  “I’m sorry, Ceecee. That’s terrible. Now I know why you weren’t at Joe’s this morning with the cinnamon rolls.” He shook his head.

  “Yep. No desire to bake at this moment. I should really call all my orders and cancel them,” I said, although it sounded just as devoid of feeling as the rest of my words. I couldn’t imagine getting the energy together to actually do it.

  “Ceecee, I wasn’t going to say anything because I know you’re attached to this place, but I think I know a great place for the bakery.”

  “Wait, what? No, I’m not attached to the building. I’m attached to The Bake Place.” I stood up straighter. I actually wanted to go out and see what he was talking about instead of staying in bed all day again.

  “Oh, great, because it’s right by Joe’s. I can show you if you want,” he said, stepping away from the counter like he thought I was going to follow him out the door in my pajamas.

  As much as I wanted to go that second, I did need to ditch the pj’s.

  “Perfect. Wait right here. I just need to get dressed real quick.” I darted back to the office and changed my clothes in record time, throwing my hair up in a messy bun and adding another sweater.

  I locked the back door and followed Campbell out the front, locking it too.

  We made our way through the Market to where Campbell was parked and headed toward Olivia’s restaurant.

  “You weren’t kidding when you said it’s right by Joe’s. We could walk there,” I said, climbing out of his car.

  The building looked a little tired and much older than I expected, but there was a charm to it.

  In the front, a few guys were laying out gravel over well-flattened ground like they were about to turn it into a parking lot.

  Fantastic, because I had never had my own parking lot. Not one day while I was in business, nor in all the years my mom was before me could we rely on having a parking lot.

  We walked up to a large, gorgeous, front door with sidelights and a transom.

  Campbell got there first and opened the door for me.

  “Oh, thanks,” I said, stepping through and holding it open for him in return.

  But he shoved my arm away from the door and yanked it shut, pulling out a key and locking it a moment later.

  “Hey. What are you doing?” I asked, genuinely confused, because Campbell was never even rude, let alone hostile or a prankster.

  “Look at the floor,” he yelled then mouthed, “Sorry,” before he turned and walked away.

  “What the hell?”

  But I looked down at the floor like he said. There were rose petals strewn all along the front hall and heading off to the left through a set of French doors.

  Part of me wanted to go another way, to get out and run as far and as fast as possible.

  Not only was I not sure I could handle facing the person I was sure was on the other side of those doors, but I looked terrible. Tears already threatened the backs of my eyes.

  But I took a few steps. Then a few more. I even managed to open the glass doors. On the other side, sitting at a little bistro table in the middle of a large room with gorgeous wood floors and three brand new ovens sitting around for no reason, Theresa held a rose and smiled at me.

  “Hi, Ceecee.”

  I broke down in wracking sobs and lurched my way to her, throwing my arms around her neck and kneeling in front of her.

  “Theresa, I’m so sorry. And I’m so stupid.”

  “But you’re here now,” she said, bending her face to mine and giving me the sweetest kiss. One I had missed more than I even realized before that moment.

  Theresa

  “Are you sure you want that one?” I asked, cocking my head to the side and assessing the pale pink swatch Ceecee chose for the walls in the bakery.

  “Yes. I’m sure. You know, I know my bakery pretty well,” she said, shaking her head, giving me a kiss, and turning back to the phone in her hand.

  I grabbed her hand and tugged her back around to me, kissing her again.

  She made that little eep sound I loved, and I deepened the kiss, reaching up to thread my fingers through her hair at the nape of her neck where it was soft and fine as silk.

  Her hand gripped the lapel of my jacket and she leaned into me, her softness starting to melt against me and making me want to haul her back upstairs.

  Then her phone chimed, and she smiled against my mouth before pulling back from me.

  While I didn’t want to let her go, I just sighed and decided I was going to order dinner later so we would have more time for kissing.

  “But your bakery is different now. You renamed the special order portion Queen of The Bake Place. You could do whatever you want with it,” I said, trying to get her attention back from the conversation with Marcus.

  All I accomplished was getting a wave of the hand.

  Ceecee expanded the bakery’s offerings to include far more cupcakes and treats.

  Her special order side of the business was already up and running in one of the two extra spaces which we turned into a kitchen, and the computer she ran her website through for her orders was in my space.

  My cupcake queen was busy.

  But that was okay. It made us a lot of money now that all she did was bake. She had a staff to do the rest, including the hapless guy who once an hour came into my space to check the website.

  Somehow, I needed to get the office in the bakery done soon so she could at least move that guy in there.

  My to do list was long.

  We planned on surprising Campbell with the next finished space just for him.

  It was tough working on it in secret while he and Olivia lived in the building in their own dated apartment. Although Carmen gave them the ugliest couches in history that used to be in her basement and they just embraced the gross side of the seventies until I got around to remodeling their floor.
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br />   But I worked on his special space while he was at work, and the bakery while he was home.

  Both spaces were almost ready.

  That would be the main floor done, the basement done, the second floor rented to Campbell and Olivia, Ceecee and I on the fourth, and I still needed to get the third-floor apartment ready to rent out. It was in the worst shape.

  After that, I would finally be able to redo Olivia and Campbell’s apartment and then our own. Of course, all of that was around the other work I had to do for my mom.

  Ceecee and I had already planned what we would do.

  While I hadn’t had the time to turn it into my full vision, it was still a nice enough apartment. Although that was mostly due to who I shared it with.

  Mom kept me pretty busy with her flips, and I was plenty busy doing my own version of a flip here. But watching Ceecee wander through my workspace, running a hand along all the tools and supplies piled up all over the place, I realized it was right where I needed to be.

  Ceecee

  “Are you really not going to show me the finished product before Campbell sees it?” I asked, sitting on the couch with Theresa’s leg slung across my lap while I rubbed her knee.

  The scars that crisscrossed it were too tight in some places, so I rubbed them almost every day with vitamin E oil and she pretended I never accidentally hurt her. But she was walking better already, and making her way up and down the stairs didn’t mean she had to take a break part way up and anymore.

  “Sweet, you won’t let me surprise you with anything I’m doing in the bakery. Let me surprise you with this,” she said, tilting her head up from the arm of the couch to look at me, her smile soft.

  “Did you just call me, Sweet?” I asked, the look on her face and the new nickname making all the butterflies in the world fly around in my stomach.

  Managing to do it without removing her leg from my hands, or even jostling me, Theresa sat up and cupped my face in her hand, staring into my eyes.

  “Ceecee, I want to call you something that only I say, so every time you hear it, you know I’m actually saying I love you.” Theresa’s voice was soft, but nothing about her was hiding.

  Did she just say she loves me?

  She did.

  My chest rose and fell in frantic breaths, and I couldn’t get the words out fast enough.

  “I love you, too,” I said.

  Theresa closed her eyes, peace falling over her features as she smiled and pressed her forehead to mine.

  Our hands found each other, our fingers intertwining. I never wanted to let her go.

  Her phone chimed and she growled, opening her eyes right in front of mine, her forehead still against mine.

  I laughed and pulled back.

  She grabbed her phone and swung her legs down.

  “Come on, it’s time for you to be surprised by Campbell’s space.” She strapped her brace back on her knee.

  “Wait, now? And Tee, why don’t we put in an elevator? It would save your knee.” I scooted forward, managing to contain the bouncing I wanted to do.

  “Don’t think I’m not trying to figure out how to make an elevator happen.” She smiled, finishing up the strap on her brace, but the smile softened. “And yes, now, but…” She turned back to me and kissed me, making me want to tell her that I never wanted to see his space if it meant stopping this kiss.

  Theresa pulled back with another growl, rubbing a thumb over my bottom lip.

  “Olivia and Campbell are going to be here in ten minutes, and the sign went up today so we’re starting outside. But I want more time,” she said.

  It didn’t matter how many times Theresa, this beautiful woman, said something like that to me, it never failed to send my heart into overtime and make everything about the world better.

  But we had to go celebrate with our friends.

  And I couldn’t wait to see what she had accomplished.

  “Let’s go see The Shark,” I said, giving her a quick kiss and pulling her to her feet, “We have lots of time.”

  Also by Darlene Everly

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  The next book in the series, Brewed Anew will be coming in February 2022 and the first book in the series, Personal Pan is available now!

  Acknowledgments

  A whole hearted thank you to Bean, the Rottens, and all of my friends and family. A big bag of thanks to Jupiter Alley and Krystal for their help in making this happen, as well as the team at Wishing Well. Sometimes, the perfect recipe just falls in your lap.