Chapter Thirty-Eight
Four months later…
“Have I mentioned how much I love knowing who won?” Charlotte asked. “It makes me feel so smug and omniscient.”
“You have mentioned it. Repeatedly,” Kendall replied irritably—though she could be forgiven for being a little extra irritable these days since little Oskar was not yet a good sleeper, and she was still operating on about four hours of sleep a night. Brody currently held the tiny baby, cradled against his chest on the opposite side of the massive theater room at Mac’s grandmother’s house, where they were having the week three watch party.
Magda had wondered if after the first week some of the enthusiasm for the watch parties would dim, seeing as everyone in town knew exactly how the show had ended, but if anything, the excitement had only grown with each successive week.
The mayor, Ben, and his wife, Ally, were there with their kids. Deenie and Connor had gotten a babysitter and shown up with Charlotte’s sisters, Elinor and Anne, and their spouses. Two of Magda’s sisters had joined her watch party—though most of her family had elected to watch at her parents’ house—where Magda usually made an appearance after the show was over. Watching herself on television was weird enough without her parents watching her watch herself on television. It was slightly less uncomfortable with all of Mac’s poker buddies and her friends and their spouses all talking over one another and calling out bets about whose cookie was going to quite literally crumble.
And Mac’s grandmother had become one of her favorite people over the last few months. Mac groaned constantly about how much they’d bonded and how often they ganged up on him, but it was obvious he loved every second of it.
She and Mac split their time between the carriage house and her apartment over the bakery. Cupcake and the cat were even learning to cohabitate. Last week, Magda had caught them curled up together on Cupcake’s dog bed.
She and Mac hadn’t actually committed to the whole living together thing yet—but that was mostly because they couldn’t decide between the convenience of her spot on the square and the perks of having more space and being closer to his gran.
Some of that might depend on where the Cup ended up.
The Cup was officially moving. Mac had decided to go for it and move to a bigger, better location, finally letting go of his cramped little espresso shop roots and transitioning to a fully functional restaurant. He had a bid in on a location that used to be an old train depot—which would take some renovating, but neither of them was afraid of the challenge.
Business had been booming ever since they’d been announced as Cake-Off contestants, and things had only gotten more insane these last few weeks as the show had started to air. Rumors were already flying online about the two of them and their “showmance.” The show people had clearly done some creative editing—taking things out of context to set the stage for their rival reversal. Magda did her best to ignore the gossip sites, but Mac seemed to find it all deeply entertaining—especially when they got things wrong.
But it was certainly good for business.
Magda had hired more help at the bakery and was still barely keeping up. Mac had pitched the idea of her taking over the space he currently used for the Cup as a secondary location for the bakery, and she was giving it some serious thought.
She was a little worried that the business would drop off after the finale. Mac kept telling her to bet on herself, but she didn’t want to bank on anything. Especially since it was Eunice who had taken home the top prize.
Magda hadn’t even been sad for a second. She’d squealed and hugged her friend, and it had felt almost fitting that it hadn’t been her or Mac. It meant so much to Eunice. And when it came right down to it, Magda hadn’t needed it. She’d needed to learn to own her awesomeness—as Mac liked to tell her. She’d always had it in her, but she couldn’t see it before. And now…
She’d performed well in the finale. Her feedback had been amazing. She hadn’t defeated herself—she’d excelled . And so had Mac. They had no regrets. And considering how competitive they still were with each other, it was probably a good thing neither of them had won.
The opening credits began to roll, and everyone cheered the familiar theme.
This was the maple cake episode—when they were literally tied together, and as it began, Magda was tempted—as she always was—to hide in the back of the room.
But then arms closed around her, a chin rested on her shoulder, and a deep voice murmured in her ear. “I think we’ve created a monster. Ben is talking about making Cake-Off Day an annual event. He thinks people would come from all over the country to watch Pine Hollow’s two star bakers compete against each other in the town square. He wants to sell tickets.”
Magda grinned and leaned back into his arms. “It isn’t a terrible idea. We could bring in impartial judges—and whoever wins could take ownership of the maple cake recipe for the year.”
He groan-laughed. “I’ve stopped making that cake.”
“I know. But it doesn’t really seem fair, since we made it exactly the same distance in the competition, and we’ll never know which one of us was closer to beating Eunice.”
For a moment, they both fell silent, watching as Terrible Tim beat Magda in the Skills Challenge. “I’m really glad he lost,” Mac mumbled, and Magda silently agreed.
“Leah heard one of his former assistants is suing him for sexual harassment. She was positively gleeful.”
Mac rumbled a laugh. They’d kept in touch with about half of the Cake-Off crowd… which was a small number relative to the other seasons, where they were all still on group chats, but the Archrivals season had been weird .
It was getting mixed reviews. Many of the Cake-Off faithful hated the negativity of the new format. Stephen had already been replaced as showrunner for the next season—after a scheduling conflict with his previous show—but Julia was still out. Magda and Mac kept in touch with her, and they knew she was still looking for her next show, but she’d stopped pitching them on the idea of their own baking show when they’d told her they were planning to stay away from television for a while.
Though that might change. Mac really was amazing at chatting with the viewers while he baked, and Magda had heard a rumor that the next season of Cake-Off might be an all-stars edition. She didn’t know if she would be invited, but if there was a chance to take another swing at the trophy… she might not be able to resist.
Their season had been difficult and incredibly stressful—but it had also been one of the best experiences of her life.
And it had brought her Mac.
Even if he did try to make her listen to Broadway playlists in the kitchen and insisted on bringing his demon cat along in a baby stroller whenever she walked Cupcake, she still loved the man.
The show came back from commercial, and Magda gripped Mac’s arms where they wrapped around her waist. Tim was about to announce the teams. She and Mac were about to have a massive fight on national television during the prep time—and she had no idea how much of that had been left in the final edit.
“It’s okay,” his voice rumbled against her ear. “I’ve got you, my little baumkuchen.”
She snorted. Trust Mac to know exactly what she needed. “You are the worst,” she grumbled, snuggling even more deeply into his arms.
On screen, the fight started. Magda groaned, closing her eyes.
Until a sharp voice rang through the room.
“ What ? That’s what you were fighting over?”
Magda opened her eyes to see Mac’s grandmother standing in the middle of the room, no longer facing the television, where Mac and Magda continued to bicker.
“All these years over a cake ?” she demanded incredulously.
“There was a little more to it than a cake,” Mac said. “Though that was, admittedly, part of it.”
“And you still haven’t admitted that you stole it,” Magda said, without any heat.
“Because I didn’t,” Mac insisted.
“Of course he didn’t,” his grandmother declared stridently. “ I did.”
Magda’s attention snapped back to Mac’s grandmother, still standing in the middle of the room—and now with everyone’s attention as someone had thought to pause the show.
“ You did?” Mac asked, his arms dropping from Magda as he came around her to approach his grandmother.
“Of course I did. I was eighteen and madly in love with your grandfather, who simply would not propose to me, because he thought I was too young for him—and there was Maryann Miller, bragging to anyone who would listen about how she had this magical man-catching maple cake.”
Mac arched his eyebrows at Magda. “ Man-catching ?”
She shrugged, but Mac’s gran was already going on. “I caught myself the love of my life. And I don’t regret it for a second.”
“So it was stolen.” Mac marveled. “I can’t believe you.”
“What? I only made it the one time. Only needed to catch one man. It’s not my fault you dug it up out of my recipe box and got yourself into trouble.”
Mac turned to Magda. “I officially apologize for my family stealing from your family fifty years ago.”
Magda laughed. “And I officially apologize for accusing you of stealing from me for a decade. I’m pretty sure what I did was worse.”
“It’s not a competition,” Mac reminded her.
“Can we get back to the real competition?” Connor shouted. “I want to see if they kill each other or make this cake!”
The watch party resumed, with Mac and Magda leaning against the back wall, shoulder to shoulder. “Man-catching?” he asked under his breath, once everyone else was engrossed in the show again.
“I did think I was in love with you,” she reminded him.
“And you did eventually catch me.”
She looked up at him, and he bent his head, leaning sideways for a kiss.
Her nemesis. The man who drove her crazy. Whom she couldn’t imagine her life without.
“Are you bummed we didn’t win?” she asked softly as, on screen, they began to bake together, working in perfect harmony.
He looked down at her, his brown eyes warm, one auburn curl falling over his brow, and a little crooked grin on his face. “Who says I didn’t win?”