Chapter 21
21
C onnor and I jerked apart as Angus growled low in his throat, the tantalizing moment over and done. Whatever that moment had been.
“Hold the door open!” Connor yelled as he untangled his arms from around me. Ella grabbed the freezer door with both hands so it wouldn’t close, gaping at both of us in a mix of shock and worry.
“What happened to your beautiful creations?” Ella had clearly seen the mess in the kitchen, her gaze sweeping over us and the two trays of salvaged sugar sculpting as I stood up and walked out of the freezer on shaky legs. “There’s broken cookies and sugar flowers everywhere. And now you two are in the freezer!”
Angus looked up and yelped sharply.
Ella waved her hand. “Sorry, you three are in the freezer.”
“It was an accident,” I said. “Then the door shut behind us. I’m so glad you came along.”
Okay, maybe I wasn’t too thrilled about her timing, to be honest, but not freezing to death definitely was a good thing.
Connor followed me, looking down at the mess on the floor. “Do you need my help in cleaning and repairing things, Ivy?”
“No. I can clean this up, Connor. Thank you, though.”
“Okay. I just wanted to offer.”
Ella watched our exchange like a tennis participant, head whipping back and forth, but she held her tongue while Connor paused and glanced back.
“Again, I’m sorry about what Angus did,” Connor said. “Both the knocking over your items and eating them, and then the locking us inside part.”
Without another word, he turned and strode from the kitchen and out into the cold night, his little dog in his arms. The back door, now unchained, clicked shut behind him.
“What was that all about?” Ella fixed her gaze on me once we were alone, no longer silent. “And did I just interrupt something? Because it looked to me like you two were inches from kissing!”
I put a hand on my friend’s shoulder. “It’s been a crazy night.” I filled her in on what had happened, amazing myself with my leveled tone and the fact that I no longer felt like I was going to collapse in grief over the loss of my work. Instead, I was calm and more settled than I’d felt in a week, like the near-death worry had somehow erased the knots inside me and left me still and, pun aside, chill.
Ella gasped, despite my logical retelling of the tale. “That’s awful ! I’m so sorry, Ivy. I know how hard you worked on everything.” She looked down at the mess. “But how did you get stuck in the freezer?”
“We carried the trays that hadn’t been ruined in, and the door shut behind us.” I glanced up at the clock. “Why’re you here?” I ran my hand along one of the trays, debating how much time it would take to redo the contents. “It’s almost ten o’clock.”
“I was driving home from Mark’s sister’s house—we had a girls’ night tonight—when I saw the lights on. I decided to stop and check on you, to see if you needed any help. When I came into the kitchen and saw the mess, I looked all over but couldn’t find you.” She rested her hand on her chest. “Well, I almost had a heart attack, thinking of what could’ve happened to you!”
I reached over and hugged my best friend, grateful for her stopping and checking on my safety. “I’m so glad you stopped when you did. I don’t know how long we would have survived in there.”
Ella giggled and hugged me back. “Keep telling yourself that, girlfriend. With the sparks being thrown around, and the heated moment I saw, I think you’d have lasted days in there.”
“Ella Hart-Goldman!” I laughed in a sudden breathless gush as I pulled back. “Shame on you.”
“I’m not ashamed at all.” Ella waggled her eyebrows. “So? Is there anything to tell? Did you kiss?” She leaned forward, expectation on her face. “How was it? Tell me everything.”
I shook my head. Funny, but I didn’t feel like sharing what happened, not even with her. For some reason, keeping it safe and quiet inside me felt right. “There’s nothing to tell. Now, I need you to leave me in peace while I try to repair what I can.”
She shook her head, firmly and with determination I knew I’d never dissuade. “I’m staying.”
I frowned despite myself. “What? Don’t be silly. It’s late. What will Mark say?”
“Even if it takes all night, I’ll stay and help.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “The two of us can knock this out faster than just you, so I’m in for the long haul. I’ll just call Mark and explain what happened.”
I blinked back the tears that sprang to my eyes. “Thanks, Ella. You’re the best friend ever.”
I’d like to say that we spent the wee hours of the night laughing and singing to the music that was playing in the background, but the real truth was that it was a colossal slog to get everything done. I knew that the sugar flowers would need about eight hours to set, so we worked in an assembly line fashion to do those first so we could set them in front of a fan to dry them as quickly as possible. It was hour upon hour of shaping and coloring and moving the lifelike sugar flowers around, but as I started to see the end results come, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of pride at how much was getting completed. They were beautiful and almost lifelike, even more so than before, and I just hoped Junie would feel the same way about them.
By four in the morning, we had replaced almost all the sugar flowers that were going to go on the cake, and I had added even more lace frosting ornaments to my existing stash. We were about forty ornaments short, but that couldn’t be helped, because we only had a limited time to get everything done before the late afternoon wedding. Also, I had planned on bringing two hundred sugar cookies as extras to place next to Connor’s fancy candy, but I was only able to complete about a hundred and forty. Even with Ella’s help, there was no way I was going to hit my goal.
I tried not to think about that too much, because I needed the next three hours to frost the wedding cake layers perfectly and to start assembling. Yawning, I shook myself a bit as I picked up the frosting spatula.
“See,” Ella said as she plunked down my fourth mocha in front of me, “this is why we must keep the coffee station. We’d die without it.”
She wasn’t wrong, and though it seemed like a small thing to worry about in the face of what I’d just endured, I now intended fully to keep it.
Connor MacDowell and his competition and the warmth of his broad chest or not .