Life is Sweet (15 page)

“Of Walt?” She laughed uncomfortably. “I can reassure you about that, at least.”

He took a step closer. “I'm serious. The thing is, I wish you hadn't walked away from us.” He put his hands around her upper arms and drew her to him.

“Cal—” Before she could get coherent words out, his lips were on hers. It took her a moment to compute. Her ex-husband was kissing her. Call her naïve, but she hadn't seen this coming. The lunge tactic seemed so unlike him.

She pushed him away and nearly stumbled into Harvey. Maybe keeping her horse on at the Knoll had been wrong. When she and Cal had separated, she hadn't wanted to completely bail out on him and the farm, and as far as divorces went, theirs hadn't been acrimonious. Also, good stables were hard to find, and Pam and Erin were here. Maybe to Cal, however, keeping her horse at Butternut Knoll came across as a mixed signal. She certainly hadn't meant to string him along—she'd assumed moving into her own apartment and the divorce decree were pretty convincing evidence that their relationship was over.

They had never discussed their breakup in any depth. Becca assumed they hadn't needed to. Now she saw that she needed to state her feelings so that he would believe that it was finished, once and for all. She took a breath. “Leaving you wasn't a mistake, Cal. It was righting a wrong. I married you because I wanted to belong to a new place, really belong, and be accepted. In a moment of weakness, I used you as a shortcut.”

“I didn't mind.”

“
I
minded,” she said. “I minded as soon as I realized what a mistake I'd made. I didn't love you, Cal.”

The blunt words struck home. “Whoa,” he said.

Never one to follow directions, she kept going. “I liked you a lot, and I loved the idea of living out here. But using you that way was really no different from the guys who would date me because of some misconception that it would get them a toehold on the celebrity food chain. It was wrong. You deserved better than that. You still do.”

He took a step backward and raised his hand in mock surrender. “Okay. I believe you.” His tone was typical Cal, but she detected real hurt in his eyes.

His expression made her want to take back what she'd said, which seemed so awful now that she played it back in her own head. “I'm sorry,” she said. “That came out harsher than I meant it to.”

“Hey, no,” he said. “Tough love.” He arched a russet brow. “Or, in your case, tough like-you-a-lot. Say no more. Message received.”

“I just don't want you to get depressed, or—”

His eyes flashed. “That's really not your business anymore.” He turned and walked away.

She hurried through the rest of the chores, feeling an aching, awkward awareness of Cal and his resentment as they maneuvered around each other. She couldn't wait to get home. The minute she'd done enough to make it seem as though she wasn't fleeing, she led Harvey out of the barn and then stopped short with a groan.

The tent. She'd forgotten that it still needed to be taken down.

Cal appeared beside her and read her mind. “Don't worry about it.”

“I can't just abandon you with it.”

He snorted. Or maybe that was Harvey.

“I want to help,” she insisted.

When he spoke, his gruff tone took her aback. “Artie and I can handle it. Go home.”

He sounded desperate to get rid of her. Could she blame him? In the end, she let Harvey out, scooted to her car, and drove back to town before she could do any more damage.

Chapter 12

Becca had planned to spend part of Sunday thinking about her presentation for Olivia's school's Career Day, but life got in the way. Pam called that morning and said she was visiting her parents in Richmond. Since Pam had worked Saturday, Becca didn't mind being solo at the shop all day. She could always send Walt out if she had an errand that needed running. But working in the shop all day didn't leave her time to sit at the computer and really nail down what she was going to say to a roomful of fifth-graders.

After work, her encounter with Cal preoccupied her thoughts. Given how badly she'd communicated with him, she was beginning to think that she should avoid people entirely and embrace her inner hermit.

Monday the shop was closed, so she spent some quality time with Harvey. She hurried in and out of the barn as quickly as possible, worried she would bump into Cal, but Artie said he hadn't been around since Saturday night.

Where was he? Not that she wanted him there, but his absence made her anxious. Her cozy world felt very lonely all of a sudden. Forget being a hermit. She missed her buddy network. Pam was still with her parents, and Erin was . . . well, who knew where. Becca had e-mailed her several times, but her efforts to reach out had so far been met with vague replies.
Everything's great! Hawaii is absolutely gorgeous!
Erin had sent her attachments—pictures of orchids, pineapples, and more selfies of herself grinning in front of umbrella drinks. Her smile was always huge. None of the pictures contained Bob, Becca couldn't help noticing. The e-mails contained no specifics, no gloating about her triumph over Nicole. No mention of when she was coming back, either.

If this went on much longer, she and Pam might have to fly out on a search-and-rescue mission. How could they be sure those Erin pictures weren't all from one afternoon? What if Bob and Nicole had done away with Erin and were sending the e-mails themselves to cover the fact that Erin had been tossed into the ocean? Or a volcano.

The thought of Nicole made Becca want to call Matthew, but now that impulse was checked, too. Knowing that a lot of people suspected them of being involved made getting together, however informally, seem illicit. They had assured Olivia that nothing lovey-dovey was going on, so it was probably best to hold the socializing to a minimum.

Letting him remain in the dark about Nicole felt a little dishonest, but according to the vague e-mails from Erin, her marriage was rock-solid again—or at least surviving in an
absolutely gorgeous
atmosphere—so maybe Matthew's own relationship could be salvaged, too.

In her restlessness, she even considered inviting Walt out to do something. But what would they have to talk about? Besides, she'd told him that he could stay in the store all day Monday if he felt like resting up. She didn't want to act like his employer/ landlady intruding on his private time.

As she and Harvey wound their way around the familiar trails, she took in the fall color and ached for someone to share it with. Solitude was never what it was cracked up to be. For one of the few times since she'd left LA, she missed that city and her old network of friends. She rarely heard from them anymore, aside from glimpsing their updates on social media. Most considered her as far out of reach now in Virginia as they would have if she'd opened a cupcake store in Siberia.

Primarily, though, she missed her mom. After four years, the loss still pained her. Now that she was older, and less of a numbskull, she appreciated her mother's character. If Ronnie Hudson had been here with a whole day to herself stretched out in front of her, she wouldn't have been whining about not having anyone to talk to. She would have gone out and “had a big time,” which could mean anything from going to a Bingo hall, to a day of beauty at her favorite salon, or a shopping spree at the closest discount store. Her mother had never been one to waste time moping.

Becca, on the other hand, was in full-tilt self-pity mode, and thinking about her mom gave her the perfect idea for how to wallow a little deeper. She returned Harvey to the barn, gave him an extra-attentive session with the brush, and drove back to town, stopping at the grocery store on the way. She swooped down the aisles, grabbing items that she hadn't bought in years, and maybe never had purchased on her own. Generic cake mix. Red Jell-O. Canned icing. Frozen strawberries. She was on a mission. A mission that would make her old French pastry instructor from the culinary institute she'd dropped out of faint in horror.

Back at her apartment, she dug out her spare hand mixer and set to work making what was for her, and probably only her, the ultimate comfort food: her mom's strawberry cake.

No telling where her mother had found the recipe. Ronnie had been an ace at whipping up comfort meals. Every time they sat down to the dinner table at their house it was a little like tucking in at the local diner. Yet in all her mom's years of making layer cakes when they just needed a treat, Becca was willing to lay money that her mother had never encountered marzipan, and would have confused a ganache with something you slipped over your shoes when it rained. But every birthday, no fail, Ronnie whipped together a strawberry cake, and in Becca's mind, the taste of it—even the idea of it—had come to mean the ultimate indulgence. Because it meant her mother, and love.

Everyone assumed the Strawberry Cake Shop had been named after the strawberry cake Becca always had on offer. But the truth was, the store was named for a cake she'd never once considered putting on offer, a cake that would probably have all the great chefs who had graced the earth spinning in their graves. She was almost ashamed to admit even to herself that she loved it more than any other dessert in the world.

She worked quickly, mixing Jell-O and cake mix, cracking in the egg that was supposed to make homemakers feel as if they were preparing food with a nutrient or two in it. When the pans were in the oven, she wasted no time putting the frosting together from a prepared tub mixed with a thawed can of frozen strawberries that slid into the bowl with a satisfying
slurp
. She had only baked this cake once or twice on her own, years before, but she had seen her mother make it dozens of times. She could have prepared it in her sleep.

One of her deepest convictions—professionally, at least—was that cake layers should always cool completely before being iced. Today she made an exception, tossing the layers into the fridge to flash-cool them and then slathering on the pink frosting as soon as she could get away with it without creating a runny mess. When it was all done, the cake listed to one side, giving it the perfect imperfect look it would have had if it had come out of her mother's kitchen. She couldn't have been more pleased.

She was even tempted to stick a stray birthday candle into the top of it for old time's sake, but she decided that would be a little too pathetic. Instead, in honor of her mom, from her bookshelf she picked what had been Ronnie's favorite movie—
The Natural,
starring Robert Redford—and popped it into her DVD player. She'd sat through the film so many times with her mom, it was almost like having her there with her. Especially when she tucked into a piece of the cake, which had that unmistakable, chemically delicious strawberry flavor. The cake was just how she remembered it—sweet enough to melt tooth enamel on contact.

Halfway through the story of Roy Hobbs, the doorbell rang. Becca jumped, reached for the remote to pause the movie, then headed down to her door. When she opened it, Walt stood in front of her, hat in hand.

“Hello, Rebecca,” he said, almost reluctantly. “I'd like to say a few words, if I may.”

It sounded as if he intended to deliver a eulogy.

Maybe he was here to tell her that he needed to be moving along.

“Sure,” she said, foregoing the usual plea for him to call her Becca. He looked so anxious, she wanted to put him at ease. “I just made a cake. You want some?”

Not waiting for his answer, she turned and led the way up. His footsteps behind her were slower, and by the time he crested the last stair, he was short of breath. He fanned himself with his hat brim and then followed her to the kitchen.

He usually came upstairs in the mornings to shower and eat his breakfast, so when he perched on a stool, one of the cats leapt into his lap as though greeting an old friend.

“Feel free to dislodge him, if you can.”

“Cash and I are buds now,” he said, treating the kitty to a lengthy chin scratch.

“It helps that you're sitting next to a cake. Cash is the first cat I've known with a sweet tooth.”

Walt seemed interested in the cake, too. He inspected it with a slightly tilted head. “Strawberry, right? I always liked that.”

She nodded and cut him off a piece, and without much encouragement, she blurted out the history of her mom and the cake. He listened patiently and attentively, but seemed relieved when she finished so he could finally take a bite.

“It's good.” His voice cracked a little, and she could have sworn he loved it almost as much as she did. “Very good.”

“I don't know why I'm feeling so sentimental about Mom today. I just miss her. I think she would have liked it here in Leesburg.” As the absurdity of the statement struck her, she laughed. Ronnie had run away from a small town and had never left LA voluntarily. “Well, maybe she would have liked to visit.”

“She always preferred the big city?”

“Oh yeah. I guess she would have gone stir-crazy in Leesburg after a while.”

“Yeah, I can see that.” He shifted on the stool.

Stir-crazy
probably hadn't been the best expression to choose. Not with Walt, who knew the real thing.

“And you say your Mom died . . . when?” he asked.

“It's been nearly four years ago now. I kind of fell apart after it happened. I felt so rootless, you know? Like I didn't have anyone in the world. I don't, actually. No siblings, not even any cousins that I know of. Just Harvey.”

He looked unspeakably sorry for her. “No father?”

“No, I never knew my father. Never even knew who he was, I mean.”

“That's not right.” His Droopy Dog look intensified.

“It wasn't bad. Of course I wondered about my father when I was a kid. There were actually a few years when I obsessed about him—you know, who he was, what happened. I'd spin all sorts of scenarios in my head, of old movie stars who'd had to choose between claiming me or their careers. Or princes who had visited California briefly and deposited me there with Mom for safekeeping. But once I got older and understood the birds and bees a little better, Mom told me that my father wasn't anyone I'd want to know. I got the feeling that he was serious bad news. She'd even put “father unknown” on my birth certificate so I wouldn't ever have to deal with him. The only thing I ever found out from her about him was that his name was Johnny—not a princely name—and that he played saxophone. Oh, and that he'd taken off after she told him she was pregnant. A real gem.”

Walt petted Cash absently, a glum expression on his face, and Becca felt a twinge of guilt for plunging them into such a maudlin conversation.

“Mom made up for the no-dad thing. She never married, but she was Supermom. She did the work of ten people, but never spoiled me.” Becca laughed. “Well, at least,
I
didn't think she spoiled me. I thought she was way too strict.” Walt was still shaking his head and looking quasi-suicidal, so she asked, “What about you? Were your parents strict?”

“I loved my father, but he passed away when I was still in elementary school. He drove a truck and died in a road accident. It about killed my mother, too. She had nothing but struggles after that.”

“Is she still alive?” Becca asked.

He looked surprised by the question. “Oh gosh, no. She died years ago. Cancer.”

“That's what Mom died of. It was awful to see.”

Walt looked pained.
Great job changing the subject to something happier, Becca.
She wasn't even sure why she'd decided to spill her family history to him, except that the subject had been on her mind and Walt was the first available ear she'd come across all day. Now she'd dragged him down with her. Poor guy.

“I apologize for prattling on about all this. All day I've been feeling mopey. You're probably regretting ringing my doorbell.” She frowned. “Didn't you say you had something to talk to me about?”

“Nothing important.” He nudged the plate away, held on to Cash, and slid off the bench. He set the cat on the floor with a parting pat. “I was going to tell you that I fixed a couple of the wobbly chairs. A few screws needed tightening, was all.”

“Oh.” Odd that he would make a special trip for that. Unless . . . “I should pay you.”

He batted the offer away with a sweep of his hand through the air. “It was nothing to speak of.” He started shuffling toward the door.

“Wait,” she said. “Would you like a piece of cake for the road?”
The road
meaning the staircase down to the first floor.

He stopped and appeared to consider the offer, giving the cake a last, rheumy-eyed glance. He shook his head. “No thank you.”

He rarely ate more than a few bites of anything, she'd noticed. It was worrying. “I could make you a sandwich.”

“That's not necessary. I've got some snacks if I need anything. Thank you, though.” He turned to leave but then stopped again. “That strawberry cake?”

She tilted her head expectantly, ready to give him the whole thing if he wanted it.

“Sweetest food I've ever eaten,” he said.

Yet he wouldn't hear of taking any more.