Dare To Be Wild (27 page)

“Don't go there. I told you it was a one-time, cross-it-off-the-list affair.”

“So you're not going to see each other again? Really? Sex only gets better once you know what you're working with.”

“Nope. That chapter is closed. Trust me, the reality paled in comparison.”

“And who were you comparing him to?”

“Shut up. Don't go there either.”

“Why are you being such a hard ass about this? If you like him and he likes you, does age really matter? Or race? Or gender, for that damn matter? Liv, when it comes to love, the packaging isn't what matters.”

“Whatever, but the reality of the situation is I don't know his last name, nor how to get in touch with him. It's done, so let it go. I have.”

“Sure, you have.”

Livia heard the front door to the shop open, giving her a plausible excuse for ending this uncomfortable inquiry about a man she was never going to see again.

“Got to go. Somebody just came into the bakery and Karen is out. I'll sketch out some ideas for the wedding cake. I promise, you will have the most beautiful cake for your special day.”

“Okay. Livi, I am so happy. I never thought I would feel like this.”

“Jas, I'm really happy for you,” Livia said, the sincerity obvious in her tone.

“I know you are, and that makes everything perfect.”

Livia hung up the phone, honestly jazzed for her friend. Clearly, Jasi, a woman who they all thought would never marry, was in love and finally ready to make a commitment. Funny, all of her close friends seemed to be settled and happy. Aleesa and Walter were going stronger than ever, Lena was truly content being single at the moment. Perhaps there was hope for her to find a sweet, companionable, sexy love to spend the next fifty years with.

She quickly washed her hands and stepped out into the front of the bakery where she and her staff usually met clients. With a smile left over from hearing her best friend's news, Livia came face to face with a very attractive, vaguely familiar face.

“Hi, I'm here to drop off a check from my mother, Naomi Maddox, which I apparently have left in the car. I'm sorry. I'll be right back.” She turned and revealed her pregnant belly.

Livia's eyes followed Naomi's daughter through the door and outside to her car. Her mouth dropped open as a handsome man, his companionable laughter only making his features all the more compelling, met her midway to hand her the forgotten check. It was Mitchell. What the fuck? She and Jasi were just talking about him. Had they somehow managed to conjure him up? Because now, after all of the nights of thinking and fantasizing and reliving their Caribbean boink fest, Mitchell was outside her door, running errands. With his fucking girlfriend. His pregnant girlfriend.

Livia felt the breath being sucked out of her body. To assure that Mitchell would not see her, she quickly stepped away from the windows and out of sight, as she tried to corral all of the inexplicable pain and jealousy into one corner of her heart, so she could deal with her customer.

A disturbing thought grabbed her heart and squeezed. Had Mitchell purposely given her a bogus number so she couldn't get in contact? She'd built him up and put him on a pedestal, making him out to be some kind of sexy demigod. Was he really a horny dog dressed in nice-guy clothing?

“I am so sorry about that. This baby is sucking up all of my brain cells. I swear, I can't remember a thing these days!”

“Congratulations,” Livia managed to squeak out.

Her fear was now confirmed.
A motherfucking horny dog.

“Thank you. We're really excited. Anyway, I'm here to bring you this,” she said handing Liv the retrieved check, “and to confirm the delivery time for five tomorrow.”

“Thank you, and yes, uh…tell your mom that I uh…will be by at…um…five to assemble the cake.” Livia stopped talking for a
moment to try to hold back the tears that were threatening to fall. “It should take no longer than…uh twenty minutes. The party is at six, yes?”

“The ceremony begins at six; the party will follow.”

“I know it will be beautiful,” Liv said, ready for Naomi's daughter and Mitchell's baby mama to leave, so she could finally break down. “Thank you for bringing this by, and good luck…with the…baby.”

As the woman walked through the door, Livia scurried to the back. She could not believe how devastated she felt. Nor could she understand why. Mitchell had been a vacation fling. Her partner in a holiday ho-down, as Jasi had so humorously put it. But it didn't feel funny anymore. Nor like a fling for that matter. Seeing Mitchell with someone else had finally cleared the fog and let the sunshine on what was the truth. For all of his gentlemanly qualities, he was only another dick trying to get laid. That said, she had fallen for that young boy, and fallen hard.

•  •  •

The phone continued to ring as Livia sank deeper into the hot, sudsy water. She didn't feel like talking to anyone. Didn't want to analyze her feelings with Aleesa, discuss the merits of single life with Lena, or make wedding plans with Jasi. All she wanted to do was drown her sorrows in a bubble bath, and wallow in her ridiculous emotions of feeling betrayed and abandoned.

The fact of the matter was that Livia had absolutely no legitimate right to feel hurt in any way, shape or form. Mitchell had done nothing to hurt her. Theirs had been a mutually pleasurable tryst that, while tempting and fulfilling, had been built on a foundation of temporary access. There had been no promises made, no covenants reached, no pacts put in place between them. Hell, they hadn't even traded complete names.

You were so stupid to throw away his phone number,
Quincy scolded.

She had torn it up, deciding that it was best thing for everyone if they didn't stay in touch. Had she made a huge mistake? If she had stayed in contact after their return, would Mitchell be with her instead of Naomi's daughter? Would he still be her lover instead of a doting father-to-be?

“It wasn't even the right number,” she said into thin air. “And even if it was, it was the right thing to do.”

You don't know if it was bogus,
Quincy reminded her.

We're really excited.
The woman's words raced through her mind, causing Livia to sit up. The sting of cool air on her exposed shoulders seemed to provide a new jolt of clarity. Just as Livi understood that she was in love with Mitchell, she was now convinced that her initial reaction of staying away had been correct. He was young, but now his youth played a very different role in her decision to let this go once and for all. Before it had been about her discomfort, but now it had to do with Mitchell's right to be with a woman capable of giving him what it was now obvious he wanted—a family. It was physically impossible for Liv to do that for him, even if she wanted to. Not only was she too old for children at this stage of her life, she'd never been able to have babies, not even when she had been married. Livia had made peace with her barren lot in life decades ago.

She sunk back down into the warm tub, recalling that this was the place it had all begun. The fuck-it list that had started the journey that had ultimately brought her to Mitchell. Looking back at it all—from the party to the toys to St. Bart's to her night with Bobby—she was happy the girls had forced her into this erotic experiment. Livia had learned a lot, specifically that sex is what you make it and the attitude you bring to it, that there was nothing wrong in selfish pleasure because that meant you were
really enjoying it, not just doing it. She now understood that women had every right to claim their desires and act on them, and doing so didn't make them some kind of whore. But perhaps the most telling lesson she'd learned from this experience was that truly great sex was not a function of the body alone, but an encounter of the heart, mind and soul. She hadn't had that with her husband or her first love. Ironically, the only man she'd experienced such emotional and physical rapture with was a thirty-something stranger who had literally picked her up at the beach.

Life really is a mother-fucking riddle.

L
ivia drove her car along the long, prestigious driveway leading to the kitchen door of Naomi Maddox's plush suburban estate. She turned off the car and looked at the time. It was two minutes to five, though Livi didn't need the clock to tell her so, as the ever tightening knots in her stomach were counting down the minutes for her.

According to her plan, she'd arrived right on time. Livia's goal was to get in, quickly assemble the cake and get out before any guests arrived. The last people she wanted to see were Mitchell and his gorgeous baby mama.

Which is why you've been getting ready since three o'clock, are made up like you're going to a black-tie event, and made a special trip to the dry cleaners to pick up your most figure-flattering chef's coat, and wore a dress instead of your usual pants,
her annoying ego pointed out.

Livia tried to ignore the voices in her head as she swung her bag of pastry tools over her shoulder. Just as she was about to pick up the two-tier cake base, a deep male voice called out from the back door.

“Need help with that?”

Livia's mind, body and heart froze. Her face squinted in nervous frustration and she felt the threatening breaths of hyperventilation looming.
Please don't let it be him; please don't let it be him,
she furiously prayed.

“Let me get those for you.”

Livia looked up and felt relief immediately wash over her. The offer came from one of the catering staff, and a grateful Livia was happy to accept. One less trip to the car meant less time in the enemy's kitchen.

“Thank you.” Livia turned back to the payload to retrieve the boxes containing the last tier and the fondant lilies. She followed in the waiter's path toward the door and watched helplessly as his foot missed the step and he and her cake went lunging forward.

“NO!” she heard herself shout.

Thank God the kid had balance. He was able to juggle and keep himself and the cake from falling to the ground, but when the sous chef came out to see about the screams, the edge of the door went right into the top tier of the cake.

Livia rushed to the door to check out the damage. At first glance, the gash in the fondant appeared ugly but not catastrophic. Hopefully, there was no damage to the actual cake. She had enough of what she needed to make repairs; it was just going to take time. Time she desperately did not want to spend in Naomi Maddox's house.

“I am so sorry,” the waiter muttered through embarrassed lips.

“Let's get inside so I can fix it. I'm going to need some work space here,” she informed the staff as she stepped through the door. Her eyes immediately went to the clock glowing from the microwave. Seven minutes after five.

As the caterer cleared space on the kitchen table for her to work, Livia more closely inspected the damage. The gash ran nearly the length of the two tiers. Additionally, the top layer had been nicked down to the cake, which meant she'd have to remove a section of fondant, reapply a base coat of icing to keep crumbs at bay, and then reapply and smooth the fondant. All that before she could apply the lilies. What she'd estimated to be a twenty minute assembly
job, had now turned into at least a one-hour repair and rebuild.

The knots in her belly continued to tick down the precious moments between her finishing the job and getting the hell out of there before the guests arrived. The ceremony was being held in the living room area on the other side of the house. She could only pray that none of the family, or those who were like family, would have any reason to venture to the back.

Livia laid out her tools and got to work. Her mind momentarily wandered back to the last time she was in this house, causing Quincy to giggle and twitch. Talk about your muscle memory. Liv smiled before shutting down the recollections so she could fully concentrate on the task before her. The destroyed section of fondant was gone, the crumbs brushed away and the cake re-iced. Now she had to let the base frosting set so the fondant would stick. Livi's eyes turned up to the clock. Five forty-three.

Her attention no longer consumed by the repairs, Livia could hear the hustle and bustle of guests arriving and being shuttled to their proper places for the ceremony. She breathed a sigh of relief. In the forty-five minutes since she'd arrived, nobody other than the catering staff and Naomi's event planner had entered the kitchen. It looked like she was going to be able to get in and out before the ceremony was over.

Fifteen minutes later, Livia was back at work, smoothing out the frosting and re-icing the pearlized borders. The harpist played the first notes of the wedding processional as she began to apply the lilies, strategically placing them over the patched area. Six-ten. Done.

With the help of the sous chef, Livia rolled the cake to its proper place of honor. It looked beautiful. Rather than sugar, the flowers looked spun by Mother Nature and thanks to Livia's impeccable eye and considerable skill, nobody would ever know that this all-important cake had recently gone through such trauma.

The sounds of cheerful laughter and applause filled the house, letting Livia know it was definitely time to head back to the kitchen, pack up her tools and make a quick escape. The kitchen was nearly empty as the wait staff exited in order to serve the hors d'oeuvres and signature cocktails. Liv headed over to the table area and began gathering her belongings and cleaning up the mess.

She was wiping up the table when she heard a voice that made her heart stand still. It was low and buttery, exactly as she'd heard it in her head a million times since last he'd spoken.

“Excuse me, could I get a few crackers and a glass of water?” His urgent request for saltines was delivered in his signature fashion—wrapping a demand in a request, and it was filled with the same compassion she'd heard when he'd come to her rescue a world away.