Page 40 of A Spot of Trouble
Happiness filled her like sunshine. She’d never been so ready for bingo night in her whole life.
“Violet, wow!” Ethel stopped in front of the concession booth, clutching a stack of bingo sheets to her chest. “Your cupcakes certainly look extra special this week.”
“They are.” Violet plucked one from the tray and offered it to her friend. “Would you like one? They’re my special this week: Burn the Fire Department Lemon Meringue.”
“Oh, dear,” Ethel said. The bingo sheets in her arms wilted like a bouquet of day-old flowers.
“What?” Violet tilted her head. Beside her, Sprinkles did the same.
Ethel could judge all she wanted, but any minute, Sam would be here, saving the day with his overflow seating plan. If Violet was going to be forced to watch a roomful of bingo-loving retirees act like he hadn’t just closed down their favorite night of the week a mere seven days ago, she was going to do so while also reminding Sam that he was going down. If he’d thought she was joking about their little wager, he was sadly mistaken.
“Nothing.” Ethel shook her head. “I’m sure they’re delicious.”
“Ooh, what are these? They look divine,” Mavis said as she and Opal paused their walkers in front of Violet’s table.
“They’re her special bingo night cupcakes.” Ethel cleared her throat. “Burn the Fire Department Lemon Meringue.”
Violet ignored the twin looks of horror on Mavis and Opal’s faces and torched another towering dollop of meringue. “It’s a three-decker cupcake—moist lemon sponge topped with a layer of zesty lemon curd and a heavy dose of whipped Italian meringue.”
“That definitely sounds delicious.” Mavis and the other two older women exchanged glances. “But…”
Violet arched a brow. “But what?”
“But the name, sweetheart. You usually call the cupcakes something fun and creative,” Opal chimed in.
“Burn the Fire Department is super creative.” Violet held her culinary torch aloft. “Get it? Because they’re firemen.”
“Sweetheart, I think she meant you usually name the specials at bingo night something more…bingo-related.” Mavis waved an encompassing hand at their surroundings. The indoor tables were almost full of seniors and tourists, and Hoyt Hooper, the bingo caller, was already sitting beside the cage of bingo balls, dressed in his usual Hawaiian shirt.
“Besides, dear, we’ve been discussing it and, well”—Mavis cast a pointed look at Opal and Ethel, who nodded their agreement with whatever Mavis was about to say—“we think Sam seems like a really nice man.”
Violet was aghast. They couldn’t be serious. “But he’s a fireman!”
“We know, but he has that sweet dog, and from what everyone says, you two had a nice little chat the other day at your cupcake truck.” Ethel cast a worried glance at the cupcakes. “Maybe you should call them something else.”
“You mean the chat we had before the softball game turned into total chaos?” Violet still wasn’t convinced the resulting chaos hadn’t been intentional. Maybe she was being paranoid, but in a million years, she would never have dreamed that a fireman would go through the motions of wooing her in order to steal her dad’s playbook. Live and learn. “Anyway, it’s not a big deal. Sam and I have a bet. This is just innocent trash talk. It’s what athletes do.”
Violet shrugged as if completely unaware that Sam himself had been rather famous for wittily taunting his opposing team back when he’d been a college baseball star. In a moment of weakness after the emotional chat with her dad the other night on the deck, Violet had comforted herself with her new hobby, which was Googling Sam. She wasn’t proud of it. In fact, when she indulged in this shameful activity, she usually kept Sprinkles occupied with a super-sturdy, interactive rubber chew toy stuffed with chunky peanut butter so her dog wouldn’t see what she was up to. A Dalmatian distraction, as it were.
She told herself she wasn’t doing anything untoward. She had a wager to win. Finding out everything she could about Sam was therefore research—including saving the link to that one shirtless picture of him that had appeared in the Chicago Fire Department’s charity calendar two years ago.
“Trash talk.” Opal pressed her lips together. “If you say so.”
“Idosay so,” Violet said, but her elderly friends no longer seemed to be listening.
Mavis cleared her throat in a way that said she meant business. “What we’re trying to say is that it seems like you and Sam really come alive whenever you spend time together.”
“Come alive?” Violet sputtered, wishing she had a more effective form of denial at the ready, but for some crazy reason, words failed her.
“The tension between you and Sam is palpable,” Ethel said, and then she fanned herself in a suggestive manner reminiscent of Blanche Devereaux onThe Golden Girls.
It was official. Violet’s life had become a sitcom. “If there’s tension between Sam and me, it’s because we despise each other.”
That strange electricity that always flickered in the air between them couldn’t possibly be romantic tension or, heaven forbid,sexualtension. He was her adversary. Her rival. Her sworn enemy. Just the thought of kissing Sam Nash made her stomach turn…albeit in a woozy, fluttery, swarming-with-butterflies sort of way.
Oh, no.Violet froze. The truth was suddenly as obvious to her as inky black spots on a Dalmatian.I want to kiss Sam Nash.
“Are you okay, dear? You’ve gone as white as your untorched meringue.” Opal wiggled her fingertips in the direction of the tray of cupcakes waiting for a pass of Violet’s butane tool.
