Page 56 of Holly Jolly Cake Fight
They joined Zara and Patty, who didn’t know anything either. They watched in silence as the few crew members did their thing, but the silence was creepy. She told herself not to lean into Laurin, but she couldn’t help it. He probably also told himself not to put his hand on her ass, but somehow it kept brushing against her rear, anyway. He was having a casual conversation with Zara, talking about cats, of all things, and the whole time, his fingertips swept lightly back and forth, ensuring that there was not a single second where Candace’s thoughts did not call back to the night before and speculate on tonight. Also, she could still feel his handprint back there.
Her head was not in the game, and that was a problem.
She stepped away nonchalantly, hooking Patty’s arm to lead her away with the intention of finding something interesting to show her, thus justifying the move. As she found it in the extra candy thermometers on the station in front of them, she glanced back, expecting to see irritation on Laurin’s face. Instead, she felt very much the mouse to his cat. Hunted, for both sustenance and pleasure. The contract stated that every contestant would need to be in attendance on Christmas Eve for the live finale. The contestants who worked in bakeries were used to limited family time on holidays, so that wasn’t as tragic as she imaginedit would sound to most people, but it also meant that if there was an elimination today — and there would be — this would be the final challenge before they went home. There was every chance that during judging, the contestants would go to their cabins and pack, and everyone would be taken to the airport as soon as the final elimination was announced.
It was not a forgone conclusion that the cat would catch the mouse this time, and Candace got the feeling that this made the mouse all the more enticing.
“Was there a cameraman in your cabin this morning?” Patty asked suddenly, distracting Candace from Laurin’s intense gaze but bringing her right back to what they’d done last night. And this morning. Laurin’s proclamation that they were alone had made her a touch more verbose than usual, and he’d occasionally been very convincing with his urgings that she tell him how he made her feel. The idea that one of the camera crew not only knew but heard her — clearly — was sobering, but Patty had a point.
“No, only a note and a golf cart for us to drive ourselves here. Which seems irresponsible. What if neither of us knew how to drive it and, like, crashed it into the freezer or rolled it off a cliff or something?”
Patty’s lips tightened and swished back and forth thoughtfully. Patty really was perfect most of the time. Not only were her bakes, on average, perfect, but she was also perfectly pleasant overall. Candace didn’t doubt Zara’s claims about the tension between them or that Patty was the source. It was a major problem, one that Candace knew would make her sick when she was back in her life and had time to process everything that had happened here. But Patty was also incredibly smartand perceptive, so she paid attention to Patty’s scowl and waited patiently to hear the assessment Patty was making.
“Were you on Taste of Tropics?” Patty finally asked with a stitch in her brows.
Candace shook her head. “That season was before my time.” She barely even remembered it. They’d tried a new format, cut it down to four episodes from the typical six to ten they did now. There were still five contestants on the last episode and two were declared co-winners. What stood out the most was it was the most poorly rated season by a wide margin.
“I wasn’t on it either,” Patty said, “but Felix was. He told me what really happened there.”
Candace canted her head. She’d only once worked with Felix En Fuego, but he’d been a regular for a while, and she knew he and Patty had a thing going for much of that time. He also only had one win under his belt: Taste of Tropics. It was the only season he’d survived without burning something to a cinder, and many people speculated it was because the shorter Taste of Tropics season hadn’t given him enough time to ruin anything. She’d never thought anything suspicious about Taste of Tropics, only that it was poorly conceived and three episodes shorter than the others.
Then again, the world thought she and Lucas had been lovers.
Her stomach churned at what the world would think if they found out there was something between her and Laurin. It was rare for on-set flings to get any publicity — no one knew about Patty and Felix, for instance — but Candace was different now after Lucas. This would get out. Candace would be branded a slut. Laurin would be her flavor of the month.
The look Patty gave Candace told her she wasn’t hiding her thoughts very well, so she cleared them as well as she could and asked Patty to explain about the Taste of Tropics season.
“They filmed that one in Puerto Rico, you know. Had that nice open-air set, really beautiful resort they were at. Those of us who weren’t invited got really jealous. But then this big tropical storm popped up. They were hoping to ride it out at first, but it kept building and building. They were forced to evacuate, and they still planned to return once the storm passed, but they made the decision to film that one episode that would wrap it up, just in case they couldn’t go back. And it turned out they were smart to do that because the set was destroyed in the storm. Felix thought he won because he was the only contestant not shaken by the fact that they’d already evacuated everyone but the essentials. He’s a bit camera-shy, you know? And it was just the active contestants, the hosts, and two cameramen. The work station cameras were on tripods. The guest judges weren’t even the scheduled judges. They were just some high-ups from the resort. Without the usual audience, Felix nailed his bake.”
Before she could ask Laurin if something like that could happen here, if there was an imminent weather emergency, Mike called for positions on the set.
Episode 5: Candy
Chapter 20
Laurin didn’t knowhow he sensed the exact moment that Candace went cold. He knew she’d deliberately separated herself, but that was only tempting him to give chase. Something had transpired in her conversation with Patty that caused a shift.
Perhaps it was body language or a dulling of her eyes. Maybe the blush had suddenly faded. He didn’t know, but he was glad to get hold of her hand again in the line-up, even if she leaned toward Patty.
He rubbed his thumb along hers, hoping to warm her back up, and instead got her chewing away on her bottom lip, but that was okay. As the few crew members scurried around in the last seconds before action would be called, she seemed as though she wanted to say something to him but gave in at the last second and leaned into him with a pensive sigh instead.
Action was called, and Candace’s grip tightened on his hand. He squeezed back, and she finally glanced at him, giving him a soft smile. That was better. Something had spooked her for sure, but it wasn’t him. Some challenges didn’t start immediately after the introduction. If there was a break after Jannie and Kate did their thing, he’d take the opportunity to massage her shoulders, ask her what was wrong. Or maybe just massage her until she was loosened up enough that he could slide his hands down the front of her shirt — today her collar was a bit lower over her scoop-neck sweater vest — while he did his best not to leave a hickey on her neck.
That was a good plan. A bit secondary-schoolish, but he was okay with that. Young love didn’t have to be between the young.
The peculiarity of the scarce crew continued when cameras started rolling, but on propellers; the camera that greeted Kate and Jannie as they pushed through the candy cane-striped door was mounted to a drone. Laurin didn’t know where the operator was, but it did look incredibly steady. Steadier than the shoulder-resting cameras. Still, midway through the season didn’t seem like the right time to upgrade the technology.
He was so distracted by the drone that he missed the half of Kate’s speech announcing that it was, indeed, Candy Week, and tuned in just in time to catch Jannie saying, “Now, we are officially on our final four, but as you’ll remember from last week, the judges were simply blown away by Candace and Laurin’s dinner spread. We’ve never had a centerpiece praised so highly—” not that they did centerpieces often on the show, “—and we were all moved to tears by Candace’s sacrifice of valuable minutes with her family so Laurin could spend more time with his daughter.”
Laurin was glad he was paying attention for this part because it gave him the best excuse to toss an arm over her shoulders and lean as though to say something to her, but really, he was grazing his lips over the pale wisps at her temple. She blushed as hotly as ever, but she was the villain getting called out on a great kindness.
“To show how much we appreciate their victory last week, our judges today will be . . . Laurin and Candace!”
He was still facing her, so he got to see her go wide-eyed with genuine shock as he did the same. Food2Love competitions rarely included immunity prizes. One this close to the end of theseason was unheard of. Laurin couldn’t remember if he’d ever seen it in a semi-final. And now—
“We’re automatically in the finals,” Candace whispered, and he got the feeling she couldn’t have spoken more loudly if she tried.
Laurin, who was still leaning in close, whispered back, “When we go back to the cabin, I’m going to pin you to the wall and split you so wide open I’ll have to wrap your legs together to close you up and carry you in for the judging.”
