Éclair and Present Danger (13 page)

There was no denying the way his eyes lit from within as he looked at her, waiting. There was no denying the enthusiasm that made it so the man could barely stand still. And there was no denying the way her hands began to shake in response. “Oh. Wow. All of a sudden I'm really nervous.”

“Don't be. Please.” He spun around and headed back toward his desk and the chair he'd inhabited less than five minutes earlier. Once he was settled, he reached for the reading glasses he hadn't been using when she arrived. “Now pretend you just arrived.”

“Pretend I just arrived?” she echoed, confused. “But I—”

“Practice on me. Let me see what you're thinking—” He stopped, smacked a hand to his forehead, and groaned. “And there I go again—doing exactly what Caroline is always calling me on the carpet for doing.” He stood, once again, but remained behind his desk, clearly embarrassed. “Look,
I'm sorry. I have no right acting like this. You're not a student looking for my opinion on everything.”

She liked this man.

She liked his earnestness.

She liked his genuineness.

And, as a result, she didn't like seeing him be so hard on himself. “What's that?” she asked, pointing at a freshly polished plaque in the center of the professor's desk.

For a moment she didn't think he was going to answer, but eventually he followed the path forged by her finger. “That's an award I just got from the president—the president of Silver Lake College, that is.”

She opened her mouth to ask for details but, instead, walked closer and read them for herself.

PROFESSOR JAY MORGAN,
TOP TEACHER AT SILVER LAKE COLLEGE

“That's quite an endorsement.”

“It is,” he said, nodding. “Especially when it's voted on by the students.” He swiped a hand down his face and then leaned forward, the plaque and its honor all but forgotten. “Winnie. I'm really sorry. I—”

She silenced the rest of his apology with her finger and then returned to the hallway for the stretcher. Squaring her shoulders, she put her hands on the side of the thin mattress and pushed it into the office. “I understand there's a smart cookie in here?”

Jay blinked once, twice, and then slowly lowered himself back down to his desk chair.

Slipping her hand underneath the stretcher, she pulled out the collapsible IV pole and extended it to its full height. Then, reaching back under the stretcher one more time, she pulled out her emergency bag, reached into its still warm interior for the bag of white chocolate icing, and hung it on the pole.

Jay laughed.

Next, she attached a long tube pre-fitted with a decorating tip at the end and drizzled the warm chocolate across the cookie still strapped to the stretcher. When she was done, she unhooked the strap and transferred the dessert to Jay's desk.

“Wow. That was awesome.” He looked from the IV tube, to Winnie, and then down at his cookie. “
This
is awesome.” He pointed at the pole. “That icing thing in the IV bag—that's genius.”

She stepped back behind the stretcher and took a moment to breathe it all in—her first Dessert Squad delivery, her first satisfied customer, her first mental pat on the back in far too long . . .

“So, Professor . . .” she teased with a rare burst of flirtatious confidence, “how did I do?”

He started to laugh off the moment but stopped himself (and her heart, for several beats) with a mischievous smile, instead. “In terms of concept, you get an A-plus. For execution, also an A-plus. For product, well, I'm not sure yet.”

She felt her answering smile begin to falter but forced herself to hold it steady. “Oh?”

He broke off a large chunk of the drizzled cookie and took a bite, his blue green eyes disappearing from view behind his unusually long, thick lashes. “Mmmm. Wow. Yeah. Okay. Product gets an A-plus, too.”

She bounced up on the balls of her feet and hijacked one of Renee's jigs. “You have no idea how much I needed to hear that.
Thank
you.”

Jay took a second bite, groaned, and then shook his head. “Actually, I take that last grade back.”

This time, she couldn't stave off the slump. “You do?”

“A-plus doesn't even come close to doing it justice.” He looked down at the cookie and then back up at Winnie. “What's
in
this thing?”

“White chocolate chips. Just like you told Renee—I mean,
my dispatcher
.”

He grinned. “Nice.”

“Your daughter does like white chocolate chips, yes?”

He shifted in his seat.

“Jay?”

“Well, technically
I
like white chocolate chips.”

It felt good to laugh. Great, even. “Even if I hadn't switched the recipient to you just now, your daughter was never going to see this cookie, was she?”

“Tasting
this
good? No. No way. I mean, I love my kid, but . . .” He left his sentence hanging in lieu of their combined laughter. “Seriously, Winnie, this is incredible.”

“Thank you. That really means a lot to me.” She didn't know why, exactly, but even though the cookie had been delivered and it was time to go, she found herself wanting to stay. There. With Jay.

But she couldn't.

Plucking the icing bag from the pole, she returned it and the tube to the bag, collapsed the pole down to travel size, and placed both under the stretcher. “Well, congratulations again . . . to your daughter, the now-avid driver . . . and to you, for being the kind of teacher clearly appreciated by his students.”

Jay stopped eating and pushed back his chair, his smile gone. “Oh. Yeah. I guess you probably have to go, don't you?”

“I should.”

Standing, he popped one more bite of cookie into his mouth. “Can I walk you out?”

“You just want to see the ambulance, don't you?” she teased. Then, hooking her thumb in the direction of the hallway, she smiled. “C'mon. I'm not too far from the front door.”

“Can I push the stretcher for you?”

“It's my job, sir.”

Where on earth did that come from?

Before she could think of a clever way to erase her bizarre teasing, he laughed, instantly easing all unnecessary worry from her thoughts.

Slowly, with her hands on the stretcher, they made their way down the hall, into and out of the elevator, and finally out to the parking lot. Along the way, they talked about desserts, the weather, his favorite building on campus, and finally the ambulance now parked beside them (and the dozen or so students who'd gathered to gawk in her absence).

“It's just a matter of time, Winnie, it really is. Even people who don't necessarily want a dessert are going to be calling just to have you show up in this thing.”

“From your mouth to God's ears.” She lowered the stretcher, opened the back door, and placed it inside. “I really want this to last.”

“It will.” He reached around her, plucked a few menus from a holder just inside the back door, and handed them out to the students. “There's a dessert for just about every ailment known to mankind. Broken hearts, bothersome roommates, bad test grades, flat tires, you name it . . .”

“I don't have a dessert for a flat tire,” she whispered as he returned to her side. “Or for bothersome roommates.”

“Add them,” he whispered back. “And add them, stat.”

S
he'd just exited the campus onto Murphy Street when her cell phone rang. Hitting the speaker button, Winnie let out a celebratory shriek.

“I take it our first call was a success?”

“Renee, it couldn't have gone any better.” She didn't need the rearview mirror to confirm the near-face-splitting smile she wore as she turned left on Nathan Drive. She felt its presence just as surely as she felt the steering wheel against her hands. “In fact, if this first run had been a school project for Jay's class, we'd have gotten A-pluses across the board.”

“Who's Jay?”

Just the mere mention of the man's name ratcheted up her body heat so quickly she couldn't help but wish Gertie's ambulance had come equipped with air-conditioning. “Sorry. I meant Professor Morgan.”

“As in our customer?”

She was vaguely aware of Renee's voice in her ear, but all she could really focus on at that moment was the image
of the handsome business professor as he'd looked behind his desk . . . smiling up at her . . . eating his cookie . . . walking beside her to the ambulance—

“The customer who placed an order for his teenage daughter?”

His teenage daughter . . .

Crap.

Shaking the euphoric highlight reel from her thoughts, she forced herself to concentrate on the stretch of Main Street that had her slowing for pedestrians and stoplights every few feet. As for when she turned onto Main Street, exactly, it must have happened while Jay was smiling. Or maybe eating . . .

He was awfully cute eating that cookie . . .

“Winnie?”

Focus, Winnie. Focus.

“Oh. Sorry. Someone just . . . uh . . . cut me off and I got distracted.” Tightening her hands on the steering wheel, she released her breath along with a well-earned sigh. “Sooo, we did it!”

“Yes, and we're poised to do it again.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. But as of right now we don't have anything on the menu that fits the request.”

“You didn't turn the caller away, did you?”

“No. I told her I'd get back to her in ten minutes. We've got . . .” Silence blanketed the car for a few seconds before Renee's voice returned. “Two minutes left.”

“Okay, so what's the request?”

“You mean the
emergency
?” Renee's laugh tickled Winnie's ear and had her smiling all over again. “See how I did that?”

“Very cute.”

She heard what sounded like a shuffling of papers and then, “This woman is down in the dumps because her diet isn't working.”

“Her
diet
?” Winnie repeated.

“Yup.”

“She does realize we deliver desserts, yes?”

“Roger that.”

Roger that?

“That's dispatcher talk, by the way . . .”

“Yes, Renee, I got that.” She turned east on Fiddler Road, the lack of streetlights and pedestrian crossings making it much easier to drive the speed limit. Surprisingly, the ambulance moved well. “So I'm trying to get how a dessert is a good thing for someone on a diet.”

“We can't save everyone,” Renee quipped.

“Wait!” She slowed as the approach to Roger's Drive came into view. “I got it. How about Can't Lose a Pound Cake? And I'll make it a low-calorie version for rescue purposes.”

When she heard no response, she peeked at the phone to make sure they were still connected. “Renee? You still there?”

“How do you do this?”

“Do what?”

“Come up with this stuff?”

She shrugged then made the final turn onto Serenity Lane. “I don't know. I just do.”

“Can you
find
a low-calorie pound cake recipe?”

“I tweak everything I find anyway, so why not?” She slowed to a stop in front of her house and slid the gear shift into park. “Well, I'm here now. Call this woman back and tell her we're on. I can deliver it later this afternoon.”

“Roger that.”

When she was sure the line had been disconnected, Winnie shut off the speaker function on her phone, retrieved her purse from the floor, and stepped out of the ambulance. An hour earlier, she'd felt equal parts excitement and apprehension as she loaded Jay's cookie and her rescue bag into the ambulance. Now, thanks to the success of her first delivery, excitement ruled.

His teenage daughter . . .

Maybe there really was something to Renee's attempts (unsolicited, by the way) at analyzing Winnie's lack of interest in dating. Maybe she really was afraid. Maybe the reason she found Jay Morgan so appealing was the fact that he was unavailable and, therefore, safe.

Shaking off the frustration threatening to cloud her day, Winnie stole a peek at Mr. Nelson's living room window and then at their shared front door. But short of the front porch light she'd failed to shut off that morning, there was no sign of life on the first floor.

Unless . . .

Smiling, she let herself in to their shared vestibule and waited by his door, the mug of hours-old coffee she could almost imagine him carrying toward her at that moment as clear as if it were already in her right hand. But the door remained closed, and her hand remained empty.

She shook off the feeling of unease slowly creeping up her spine and headed toward the stairs. Mr. Nelson was probably just out, playing bingo or scoping out women from his favorite bench outside the Silver Lake Community Center.

Her worries somewhat placated, she let herself into her apartment to find Renee poring over a pile of opened cookbooks.

“Find anything?” she asked, dropping her purse beside the door. “Remember, we're looking for low-calorie versions.”

“I'm looking.”

Winnie stopped at the sink, turned on the water, pumped two drops of soap into her hands, and then washed them thoroughly before joining her friend at the table. On instinct, she grabbed one of her favorite books and flipped to the index. Sure enough, she found three different pound cake recipes listed and turned to the first.

“Oh, I saw that one already,” Renee said. “But it isn't low calorie.”

She turned to the second recipe, read the listed ingredients, and then tapped the page with her finger. “This is it.”

“Winnie, that's definitely not low calorie.”

“It's not low sugar, either. But it will be both by the time I'm done.” She looked at the picture in the book and mentally swapped it with the one taking shape in her thoughts. “Oh, and it will have fresh berries on top. With just a hint of whipped cream. That way our customer gets her treat without hurting her dieting efforts all that much.”

“You make my head hurt, you know that?” Renee said, closing the book in front of her.

“Why's that?”

“You're too smart. It's intimidating. And annoying.”

She laughed. “Only when it comes to baking. I'm a total dunce when it comes to everything else.”

“A
dunce
? Seriously?” Renee scrunched her face and then followed Winnie over to the cabinet. “You really need to hang out with people your own age once in a while. You know, learn some more modern expressions.”

“I like Mr. Nelson's expressions better.” Winnie pointed Renee toward the flour and sugar containers and then turned her attention toward gathering up the rest of the necessary ingredients—vanilla extract, baking soda, eggs, butter, salt, yogurt, lemon juice . . .

“What's the grater for?” Renee asked, as she deposited the containers on the counter and pulled the electric mixer from its drawer.

“The lemon rind.”

Once Winnie had everything she needed assembled around her, she got to work creaming and mixing. “Renee? Have you seen any sign of Mr. Nelson this morning?”

“I sure did.”

“Okay, good. I was kind of surprised he wasn't home, especially since the twelve o'clock news has only been over for about twenty minutes.” She set aside her mixing bowl long enough to spray the tube pan Renee placed on the counter. “I
guess the weekday weather girl must be on vacation this week . . .”

“He's home, Winnie.”

She stopped spraying and looked at her friend. “He's home?” At Renee's nod, she put down the can. “Then where was my hug . . . and my mug?”

Renee's left eyebrow shot upward. “Huh?”

“Never mind.”

“He probably didn't come out because he's not exactly a happy camper at the moment.”

“
Mr. Nelson
?”

Renee pouted her lower lip in time with her nod.

“But
why
?” Winnie asked. “What happened? Was Bridget sniping at him again?”

“No. She was in here with me.” Renee paused her hand on the oven's control panel. “What's the temperature?”

“Three-seventy-five.” She moved on to the second bowl and the sifter. Slowly, she sifted the flour, baking soda, and salt into the clean bowl and then added all to the first mixture, alternating between the dry ingredients and the yogurt. “Did Bridget need something?”

“Nope. Just wanted to stop by and see Lovey. That cat really loves her.”

“I'm aware.” Winnie craned her head around Renee and studied the white and brown cat fastidiously preening herself atop the windowsill. “Anything else?”

“She sang your praises for a while.”

“That's nice.” Winnie added the lemon juice to the bowl, gave it one final mix, and poured the batter into the prepared pan. “Is that all?”

“We plotted a little.”

“Plotted?”

Renee leaned across the oven and hit the timer button. “How long?”

“Let's go with thirty-five minutes and then I'll check.” She looked at the strawberries and waffled between simply
slicing them and making a berry glaze. After careful deliberation, she chose to go with the simple fruit topping as a nod to the customer's dieting issue. She could always switch to the glaze in the future.

Satisfied with her decision, Winnie wiped her hands on the dishcloth and sank onto a kitchen chair. “So what were you two plotting? Or don't I want to know?”

“You don't want to know. But I'll tell you anyway.”

Winnie waved the dishcloth in the air. “Actually, let's talk about something else. Like the weather . . . Or your favorite color . . .”

“We were trying to figure out how to get you to give Master Sergeant Hottie a real chance.”

She tossed the dishcloth onto the table, grabbed the closest pen, and pointed it at Renee. “Look, you two need to give it a rest.
Greg
is a nice enough guy, yes. And he was helpful when I was trying to figure out how to play out the Dessert Squad theme. But he's really not my type.”

Renee snorted as she, too, took a seat. “No one is ever your type, Winnie. That's the problem.”

Au contraire, dear friend. Jay Morgan is exactly my type . . .

Dropping the pen onto the table, she cleared her throat and forced Renee and herself into different waters. Safer waters.

“We need to broaden the menu. Cover more problems.”

“Such as?” Renee asked, picking up the pen and reaching for their idea pad.

“I don't know, maybe for a college kid dealing with roommate issues . . .”

“Roommate issues?”

She nodded. “Or a flat tire.”

Renee considered that and then wagged the pen at Winnie. “How about a bad date or being flat broke?”

“You mean like Another Bad Date and Nut Bars?” She
stared up at the ceiling and then lowered her gaze back to Renee. “And . . . and . . . I got it—All Out of Dough-Nuts!”

Renee repeated the names, laughing as she did. “You do realize you have savant-like tendencies, don't you?”

“Add them.” She watched the woman add the desserts to the running list and then refocused their attention on the previous conversation (no, not the one about her nonexistent love life). “So about Bridget being here and Mr. Nelson—”

“She heard a car door shut outside and had to know what was going on.”

“And?” she prompted.

“It was the Wagners' son with a prospective buyer.”

Suddenly, the notion of an always happy Mr. Nelson being . . . well,
not
happy, made all the sense in the world. Sure, on some level he knew Bart was never coming back. But even so, his friend's body had barely been in the ground for forty-eight hours . . .

“I'll talk to him tonight,” she said, standing. “This has to be hard for him. Bridget, too.”

She felt Renee's eyes following her as she approached the windowsill and Lovey. “I got the impression Bridget was okay with the person.”

Reversing her steps before Lovey even had the chance to hiss, Winnie stared at her friend. “Bridget was okay with
what
person?”