Chocolate Kisses by Judith Arnold

Author:Judith Arnold [Arnold, Judith]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Romance, Contemporary
ISBN: 9780373832576
Barnesnoble:
Goodreads: 15841747
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 1992-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Six

2:12 p.m.

“FINANCING?” she asked.

They were in the kitchen of Wyatt Hall. Seated on a stool, Ned observed as Claudia arranged her cake materials on the counter. This time everything had survived the trip across town in her van.

Following in his car, his back seat filled with heaping trays, Ned had felt her absence keenly. He had wanted to be with her, smelling her clean fragrance, admiring her stunning blue eyes.

Of course, if he’d been seated beside her in her van, he might have been unable to resist the temptation to reach out and grab her. And then she would have lost control of the van and it would have skidded on an icy patch of road and all the food would have been ruined again.

And then they would have had to start all over. Which might have been kind of fun.

Fun for him, anyway. For her it would have been a disaster. As soon as he’d stopped trying to seduce her at her house, she’d become compulsively businesslike, trooping around her kitchen like a drill sergeant, barking orders as if she viewed the cotillion as a military campaign—with Melanie serving as the commanding officer of the opposing army.

Fortunately, Melanie wasn’t at Wyatt Hall when they arrived. Edie was, but after huffing about Claudia’s invasion of her precious kitchen, she let Ned convince her that the florist needed her invaluable advice regarding the flower arrangements in the ballroom. Once he’d dispatched Edie, Claudia got to work assembling her cakes.

It seemed like a good time to broach the subject. “Nothing complicated,” he told her. “I’m only thinking of what you could accomplish with the proper capitalization.”

She flashed him a sharp, blue-eyed glance. “Proper capitalization, huh,” she repeated dubiously. “Pretty fancy language.”

“All it means is having enough money to get Fantasy Feasts to the next level.”

“The next level of what?”

He watched as she smoothed the pink frosting over the largest chocolate cake layer, which sat on a doily-lined silver tray. With a deft flick of the pan, she dropped the second layer on top of the first, centering the smaller heart atop the larger one.

“Imagine what your life would be like if you could work in a kitchen this big all the time, in a shop in town. If you had a clerk, and an assistant, and an eye-catching sign out front.”

“Yeah, right,” she snorted. “That sounds like a lot more fantasy than feast.”

“Not if your company had an infusion of cash. That’s where I could help you out.”

She shot him another look, this one decidedly suspicious. “What am I, the newest Wyatt charity?”

He shook his head and chuckled. “No one’s going to give you a penny. However, I can put together funding—”

“A loan? Forget it.” She cut him off. “I’m already paying off my van, a mortgage and the refrigerator in my cellar. I’m not taking any more loans.”

“I’m not talking about a loan, either,” he explained patiently, trying not to let the graceful gliding motions of her fingers distract him. “I’m talking about an investment.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.