The Cupcake Queen by Patricia Coughlin

Author:Patricia Coughlin
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Silhouette
Published: 2002-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eight

Driving into town, Olivia found a new appreciation for the expression footloose and fancy-free. With vintage Bruce Springsteen on the radio, she turned up the volume and sang along. She felt sixteen again, cutting class on a day too nice to waste indoors. She felt the same heady sense of exuberance and possibilities she’d felt as she and her friends slipped out the school’s side door. Hearts pounding, they would make a crazy dash for a well-worn spot hidden amongst the cedars, where they would stretch out on the grass, smoke cigarettes and talk about boys.

Instead of escaping chemistry class, today she was breaking free of Owen Rancourt and his long list of chores guaranteed to make her aching muscles ache more. There was also another significant difference between then and now: her chemistry teacher never held the door open for her to make her escape. Rancourt had, and she couldn’t help wondering why.

Even more bewildering was how she felt nearly as lighthearted on the return trip as she had making her getaway hours earlier. Only this time her mood had less to do with a reckless sense of freedom than it did anticipation. She wasn’t quite sure how to describe what she was feeling, other than that it felt a little bit like Christmas Eve, and a little like waiting for a blind date to ring the doorbell and a little like coming home again after being gone a long, long time.

Excitement, suspense, comfort.

It was a strange mix, and potent. It must be to cause the persistent flutter in her chest and restlessness everywhere else in her body. There was no denying it, not to herself anyway. She was looking forward to seeing Rancourt again.

Good Lord, could that be her subconscious’s way of telling her she’d missed him?

Olivia scoffed at the notion. Not possible.

It was more likely that she was mistaking her absence of dread for anticipation. After all, he had been unexpectedly tolerable at breakfast, almost pleasant, in fact. She thought wistfully of how much less stressful the coming weeks would be if he could only stay that way. It didn’t require a Mensa member to figure out what had prompted his mood swing. It appeared that last night’s kiss had not been the humiliating washout she’d first thought. Unless she was way off her game, the man was coming around.

Not that she had ever seriously doubted he would, she told herself. Now that his defenses had cracked slightly, all she had to do was disassemble what remained. Mingled with her satisfaction was a small twinge of something less comfortable. Scruples? Always before when she’d played this game, her opponent understood the rules as well as she did, and had his own bag of tricks. Owen Rancourt did not strike her as a man who viewed games as a diversion. If he played, he would play to win, no quarter given, none asked. That made them even, she decided, casting off any uncertainty.

In fact, she reflected, if

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