The Sweetest Temptation. Rochelle Alers
she’d invested too much money in Let Them Eat Cake, and the small patisserie, conveniently located three blocks from her apartment building, was now showing a profit. She also had to consider her employees—two full-time clerks, part-time baker and now her assistant. Six months ago she’d expanded the shop’s hours of operation from four to five days a week. However, she did make an exception for weeks during Thanksgiving, Christmas and Valentine’s Day. The only time she opened on Sunday was for Mother’s Day.
Faith returned home in time to shower and make it to the twelve o’clock mass. She’d attended an all-girl private Catholic school from grades one through twelve, and going to mass was a ritual that had become as natural to her as breathing.
Sleet had begun falling when she left the church to hail a taxi to take her to the Ambassador Grill, a restaurant in the United Nations Plaza Hotel, touted to serve an extraordinary Sunday lobster-and-champagne brunch buffet. The restaurant was a favorite of Peter Demetrious. He was waiting for her when she arrived, and within minutes they were shown to a table.
He was shorter in person than he appeared in photographs, his full head of hair a shocking white, and the minute lines crisscrossing his weather-beaten face reminded her of a map. Faith had researched his background on the Internet and learned that the celebrated photographer, the only child of a Greek father and Italian mother, was born in San Francisco, and currently made his home in Southern California. In several articles written about him he admitted his obsession with photography began when an uncle gave him a Brownie camera for his eighth birthday; half a century later his passion hadn’t waned.
Over flutes of mimosas and fluffy omelets, Faith outlined the concept for the coffee-table book as Peter Demetrious studied her face as if she were a photographic subject, his sharp, penetrating black eyes missing nothing.
“When’s your deadline?” he asked.
“June thirtieth,” Faith replied.
Peter removed a small leather-bound diary from his jacket pocket, flipping pages. The creases in his forehead deepened. “How many cakes do you want me to photograph?”
Faith touched a napkin to the corners of her mouth. “I’m not certain. What I’d like to do is separate the book into themes—birthdays, holidays, weddings and special occasions like sweet sixteen, engagement, new baby and anniversaries. Then there are the religious themes—christening, communion, bar and bat mitzvah.”
“Give me a number, Faith.”
“I estimate between eighty and one hundred. The publisher has projected a 240-page book, and that includes text, recipes and credits.”
Peter stared at the pastry chef as if she’d suddenly taken leave of her senses. “You’re going to bake one hundred cakes before the end of June?”
She nodded, smiling. “It’s not impossible. If I bake five or six a week, then there’s no reason why I wouldn’t be able to make my deadline.” Faith knew it wasn’t impossible now that she had an assistant. “Do you have a date for the shoot?”
Peter stared at a page in his diary. “I’m going to be back in New York for several weeks in late April.” He flipped a few more pages. “And I also have a full week in mid-June.”
Pulling her cell phone from her handbag, Faith turned it on. She’d missed a call because she always turned it off before entering church. Activating the calendar feature, she scrolled through the months. The end of April meant that she had at least sixteen weeks to bake and decorate the cakes. A smile softened her mouth. Peter had given her plenty of time.
“I’ll have them ready for you,” she confidently.
“Will they keep?” the photographer asked.
Faith nodded. “Yes. They’ll be frozen solid and definitely not fit for human consumption, but I’ll spray them with a waxy substance before you photograph them to give them a fresh look.”
“Where are you going to store them?”
“Some I’ll store in the freezer in my shop, and the others in the freezer of a friend’s restaurant.”
She’d called a friend who owned and operated a restaurant before she signed the book contract to ask if she could rent space in one of her walk-in freezers to store the cakes.
Peter’s dark eyebrows lifted with this revelation. “It looks as if you’ve done your homework.”
“Would you have agreed to collaborate with me if I hadn’t done my research?”
“No, Faith. I’m too busy, and to be honest I don’t need the money. I agreed to collaborate with you because I’ve never done anything like this, and I owe your cousin Tessa for contracting me to photograph the Fyles-Cooper wedding, which by the way will be in the next InStyle Wedding book.”
If Peter owed Tessa, then Faith owed Tessa—big-time—for getting him to agree to photograph her cake designs. Tessa and Simone Whitfield were the sisters she’d never had, but somehow she got along better with Tessa than Simone.
“Where are you going to photograph them?”
Resting his elbows on the table, Peter leaned closer and lifted his bushy eyebrows. “I’ll make arrangements to shoot them in a photography studio in Tribeca.”
“Do want to take any outdoor shots?”
“No. The studio is filled with stock art and set decorations that we can use for interior and exterior shots.”
Raising her flute, Faith touched it to Peter’s. “Cheers!”
He raised his glass, grinning broadly. “Il saluto!” he countered in Italian.
They lingered at the restaurant for another half an hour, then Peter settled the bill and suggested they share a taxi. He got out in Tribeca while Faith continued on to the West Village.
It was exactly four when Faith walked into her apartment, ideas as to what cake designs she wanted Peter to photograph crowding her mind. She’d tried imagining what the book would look like on bookstore shelves or on coffee tables, and until she decorated the first cake the notions remained that—just a notion.
She’d grown up a dreamer—a weaver of fairy tales. Her parents thought she was going to be a writer because of the number of notebooks she’d filled up with childlish stories. The day she celebrated her sixteenth birthday she wrote down three wishes in her diary: become a chef, write a cookbook and marry a prince before she turned twenty-five. Long ago she’d accepted the truth that not all dreams come true as scheduled, but she was satisfied knowing that two of the three had manifested.
Faith changed out of her pantsuit and into a pair of well-washed faded jeans, a long-sleeved tee and a pair of thick cotton socks. She checked her home phone for messages. Nothing. Then she remembered the missed call on her cell phone. Retrieving it, she tapped in her password and folded her body down onto the cushioned window seat.
She listened to the recorded message: “Faith, this is WJ. I was told that you helped Kurt in the kitchen last night. I wanted to speak to you but you were gone. I’m sending someone over to your place this afternoon to deliver a little something to show my gratitude for all you’ve done to make my daughter’s engagement party so spectacular. The person should be at your place at four-thirty. If this is not a good time for you, then call me…”
The sound of the doorbell eclipsed the voice coming through the earpiece. Faith took a quick glance at the clock radio. It was 4:33. Whoever WJ was talking about was standing on the other side of her door.
She crossed the room and peered through the security eye. William Raymond’s someone was no other than Ethan McMillan.
“Who is it?” she asked.
“Ethan McMillan.”
Faith unlocked the door, coming face-to-face with the man with the sexy smile and seductive voice. He was dressed down in a pair of faded jeans, pullover sweater, lined bomber jacket and