The Bachelor Baker. Carolyne Aarsen

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СКАЧАТЬ all day. Just had a baby. Nut allergy. Moved away.

      This last comment appeared beside two of the eight names on her list, a sad commentary on the state of the town of Bygones, which she had only recently moved to.

      When Melissa had received word of a mysterious benefactor offering potential business owners incentive money to start up a business in the small town of Bygones, Kansas, she had immediately applied. All her life she had dreamed of starting up her own bakery. She had taken courses in baking, decorating and business management, all with an eye to someday living out the faint hope of owning her own business.

      When she had been approved, she had quit her baking job at the hotel in St. Louis, packed up her few belongings and come here. She felt as if her life, after all the mishaps and missteps, had finally taken a good turn. A turn she had some control over.

      She started up the bakery in July and for the past month she had been running it with the help of Amanda. However, in the past couple of weeks it had become apparent she needed extra help.

      She had received the list of potential hires from the Bygones Save Our Streets Committee and was told to try each of them first. Brian Montclair was on the list. At the bottom, mind you, but still on the list.

      “I want to thank you for coming here,” she said by way of introduction.

      “No problem,” he said, glancing her way, then looking suddenly away as if unable to hold her gaze. “What can I do for you?”

      “The reason I called you here was to offer you a job,” she said, injecting a note of enthusiasm into her voice.

      Melissa still didn’t know what the people on the SOS Committee were thinking when they put this man on her list. He looked like he should be pulling wrenches, not handling the delicate petit fours, tarts and cupcakes she stocked in the bakery.

      Brian pulled back, his frown making his heavy eyebrows sink lower, hooding his eyes. “A job? Here? In a bakery? That’s why you phoned me?”

      In spite of her own concerns about his suitability, the veiled contempt in his voice raised her hackles. “Yes. I was given a list of potential hires and your name was one of the candidates.”

      “Seriously? The committee gave you my name?” He slapped one large hand on his blue-jeaned thigh.

      She frowned herself at his shocked anger. “I was told everyone on this list was looking for work. Why else would you think I would have called you?”

      “I don’t know. That’s why I came. To find out what you wanted. As for your list, I sure never put my name down for working in a bakery,” he said, his voice full of frustration as he shoved his hand through his shaggy blond hair, his blue eyes growing hard. “The new hardware store, sure. Maybe even the bookstore that just started up, but this bakery? Seriously?”

      Melissa drew in a slow breath, trying to stifle her own growing anger with his incredulity. Though she had only been running the bakery for a month now, she was proud of what she had done here.

      Bygones, Kansas, she understood, had been dealt some hard economic blows the past few years. The closure of Randall Manufacturing, a major employer, had reverberated through the town, resulting in people moving away, businesses losing revenue and some even closing down.

      Then, in May, someone with deep pockets set up the Save Our Streets Committee to oversee the selection of candidates to run new businesses in Bygones. Melissa had been one of the lucky applicants.

      “It’s a good job,” she said now, a defensive note entering her voice.

      “If you like working with frilly cakes and sugar and all that stuff you’ve got in those cases out there,” Brian said, sweeping one large hand in a dismissive gesture behind him.

      “I happen to enjoy it a lot.”

      “Well, I’m a guy. I can’t see myself baking and icing cakes.”

      Melissa wanted to stop the interview immediately, but she knew she would have to report back to the committee and they were quite adamant about her trying to hire the people from their list.

      And given that Brian was the last one on the list...

      “The hours are from nine o’clock to five-thirty with half an hour off for lunch,” Melissa said, forcing herself to carry on in the face of his obvious antagonism.

      Brian drew in a long, slow breath, tucking his chin against his chest and looking away from her, his hair falling across his forehead. Then he looked up at her, his blue eyes like lasers. “I can’t do it.”

      Melissa blinked, then felt the tension gripping her ease off. Brian had been the last person, in many ways, she wanted to hire.

      She could still hear her friend Lily, who ran the flower shop beside her, Love in Bloom, specifically warning her not to hire the very man sitting across from her. Apparently he had been angrily vocal in his dislike of the new businesses starting up in Bygones and especially vocal about her bakery with its useless cakes and tarts.

      But at the same time she knew that when she went back to the committee for a new list, she would have to show that she did all she could. So she gave it one more college try.

      “I think...I think you could like working here,” she said with forced enthusiasm, stifling her own frustration with his obvious reluctance. “Besides, I know there aren’t many jobs available in town.”

      His eyes narrowed and as he leaned forward, she could almost feel the hostility radiating off him. “I don’t need you to tell me that.” He spoke quietly but forcefully.

      “Of course,” she said again, wishing she didn’t feel so intimidated by him.

      Brian’s eyes ticked around the office with its bare walls, then behind him, as if assessing the situation. The office was just off the sales counter of the bakery. Through the door she saw a portion of the glass cases holding the squares, cupcakes, tarts, cookies and pies she had baked this morning. Her feet still throbbed from being on them since five o’clock this morning, but it was a good feeling.

      Brian turned back to her and pressed his hands against his thighs as he stood, filling up the small space even more.

      He drew in a deep breath, his lips pressed together, and gave her a curt nod. “Thanks for the job offer, but no thanks.”

      He held her gaze a split second more and for the tiniest moment, Melissa felt a nudge of regret. In another time and another place she could acknowledge his rugged good looks, the line of his jaw.

      But not here. And not now.

      And not after what Jason did to you.

      Melissa buried that thought again. Jason was in the past. She was in another time and a better place and she was her own person and her own boss in charge of her own life.

      Girl’s got to take care of herself because no one else will.

      Her mother’s constant mantra rang through her mind as she got to her feet.

      “Thanks for coming in,” she said, trying not to let her relief show.

      Brian held her gaze another moment, СКАЧАТЬ