Éclair and Present Danger (27 page)

You're a Peach Pie

Pastry for double-crust 9-inch pie

½ cup sugar

¼ cup packed brown sugar

4½ cups sliced and peeled peaches

3 tablespoons cornstarch

¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon

¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg

⅛ teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons lemon juice

1 tablespoon butter

1. In a large bowl, combine both sugars. Add peaches and gently toss. Cover and let stand for one hour.
   
2. Line a 9-inch pie plate with the bottom pastry. Trim and set aside.
   
3. Drain peaches and reserve juice.
   
4. In a small saucepan, mix the cornstarch, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt. Slowly add in reserved juice and stir. Bring to a boil, then cook and stir for 2 more minutes to thicken. Remove from the heat. Add in lemon juice and butter, and stir. Gently fold in peaches and pour all into crust.
   
5. With a rolling pin, make a lattice crust from the remaining pastry. Seal edges and flute if desired. Cover edges loosely with foil.
   
6. Bake at 400 degrees for 50–60 minutes or until crust is golden brown and filling is bubbly. Remove foil. Cool on a wire rack.
   

Worry No s'More Bars

1¼ cup graham crackers—crushed

4 tablespoons butter, melted

¾ cup sugar

½ cup brown sugar

½ cup butter, softened

1 egg

½ teaspoon vanilla

1¼ cup all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup chocolate chips

1 cup mini marshmallows (with an additional handful for the top)

1 full-sized chocolate bar

1. Line a square baking pan with parchment paper and set aside.
   
2. Combine crushed graham crackers and 4 tablespoons of melted butter. Press into bottom of prepared pan to form a crust.
   
3. Cream ½ cup of softened butter. Mix in both sugars and cream again until fluffy. Add in egg and vanilla. Mix again.
   
4. In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Add to butter mixture and combine.
   
5. Add in chocolate chips and marshmallows. Stir.
   
6. Spoon cookie dough on top of graham crust and spread (dough will fill in any gaps as it cooks).
   
7. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes.
   
8. While bar is cooking, break chocolate bar into pieces and place in freezer.
   
9. Sprinkle reserved marshmallows on top of cooking bar and continue baking for another 8 to 10 minutes.
   
10. Remove from oven and place chocolate bar pieces on top. Cool completely.
    

You Are One Smart Cookie

1 cup butter, softened

¾ cup brown sugar, packed firmly

¾ cup sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 eggs

2¼ cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

2 cups semisweet or white chocolate chips

1 cup milk chocolate or white chocolate chips for drizzle

1. In a large bowl, combine butter, both sugars, and vanilla. Beat until light and fluffy.
   
2. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
   
3. Slowly add flour, baking soda, and salt. Beat until well blended.
   
4. Stir in chips.
   
5. Spread in greased 16-inch round pizza pan (14-inch if you want a thicker cookie).
   
6. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.
   
7. Cool cookie in pan.
   
8. Drizzle with melted chips.
   

W
innie Johnson capped her pen and tossed it onto the wicker table, narrowly missing the black rook poised to capture the white queen.

“Whoa, I'm sorry, Mr. Nelson, I guess I wasn't thinking.”

“
Winking
? You want to learn how to do some winking?” The seventy-five year old former sailor extracted the pen from the middle of the chessboard and set it, instead, on the edge of the table closest to Winnie. “I can teach you how to do some winking.”

She tapped her finger to her ear and waited for her housemate to turn his hearing aid up a notch or two. When he did, she set the record straight. “I said
thinking
, Mr. Nelson. I wasn't
thinking
when I tossed my pen onto the table just now.”

“Seems to me you've been thinking
too
hard, Winnie Girl.” Hunching forward, he slid the black castle-like piece four spots to the left and then collapsed back against his chair with exhausted elation. “Now
that
was a move.”

“You're playing
yourself
, you old fool.” Bridget O'Keefe,
their next door neighbor, paused her hand midway down the spine of the brown and white tabby cat curled into a ball on her lap and shook her head. “Winnie asked for your help today, Parker. You do realize that, don't you?”

Elation turned to consternation as the elderly man took in first, Winnie, and then Bridget. “I came up with Baked Alaska-Bound!”

Bridget's snort of disgust was so sudden and so loud Lovey woke from her sound slumber and narrowed her eyes on Winnie.

Hissss . . .

Raising the cat's narrowed eyes with a glare, Winnie hissed back, earning herself a second and louder hiss from Lovey and a soft tsking sound from Bridget.

“
What
? She hissed first,” Winnie argued. “I'm not even the one who disturbed her umpteenth nap of the day! That was you, Bridget, with your reaction just now to what Mr. Nelson said.”

Mr. Nelson patted the top of his thigh and smiled triumphantly at Bridget as the cat abandoned the eighty-something's lap in favor of his. Once Lovey was settled, tummy side up, he brought his attention back to Winnie. “Now I realize this is something I've never said before, but . . . well . . . Bridget is right.” The second the sentence was out, the man scrunched his nose and made a face befitting someone who'd tasted something utterly awful.

Winnie laughed. “
About . . .
”

Shaking his head in one last burst of theatrics, Mr. Nelson pointed at the purring animal gently rolling around on his lap. “Lovey is never going to accept you if you keep hissing at her like you just did.”

“I only started hissing back when it became apparent she has no gratitude for the fact that I'm the one who feeds her, and waters her, and sleeps on the couch just so she can have my bed!”

“Give it time, Winnie Girl.”

“It's been over a month now, Mr. Nelson. How much more time does she need? She's a
cat
.”

“She'll come around. You wait and see.” Glancing back at the chessboard and the answering move he was surely itching to make, Mr. Nelson mumbled something under his breath and then focused again, on Winnie. “Now, about this brainstorming you wanted to do today . . . You
did
write down Baked Alaska-Bound, didn't you?”

She opened her mouth to answer but closed it as Bridget took center stage. “Just how many people in Silver Lake do you really think are going to Alaska, Parker? One? Maybe two? Do you really think that's worthy of a spot on Winnie's menu?” With a dismissive flick of her hand (and the dramatic wince that invariably followed), the woman uncrossed her swollen ankles and readied her stout frame to stand. “Fortunately for Winnie,
one
of us brought along our creativity this afternoon. As a result, I predict my Couch Potato Candy will be a crowd favorite in no time.”

“No one
likes
potato candy, Bridget.” Mr. Nelson rubbed Lovey behind the ears and then scrunched up his nose again. “Have you ever had potato candy, Winnie Girl?”

“I can't say that I have.”

“Do yourself a favor and keep it that way.” This time, when he gestured toward Winnie's notebook, he used his non cat-rubbing finger. “How 'bout something for a flu? Or when you're feeling all hot and achy—”

Hot?

From a flu—

“That's it! Mr. Nelson, you're a genius!”

Straightening in his chair, Mr. Nelson puffed out his chest with pride. “Ah, Winnie, you shouldn't.”

“You're right, she shouldn't.” Bridget yanked the hem of her housecoat across the top of her vein-ridden upper shin and then pinned Winnie with an indignant stare. “You're calling
Parker
a genius?”

“Yes! A rescue squad surely needs something for someone
with the flu!” Winnie recovered her pen from its resting spot beside one of Mr. Nelson's captured pawns, slipped off the cap, and began to write. “Lava-Hot Fever Cupcakes or—no! I'll make it Lava-Hot Fever Mini Bundt Cakes and they can come in all sorts of varieties—dark chocolate, milk chocolate, white chocolate . . . Whatever the customer wants.”

A quick flash of his tongue in Bridget's direction was followed by yet another puff of Mr. Nelson's chest and a slow nod at Winnie. “Unlike potato candy,
that's
somethin' folks would actually want to eat, isn't it, Winnie Girl?”

Bridget scooted forward on the rocker, rose to her feet with nary a grunt or groan, and turned, hands on hips. “I declare you insufferable, Parker Nelson!”

Declare?

“You sit there, playing chess with yourself for hours on end and—”

“Wait,” Winnie said, waving her hands between the pair. “Say that again. Please.”

Bridget removed her left hand from her hip and used it to point at the man seated in front of her. “Gladly. You are insufferable, Parker Nelson!”

“Did we really need to hear that again?” Mr. Nelson asked, peering around Bridget to afford a better view of Winnie. “My hearing aid is on full volume.”

Again, Winnie waved her hands. “No. No. Not that part. The other part. About declaring . . .”

“Oh. Right.” Bridget narrowed her eyes on the cat-stealing elderly man. “I
declare
you insufferable, Parker Nelson.”

“I declare,” Winnie repeated. “Yes! I—I D'éclairs!”

Bridget slid her irritation onto Winnie. “
What
do you declare?”

“I don't know. Anything!” Powered by another burst of enthusiasm, Winnie turned the page of her notebook and began to write. “A pregnancy, an engagement, a promotion—anything!”

“I don't understand.”

She looked up from her latest menu addition and gave in to the smile she felt building inside her chest. “Éclairs. Only I'll call them I D'éclairs. The customer can decide what they're declaring.”

Mr. Nelson hooked his index finger underneath Lovey's chin and gently guided the cat's sleepy eyes up to look at his own. “How can you hiss at someone who smiles like that, you silly girl?”

“Because Winnie hasn't
been
smiling like that these last few days,” Bridget said. “She's been quiet—too quiet, if you ask me. Maybe her sciatic nerve is acting up. I get quiet when mine is acting up.”

“Can you let me know when that's happening? Because I'll need to hit the store for some blankets before all them folks in hell snatch 'em all up.” Mr. Nelson slapped the side of his leg and laughed—a big hearty sound that only deepened the reddish hue now branching out across Bridget's otherwise pale complexion. “Get it, Winnie Girl? The day Bridget is quiet is the day hell will have officially frozen over!”

Winnie stopped writing. “Sure, sure, I get it. But I
have
been smiling . . .” When Bridget shook her head, Winnie maneuvered her own around Bridget's midsection to get a better view of a still-chuckling Mr. Nelson. “Haven't I?”

Bridget reached down, plucked Lovey off the elderly man's lap, wrapped her arms around the cat, and proceeded to whisper something in its ear. The fact that Winnie was able to pick out “Parker,” “deaf,” and “senile” among the whispered words was a pretty good indication Bridget hadn't found the whole hell-freezing-over thing nearly as amusing as Mr. Nelson had.

Eventually, though, Bridget returned her focus to Winnie. “Now don't worry, dear. Parker and I know what's wrong. And we're here for you. Just like always.”

Tightening her hold on her now-capped pen, Winnie
ping-ponged her attention between her aging friends. Sure enough, their faces both sported the same concern.

For her.

“Nothing is wrong. I swear.” Winnie stood, crossed to the porch railing, and then turned and leaned against it so she could see both of her friends at the same time. Only now, their concern had morphed into something that looked a lot like skepticism. “
What
? I mean it! Nothing is wrong. Sure, getting the Emergency Dessert Squad off the ground is exhausting in some ways, but it's proving to be a whole lot of fun, too. I mean, think about it. I'm still baking just like I've always wanted to do and now, because of the whole ambulance theme, I'm getting to come up with all these crazy names and new recipes. I'm living my dream. Truly.”

Bridget exchanged a knowing glance with Mr. Nelson.

“
What
?” Winnie heard the exasperation on the edges of her voice and did her best to rein it in. “
What
am I not doing? What am I not saying?”

Bridget lowered herself and Lovey into Winnie's chair and began to rock ever so gently. “We may be old, and Parker, here, might be nearly deaf, but we're not blind, Winnie. Not yet, anyway.”

“I don't understand.” And it was true. She didn't. Mr. Nelson and Bridget might as well have been speaking in tongues . . .

“That young man of yours hasn't been coming around the last week or so,” Bridget said.

Mr. Nelson nodded. “I could talk to her if you want. See if something I say might make a difference.”

“
Her
?” Winnie echoed in confusion. “Who's—”

“The daughter,” Mr. Nelson clarified. “Your young man's daughter.”

Bridget's dramatic exhale had Lovey on her feet and off the elderly woman's lap in less than a second. “What do you think you can say or do that is going to get through to a sixteen-year-old girl, Parker? Sit on a whoopee cushion
and hope the sound of a seventy-five-year-old man pretending to pass gas makes her grow up and start thinking of someone other than herself? Please. Let's pose solutions that actually have merit.”

“And you think setting Winnie up on a blind date with the nephew of someone in your crocheting group has merit?”

Winnie parted company with the railing, her hands splayed outward in front of her chest. “Hold on a minute. Jay not coming around the last few days isn't because of any
problem
.”

“Does that mean the girl is thawing to you?” Mr. Nelson asked.

She stopped herself, mid-snort, as Lovey looked up at her from the porch floor and hissed.

Blinking through the threatening tears, Winnie looked over her shoulder at the ambulance parked in her driveway and willed its Emergency Dessert Squad logo to help steady her breath. At thirty-four years of age, Winnie was blessed with a whole posse of good friends. Granted, the majority of them were over the age of seventy, but still, they'd brought her a great deal of happiness. Yet, when it came to men and dating, things had been a little different (or, nonexistent, as her friend and Dessert Squad employee, Renee, had been all too quick to point out whenever an opportunity did—or didn't—present itself).

That had all changed, however, when she met her first Emergency Dessert Squad customer, Jay Morgan, six weeks earlier. The business professor at Silver Lake College had placed an order as a way to check out Winnie's one-of-a-kind business idea. And from that first moment, they'd clicked. The only snafu in the mix? Jay's sixteen-year-old daughter, Caroline.

“Winnie?” Bridget prodded.

Inhaling the courage she needed, she returned her focus to Mr. Nelson and his lingering question. “No. There's no
thawing.” She swallowed back the lump now threatening her ability to keep speaking and forced herself to continue, her voice vacillating between raspy and downright difficult to hear even by her own ears. “But that's not why Jay hasn't been coming around.”

She closed her eyes in the wake of her own words—words she wanted to believe more than anything else. Yet, try as she did to buy what she was selling, there was no ignoring the voice in her head that kept posing the same two questions over and over again . . .

Why
hadn't
Jay come around?

Why
hadn't
Jay returned either of her calls over the last thirty-six hours?