Shari was traveling with a delivery of two cakes that replicated sculptures by an up-and-coming artist that were being shown at a gallery in Bridgeport. Drake had closed himself in his office, making more moves where the bakery was concerned, no doubt. He was definitely dedicated to the business. As were the rest of the Draysons. They were a close-knit family, the business holding them as strong as their familial bond.
That left him and Belinda in the kitchen today to get out the orders. Carter was expected, but there was no exact time one could ever expect Carter. He worked his own hours, which were usually long and rigorous since he was always striving to achieve more, even though he was already a master at his craft.
“You don’t look funny,” he said when he’d closed the refrigerator, carrying the rolls of fondant over to the working table. “You look really cute in your Betty Boop apron.” It was an honest assessment, one he usually kept to himself. Today, however, Malik had the urge to go out on a limb.
“It was a gift,” she said, slapping her hands down over the apron. Too hard to be an attempt at wiping something off, more likely she thought she could erase Betty Boop’s voluptuously shaped body from the material.
“A very nice gift. Who gave it to you?” he asked as he worked.
Belinda had finally stopped touching the apron and obviously decided to get to work herself. There were two full sheet cakes on the other end of the table. She picked up a bowl of buttercream icing and a spatula and moved closer to the table, on the opposite side from Malik.
“My father.”
“You a Betty Boop fan?”
“Yes.”
It was cordial conversation, the likes of which he and Belinda had gone through on more than one occasion. It wasn’t normally this stiff, even though Belinda was not a fan of conversing while she was working. But Malik sensed there was something bothering her today. She was even more reserved than normal.
He retrieved a marble cutting board and rolled out the first layer of pea-green fondant. Using the rolling pin, he began the painstaking process of smoothing it out just another layer or so before he would drape it over the golf course cake he was working on.
“I can like Betty Boop if I want to. I’m not so stuck-up that I don’t know a simple cartoon character when it’s splattered on the front of my apron,” she said abruptly.
Malik had looked up at her, not speaking for a moment. She hadn’t even gazed at him, just kept scooping icing onto that spatula and gently smoothing it onto the cake. It was amazing how much pent-up emotion she was holding on to. He could see it in the stiffness of her shoulders, the stern set of her lips. And yet, her hands were supersteady, smoothing icing in lengthy strokes, making sure the cake was covered evenly.
“You can like whatever you want. That makes you decisive, not stuck-up.” And yet he wondered who’d called her stuck-up, and if they’d had the guts to do so to her face.
“Right,” she said slapping the spatula into the icing bowl. She turned the cake, surveying it.
“If you tell me who, I’ll gladly punch the person who called you stuck-up,” he offered with a serious face. “Providing it’s not a female.”
The edge of her lips twitched and he knew she wanted to smile. He’d seen her smile before, had received a sucker punch to his gut each time. This one, albeit small, was hard earned. Something was really bothering her.
“It’s not worth it,” she said with a shrug of her shoulders. “His loss.”
The last was spoken in a softer tone. So much so Malik had barely heard it. After only a few minutes of trying to phrase his question just right, he asked, “So a guy you were dating called you stuck-up. Why? Because you weren’t into him?”
She’d been making sure the tip was properly attached to the tube and had just been about to apply the border to the cake when she paused. Her head turned to the side and she looked at him. Even on Belinda the white hair caps they were required to wear at all times in the kitchen looked cute.
“How did you know it was a man?”
“Because you’re not the type of female to get bothered by what another female says about you. Besides, if it were a female, you would have simply cursed her out and kept it moving.”
She chuckled. “You’re right about that.”
He’d seen Belinda tear down jealous females with a look and a few words spoken in the coolest voice. She wasn’t the screaming and hollering type, nor was she into physical altercations. But she was no doormat, either. Anybody coming at her with smart words should prepare to get an earful. So it had to be a man that had said this to her. A dumb-ass man that most likely needed an eye-opener to see the error of his ways. Malik would be more than happy to open his eye for him—or close it permanently.
“It’s nothing. Just another date gone wrong. I should probably start my own reality show. Surely my love life is entertaining at best.”
Her love life. How long had Malik been thinking about Belinda’s love life? Too damned long. Belinda Drayson-Jones was not on the list of available women for him—no matter how attracted to her he was. How attracted to her he had been for some time now. But pursuing her would go against too many of his rules on dating, namely the no-drama rule. If he went after Belinda, Carter would totally go off. The men in this family were very protective of their women. And as his best friend, Carter would definitely have strong feelings about a relationship between Malik and Belinda—especially with Carter’s never-mix-work-with-pleasure rule. And then there was the fact that Belinda was Lillian’s favorite granddaughter. No secret there. The matriarch doted on everything Belinda did, because everything she did was always right.
Still, he couldn’t stop himself from saying, “You’re dating the wrong guys.”
“Tell me about it,” was her reply.
“Okay, I will.” He smiled to keep things on this light tone. “Just because he comes from a good family, with money and stature, has a high-paying job and drives a fancy car doesn’t mean he should be a candidate.”
“That is not how I select my dates.”
Malik gave her a knowing look. “You’re not going to date any man you think will tarnish the Drayson family name. So in your mind the man for you has to be influential, accomplished, handsome and debonair. Those are all superficial traits, flimsy as the society pages that describe him that way. Hence, big mistake for you.”
“Malik, really? Do you think I select men from the society pages? You make me sound desperate.”
“Not at all,” he said shaking his head. “You’re too beautiful to be desperate.”
Now, that was a first. Malik wasn’t shy when it came to women; he’d just been careful to stay in his lane where Belinda was concerned. With that comment he’d just swerved into the left lane and had to regain his control to keep from crashing.
“That’s sort of what he said. Apparently I’m also too beautiful to be so stuck-up.”
“Like I said, he’s an idiot. Which means you made a bad choice.”
“Apparently beauty has nothing to do with that that, huh?” she asked.
Malik wanted to let this conversation drop. He’d never talked to Belinda about the men in her life before. Actually, he’d made a point not to discuss that with her. Pity parties weren’t his thing so thinking about the woman he’d never had was a pastime he tried to do without.
She’d finished the yellow border of the cake and was just about to line up the previously made sugar roses when one of them slipped from her spatula and landed on the table instead of the cake. She cursed, her lips drawn tightly as she retrieved the rose that hadn’t been harmed and put it in its