Chapter 45

Rachel

I paced. I swear I was wearing a path in Megan’s floor.

“Rachel. Come have some tea.” Megan’s voice was weary as she put two mugs on the table.

“Megan, I hate this. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it.” Wolf was jumpy. We were agitated. We were anxious and unsettled.

“I know.” She plopped down at the table. “I’m nervous for you. I know how I’d feel if it were Sam.”

Sam glanced back at his wife, concern on his face, before staring back out the window. We were all on edge.

“Okay. Let’s bake.” Megan got back up from the table and started getting bowls out. Relief swept through me. Something constructive I could do.

“I hope you have a lot of flour stashed away,” I commented dryly as I put the measuring cups on the counter.

“Maybe we can pretend to be focused on business and college stuff while we create.” Megan gave me a wry smile. I returned it.

“For sure.”

Cookies, a batch of biscotti, and rising bread dough later, I felt better. My stomach was still all tangled up in knots, but at least some of the tension riding in my shoulders had released.

“Better?” Meg asked.

“Some.” I put the cover back on the bowl of bread dough and set it on the counter closer to the oven so it would rise nice and fluffy.

“So I wasn’t entirely kidding when I was talking about college stuff. In between training and all, I have managed to do a little research.”

“Seriously? This sounds like another good distraction. Haul out all your notes. Let’s take a peek.”

Sam chuckled. “Meg, is it okay if I eat a few of these oatmeal cookies? Are you saving them for anything?”

“Nope. Go right ahead.” Megan smiled at him as she grabbed her laptop and sat down on the couch. She patted the seat next to her and I plopped accordingly.

“Did you make a spreadsheet?” My lips twisted up again as Megan pulled up a spreadsheet of business courses offered at the three closest community colleges.

“I did. Look. These here in blue are my favorite of the offerings. I think these are going to give us the best selection of what we want for the bakery business.”

I perused the blue courses. They did appear inclusive. “How about the pink ones? Next favorite?”

“Yep. These all sounded pretty good, too, but they don’t offer anything related to baking specifically. And the courses in green, that program doesn’t have as strong a marketing course. The other perk about doing the blue route—that’s at Tri-Falls College—is that they have an on-site culinary program. Sometimes they host demo nights for students. They do baking ones. I thought that might be helpful and make up for the fact that they’re fifteen minutes farther away.”

“I like the idea of the culinary demos. I bet we could befriend some students for some additional tips. Maybe even find someone to hire on part-time to help with stuff if Raven gets too busy with her graphics design stuff.”

“So you like Tri-Falls?”

“Looking at these courses, I think this sounds great.”

“Yes! Let’s pull up application forms and get on it. Right now!”

We high-fived each other. One step closer to opening Nutmeg & Crumbs.

But still so far away from Kyp.