I jogged back inside and went straight for my cell phone. Without a moment of hesitation, I punched in Rosalind’s number. She picked up on the second ring.
“Rosalind, it’s Jules. Let’s do it!”
“You mean the property?”
“Yes! We want it.”
“That’s wonderful, but why the change of heart? I was under the impression after you saw the water damage the other day that you weren’t sure that you were interested in moving forward.”
“I wasn’t, but now I am.”
Her excitement came through on the line. “Wonderful. Absolutely wonderful. I’ll submit the final application and let you know as soon as the committee makes its decision.”
I thanked her and hung up. A wave of regret washed over me for not consulting Mom. While she had said it was ultimately my decision, we were a team and I had acted rashly. Hopefully, Mom would definitely agree with me that we couldn’t let Richard Lord get his greedy hands on the property.
“Have a minute?” the installer called from the kitchen.
“Sure,” I replied, sticking my phone back in my purse and hurrying to the kitchen. The ovens were installed and gleamed under the bright overhead lights. My throat caught, and I had to blink back a tear. Between the freshly painted walls, rearranged freestanding shelves, and the shiny ovens, the kitchen looked brand-new. “Wow! That was fast.”
The installer tucked a pencil behind his ear. “Yeah, this was an easy job. I want to walk you through maintenance and everything before we take off.” He proceeded to show me all of the additional features the ovens offered, like the adjustable and removable chrome-plated racks and a switch that automatically turned the fan and heating element off when the doors were opened. In addition to having functional ovens, the new models would fire up much more quickly than our old machines.
Once I was up to speed on all the bells and whistles, the installers gave me their card—the ovens were under warranty so on the off chance that anything went wrong, they would come out and make any necessary repairs. After they left I did a dance of joy around the island and touched all the buttons on the ovens. I couldn’t wait to take them for a test-drive, but I needed to get back to Ashland Springs and help Mom pack up our booth. I knew there was no way I was sleeping tonight, so after dinner I planned to come back and try out the ovens before the Monday rush.
When I returned to the Chocolate Fest the organizers had already begun awarding winners in each category.
Mom waved me over and squeezed my arm. “How did it go?”
“They are in and ready for business.”
“That was fast.”
“I think those were my exact words to the guys who did the installation.”
She started to ask me something else, but Chef Garrison spoke to the crowd. “Thank you all for making this the most successful Chocolate Festival in recent memory. Before we get to the winners—which I know you’re all waiting to hear—I want to share some numbers with you.” He took an index card that one of the other organizers handed him. “We had over three thousand people through the doors this year.”
The crowd gasped.
He nodded enthusiastically. “That’s right. Give yourselves a round of applause.”
Everyone clapped. I spotted Bethany and Carter standing shoulder to shoulder near the Confections Couture booth. She gave me a friendly wave. Carter looked from her to me and then elbowed her in the waist. She dropped her hand and whipped her head toward the stage. That was odd. I wondered what was going on with the two of them, but Chef Garrison was revving up the crowd.
“Do you want to know how that equates to chocolate?” He waited for the crowd to settle down before continuing. “The chocolate numbers are pretty impressive too. By our count over one thousand pounds of chocolate were served this weekend. That’s two and half million calories in chocolate.”
“Time to get back to my morning runs,” I whispered to Mom. “I think I sampled at least a pound on my own.”
“Me too.” Mom pinched her narrow waist.
“Now, what you’ve all been waiting for,” Chef Garrison said, holding up a large envelope. “The results!” He ripped open the envelope and proceeded to announce the winners of the secondary awards. After each vendor took their chocolate trophies, he held up two envelopes. “And, for our final two awards. First, the People’s Choice award goes to…” He slowly opened the envelope, peeked inside, and then announced, “Torte!”
Mom looked at me in shock. Her eyes were wide. “We won? Did he really just say Torte?”
“Yes!” I nodded. “Go, go up there,” I said, pushing her toward the stage.
She beamed as she accepted the People’s Choice award and started to leave, when Chef Garrison stopped her. “Wait a minute. We’ll want to get a photo with you and the winner of the Best in Show.” Mom caught my eye and beamed with delight as she cradled the trophy in her arms. I was thrilled for her; no one deserved recognition for their work more than Mom.
“Without any further delay, it is my pleasure to announce that this year’s Best in Show winner is, drum roll, please…” Chef Garrison made a drumming sound on the podium before opening the last envelope. He looked at the certificate and then to Mom. “Torte!”
Mom’s jaw dropped. I jumped up and down and cheered as loud as I could while the crowd applauded around me. Chef Garrison hugged her and a photographer snapped photos of her. We had won Best in Show and the People’s Choice award. I couldn’t believe it but soaked up every second of watching Mom have her moment of glory on the stage. People congratulated us as Mom and I walked in a daze back to our booth.
“We won? We really won? I still can’t believe it.” Mom handed me the chocolate trophies. “You are the one who should have gone up on stage to take these.”
“No way. That was all for you. You’ve built Torte and made it is what is today. Torte wouldn’t even exist if it weren’t for you.”
Mom grabbed me into a hug and we danced around the booth. “We won!” she finally squealed when she released me. “And we won because of you—don’t even try to sneak out of taking credit.”
Photographers from the Ashland and Medford newspapers snapped our picture, asking us each to hold one of the trophies and pose behind our wedding cake display. I directed their questions to Mom and stayed back, forcing her to answer. After our mini media blitz, the organizers came by to offer their congratulations again and informed us that the ballroom was being used for an evening wedding.
“Things went longer than we expected, and we need to set up for the wedding immediately. Go ahead and take anything you can now,” she said. “Our maintenance team will take care of the rest. I’ve assigned one staff member to each vendor. All vendor items will be boxed and waiting for you in the storage area.” She pointed to a team of staff members already tearing down the Chocolate Fest banners and wheeling in carts to stack tables and chairs. “The storage area is through the back doors and down the hall. If you want to access it from the alley, just stop by the reception desk and they’ll give you a temporary key. You can come back this evening or tomorrow—whatever is most convenient for you.”
“Guess we’re off the hook from packing up.” Mom grinned and stacked the empty pots of sauces in a cardboard box.
“We don’t have that much stuff. All of our samples are gone. The big issue is going to be the wedding cakes. I can take one now, but we’ll have to come back for the others.”
“Leave them in the cake boxes. I think they’ll be fine. Plus, this means we can go see Torte and have a double celebration tonight—new ovens and winners of the Chocolate Fest.”
Grabbing as many supplies as we could, we packed one large cardboard box and the tiered cake. We left the rest for the hotel staff and headed out through a frenzy of activity. Half of the vendor tables near the front of the ballroom had already been disassembled and loaded onto carts. One staff member vacuumed while two others arranged round tables.
“They aren’t wasting any time,” Mom commented.
“I’m surprised that they would schedule events back-to-back like that. We weren’t that late, were we?” I answered my own question as we stepped outside into darkness. “Maybe we were that late, what time is it?”
Mom hoisted the box of supplies. “I can’t see my watch, but it has to be after five, maybe even six. We did go long. I wonder why they let that happen.”
“Yeah, weird.” I balanced the cake box as we walked to the bakeshop. “Mom, there’s something I have to tell you.”
“Uh-oh, that doesn’t sound good.”
“It’s not bad, at least I hope you won’t think it’s bad.”
She stopped and looked me straight in the eye. “Did something go wrong with the ovens? I thought you said installation was a breeze.”
“No, it’s not the ovens. Just wait, you’ll see in a minute—they are amazing. I can’t wait to test them out tonight. No, it’s about the basement property.”
“Okay.” Mom gave me an expectant look.
“I called Rosalind this afternoon and told her that we want it.”
“You did?”
I grimaced. “Are you mad? I didn’t mean to do it without talking to you one more time, but I found out that Richard Lord is trying to get his hands on the space. I couldn’t stomach the thought of having him anywhere near Torte, and before I even realized what I was doing I was dialing Rosalind’s number. I’m really sorry.”
“Richard Lord wants the property?” Mom’s eyes were wide.
“Yeah.”
She smiled. “I would have done the same thing, honey. If I wasn’t holding this box, I would kiss you. Good work.”
“You’re sure?”
“Positive. We already talked about it—the brick oven, expanding our operations, all of it will be great. I know it’s what you want. You know it too. Richard was simply the nudge you needed to make this happen.”
“Mom, you’re the best,” I sighed as we continued down the street.
“Now we have three things to celebrate tonight. I can’t wait.”