Frosting Her Christmas Cookies - Alina Jacobs Page 0,33

or hate being here. This is a lot of effort to put in for a Christmas show.”

“Someone has to uphold artistic integrity,” I sniffed as I began the tedious process of melting down sugar.

Jonathan looked alarmed. “You’re not going to make Jell-O shots, are you?”

I smirked at him. “You mean you don’t want your Christmas desserts à la fraternity party? I would have thought that was your jam: staying up all night drinking and fornicating with undiscerning abandon.”

“I’ll have you know I’m very particular about who I sleep with,” he retorted.

I raised an eyebrow as I checked the temperature of the sugar. “Uh-huh. Is that why all those pictures are up online with you stumbling into town cars with various girls whose names I bet you don’t even know but yet you bring them back to your condo?”

“Hell no, I don’t sleep with women in my house. We do it at theirs or in the club or in a hotel. I never, ever bring them to my condo. Never. It’s a terrible idea,” he said, shaking his head.

“With an attitude like that, I’m shocked you still have a fan base,” I remarked as I stirred the sugar. “But then, some people are so easily impressed and would do anything to sleep with a billionaire.”

“Or maybe you’re just jealous,” he joked, leaning in too close to me. “I can get you drunk and fuck you in a town car if you’d like.”

I was glad I was wearing all that makeup, because I went red. “I’m sure I’m not missing much.”

“Don’t you want to find out?” he asked in a low voice.

I swallowed. The way he was looking at me—like he wanted me more than any other woman—let’s just say that if no one else had been around, I might have just let the sugar burn and taken him up on his offer. No man had ever looked at me like I was desirable before.

“I need to finish my dessert,” I croaked.

Jonathan grinned, winked, and then went over to another contestant.

I glanced over at him in between adding in a bit of cream of tartar and corn syrup then set about stirring slowly. He was flirting with the bachelorette two tables down from mine. The way the contestant was giggling and batting her eyes at him, he was clearly turning on the charm.

I stirred my sugar mixture furiously.

Did you seriously think he actually wanted anything to do with you? I scolded myself. Jonathan clearly doesn’t want someone who dresses up as a nightmare creature. He wants someone soft with big boobs and a sexy outfit who will stroke his ego and tell him how awesome he is.

Just forget him. Win this contest then win the scholarship.

I paused in mid-stir.

Win the contest? I needed to be out of the contest. But a part of me desperately wanted to show up Keeley. She was so sure she was better than me, that she was going to beat me again.

I wanted to trounce her, and I was sure my cake was going to do it. I was planning on serving cognac three ways. The first was in a royal Manhattan with an alcohol-infused cranberry. The second was in a cake that looked like the bottle of alcohol, for which I had brought in a whole set of edible paints to make the cake look as lifelike as possible. The third was in a layered mousse dessert in a glass made out of sugar that was going to look identical to the cocktail but be a completely different experience.

Too bad I couldn’t just submit this dessert as my scholarship, I thought as I started heating another saucepan with a generous slosh of cognac and a handful of cranberries to start soaking.

I was concerned about the scholarship. I was still floundering around, trying to come up with a winning idea. This was while also anxiously waiting for information from the Getty museum to see if I had made it to the in-person interview round. I needed to assemble a portfolio that would be enough to impress my interviewer.

In between stirring and checking the temperature, I measured out the ingredients for my cake. I could have just made a standard yellow cake, but instead, I was going to make a layer cake with cognac-infused cream, chocolate ganache, and a cranberry reduction.

It took the sugar mixture about an hour to reach the boiling point. By that time, my cake was in the oven. I carefully poured the boiling candy