"Be my guest," Annabeth said warmly as she turned to lead Maggie into the depths of her bakery. "Let Hannah know if you want more coffee or anything else."
Annabeth's new equipment took up almost the entire back wall of her production area. It consisted of the dough laminator, which eliminated the strenuous work of rolling out and folding the multiple layers of cold butter and chilled dough that formed the basis for puff pastry, and a sleek cutting and rolling machine that took the lengths of laminated dough and swiftly shaped it into croissants, danishes, and other flaky items.
"Ooh, nice," Maggie said. "That laminator is life-changing, isn't it?"
The two of them exchanged grins. They both remembered grueling hours spent manually folding dough around rock-hard blocks of butter, and the effort involved in rolling it out, folding it, and rolling it out again, over and over.
Maggie had the advantage of a shifter's strength, but it had still been tedious and extremely time-consuming work, especially since you had to pause between rolling out each layer and refrigerate the whole thing to keep butter from softening too much before the pastry went in the oven.
From her own experience owning Cacao, she knew equipment like this, even used, didn't come cheap. Annabeth's business must be doing very well, and that made her happy for her friend.
Annabeth laughed ruefully. "After years of having to laminate dough by hand…this is absolutely the best investment I ever made! And my chocolate and huckleberry jam-filled croissants are giving my cinnamon rolls a run for their money these days."
"I'm happy for you," Maggie said. "And it's amazing to see what you've done with this place. When I was growing up, Frank's Bakery was good, but always kind of dingy."
Annabeth's dimples reappeared. "And I'm happy for you," she said. "Maggie, Steve's a keeper. Don't let this one get away!"
Maggie's inner jaguar spoke up. She's right, you know. Why won't you let him court us?
It was getting more and more difficult to come up with a good reason not to date him for real.
After all, Steve had defended her when her own brother had been willing to look the other way because he didn't want to inconvenience himself.
We need someone we can trust, whispered her jaguar spirit. Someone who will have our back.
Maggie sighed. Bad enough that she was faking an engagement to her clan, necessary as it was. She hated that it was necessary to lie to her friend as well.
Small town, she reminded herself. Everyone gossips.
Not that Maggie was worried about Annabeth. But her assistant, Hannah, was a bear shifter, with a shifter's keen ears. She could probably hear everything that they were discussing right now.
"He's a great guy, but we've got a lot of stuff to work out," she said evasively. "Like the fact that we live and work in two different cities."
"I think you should keep an open mind," Annabeth urged.
"But—" Maggie began.
Annabeth interrupted. "Maggie, remember how, all those years ago, you told me not to be afraid to change my plans and to take a leap of faith in moving to Bearpaw Ridge?"
Maggie nodded.
"Well, look how things worked out for me." She smiled, her face glowing with the kind of happiness that Maggie ached to experience for herself. "And you're already engaged. If you love each other, then you should be able to work everything else out."
"I'll do my best," Maggie said, with a burst of insight. "It's not gonna be easy, but I hope we can make things work."
Because she couldn't lie to herself any longer. Truth was, she was looking forward to the big engagement party at the hotel tonight, because it would give her plenty of excuses to kiss Steve again.
Plenty of other people have managed to make long-distance relationships work out. Maybe it's not impossible.
Chapter 14
Slippery When Wet
When she and Steve returned to the hotel later that afternoon, Maggie wondered if she could squeeze in a nap.
After her difficulty falling asleep last night, and the shock of waking up in Steve's arms, she was starting to run out of steam.
And with the engagement party beginning in a few hours, she still had a long night ahead of her.
Back in their room, she unpacked her favorite cocktail dress and hung it up to see if she needed to touch it up with an iron before the party.
It was a peacock-colored confection with a knee-length pleated chiffon skirt and an A-line chiffon-and-lace top sprinkled with sequins.