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“No, I mean what are you even doing here? Are you trying to destroy everything I’ve worked so hard for?” She sniffled.
“Why would you think that?”
She repeated my question under in her breath in a mocking tone. I couldn’t help but frown. Was she having some sort of breakdown?
“Why would you think that?” I repeated.
“Well, I’ve lost the contest because of my ankle.”
“You haven’t lost the contest. It hasn’t happened yet, and I’ve told you the ankle was an accident.”
“Really? Are you sure about that?” She turned and looked at me, her eyes full of anger.
I didn’t know what she was referring to, but I had not tripped her on purpose, that much I knew. “Yes, I’m sure.”
“Well, it sure looked like it was on purpose. I watched the entire thing, from about fifteen different angles online. Just look…” She reached into her pocket and shoved her phone at me.
I took the phone from her small hand and watched the screen. There it was. I had relaxed back and crossed my legs out in front of me just as she went to walk across the stage. She was right; from watching this, it certainly looked like I had done it on purpose. Her eyes were fixed ahead of her, a smile on her face, and then there were cookies everywhere and she was on the ground.
“Well, of course, this looks that way…” I said, swallowing hard, staring at the screen until she pulled the phone from my hand.
“Well if that isn’t enough to prove it to you, all you need to do is watch the fourteen other videos. Honestly, I should sue you for damages.”
I looked at her, praying to God she didn’t go down that road. I had nothing—absolutely nothing. It would be pointless for her to do that.
“Then there is this,” she said, shoving the phone back from me.
I stood there, not saying anything, waiting for her to show me the next thing.
“Here.” She shoved the phone at me again.
I looked at the screen and the picture of messed-up boxes of cookies. “What’s that?” I questioned.
“What’s that?” she questioned in a mocking tone. “These are the orders that were sent out to customers. They are a complete disaster!” she cried.
“Well, surely, you aren’t blaming me for this?”
She glared at me. “Who do you think I’m going to blame?”
“The post office.” I shrugged and gave her a cocky grin, certain that she would move the blame from me to the postal service.
“Right, yes, what on earth was I thinking. I’ve only been doing this longer than a year, every order arriving in perfect shape, until now, and I am suddenly going to blame the post office!” she yelled, pocketing her phone.
“Well, I don’t see how you can blame me.”
“You do realize that I’ve spoken to Melinda. I know you’re the one who packs the boxes—every single box. I also know that you have not followed any one of the directions in my book, which is the least you could do.”
“I thought they were… more of a guideline.”
Brooke just stood there, staring at me. “You know, Tristan, you don’t run a bakery. In fact, I have no idea what it is you have done in your life. I don’t even know if you actually graduated school or not, but I do know that you clearly are not qualified to work in this kind of environment. You may as well just leave, if this is all the help you’re going to be.”
I didn’t know what to say. Was she kicking me out? I stood there, just looking back at her, at her beautiful eyes. God she was even more gorgeous when she was angry.
“I can do better,” I said in a low voice, praying that she didn’t want me to really leave. I had nowhere to go. My credit card had been frozen due to non-payment, and my account was almost at its max. Vicki was still angry as hell at me, even more so since the video from the other day had gotten leaked. I was shocked she hadn’t fired me yet.
“Can you? Can you really? I don’t know if you know what it takes to get an account with Baking Crate, but I will say that they don’t let just anyone have one. It takes years of proving yourself, years of applying.”
I nodded. “Yes, I know. I was somewhat shocked to see you had one, actually. There are much bigger establishments that don’t have an account.”
