The other side housed several offices that were used to conduct bakery business and a storage room for the extra bakeware and packaging materials. The front area comprised the showroom, which faced Michigan Avenue.
As he walked up the hallway, Carter strolled past framed photographs of Lillian’s throughout the years, starting with his grandmother holding Uncle Dwight in her arms in front of the modest first storefront on Chicago’s South Side, and ending with the family picture they took outside the Michigan Avenue store when Lillian’s was featured in a local magazine last year. The rich marble facade of this location was a far cry from the little nondescript building where Lillian’s had first gotten its start.
“Carter.”
Carter stopped and turned at the sound of his father’s voice.
“What’s up?” Carter asked.
Devon Drayson did not look as if he was in the mood for exchanging idle chitchat. “Why are you just getting here?” he asked.
“Had a long night,” Carter answered with a grin. “Believe me, it was worth walking in an hour late.”
“An hour and a half,” his father corrected him. “Carter, when are you going to start taking your work seriously?”
His spine straightened in protest. “I do take my work seriously. Do you know how many people come to Lillian’s specifically requesting that I design their cakes? My work brings in more business than anyone else around here.”
“I’m not discounting your talent, just your work ethic. You should have been here to open the bakery early this morning, not strolling in hours late as if you don’t have a care in the world.”
This from the king of the carefree lifestyle. His father had perfected bachelorhood, never even coming close to marrying. Yet he had the nerve to talk about how Carter lived his life?
“I know what it’s like to be young and single, but there comes a time when you have to think about the long-term, Carter.” His father took a step closer and lowered his voice. “You know that your grandparents will soon let go of the reins of this business. Now, do you want a piece of it?”
Carter was tempted to say no, but that would only cause him more grief. The truth was, he’d been questioning a lot lately whether he still wanted to be a part of the family business.
He had never felt as if he was as much a part of Lillian’s as his cousins were, and he placed much of the blame squarely on the shoulders of the man standing before him. After all, it was his father’s fault that Carter was the only illegitimate grandchild. As the only bastard of the bunch, Carter had always felt as if he had to work extra hard to prove that he belonged.
His grandparents had never made him feel like an outsider, but Carter knew they didn’t approve of his father’s perpetual bachelorhood. The fact that his father had never married Carter’s mother had been the subject of many disagreements over the years.
But that was his father’s issue. Carter had nothing to do with that. He was a part of the bakery’s legacy, too, dammit.
“I have as much stake in Lillian’s as the others do,” Carter said.
“Then start acting like it,” his father demanded. “You need to show everyone in this family that you are committed to this business.”
“Maybe the family needs to show that they’re committed to me,” he countered, letting the frustration he normally hid behind a carefree smile rise to the surface. “I didn’t have the advantage of growing up on the great Drayson Estate the way Belinda and Drake did. I wasn’t there every Sunday afternoon like Monica and Shari. Yet I put just as much time into Lillian’s as they do. No, I put in more. I bust my ass for this business. So, tell me, Dad, does the family value my input? Does everyone here realize just what I bring to the table?”
“Don’t get full of yourself, Carter. You may be a good baker, but there are others out there. Just because you have Drayson blood running through your veins doesn’t mean you get an automatic pass. You need to straighten up, or you’re going to find yourself cut out of this business.”
With that his father turned and went back into the sales office.
Carter stood in the hallway for several minutes, trying like hell to rein in his fury. He was damned tired of always having to defend himself. From his teenage days, when he’d worked as a delivery boy, to now, as one of the head bakers, he’d given Lillian’s one hundred percent of himself. But his best never seemed good enough for his family.
Carter thought about the phone call he’d received last week from a representative of Robinson Restaurants, one of the hottest restaurant conglomerates on the East Coast. The man Carter had spoken to had been extremely interested in Lillian’s, and specifically in what Carter had accomplished as the bakery’s premier artisan cake designer. When he’d asked if Carter would be interested in becoming the executive pastry chef for the Robinson Restaurants Group’s flagship New York location, he had been floored.
The offer had warranted some serious soul searching. He was torn between loyalty to his family’s business and the appeal of finally being somewhere where his work was appreciated. Discussions like the one he’d just had with his father did nothing but tip the scales in New York’s favor.
Despite what Devon believed, Carter knew there wasn’t a damn thing wrong with his work ethic. He put his heart and soul into Lillian’s, pulling sixty-hour workweeks, spending his time off at home working on his decorating technique. He loved this business, but he wasn’t sure the feeling was mutual.
Oh, he had no doubts his family loved him, but did they value him? Maybe it would take his leaving to show them just how much he was worth to Lillian’s.
* * *
The emergency meeting for which his grandmother had summoned the Drayson grandchildren turned out to be a slightly beefed-up version of their normal weekly status report, with the exception of a more in-depth discussion of Lillian’s involvement in You Take the Cake, a reality TV show their family had agreed to participate in. His aunt Daisy had flown to Los Angeles to meet with the show’s producers and sign the contract. Lillian’s was officially on board.
Unfortunately, so was Brown Sugar Bakery, owned and operated by onetime Lillian’s employee and ultimate backstabber Dina English. Dina was a four-letter word in more ways than one around this kitchen. Carter was personally looking forward to annihilating Brown Sugar Bakery on national television. He could only hope there would be tears involved.
After the meeting, his younger cousin Shari approached him. Like the rest of the Drayson clan, Shari had come up in the ranks at the bakery. She, too, specialized in cakes, along with Lillian’s ever-popular gourmet cupcakes.
“Have you finalized the details for the event at Lincoln Park Zoo?” Shari asked.
Carter nodded. “We’re providing four cakes in all. A Bengal tiger, a silverback gorilla, a giraffe and a Nicobar pigeon. One of my former classmates is loaning me a few of his students from the culinary school he just opened. We’re going to transport the tiger, gorilla and pigeon, but the giraffe will have to be constructed on-site.”
“Sounds as if you have everything under control.”
“I always have things under control,” Carter snapped, grimacing at the unwarranted bite in his tone. He blamed the earlier conversation
