I’m letting you off the hook.”
“I don’t need to be let off the hook. I’m letting you off the hook. Isn’t this messing with your busy social calendar, anyway?”
“Nothing could be more important than this,” he said. “How did you get time off, anyway? Your mom’s always complaining that you hardly ever can get away from work.”
“Well, I did this time,” she said and then cleared her throat. “And I happen to have a lot of experience with running a business. You know, purchase orders and employee benefits and such. Just like you have in your type of job. All the outdoorsy stuff you do as Ranger Logan.”
Logan couldn’t keep his jaw from tightening, but this wasn’t the time for him to clear up her confusion about his job because he had a more important point to make. “So, exactly how many wedding cakes have you made?”
“Uh…none.”
“Just as many as I have.”
This time she rolled her eyes at him just the way she used to when they were kids and he told one of his knock-knock jokes. “You don’t have to be able to decorate the cakes to run this kind of business.”
Logan tapped an index finger against his cheek. “So I should do just fine by myself.”
“Why are you being so stubborn? You’re being just like you were when you were six, and you didn’t want to wait for your turn for board games. It’s almost June, the biggest wedding month of the year in Markston, and you’re wasting time arguing with me instead of working with me.”
She took a few steps toward him, pinning him with a look that would have made him straighten up and fly right when he was a kid. But because they were adults now and he towered over her, Logan only stared her down.
“Yes, I know what June is.” He didn’t try to hide his irritation. “I’ve been around this business a long time. You’re wasting my time when I need to be getting up to speed on things. I told Mom I would do this, and I’m going to do it…alone.”
She fisted her hands at her sides. “You must be the most infuriating person who ever lived.”
“No, I think there are two of us.”
“I think you’re both right.”
At the sound of the third voice, Logan turned to look at the glass door that Caroline had unlocked. Trina Scott stood just inside it, her crossed arms over her chest.
Logan sighed. None of the employees had even arrived, and it was already looking as if he wasn’t cut out for the job he’d promised to do. But his brothers, Mrs. Scott and even Caroline were wrong to doubt him. Somehow, with God’s help, he planned to make this work.
Caroline stared at the floor avoiding her mother’s gaze, her cheeks burning. She was so shaken that several seconds had passed before her pulse slowed. It didn’t make sense. In the business world, she’d always been cooler than a cucumber on ice. No one had been able to get a rise out of her. Now, infuriatingly stubborn Logan Warren had done it without breaking a sweat.
Why couldn’t he just be gracious and accept the help he so obviously needed? In a bakery, a park ranger would be like a bull in a china shop anyway. But instead of being grateful for her offer, he’d insisted on asking questions about why she had the free time to come to Markston.
She’d hoped in the confusion regarding his mother’s health crisis that no one would have time to wonder about her sudden availability. She hadn’t expected Logan Warren to be the observant type, but nearly as soon as he’d seen her, he’d zeroed in on the point she’d most hoped to hide.
What surprised her even more was she’d been tempted to share her whole humiliating story with him. Something about the way he’d studied her with those bright green, penetrating eyes had made her wonder if he could see how lost she felt. Maybe he understood because they shared that feeling of uncertainty in common.
“Will one of you explain what’s going on here?”
Her mother’s words pulled Caroline back from her strange thoughts. Where had they come from, anyway? Logan had enough on his mind with his own family crisis for him to concern himself with her problems. And for her to imagine that she had anything in common with ne’er-do-well Logan Warren demonstrated just how off-kilter she’d been the last few days.
“It was nothing,” Logan answered for the both of them. “Just a disagreement.”
“I can see that.” Trina tucked her chin-length brown hair behind her ears with all the care of someone who had a huge mane of it—or someone waiting for a better answer.
“What are you doing here, anyway?” Caroline asked.
“Refereeing apparently. I had hoped you two would work this out together, but…”
That her mother was standing inside the bakery rather than the hospital’s critical care unit made it clear she hadn’t trusted the two of them to find a way to work together.
“Sorry, Mom.”
“I’m sorry, too.” As Logan bent his head, his light brown hair fell across his eyes. “I know you were trying to help when you called Caroline, but—”
Trina shook her head to interrupt him. “Logan, stop right there. Your mother’s facing the crisis of her life, and all you can do is spend time arguing about whether you need my daughter’s help at the bakery?”
“I’m not trying to upset you, Mrs. Scott, but I have this under control. I already took leave from work.” He gestured toward Caroline. “We don’t both need to lose time at our jobs during Mom’s recovery.”
“That won’t be a problem.” Trina glanced sidelong at her daughter. “You didn’t tell him, did you?”
With heat scaling her neck and face, Caroline shook her head.
Her always matter-of-fact mother took a step toward Logan. “Because of the current economic downturn, investors pulled the financial backing on the Ultimate Center, and the whole project for the mega-mall that Caroline managed folded.”
“You lost your job?”
Caroline looked up to find Logan watching her. She pressed her lips together and nodded.
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Thanks.” His compassionate tone made her shift where she stood. Vulnerability was a new feeling for her, and she doubted she would ever wear it well.
“As soon as Caroline told me what had happened at work, I knew this would be perfect. God definitely has a plan here.”
“God wanted your daughter to lose her job?” The side of Logan’s mouth lifted.
“Oh, you know what I mean.” Trina waved away his usual attempt to be a class clown with a brush of her hand. “So it appears that you’re both available to work here, at least for a while. And it’s going to take both of you.”
He appeared to consider what she’d said. “Go on.”
“Okay,
