At seven o’clock Berry turned the sign in the window to read closed.
Jake looked up from the cash register. “Something wrong?”
“We’re closing early tonight. We’re having a bon voyage party.”
Jake put his hand to her forehead. “You running a fever?”
Berry threw her baker’s apron on the counter. “Not yet, but the night is still young.”
“I like this kind of talk.”
“We need party stuff. Chips and dip and cheap champagne.”
“I feel like hiring a band.”
“I think you’ve done enough already. After all, you bought Mrs. Dugan’s cruise ticket.”
“You don’t know that for sure.”
Berry locked the front door behind them. “Are you going to deny it?”
“No. But I don’t think I want to admit to it, either.”
“You go across the street to Groman’s Bakery and see if you can get some sort of cake. Maybe you can persuade them to write something appropriate on it. I’ll get the champagne and munchies and meet you back here.”
Half an hour later they rendezvoused at the car. Jake held a large white baker’s box in his hands. “Wait until you see this terrific cake. Mrs. Schwartz got mad at her husband and canceled their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary party.”
“And you bought their cake?”
“I got a real good deal.”
Berry peeked inside. “There must be ten pounds of icing on this cake.”
“Mrs. Schwartz likes icing.”
Berry slid behind the wheel of the station wagon. “I’ll drive, you hold the icing.”
Jake settled the heavy box on his lap. “Why did you decide to do this? I was under the impression that nothing short of an invasion by aliens would get you to close the Pizza Place early.”
Berry twisted her hands on the wheel. “It was the look on Mrs. Dugan’s face. Like she was a little girl, and it was Christmas morning. She hadn’t expected anything that nice to ever happen to her again. It made peddling pizza sort of insignificant.”
The hand that touched her cheek was gentle. It tangled in the hair behind her ear and caressed her neck. “You deserve nice things, too. If I gave you a cruise, would you go on it?”
“Don’t even think about it. No more cruises!”
“Maybe we could go on a cruise for our honeymoon.”
“Honeymoon?”
The car careened into the wrong lane and thumped against the curb, causing the cake to fly off Jake’s lap, smash into the dashboard, and flip over onto Jake’s feet. Berry came to a screeching halt, looking first at Jake’s chalk-white face and then at his brand-new loafers, buried under a mountain of icing. Berry clapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh, crud.”
Jake plucked a gooey piece of cake from his trouser leg and tasted it. “Not bad.”
Berry reached down and lifted a sizable lump from his cuff. “Yum, cherry filling between the layers.”
“Mrs. Schwartz knows what she’s doing when it comes to ordering cake.”
“Ah, about the honeymoon. You did say honeymoon?”
“Mmmm. Remember my plan. Kids and dogs and a wife and stuff? Not necessarily in that order. Man, this cake is great.” He offered her a piece from the dashboard. “You have to try this. One of the layers was chocolate.”
“Are you serious?”
“Of course. I wouldn’t kid about chocolate cake.”
Berry felt the cake flipping around in her stomach. “Kids and dogs and wife and stuff?”
“I told you about it in the basement the other day.”
“Number one… you’re ignoring my plan. And number two… of all the nerve! You just don’t assume these things. What about a proposal?”
Jake licked the cake from his finger. “If I asked you to marry me, what would you say?”
“No!”
“Exactly. I decided my best shot was to hang around and make myself lovable and indispensable.”
She squinched her eyes closed and slapped herself on the forehead. “Unk.”
“How do you do that? How do you make that sort of strangled sound in your throat?” Jake asked.
When she stopped the car he was going to find out. She was going to place her fingers on his neck and squeeze until he made his very own strangling sounds. It would be okay. She was sure the judge would understand.
She pulled into the garage and reconsidered the choking idea. Suppose her fingers didn’t choke him. Suppose they wandered over his broad shoulders and played with the baby-soft curls of hair around his ears. In the past, her fingers hadn’t been too trustworthy. Probably choking was not a good idea. And what about that twinge of excitement that hit her stomach when he said honeymoon? In all honesty, before fury there had definitely been glorious delight. Better not choke him-it wasn’t good taste to choke someone you might marry. Oh, Lord, did she just think that?
Jake slid his feet out of his shoes. “If I’m careful I can leave most of the cake here.”
Berry nodded numbly. She was doomed. A small hysteria-inspired giggle escaped before she firmly clamped her mouth shut.
Jake looked at her sidewise. “Are you laughing at me?”
“That wasn’t laughing. That was a temporary loss of self-control.”
“Well, at least we’re moving in the right direction.”
Berry pushed through the kitchen door and set her grocery bag on the counter.
Mrs. Fitz was making tea. “You’re home early! Oh, Lord, now what?” she worried. “Another fire? The Pizza Place burned to the ground?”
“I decided to close early.”
“You never close early. Something happened and you don’t want to tell me. Was it the gas line? Did the gas line blow up?”
Berry took a large bowl out of the cupboard and began filling it with chips. “I just closed early. Boy, you’d think I was some kind of workaholic. You’d think I never closed early before.”
Mrs. Fitz gave Jake the once-over. “What happened to him?”
“Cake.”
“What were you doing?” she said to Jake. “Eating it with your feet? Is this something kinky?”
“It was an accident,” Berry said. “This big cake sort of fell on him.” She waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. “Anyway, we’re going to have a bon voyage party for Mrs. Dugan. I even bought champagne.”
Mrs. Fitz’s face crinkled into a smile. “What a wonderful idea. I’ll go get Mildred and Sarah. They’re upstairs, fussing with Sarah’s new clothes.”
A moment later Mrs. Dugan shyly stepped into the kitchen. “Well,” she murmured, “what do you think?” She was dressed in a smart navy pantsuit with matching navy shoes and a soft white shirt. Her hair had been cut and waved into a feminine bob that was short enough to show off a pair of small pearl earrings. “I went to the beauty parlor. Do you think that was wasteful of me?”
“Mrs. Dugan, you look beautiful.” Berry hugged her. “This is much more fun than buying a Jeep. And the beauty parlor was a great idea.”
Jake tucked a bottle of champagne under his arm and arranged five champagne glasses on a tray. “Berry, you get the snacks, and we’ll have this party in the living room while Mrs. Dugan shows us her new wardrobe.”
Mrs. Fitz settled herself on the couch. “Even the bathing suit. She looks pretty good for such an old bag.”
“I’m not so old,” Mrs. Dugan told her. “I’ve kept myself in shape. I’m almost as good as new.”
Berry slouched low in the couch, her legs outstretched, her hand toying with her empty champagne glass. “That was nice,” she said to Jake. “It would have been better if we’d had a cake, but it was still okay.”