But right now that connection is gone. I want to blame the amnesia, but I’m pretty sure that’s just the optimism thinking.
“Max didn’t stay,” I say cautiously.
She rolls her eyes and mutters something I can’t quite make out. “Goody two-shoes,” maybe? She wouldn’t call me that if she knew I woke up to another man in my bed. “Any progress with your memory?”
I shake my head. “Not yet. Patience, right?” Patience. I’m engaged to marry the man of my dreams, who I might or might not have been cheating on. Waiting for my memories to return should be a piece of cake.
“Well, patience isn’t going to run this bakery,” Liz mutters. “In the meantime, I’d better bring you up to speed.”
She gives me a tour of my bakery. The front area is small but serviceable. It has four tables and a bar along the wall with outlets. “So people who are working on their laptops don’t hog the tables,” Lizzy explains. The glass cases in the front feature everything from freshly baked Italian bread and croissants to cupc
akes and fresh pastries.
“My mouth is watering just looking at all of it.”
Lizzy snorts. “You don’t touch it. Not a grain of sugar has passed those lips in at least three months.”
“Nothing tastes as good as thin feels, I guess?”
“Clearly the amnesia has wiped away all memory of your cheese Danish. Maggie declared it foodgasmic, and she’s not wrong. And your chocolate croissants?” She closes her eyes and bites her lower lip.
“You’re making me hungry,” I complain.
Her lips quirk into a lopsided smile. “Good. I didn’t think you were capable of hunger anymore. Maybe the amnesia fixed you.” She leads the way past the glass cases and through the doors to the gleaming stainless-steel kitchen at the back. Ovens line one wall, and another has a row of walk-in coolers.
“Holy crap,” I breathe. “How did I afford this place?”
“You didn’t. You had some silent partner backing you, so money wasn’t an issue.”
“Silent partner? Who?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. You were all mysterious about it. We thought it might have been Asher, but when Maggie asked him, he said he didn’t have anything to do with it. Mom thinks maybe it was Max, but that doesn’t explain why you’d be secretive about it. But somebody came in here and renovated the building and got you your little start-up.”
“It’s probably in my paperwork, huh?”
She shrugs. “I guess.”
“I’m just surprised Mom didn’t try to talk me out of it. You know how she’s felt most of her life about my baking.”
“She wasn’t thrilled about your choice, but you could pretty much do no wrong in her eyes since you started dating Max.” There’s something snide about the way she says it, as if I dated Max and improved my relationship with my mom all to irritate her.
“I can’t believe I took the plunge. That doesn’t seem like me.”
“You haven’t seemed much like yourself for a while now,” she says, but I don’t think the words are for me. She shakes her head and waves away the subject. “You had a wedding last weekend while you were in the hospital. You’d already gotten the cake finished, so Maggie and I handled it for you, but you probably want to call the bride when she gets back from her honeymoon next week.”
The bride. Because I make wedding cakes.
“I’ve been taking care of the bread orders for the restaurants and grocers who contract with you. Drew has been keeping up with the baking for the front, but school’s going to start soon. She won’t be able to put in the hours she has been.”
“Drew?”
“Cally’s sister.”
I shake my head. “I know who she is. I guess I’m just surprised she works for me.”
“She started the week you opened. She’s a good little worker as long as you can keep her off her phone and away from the customers. Customer service isn’t her forte.”
I grin at the image of Cally’s know-it-all teenage sister struggling to be kind to sorority girls ordering non-fat, sugar-free, extra-hot, double-shot mochas.