Company Ink (3 page)

Ella nodded, polishing off her glass. “Mmm-hmm. Deny it to yourself if you want,
chica,
but you can’t fool me.”

Violet narrowed her eyes playfully as she glanced at her best friend. “I hate you.”

“No, you love me, doll. And mark my words, Vi, this isn’t over.”

Violet took brisk steps from the train to the bakery on Tuesday, after a couple of well-deserved days off. The bounce in her step could have easily been because of the gentle breeze in the air or the sound of the birds as they slowly awoke from their nightly slumber. She’d always been happy to go to work since starting at Wynne’s Kitchen. From the beginning, Violet was given the freedom to test recipes and meet with Wynne at any point when an especially tasty idea came to mind, thanks to Wynne’s genuine interest in her development as a baker. She reveled in making Wynne proud; the older, sophisticated woman shared many of Violet’s grandmother’s personality traits and, as a result, she and Wynne had already formed a special bond. She also loved spending hours decorating cakes, chatting up customers, and making their buttercream dreams come to life with a wave of her icing wand.

Life had gotten a little more complicated with Ben on the team, Violet knew, even having spent only one afternoon with him before her weekend started. They’d spent the bulk of his working interview at her station, chatting about production and going over the menu. She knew helping to introduce a new manager to the busiest bakery in the company would be trying and, quite frankly, a pain in the ass. After all, she had promised Wynne she’d give it her all when it came to getting the new guy acclimated to working at The Rock. But damn—the guy didn’t seem to have a clue.

On a daily basis, Vi was responsible for fulfilling orders to be picked up in the late morning or early afternoon. She also made sure that the bakers and prep cooks were following their lists to the letter and had to deal directly with the general manager if any of the food inventory needed replenishing. And while Violet prided herself on being reliable as all get-out, the general manager needed to know her job inside and out …
obviously
. He seemed a little stunned by all the information she’d offered up in a short period of time. His facial expression was enough to let her know that training this guy would be no easy feat.

So far, Ben was a nice enough guy, but he seemed perplexed by The Rock’s popularity with tourists. The fact that he didn’t get the draw of the tastiest treat in the city had chipped away at Violet’s nerves until she wasn’t sure she even wanted to help the guy. She’d somehow gotten it in her head that he wouldn’t take the job seriously, and for her, that meant trouble. Violet didn’t want to spend time in a store where her ideas and work would go unnoticed because one of the people she was supposed to shine for didn’t get it. By the end of her shift, her tolerance for Ben had been at zero. As she left, she’d hoped her brain would clear during her days off and she’d be able to start fresh when she came back.

Violet arrived at The Rock at 5:30 a.m., roughly a half hour before her shift was scheduled to start. She was enjoying a cup of instant oatmeal and a banana in the office and couldn’t help watching for Ben to walk through the door. The whole thing was weird—part of her wondered how much of the menu he’d forgotten, another part wondered if his eyes were as blue as she remembered. Having gotten so used to being engrossed in her greatest passion—baking—she wasn’t even sure how she could be attracted to a guy who didn’t know the difference between a tart and a pie.

“Get it together, Vi,” she spoke aloud, pulling her curls into a ponytail and shoving it all under a hairnet.

The clock now said 6:00 a.m. With a shake of her head, she made her way upstairs to set up her station for the day. The store would be opening in an hour, so the counter staff was helping the kitchen crew by pulling cupcakes out of the oven and onto racks for cooling. Meanwhile, the morning bakers were scooping freshly prepared muffin batter into pans in preparation for the morning rush. Violet took a deep breath, inhaling the heavenly scent.
What a way to work
.

The counter staff had been gracious enough to start a pot of coffee for the rest of the openers; Violet thanked them all as she grabbed a large cup before taking the last few steps to her station situated in the front window of the bakery. She was almost afraid to look at last night’s production list; the night manager, Jamie, loved to pile her list high no matter how often Violet reminded her that, as production supervisor, she couldn’t spend all day stuck at her station. Jamie seemed to think that because Violet could ice a three-minute cake, there was no reason she couldn’t bang out ten cakes in a half hour on a daily basis and then do twelve more. It was Jamie’s corporate-machine mentality that Violet was never able to get on board with, so it was with a roll of her eyes that she made a mental note to drop a couple of those specialty cakes on the afternoon icer’s list.

Setting up her icing wands, tips, and other tools took another five minutes, and she moved on to turning out the layers so that they could finish cooling. Violet looked up at the clock over the register bank; Ben was officially fifteen minutes late.

She forced the thought of him out of her mind and went to the center counter to help cut bars and set them out for service.
Who cares if he’s late?
She scooped up salted caramel brownies with a spatula and placed them on miniature paper doilies. She was stacking them on a doily-topped cake dish when she heard a scraping sound come from the bakery’s side entrance. Violet looked up to see Ben letting himself in, presumably with keys given to him by Jay, the operations manager. She lowered her gaze quickly as she waited for the bells over the door to chime as it opened.

When Ben entered, his eyes were dark and distant. Brow partially furrowed, he practically stared right through her before looking away and heading directly to the office downstairs.

Violet blinked a couple of times, his strange arrival taking her by surprise. For someone who was such a social butterfly on his first day, the apparent chip on his shoulder was an unexpected change. It made Violet nervous about what to expect for the rest of the day. After all, as Wynne reminded her before she left, Violet would be a crucial part of Ben’s assimilation into the company.

Jessica, the store’s floor supervisor, approached her with an ecstatic smile. “Vi, have you seen the new guy? My mornings just got much, much better.”

“Yeah, I started training him last week.”

Violet zoned out as Jessica began to talk animatedly about Ben. Staring blankly ahead of her as she attached piping tips to their designated pastry bags, she wondered just how closely Jessica had worked with Ben in the two days since he’d joined the team. As the production supervisor, Violet would be interacting with him frequently where it concerned the quality and amount of baked goods being sold, but Jessica would be Ben’s direct link to the floor when he was up to his elbows in administrative work during the day and, therefore, would interact just as much with him as Violet would, sometimes even more so. Violet frowned as she was visited with a sinking feeling that left a rock-sized lump in her tummy.

Jealous much?

“And you’ll be training him all this week, Miss Production Sup,” Jessica finished, nudging Violet playfully. “Just when I thought I’d hate your job, in walks Thor with a snazzy haircut.”

Yanking herself out of the brooding, Violet turned toward her co-worker with a smile. “I’m sorry, are you swooning over our general manager?”

“Stop pretending you aren’t as excited about training this guy as I am about ogling him all day,” Jessica teased.

“Would you set up your floor already?” Violet dismissed with a laugh. “I’ve gotta have a quick talk with the bakers about the lemon muffins. I’m pretty sure if we double the batch we’ll sell out.”

“Triple it if you want; the customers are nuts about those things. I’ll check in with you later.”

As Jessica made her way toward the cash registers, Violet leaned against the marble counter and placed a hand on her forehead. The reality that she would indeed be working closely with him sunk in and hit her hard. No one in the store knew the menu and its elements like Violet, regardless of the fact that she’d only been there a number of weeks. The other employees saw working at the bakery as a paycheck; to Violet, it was art, a labor of love, an important step on the road to realizing the dream of owning a bakeshop. Working at Wynne’s Kitchen meant everything to her, so she buried herself in the job, getting to know every nook and cranny and committing it all to memory.

She had a lot to prove, in a manner of speaking, if she was going to climb the ranks successfully. And whether or not Ben would be a roadblock or a stepping stone still remained to be seen. She did know, however, that Wynne was counting on her to make the store’s transition from old general manager to new general manager as smooth as possible. Violet didn’t want to let her down. All she could hope for at this point was for her dedication to help advance her career with Wynne’s Kitchen instead of turning her into a bottom-rung worker who would serve as everyone else’s leg up.

She headed toward the baking area, where stacks of fresh baked muffins, cookies, and scones awaited her inspection, and tried to decide whether she should approach Ben or wait for him to come upstairs. Violet stared blankly ahead in a daze as she pulled a blueberry scone apart in her hands.

“Hey,” a baker called out. “Vi, where are you?”

Violet looked down at the mutilated treat in her hands.
Damn
.

“Just checking consistency,” she muttered dismissively, a horrible attempt at a save as she held it up toward him. “Good job, Mike. Make another half round.”

Before the baker could say more, she dumped the scone on a nearby paper plate and balanced it on her clipboard. With a dessert allowance of one treat a day, this violated confection would have to be it for her. She grabbed her coffee and decided to gather her thoughts in the office, knowing in the back of her mind that was exactly where Ben would be.

Her feet carried her down the back stairs and through the prep area. Past the dry and cold storages and a few feet from the employee bathrooms lay the back office, where she and the other managers sat to either handle administrative duties, have lunch, or take phone orders. It was a large space, wide open except for the five workstations that lined three of the four walls. Lining the fourth wall, alongside the door, were cabinets and counters that held their copier, retail merchandise, extra polo shirts emblazoned with the bakery logo, and other office supplies. With her eyes on Ben, she attempted to step in quietly, only to trip on the corner of a counter. She let out a tiny squeak as she narrowly avoided dropping everything. She cursed herself silently as Ben turned and looked at her. He looked tired.

“Good morning,” she said.

“Hey, Violet,” he muttered, his voice lacking spirit but somehow still sounding just as cozy as a down blanket. “Aren’t you the lark?”

Violet grinned, taking a seat and carefully setting her coffee and scone down in front of her. “I take it you’re not a morning person.”

“Not lately,” he replied, his voice transparently bitter.

His response made her stop short, surprised at how easily two words could be so off-putting. She stared at him briefly, nonplussed, trying to decide whether or not she should be offended, as he went back to counting the register drawer in front of him. A painfully awkward moment of silence passed between them; finally, Ben let out a deep sigh.

“Look, before you think I’m some kind of jerk, I just want to apologize. I had a really rough”—he paused, seeming to check himself before continuing—“commute this morning. It was just a nightmare, and I’m kind of trying to get past it so I can get through the rest of the day.”

“Oh.” If anyone understood the commute through Midtown, it was Violet. “No worries. The city’s rough, I know.”

At that moment, the office door opened. Jay, the company’s operations manager, stepped in with a smile. A twenty-something Puerto Rican from Queens, he often looked like he’d just stepped off the cover of a magazine despite being dressed for the bakery in a tee shirt and jeans. He normally worked in Wynne’s corporate office near Central Park South but would be sticking around The Rock, at Wynne’s insistence, to help Ben with the finer points of operating the bakery. Placing his messenger bag at the assistant manager’s station, he flashed a grin at Violet before looking to Ben. A wide, friendly grin stretched across Ben’s face as he met Jay in the middle of the office. They shook hands, and the Ben she’d first met completely emerged.
Night and day
, she couldn’t help but think.

“Hey, sorry I’m late.” Jay beamed, far more of a morning person than she and Ben combined. “How are you, Vi?”

She gladly returned Jay’s friendly welcome. “Peachy keen, jelly bean! Training Ben today?”

Jay nodded. “I’ll be working with him until about noon. After that, he’s all yours. Wynne wants him learning to do production by the end of the week.”

“You might have your work cut out for you, Violet. I’m used to a smaller menu with way fewer variations.” Ben grinned.

She raised an eyebrow.
Oh, now we’re running for office?
“You’ll get it in no time, I’m sure.”

“I’ll check in with you when Jay’s done with me.”

“Sounds good,” she replied. “I’ll make sure my morning orders are done so we can focus on training.”

Turning back to her scone, she listened halfheartedly to Ben’s spirited conversation with Jay. His mood had flipped 180 degrees in a matter of seconds, and she couldn’t help but feel like her head was spinning. She supposed she shouldn’t hold his ability to schmooze against him; then again, she couldn’t help but wonder what had caused him to yank up such an emotional wall. Why was she even interested?

Do you wanna save him, Vi?

She let out an amused snort that she hadn’t meant to release.

Jay and Ben fell silent, abruptly stopping their conversation to stare at Violet. A slightly embarrassed smile tugged at the corners of her mouth as she looked around.