Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 89238 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 446(@200wpm)___ 357(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89238 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 446(@200wpm)___ 357(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
My stomach dips. It won’t be the first time I’ve turned him down. “I want to thank you for the offer. Truly, it’s amazing,” I tell him even though it wasn’t amazing. He doesn’t need to know that though.
“I hear a but,” he says, his voice full of a little too much charm. “Sort of like when I asked you out.”
It’d been foolish to hope he wouldn’t bring that up. A few months ago, the chocolate magnate—the man who bought The Chocolate Connoisseur and turned it into a national chain with fantastic low prices—had visited my booth at the San Francisco Chocolate Show several times. First, he’d talked about how he built his company as a bean-to-bar business—meaning he makes his chocolates straight from cocoa beans, making him the biggest small-batch chocolate maker.
Then he’d tested the milk chocolate bar I’d crafted from Valrhona, the dark chocolate with hints of orange, and the semi-sweet with just the right amount of coconut and almonds. Some of the best from a chocolatier, he’d said, then asked me out to a fancy dinner.
While I’d appreciated both his effort and his chocolate compliments, I didn’t feel the chemistry. I don’t believe, either, that chemistry comes later—you either feel it or you don’t. And fine, maybe the ultra-romantic in me had rushed headfirst into romances in my twenties with the wrong men, but I also know that I need chemistry. I need flutters. I need to feel that special something. But I’d listened to enough of Juliet’s podcasts so I’d turned him down politely with a kind thank you but I don’t think I feel the same way.
Gentle honesty is better than saying you’re busy. They can tell when you’re not busy, she’d said on an episode.
A few weeks ago, he asked to buy my shop, and I was this close to accepting the offer.
A buyout felt like the safe answer. A way to pay off the loan. To avoid my parents’ pitfalls with money. But perhaps it’s not the only answer. I don’t want to give up what I’ve dreamed of my whole life. What my parents never really achieved—independence. Maybe this is foolish. Maybe this is risky. But I’m doing it anyway.
“It’s a great offer, but I want to keep growing Elodie’s,” I say, and I’m bouncing with new hope over how to do that thanks to an idea born over pillow talk.
Because chocolate? That’s been my one constant in my chaotic life. It’s the one thing that’s never let me down. The one thing I could always depend on when my parents weren’t dependable at all. Maybe a future with Elodie’s Chocolates can make Amanda’s dreams possible. More than a buyout.
Sebastian’s quiet for a long beat, a kind of icy silence. I don’t breathe until he sighs ruefully, then says, “All right. I’ll just have to continue competing with you from down the street.”
It’s said jovially, but is there a warning shot in it? “There’s room for both of us,” I say, because really, there is. Can’t he see that? It’s just chocolate. You can never have too much of it.
“Of course there is. But enjoy the bath bombs.”
“I will,” I say, feeling only a little guilty about that lie.
I return home, excited and hopeful about tomorrow. I made a decision and it feels like a damn good one. I’m such an adult.
I can’t even say my parents would be proud. They never adulted this well.
“Your outfit of the day is ready,” Amanda declares as she leaves my closet on Monday morning. “Today you’re the…candymaker.”
I laugh. “Isn’t that my outfit of the day every day?”
“Work with me here. Today you need to be extra. Extra candymaker,” she says. “It’s all hanging up for you.”
I gesture to my sweats and hoodie. “And what’s this?”
“Walking your sister to school outfit,” she says.
Along the way, we catch up on how she’s doing with her application to art school (great!), the next level in Valorant, the video game she plays (so close), and the inscribed decorative plate she’s working on in ceramics (so hard).
It’s like Friday night’s burger fiasco never happened, especially when she takes off to meet up with Ally outside their middle school with barely a goodbye.
But that’s for the best.
I return home and strip out of my casual clothes and into the candymaker costume.
I put on my best I’m going to look really fucking good on social media dress. It’s a red-and-white checked skirt, swingy and playful. It hits at the knees. A belt cinches at the waist with a buckle made in the shape of a heart. I pair it with the white tank top Amanda picked and a matching three-quarter-length red cardigan with buttons shaped like cherries.
Damn, Amanda did good with her picks.
I curl my hair in my best retro do. I check my reflection. Yep. That girl in the mirror can sell the hell out of chocolate. I slick on some lipstick, then some gloss, then spritz on the tiniest bit of perfume—the same cherry kind I wore on Friday night, courtesy of a Samira trade for salted caramels. I put on my lucky jewelry too, just like I wore that evening.