Jessica's Fate

Chapter 41

I looked up from my buttercream at the keys that landed next to me on the island. "What are those?" I asked, glancing up to see Luke and North watching me. Luke was beaming from ear to ear and North, well, while the look wasn't as exuberant as the one on Luke's face, he was slightly less grumpy today as he crossed his arms. "I mean, I see that they appear to be car keys..."

North huffed a sigh and scowled at me.

I grinned at him until he finally sighed again and gave me what amounted to a smirk. "Luke?"

"Well, it's your birthday next week." He said, smile fading. "And you graduated high school and got your driver's license." He was bordering on a ramble but that's part of what I loved about having Luke as a brother.

North elbowed him. "And anyway, we all thought it was time for you to have a car." He said simply. "Think of this as a combination graduation present and thank you gift in advance for the dessert bar you're making for the ceremony."

"It's from all of you?"

"Yes." Luke nodded. "And Uncle and Erica too."

My eyes widened. "You're serious. Both of you." My jaw dropped open.

North laughed at me. "You're so cute when you get flustered." He said. "The frosting can wait, come see the car."

"You've obviously not been in this kitchen with Luke for a long time. I can't leave him alone with my buttercream."

"I'll come with you. I won't be anywhere near the buttercream." Luke promised.

"Okay fine." I rolled my eyes at them and turned off the mixer, going to wash my hands at the sink, drying them as I followed North out of the kitchen. I stopped short of the doorway, causing Luke to bump into me and pushing me into North's back. "Oh. My god. You... you can't be serious." I raised a hand to my mouth, staring at the car... CRV that was sitting there.

"It's yours." North said, nodding at the keys in my hand.

"Shut. Up."

Luke laughed his ass off at that. "No, seriously. It's yours." He said, wrapping an arm around my shoulders. "It's not HUGE and it's big enough that you can cart cupcakes and things around in case you decide to take on some dessert catering gigs of your own outside of what Uncle can line up for you."

I shook my head wordlessly still staring at it.

North wrapped his arm around my shoulders on the other side. "Because after you do the desserts at our ceremony, you're going to be getting jobs." He said. "Now, go look at it. I didn't spend all this time tricking it out to be as secure and safe as possible just for you to stay all the way over here and stare at it like it's going to disappear."

I wiped away the tears that had sprung up in my eyes and turned first to give North a quick hug before I hugged Luke and left the safety of the diner doorstep and their arms to go check out my gift. It was amazing. He wasn't kidding, it probably had more safety features than I could have ever imagined. I pointed at him. "Tracking devices only go on if I've texted any of you with a 911 come save me request, right? If I just get lost, I want to figure my own way back."

He grinned at me and raised his hands. "I have no problem with that. And if that's what you want then I'll make sure Kota honors it too."

"Yeah, surprisingly it's him you have to worry about anyway. The rest of us want you to be as independent as you want to be." Luke said as they joined me at the car and North took over giving me a full run down on what my vehicle could do for me.

I rolled my eyes at him when he finished. "Thank you again, I really think it's great."

"Come to dinner tonight to thank the rest of them?" Luke invited me.

"Sure. Am I bringing dessert?"

He shook his head. "No, of course not. But if you could make me a chocolate peanut butter layer cake, I'd appreciate it. I have to bring dessert." He gave me a cheeky grin and tugged on the end of my ponytail.

I rolled my eyes at him. "Whatever." I laughed and we locked it up again and headed back into the kitchen so I could finish what I was working on and would be able to whip up the cake Luke wanted. I glanced over my shoulder at North as he came in with us. "So, question..." He shrugged. "I want something else to distract me from what I'm currently missing."

"Oh?" He raised an eyebrow at me and crossed his arms. "Baking isn't enough of a distraction?"

I shook my head and started the mixer again. I stared at the frosting for a long moment before I looked at him again. "Outside of bread dough, which is an excellent way for me to get a bunch of frustration out because I can beat the hell out of it when I knead it, baking just allows for lots of time to think about things."

"So, what sort of distraction do you want?"

"I'd like to pick up another language." I said, pausing the mixer to run the rubber spatula around the edges of the bowl.

"How many would that be?" Luke asked, coming out of the office again.

"Hmm. Good question. English. Spanish and French, oh and sign language." I said. "So, the new one would be the fifth if we count sign."

"And outside of distraction, why do you want to learn another language?" North raised an eyebrow at me again.

"Because I'm going to France. I already have two of the alternate languages I'd need to make in Paris. My French is flawless according to my French teacher. But I want Russian. I might meet Russian chefs in Paris. And being in Paris means a side trip for a weekend into Russia would be allowed."

North winced before looking at Luke and I couldn't help but wonder just what they were silently conveying to each other. "I don't know that the ventures into Russia would be advisable." North finally said.

I shrugged. "it's available." I said. "Maybe I wait for you or Owen to come visit before I go." I smiled. "But it doesn't mean I won't ever need Russian. I expect that there will be Russian speakers in my training courses. And it would be nice in case I ever want to hire someone for the bakery that speaks more Russian than English." I shrugged. "I almost expect that I will pick up Italian while I'm over there on top of it all."

"Our little bilingual sister is going to kick all of our butts at language fluency." Luke said proudly. "We can make it happen." He shrugged at the dark look that North gave him. "I swear, you won't have to deal with him." He reassured North.

I blinked. "Deal with who?"

"Never mind, sweets. We know someone and North will work out the details with him. You can have him as a tutor as long as you want and feel it's helping you learn." Luke said.

"Yeah, he'll do it." North rolled his eyes and walked out into the dining room, muttering something I couldn't quite hear about professional Russians and how temperamental they were.

Luke chuckled. "I almost think he's a bit disappointed you said Russian and not Greek or German."

I shrugged. "Ah, might need to learn those when I'm back from France but for now, why learn way more languages than I need?" I asked.

He tugged my ponytail again and grinned at me. "True." He watched me put away the frosting I was working on. "I don't want you to make the cake if you don't want to." He said.

"It's no big deal." I smiled. "I love making cake for my family." I said softly. I went over to the walk-in freezer and pulled out the layer cakes that I had stashed as a backup. Two round layers would be cut to be 4 and it wouldn't take long at all to make fresh buttercream and the ganache.

His eyes gleamed. "And we love eating cakes. Even grumpy."

I laughed. "I know. So, let me work and I'll plan on driving myself and the cake over to your house in my new car."

"Works for me." He said.