Raspberry Crush Read Free

toward—someone who uplifted everything around her. She had a freckled face, tanned from a recent trip to Cancun, and a skinny little body that looked like a bag of bones, but was somehow adorable. Her grandmother, Mrs. Tailor, was wizened but just as tiny and cute, with watery green eyes and deep wrinkles across her face. Katie had moved in with her a couple of years ago, because she hadn't wanted to leave Boston when her parents had relocated.
    Recently Katie had broken up with her boyfriend, but Billy figured her single status wouldn't last long. Unlike herself, who always took forever to find someone new. Then again... she could hardly complain when, after a recent bout of forever, she'd found Mark Warner. Cute, charming, and—most important—interested, Mark was a distribution rep who used to come into the bakery on business, and six weeks ago he'd asked Billy out. Although they weren't officially exclusive yet, they seemed to be heading in that direction.
    "Hell- o ," Melissa sang out as she entered the store with a Boston Globe folded underneath her arm. Billy, Katie, and Mrs. Tailor said hi, while Georgette grumbled something under her breath and reached for another pastry.
    Melissa's designer heels click-clack edloudly as she walked briskly into the back, and once she was out of earshot, Georgette remarked, "Oh, goody—the princess is here."
    Billy reserved comment, because the tension between Georgette and Melissa was common knowledge—and pretty hard to miss. Basically Melissa thought little of telling people what to do, and Georgette didn't take well to orders. But Billy suspected it went beyond that. She had the distinct feeling that Georgette, who'd been a high school cafeteria lady for years before becoming a baker, defensively resented Melissa's general air of superiority.
    "Hey, did anyone see The Bachelor last night?" Katie asked.
    "No, I missed it," Billy said, tearing a Sweet 'n Low over her coffee. She neglected to add that she'd missed it on purpose. The Bachelor was a reality-TV show in which good-looking women all vied for one man—usually a phony pretty boy with a tediously bland personality.
    "I saw it," Georgette said, and snorted. "I'll tell ya, no man would ever lead me around by the nose like that." She tore off a hunk of scone with her teeth, then added bitterly, "No man'll ever treat me like dirt again."
    As always, it was an effort to segue to her "asshole ex," Gary. The two had lived together for nearly twenty years. They'd had a son together, though they'd never gotten married, and obviously Georgette still harbored resentment that Gary had left her and married another woman. But on the upside, being dumped had been the impetus for a fresh start. She'd quit cafeteria work to pursue her love of baking, and even without formal training, her skills in the kitchen had dazzled Donna and landed Georgette a job.
    And despite how much she hated Gary, Georgette still loved men. In fact, they were practically all she talked about. Unlike Billy's sister, Corryn, who'd pretty much shunned the opposite sex since her divorce, Georgette was constantly on the prowl, claiming that fifty-two was her true sexual peak, and describing in detail how much she longed for a young stud to ease the tension.
    Just then Des Aggerdeen came trotting in, his shaggy hair flopped over his face and his guitar slung over his shoulder. "Hey," he said, smiling at Billy with sleepy eyes.
    "Hi, what's up?"
    "Man, I so don't feel like being here today." Des groaned as he folded his lanky body into the chair beside her. "The band was practicing late last night, and now I just wanna crash." Another irony about Des: He had a "Kill Your Television" sticker on his guitar case, and a vocal disdain for pop culture in general, even though his grunge-rock band, The Sophists, exemplified exactly that.
    "You should come see us play sometime," he said, looking at Billy. "It would be awesome to have someone in the crowd who totally feels