Make Me Beg, Daddy

Chapter 3

Until then, I’ll be the same Delilah I’ve always been. Do-It-All Dee. They won’t notice. They never do.

Right then, the timer goes off.

That’s the funny thing about this job: Dough doesn’t care. There’s a half sheet of gingerbread that needs my attention whether or not my husband is sleeping with my sister. If I don’t pull it in the next thirty seconds, the edges turn bitter and it’ll all go right into the trash can.

So I pull it.

And then I keep going, because there are three hundred and something families driving to my counter today and I fully intend to put a smile on their faces.

There’s the O’Briens, who order the same twelve-dozen assortment every year for the office party and tip my whole staff in crisp hundred-dollar bills. There’s Mrs. Feinstein, who’s eighty-four and orders one small cake and eats it over four days. P.S. 218 needs six sheet trays by ten.

None of them did anything to me.

So I want to do right by them.

And more than that, I need something to occupy my mind for a while. Because, if I sit down again, I’m going to start watching those videos on a loop until my staff comes in and finds me in a sobbing puddle on the floor. The work is the only thing in my life that will hold me together.

So I work.

And work, and work, and work.

Finally, as the sun starts to rise, I can step back and take stock of the output.

The case items are in, the wedding layers are wrapped and labeled, and there are nineteen dozen cookies done and drying under the fan.

It’s not everything, but it’s pretty good.

I check the time. I’ve got ten minutes before Priya’s car pulls into the lot.

Which is when I make myself do the last thing.

I wash my hands, dry them properly, then take my phone into the office and shut the door. Dropping into the squeaky chair, I pull up the third video, the only one I haven’t seen, and force myself to watch the whole thing.

It’s two minutes and thirty-eight seconds and I’m not going to describe it because I don’t want it in my head any more than it already is. As much as possible, I try not to focus on the s*x.

Instead, I watch the frame edges. I’m looking for anything a stranger could use. A face. A clock. A voice.

A receipt.

Twice, I get something. At about forty seconds, the camera swings and catches the nightstand, and my lamp, and his watch sitting on top of a magazine.

That’s Connor’s watch. I bought it for him for our fifth anniversary. It’s something. It’s not enough, but it’s something.

At a minute fifty, there’s the corner of our closet door and the sleeve of his gray work coat hanging on the back of it.

I hit share on all three files and save them to my phone, straight to the device.

Now, Viv can empty that album whenever she likes. She can burn her whole phone or dunk it in her rose-petal bath at the Four Seasons and it won’t matter.

It’s mine now.

I let out a weary breath and go to swipe out, but the third video is still playing, the last few seconds. Something stills my hand just before I close it.

Connor’s voice, sighing happily. “This is so f*****g reckless. We’re gonna get caught.”

Off-camera, out past the edge of the frame, my sister laughs.

“Relax. She never notices anything.”

“—and can you write Merry Christmas, Gladys on the big one?”

“I can write anything you want on it,” I say. “I just did a cake for a nice lady’s fourth divorce that said ‘All My Exes Can Eat s**t and Die.’“

Mrs. Kowalczyk laughs at me. I box her order, ring her up, and hand it across the counter.

“You’re an angel, Delilah,” she tells me.

“Takes one to know one, Mrs. K. Merry Christmas.”

It’s been a doozy of a morning. Since the millisecond we opened, it’s like every single person in Sunset Park has been through my doors. I’m on the precipice of internal collapse, and the only thing keeping me from hurling myself off the edge is a steady stream of espresso.

But as long as I keep moving, keep working, I can forget what I saw in the gray light of the morning. Video? What video? Never heard of her.

“Delilah Dorsey.” Priya emerges from the back with a hotel pan on her hip and her eyebrows already up. “You told me you were going home.”

“I... did?”

“Liar!” cries Priya. “She’s a liar! Seize her and burn her at the stake!”

“I think you’re confusing liars with witches.”

She frowns. “Am I? Oh, well.”

“Not that I’m not in favor of putting liars through heinous executions, though,” I mutter under my breath.

“What’s that? Gotta speak up, love.”

I shake my head. “Nothing. Just some philosophical musings.”

“Alright, my little Aristotle. Don’t think too hard, you’ll give yourself a headache.”

Then she gallivants off back into the kitchen to check on the gingersnaps that the law firm of ambulance chasers paid an exorbitant price to bulk-order at the last minute.

When she’s gone, I let out an exhale like a deflated balloon.

What surprises me is which part of last night hurts.

I thought it would be the videos. And yeah, of course, that was like being drawn and quartered in and of itself.

But it’s the last ten seconds of the third one that are playing again and again in my head like Chinese water torture.

Connor saying, We’re gonna get caught.

My baby sister’s laugh. As carefree as ever.

“Relax. She never notices anything.”

Ouch.

No matter how many times I replay the memory, it hurts just as bad as the first.

“Excuse me—are the gingerbread men gluten-free?”

“They are the exact opposite of gluten-free,” I tell the customer, a suave-looking guy in a nice suit. “I’d go so far as to call them gluten-forward. Gluten on top of gluten, really.”

He grins. “Perfect. Load me up. Gluten-free tastes like cardboard, anyway.”

“I couldn’t agree more.” I grab the tongs and give them an experimental clack to be sure they’re in good working order. “How many is ‘load me up,’ by the way?”

“Dealer’s choice.”

“Dangerous words,” I warn. “I’ve been awake since yesterday. My judgment is impaired.”

“Then I’ll take whatever you’d want if you were me.”

That’s such a strange thing to say that I actually look at him properly for the first time. Dark hair, stylishly messy if a little too long on top, like he keeps meaning to get it cut and keeps not doing it. Dark pea coat over his suit, unbuttoned. He’s got a permanent half-smile on his face that makes me want to smile along with him.

Even though every smile today has felt like it’s been the product of hot pincers hooked into my buccal fat and dragged wide.

I box up six gingerbread men and then, on a whim, throw in two of the pistachio linzers I’ve been pushing all week.

His eyebrows rise. “Pistachio? Now, you’re scaring me, Chef.”

“Trust me,” I advise. “Pistachio frangipane, raspberry, so much powdered sugar that you’ll think I’m secretly Pablo Escobar. You’ll get it all over that coat and think about me for the rest of the day.”

Oh, God. Think about me. Who am I? What am I saying? I hear it about a half-second after it leaves my mouth, at which point it is legally and physically unretrievable.

“Is that a threat or a sales pitch?”

I shake my head. “I didn’t even throw in a bear claw. That would be a threat. To your insulin levels, at least.”

“That’s not a threat. Death by sweet treat is how I’ve always wanted to go.”

“I can’t have your blood on my hands.”

“Boo,” he teases. “You’re boring.”

“Yeah, well, someone has to be the adult.”

He laughs. “Sounds exhausting.”

“It builds character.”

“Does it?”

“No,” I admit honestly. “Just heartburn and back pain.” I tap in his order at the register. “That’ll be twelve-fifty. Good luck in the afterlife.”

“Thanks, Miss...?” He arches his eyebrow, obviously asking for my name.

But before I can reply, the doorbell chimes and he gets his answer at full volume.

“DEE-DEE!”

I grimace. As always, my sister is heard before she is seen.

She comes bustling through like she thinks she’s a movie star, huge purse slung over one forearm, even huger sunglasses perched on her nose. Her hair is freshly blown out, diamond studs glint in her ears, and, even though it’s winter in New York and thus n****e-achingly cold outside, her sweater is cropped high above the navel to show off a midsection that Naomi Campbell would die for.

“Hi, Viv,” I mumble.

“Oh my God, it smells like a Bath & Body Works in here,” she declares at the top of her lungs as she cuts through the waiting queue. She comes to a halt in front of the register and gives me a scathing up-and-down over the rim of her sunglasses. “Are you wearing the same clothes as yesterday?”

I look down at myself. “Uh... maybe? I can’t remember.”

“Ew.”

She glances to the side at the man in the pea coat. He glances back at her.

And, like always, I see it happen.

The Shift.