One Cup Of Flour Two Cups Of Murder (Winnona Peaks Mysteries Book 2) Read Online Free Page A

Jefferson’s beignets though she knew it was not by much.   It would be much tougher when they all had to bake their cookie recipe.  It’s harder to finesse the judges with a complex pastry process when it came to cookies since the key to a cookie victory is the taste and presentation. 
     
    All in all, she just had to take it a day at a time and celebrate the small victories.  Anna just wished that Alexander, her boyfriend, would notice the blue ribbon.  He’d helped her all day even though he was picking up extra shifts.  She loved him to death, but he had that French chef temper.  She’s just glad she hadn’t been one of his students.  Anna got a job at one of the local bakeries after she graduated as a baker and he was the consulting pastry chef on organizing the menu.   Some people thought he was boorish, but she was sure that he had to have a softer side.  She wasn’t sure if he learned this behavior when he studied in Paris or if he was always a hot head.  Trying to train under the French executive kitchen system is like being placed in a pressure cooker; people just did not understand Alexander. If you can’t take the heat get out of the kitchen, wasn’t just an old, worn-out adage for French chefs. 
     
    Alexander would often talk about his students when he came home and she would try to get him to ease up on them a bit.  Nobody liked to be in tears at school.  Anna herself went home crying her first day at Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts.  She had barely yelled a peep in her life, so having to yell, “Yes Chef!” at the end of each menu session was foreign to her.  All the gesturing and ranting over scalded butter or an emulsion that didn’t go quite right really wore on her nerves.  To be honest, she went home and cried the first month of school.  She tried to tell Alexander that, but he just waved her off and started ranting about having too many women in professional kitchens.  She didn’t like to fight, so she just let him have his way; that’s what her mother taught her.
     
    By nature, Anna was just quiet and, as her Uncle Harry described her, sweet. When he would visit, he would specifically order Anna’s cookies for dessert.  Though her mother encouraged her, her father was always distant and silent.  Maybe that’s what Anna likes about Alexander; he was silent or distant just like her dad.  He was always in her face, even if he was grumpy.  He cared about food, but she was convinced he cared about her, too.  She just wished he were more like Uncle Harry. Uncle Harry was a bright ray of sunshine that would blow into their house every couple of months as he traveled the country selling veterinary supplies to farmers and ranchers.  Anna knew it was silly, but she latched onto that ray of sunshine from the first day he made a big to-do about her cookies.  She even put a picture of Uncle Harry in her shop, Cobbler House. 
     
    She realized the day was coming to a close as it started to get dark.  She needed to hurry so Alexander wouldn’t yell as much.  Anna really hoped the first round win would please him.  He’d left right before the judging to get some sleep in the car, leaving her to clean up.  Finally done, she was carrying a small box of ingredients and not paying much attention to where she was going as she rounded the exit turnstile, heading to her car when she knocked into a dark figure in the parking lot. “Oof! Oh, I’m so sorry!” Anna apologized.
     
    “Anna?”
     
    “Christy!”  Anna put down her box of ingredients and reached out to hug Christy.  “What are you doing here?”
     
    “Oh, Vanessa’s baker, Lily, didn’t show up today, so I stepped in to help. I hope you don’t mind.”  Christy smiled at Anna, crossing her arms.
     
    “Oh, why would I mind?  Competition makes all of our bakeries better. Even if we do it because we’re in love with pastries, the challenges make us better.  Lily Smith was one of Alexander’s