Well, because of Didi. Actually because of him. He was the one who had decided to insert himself into their situation. So she didn’t feel guilty exactly. But as someone who wanted Hot Cakes to be the very best it could be, she was aware that they were missing a piece of their puzzle.

Ollie nodded. “Yeah, the new bars.”

“So they’ll be brown—because of the chocolate,” Dax said. “And a little lumpy because of the crispy-crunchy pieces.”

Ollie shrugged. “Yeah.”

“And then you want to make them look like an animal.”

Ollie frowned. “What are you getting at?”

“Alpaca poop,” Dax said. “That’s what I’m getting at. They could remind people of alpaca poop.”

“I thought you liked alpacas,” Ollie said.

“Love them.”

“So…”

“But they poop, Ollie.” Dax shrugged.

“But they’ll be shaped like alpacas,” Ollie said. “Not like poop.”

“Sure. But the color and texture could be reminiscent of poop. Add in the animal shape and it might put that thought in people’s heads,” Dax said.

“It might just be you,” Ollie told him.

“No, I think he has a point,” Piper said, picking up plates that had held muffins from Buttered Up.

It was a really good thing that they’d smoothed over the tension between the two businesses if for nothing else than because it meant they could have breakfast pastries at morning meetings now. Zoe’s muffins and scones were amazing.

“You’re just saying that because you’re being contrary,” Ollie said.

Piper gave him a look with one arched brow. “I am?”

“You are,” he said with a frown. “You’re disagreeing with everything I’ve said lately.”

“Maybe you’ve been wrong a lot lately,” Piper said.

“I figured you would love the alpaca idea,” Ollie replied. “What with your new fascination with the Ryan farm and all.”

“That’s sweet of you to think of me,” Piper said with a big—totally fake—smile. “But my fascination with the farm isn’t really about the alpacas.”

Ollie’s frown deepened. “Should we just make the new bars look like Drew Ryan then?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Piper said.

Ollie relaxed slightly. Whitney was probably the only one who noticed, but she’d been watching him carefully. He was jealous of Drew. She just wondered if he realized why. Did he know that he had feelings for Piper? Oliver Caprinelli was brilliant but he seemed oblivious to everything having to do with Piper and her feelings for him, and, for some reason, Whitney wouldn’t be surprised to find out that Ollie didn’t even realize that he was annoyed by Drew because Ollie was in love with Piper himself.

“If we were going to make Drew into a snack cake it would be devil’s food with a sweet, smooth, creamy, filling.” She paused. “And it would have to be jumbo sized.”

Whitney pressed her lips together to keep from laughing and Grant, Aiden, and Dax all swung to look at Ollie.

Clearly those guys realized that Ollie had some feelings besides appreciation or admiration for his assistant.

“We already have chocolate cake with cream filling,” Ollie finally said.

It was not a great comeback. But it was very funny. To everyone else.

Piper just nodded. “Yes, we do.” She looked at Aiden and pointed at his computer. “By the way, Cam is joining via video.”

Aiden opened his laptop and clicked a few buttons. “Hey, man,” he greeted a moment later.

“Hey,” Cam’s voice returned. “Sorry I’m late.”

“No problem. We’re discussing the shape of the new snack bars.”

When it was said like that, it sounded stupid, Whitney had to admit.

Aiden turned the computer to face the rest of the table.

“We should give Cam a chance to weigh in on the shape,” Ollie said. Though he didn’t look like he actually cared what Cam thought. He was watching Piper as she moved around the room. “What do you think of alpacas?”

“Um,” Cam said.

“No,” Grant said. “Dax has a good point about the poop.”

“The poop?” Cam echoed.

Aiden sighed. “Yeah, maybe you did miss a few things.”

“Alpacas,” Ollie said, his eyes still on Piper. “The new bars—”

“That will look like poop,” Dax interjected.

“Should be shaped like alpacas,” Ollie finished.

Piper faced him with a hand on her hip. “I thought that we’d already—"

“It will be far more cost effective to keep them squares or rectangles,” Whitney said quickly.

Everyone stopped talking and looked at her.

“We’re already set up to do squares and rectangles. And circles, of course,” she said.

Grant nodded. “Good point.”

“Squares and rectangles are boring,” Dax said. “No offense,” he added to Whitney.

She smiled. “None taken.” It wasn’t as if she’d been the one to decide the shapes of their snack cakes. Then again, she doubted much thought had been given to it at all. Back when her grandparents had started Hot Cakes there probably hadn’t been a lot of shape options in the big machines they’d installed to make their cakes. “But it really will cost less to keep doing the shapes we’ve already got. No need to reconfigure the machines that way.”

Grant and Aiden both nodded. Looking slightly relieved if she wasn’t mistaken.

“How quickly can we get the new bars into production?” Aiden asked. “If we stick with common shapes?”

The question was directed to Whitney. Of course it was. None of the other people in the room knew as much about snack cake production as she did.

She nodded. “Keeping with the common shapes will cut that time down dramatically as well. A couple of weeks,” she said. “It’s less about making the snack cakes themselves—we have the base recipe and can pretty easily adjust it for mass production and shelf life—but it’s about the process of transitioning machines.” She looked around the table. They all seemed interested, and as if they weren’t sure what she was talking about.

No one else said anything.

So she went on. Trying very hard not to fidget. Or look at Aiden’s computer. Too much. She felt Cam’s eyes on her though, even through that screen. It was all made stranger because he was sitting in her kitchen at the breakfast bar. Where he’d offered to lick her nipples…

“Whitney? You were saying something about the Cinnamon Curls?” Grant asked.

See? This was why it was a problem for her to be involved with Cam. She’d get distracted in the middle of explaining that the Cinnamon Curls were their lowest selling cakes so that machine could possibly be used part-time for the new bars, but that because the new bars were chocolate and the Cinnamon Curls were not it would be a bigger transition than using a machine that already used chocolate.

She blew out a breath. She was not going to think about Cam and her breakfast bar and that he probably really hated what she was wearing today. It was all gray.