Love lies and mistletoe, p.10
Love, Lies and Mistletoe, page 10
“I can meet in an hour. The Daily Grind?”
“That would be wonderful,” he said hurriedly.
“Or did you want to meet halfway? You don’t have to come all the way to town in the middle of the work week.”
“No, that’s fine. I can check in on Auntie after our meeting,” he said.
Now Layla knew something was up. It was a meeting, not a date. And he sounded so…formal. Something had happened, or didn’t happen, that changed things. She checked her phone. Why didn’t she ask to meet sooner? Now she wouldn’t get anything done in the next fifty-nine minutes.
After opting for a quick bath and not the long, leisurely soak she craved, she walked the block to the Daily Grind. It was not yet five o’clock, but it was dark enough that the streetlamps were on. Inside the coffee shop it was surprisingly busy for the dinner hour. Meals weren’t an option at the Daily Grind unless you settled for a bagel with cream cheese or a chocolate chip scone. Smoothies, tea, and every coffee concoction under the sun, yes. And the place had a charming vibe, all local art on the walls and a funky selection of mugs hanging from a giant pegboard. Picking a mug to suit her mood was one of the quirky advantages of visiting the coffee shop instead of taking a cup to go. She found one of her favorites, a pear-shaped one with a teal heart, and took it to Jen to fill.
No sooner had she sat down than Kyle walked through the front door, bypassing the counter to order, and came straight to her when she waved.
“Hey,” he said, a little out of breath.
She watched him pull out the chair and sit without taking off his coat.
“Are you going to order something?”
He looked at the counter. There were two people in line. He frowned.
“Nah. I won’t…well…” He shook his head as if dismissing a thought. “How are you?”
Okay, so he wasn’t planning on sticking around long. She sensed what he was going to say even before he said the words. She might have known that before today. Still, it stung. This wasn’t the conversation she wanted to have, sitting in her favorite coffee shop, at the end of a long day. Scratch that—a long week.
“I’m good. So what’s going on with you?” No sense in beating around the bush. She’d never been good at playing games to save face.
“I’ve been thinking. About us.” He picked at his thumbnail.
“Yes. I have too.”
Kyle perked up. “You have?”
“Sure. I like you, Kyle.”
“Oh.” When he visibly shrank, she knew she was on the right track.
“But—”
“Yes?” Kyle straightened again. He reminded her of her family’s old pointer, eyes and ears on high alert when a treat was dangled over his head.
“There’s something…well…” She tried to read him beyond the eager hound expression.
“Let me guess: There’s something missing?” he asked, wagging his finger between him and her.
She froze, watching him for a hint of regret. But he only seemed more excited that they might be on the same page.
“Exactly.” She nodded.
He laughed and collapsed against the back of his chair.
“That’s a relief.”
She let out a small laugh. “You’re telling me.”
Around them, a few customers went about their business, tapping on laptops, reading, chatting. She bet no one was getting dumped.
Kyle ran his hands through his hair. “I mean, you’re great. So great. But it’s like I’ve been hanging out with my sister.”
“And you’re the brother I never had.” Okay, enough of the platitudes. She wanted to leave. It was a to-go cup kind of night after all.
But Kyle wasn’t finished. “I mean, I’ve never dated someone that I’ve liked as much as I like you but felt zero chemistry for.”
She took a sip of coffee to hide the tremble of her lips. She didn’t know why she suddenly felt like crying. Maybe the busy week was catching up to her.
“Anyway, I wanted to tell you in person. It’s the decent thing to do.”
“Thank you for that.”
He pounded out a rhythm on the tabletop. “What do you think we need to tell Auntie?”
Marybelle would be disappointed. She didn’t want to break the news. “How about what you just told me?”
He stopped drumming. “I should tell her? Then she’ll think I broke it off.”
“Isn’t that why you wanted to meet me here? To break it off?”
“Well, yes.” His brows pinched together.
“And you’re going over to check on her anyway, right?” She gave him a casual smile. “A perfect opportunity.”
“It might be better coming from you.”
“Why’s that?” She couldn’t wait to hear his excuse.
“It’s just awkward. I don’t usually talk about my relationships with Auntie.”
Now she knew he was lying. Marybelle loved to give her a play-by-play of their most recent outing: what he said about her, what they ate, where they stopped to buy this or that. At first it was funny, but Marybelle grew increasingly obsessed with recounting these dates. Finally, Layla asked her to stop. Listening to Marybelle’s dissection of the events took the fun out of it. She found herself wanting to see less of Kyle so she wouldn’t have to endure Marybelle’s recaps.
“That’s not true, Kyle.”
His face might have gone ashen. She couldn’t tell with the mood lighting in the shop.
“She summarizes our dates so perfectly that she could very well have tagged along.”
“Oh…I—”
She wasn’t finished. “For future reference, it’s weird that you spill so many details about our dates to Marybelle. I don’t blame her for talking to me about it. She’s happy that two people she cares about found common ground.”
“I…I didn’t know she did that.”
“Now you do. So I guess we’re finished here?”
She didn’t wait for an answer. Layla swept up her crumpled napkin and her mug, and left Kyle sitting there, probably wondering how he’d break the news to his dear auntie.
Chapter Seventeen
This job was the last one scheduled until after Thanksgiving, and it was a doozy. The small outdoor mall was one job he’d lobbied for last year, but the management company had already chosen Brant’s competitor. After a scheduling mishap, the Evergreen Plaza people called Light the Night in a panic to book him. It would be a very merry Christmas for his employees now that this job was almost finished. He’d already told everyone they’d be getting a nice holiday bonus because of it.
Brant stepped off the lift truck and onto the roof, lugging the last bin of lights from the platform. He set it next to the others as his phone beeped. At ground level, Jeff positioned the ladder, then slowly extended it toward Brant until he secured it against the fascia of the building.
Jeff gave him the thumbs up. “Hold ’er steady! Coming up!” he shouted.
Brant’s phone beeped again. He unclipped it from his belt and glanced at the screen.
Layla.
The cloudy day suddenly appeared a little brighter. He glanced down at Jeff who was slowly making his way up. He gripped the ladder handle tighter with one hand and answered.
“Brant? It’s Layla.”
Brant sat down cross-legged on the roof, giving her his full attention. Jeff’s head appeared over the roofline at the same moment. He bugged his eyes out at Brant when he saw his boss taking an unscheduled break.
“Hey. How are you?” It was good to hear her voice.
“I’m doing well. I didn’t catch you at a bad time, did I?” Layla asked.
Jeff crawled up onto the roof and threw his arms wide. “Why didn’t you tell me it’s break time?” he asked. “I would have sat in the truck and finished my coffee.”
Brant waved him off, shushing him. He wasn’t about to ignore this call.
“No, not at all. I just happened to be on break.”
That earned a mumbled curse from Jeff.
Layla cleared her throat. “I’m calling to let you know that I’d like to go to the Holly Days dinner. If it’s not too late.”
“Of course it isn’t.” The beating in his chest was so loud he wouldn’t be surprised if Jeff heard it. “You won’t regret it.” He gritted his teeth. Maybe those weren’t the most carefully chosen words. “What I mean is, you’ll make some great connections.”
She chuckled softly. “That’s what I’m counting on.”
There was a prolonged pause.
“Your friend Ernie called back.” He stood up to help Jeff unroll the lights.
“Yeah?”
“He said it’s not for sale after all. It’s too rundown. He doesn’t want to get sued.”
“I told you.” Layla chuckled. “He likes to dangle the bait until he has a bite. Then he cuts the line. And I take it back. Copper Creek does have a health inspector.”
“Needless to say, I’m still on the lookout for a permanent place. So if you know of anything.” One of his neighbors had graciously agreed to let him park his lift truck at the back of their lot until after the holidays. Jeff kept the other truck at his house. Brant had also rented a storage unit for the rest of his equipment for the short term. His situation was no longer as desperate as it was a week ago.
“I’ll keep my ear to the ground.”
She went silent again. In front of him, Jeff shot him a look for making a bigger mess by helping him unroll the lights. Brant decided to stop and sit. He obviously couldn’t talk to Layla and do anything else at the same time.
“How’s business?” he asked.
She let out a short laugh. “It’s absolutely insane. I don’t understand it. It’s like the difference between living under a rock and standing in the middle of Times Square.”
He smiled. “That’s great news. Congratulations.”
“But I don’t have any time to place orders let alone restock. The store will be bare bones after next weekend at this pace.” There was rustling and then something dropped in the background with a loud crash. She groaned.
He chuckled nervously. “What’s going on there?”
“Sorry, I’m trying to make room in the refrigerator for this turkey.”
He wasn’t quite ready to hang up. “So you’ll have company?”
“It will be just me and my neighbor. We’ll have turkey for days since I got a much larger bird than I needed. I’m a little out of practice with hosting by myself.”
“You can always freeze your leftovers.”
“No doubt. Anyway, having the shop means I need to stick close to home for the holiday.”
“Sounds like you need to hire another employee.”
She sighed. “I suppose I should think about that. I haven’t the first clue about hiring though.”
He heard water running in the background and the clinking of dishes. She was distracted, and he didn’t want to get in the way anymore. “I have tips about hiring if you need any. But I’ll let you go. It sounds like you’ve got your hands full.”
“I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you.”
Reluctantly, he said goodbye.
He waited for Jeff to give him an earful. It took all but a second after he clipped the phone to his belt again.
“I can’t tell you how many times you’ve called me out for looking at my phone while I’m on the job. And yours wasn’t even a business call if my ears heard right.”
“It was equally important.”
“Right. And what about safety protocol? You’re supposed to have both hands on the ladder when I’m on it.”
“My one hand has the strength of two.”
Jeff snorted. “I’ll remember that the next time you’re dangling from a lift. Remember that?”
How could he forget? One of his lifts, a piece of junk that needed constant repairs for perpetually malfunctioning hydraulics, gave him the scare of his life last season. One day it stopped working when he was twenty feet in the air. His only option was to climb down, which he soon found was easier said than done. Jeff saved him with a well-placed ladder.
“Sorry.”
Jeff gave him a sidelong glance. “Was it Layla?”
Brant lifted another coil of lights from the stack, cut the plastic tie, and unrolled it. “Yes, it was.”
“Has she warmed up to you any more?”
“I think so, but it’s definitely a work in progress.” He collected a bag of clips and hooked it onto his belt. He tossed the other bag to Jeff. “I still have a ways to go.”
“If she agreed to go to the dinner with you, I’d say you’re heading in the right direction.” Jeff wore a side smirk. “What did you ever do to her anyway? You never finished the story.”
“I kissed her under a mistletoe.”
Jeff straightened and looked at him with a broad grin. “Dude! What a Romeo you are.”
Brant cringed. “Not exactly.”
“Uh-oh.”
“She wasn’t expecting it. I thought she was someone else when I did it.”
Jeff gaped at him.
“The person I thought I’d kissed—Danielle, you remember her?—”
“I sure do. Dragon Lady Danielle. She wasn’t the most pleasant person to work with.” Jeff trailed Brant, holding the end of one coil while they made their way across the roof to the southwest corner of the building. “You took her to some fundraiser, didn’t you?”
“Yeah. That was a lesson learned.”
Danielle had been the contact person for TruLife Insurance, one of his smaller contracts last year. She was fun, pretty, and impressed him with her knowledge of flipping houses right off the bat. But he soon found out she was too vain for his tastes and insecure to boot.
“Anyway, Danielle caught me in a lip-lock with Layla. They’d looked so similar. Same dress, same color hair. Layla’s back was turned and, well, it went downhill from there.”
Jeff whistled. “I do not envy you, bro. Truly bad form.”
“I probably could have apologized my way out of it, but Danielle threw a fit. I bus-tossed Layla as a result, in part from the shock of it and because Danielle worked for a client at the time. Layla was humiliated and rightly so.”
“So you didn’t want to upset Danielle in case she took revenge.”
“That’s the short of it. You don’t know how many times since then I’ve wished for a do-over of that night.”
They came to the edge of the parapet they’d line with lights before they used the lift to hang lights on the lower roofline.
“So what’s the end goal? With Layla, I mean.” Jeff asked.
Brant took a handful of clips from his bag and fastened one onto the end of each light. Jeff did the same with his end of the light coil. He should have grabbed his gloves from the truck. It was much colder on the roof. Nothing blocked the wind. His fingers would be numb in no time.
“I like her. A lot. Maybe it’s the challenge of changing her mind about me or maybe it’s something more.” He took out another handful of clips. “She’s got something special about her, that’s for sure.”
“I wish you luck. Sounds like you need it,” Jeff said.
Luck, and maybe a healthy dose of thoughtfulness, might get him into Layla’s good graces again. The ice had thawed somewhat when he’d brought her lunch at the inn and the forgotten supply box to her store. Her eyes had lit up when he complimented her shop and her work. She was one of those quiet yet intense types. He was determined to get her to see him as more than a convenient ride to a networking opportunity next month though. It had been so long since he’d met someone who’d engaged him enough to be worth the chase.
Here was his chance with Layla. If the Holly Days Festival dinner wasn’t a setting ripe for the beginning of something special, it wasn’t meant to be.
Chapter Eighteen
Layla had set her alarm for eight o’clock Thanksgiving morning even though she was awake well before first light. Turkey roasting weighed heavily on her mind. It would only be her and Marybelle at dinner, but the chance of ruining a twenty-dollar hunk of meat felt like high stakes. While still wearing her pajamas, Layla sipped coffee and read the directions she found in the little plastic envelope when she unwrapped the bird.
An hour later, her phone rang as she set the lid on her roaster, the turkey now fully prepared in all its seasoned-and-stuffed glory. She felt quite proud of herself, despite being well into her thirties and never having prepped a holiday dinner by herself. Turkey roasting—check. Now onto getting the green bean-cranberry casserole ready for later.
“Hello?” She squeezed the phone between her ear and shoulder as she carried the empty platter to the sink for washing.
“Layla.”
It was Marybelle. It was only one word yet Layla knew something was wrong. Marybelle’s tone was clipped and a bit frantic.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’ve fallen.”
“I’ll be right over.”
Layla didn’t wait for another word. She set the phone on the counter and rushed through her living room and downstairs to the front door. Outside, lazy snowflakes drifted down, settling on the boardwalk in front of the shop. She almost slipped herself, so she made her way slowly across the walkway toward Marybelle’s front door. Thankfully, the door was already unlocked.
“Marybelle?”
Movement from the kitchen at the back of the apartment caught her attention.
“Here,” called Marybelle, waving a feeble hand.
Her heart hammered in her chest from the phone call and her rush to get to Marybelle. Seeing her friend on the floor, a trickle of blood oozing from the gash on her forehead, almost stopped it cold. She hurried around the counter, pulling open drawers in a search for a towel, something clean to press against the wound.
“What happened?” She knelt beside Marybelle, who managed to sit up and rest her back against the refrigerator. Pressing the cloth against Marybelle’s forehead, she dialed Kyle’s number with Marybelle’s phone.
