Page 62 of The Last Lavender Sister

“Which is in three weeks.”

“Damn, you’re fast.”

She pointed at her growing stomach that had likely taken on size since they’d been sitting there. “I’m in a race, Aster.”

“Brynn and I will be fine.”

“If you say so.”

Aster spent the rest of her day in town. The diner was centrally located and gave her a perfect excuse to walk the sidewalks and mentally reestablish this place as home. She passed a few folks who were surprised to see her back.

“Aster, you’re home.”

She smiled because it apparently took her leaving for Tammy Littlefield from Spaghetti Straps to finally learn her name. “Hi. Yeah, just back recently.”

“For good?” She nodded and rocked back on her heels. “Well,that’s exciting. Did you check out the new candy shop? You can fill up your own bag with whatever you want.” She gestured emphatically across the street, and Aster remembered how exciting it was when something new happened in town.

She used to hate how desperate that felt. Now it seemed sweet and earnest. Somewhere along the way she’d softened. Perhaps with age. Perhaps with heartbreak. Maybe the loss of her mother. The end result was that she wanted to check out this new candy shop, which from the looks of the sign was called Edna’s Sweet Treats. Well. Who was Edna? And maybe they had a little something in common.

“I think I’ll check it out right now.”

“Fantastic. I’m a big fan of the gummy fish. Take care, Ashton.”

She closed her eyes. Couldn’t win them all.

Edna’s had gone in where the old fishing supply store used to be. She understood why it had gone under. The closest spot for quality fishing was quite a haul. The candy store was bright, colorful, and packed with options. It immediately lifted Aster’s spirits. She imagined Edna was the elderly woman behind the cash register with the tinted glasses and tall white hair. She was chatting away with a customer as Aster perused the aisle.

“I’ll be back soon. The clients love the new chocolate mints you sent over, and I’m going to place a formal order.”

Aster froze. Brynn was the customer. Her neck prickled with warmth at the sound of her voice. Everything in her told her to bolt, and with a heated face, she tried. She turned to go, panicking more than she would have predicted. The only problem was that the door of the small shop felt woefully far away, and she bumped her shoulder on a jelly bean display, calling huge attention to herself.

“Aster?”

She froze. She wished she was the kind of person who could keep walking and never look back, but this place was too small for that. So she turned back as casually as she could, but the no-big-deal battle was surely lost. “Huh?” She made a point of blinking and refocusing as if she’d totally just realized it was Brynn standing there with a question mark on her face, searching Aster’s. “Oh. Hey. Hi.” She was a child again. Cheeks ablaze. Stripped of all intelligence and ability. She slid a strand of hair behind her ear and waited.

“Your hair is longer.” Brynn smiled. Correction, attempted tosmile. It faded almost immediately. She looked like Aster felt, like she’d just seen a ghost.

“Yours is a tad shorter.” It wasn’t a huge shift, and someone who didn’t know every inch of Brynn likely wouldn’t have noticed. Aster wasn’t them. She glanced away and back, remembering how she used to play with that hair while Brynn rested her head in Aster’s lap, lost in the pages of a book. She’d threaded her fingers through it in the heat of passion.

Brynn absently touched her hair. “Yeah. A little. Well…” She lifted her bagged purchase.

“Well…” How odd to share common space with the person you felt closest to in the world and still have them feel millions of miles away. “Have a good day.”

“Right.” The light in Brynn’s eyes dimmed, the formality of their exchange painful. “You, too.”

Brynn left the store, bag in hand. Aster remained, wishing that had gone better but knowing there was too much water under that bridge to expect it to. Their past had clouded the entire conversation, weighing them down with awkward regret. They were a broken pair, not that this was news. Even though they’d been friendly, she was still deeply angry at Brynn for exiting their friendship. She imagined Brynn had her reasons for what she did, but at the present time they seemed like so very long ago and baseless.

“Can I help you?” Edna asked, craning her neck. “We’re having a twenty-five percent off sale on display case chocolate. The ones shaped like animals are my favorite. Have you seen the chocolate frogs? You don’t often see frog chocolate.”

“I think I’ll come back another time,” Aster said blandly. Not even chocolate in frog form could fix her mood.

Chapter Fifteen

Brynn patted Chestnut the mischievous dachshund on the head. “You stay out of the trash from now on, young man.” After treatment on the good drugs for a wobbly tummy and an overnight stay with Freddy, Chestnut was on his way home to keep his owners forever on their toes.

“Thanks, Dr. Brynn,” Erica and Ben said, scooping up their boy. They seemed like a really nice family, which reminded her that she was due to meet Tyler for a fitting in twenty minutes. She moved quickly about the office but it wasn’t fast enough, which left her racing on foot eight blocks to the small alterations shop. Out of breath and guilt-ridden for running late, she burst through the door.

Tyler turned. “You made it.”

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