Page 1 of Late to Love

Chapter1

Darcy

DAMN, I’M GOOD.

I stand back and look at the lengths of trim, perfectly done. They’ll be gorgeous once I sand and stain them.

And, bonus, it’ll reduce my rent with Agatha by a little. Which, in this economy? Ya girl needs.

I push my safety goggles to the top of my head and pluck a relatively clean handkerchief from my overalls pocket to wipe the sawdust off my face. The molding cutter is a fantastic tool for my table saw, but it’s dirty as all get out.

Now that the trim is finished, I’ll get back to the one-of-a-kind dining table I’ve been working on. I don’t have any idea what I’ll do with it when I’m done, because my website isn’t even up and running yet, but at least I’ll have something to sell when the time comes.

“Yoohoo, Darcy!” Agatha’s voice carries through the Fleetwood Mac blaring from a speaker I have set up in the garage’s corner. I grin. My landlord’s here.

Using the remote to turn the seventies mix off, I give the old woman a smile. She is easily the grandmother I never had, and she’s not the worst bowler, either. “Hi, Agatha.”

She comes farther into the garage, taking in the random pieces of wood, the table saw, the lathe that’s almost always being used for one thing or another, and of course, the gorgeous trim I’ve just completed. To the untrained eye, it may simply look like a standard piece of wood that gets nailed up to the ceiling. But I know that hardly anyone makes their own trim, and this is as personalized and unique as it gets. “Oh, that’s lovely!” Her eyes light up as she takes it in.

I preen. See? Agatha knows what’s up, even if no one else does. I pull it off the table and hold it up for her inspection. “Thank you.”

She runs a hand softly over the unsanded wood. “Really well done, Darcy,” she insists. “You should be proud of yourself.”

“Aw, thank you, Agatha. I am,” I tell her. Too bad my own father isn’t as prone to making these types of declarations. I mean, sure, he’s proud of me, as well, but for one, he isn’t nearly as capable of a carpenter as I am, and for two, my work is rarely good enough for him. He’s always pushing me to be better, to do better. I appreciate it, but it’s nice to get a simple “good job” every now and then.

Reason number two thousand why I had to move out of the house.

That, and at age twenty-four, I should be living on my own. Not that adulting doesn’t suck, because it really does, but at least now I don’t have to work a full day with Dad and then be expected to cook while he sits in front of the television with a beer.

I sound ungrateful. Hell, for that matter, it sounds like my dad is some throwback from the 1950s, and it’s honestly not the case. He cleaned after I cooked, for one thing. But without another person in the house, the two of us fell into some pretty specific roles as I got older.

“Do you want any of the quiche I made for dinner before we go bowling tonight?” Agatha smooths her wrinkled hands over a teal apron covered in white and pink daisies. I’m obsessed with it and told her so when I moved into the cottage behind her house six months ago, and even though I know she owns more aprons than I do pairs of underwear, this is the one she wears the most.

I nod. “I’d love that. Let me clean up and I’ll be over shortly.”

She casts a wistful look over the garage as she turns to leave. “It’s so good to see this place get the kind of love it deserves.”

My heart twinges. She lost her husband when he was too young, only in his early sixties, and all his tools were back here—including the amazing molding cutter—when she allowed me to turn the garage into my personal workshop. I insisted on paying extra for the privilege, and she decided that payment would be made by sprucing up her place with things like the trim I’ve just finished.

After a hasty shower, I cross the backyard and let myself into the back door. “Here!”

“In the kitchen,” she answers.

We make quick work of the simple meal, which is the aforementioned quiche and a side salad tossed in the lightest oil and vinegar dressing imaginable. There’s more to the dressing than that, but she refuses to give me her secret. Says it’s the same recipe as the Dash In Diner, which I absolutely believe. The owner of the diner, Willa Dash, used to live in my cottage. Then her sister Goldie lived there, and now I do.

To hear Agatha tell it, she’s the reason they’ve both met their respective men, and she is more than happy to turn her attentions to me.

Yeah, no thank you. I adore her, but I won’t be trusting Agatha with my love life anytime soon. Not that there’s one to speak of, mind you, but still. No way.

After dinner, Agatha rides with me to Hall’s Balls, our little town’s equivalent of a pool-hall-slash-bowling-alley-slash-bar-slash-arcade. It sits just off the pier and is absolutely packed in the summer with beachgoers and tourists. Given that it’s early May, we’re mere weeks from being overrun for the season, but the owner is good about letting us keep our weekly slot.

The familiar smell of the place welcomes me as we step inside: a hint of lemon cleaner, followed by an odor I can only classify as the Hall’s Balls Special.

We head to the bar at the far end of the space, going past the welcome counter where Harrison usually stands. Someone else is working there instead, and since I don’t recognize them, I wave and keep moving.

And there he is.

Anthony Hall. Owner of Hall’s Balls and undoubtedly the grumpiest dude to ever grace our small beachside town.

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