Page 78 of Homecoming

“Talk to you then. Thank you.”

“No problem.”

“Is my baby gonna be on TV?” Kara asked.

“Yep. Does that make you hot?”

“No.”

“She’s ruthless,” Dan said to Bertha.

“She has to be around you.”

“I’m glad you see what I deal with, B.”

“I see it.”

“I hope you also see how blissfully happy I make her, and with just one penis, no less.”

Bertha cackled with laughter.

“Please don’t laugh at him. You’ll just encourage him.”

“I’m funny as well as sexy.”

“And not at all full of yourself,” Bertha said with an affectionate smile.

It meant everything to Kara that Bertha liked Dan so much that she teased him the way she would one of her own kids or grandkids.

“Not one bit.”

Buster opened the bait bin, and Dan’s expression shifted immediately from pleased with himself to a shade of green that would make the Grinch envious.

“Uh-oh,” Kara said as Dan rushed to the side of the boat to barf.

She glanced at Bertha, who was trying hard to contain her laughter.

“At least he’s puking instead of me,” Kara said as she took another bite of her sandwich. She felt a thousand times better since she’d been rehydrated at the hospital.

“Poor guy,” Bertha said. “That smell isn’t for the faint of heart.”

“No, it isn’t, but it’s funny how it has no impact on me.”

“You’re smell blind to it like we are. People from away can’t handle it.”

“Away?” Dan asked when he returned, looking pale but no longer green. “Is that where I’m from?”

“Anyone who isn’t from the Downeast coast is from away,” Kara said.

“Even if they’re from another part of Maine?”

“Especially then,” Bertha said with a laugh.

Work was sobusy that Renata had had no time to fret about the disturbing new vibe with Myles since she’d agreed to attend the wedding with him. Judging by the dopey grins he directed her way every chance he got, that’d been a huge mistake. Whenshe’d arrived that morning, a coffee fixed the way she liked it with oat milk and froth had been waiting for her, along with the lemon Danish she’d once described as her kryptonite.

Damn him.

She made the Danish last all morning, taking little bites as she fulfilled orders, fielded calls from customers and suppliers and printed postage labels.

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