Page 3 of The Pretenders of Copper County
“Tell me.” Van scratched his cheek. “When was the last time you hooked up with a hot, uh… guy?” he guessed.
I nodded, then shook my head, then pressed a hand to my stomach, where a bunch of pygmy blues were fluttering their wings as if trying to escape. “Guy,” I agreed in a small voice. “And it’s, um, been a while.” I refused to admitthat I hadn’t dated a guy, let alone hooked up with one, in… let’s see, it was a couple weeks until my twenty-fifth birthday, so if I did the math correctly, that meant it had been approximately… twenty-five years?
“Well, there you go. Plenty of hot single guys in this town.” He winked broadly. “Have an adventure! Be like the dude in that stup—uh, that really interesting show you’re always watching. Hasn’t Crys asked you to go out with her crew a couple times now?”
“Oh, well…” I rubbed the back of my neck with the cuff of my sweater. One time, Crys had invited me to go ax throwing. Another time, she’d invited me gorge jumping, which, to my shock, involvedjumping into actual gorges. “She might be a little too adventurous for me? And I… you know. I’ll be going home once Uncle Danny’s ready to come back, so I don’t know if I want to put down roots here?—”
“Who said roots? I said sow wild oats,” Van said reasonably. “It’ll be good for you. You’re young. You’re sweet. You’re a looker, too, underneath those sweaters your nonna knit you back in the day—that’s an objective observation, mind you,” he added quickly. “Ya ain’tmytype.”
I snorted and tugged the cuffs of my sweater—which, yes,hadbeen hand-knitted by my nonna—further down my hands. “Thanks, Van.”
“But be honest: would you even notice if someone tried flirting with you?” Van lifted one bushy eyebrow. “Just yesterday, I heard someone asking Ernie about you—who you hung out with, whether you were dating anyone, and so forth—so it stands to reason?—”
“Someone asked about me? Wait, really? Was it a guy? Do I know them? Were they cute?” The tiny fluttering butterflies became a whole kaleidoscope of giant swallowtails. “What did Ernie say?”
Van scowled. “Jesus, kiddo, I didn’t stand around eavesdropping, and I ain’t the damn Matchmaker of Little Pippin Hollow. The point is, open your eyes and open your mind.” He tapped his temple aggressively. “I know Danny raised you to keep your head down and be responsible and all that. He wasn’t wrong… to a point. But your Uncle Danny was also so stressed about work and… other stuff, his heart went wonky at fifty-nine. Part of the reason he sent you here was to figure out what you want your life to look like, right? So next time you get asked to do something—I don’t care if it’s joining a bread-baking club, or going on a date, or doing one of them psychedelic retreats in Peru—if you’re even the smallest bit interested, promise me you’ll do it. Don’t overthink. Don’t ask yourself what Danny would say. Throw caution out the window and leap before you look. Okay?”
“Sure,” I agreed. And because it meant so much to me that he cared, I nodded a bit more enthusiastically and promised, “Yes. I’ll do that.”
“Good man,” Van said with a nod. “Now, get outta here. Go home and change. Nobody’s adventure ever started with damp jeans, ya feel me?”
Because he was right, when I left the office, I ducked under the pass-through and called a cheery “See you later” to Crys, who was working the bar.
I was surprised when the bald man from earlier stopped me as I headed for the door. “Hey. Chris, right? I wanted to ask you about those, ah, charcuterie things? My wife’s a sucker for ’em. Don’t suppose you have a business card?” He gave me a hopeful little smile.
“Me? Oh.” I shook my head. “No. I only do it for fun. Nobody’s gonna pay somebody to arrange their cheese into—” I stopped.
That was cautious Uncle Danny talking, right there,after I’d promised Van I wouldn’t second-guess myself that way. And after all, what was the harm in making a little cash on the side and helping this man do a nice thing for his wife?
I cleared my throat. “You know what? I’m going to print up some business cards.” I grinned. “If you’re around tomorrow, I’ll give you one.”
“I’ll be here,” he agreed.
Itdidfeel good to do something a little… risky, I realized as I stepped out onto the sidewalk and pulled my jacket tight against the chilly twilight air. Really, refreshingly good. Maybe Van had a point about the whole adventure thing. Maybe he was right that good things would happen if I went a little wild.
So when a sporty little black car pulled up alongside me halfway down the block and the passenger’s window rolled down, I didn’t ignore it or walk faster the way I might usually have done.
“Chris?” The driver of the car had a voice so deep—soJohn Ruffiandeep—I stopped in my tracks, sure I hadn’t heard right.
“Um. Yes?” I peered into the open window
In the weak, golden glow of the dome light, I saw that he was tall and broad and bearded and plaid-flannel-shirted and—holy shoot, holyfreakingshoot—he had the same bright green eyes as the Sunday brothers.
“Thank fuck,” the missing Sunday said in a voice that—pinky swear—was the sexiest single sound I’d ever heard. “Get in. I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Get in,” I repeated inanely. “In…” I swallowed hard. “…your car?”
“Yeah.” He frowned like this should be obvious, and probably, it was.
I pushed my glasses up, then ran my hand through my hair, hoping that for the first time in my existence, I could pull off “effortlessly cool,” but it was no use. The idea that this man—this lumberjack, thisSunday—had been waiting for me had dumped my brain into a blender and hit the smoothie button. I could barely make my mouth form words.
“Oh. Um. Does Webb need something at the orchard? Or…” My voice trailed off as I sifted through the slurry of my brain, trying and failing to come up with any other plausible reason why this gorgeous man would be looking for me. “Does someone need an emergency charcuterie?”
“What the hell is an emergency char—? Never mind.” He glanced up and down the mostly deserted street, seeming agitated. Almost kind of… nervous? It made my chest go warm in sympathy, which somehow reconnected my brain to my mouth.
“Try taking a deep breath,” I suggested. “That sometimes helps me.”
“I think what would help is not doing this here,” he muttered. “Where the trees have eyes and every busybody has an opinion. But here we are.”
