Page 55 of Sandbar Storm
She was teasing him, but he was serious.
“Yes. That’s how it is.” Cole had looked into her eyes. They hadn’t so much as held hands in the times they’d spent together. But he’d reached out, pulled her in at the waist, and kissed her softly, but with no doubt that yes, he considered her his girlfriend.
She’d leaned back and looked at his handsome face and the twinkle in his eye. “Yes, that is how it is. But you’re my boyfriend.” She’d put her arms up around his neck and kissed him right back.
It was a dreamy moment on top of her new dream store. She blushed a little now as she remembered it.
Then Alison’s voice with an urgent question brought her back to the present.
“A lady on the phone wants to know if we are the store that carries the linen tablecloths she saw at her friend’s house. We have three, she wants me to reserve one.”
“Get her name and I’ll set one aside.” Siena loved going the extra mile to make customers happy. Hopefully that made the woman on the phone a customer for life.
As the door opened on Just The Thing, Siena’s eyes were wide.
She realized she didn’t just have a customer. She had a ton of them! And they were lined up to get in.
ChapterTwenty
Viv
The feeling started right before the re-opening. It was dull and distant.
Viv ignored it.
It was a low moan then. As if there was something howling in the night, far away, but stalking her. It was getting closer.
She ignored it. No reason to do anything but enjoy Siena’s big day.
And it was a big day. Her daughter sold so much on day one—the kaftans were gone along with the art she’d procured and just about every bit of linen she had stocked.
They had a wonderful celebratory dinner by the water. This time it was at Hope’s cottage after closing. They had leftovers and cold drinks.
Viv met Greg Macqueen; he already knew Tag. This was a small town, and that fact was charming, but Viv sometimes forgot how connected people were here.
Viv imagined this was the kind of cottage she could live in if things were different. She didn’t need Nora House or Two Lakes Grove Hotel. Those places were grand. She had grand back in New York.
But a little cottage by the water. Something simple, with a light-filled sewing room that faced the lake. That would be lovely.
That’s what she would do next. If things were different.
Tag said there was a place, an open lot, a few doors down from his fixer upper.
She promised to look at it, but the idea of buying or building was hopeful. It seemed like denial, planning that far ahead, when her future was uncertain at best, short at worst.
Because things weren’t different. They were the same. The exact same as when they’d left New York and come here.
When the excitement of the relaunched store was over, she got on the phone with Marion Anderson. It was better to know for sure than to walk around in doubt. She did have plans to make. And she would make them herself. Not Siena. Not her doctors. Not Bret.
Viv was deciding her next steps on her own. And she’d do it armed with the truth. Positive thinking wouldn’t change the science. She wanted the science. Then she’d figure out the rest.
The doctor was so nice and happy to help her. She ordered new tests.
“And I’ll have your charts sent over from New York, yes, of course. It will give me the complete picture.”
“How fast should I get the tests you’re ordering?”
“Sooner is always better. I’ll be here tomorrow. You get in at noon, and I’ll see you in the afternoon. I’ll pull some strings.”
