How Sweet It Is

by Dylan Newton

  Kate knew she wasn’t one of those women.

  Albeit infrequently, when the tears came, so did the blotchy red skin on her neck and cheeks—the bane of every redhead on Earth—and her eyes would be as red-rimmed and bloodshot as one of those African tree frogs for the rest of the night.

  “Oh, my dear,” came the woman’s voice at the same time as a gentle pat on Kate’s arm. “Please don’t worry about it. It’s just you and me left. Everyone knows I close at four p.m. Let me lock the front door, and you can take as long as you’d like to collect yourself. Nobody will be the wiser.”

  Kate picked her head up enough to confirm the café was, indeed, empty. At some point while she’d been moping, all up in her own feelings, the rest of the customers had left. Kate wiped her eyes and nose on a few more of the napkins and fanned her face, blinking fiercely as she took deep breaths to get hold of her emotions. By the time Patty flipped the sign to Closed and twisted the shades shut on the big plate-glass windows, Kate’s breath had stopped that stupid cry-hitching thing it did whenever she broke down.

  “Now,” the woman said, bustling back to retake her seat across the table, “this place may look like a cupcake shop, but I can tell you it doubles as a counselor’s office, think-tank, and an all-purpose battle station, when necessary. You look like you need someone to talk to, and I’m always looking for a reason to delay doing the dishes. So why don’t you say we help each other out, and you finish your cupcake while you tell me what’s got you so worked up?”

  Ordinarily, Kate would never have talked to a complete stranger about anything more than the random comments about the weather she might make to people on the subway. But here, in this tiny town, in this quaint, homey shop, with this sweet, well-meaning woman, Kate found herself wanting to unburden herself of the weight of today’s rotten start. Patty reminded her of her late mentor, Maya. Minus the apron, of course—Maya was like Kate with her lack of culinary skills. It was more in Patty’s demeanor: calm, collected, and filled with a genuine concern for others’ happiness—that drew her to the café owner.

  Pointing with her fork to the picture of Drake, she began.

  “It all started with this guy, and I can’t give you the details, but my job involved planning an event—”

  “His book launch.” Patty filled in the blank, smiling. “We all know about the upcoming release. It’s on Halloween, his favorite holiday.”

  “Right.” Kate nodded miserably. “And to make a long story short, I did my research online and believed…well, a bunch of stuff I shouldn’t have.”

  “Such as?” Patty’s right eyebrow raised in that subtly challenging gesture.

  Kate ducked her head.

  “He wasn’t anything I’d prepared for. I thought he’d be this…angsty, darkly mysterious guy who…I don’t know, dressed in steampunk garb, complete with some Gothic cape. I prepared this whole over-the-top scary launch for a writer I’d pictured as the brooding, Heathcliff character from—”

  “Wuthering Heights,” Patty finished, a side of her mouth quirking up at the corner. “But then, you met him, and…”

  The woman clearly expected her to fill in the gap. Why not tell her the whole tale? It’s not like it probably wouldn’t be all over this small town soon, anyway—how she’d practically accosted the man, then gotten tossed from his house.

  “He’s not like that at all. So, I made a total ass of myself and blew a great opportunity. That I can handle. But I might have gotten my best friend, his publicist, in some hot water, and her career may take a hit unless I can convince him to be on board with some much more laid-back version of a book launch. But after what happened this morning at his house, he’d sic the rest of his dogs on me if I were to come back and beg for Imani’s job. I wouldn’t blame him after I accidentally gouged his arm with my dumb shoes and the sight of his own blood made him woozy.”

  The woman’s eyes bugged out. “Oh, my.”

  Kate sensed more tears threatening, and she put down her fork to fan her face again, nodding.

  “Yeah. ‘Oh, my’ just about sums it up. He’s okay, I think. I caught him when he fainted and made sure he didn’t hit his head or anything going down. But when he was passed out on me, he was seen by…” Kate caught herself before revealing the movie producer’s name, shaking her head. “…someone important in that compromising position, and I guess it must have embarrassed him, because soon after that while I was cleaning up in the bathroom, he got really angry and fired us all. I didn’t prepare for this event proposal, like I should have, and I have only my stupidity to blame for my failure.”

  “I don’t think you’re stupid, Miss—um, what did you say your name was?”

  Kate hadn’t said, but she shrugged. What difference did her name make at this point?

  “It’s Kate,” she said. “Kate Sweet, and I own Sweet Events—the company that was previously handling the launch.”

  “Well, Kate.” Patty slid her chair up closer and tucked one side of her salt-and-pepper hair behind her ear. “I happen to know the Matthews family. Very well. And I know that while they aren’t perfect, not by a long shot, they are decent people. I don’t think it’s a lost cause for either your friend or for you.”

  “You’re so kind,” Kate said, giving the woman a watery smile. “Thanks for listening, and I’m sorry about all the waterworks. I’m not normally like this. In fact, I’m not ever like this. It’s been such a day. Such a horrible, nightmarish day.”

  “If there’s one thing I know, it’s nightmares and how to cure them,” Patty said, untying her apron strings and setting the pink material on the table, gazing thoughtfully around the café. After a moment, she got up and skirted behind a nearby table, plucking three framed pictures from the wall and bringing them back to Kate, where she slid them next to the crumb-covered plates. “I think this might be the answer to you and your nightmare.”

  Frowning in confusion, Kate stared at the pictures. One was a grainy, black-and-white photo of two men in camouflage, and the other two were in color, one more recent than the other. She examined the most recent photo. It was Drake, complete with his black glasses, standing in between two taller men, all of them in Marine dress blues. Drake’s arms were thrown around both of their shoulders. She didn’t recognize the tall, blond guys with him, but they all looked impossibly young to be serving their country. Kate noticed the date inscribed at the bottom was from ten years earlier.

  “I didn’t know Drake Matthews served in the Marines,” Kate said, peering at his young face. Having met the man, she noticed the years had added only a few lines by his eyes—he basically looked the same.

  “It’s in his DNA. He and his brothers followed in their father’s footsteps, and their grandfather’s before them.” Patty nodded and then pointed to the older, black-and-white picture. “This is Drake’s great-grandfather, Hawthorne Matthews, the man who built the house that’s still owned by the family. Standing next to him is Drake’s grandfather, Hawthorne Matthews Jr. Funny story: these two presented themselves at the recruiter’s office together, four days after Junior’s eighteenth birthday, to sign up for the war together in 1941.”

  “Wow,” Kate said, then looked at the third picture. It was color, but faded with age, of a middle-aged man dressed in a Marine uniform, sitting ramrod straight. He held a baby on his lap and his chair was flanked by two small boys. “Is this…Drake’s father, then?”

  Patty nodded, cocking her head at the picture and pointing to the older-looking boy with the dark hair and serious eyes. “Yes, and that’s Drake right there. You may not know this from your internet research, but Drake sponsors several county-wide veterans’ shelters and other groups that aid our veteran population. I think the answer to your problem might be to change Drake’s mind through where he feels it most—his heart, and through the things he loves.”

  Kate’s eyes lit up. “So, if I can figure out a way his launch might benefit veterans, you think he’ll change his mind?”

 
; Patty smiled, using her apron to wipe the finger smudges from the pictures before hanging them carefully on the wall again. “I can’t promise anything, but I believe this boy has a good heart, and he’s always looking for ways to raise awareness for wounded veterans.”

  Inspiration struck, and Kate pulled out her phone.

  “Excuse me for one second, Patty. I’m about to call in some favors.”

  Chapter 6

  Drake slumped against the leather couch in the front room. He stared at the fire, focusing on Sasha’s puppy snore as she lay zonked out on her favorite plaid blanket next to him. He envied her ability to sleep through all sorts of shouting matches—like the one his brothers were now waging. Over him. Or rather, over what he should have done to Evan Everstone instead of throwing a drink at him.

  “You drink the alcohol first, then throw the glass,” Zander said, shaking his shaggy surfer locks in disappointment as he poured three glasses of whiskey at the makeshift bar on top of Nana’s old tea cart. Although technically the baby of the Matthews boys, Zander towered over them all at six foot five. “Haven’t I taught you anything?”

  “Someone should kick that cane out from under Everstone and make him stand on his own perfectly good feet for once in his life,” Ryker said as he accepted the drink from Zander and plopped down on the couch next to the dog, giving her a pat when she snorted awake.

  Ryker, the middle Matthews boy, with his younger brother’s blond, blue-eyed looks and his older brother’s drive and ambition, was a perfect combination. The only one of the boys to do more than one tour as a Marine, Ryker was following in the footsteps of their late father and grandfather before him, becoming an officer, and had planned to serve until retirement.

  Until one hot day in Afghanistan when he’d been the loser in a showdown with an IED.

  The medics saved his life.

  But they couldn’t save his leg. Or his career.

  Ryker had been medically discharged, destroying his lifelong ambition and leaving in its place a nagging phantom itch for a career so brutally ripped from his grasp.

  “You had the perfect chance to settle the score with the dude who convinced your ex-snake Rachel to publish that trash about you, and you blew it!” Zander made a fist in frustration, splashing whiskey on Ryker in the process.

  Ryker cursed, glaring thunderously at Zander as he wiped off his shirt. Then he hefted the heel of his metal, spring-like, titanium prosthesis onto Nana’s antique table, crossing his legs. “Zan’s right. Throwing a drink is a rookie move. Next time, give him a good, solid punch, right between the running lights, and knock some sense into that lying, lady-thieving loser.”

  “Alliteration—pretty impressive,” Drake said.

  Zander whistled. “Watch it, or you’re going to blow your rep as the Grease Monkey to the Car Gods,” he said, alluding to Ryker’s day job as a classic car restoration and customization mechanic. “Now get your Terminator leg off Nana’s antique table, or else—”

  “Or else what?” Ryker challenged, a gleam in his blue eyes. “You’ve been spending too much time breathing in the paint fumes in your art studio, and too little time in the gym to be chest-thumping with me. I’ll put you on your ass.”

  Ryker’s go-to tease for his younger brother’s über-successful ceramics art chain struck a nerve, and just like that, it turned into a scrum. The two youngest Matthews brothers jockeyed for position on the couch, shoving and wrestling good-naturedly, like two bear cubs.

  Sasha jumped down from the couch to avoid being crushed, shaking her coat and barking at the ruckus, while Drake leaned out of the way, protecting his drink and chuckling.

  Despite his crap morning, Drake’s mood lifted, as it always did around his brothers—the two people in the world he trusted most. They’d arrived in Zander’s tiny Prius—what their mom termed the “Clown Car” for how the large men piled out of it, like performers in a circus—only ten minutes after Drake had left the walk-in medical clinic. Their timely arrival led Drake to assume someone in town had seen him and called to tattle. His brothers were ostensibly here for a social visit, but Drake knew they wanted the skinny on why their typically rattle-proof brother tossed two women and a billionaire out of his house and ended up with a gouge on his arm that required a trip to the clinic to close.

  As if reading his mind, his younger brothers finally settled down onto the leather sofa, their drinks remarkably intact. Then, using some sort of bro-lepathy, they fixed their blue eyes on Drake, asking questions in rapid fire.

  “Dude, why’d you fire that gorgeous publicist of yours? Imani seemed pretty amazing.” Zander brushed his shaggy hair out of his face, only slightly out of breath from the couch wrestling match. He gave a wicked grin. “You should introduce her to me. I am the best Matthews boy—took Mom and Dad two times before they got it just right.”

  “Speaking of Mom, she got a call from Mr. Penny today about a…let me see, how did he phrase it? A lewd sex act in your front yard with some hot redhead?” Ryker asked, his silvery blond brows rising in question.

  Drake groaned. “Mr. Penny called Mom?”

  Ryker straightened, his eyes alight. “Damn! You did the nasty with a ginger in the front yard? I feel like we’re in one of your novels where a demon double possesses the clueless, dorky writer and ushers in Armageddon.”

  “Demon Double. That’d be a good title for your next book,” Zander said, standing to put his empty glass on the antique tea cart. He wandered over to the front window, peeking out of the lace blinds. “Well, bro, I hope you used protection. Casual sex with a fan might sound like heaven, but there’s nothing holy about chlamydia.”

  Drake sputtered on his drink. “I thought you said you were here to cheer me up?”

  While Drake appreciated his brothers’ company, the fact his actions were already the talk of the town—as well as his mother and who knew how many reporters—made his stomach clench in anger.

  “You know how Mom is about people who talk trash about you. She told Mr. Penny if he didn’t shut his flapping gums, she’d ban him from the café,” Ryker said. “Care to let us in on the whole story?”

  Drake sighed. “There isn’t much to tell. My publisher hired an event planner for the book launch. She came here…and it got a little crazy.”

  “Define ‘crazy’?” Zander crossed his fingers, holding them up dramatically. “Please, please tell me it’s Girls Gone Wild crazy!”

  Tipping his drink back until the ice cubes clinked against his teeth, Drake drained his whiskey and handed the empty to Ryker, who leaned over the leather couch to snag the bottle, giving him another three fingers’ worth. Drake gave his brothers a quick, Cliff’s Notes version of the story.

  “So, in summary,” Ryker said, his face serious, “a hot girl scratches you with her shoes and you conk out. Then you fire her, and your publicist, because you’re pissed Everstone was here? I mean, that was your best move? He is producing your next book-to-movie adaptation, so logically, you’ll have to work with him sometime. I think you’re misdirecting your anger, Drake—and while that’s a topic I could write volumes on, you’re supposed to be the level-headed one of the bunch.”

  Drake touched his bandaged arm, remembering the stunning woman with her killer heels and terrible launch ideas.

  Shit.

  His brother was right. What a jerk he’d been to her, and Imani too. The only one who’d deserved his ire today was Evan, but like the IED that had gone off under his brother’s tank, his anger erupted like an all-directional grenade. He’d been curt to Imani, but atrocious to the poor event planner. While misguided, she’d only been doing her best.

  Kate.

  His mind still whirred with the electric zing of their first encounter. His fingers itched to be on the keyboard, capturing the details while they were still fresh and visceral. He remembered the smooth heat of her upper thighs, the floral scent of her hair, the way her eyes gazed up at him like he was some sort of superhero, when all he’d done was pick
her up out of the mucky grass so she wouldn’t break an ankle. He recalled his sense of awe when he’d come around after passing out and found himself on top of her. The feel of her silky auburn hair in his hands, the sprinkle of freckles across her nose, the way she looked up at him, her green eyes wide—all of it had goosed his muse into overdrive. He wanted to start typing. He knew exactly what to do now with his hero when he first meets the woman he’s to marry. He’d write about how they literally ran into each other, the plot device allowing for forced intimacy, bringing his characters together faster…

  “Hey,” Zander asked, interrupting his thoughts. Drake looked up and saw his youngest brother crouching down next to a box by the parlor window. “Why do you have all of Grandpa Matthews’s letters to Nana down here? Are you finally pitching some of the stuff in this house and making it your own? I mean, it was cool of you to buy the old place when Nana had to move to assisted living, but she doesn’t expect you to keep it like a shrine. Nobody does. And what’s in here that’s so ‘Forbidden’ it needs its own folder?”

  As soon as his brother made the air quotes around the title to his clandestine project, Drake shot up from the couch. He vaulted over Ryker’s legs and snatched the manila folder from Zander, thrusting the whiskey glass into his hands instead.

  “That’s just something I’m working on. Backstory for Twisted Twin.” Drake piled the boxes carefully onto each other again, and this time shoved them in the corner behind the pink needlepoint-covered ladies’ chair nobody sat in.

  Zander squinted one eye at him. “I thought that was set in the present? These are letters from the Second World War. I read through some of them that time when you two locked me in the attic and told Nana I’d joined the circus. They’re less about history, and more about hanky-panky. Grandpa Matthews really had it bad for Nana. Did you know he wanted to marry her before heading off to war? But Nana was only sixteen, so her parents wouldn’t give their permission.”