by Wendy Vella
“What’s paraben then?” Miss Sarah stepped into the conversation—literally. She now stood before him, hands on hips.
“Now, now, we’re not talking about what’s in my shampoo, but what’s in your tea, ladies.” Joe bent to brush a kiss on a soft, paper-thin cheek that smelled of musk. “Have to head off now, have work to do. Come in later, and I’ll pour you a glass of that hideous sherry I stocked just for you, and I can bask in my success.”
“If I didn’t love you so much, Joe Trainer, I’d dislike you intensely.”
“Now you don’t mean that, Miss Sarah. I’m your favorite, admit it.”
“Actually, you may have slipped down to second favorite, as of two days ago.”
“My heart’s breaking here.” He wondered why he was so aware of a woman who was now a stranger to him, but he was. He knew when she walked away, and made himself stay focused on the older woman instead of following Bailey with his eyes.
“Sarah’s star pupil is back in town, aren’t you, Bailey. So to be fair, she has to take first place, seeing as we’ve been following her career for years.”
Because they were talking about her, he could look at her. She was standing beside the counter, looking at the scones.
“So she’s back in town a few days, and my position slides? Hardly seems fair.”
She looked up at him and smiled. It was natural, and made her look sweet, which he did not notice.
“What can I say?” She shrugged. “It’s a gift.” She repeated his words, making everyone laugh.
He had to leave then, because work was piling up. What he actually wanted to do was sit and talk to Bailey, but instead he made himself walk to the door. “I want you two to try harder with the next tasting, because that effort was pathetic.”
“How do you know about marshmallow root?” Miss Marla asked.
“I have a plant.”
That got them scoffing, because everyone knew Joe was no gardener.
“See you round, Bailey, Maggie.”
They waved at him, and Bailey caught his eye, but then looked away. Joe felt that look right to his toes. Closing the door, he made himself walk out into the sunshine under the huge blue-and-purple teacup.
“Let’s go, Buzz.” His dog fell in beside him as he walked.
“Joseph Trainer, the noise coming from your establishment last night was too loud!”
“You have to be kidding me,” Joe said beneath his breath as Mary Howard approached him. “If I say bite, you get to it, boy.”
He looked down at his dog, who simply wagged his tail.
“Some kind of protector you are.”
“You look at me when I’m speaking to you, boy.”
Dressed for exercise in a pair of stretchy black leggings that challenged the laws of gravity, Mary Howard stood bristling before him. Her mouth was set in an angry line, as it always was when she was anywhere near him. He and this woman shared bad blood.
“I’m thirty years old, Mrs. Howard, please don’t call me a boy. And I can assure you the sound the band made last night was well within the limits. As a town councilor, it wouldn’t be right for me to try and break those limits, now would it.”
“Don’t you answer me back, boy, I know what I heard.”
Her eyes narrowed as she leaned toward him. The corner of her zip dug into the flesh under her chin, which had to hurt.
“I’m not checking them again, Mrs. Howard, because they haven’t changed since last time you complained.” Joe usually went for the path of least resistance when he encountered her, but sometimes, like today, when he was feeling edgy, he struck back.
“You’ll do what’s right because you owe this town, and some of us more than others.”
The burn of anger slowly filled his body. He tamped it down.
“I haven’t forgotten what I owe some of the town, Mrs. Howard.” He put emphasis on “some,” because this woman was definitely not one of them.
“You and yours are bad blood, and to my mind that doesn’t change. Drinking, drugs, and stealing, that’s all you’re good for.”
“With all due respect, Mrs. Howard, I’ve been back ten years, and not been in one scrap of trouble. Jake’s running a successful business at the ranch, and Luke’s a firefighter, so I’m not entirely sure what we have to do to prove we’ve changed. Furthermore, I’m about done trying.”
Not that he or his brothers’ gave a shit what this woman thought of them, but she was like a burr under his skin sometimes, which was never comfortable, but something he could live with if he had to.
“How’s your son doing, by the way?”
She was now the color of a tomato.
“Don’t you speak about my boy. He’s ten of you.”
“If you say so, but then how would anyone know? He left town same time as me, and never returned. You have to wonder why?” He wasn’t a mean person by nature, but sometimes it came out, and usually when he was around this woman.
“My boy has important business, and has no time to come back to this small town.”
“The small town you live in, Mrs. Howard?”
She spluttered, but rallied. Nothing kept this woman’s mouth shut for longer than ten seconds.
“Hello, Mrs. Howard.”
Joe hadn’t heard the tea shop door open, or Bailey move to his side.
“Who are you?” Mrs. Howard looked Bailey up and down rudely.
“Bailey Jones.”
The beady eyes narrowed. “I heard you were playing piano in New York.”
“Yes, and other places.”
“Well, you just keep away from him and his.” She looked Joe’s way.
“Pardon?” Bailey’s question was cold enough to have ice on it.
“Bailey—”
“He’s bad,” Mrs. Howard interrupted him. “Always was.”
“Well now, I guess that’s a matter of perspective then, isn’t it,” Bailey said.
“And what does that mean?”
“Perspective? Let me see if I remember what the dictionary definition is.”
Joe snorted.
“I know what it means!”
Bailey’s expression was innocent. “Excuse me, but didn’t you just ask me what it meant?”
Joe wondered if the top of Mary Howard’s head was about to blow off. He really shouldn’t be enjoying her discomfort so much, and especially not as it would put Bailey into her firing line, but hell, he was only human, and this woman was a bitch with a great big fuck off capital B .
“You just watch yourself, girl. I have weight in this town,” Mary Howard snarled. Then glaring at both him and Bailey, she turned, looked down at her shoelace, and bent to do it up. Joe wasn’t entirely dismissing the fact that it was a deliberate act on her part to do this; Buzz, however, never missed an opportunity, and wandered on up and put his nose where it shouldn’t be.
“Argh!” Mary Howard was once again upright. “That dog just violated me.”
“Naughty boy,” Joe said in the tone he used to order supplies for the bar. Bailey giggled, which earned her a glare. Mrs. Howard then stomped away.
“I’m sorry you had to be part of that, Bailey, but thank you for saying what you did.” He turned to face her, now only a foot separated them. Her eyes looked blue more than gray out here in the sun. She was still pale, and to his eyes tired, but for all that, she was beautiful. He found the scar on her cheek again. What put that there?
“I don’t like mean people, and she’s always been one.”
“With a long memory.”
“We all have those,” she said in a quiet voice. “Goodbye, Joe.”
Before he could stop her, she moved around him to give Buzz’s head a scratch, and tell him he was a good boy, then she’d walked away. Resisting the urge to follow, Joe made himself head in the opposite direction, wondering what Bailey Jones remembered from those two years they’d been in each other’s lives.
What did she remember? Like him, was it everything?
CHAPTE
R FOUR
Ryker Falls was at the foot of two huge mountains, and Joe took a few seconds to look at them, to steady himself, before heading back to work.
The twins, the locals called them. The Ryker family who founded the town had two children, twins, Roxanne and Phillip, so the left-hand mountain was called Roxy, and the right Phil. Identical in height and breadth, they could be seen from miles away. They were a year-round tourist town, because when people weren’t skiing down them, they were tramping up them to see the falls. A river ran down two sides of the town, and met the sea. This allowed more activity for those keen on water sports, or fishing.
“Afternoon, Joe, Buzz.” An elderly man appeared at his side. “That she-devil, Mary Howard, been giving you trouble again?”
“Hey, Mr. Goldhirsh. Nothing I can’t handle,” Joe said. “When’s the race?”
Tall and thin, Frederick Goldhirsh had lived in Ryker for fifty years, and his age was as yet unknown. He never told anyone, no matter how often he was asked. “Age,” he said, “is just a number.” Of Jewish descent, he started his life in a concentration camp in Nazi Germany, and considering how he had suffered by losing his entire family, the man was the most positive person Joe knew. He ran marathons year-round in every corner of the globe. He was jogging on the spot before Joe now.
“Six weeks on Sunday, and I expect your support, as it’s the annual Ryker Falls run.”
“I’ll be at the end clapping like every other sane person. Aunt Jess will be back too.”
The man’s eyes crinkled at the corners as he barked out a laugh. He’d been in love with Joe’s aunt for at least ten years.
Mr. Goldhirsh was dressed in a tank top that said London Marathon, and a pair of blue shorts. On his head was a red cap. Joe watched as he dug around in the pocket at the back of his shirt and pulled out a biscuit.
“You have to be kidding me.”
“He expects it,” Mr. Goldhirsh said, handing Buzz the biscuit.
“He’s going to be the size of a grizzly soon.”
“Wouldn’t do you both any harm to do some training with me, Joe.”
“God’s truth, Mr. Goldhirsh, I’d be dead before we hit the first mile mark.”
“And that’s the problem with the youth of today,” the man said, lifting a hand. He was obviously done with making Joe feel inadequate, and ready to move on and find someone else to hassle.
As he didn’t finish that sentence, Joe did it for him as he started walking again. “No resilience.”
Ryker had two parts to the town. The “green belt,” as Joe called it, was for those who wanted healthy alternatives for their body and soul, like alfalfa sprouts and meditation. You could get a beet and kale smoothie, though why the hell you’d want to was beyond him, and someone to get your chakras back in line and find inner peace.
“Not that I couldn’t do with some of that,” he muttered. His inner peace had been shattered two days ago when he found Bailey in the grocery store. He hadn’t stopped thinking about her since, and now that he’d just seen her, and she’d supported him with Mary Howard, he was even more aware of her.
Then there was his part of town. The place where you could get a meal and pay as little or as much as you wanted. Shops sold everything from hand-painted crockery to high-priced jewelry. Over the years, Ryker had learned to cater for everyone who entered it.
He and Buzz crossed the road and entered his bar. He’d bought the place five years ago, and he’d been making changes ever since. The facade was red brick, the front doors white, like the frames on the two front bay windows. A sign curved over the doorway with the letters A and S on it, and at night it was lit by twenty bulbs.
Joe loved this place because it was his alone. He shared several investments and properties with his siblings, but not this.
With polished wood floors, and muted lighting, the bar area had plenty of seating or leaning spaces. One wall was bricked, and to one side sat a small stage. Joe looked at the piano and thought of Bailey.
“And that has to stop,” he muttered, walking to where his manager was standing, poring over the bookings for the night. He had to get his head around the fact that she was back, and different, and that they no longer meant anything to each other. How could they after fifteen years?
“Hey, Buzz. We’re full tonight.”
“How come he gets a greeting and I get ‘we’re full tonight.’”
“He’s cuter.”
“You pull out a dog biscuit and you’re fired.”
“What bug crawled up your ass?”
He waved a hand, dismissing the question. “I want to say great, but with the staffing issues, we’re gonna be pressed, Em.” Emily Paul was short, with a big attitude. She had a cap of straight blonde hair, and several piercings that made his eyes water. She had been the best applicant he’d interviewed by far, even though she was younger by a good five years. Joe believed in gut instinct, so he’d employed her, and never regretted it.
Passing the bar he’d had another friend build with one long slab of local timber, Joe ran his hand along the smooth length before heading to his office. Buzz made a few circles on his bed, then settled down with a heavy sigh.
“Yeah, like your life is so hard.”
The dog ignored him and was snoring like the buzz of a chainsaw minutes later. Looking at the clock, Joe noted the time as 4:00 p.m. He’d be lucky to see his bed by 1:00 a.m., and wasn’t displeased. If he was busy, he couldn’t think about her.
CHAPTER FIVE
“ A drink, a meal, nothing more, Bailey. Seriously, you can’t just hide inside for your entire stay. It’s not healthy. You’re pale, with bags under your eyes, and way too skinny. You’re coming out with me tonight.”
“Don’t hold back, Maggie, and I didn’t stay inside today. Day two, I might add. I had tea with you at Miss Marla and Miss Sarah’s tea shop, then we walked down to the boardwalk.” The tea shop where she’d seen Joe. And then outside where she’d heard that bitch Mary Howard abusing him. The old Joe wouldn’t have just stood there and taken that. He’d have yelled back. Like her, lots had changed, it seemed.
“Do you want me to hold back, Bailey?”
“No, I always liked that you told me what you were feeling, Maggs. It’s taking me a while to adjust, okay? I haven’t been around anyone like you in years.”
“I’m not sure that’s a compliment.”
“I assure you it is,” Bailey said. She did want straight talking, because it was the truth she needed in her life now. No more lies or platitudes. No more empty words because people thought they were what she wanted to hear. “I value your honesty, Maggs. But I’ve been back two days, surely I get some time to just be a sloth?”
Two days of staying in Maggs’s wonderful home. It was close to the mountains, in the less-populated part of town. With two bedrooms, the body of the house was not overly large, but what it lacked in size it made up for with the view from the conservatory. Glass walled the room on three sides and the roof, and it offered never-ending views of the twin mountains. The minute she’d walked into that room, Bailey had fallen in love with the little house.
“Good. Because lying is not what we do, Bailey. And yes to being a sloth—if I believed that was what you were doing.”
“You don’t?”
“No, I don’t, but as yet I’m not sure what’s going on with you.”
“Does there need to be something going on? I mean, can’t I just be here to see you and take a holiday?”
“Hmmm.” Maggs made a noise that was neither agreeing nor disagreeing.
They were driving down the main street of Ryker, looking for a place to park. Her friend had dragged her out the house with the promise of good food and wine.
“I’ve talked at you for hours. Shared my entire life story, yet you’ve told me nothing about yourself, Bailey, other than everything is wonderful... fine, in fact. What I really want to know is why you’ve stopped performing, and where you’ve been since?”
&n
bsp; Bailey didn’t want to talk about that stuff, because it was painful.
“You know what I’ve been doing, Maggs. I wrote about it in the letters I sent you. I went to Juilliard, then performed around the world. I didn’t have time for much else.” Her life had been a strict schedule of practice and engagements, which she had enjoyed until they started to suffocate her. Then one day, everything had changed.
“What about people you know or things you’ve done outside music. Got drunk with friends, the night you lost your virginity. I want to hear those stories.”
“Ha ha.” Bailey made herself laugh. “That would take hours.” In fact, it would take seconds, because other than a few brief rebellions that involved leaving hotel rooms and walking about cities alone, there wasn’t anything to tell. Losing her virginity had also been spectacularly unsuccessful, and painful.
Bailey looked out the window at the streetlights; she still found it hard to believe that she was actually back here in Ryker.
“I’ll share the virginity story if you will.”
She laughed again.
Maggie sighed. “I’m worried about you.”
“Don’t be. Instead, help me find some work for the time I’m here.”
“Why do you need work? Aren’t you rich?”
“Hardly that, and I want to work. Maybe there’s somewhere I could play at nights?”
“But you’re on holiday.”
“I get bored easily.”
“So what were you doing before you came to Ryker, if you stopped performing?”
“This and that.”
“And?”
“And I need a job, Maggs. I promise to fill in the gaps soon, but for tonight can we just have fun?”
She felt Maggie’s eyes on her, but kept hers out the window. She had money, she just wasn’t able to access it, and wouldn’t be able to until she gave in to her grandfather. Yet another stupid mistake on her part. Bailey shuddered at how gullible and easily manipulated she’d allowed herself to be. She was in this predicament because she had no backbone, but that was changing now.
