by Bria Quinlan
“You expected to find my mom here?”
He wasn't sure why this was such a weird idea to her. Maybe her mom didn't spend a lot of time at the actual bakery. Maybe she did all the heavy lifting, so to speak.
“Well, yeah,” he said again, for lack of a better answer.
“She usually comes in after yoga.” She gave him a bright smile, as if this conversation wasn't going in circles.
Spence figured cutting to the chase was his best option at this point.
“I inadvertently insulted your mom, and I want to fix it.”
All the friendliness on her face shifted into a neutral position.
He kind of hated that a lot. She was so…adorable in a completely sexy way. Her little flare skirt swung around her knees as she stepped back and gave him a measuring look.
“You did?” She crossed her arms over her chest, and he wasn't sure if she knew it was a move of self-defense before she carried on. ”My mom is pretty hard to insult. Pretty Zen. Live and let live kind of person. You would’ve had to have done something really horrible to have insulted her.”
The more he thought about it, the more he realized he had done something pretty horrible.
After his drive and getting a look at the little shop, it was clear Starlight Harbor should be on one of his lists, and he’d figure out which one before he left. Absolutely not one with the word tacky in it.
He didn’t do anything along the lines of charming or quaint or must-see. Most of his articles aimed for something more tongue-in-cheek or (and he was ashamed of this as he stood in front of the angel) out-and-out mockery.
But there had to be something he could write about to make up for getting it so wrong.
It was that damn singing shark all over again.
And, if he brought them some business—not just the bakery, but the whole town—it would definitely be harder to sue him.
The cute baker’s assistant cleared her throat.
Right.
“I’m sure you’ve heard about the site that listed your town as one of the top tiny towns—”
“Tacky,” she cut him off, her entire demeanor changing, shifting to hostile. Obviously she knew what he’d done and wasn’t happy about it. ”It wasn’t the top or the tiny or the town. It was the tacky part.”
“Alliteration?” Even he heard the question mark at the end of that sentence.
“Tremendous.”
“You think alliteration is tremendous?”
She gave him such a scathing look that he stepped back.
“Tremendous is a tremendous T word that would have described this town.” She narrowed her eyes. “And my shop.”
Well, crap.
“Oh. Right.” Spence wasn’t sure he was winning any points.
He’d walked in here expecting to find a frustrated, overrun granny—which, looking back, was just stupid. More people lived in small towns and liked cupcakes than the elderly. Instead, he’d found a tiny hurricane of torment.
How about those T’s?
“Well,” he began, trying to get them back on track so he could head home. It had been a seven-hour drive all out in the middle of the night. And he needed to get at least part of the way home today. Sleeping in the car was definitely a budget-induced option. ”I wanted to come up and try to smooth things over.”
She started moving with an angry grace that was both fascinating and a bit terrifying. You typically knew if a guy was ticked off enough to take a swing, but he wasn’t sure what was happening right now. Of course, he also wasn’t messing with a woman who had that look on her face.
She was tiny compared to him, but at the moment he didn’t doubt she could take him. Even disregarding he wouldn’t hit a girl or someone that much smaller.
“Let me get this straight.” She came around the counter and went right past him, pushing the chairs in and wiping down a table. She swiped the rag over it with a fierce scrub, looking like she was trying to scour the varnish off the top.
"You’ve come all this way, from Upstate New York to fix it?" Her words came out fast and snippy, a bit more sarcastic than Spence would have thought so much cuteness could produce.
It wasn’t lost on him that she already knew where he was from. It wasn’t a hard thing to figure out, but it showed she hadn’t closed her computer after her comment and walked away.
Now, looking at the little old baker who was actually a beautiful and talented twenty-something with what he was fearing was a taste for revenge, he also started rethinking his previous idea of small town lawyer.
Crap.
"As best I can." He realized now was not the time to sound cocky or too sure of himself.
Of course, he hadn't felt any of those things since he walked into this bakery. Plus, he was still waiting to hear back from his guy at Yelp.
"As best you can?” She threw the rag down on the table and strode up to meet him toe-to-toe. Which should've looked ridiculous because she barely came to his shoulder, but instead he was pretty sure at this point she’d win whichever battle she was willing to fight.
"You're not just a minion. You're the mob boss.” There was so much accusation in her voice he half expected the FBI to kick down the door, raid the bakery, and take him off in cuffs right then.
"Don't you think that's a little extreme?" Even as the words rushed out of his mouth, he realized they were the stupidest thing he could say.
"Extreme?"
She poked her finger into his chest. He looked down at the tiny hand, wondering what he was supposed to do with that.
"Extreme?" she said again. ”You sent hundreds of people after my business. My tremendous, tiny, tenacious business. I had to close my website, turn my phone off. I'm trying to deal with orders, and I'm not even sure if they're real or not. How many comments attacking me or my business on your site were there? Did you give them my company name and location?"
"No! Of course not. That's completely unethical."
How insulting was that?
She looked at him as if she was surprised he knew what the word meant.
"I know what ethical means."
"I'm not sure you do.” She stabbed her finger into his chest again.
Spence carefully blanked his expression because there was no way the angel of vengeance would find his amusement amusing.
“You are everything that's wrong with the Internet. Pretending you're a journalist when you can't even research whether a town is tacky or not.”
She walked to the door and threw it open, waving her arm across the expanse.
“Does this look tacky to you? Does anything about this look tacky to you?”
When he just stood there a wee bit, afraid to move, she stabbed a finger at the ground as if telling him to get his butt over there now.
Spence was not impressed with this move, but he figured generations of men owed it to her from all the whistling and snapping that women had put up with for centuries, so he walked said butt over and looked out onto the green.
He saw exactly what he knew he would. A cute, polished, sweet little town.
Nothing tacky about it if you took the idea of Christmas out of the equation. And even the Christmas things present were tastefully done.
Of course, he couldn't help but notice yet again that there was no one out there.
Even if these people got hate visitors, they’d be better off than before he mentioned them.
"Maybe this will bring you some business,” he said hopefully, trying to defuse her anger.
"Really?" She pulled the door shut and stormed back to the edge of her café to the bus cart. As she picked up each of the cups and saucers and slammed them onto a tray, he half expected glass to start flying.
"Sure. We've had lots of places get more visitors after doing an exposé on them."
She stared at him a long moment until he was pretty sure he’d won her over. All she needed was for someone to come along and explain how this worked.
“I’ll put the page back u
p and suggest people who are in the area stop by.”
She crossed her arms, her expression starting to soften.
He had her.
“I’ll mention the cake. I mean, that’s a gorgeous cake.” He glanced at the pastries again, wishing he’d ordered something before she found out who he was. ”And then business will pick up and you won’t have to worry about anything.”
This was a better plan than the one he’d driven up here with—which, of course, was basically show up, apologize, get Yelp down, move on with his life, and not deal with crazy backwoods coastal locals.
“I wouldn’t have to worry about anything?” she asked.
“Nope. Worries gone.”
“You’re going to save me and my little town?”
When she put it like that, she should be thanking him. Maybe he could get some affiliate agreements set up.
He gave her a reassuring smile, maybe a bit of a flirty one, too, and nodded.
“I’m sure we can do it together.”
She stared at him a long moment before mumbling some letters and then pointed at her door.
“Get. Out.”
7
"And then he said, ‘Don't worry, little lady. I'll save your tiny town and you, too."
Lyra picked up her glass of iced peach tea and downed the rest of it like it was a shot of whiskey.
"Can you imagine the nerve?” she demanded. ”Does our town look like it needs saving? Do I look like I need saving?”
Skye and Vivian gave each other a quick glance before they smirked in Lyra’s direction.
"So, he's hot?" Vivian finally asked.
Skye snorted behind her sandwich as Lyra turned a glare on Vivian.
“What's that supposed to mean?" Lyra picked her glass back up, surprised to find it empty after her whiskey-shooting it.
"Well, you always had a thing for John Wayne movies…” Vivian waved her hand to stop the rush of words. ”Not John Wayne, we have heard. He is problematic.”
Skye mumbled a word under her breath that was much stronger than problematic.
"But John Wayne movies, John Wayne characters… Those you've always loved. And you just used the pretty little lady line.” Vivian grinned, looking pretty darn proud of herself. “And thus, Mob Boss must be hot."
Lyra grimaced. She hated that when he first walked in she’d noticed.
Oh, she’d absolutely noticed. The just-right amount of swagger carrying broad shoulders around. The way he took in everything, nodding to himself as if he approved. The flop of just barely too long dark hair that nearly fell into his eyes but was halted by the black-rimmed glasses he wore like Clark Kent—who, can we stop for a minute to appreciate that Clark was hot? Lois was an idiot.
Then she noticed how he was immediately enamored with her store, his gaze glancing around at all the cute little touches she’d added to make sure this was more than just a place to get a sugar rush. It was like sitting in a friend’s kitchen, relaxing and letting them spoil you.
And then he zoomed in on her cake. It wasn't often she took the time to make a nine-layer cake. She was practicing for an engagement party that she wanted to spoil the bride for.
The family had been coming to Starlight Harbor for generations, each one having at least one serviceman—and then servicewoman when Marianna had enlisted—who’d impact the holiday schedule with their deployments.
She and Marianna had hit it off when they were younger, and she was always glad when they came back.
Marianna was marrying a civilian but wanted to do it here at Starlight Harbor, a place she considered nearly as sacred as her family's local parish down in New Jersey.
So, Lyra was thrilled to see the effect her cake visually had on a guest. It gave her the confidence to try to pull this off on a bigger scale for Marianna and her husband-to-be.
After the attacks and the stress of the day before, and the added fun of not sleeping all night, it would have been exactly what she'd needed.
And then he'd opened his mouth.
So there it was. Her story at an end. The enemy vanquished.
"And then he started stalking you." Vivian snorted.
Lyra shook her head. ”Stalking me? Nope. I threw him out, and he went. I am woman."
"Okay then, Miss I Am Woman, why is he sitting out on the town square, watching your shop?” Vivian hooked her thumb toward the picture window, not bothering to slow her focus on her food.
If Lyra didn't love her and her bottomless stomach and her five-nine size six frame…
"He's out on the square?" Lyra wasn't sure what that meant beyond that he wasn't giving up and going home like she'd intended him to.
Hopefully not that he was about to launch a second attack on her.
She stood, tossing her napkin down on top of her unfinished meal.
"I'll take care of this,” she said in a surprisingly low and threatening voice instead of her normal squeak, and strode toward the door.
Behind her, Skye was already scraping her chair away from the table.
“You couldn't have waited until after I finished my sandwich?” Skye asked Vivian as she watched Lyra push through the front door.
Lyra glanced both ways as she crossed the street, force of habit even though it was a one-way circle around the square. Her fingernails cut into her palms where she made tiny little fists of rage. She was going to defend her town and kick this guy to the curb.
The shock on Spence’s face as he caught sight of her storming at him was nearly comical enough to slow her roll, but she was on a mission.
Save Starlight Harbor from the nasty Internet mob of Roadside Adventures groupies.
"I thought I told you to get out." That was strongly stated and clear. There was definitely no mistaking what she meant this time.
He raised his hands to the side, giving her the standard Confused Male look.
"I am out." He glanced around like he might be being punked or something. ”Literally outside. The trees and flowers and fresh air. … Very, very, very, very out.”
"I meant out of my town. Get out of my town you…you…flat soufflé." She stomped her foot in frustrated anger.
The confused look turned to one of pure humor. He was laughing at her.
"You're running me out of town?”
"I thought that was clear.” Lyra crossed her arms, ready for a standoff.
"Well, you can't really kick me out of a town. I haven't broken any laws. This isn’t the Wild West. I'm just peacefully sitting on a park bench.” He shrugged and gave her a whatcha gonna do look.
"I don't know how it works in New York, but we don't put up with that kind of stuff here in Maine. It's time for you to get back in your little whatever you drove in on and take off."
"Again.” He shook his head. ”It’s a free town.”
She’d had enough. She’d had more than enough. This had to be harassment. Looking to where the cars were parked on the opposite side of the street, Lyra spotted the New York plates and sprang into action.
She dodged around him, picking up his messenger bag and marching toward his car.
“Hey! What are you doing?” He caught up with her in about two steps, her much shorter legs no match for his.
"I'm putting you back on the horse you rode in on and pushing you out of town."
“Those images don't even go together." He reached down and gave his messenger bag a tug as she stepped into the street. ”Give me back my belongings, or I'll call the cops.”
"Oh, you just go right ahead and call the sheriff. And I'll file stalking charges. You're sitting here watching my store. That's not creepy.”
"You're absolutely right, sitting outside, on a beautiful day in a park on a park bench… Facing the direction the park bench is facing… Totally suspicious behavior. You should skip the sheriff and go directly to the National Guard."
"Don't tempt me.” She tugged on the messenger bag.
He wrapped the strap around his wrist, locking it to him.
&nb
sp; Stalemate.
"Give me my bag, or I’m not kidding. I’ll call the police.”
She was about to answer something she was positive was super pithy when a car horn beeped, the bright yellow Mustang skidding to a halt.
“Oh, geez.” Lyra waited, knowing that the circus had just truly come to town and Spence was in for something now.
Whether that something would help her vanquish him or just make him keel over dead with laughter …well, win-win really.
The new bright yellow Mustang was thrown into park and Miss Angie climbed out from behind the wheel, her little pup Captain Jack Slickpaws hopping down behind her.
"Lyra! What in the world is going on?” Miss Angie swept over in her typical garb that was half tavern wench, half hippie and glanced between the two of them. ”Is this young man trying to steal your bag? Because Captain Jack will take care of that." They looked down at the twelve-pound puppy running around chasing his tail where Miss Angie had tied a small Jolly Roger flag.
Yep, Lyra felt ten times safer suddenly… Not so much.
"This is my bag.” Spence gave another tug of the strap as he glared down at Lyra.
“Yes. It is absolutely his bag. I was walking it to his car for him.”
“Oh, Lyra, you've always been such a thoughtful girl. Your mother must be so proud.”
Lyra smirked at Spence. She all but shouted with her eyes This is my town, buster. She wasn’t sure he was getting the message, though, because he gave another tug on the bag. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the sheriff and Vivian coming out of her shop.
Finally. The cavalry!
"This place is absolutely ridiculous,” Spence announced as he glanced around.
His words had Lyra envisioning all the horrible articles he was picturing writing.
"This place is absolutely not horrible. And if you say it is in one of your stupid articles, I will sue you for slander."
Spence snorted. “Libel."
Miss Angie glanced between them, completely confused.
"I really don't care what it is. That's why I would hire a lawyer. To help me with the harassment lawsuit that I'm already plotting in my head."
“Oh, Lyra, is this man harassing you?" Miss Angie looked down at the pup. ”Captain Jack, we might have to do something about this."
