Candy Crush

by Tami Lund

  She began to question her decision to choose to move to a small town. She had thought she could get lost in a small town, but really, small towns were notorious for everyone knowing everyone else’s business. This is a mistake, she thought as she sat down and looped Butter’s leash around the table leg. Butter dropped to the floor next to her chair and put her head on her front paws.

  A perky dark haired, blue-eyed waitress bounced up to their table and said, “Hey Brandon,” and gave him a full wattage smile. Gabriella felt an annoying pang of jealousy, which was silly since she just met the man less than an hour ago, and she fully intended to ditch him just as soon as she had a full belly.

  “Hey Brittney. I’ll take a Corona in a bottle. What would you like, Gabby?”

  Gabriella glared at him and said, “A glass of wine. House red, please.”

  “Okay, I’ll be back in a jiff.” Brittney dropped two menus on the table and bounced away.

  “Don’t call me Gabby,” Gabriella hissed to Brandon as he opened his menu and began idly perusing it.

  “Okay. How about Sweet Pea?”

  “What?”

  “Sweet Pea. It’s a southern kind of nickname, since you’re obviously a southern bell. That accent is sexy as hell.”

  He glanced up from his menu and gave her a heated look. She blinked and sat back in her chair. A shadow loomed over their table and Gabriella and Brandon both looked up.

  “Somebody said there was a dog in my restaurant, so I had to come out to take a look. I should have known it was you, Brandon.” The woman was nearly six foot tall, with thick black hair that was cut into a short, curly bob. She was big boned but she carried it well. She wore a red t-shirt with Main Street Pizza embroidered over the left breast pocket and a pair of black jeans. A white apron was tied around her waist, and it was smeared with lots of red splotches. Gabriella guessed she was probably in her sixties.

  Brandon grinned and stood up and hugged the woman. He turned and nodded toward Gabriella. “Aunt Korina, this is Gabriella. She just bought the candy store. That’s her dog, Butter. She’s harmless.”

  “Which one, the dog or Gabriella?” Aunt Korina asked him, and then she turned and thrust her hand at Gabriella. “Nice to meet you, Gabriella. I like the dog’s name. Her fur is the color of butter. How long are you planning to stay in town?” Gabriella shook the hand Korina offered and tried to keep up with the questions she shot out like rapid-fire bullets.

  “Well, since I bought the candy store, I was sort of thinking it was a permanent arrangement,” Gabriella said in confusion.

  “Huh,” Aunt Korina said. “Between that candy store and Brandon, nothing is permanent.” Brittney returned with their drinks and Korina stepped to the side. “I gotta get back to work. Stop in anytime, Gabriella. Twenty percent discount to all Main Street merchants. Just let whoever’s at the register know.”

  “Thank you,” Gabriella said with a smile. Brittney stood next to the table, pencil poised over the small notepad in her hand.

  “Do you trust me to order for you?” Brandon asked, and Gabriella nodded. Since the owner, and probably cook, based on her apron, was his aunt, Gabriella figured Brandon really did know what was best on the menu. He turned to Brittney. “Large BBQ chicken pizza, thick crust please, and bread sticks.” When Brittney walked away, he said, “The bread sticks are worth it.”

  “Brittney seems to like you,” Gabriella commented before she could stop herself.

  “She’s my cousin. Well, she’s my cousin’s kid, so I guess she’s like a second cousin twice removed or some crap like that. In my family, she’s a cousin.”

  “So your aunt owns the pizza parlor?”

  “Yep. For forty years. We’ve all worked here at one point in our lives. Some never leave.” He nodded at the bus boy, a man in his early forties, with greasy black hair and sallow skin. “Poor Aunt Korina can’t say no to her relatives.”

  “Why do you and Korina seem to think I’m only here for a short time?” Gabriella asked him.

  He leaned back, draped his arm across the back of the booth and took a swig of his beer. He watched her for a moment before responding.

  “Rumor has it that candy store is jinxed. The same family owned it for something like fifty years. And then the last son who was running it died, and supposedly the family fortune disappeared with his death. Of course, it’s just a rumor that there ever was any sort of fortune, since there was never any proof the money existed.”

  He paused to take another pull from his beer. Gabriella sipped at wine and patiently waited for him to finish his story.

  “He died seven years ago. Since then, there have been five different owners, and none has lasted more than six months. It’s been empty for nearly two years. My job is to make sure that the downtown storefronts are rented and look good at all times, so that candy store is kind of the bane of my existence, since my office is directly across the street and I have to look at it every time I sit at my desk. It’ll be nice to have it open again, at least for six months or so.”

  “I’m not leaving in six months,” Gabriella insisted, even though she’d given herself that very same deadline only an hour earlier. “Why does everyone leave anyway?” She didn’t believe in jinxes and superstitions. The cold hard facts of reality were bad enough.

  Brandon shrugged one shoulder. “Varies. Vandalism, robbery. Sometimes enough small accidents happen to freak them out and they pack up and leave. The latest one just disappeared. He was a nice older man. He stuck it out the longest, and then he just up and walked away. The police suspected foul play but they were never able to prove anything. He’s never resurfaced. His family didn’t do anything with it for the longest time. Finally, just a few weeks ago, they managed to get him declared legally dead so they could sell the candy store. And now here you are.” He spread his arms wide in front of her and winked.

  “Sounds like a lot of bad luck. Or maybe just some bad kids running around town. Hopefully, they’ve graduated and moved on.”

  Brandon nodded. “That’s what the cops thought, too. But all of the local deviants always had airtight alibis. Looking out of town didn’t seem to make sense, since it was always specifically the candy store. They didn’t think out of town vandals would come to our small town and purposely vandalize a candy store.”

  “So what’s the theory?” Gabriella asked in spite of herself.

  “That the candy store is jinxed.”

  Gabriella pursed her lips. “Do you believe that?”

  “I think I like the fact that it will no longer be a blight on my main street. Do you have an ETA for opening day?”

  Brittney returned with a pizza stand and the pizza. She put them both in the middle of the table and handed Brandon a pie server. Korina was right behind her. She stepped up and placed plates, napkins, Forks and a basket of bread sticks on the table.

  “So when are you planning to re-open the candy store?” Korina asked, echoing Brandon’s question. Brandon served up slices of pizza while Gabriella answered.

  “Well, honestly, I didn’t expect it to be in such a state. I was planning on a little dusting and rearranging maybe, but that place looked like it’s going to need some serious work.” She looked at Brandon and he nodded his agreement.

  “So I have no idea. It would be nice to be open by mid-October, so I could take advantage of Halloween. Maybe I could have a Halloween-themed grand opening,” she said as she stared off into space, picturing it in her head.

  Brandon and Korina exchanged a look.

  “Brandon, you should rustle up your brothers and your cousins to help. It will shorten her time frame significantly if she doesn’t have to do it all herself.”

  Brandon looked like he wanted to argue, but Korina quelled him with a look. “Call them. Tomorrow. Have them over to that store on Saturday morning. Can you wait that long, Gabriella?” She turned to look at Gabriella, who had been observing their exchange with some interest. It was amusing the way Korina bossed Brandon aro
und like he was a kid, and fascinating the way Korina stepped up and offered her family to help, after having met Gabriella twenty minutes prior.

  “That’s fine,” she said faintly, feeling as if she really had no choice. Although she reasoned she would be a fool to turn down the offer of help.

  The few days lead time would give her time to take inventory, decide where everything should go, order any necessary supplies. In her head, she mentally pictured everything she could ask her help to do. She wondered if they would paint for her too.

  And then she wondered if she had fallen down the rabbit hole. She’d been in town for all of an hour and already she had the Sarantos family scheduled to help clean up her candy store on Saturday morning.

  “It’s settled then. Enjoy your pizza.” Korina walked away. Brandon called out for another Corona and then turned to glare at Gabriella.

  “What?” she asked, blinking owlishly.

  “You could have said no,” he pointed out.

  “I’m not sure I could have,” Gabriella commented as she watched the formidable Aunt Korina walk away. “Besides, why don’t you want me to accept her offer of help?”

  ***

  Brandon thought about his rather large family – all the women who wanted to marry him off and all the men who would be instantly attracted to Gabriella.

  “Let’s just say once you’ve accepted help from the Sarantos family, there’s no going back.”

  Gabriella was too busy enjoying her pizza to comment on his cryptic explanation. And Brandon was too busy watching her enjoy that pizza to be able to do much of anything at all. When she took a bite and moaned with pleasure, he inhaled the piece he was chewing and started choking.

  She jumped up and started beating on his back while he grabbed his beer and took a long drink. He pushed her hand away and gasped, “I’m fine, stop.”

  She sat back down and took another bite. Her moan of pleasure was much quieter this time.

  “That’s a noise someone makes when they’re having sex, not eating pizza.”

  Gabriella’s eyes widened and she stared at Brandon, but she did not speak until she’d swallowed the food in her mouth.

  “This pizza is almost as good as sex,” she said, and then she looked utterly shocked, as if she was surprised at her own words.

  Brandon lifted one eyebrow. “You haven’t had very good sex then. I mean, this pizza rocks, but it’s not that good.”

  “I also haven’t eaten in seven hours,” she pointed out. “So practically anything would taste good. And this pizza is nearly as good as sex.”

  Brandon decided he was definitely going to have sex with her. And then he’d ask her again if the pizza was as good as sex.

  They each had one more drink and with Butter’s help they finished off the pizza and bread sticks.

  As they left the restaurant, Brandon asked her where she planned to spend the night. In his head, she turned to him and whispered suggestively, “I was hoping you’d offer your bed.”

  In reality, she said, “The real estate company said there is an apartment above the candy store. I planned to stay there.”

  Brandon gave the candy store a dubious look. “Maybe I should go with you, check for raccoons again,” he suggested.

  She hesitated.

  “After seeing the state of the store, are you sure you want to be alone when you check out that apartment?”

  Gabriella sighed and gestured at the alley that ran behind the row of stores on the candy store’s block. “Lead the way,” she said, sounding resigned.

  ***

  Behind each business there was a small area of asphalt with a small dumpster parked to the side of the back door. Each business also had a large spotlight, shining over each back door. Gabriella wondered if the apartment over the candy store had heavy drapes, otherwise she’d never get to sleep with all the lights glaring into the windows.

  They walked in and out of shadows, as they passed each spotlight in turn. Gabriella had taken off Butter’s leash and she wandered around the alley, sniffing dumpsters and watering clumps of weeds.

  Gabriella could see the stairs leading up to the apartment above the candy store. The staircase was outside the building and was exposed until the top, where a small tin roof covered the balcony that jutted out from the back of the building. When they reached the stairs, Brandon held out his hand, palm up. Without a word, Gabriella handed him the keys and followed him up the rickety stairs. Butter climbed the steps behind her.

  “One of my cousins is a carpenter. I’ll mention these stairs to him. He’ll probably be here Saturday,” Brandon said when he reached the top.

  He unlocked the door and stepped inside, flipping the nearest light switch as he did so. Gabriella was relieved when a bright light popped on. And then she gasped.

  The apartment had either been ransacked or there had been a struggle of some sort. The eat-in kitchen and living area was all one room, and while the kitchen appeared relatively unscathed, the living area was virtually destroyed. A couch sat in the middle of the room, its cushions and arms in shreds. A chair was upended next to it, with springs sticking out the bottom. An old box television with a smashed screen lay on the floor. Pictures hung haphazardly from the walls. Most had broken frames and broken glass. The coffee table was in two pieces, splintered wood sticking out every which way.

  “Whoever was here last was really pissed off,” Brandon said as he stepped around the debris and walked down a short hall to look in the bathroom and bedroom. “The bathroom looks okay but the bedroom is ransacked as well. The bed looks like someone took a knife to it. And I think there might be something living back there. I think you should stay somewhere else tonight. Maybe for the rest of the week, until my family can get in here and get this cleaned up. I don’t suppose you have an alternate place to stay?”

  Gabriella shook her head dismally. This was not at all what she expected to find when she’d decided to start her life over. She expected a little dust, maybe some dated furniture, but at least she expected it to be inhabitable. She suddenly felt overly depressed and exhausted. “I guess I’d better go find a hotel.”

  “There aren’t any hotels in this town.”

  “There has to be a hotel,” Gabriella said, a tinge of desperation in her voice.

  Brandon shook his head. “Just a couple of bed and breakfasts at two-hundred dollars a night each.”

  Gabriella blinked up at him, desperation shining in her eyes. She couldn’t afford to stay in a two-hundred-dollar-a-night bed and breakfast. She had already dumped almost all of her savings into this candy store, and at the moment, she did not have a source of income.

  “I’m sure I’ll manage,” she choked out as she shifted her gaze to the hall leading to the bedroom.

  Brandon snorted. “No you won’t. Come on, you can stay with me. It’s only four blocks away. I usually walk to work, so I’ll ride home with you.”

  “Absolutely not,” she said with such vehemence that Brandon laughed. She gave him a cross look and he sobered to just a lip twitch.

  “I’m not harmless,” he admitted. “But I’m not a rapist or serial killer or whatever the hell you’re afraid of right now.”

  “I’m not afraid,” Gabriella insisted. More like petrified, but I’m not sure if it’s of him or my reactions to him.

  “You’re a lousy liar too. Come on, let’s go back to the pizza parlor first. Aunt Korina will vouch for me.”

  “And I’m supposed to take her word?”

  “Sure. She makes the best pizza in town.”

  Gabriella didn’t exactly agree with his convoluted reasoning, yet somehow, some way, she found herself standing next to her car on the grassy curb, staring up at an imposing Victorian home, complete with intricate scrollwork on the tallest point. A light shone over the front door, illuminating a wide front porch that wrapped around the side of the house. A pentagon-shaped tower jutted out into the porch corner. She could tell there were two large trees in the front yard. Ever
ything else was dark.

  “It’s huge,” she said before she could stop herself.

  Brandon chuckled. “See, you can relax, Sweet Pea. We don’t even have to sleep in the same wing, if you don’t want to.”

  Gabriella glanced back at her car and the miniature U-Haul trailer hooked to the bumper. “What about the trailer? I’m supposed to return it by the end of day tomorrow.”

  Brandon thought about it for a moment. “I’ll think of something by tomorrow,” he finally said. And for some inexplicable reason, Gabriella believed him. “Come on.” He started walking towards the house.

  “It’s beautiful,” Gabriella breathed, still rooted to the spot, staring once again at the antique home.

  Brandon stopped walking and turned to give her a bemused look. “It’s good looking too, but you’ll have to wait until daylight to get the full effect. It was my great-grandma Sarantos’. By the time she passed, everyone else who was old enough had a home, so I got it by default. Luckily, I’m pretty handy, because it wasn’t in very good shape when I inherited it.”

  “I’m not sure this is such a good idea,” she started again, but Brandon shook his head and cut her off.

  “Stop stressing, Sweet Pea. I like my position with the DDA and my family probably already likes you more than they like me. You’re safe here.”

  The look he gave her was contradictory to what he said. The look said, You’re anything but safe with me. Want to see my bedroom?

  Gabriella wondered what the hell she was doing. She was going home with a man she’d met only hours ago, in a small town that she knew nothing about, with no family or friends to help her if she ended up in trouble. What if he really was a mass murderer? Or a rapist?

  Or worse: what if he came on to her and she was too overwhelmed, too tired to resist? She shivered delicately. Brandon leaned over and whispered in her ear, “I only bite if you ask nicely.”

  Gabriella straightened and walked around to the trunk of her car, goaded into action by his assumption that she might be interested in doing just that. She was not attracted to him, damn it.

  She opened the trunk and began shifting through the bags and suitcases. She pulled out a bag of dog food and a shoulder bag that contained Butter’s necessities and handed them to Brandon. Then she pulled out one of the suitcases, pushed a button to pop out the handle, and pulled it up the curb and followed him up the front walk to the porch.