by Kris Jett
“When have I been an asshole?” Cash asked, still not backing down.
“All right, drop it or we’ll be here all day. We’re supposed to be having a meeting. Let’s just get to it,” Cooper said He nodded toward the door at the back of the store where the small break room was located. Right now it was just a coffee pot in the corner, a small two-seater couch, and a round table with six chairs. But they didn’t need much more with only the three of them working there.
Cade took a seat between Cooper and Cash at the table thinking it was probably wise to keep them apart for the moment. Cooper took out a notebook and started ticking things off on a list.
“We have some final things to run-through before doors open Monday,” he said. “All inventory in and entered into the system?”
“Yep,” Cade said.
“Things squared away with the bank? Got the registers set up and ready to process transactions?” Cooper continued.
“All that’s ready. All we need are the customers,” Cade said.
“They’ll come. I’m all over it,” Cash said.
The brothers never officially ironed out who held what position in their business and they didn’t think they needed to. They were partners and divvied up the tasks as equally as they could. All three would work on the snowmobiles. Cooper handled the daily operation and interaction with the townspeople. Cade kept the books. And Cash handled marketing and sales. They’d never run a business before so they took things day by day and just hoped they were getting it right.
Cade felt himself spacing out while Cooper went on about opening day details. His thoughts drifted to sitting on the back of that Ski-Doo, racing down the trails, with Jessie seated in front of him, his legs wrapped around the back of hers, only clothes and snow gear in between them. And back at the garage after they’d put away the sled and took off their gear. There was something there. A moment. He was sure she had felt it too. He was about to kiss her before her asshole ex-boyfriend walked in and interrupted. He could practically taste her lips. He bet they would be sweet.
“Cade. Cade,” Cooper repeated, louder.
“Hmm?” Cade said.
“I’d asked you a question. Did you get the rebuilt crankshafts?”
Cade shook his head, trying to refocus. “Oh. Yeah. Sorry about that. They’re in.”
Cooper gave Cade another look and then scratched something on his legal pad.
Cade ran his hands down his face and then clasped them together on the table. He should forget about this girl. She had a lot going on right now and so did he. He was launching a business next week. That was huge. Maybe Cade needed to find a new hang out to work in when he wanted to get out of the office. Jessie Foster was a distraction he just didn’t need right now.
Chapter Nine
Jessie took a deep breath and then slowly trudged back into the Starlight Pub. She was still angry with her mother but had cooled off some after that ride with Cade. Not to mention he currently occupied about ninety-five percent of her thoughts. Seeing him standing there afterward in the garage with the helmet cradled under his arm, he was so damn hot. She had a pulse and obviously had recognized before that he was extremely good-looking. But just then with that huge smile on his face, the corners of his eyes crinkling and his long yummy eyelashes, she felt completely captivated by him. He had the sexiest short dark beard and she badly wanted to kiss him in that moment and seen what it felt like against her face.
But then her ridiculous ex walked in and ruined the moment.
“Jessie Lynn Foster,” her mom said, exiting the kitchen with a tray piled high with food. “Where the hell have you been?”
Jessie takes the tray from her mom. “Settle down, Mom. I’m not nine. Now where is this food going?”
“Table two and I’m not happy with you.”
“Of course, you’re not,” Jessie replied as she breezed past her mother and delivered the food to the family of five sitting near the fireplace. She could feel her mom staring at her back the entire time. She slid the tray under her arm and made her way back toward the kitchen.
“So, this is how it’s going to be then?” her mom asked when Jessie tried to slide past her. “You’re going to keep giving me attitude because I’m helping our family, your sisters, my daughters?”
“Pretty much,” Jessie said curtly.
“Well, that’s unfortunate.”
Jessie grabbed a couple of menus and headed for the door to seat a young snowmobile suit-clad couple who just walked in. Her mom and her worked the rest of the lunch shift in silence. Each one thinking the other was wrong and she was right. Neither willing to back down.
Jessie was tallying table six’s tab when she felt a blast of cold air on her back. She’d thought the lunch crowd had ended but apparently, they were getting stragglers. With a slam of the cash register drawer she glanced over her shoulder to see who was coming into the pub.
“I got in early,” her sister Wynn said, her arms full of bags and a bouquet of discount store flowers.
Jessie heard her mom gasp. There were tears in her eyes.
“Wynn,” her mom said, clasping her hands together.
From behind Wynn a tiny little girl with a mop of blonde curls came toddling out. “Hi! Hi! Hi!” she said.
It was Melody. Jessie’s first and only niece. She could feel her heart thaw slightly at the sight of her.
“My baby!” Jessie’s mom exclaimed. She raced toward Melody and scooped her into her arms. “Grandma loves you, baby girl.” Her mom squeezed Melody tightly and then reached for Wynn and pulled her into the embrace. “I’m so glad you’re home.”
Jessie was glued to her spot next to the cash register. She didn’t know how to respond or what to say. Was she supposed to approach Wynn and the baby and embrace them too? Wynn hated her. Maybe she should hang back and let Wynn make the first move.
Jessie studied Wynn. It had been almost four years since she’d laid eyes on her. She was still the same Wynn but different at the same time. Maybe a bit frazzled. Her hair had thinned out and wasn’t as full of life as it had been last she’d seen her. Wynn had always had beautiful thick auburn waves and now her hair looked flatter, sadder. And her face had aged. She looked tired like she could sleep for a week if someone told her it was okay to. She was thicker around the middle also. Not heavy exactly, but she had to be a good twenty pounds heavier than the last time Jessie had seen her.
“Jessie?” her mom called out to her. “Come say hello to your sister and niece.”
“Hi, hi, hi!” Melody said again.
She was pretty cute.
Jessie hesitated and then slowly made her way to where her mother and sister stood. She kept her arms crossed over her chest and avoided making direct eye contact with Wynn. “Hello.”
“Hi, Jess,” Wynn said, also hesitant. Which in a way relieved Jessie. At least she wasn’t the only one feeling incredibly awkward at this reuniting. “You look…good,” her sister added.
Jessie shrugged. “Thanks. You too.”
Her mom let out a happy whoop and grabbed her and Wynn around the neck, pulling them both toward her in a hug. “It’s so good to have my girls together!”
Jessie squirmed uncomfortably, only inches from her sister’s face. She looked in her eyes and Wynn’s looked cold and unfeeling.
She still hasn’t forgiven me, Jessie thought. It’s an act.
Jessie got loose from her mom’s grip and stepped back a couple of feet. She looked down into the big blinking eyes of her niece.
“Hi, Hi!” Melody said, dropping the giant stuffed Minnie she had been lugging around with her.
Jessie squatted down to her level and picked up the Minnie. “Here you go,” she said, handing back the doll.
“Hi,” Melody repeated again.
“Hi,” Jessie echoed.
Jessie’s mom pulled Wynn and Melody over to a table near the fireplace and talked animatedly with them. Jessie returned to behind the bar, trying to find something to bu
sy herself with. She felt strange. Out of place. Like she was an intruder. Which was ridiculous. This was her pub, her home. If anyone was the intruder, it was Wynn.
Jessie glanced over at the happy reunion. So why did she feel so funny?
Cade suddenly filled Jessie’s head and she glanced around the pub. Was his stuff all gone? Did she miss him coming back in to pick up his things when she was arguing with her mom? She had hoped he’d maybe linger awhile. That they could talk some more. Or pick up where they’d left things before Jason had interrupted. She wondered what it’d feel like to have his lips on hers, his arms wrapped around her. She had brushed his bicep when she was taking his snow gear from him and he felt like a rock. She’d bet he could easily lift her and throw her up against a wall and have his way with her if he was so inclined. Jessie could feel her face flush as her thoughts grew wilder. She could tell Cade was no Jason. The missionary man is what she used to jokingly call him to April when they’d talk about sex back then. He was very vanilla. Which made Jessie all the more stabby that he’d slept with her sister.
Jessie grabbed a washcloth and began washing down tables as she continued her thoughts of Cade. Which were infinitely better than thinking about her sisters’ homecoming and the happy family reunion happening in the corner without her.
Chapter Ten
Jessie rapped on the locked door of MoonBeans. She could see through the window that April and Harry were busy closing up the café.
April unlocked the door and swung it open. “Hey, girl, come on in.”
Jessie walked into the warm store and unwound her scarf from around her neck.
“Everything all right?” April asked.
Jessie sighed. “Can I take you up on that drink?”
“Don’t say another word. Harry, I’m out of here,” she shouted over her shoulder.
“Hey, hey, you can’t ditch me.” Harry walked out from the storage room in back.
“It’s fine,” Jessie told April. “I can wait.” The chairs were all on top of the tables and the floor was still wet from where they must have just mopped. Jessie took a seat on the brick in front of the fireplace. There was no fire now, but it still felt warm.
“Fine, but let’s wrap it up in five minutes, Harry,” April said.
April and Harry raced around the room, shutting down everything for the night. Jessie picked at the bark on a log at the top of the wood rack. Wynn’s coming home had been harder for her than she thought it would be. She couldn’t believe Wynn still hated her. She didn’t say it of course, but she didn’t have to. Jessie could feel it. When the hell would Wynn ever grow up and get over herself? Starlight Pub has always been Jessie’s happy place and with Wynn sitting there with her mother, gabbing away like it was perfectly normal for her to be there, it just made Jessie ill. She wanted to get away fast. She sure wasn’t going to stick around for Luci’s arrival.
Jessie thought about Wynn and Luci’s relationship. She never thought of them as close but she was sure that they kept in some kind of contact. As much as two people living far away from each other could. Luci went to New York to chase a dream but Wynn ended up in St. Louis, Missouri by default. She followed her husband there because he had gotten some supposedly great job managing a large grocery store. Then when the relationship ended she was stuck there alone.
Now that everyone was back would they be ganging up on her? She was the youngest. Would they try and push her around? She sure as hell wasn’t going to let that happen. She knew she had to stand her ground. They chose to leave. This was her town, her pub, and her community. She wasn’t going to let them come back and take any of it away from her. If anyone would be made to feel like an outsider it would be them, not her.
These thoughts pounding away in her head were all too much. That’s why she came looking for April. She’d help her forget her troubles, at least for that night.
“All right, hon,” April said as she shrugged on her coat. “Let’s get out of here. See ya tomorrow, Harry.” She pulled Jessie to her feet, looped her arm through hers, and pulled her out into the cold night air. “So where are we off to? Downspout? Shakey’s?”
Jessie thought about this. “Could we get out of town actually? I’m not in the mood to see anyone I know.”
April smiled. “I know the perfect place.”
The girls climbed into April’s car and twenty minutes later found themselves in front of Rummy’s Tavern.
“Rummy’s?” Jessie said. “Never heard of it.”
“Which is why it’s perfect,” April said, pushing through the doors.
Jessie scanned the room, taking it all in. There were a couple of dart boards on a back wall, a pool table with a group of men around it, and a long, long bar with men sitting on every stool. This place was crawling with men, actually, which was probably why April liked it. Not her usual type though. April went more for the put together guy. Crisp collar shirt and expensive slacks or ironed jeans. These guys were sporting flannels and trucker hats.
“End of the bar, third from the left. He’s mine,” April whispered in Jessie’s ear.
Jessie grinned. “Got it.”
April had always been unapologetically sexually adventurous for a lack of a better word. When men slept around they were pat on the back. Called players and studs. When women slept around they were called horrors and sluts. Total double standard. April's multitude of men used to bother Jessie sometimes when they were younger. Like the time they walked into a full bar one night and April had said there wasn’t a man in the room she hadn’t been with. Skeev factor aside, it certainly narrowed the choice of dating material for Jessie. But then again, if these men were all so willing to have one night stands they probably weren’t right for a serial relationship girl like Jessie.
Jason had been Jessie’s first real love and they were together the longest at three years. Since then she’d been on dates here and there and had one longer-term relationship with a software developer who was doing a consulting job here in Snowy Ridge. His name was Jackson and they’d dated for a little over a year. When his gig was up and he wanted to take a new consulting position in Nashville, Jessie decided to end things. While Jackson was a lot of fun and a great guy, she wasn’t truly in love with him. Not so much that when the choice came down between being with him and staying in Snowy Ridge with Starlight, she chose Starlight. April had been bugging her to get back out there and date again since Jackson left but no one had really piqued her interest. Until Cade anyway. Most guys in Snowy Ridge Jessie had either known forever or they were just passing through on vacation.
Jessie marched up to the bartender. “Two shots of Fireball and two Long Island Iced Teas please. We’ll be sitting over there.” She’d pointed to a table in the back away from the door and the cold air blasting in each time someone entered.
“You want to sit way back here?” April asked as they made their way to the table. “No one will see us. And you didn’t even let me work my magic yet. I could have had those drinks paid for.”
“You work on the next round.” Jessie winked at her.
The girls took their seats and Jessie stared up at some hockey game on the TV overhead. She had no idea who was playing nor did she care. She was never much into sports. April faced the bar and made eyes at various men.
Jessie guzzled her drink and her shot quickly and immediately felt a little buzzed. While she did run and operate a pub herself, she really didn’t drink all that often. Or this quickly. Before she could order another round, a waitress appeared with two more Long Island Iced Teas.
“Courteous of the man in the brown flannel and backward Chicago Bears cap there,” she said to them.
April scanned the men. “Oh, that’s my future husband. I’ll have to go thank him.”
Jessie laughed and started her second drink. “Thank him for me too, would you?”
April sauntered over to the bar and wrapped an arm around the backward baseball cap guy. A few minutes later she returned to the table with h
im, his buddy, and four shots of Tequila.
The men introduced themselves and Jessie was sure that they were very nice she was just having a difficult time concentrating on what they were saying. She was feeling warm and toasty and a little bit dizzy. The light from the beer sign on the wall was starting to give her a headache. She wondered if she could pull a plug somewhere and turn it off.
April told stories and laughed and laughed and the backward baseball cap guy was making himself more and more comfortable with her. April was practically sitting in his lap. The other guy kept trying to engage Jessie in conversation but Jessie didn’t feel like making idle chit chat with this guy she was sure she’d never see again.
The guy got up and retrieved more drinks which Jessie readily took. She was suddenly very thirsty. And she tried hard to concentrate on what April was saying to her as she shook her arm and pointed.
“Look, Jessie! Jason’s here.”
Jessie stood and twirled around, almost falling flat on her face. Jason caught her in his arms, laughing. “Jason! You’re here! Did you come for me?”
“I sure did,” he whispered.
Chapter Eleven
This might not be the worst idea in the world, Cade thought. He followed his brothers into the old townie bar. The place was filled with what could only be regulars. Men with unruly beards who looked like they’d been snow plowing or trucking all day and women with sprayed hair, heavy lipstick, and short skirts. Cade was sure he stood out in his black leather bikers jacket and his heavy black boots. It wasn’t the kind of scene he was used to back home in Chicago but it’d due for the night. Cash had mentioned he stumbled upon this place one day while driving back from Farm and Fleet and that the beer was cheap but good. Can’t beat $2 bottles.
