by Jean Oram
"You finished your little snit?" Gloria asked without looking up.
Mandy popped the menus back in the stack next to the pizza-by-the-slice display and stuck out her tongue.
"Good. Then come on over here and tell me how you're coping with Oz getting married because I'll bet you this restaurant you weren't home sick all these days. At least, nothing a heartsick girl can't give herself."
Mandy glared at Gloria and worked on tilting the window shades so the streaming sun wouldn't blind the early morning customers. "Ten minutes 'til open. Can you finish up the salt? I need to restock the serviettes since nobody seemed to notice how low they were while I was gone."
Gloria slowly screwed the lid on a shaker, and Mandy could feel the woman's eyes prying at the cracks in her façade as she moved from window to window.
"Better find a man to look after you, Mandy."
"But you just said—"
"You don't want to end up a waitress all your life."
Mandy's steps faltered as the truth struck her like a two-by-four to the back of the head.
Oh, God. Even Gloria could see it.
"An independent woman doesn't need a man to be something or somebody," she muttered, knowing her words would be in vain.
"Well, you certainly are independent enough," Gloria said, "but that doesn't mean you're automatically a somebody."
Panic sucked at Mandy's gut. There was nothing for her here, but there was nothing for her out there, either. She had nothing because she was nothing. The need to be bigger than Blueberry Springs ate at her, and she fought the surging need to run out the door and blast down the windy mountain roads in her big ol' Ford. To run from everything and somehow stumble into a life where she could be something. Something more. Life was ticking by, the clock picking up its pace.
She busied her hands with restocking empty jam baskets while she worked to pull herself together. There was nothing more for her to grow into here. Nothing to distract her the way there was the last time she felt like this. Unless she took over the business, she had nothing. And this restaurant, mismatched décor and all, was Benny's pride and joy as well as his connection to the community. He wasn't going to give it up.
Mandy glanced at Gloria over her shoulder and caught the smug, knowing look of a woman who could see someone's future laid out before her. Mandy straightened her spine and tipped up her chin. Gloria's smile expanded and Mandy could hear the woman's thoughts from across the room. Stinging her as they went slap, slap, slap.
"No. I won't," she said firmly, her jaw tight.
"Won't what?" Gloria said, challenge in her voice. She leaned forward like a cougar assessing its prey, all ears and unblinking attention, waiting to go in for the kill.
"Become—" She caught herself before she said you. "I won't be a waitress for the rest of my life. I'm more than that."
Gloria laughed. "Not a new idea, kiddo." Challenge still lingered in her tone. "So? Whatcha gonna be, then?"
Mandy breathed hard as if she was in the middle of a passionate fight with a lover. She leaned down, staring at Gloria. "I'm going to open my own place."
Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit. Where the hell did that come from?
Gloria screeched out peels of laughter, her hands resting on her stomach for support. "Are you, now? Well, then. Tell me what Benny thinks of that!"
"He'll support me," Mandy said with conviction she must have borrowed from one of her mother's soaps because it certainly didn't feel real. "Maybe I'll go into catering. Make lunches for Jen's outdoor excursions." Now there was an idea. Her good friend, Jen, had been running hikes, camping trips, and the like through her boss's sporting goods store. She could probably use snacks and lunches for her clients. Although her friend's budding business would need to grow a heck of a lot in order to support Mandy providing lunches for a living. "Or open a bakery."
Gloria's laughter got even louder.
Benny had trained her to run his restaurant so he could take vacations; he hadn't taught her so she could leave and compete with him. What was he going to think if she used his shared business tips against him?
But she wasn't going to open her own place.
Although she could totally do it.
Maybe.
Probably.
No. Not really.
Yes. Yes, dammit, she could.
The problem was that she was stuck in Blueberry Springs where the options were about as plentiful as oranges on an apple tree. But maybe that was all she had to do—just reach and pluck something new from that tree. And if it was out of reach, then maybe she just had to get up on her toes and stretch a little.
And maybe Benny was secretly waiting for her to take over so he could retire. He had all his rental properties around town bringing in income. He didn't need this place.
"Where you gonna get that kind of cash and brains?" Gloria asked. "You're gonna have to sell your truck."
Mandy frowned. She and Frankie had poured months—years—into souping up her machine. It was finally where she wanted it to be and it had so many great memories wrapped up in it. She loved that truck the way most people loved their children. It was so not up for grabs. It was going to take her places, but not at its own expense.
She'd have to work off the place. Over a decade. Or three. Basically, in time for her retirement, since she'd spent most of her extra cash proving she was more than that Mattson kid with worn out hand-me-downs from her brothers.
Damn those designer sales in the city. She might look well-dressed, but her savings weren't where they should be if she wanted to go into business.
"Why don't you buy one of those chains?" Gloria suggested. "That's got to be cheap and easy. I bet even you could run one of those things."
Mandy shot her a glare, but the wheels in her head started turning.
"Or," Gloria offered, "just ask Benny to give up his place." Gloria hooted with laughter, just about knocking herself out of her chair.
"I just might," Mandy stated, striding to the office Benny had at the back of the building. It was a longshot, but it was worth a try...wasn't it?
* * *
With the idea—however unlikely to become reality—of taking over Benny's poking at her, Mandy pushed herself to raise her fist to knock on his office door. Just before her knuckles rapped against the thick wood, she drew back. If the door was closed, he was trying to catch up on paperwork. She shouldn't disturb him. She should think things through.
She turned away.
But it was her life. How long was she supposed to sit here waiting for someone else to make it what she wanted? Flicking her hair over her shoulder, she turned back and raised her fist again. This woman would not wake up one day to realize she'd served her life away and had regrets.
The door opened as she went to bang against it and she had to step forward to steady herself.
"Oops." Benny squeezed her upper arm for support. "Good to see you feeling better." His nose wrinkled slightly and Mandy panicked, backing away.
She put a hand on her forehead. "Actually, I think I need to—"
"We need to take out the trash," he interrupted. "I realized how much you do around here when you were away." Still holding her arm, he drew her into his office. "It's different when you go on vacation and I have time to prepare for it." He offered her a spot on the couch against the wall.
She perched on the edge of the low couch and clenched her shaking hands together. Benny sat forward, elbows propped on his desk as he gazed down at her. He studied her in a way that said he had things on his mind. Almost as if he'd overheard her with Gloria...
No, no. He couldn't have overheard. His office door had been closed and, last she checked, he couldn't read minds.
She stood and re-tucked the back of her shirt. This was silly. She needed to carry on as she always had. There was nothing wrong with who she was and what she was doing with her life. She enjoyed it. She was good at it. And the money was half decent, after tips.
And, she reminded
herself, she didn't need much if she wasn't going to open her own place. And she wasn't going to open her own place because that was a silly idea that hadn't been thought through. She was happy here. She was just feeling weird because Oz got married. She had been happy until then, right?
Oh, but damn. She really did like the idea of having her own place. She could tell this wasn't a feeling that was going to go away any time soon because she knew she could do this. She could be someone. Over the past few years, how many times had she secretly imagined this place as hers?
She met Benny's eye. She could own the best restaurant in town. She just had to pry it out of Benny's hands, somehow.
She plopped onto the couch again.
"What's up?" Benny asked.
"What?" Mandy flinched. What was she thinking? She couldn't ask him to hand over his pride and joy. His livelihood. And she couldn't compete against him, either—not when he'd taught her everything she knew about the business.
"I know the others don't pull their weight. It's hard finding good help."
"It's not that." He waited for her to continue. "I've been thinking..."
Benny's expression turned stern and he presented a palm toward her. "Before you go any further with that line of thought. Like I said, over the past few days, I've realized how much you do and how much we rely on you."
Mandy nodded slowly.
"Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that you deserve a raise."
"Er...what?" A tidal wave of confusion washed over her and she rubbed her hands down her thighs, trying to cobble her thoughts back together from the various corners they'd scattered to like balls on a pool table.
Benny passed her a check. "Consider this a bonus. Sort of like back pay. I should have realized your value sooner."
Mandy looked at the check and shook her head in disbelief. There was no way she could ask him now. No way in hell. She blinked at Benny. "Wow. Thank you."
Benny stood and with a hand on her shoulder, ushered her to the door. "No, thank you." Out of the corner of his mouth, he added, "And just so you know, nobody else is getting a raise."
Still shaking her head with the wonder of it all, she went to the staff room to tuck the check in the safety of her purse. Except. Damn. She sat on the long ottoman, hands gripping the edge. She closed her eyes. Gloria was going to spill the beans of her idea and then flick every last one of them so far away, she'd never be able to retrieve them all and save face.
She popped off the ottoman and hustled into the dining room, finding Gloria still sitting, leisurely capping shakers, fine white grit surrounding her. The front door was still locked, despite the hour.
Mandy unlocked it to let in waiting customers, settled them in with fresh coffee and joined Gloria to twist on the last caps. In a low voice, she said, "You know what I was saying about opening my own place?"
"Benny turned you down, did he?" Gloria raised a brow and said, "Good. Because you'd work me too hard if you were the boss." She made little yipping sounds while puppeting her hand. "I'd have to quit and go on welfare or get one of those damn computer jobs Amber keeps talking about. And seeing as I have enough trouble finding the on button, never mind dealing with that right clicking business, I'd be on welfare soon enough, anyway. So why even bother?" She threw up her hands.
Mandy sighed and rolled her eyes. "Gloria," she said, impatience cutting her voice. "I was just spouting off. I'm not going to take over Benny's and I'm not going to open my own place and compete against him, either." She made a cutting motion with her arms. "It's nothing."
"Too bad. It would've been fun to watch."
Chapter 3
Mandy eased into Frankie's house, and, shivering, shook the snow off her jacket hood. After a couple of warm days, they were right back into winter again, with even more snow falling after a record breaking year.
"Is this another ice age or has Hell frozen over?" Mandy muttered to Frankie who, instead of taking her coat like he usually did, ambled to the kitchen on the opposite end of the small home.
Mandy sighed and hung up her coat. "Want to race around the track?" she called after him.
No reply.
Well, that was fine. She could act all miffed, too. Miffed that she was still thinking about that damned kiss and how hot it had been. And how it had brought on a slew of hot and heavy dreams that made her body react just thinking about of them.
They were friends! Dammit. Friends.
And that's all they ever should be.
End of story. Happily friendly ever after.
In the meantime, she needed to find some hapless fool with whom to work out her sexual frustrations. Then she could stop projecting all this lust onto Frankie because that was all this was. Just a heck of a lot of tension that needed working out in a physical way.
She gave Heart a quick scratch under the chin, ignoring the wet tennis ball in his mouth as she hurried after Frankie.
"Maybe we could shoot stuff out of the tree with your slingshot?" she called. "It's kind of cold but..." She rounded the corner into the kitchen and stopped. "Oh, sorry." Frankie's boss, Alex, with his hair as neatly parted as ever, sat hunched over the kitchen table. Beside him, Frankie's fellow parts man, Dodger, the lenses of his glasses so filmy Mandy had to suppress the urge to whip them off his face and give them a good polish, worked on an ancient laptop. "I didn't realize you were in the middle of something."
She pulled up a chair to join the men as Frankie rooted around in the fridge, clinking bottles of beer. She watched him dig deeper into the fridge, his firm ass tucked into a perfectly worn pair of Levis. For the eighth time in the past hour, she wondered why she didn't just toss the man into her bed. Or his. Or onto the couch. Wherever. It didn't matter, as long as his hips and lips were right up against hers.
Maybe they could try the friends-as-lovers thing.
She gave herself a mental shake and accepted the cold beer, refraining from shoving it down her shirt to cool off. Nope, she thought, the friends-as-lovers thing would never work. She needed his friendship, not a whirlwind fling.
"What are you doing?" she asked Dodger, who was hunting away for the right keys on an ancient laptop.
"We're planning a show and shine for cars that predate 1990 as long as they've been fully restored or have distinctive custom modifications. And we're going to add a cruise down Main Street afterward for people to prove they still run," muttered Dodger.
"Cool."
"We need a secretary-treasurer," Alex added. The men eyed her hopefully and Frankie slipped into the vacant spot to her right.
"Right," she said. "So the three of you can sit around and scratch your balls all day while taking credit for everything I do." She shook her head. These guys might be the Houdinis of the car world, but when it came to organizing promotions or dealing with the finer points of a business...she'd be on her own.
"Ooh, bitter woman," Alex teased.
"How the hell do I save this thing?" Dodger pushed down two keys and then shoved his glasses up his nose, peering at the screen before returning his attention back to the keyboard. "Stupid computers."
Mandy sighed and sifted through a few papers scattered over the table. They definitely needed help. Maybe she could help keep them organized and on task while somehow showing Frankie that the two of them needed friendship above all else. "It's pretty cool that you guys are finally doing this," she said, setting down the papers. "And while I'm not sure about being secretary, maybe there's something I can help with. When are you having it?"
"We were thinking about holding it during Sports Day," offered Alex. "There will be ball teams from out of town coming in, and lots of people go to the carnival, parade, and other events. We could tack our event onto the town's."
"That's two months from now," she stated in surprise, sifting through the papers again. There was way too much to do in eight weeks. Especially with everyone working full time.
Frankie scratched his cheek. "Mandy makes a good point. There's not a lot of
time and when all this snow melts there's going to be a lot of mud and rock slides on the highway. Nobody's going to want to bring their souped-up anything through until late summer."
Mandy stretched her arms. "You guys know so many people who'd come to something like this, you could easily pull off your own event."
The silent group stared at each other as if to say, "We do?"
She tried to remain patient. "Your contacts? From work? Between the three of you, you've got to know a ton of car people."
"Yeah, totally," said Dodger, nodding.
"We need a name," Alex said, rubbing his right eye. "We're stumped."
"Blueberry Cruise," Mandy said.
"I like it!" said Alex, slapping the table.
"Yup. Write it down," Dodger said. "What do you think, Frankie?"
Frankie shrugged but the glimmer in his eyes and the way his shoulders lifted in that sexy, happy way of his made Mandy know it had his vote as well.
Seriously. This was all so easy. They should make her president, never mind secretary.
"You guys need money?" she asked. Their eyebrows went up. "I don't have any. I'm asking about sponsors," she clarified. They shook their heads. "I bet you could get Fred to offer all entrants twenty percent off a car wash the day of the show and shine and maybe offer a couple of prizes."
"Why would he do that?" Dodger asked.
"Why wouldn't he? You'd be promoting his business, plus his place will be super crazy busy because of you guys." She sighed. "Listen, I don't want to be your secretary-treasurer, but I'm happy to help you out as a friend."
Frankie scratched his neck, head tilted back. She could practically hear the wheels turning as he formulated a plan. He waited to see if she was done talking, then bent over a fresh piece of paper and began writing line after line. She tried to see what he'd written—daring to hope it was a letter from him professing that her friendship was vital, more vital than anything else and he was grateful for it and the way she was totally saving their butts with all this brainstorming she was doing—but she couldn't see past his arm.
