His Forever Valentine

by Marie Ferrarella

  “Nothing wrong with having the meetings in here,” Miss Joan told her, then shrugged. “But we’ll see. Always good to have money on hand for emergencies,” she added.

  Relieved that she hadn’t somehow managed to insult the woman, Val nodded. “Oh, and one last thing.” She’d mentioned this the day before. “There is going to be a need for extras on the film,” she reminded the woman. “So anyone who’s ever fancied seeing himself or herself on the screen, this is their chance to make that happen.”

  “We can post that on the bulletin board,” Miss Joan told her, nodding toward the rectangular corkboard that was mounted by the door. A few notices were currently pinned to the surface. “Most everyone in Forever comes here for a meal or their morning coffee or something so if anyone’s interested in smiling for the camera, they’ll see the notice.”

  “Actually, they’d have to act like they don’t see the camera. That’s the whole point,” Val explained. “Extras provide the human background in a movie.”

  Miss Joan nodded. “Why don’t you put all that down and we’ll post it?” she suggested. Turning her head, she called out, “Rayleen, why don’t you go into my office and bring out a sheet of paper and a pen for me?”

  “Right away, Miss Joan,” one of the waitresses immediately replied, hurrying off to the back.

  “She’ll be just a minute,” Miss Joan promised. Glancing to her left, she saw someone taking a seat at the far end of the counter. “Excuse me for a minute,” she said just before making her way to the new arrival.

  “Time to get to work,” Rick said to no one in particular as he got off his stool. Taking out a bill, he left it on the counter beside his cup. “I need to leave before Miss Joan gets back,” he told Val. Tipping the brim of his hat to her, he added, “Nice meeting you.”

  That was odd, she thought as the sheriff made his way out of the diner. She turned to look at Rafe. “Why does he have to go before she gets back?”

  Rafe laughed. “Because Miss Joan insists that the coffee is on the house while the sheriff tells her that he doesn’t want to take advantage of the badge. It’s an ongoing thing, my sister tells me. Both of them are stubborn as hell in their own way,” he confided.

  Someone always had to be more so, Val thought. “My money’s on Miss Joan,” she said.

  She expected Rafe to agree with her since he was the one who’d told her that the woman always got her way but he surprised her. “Mine’s on Rick. According to Alma and Gabe, the sheriff can be really stubborn when he wants to be.”

  At that point, Miss Joan returned. Looking at the counter, she frowned at the money left beside the empty coffee cup.

  “That man,” she murmured in exasperation. Taking out a jar from beneath the counter, she set it down beside the cup and put the bill Rick had left through the slot on the top. “It’s my charity jar,” she explained to Val. “Anyone comes through here who’s down on their luck, I give ’em whatever’s been collected to help get them back on their feet.”

  Rafe smiled at the woman. “You give them much more than that.”

  Miss Joan snorted. “Nobody needs you running off at the mouth like that, boy. You’re boring your lady friend here.”

  “I’m not bored at all,” Val told the woman. “You know, the director likes to incorporate a little improvisation in the movies he makes.” She grinned at the woman. “A savvy, sassy diner owner might be the very thing that will spark his imagination.”

  Miss Joan snorted dismissively, but Val had a really strong feeling that the woman wasn’t nearly as indifferent as she pretended.

  “Can I get you two something?” the woman asked, looking from Val to Rafe.

  “No, thank you, nothing right now,” Val replied. “I had a very large breakfast.” Miguel wouldn’t think of letting her leave until she’d had a little of everything the newly returned housekeeper had prepared. “Rafe’s father made sure I was filled up to the gills.”

  Small, amber eyes took full measure of her. “That probably took all of two eyedroppers,” Miss Joan theorized.

  “Here’s the pen and paper you asked for,” the tall, slender dark-haired waitress Miss Joan had sent off to her office announced, putting both down on the counter.

  Miss Joan in turn pushed the pen and paper toward Val. “Put down whatever you want the good citizens of Forever to know, then tack it up on that board,” she instructed, nodding at the bulletin board she’d previously mentioned. Just as she nodded, two more people entered. The diner was starting to fill up.

  Val began to write and Miss Joan said, “Well, thanks for the official heads-up. I’ll see you around.” With that, she went to wait on the two men who had just come in.

  Val finished writing her notice. After reading it over, she decided it was good enough to tack up. “I guess Miss Joan’ll take care of making sure that everyone reads this.” There was no doubt in Rafe’s mind that the woman would. Having a movie company in town, filming, was something that had never happened in Forever before. That made it a big deal.

  “Count on it.”

  That was good enough for her, Val thought. Pausing by the door, Val took two of the thumbtacks that were stuck in on the side of the board and used them to tack up her sign. She placed it right in the middle. Satisfied, she left the diner. Rafe followed her down the steps.

  She turned to look at him once she’d stepped to the side of the steps. “Rafe, I would like to buy you the biggest, juiciest steak in town—my way of saying thanks for all your help.”

  “Well, not that I actually did anything—other than get you out of the bull’s path yesterday,” he amended. But that had been sheer instinct. Saving her from the bull had nothing to do with helping her with the scouting job she was on. “But I could always eat a good steak.”

  “The biggest, juiciest steak in town,” she repeated. When Rafe laughed, Val stared at him. She couldn’t understand why that was particularly funny to him. He’d just said he liked steak. “Why are you laughing?” she asked.

  “Because Miss Joan’s diner is the only place to eat in town so the ‘biggest steak in town’ would be right here, as well.”

  “No other little out-of-the-way cafés around here?” she asked. They hadn’t gone on a full tour of the town yesterday and she knew that the diner was the main gathering place, but she just couldn’t conceive of there being no other place to go.

  “Nope.”

  She glanced over her shoulder at the diner. “Miss Joan has a monopoly, I take it.”

  He leaned against the hood of his vehicle, facing her. He supposed this was all very small time to a woman like her. “I guess you could see it that way. The rest of us just see it as the way things’ve always been. Cozy,” he emphasized. “There is a saloon in town,” he told her, “but the owner and Miss Joan have a deal going. She doesn’t serve hard liquor and they don’t serve food. Everybody’s happy.”

  He watched as her eyes lit up. Obviously, he’d said the right thing. “A real saloon? Or just another bar?”

  The former suggested a place with character where interesting people turned up. The latter word made her think of a crammed little place where the lighting was dim and the people who frequented it were even dimmer.

  “No, it’s a saloon,” he assured her. “Actually, it was here before Miss Joan came with her diner, at least that’s what they tell me. I wouldn’t know firsthand. Before my time,” he explained.

  She thought for a moment. “I don’t remember seeing a saloon yesterday.”

  “That’s because I didn’t think you’d find it more interesting than the countryside or the reservation. Only so much a person can take in in one day,” he said.

  “Fair enough,” she replied with a nod. “Take me there now,” she said suddenly.

  “You want to see the saloon?” he asked, somewhat surprised. She didn’t
strike him as someone who would want to set foot in a dark and rather boring place like that.

  Val nodded. “Yes. I want to check it out. It might add some extra color to the movie.”

  Since the saloon had been part of the town for as long as he could remember, he didn’t think about the place one way or another. Like Miss Joan’s diner, it’d always been there, mainly for men looking to unwind and kick back a little. It had its place in Forever, but in his opinion, didn’t play as much of a role in the town’s day-to-day life as the diner did.

  “I don’t think people think of ‘color’ when they think of Jack’s,” he told her.

  “What do they think of when they think of Jack’s?” she asked, curious. She was always open to input. She’d discovered on her very first assignment, searching for the right location to film The Twelfth Princess, coincidentally another romantic comedy directed by Jim Sinclair, that you just never knew when you could pick up something to pass on, something useful to the production company.

  Rafe grinned at her. “Something tall and cold and wet,” he told her.

  “In other words, a drink.” More to the point, she thought, a tall glass of beer.

  “Either that,” Rafe deadpanned, “or a bartender who’s been rained on.”

  “Very funny,” she countered. “What time does the saloon open?”

  She probably had to wait a few hours, she judged. It wasn’t even close to noon yet. But she did want to explore the premises, see if it could fit into the framework of the story somehow. Half the movies she’d worked on with Sinclair were two-thirds scripted, one-third improvised. The latter was influenced by what the director saw once he got to the chosen location. He’d taught her that spontaneity was an integral part of any film.

  “What time is it now?” Rafe asked in response to her question.

  Her eyes widened. “You mean it’s open this early?” Why would a place that only serves alcohol be open at this hour? From what she’d seen of the town so far, its citizens didn’t strike her as the type who needed to drown their sorrows on such an extreme basis that they began before the day was even underway.

  He nodded. “The owners live above it and close the saloon down when the last customer goes home—or on the really rare occasion when all three of them feel too tired to continue serving drinks.”

  “So all three of them are co-owners?” Val asked him. “Do they take equal turns working behind the bar?”

  He nodded. “They do, but it’s pretty clear to everyone that it’s Brett who really runs things. Most of the time, Liam and Finn just go along with whatever he says. Although,” Rafe qualified as they walked, “lately Liam—that’s the middle brother—has been acting as if he’s getting kind of itchy.”

  “Itchy?” she echoed, slanting a quizzical look in Rafe’s direction.

  “Yeah, itchy,” he repeated with emphasis. “You know, like he wants to leave Forever. Get out and see what the world has to offer. Itchy,” he repeated with emphasis this time.

  “I see. How does Brett react to this ‘itchiness’?” she asked, trying to absorb the family dynamics of the establishment she was going to see.

  Rafe shrugged. “He pretends it’s not happening. I think he figures it’s a stage that Liam’s going through and it’ll fade away eventually.”

  “And Finn?”

  He laughed. “When he’s not working there, Finn’s too busy chasing girls to notice anything.”

  “Sounds like an average red-blooded boy,” she commented with a smile. Then, giving him a long glance as they walked to Jack’s, she asked, “Do you ever get ‘itchy?’”

  Rafe looked at her as if the question made no sense to him. “What?”

  She knew he’d heard her. Was he stalling so he could frame his answer? “Do you ever think about leaving Forever and seeing what the rest of the country has to offer?”

  “Seriously?”

  “Of course, seriously.” The grin she saw on his face made her wonder if he still thought she was ultimately kidding.

  “Nope.”

  She stopped walking for a moment and scrutinized his expression. “Really?”

  “Really,” he confirmed. “This is where I’m supposed to be,” he told her, then gave her more of a basic reason for why he felt content here. “Everybody here knows everybody else, looks after everybody else. It’s like one big family. We don’t always get along, but that’s what happens in a family,” he said with a shrug. “But the bottom line is that if something comes up, we’ve all got each other’s backs. If I left,” he theorized, “that’s one less back that’s covered—and who’s gonna cover mine?” he asked. He supposed that sounded overly syrupy to her. “You probably think that I’m crazy.”

  Nothing could be further from the truth—although because of the nature of her work, she’d had the opportunity to see the world and discover what it had to offer. “No, actually I think you’re lucky.”

  “Lucky?” he questioned, wondering if she was just patronizing him.

  Val nodded. “Lucky,” she repeated. “Not that many people have what you feel you have. They spend their whole lives looking to fit in somewhere and you’ve done it without giving it much effort at all—and never leaving your own backyard. I call that lucky.”

  He turned the tables on her. “How about you? Do you feel like you fit in where you are?”

  Her answer wasn’t as quick as his. She gave the matter thought before saying, “For now, yes.”

  “And later?” he pressed, curious.

  “Will come later,” she told him elusively. She didn’t want to get overly serious about herself. She wanted to keep this relationship—and the information that went into it—light. At least on her end. “C’mon, introduce me to Jack.”

  “Brett, Liam and Finn,” he corrected. “Jack is their father’s name. The saloon originally belonged to him.”

  “So the saloon did close down once in a while,” she responded with an approving nod of her head.

  “What makes you say that?” he asked, curious as to her deduction.

  “Simple. Jack Sr. must have had some downtime, otherwise, there wouldn’t be a Brett, a Liam and a Finn,” Val said.

  Jack’s was right up in front of them, a small two-story building that was in desperate need of a paint job. The wood had darkened in the sun, looking the way saloons must have looked like at the turn of the past century.

  Rafe laughed as he opened the door for her. “Nothing gets by you, does it?”

  She felt it best not to answer that. Instead, she gave him a mysterious smile as she walked past him. She felt it was more effective that way.

  And it was.

  Chapter Eleven

  It was dim within the small room that comprised the saloon, although not quite as dim as Val had actually expected.

  The interior of Jack’s was one-third the size of Miss Joan’s diner and the two-story building faced a side street off what could whimsically be referred to as the beaten path. Miss Joan’s diner was centrally located, easily gotten to from any corner of the town. Jack’s necessitated a definite pilgrimage as well as knowledge of where one was going.

  That was done on purpose, some of the town council maintained, to discourage seducing the “young people” and keep them from going in, but the actual case was that the town had just naturally built up around the diner, not the saloon.

  The latter was not a social outcast nor a pariah. Each establishment served its own purpose, although some of the wives in Forever and the outlining area felt that Jack’s purpose was simply to keep their husbands away from home for large chunks of time.

  Still, possibly thanks to the fact that there was a sheriff’s department that was not overly busy and welcomed some sort of work, the people who frequented Jack’s comprised a relatively quiet crowd. They were
far more interested in either socializing or drinking to forget than becoming confrontational, boisterous or troublesome.

  When Val and Rafe walked into the establishment, the place was empty except for a tall, lean bartender who was busy putting glasses away behind the bar and his lone customer. The latter could be said to be communing with the bar, his face very obviously pressed against the gleaming, well-polished surface.

  The customer was snoring.

  The irritatingly loud noise didn’t seem to bother the bartender.

  When the floorboards creaked beneath their boots, the bartender half turned in their direction to see who had come in. “You here to claim him?” he asked before he’d turned fully around.

  “Actually, I’m just here to show Val your den of iniquity,” Rafe responded.

  Coming forward, Rafe peered at the man sleeping on the counter. There was only half a profile available for examination but it was enough. He recognized the unconscious man.

  “You’re letting Jamison sleep it off here again?” Rafe asked.

  After finishing another glass, the bartender set it down on the bar. Interest gleamed in his eyes as he looked over the woman Rafe had referred to as “Val.”

  “There’s no ‘letting’ involved,” the bartender answered. “I’m doing it to preserve a life. Two, actually. Jamison’s missus said she’d skin us both the next time I brought him home in that condition. So I left him here. Figured Jamison looked better with his skin on.”

  “But not you?” Val asked, amused by the man’s narrative.

  Brett Jack turned around completely to face her, then glanced in Rafe’s direction, waiting for an official introduction.

  “This is Valentine Jones,” Rafe told him. “She’s out here scouting locations for a movie.”

  Brett wiped his hands and set the towel on the bar for a moment. “Pleased to meet you, Valentine.”