The Café between Pumpkin and Pie

by Marina Adair

  She would’ve been a lot nicer to work with than her damn granddaughter, who still walked around with a stick up her ass and a severe superiority complex. Just like in high school. The only thing that had changed about her was her looks.

  Sydney freaking Byrne had surprised the hell out of him at the funeral. As a kid she’d been what you would call a late bloomer. Gangly and awkward. She’d come to live with her grandmother after the deaths of her parents. Her mother and father had slid off the road near Portland in a snowstorm and had wrapped their car around a tree. Syd’s dad had grown up in Moonbright and the entire town mourned the couple’s death. But Sydney never fit in.

  She’d left right after high school, and except for the times Stella talked about her, Nick hadn’t given her too much thought. But after he laid eyes on her two weeks ago, she’d taken up considerable space in his late-night fantasies. All those supple curves and those big blue eyes.

  Today, it had only taken his short meeting with Syd to squelch those fantasies. She was as difficult as he remembered.

  He pulled into his narrow driveway and flicked on the heat as soon as he got inside. Another day had passed with his forgetting to call the chimney sweep company his family used. The reason he’d bought the house was for the fireplace, which according to the inspection hadn’t been cleaned in at least three years. On a night like this, a drink in front of a toasty fire would’ve been a nice end to a long and frustrating day.

  Instead, he nuked some leftover lasagna. After dinner, he got the inventory list Syd had asked for from his truck, snapped a picture, and texted it to her. The woman was a giant pain in his rear end. It wasn’t his fault that Stella hadn’t discussed the kitchen project with Syd. Nor was it his fault that he was sticking to his and Stella’s agreement. What did Syd expect? That he would break his promise to a dying woman? If he didn’t know better, he’d think the real issue was that Syd was still holding a grudge from sixteen years ago.

  * * *

  The next day, Nick ventured out of his office to take in the parade. Thirty-two years and he hadn’t missed one. According to his mother, he’d watched his first parade from a baby carriage. Now his nieces and nephews, at least the ones old enough to walk, marched in the ragtag processional dressed as ghosts and goblins and superheroes. It was cute as hell.

  He spied Hannah Allan in the sea of crazy dressed as Little Bo Peep and gave her a wave. Her family owned the Corner Café, an institution in Moonbright. They’d gone to school together and Hannah now helped out at the café.

  “Hey, what do you know? It lives.” Nick’s brother Sal smacked him on the back. “I thought you’d chained yourself to the desk.”

  Nick gave Sal a one-finger salute. “Where’s Rory and the kids?”

  Sal pointed across the street where his wife, dressed as Dae-nerys Targaryen, and Nick’s niece and nephew—both dragons, of course—waited to be given the signal to join the parade.

  “Where’s your costume?” Nick asked.

  “You’re looking at it.” Sal spread his arms wide. “It’s called overworked contractor.”

  Nick snorted. “You and me both.”

  “How’d it go at the Byrne place yesterday? How’s Syd doing?”

  “As well as can be expected, I guess.” Maybe he should’ve given Sydney another week of bereavement before tearing up the carriage house. “Stella never told her about the new kitchen and it caught Syd off guard. I don’t think she’s too thrilled about it.” That had to be the understatement of the year.

  “Shit. What about all the materials we bought? Wasn’t it like fifty grand in appliances, fixtures, and cabinetry?”

  More, but who was counting? “Something like that. We’ll work it out,” he said with as much optimism as he could muster.

  “Is it true she’s one of those celebrity chef types with a cookbook coming out?”

  The cookbook was news to Nick. But according to Stella, Syd had been featured in a few gourmet magazines. “All I know is that she owns a bread bakery in San Francisco.” And from what he could tell, she was anxious to get back to it.

  “With that new kitchen, why doesn’t she just expand her business to Moonbright?”

  Nick looked at Sal as if he had a screw loose. “Right, Moonbright. Because expanding in a town the size of a hazelnut in the ninth least populous state in the nation would certainly be the natural progression of things.”

  “Give me a break—it was just an idea.” Sal threw his arms up. “I’d better get back to Rory and the kids. I’m supposed to walk with them.” Sal started to leave, pivoted, then put Nick in a headlock and whispered, “Jen’s back for the parade. Just wanted to give you fair warning.”

  Though Nick wasn’t surprised that his ex was in town, his first reaction was to search the crowd so he could take cover. He didn’t want to run into her, which would inevitably mean rehashing the same old bullshit they always did. They’d made the right decision by breaking up. But when a couple had more than a decade’s worth of history between them, things were never cut-and-dried.

  He strolled, hugging the inside of the sidewalk, watching the parade over the heads of the throngs of bystanders. All the storefronts had been decked out in fall colors and Halloween décor for the event. Moonbright boasted having the largest pumpkin patch in Maine. Between that and the parade, people came from as far away as New York to take in the quaint flavor of the small town.

  Nick zipped his jacket. Although there was no snow in the forecast, a brisk breeze had kicked up, chilling the clear afternoon air. After the parade was over, the shops would open to trick-or-treaters and patrons alike. His family usually got a table at the Corner Café. But this year his folks were out of town, escaping the cold. They’d finally taken that trip to Turks and Caicos that Nick’s father had been promising his mother for ages. So, the rest of the Rossi family was free to roam.

  A flash of red caught Nick’s eye on the other side of the street. There she was, standing in front of the bakeshop, staring at the case of goodies inside, instead of the parade. He should’ve kept on walking, but like a dumbass he crossed the road, dodging cowboys, skeletons, and a few naughty nurses to keep from getting trampled.

  “Hey,” he said. “Nice to see you.”

  Sydney turned to face him, pulling her red coat tighter. “Is it?” Her lips turned up at the corners as if to say she knew he was full of crap. “I think the last time I was here for the parade was my senior year in high school. Gram always begged me to come, but this time of year it’s difficult for a professional baker to get away.”

  “I imagine it would be. You’re probably swamped all the way to Christmas, right?”

  She nodded. “Gram loved this parade and this little town so much. Looking back on it, I wish I’d come more often.... Well, it’s too late now.”

  “Knowing Stella, she understood.”

  She didn’t respond, but there was a wealth of sadness in her silence.

  “Did you get that inventory list I texted you?” On a scale of professionalism, accosting a client at a Halloween parade to talk shop ranked a negative ten. But Sydney Byrne wasn’t his client.

  “I did.” Her smile was tight. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think my grandmother was planning to open a bakery.”

  Sal’s words rang in Nick’s head. “You think she meant it for you?”

  Syd shook her head. “I’m fully entrenched in San Francisco and am about to open a second location in the city. She knew that. Our biggest dream was that she’d be there at my grand opening and book release party.”

  “I’m sorry she didn’t make it.”

  “Me too. I’ve asked around a little, and so far no one besides you knew anything about Gram’s plans.” She squinted up at him accusingly.

  The marching band launched into an off-key version of “Monster Mash.” He pointed to his ears and shook his head. She laughed, and the way her face lit up just about knocked the wind out of him. For a few seconds they just stood there, holding each o
ther’s gaze.

  Then he motioned that they should move farther down the street, away from the noise. She followed as he ducked into a narrow alley between two buildings that muffled the sounds of the parade.

  “Better?”

  She nodded. “I was just saying that besides you, no one had a clue about this kitchen of Gram’s.”

  He’d heard her the first time. “Syd, why would I make it up?”

  “I’m not saying you made it up.”

  “Then what exactly are you saying?” He waited.

  “I’m just really confused. Gram and I talked every day. Not once did she mention this project.”

  “Maybe she wanted to surprise you.”

  “Oh, I’m surprised all right.”

  Hurt seemed more like it to Nick. How could he blame her? It did seem rather unlikely that Stella would’ve kept her plans from her only granddaughter. But, hell, it was just a freaking kitchen, not the end of the world.

  “It won’t take me long to finish it,” he said. “And who knows, maybe the new owners will start a catering business.”

  She awarded his comment with a good amount of side-eye.

  “I’ll do a good job; you can depend on it.” He hadn’t said it to goad her but could see that his promise was having that effect by the way her face screwed up.

  “Clearly, my grandmother trusted you more than she did me. So you at least have that going for you.”

  “A little melodramatic, don’t you think?”

  She rolled her eyes. “You ought to get out a little, Rossi. The days of men telling women they’re being dramatic went out with girdles.”

  There was no winning with her. “All I was trying to say is that my family’s company has a lot of history with your gram’s Victorian.” The house on Maple had been a regular patient of Nick’s father. Window replacements, new flooring in the laundry room when it had flooded a few years ago, a screened-in porch for summer, and a myriad other fixes and additions.

  “I know. I’m not questioning your qualifications as a contractor.”

  Nor should she. He took pride in the work he did and considered himself a craftsman. “Everyone in town loves that house. It’s one of the crown jewels of Moonbright. I wouldn’t do any work that would change that,” including carrying out her earlier request to plunk the new appliances and cabinetry into the Victorian’s period kitchen.

  In a resigned voice, she asked, “How long is not long?”

  “Five weeks. Four if I push it. But I’ve got a lot of clients who are pressuring me to get their jobs done by Thanksgiving. They’re good clients.” He emphasized the word “good” to drive his point home, because so far she’d been a giant headache.

  She huffed out a breath. “Message received.”

  He took her arm. “Come on; let’s watch the parade. Then I’ll buy you a cup of coffee and a whoopie pie over at the Corner Café.”

  They found a spot on the sidewalk with a good view and watched until the grand finale—a giant pumpkin-faced helium balloon that brought up the rear. The crowd slowly dispersed and Nick and Sydney strolled to the café. It wasn’t until they got a table in the corner that he noticed the gawking, inquisitive faces.

  Like any small-town inhabitants, the residents of Moonbright liked their gossip. And Nick suspected that by tomorrow folks all the way to Bangor would be laying bets on whether he and Syd were an item. To his relief, she didn’t seem to notice the speculative stares coming their way.

  A server took their orders. Syd shrugged out of her red coat and draped it over the back of her chair. Nick once again noted how the scrawny high school girl he remembered had filled out in all the right places. Today, she wore her dark brown hair down, the ends curling above her shoulders. Despite her casual clothing—a turtleneck, jeans, and a pair of short boots with furry tops—she carried an air of big-city sophistication that unexpectedly turned him on.

  Born and bred in Moonbright, he’d always considered himself a girl-next-door kind of guy. Probably why he and Jen had had so many problems.

  “I always adored this place,” Syd said, glancing around the room at the wood-paneled walls, the green vinyl counter stools, and the banquette seating, then up at the pressed-tin ceiling. The restaurant was a throwback to a simpler time.

  “Nan sure can cook. But I’m guessing you go in for all that gourmet stuff.”

  She shook her head. “Comfort food will always be my first love.”

  “They have that out west?” He rubbed his chin. “Unless you consider kale comfort food.”

  She laughed again. “Maybe not whoopie pies, but San Francisco has its share of comfort food. And I don’t mean kale.”

  He’d only been to California once and had never understood what all the fuss was about. Jen, on the other hand, got stars in her eyes at the mere mention of the Golden State. Perhaps that’s why he’d gone out of his way to dislike it.

  “So you’re opening a second bakery, huh?”

  “I’m hoping to, yeah. I just have to raise the cash.”

  “You mean like investors?” It was nosy of him to ask, but as a businessman he was interested.

  “Only silent ones if any at all.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “I’ve learned that I don’t play well with others.”

  “Big shocker there.” He cocked a brow. “What happened?”

  “I didn’t have any money when I founded Bread and Cie. And I was too inexperienced to understand that by taking on financial backers, I was relinquishing control. It was a tough lesson but one I won’t make again.”

  “It must be a pretty big business.” For some reason, he’d visualized it as a mom-and-pop bakery not dissimilar to Moonbright’s Bellaluna’s Bakeshop.

  “We provide bread, rolls, biscuits, croissants, muffins, and scones to a good many Bay Area restaurants, cafés, and gourmet grocery stores.”

  “Wow. When Stella described it as successful, I had no idea what kind of scale she was talking about. So is that the model for the second bakery?”

  “Nope. The second bakery is a totally different concept. Strictly business to consumer. But first, I have to find the right location. Somewhere with a lot of foot traffic that I can still afford. San Francisco is an expensive town to do business in.”

  He nodded, knowing firsthand the expense of running a company. His father had started as a one-man band with Nick and his brothers helping out on weekends and during summer vacations. But Nick had big plans for Rossi Construction, and the math to make it happen would take a truckload of Benjamins.

  The server came with their coffees and dessert. Syd took a bite of her whoopie pie, closed her eyes, and let out a hum of appreciation.

  As he watched her, Nick’s groin tightened. Jeez, he needed to get a damn grip. Start dating again. But not in Moonbright, where there were prying eyes everywhere. And not with Sydney Byrne, who preferred the bright lights and the big city. Been there, done that, had the returned engagement ring to prove it.

  “Boy, have I missed these.” She wiped a crumb from the corner of her mouth, drawing his attention to her lips. Plump and pink.

  Yeah, he really needed to start dating. All work and no play wasn’t helping his libido.

  “Nan could make a killing in California with these.” She took another bite, this time using the tip of her tongue to lick away a dab of stray filling.

  He wondered if she knew what she was doing to him.

  “What’s wrong? Aren’t you going to eat yours?”

  He quickly looked down at his plate and shoved half the pastry into his mouth, hoping it would feed his craving.

  Chapter 3

  Syd woke up in the middle of the night, unable to sleep. It had been like that since all the upheaval in her life. Gram’s death and Syd’s breakup with Gage had caused a lot of tossing and turning.

  Instead of trying to fight it, she wrapped herself in Gram’s old woolen shawl and crept down to the kitchen for a cup of something warm.

&nbs
p; The wind was still howling and an errant tree branch scraped against the window, making her jump. It was a little scary being alone in the large Victorian with its creaks and unfamiliar noises. And it was Halloween of all nights. Too late for any last-minute shenanigans from the neighborhood kids, which made the sounds even more ominous.

  She lit a fire under the kettle. Gram would’ve suggested a warm cup of milk. But Syd worried that it would curdle in her stomach. Other than the whoopie pie she’d had earlier with Nick, she hadn’t eaten anything solid all day. She unwrapped the rest of the ciabatta bread she’d made the previous day, cut two fat slabs, and popped them in her grandmother’s old Dualit toaster. The refrigerator was filled with leftover casseroles the neighbors had brought over in the days following Gram’s funeral. Tucked in the back, she found the Irish butter her grandmother swore by and a jar of homemade jam.

  The kettle whistled and Syd made herself a cup of herbal tea, sipping it while she stood over the counter, waiting for her bread to brown.

  Suddenly she wasn’t alone.

  The reflection of a man in the chrome of the toaster stared back, startling her. She jerked, her pulse racing, and quickly looked over her shoulder, expecting to see a ghost. Or, worse, an intruder. But no one was there.

  Syd looked at the Dualit again, and the distorted image danced before her. It was hard to make out, but it was a man all right. He had a strong jawline and high cheekbones.

  And pretty soon I’ll be seeing Jesus in my toast.

  Syd dismissed it as a trick of the light from the overhead fixture. Or was it that silly Moonbright legend? The thought made her laugh. According to the superstitious townswomen, including Gram, if you looked in the mirror at midnight on Halloween you’d see your future spouse. Syd glanced up at the clock on the wall. It was eleven fifty-two. Take that, you old myth. And a toaster wasn’t a mirror. But more important, she wasn’t in the market for a husband. Or even a boyfriend for that matter.

  “You hear that, big guy?” She chucked the warped image on what she thought was his chin and a zing of heat from the Dualit went through her like an oven blast. She dropped her hand to the counter and a business card fluttered to the floor.