Still, as I take a bite, my heart comes alive with a tiny little flicker of anticipation. I may not quite know what it means, but I know it’s a good thing somehow. It’s the best raspberry Danish I’ve ever eaten. The buttery, flaky dough and sweet, tart raspberry filling taste like hope, like possibility.
Chapter 40
Walt takes our refusal of his offer surprisingly well.
“Eh, that’s okay,” he says, tearing off half the bear claw and stuffing it into his mouth. He’s standing in the shop, installing the new light fixtures. I went with brass and frosted globes. It’s a very Parisian look, which warms my heart. “I got my eye set now on the building where the Four Corners Tavern is,” Walt confides to me. “If I own it, they can’t throw me out.”
I snort in amusement. “Walt, if you’re going to be going to puzzle club with my mom, you’re going to have to mend your ways. Gwendolyn Wynne is not a lady to associate with a drunken rabble-rouser.” I shoot him a warning look.
“I’m a teetotaling rabble-rouser, thank you very much.” Walt rolls his eyes but then meets mine, his bright gaze surprisingly direct. “I expect if I had the love of a good woman like Gwen, I’d straighten up and walk the straight and narrow in a hot minute,” he says. “Not much a man won’t do for a good woman’s love.”
It’s the most sentimental speech I’ve ever heard from Walt.
“You be careful with her. If you hurt her, I’ll turn your life into one of those murder mysteries you’re so fond of,” I warn him. “You’ll be crab bait. They’ll never find your body.”
He gives me a little salute. “Understood. Message received loud and clear. I think the world of your mom. Always have. I’ll take good care of her.”
Then he turns his attention to more prosaic matters. “I’ve got the invoice for the work we’ve done so far,” he says, handing it to me. “It comes out to a little more than we thought it would because of the extent of the water damage and you getting the more expensive flooring. This is for the plumbing repairs and the floors and fixtures and stuff. It doesn’t include those fancy display cases you wanted me to order though. I’ll invoice you when they come in.”
I glance at the total and my stomach drops. Fifteen thousand dollars? That’s more than the total amount Mom set aside. And that doesn’t include the display cases or the amount we will need to pay for our portion of the building upgrades. I swallow hard, thoughts racing. What are we going to do?
Walt sees my stricken expression. “Hey, Emmie, I want to talk to you about something now that I know you all don’t want to sell.” He takes off his baseball cap and slaps it against his thigh. “I know you’re not flush with cash right now, and I got an idea. Hear me out, okay? I want to invest in your chocolate business, as a silent partner.”
I stare at him in confusion. “You want to invest in my chocolate business?” I ask, baffled. “Why?”
He shrugs and scratches his head. “Call it payback. I don’t know if you know this, but I was a friend of your daddy’s when we were young bucks. We were always getting into some trouble or another. Truth be told, I was usually the one getting us bothinto trouble.” He shoots me a rueful look. “Bert was a good man through and through. There was one time we were gonna go fishing, but well, it’s a long story. Ended up having to get rescued by the coast guard and that didn’t set too well with Gwen. After that incident, she made him give up his wild ways and any ‘bad influences.’ ” Walt makes air quotes with his stubby fingers. “Meaning me. But your dad never forgot his old buddy Walt, and I always knew I could depend on him to do me a good turn if I needed him to. He once bailed me out of jail in Seattle after a wild weekend. And about fifteen years ago, I was broke and living in my car, and he let me camp out here at the store after-hours for a few months till I got back on my feet. This was way back, before I won that state lottery.”
“You what?” I ask in surprise.
“Oh, I don’t tell most folks about that. I kept it real quiet. It wasn’t a huge sum, but enough to get me on my feet and let me get started in real estate. I used the lotto winnings to buy my first commercial real estate building,” Walt says nonchalantly.
I am gobsmacked. In a town as small as Poulsbo, how has Walt managed to keep this quiet all these years?
Walt holds his cap to his chest like he’s saying the Pledge of Allegiance. “Emmie, I have to tell you something.” He looks so solemn my stomach drops. “When your daddy got sick, right at the end, he asked me to come to the hospital,” Walt confides. “It was just him and me, a coupla weeks before he passed. He asked me to keep an eye on you and Gwen, make sure you had all you needed. And I’ve tried to do right by him ever since.” He hesitates, shuffling his feet nervously. “I had a key to this shop from the time when I was camping out here, and ever since he died, well, I’ve been comin’ in once a month or so at night to fix leaks and do little repairs, trying to keep my word to him.”
“You what?” I stare at him, mouth agape. “Has it been you this whole time?” I think back on all the times I repaired something by following a YouTube tutorial, and sometimes days or weeks later I’d notice that it seemed like I’d fixed it even better than I remembered. Was it Walt all along?
Walt grins a little bashfully. “You did the best you could, Emmie. I’d just come in and find what you’d tried to repair and fix it a little better, so it would hold up and do what you needed it to do.”
It’s been Walt all along. Like some slightly grizzled, potbellied elf helper.
“Did you leave the gold sprinkles too?” I ask.
Walt looks puzzled. “The what?” he asks.
“Nothing.” I wave away the question. I guess some mysteries will never be solved.
“Thank you,” I tell Walt, tearing up at the thought of my dad looking out for his girls, even from beyond the grave. On impulse I throw my arms around Walt and give him a hug. He looks discomfited by this display of emotion. “It was nothing big,” he says, patting my back awkwardly. “Just doing right by my old friend.”
“It was big to us,” I say, stepping back and seeing Walt with new eyes. Is this why Mom is inviting him to puzzle club? Has she caught a glimpse of the soft center beneath his hard-boiled shell? It’s starting to make more sense to me now.
“But I still don’t understand why you want to invest in my chocolate business,” I point out, wiping my eyes.
“Why not?” Walt says, looking surprised. “Seems like a good idea to me. I believe in your product. I’ve tried most of it already. I’d be honored to invest if it helps you and lets me keep my promise to your dad.”
“Hmm…” I eye him speculatively. “What do you have in mind then?”
Walt asks for a piece of paper and scribbles a simple contract on it. He hands it over. He’s offering me a no-interest twenty-thousand-dollar loan with a repayment term of ten years. I stare at the few scrawled lines in shock. It’s a generous offer, an exceedingly generous offer. It would allow us to pay for our portion of the upgrades with enough left over to purchase the new equipment I need, and probably allow us a little cushion for any lean months too. It feels too good to be true.
