Page 16 of Never Your Valentine

Lia removes the rubber band from the stack of legal papers. “Let’s get through the formalities and then I’ll take you over there so you and Grant can discuss⁠—”

“I don’t have anything to say to him,” I snap.

Lia doesn’t seem to notice my tone. “He might not even be there. Grant’s a night owl.”

“So the rage room is only open at night?”

“Hours vary by season. All I know is, if I’m still in the office when the music starts up, it’s time to go home.”

Chapter 6

Grant

I chug coffee from my travel mug as I drive home from Escanaba, where I picked up a load of dishes from an antique dealer. The plows have come through so the roads are passable. Lake Michigan is appearing and disappearing among pine trees planted along US-2. I’m making this trip on about four hours of sleep.

I was up half the night thinking about Annabelle. And about me. It was such a dick move to leave like that, especially without an explanation. But staying would be worse. I did the right thing. So why do I feel like shit about it?

Annabelle lives here. That means I’ll see her again. I’ll run into her at the library, or the coffee shop, or the post office. Sooner or later, we’ll have to make polite Midwest small talk. If she’ll even talk to me.

When I get back to town, I park on the street, since the parking lot beside The Break is full of last night’s snow. Felix will plow it for me if I ask him, but it’s usually an afterthought. If I owned the building, I’d hire a service to maintain the parking lot all winter, but I’m just a renter. My landlord died last year, God rest his soul, and I’ve been paying the estate through the lawyer ever since.

I never set out to be a business owner. When I was eighteen, I needed to get out of Echo Creek. The army offered a one-way ticket to anywhere, so I took it. When I was in California, some guys in my unit started going to a local rage room. I thought it would be a one-off, but they liked it enough to keep going back, and I watched the way they dropped real dollars for the chance to smash things.

I’d already been in the military ten years at that point, with very little to show for it, and this seemed like my way out. I found this building, put up the walls and the control booth, and started scouting for breakables. I’ve cultivated a network of estate brokers and flea market jobbers, but if we get low on inventory, I’ll scour garage sales and thrift stores myself.

Today, I got a nice set of Royal Stafford dishware for a song. I’ll skim off the intact pieces for the front of the house. Anything chipped or scratched will get thrown against a wall or beaten into unrecognizable bits.

My sister’s waiting for me in the maker area up front. June hands me a latte from The Grind, along with a chocolate bar. “Thank you,” I say. “What’d you win this time?”

“Ten bucks at the church raffle,” she says with a little toss of her head. “Just enough for coffee and chocolate.”

“I put ten bucks into the church raffle. I should have given it directly to you. Cut out the middle man.”

“That’s not how winning works.”

“I wouldn’t know.” I go out for another load of dishes.

June has the first box unpacked and sorted by the time I bring in the other two. “Look at this sugar bowl,” she says. It’s got apples around the rim and leaves painted on the bottom. “The ladies are going to fight over this. Too bad about the cream pitcher.”

“I’ll take that.” I swipe the pitcher with its missing handle.

June puts down her coffee to dig through the boxes. “Told you this would be a good lot. Totally worth the trip.”

“Says the woman who didn’t drive forty-five minutes each way.”

“I just find. You have to fetch.”

I give her a grumpy growl, but the truth is, I like working with my sister. She’s excellent at running the maker space, doing everything from hosting birthday parties to handling our advertising, leaving me free to run the rage room.

June hands me a stack of chipped plates. “Lia Sellers called. She’s coming in at eleven. She wants to introduce you to the new landlord.”

I suck an angry breath through my nostrils. “It’s not Ender, is it?”

“She didn’t say.”

Ted Ender is a developer from Chicago who’s been sniffing up and down the lakeshore, and has set his sights on Echo Creek. He and his far-off investors aren’t content with driving up the cost of local housing by turning all the available real estate into Airbnbs. Now, he’s making outrageous offers for storefronts in hopes of renting them to franchises like Starbucks and Subway.

So far, the chamber of commerce and the city council—basically the same handful of people—have been able to fend him off. Unfortunately, the mayor thinks Ender is a “strategic thinker” with “worthwhile ideas,” so it’s an uphill battle.