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“Other than you?”
“No fast food.” She took in the shabby but quaint main street. “I didn’t see any chain restaurants out on the highway, either. This place isn’t big, but it’s big enough for a NAPA Auto Parts store or a Blockbuster. Where are they? If you took away the cars and ignored peoples’ clothes, it would be hard to figure out what year it is.”
“Interesting you should mention clothes.” He studied her black bike shorts and camouflage T-shirt. “I guess you didn’t get the dress code memo that came with your new job.”
“That piece of crap? I tossed it out.”
A woman’s face popped up in the window of Barb’s Tresses and Day Spa next to the pharmacy. At the insurance agency on the other side, a balding man peered out from behind a church rummage sale poster. She imagined similar heads popping up across the street. In a town this small, the news of their famous new neighbor’s arrival would spread quickly.
She followed Dean into the pharmacy, keeping a respectful three paces behind, which further annoyed him, even though he’d brought it on himself with his attitude. He disappeared to the back of the store while she talked to the cashier and discovered there were no job openings. Two women rushed in, one black and one white. The man from the insurance agency entered, followed by an older woman with wet hair. Next came a skinny guy with a plastic name tag that identified him as Steve.
“There he is,” insurance man said to the others.
They all craned their necks to stare at Dean. A woman in a bright pink business suit came charging in, her taupe pumps clicking on the tile floor. She looked as though she was around Blue’s age, too young for her hair to be so stiffly sprayed, although Blue had no room to criticize anyone’s hairstyle. She’d have gotten hers cut if she hadn’t left Seattle so abruptly. She edged toward the mascara display just as the woman called out to Dean, uttering his name on a long, adoring breath. “Dean…I just heard that you’d shown up at the farm. I was on my way out to welcome you.”
Blue peered around the mascara in time to watch Dean’s blank expression shift to recognition. “Monica. Nice to see you.” He held nail clippers, an Ace Bandage, and a package of what looked like gel shoe inserts. No condoms.
“Goodness, the town is buzzin’,” Monica said. “Everybody’s been waiting for you to show up. Isn’t Susan O’Hara amazing? Don’t you love what she’s done to the house?”
“Amazing, all right.”
Monica drank him in like a frosty glass of sweet tea. “I hope you’re staying for a while.”
“I’m not sure. Depends on a couple of things.”
“You can’t leave till you’ve had a chance to meet all of Garrison’s movers and shakers. I’ll be happy to throw a little cocktail party and introduce you to everybody.” She curled her fingers around his arm. “You are just going to love it here.”
He was used to having his personal space invaded, and he didn’t pull away but tilted his head toward the cosmetics instead. “I have someone I want you to meet. Blue, come over here so I can introduce you to my real estate agent.”
Blue checked her impulse to duck farther behind the mascara. Maybe this woman could help her find a job. She slapped on her friendliest smile and made her way over. Dean pulled away from his real estate agent’s overly possessive hand to wrap his arm around her. “Blue, this is Monica Doyle. Monica, my fiancée, Blue Bailey.”
Now he was just being lazy.
“We’re getting married in Hawaii,” he said. “On the beach at sunset. Blue wanted to go to Vegas, but I’m too well organized for that.”
He was perfectly capable of fending off women without resorting to an imaginary fiancée, but apparently he didn’t want the tedium of dealing with all those panties being thrown at him. She had to admit she was surprised.
Monica’s face had fallen, but she did her best to hide her disappointment behind some rapid eye blinks and a quick survey of Blue’s appearance. The real estate agent took in the camouflage T-shirt Blue had appropriated from her apartment building’s laundry room after it had been thumbtacked to the bulletin board for a month. “You are the cutest thang, now aren’t you?”
“Dean thinks so,” Blue said modestly. “I’m still not sure how he managed to overcome my aversion to aging frat boys.”
His warning squeeze pulled her into his armpit, which smelled deliciously of one of those expensive male deodorants that came packaged in phallic-shaped glass bottles stamped with designer logos. She stayed there a few beats too long before she poked her head back out. “I noticed the For Sale sign when we came into town. What’s that all about?”
Monica pursed her penciled and glossed lips. “Nita Garrison being her normal hateful self, that’s all. Some people aren’t worth talking about. We do our best not to pay her any mind.”
“Is it true?” Blue asked. “The town’s really up for sale?”
“I suppose it depends on how you define town.”
Blue started to ask how they defined this one, but Monica was already calling over the people lurking in the aisles so she could introduce them.
Ten minutes later, they finally escaped. “I’m breaking this engagement,” Blue grumbled as she followed Dean to the car. “You’re too much trouble.”
“Now, sweetheart, surely our love is strong enough to survive a few bumps in the road of life.” He stopped at a newspaper vending machine.
“Introducing me as your fiancée made you look ridiculous, not me,” she said. “Those people aren’t blind. We look bizarre together.”
“You have some serious self-esteem issues.” He dug in his pocket for change.
