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Their mother was not one to stand back when one of her chicks was hiding anything. In fact, she would talk at you from sunup to sundown. Interrogating you with a ruthless but gentle persistence that often had you dropping to your knees begging her to stop. Or spill your guts.
The strange thing was she’d never done that with him, but she’d had to know he’d come home different from the man who’d left town.
“I would.”
Her teeth snapped together, and they drove in silence the rest of the way.
Chapter25
Limpets Bakery was through town and close to the river. The building was tall, two stories, and the top part was for storage, as Mr. Limpet lived in the old folks’ home with his wife. Next door to the bakery was the Promenade Pizzeria.
“I’ve never worked out why the Calloways don’t have a square-dancing name for their store,” Zoe said.
“Mr. Calloway’s great-grandaddy had that place before the whole square-dancing mania hit Lyntacky,” Sawyer said. “Same for Limpets, so they can keep the original names.”
“Okay, that makes sense then,” Zoe said. “But where I was going with that was you’ll need to have a square-dancing bakery name, Rye, if you change it, which you should.”
“Hot Hash,” Sawyer said.
“Slip The Clutch,” Zoe added.
“Little Do Si Do,” Sawyer said.
“Square Em Up,” Zoe said, making a square with her fingers that Sawyer ignored. There was nothing worse than having your inadequacies thrown in your face constantly.
“Shut up, both of you,” Ryder said.
Part of the curriculum when you started school in Lyntacky was learning about square dancing, over and over again.
“Just trying to help, bro,” Sawyer said.
They parked, and his eyes went to The Gnat, which was farther down the road. The car park was full.Was Birdie there?
“You got J Bitch’s name off your arm yet?” Zoe asked him.
“J Bitch?” Sawyer raised his brow.
“Nina came up with it. I think it works for her, considering she hurt you. Not that we know shit all about that.”
“Leave it alone, Zoe. It’s in the past.” He put his arm around his sister and hugged her.
Sawyer might be grumpy more often than not, but he knew he had people at his back who loved him. He wondered who Birdie turned to first when she needed support.
“Okay, let’s do this,” Ryder said, getting out of his truck.
They soon stood looking at the bakery.
“It seems solid enough,” Ryder said.
“We’d need to check all that,” Sawyer said. “No point in buying something that needs tearing down.”
Ryder nodded, but Sawyer could tell he already pictured this place as his.
It had once been white with blue accents. The awning was striped and the sign painted in pink lettering on a white background. It was all now faded and tired and looked the same color. It had fastenings on one side and hung lopsided.
“The location must get traffic to The Gnat and the pizza place. Plus you have Slatter’s farther on and Circle Left,” Zoe said.
The Slatter family ran fishing tours. Hired kayaks and did treks. In fact, anything that involved outdoors and tourists. The Circle Left was a big old house that had once been a hotel saloon back in the day. It was still a hotel but also a restaurant and place for events like weddings.
