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I go behind the ice cream cooler and pick up a cup and a scoop, then open up the lid to all eight flavors of the day: Moose Tracks, cinnamon bun, peppermint, blueberry, cherry, vanilla, and triple chocolate, and one empty container. My smile falters when I see that there’s no coffee flavor.
“What the heck happened to the coffee ice cream?” I ask aloud to no one. Now I’m extra grumpy. Dad’s being a pain in the ass to nurses and to my mom, he’s working Matthew and my mom to death, and now there’s no ice cream.
Unexpectedly, someone nearby clears her throat.
“Oh. That would be me. I the-heck-happened.”
Startled, my gaze snaps up to the worn-out diner table and chairs that Mom added last year. To the left is the shelf display of bug spray. On the wall to the right of the table is a taxidermied northern pike with a bright orange lure hanging from its gaping fish mouth.
And in between the two, seated at the table, confessing to having eaten the last of the coffee ice cream, is…a woman.
She’s in her twenties, and not here to fish. That this person is out of place in a bait shop in an isolated village in upper Michigan is the understatement of the year. With her hot pink leggings, off-the-shoulder sweatshirt, headphones, and open laptop, she obviously thinks this place is a Starbucks. And yet, the woman looks back at me with eyes so big and green that I feel like I’m looking into her soul.
“You ate all of it?” I rasp.
Who is this? I’ve never seen her before. Maybe she’s a friend Gretchen’s, Matt’s wife. Or maybe she’s here with Josh and Penny, or Bree and Cody, both young couples who sometimes spend a week up here at the end of summer.
The woman nods. “What was left of it, anyway, after the afternoon rush.”
Afternoon rush. That’s funny. A rush in Paradise Lane is three, maybe four customers at one time.
“Well, I hope you enjoyed it,” I snap, giving her a dark look.
The woman seems taken aback by my grouchy behavior, and I wonder if that was harsh of me.
Then, as if sensing I’m all bark and no bite, a slight smile pulls at her lip, and she lifts one sassy, mostly bare shoulder. “I sure did.”
Guess I’m not getting an apology.
“That was my ice cream. I came all the way from Dallas for it.”
She purses her lips and says, “Do they not have coffee ice cream in Dallas? How sad.”
I hem and haw, trying to think of what to say next.
“They do,” I say stupidly.
Her perfect eyebrows lift. “Oh. That’s good news. You can toddle on back to the Lone Star State and get yourself a heaping helping.”
I don’t know why I’m engaging with her sass. “Toddle? I’m 32. I don’t toddle.” I really shouldn’t speak with gritted teeth. It’s not a good look.
The woman laughs prettily. The kind of laugh that could make a man perform stupid human tricks to keep her laughing, if she weren’t so sharp and irritating.
“Oh! I assumed you were a baby because of your little tantrum over the ice cream. But if you’re a grown man? My mistake. Sorry.”
Not the apology I was looking for.
She looks past me and shuts her laptop, and for the first time, I can see all of her. The neckline of her sweatshirt—if you can call it a neckline—sweeps loosely across her sternum, revealing the tiniest hint of the swells of her breasts. The sweatshirt she wears is a midriff, showing off a pleasing little belly roll that begs to be nibbled. I inwardly groan and bite the inside of my cheek, trying to think of a comeback. And suddenly, my brain has stopped working. My mouth is full of cotton, and I have no words. No witty comebacks.
Damn it, who is this girl? Her sass is over the top, her outfit is deranged, her laptop is covered in lewdly worded stickers about something called “book boyfriends,” she ate all my ice cream, and she has annoyingly attractive tits.
Someone save me.
Or don’t.
I’m fine to just stand here and glare at this irritating, smart-mouthed intruder, trying to think of something to say.
“Cash James Young! How did I not see your car go by?”
