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“And now, thanks to you, I have to start over,” I say, pointing an accusing finger toward the pile of curtains now crumpled on the ground.
“You’re trying to hang curtains by jumping up and down on an unsteady table? That’s your plan?”
“What else am I supposed to do? It has to get done. I have to do it.” Stress and adrenaline have my pulse pounding loudly in my ears. The curtains are the only line of defense I have against Lucas Pine until I find a new building.But what if I can’t find a new building? I’ll lose my business—my safe space, my purpose—to this jackass.
Luke presses a flat hand to his t-shirt clad chest and points through the windows to his shop with the other. When he speaks his voice comes out with an irritating level of calm. “I’m rightnext door. I can help you.”
Squaring my shoulders, I move close enough he has to tilt his head down to look me in the eyes. He may be taller than me, but that doesn’t mean I can’t take up space. “I don’t need your help. I don’twantyour help.” The words pour out of me, fast and loud, like the dam holding my self-control has burst. “I don’t want you here at all. I don’t want you next door. I wish you’d never moved here and taken everything away from me.”
His face goes stony, the muscles in his jaw flexing underneath his short-trimmed beard and the wildness in his eyes flattening out into cool indifference. He presses in even further, our foreheads almost touching. “Is that what you think happened, Allie? That I took everything away from you?”
“Itiswhat happened. This building was my dream.” Heat has flooded from my neck to my ears, and I know I’m flushed red with frustration, unable to hide my feelings from anyone. I fuckingloathethat my voice cracks on the next word. “Everything was hanging on it.” It’s not his fault that pursuing his dreams happened to randomly fuck me over.But if I don’t blame him, who do I have to blame?
Luke stares at me for a long moment before he steps back, leaving me blinking against the bright lights I hadn’t realized he was blocking with his height. He heads toward the door without a word. I should feel vindicated, but something in my chest tightens instead. The brief moment of catharsis that came with speaking my mind fades into guilt.Fuck.
I’m still staring out the door that Luke disappeared through when a welcome and joyful figure appears. “Allie!” Sadie squeals and rushes toward me from the doorway, rolling a sensible black carry-on suitcase behind her and balancing a canvas bag of groceries stuffed to the brim on her hip. Her long golden hair is styled to perfection in loose curls that are supposed to lookeffortless, but I’m sure took at least thirty minutes to create.
“Sadie!” Her presence is like a burst of sunshine that breaks the heavy cloud hovering over me after my interaction with Luke. She sets her grocery bag down on a table and pulls me into a tight hug. “You’re early, right? I was planning to pick you up in an hour. Did I mess the time up?” My mind races. Did I have it on my calendar wrong? Was she waiting at the airport for me, and I blew her off?Fuck, how long was I working on these curtains?
“No, no, no, you’re wonderful!” My joyful friend rushes to reassure me, “I got an earlier flight and wanted to surprise you.” She holds her hands out by her sides and spins in a circle, sending her sunset-colored floral skirt into a twirl. “Surprise!”
I pull her in for another hug and let her familiar scent of vanilla and orange blossom flood my senses. “I love this surprise. What do you need? Are you hungry? Do you need a drink? We get to startTurbinegirls’ night early now!”
Turbinegirls’ nights have been a tradition since the night before our grand opening. Devon, Sadie, and I popped a bottle of champagne, or three, in celebration and stayed up laughing and talking in the empty café until the late hours of the night. We all worked my opening day together, hungover, on three hours of sleep. Over the years, we’ve repeated the event every time Sadie’s in town, with a couple of tweaks. Now we include food and make sure no one has to be up early the next day.
“I’m good. Just happy to be here. I’msooverdue for a vacation.” Sadie walks over to the table and opens the canvas bag of groceries. “I brought the yummiest charcuterie spread.” She pulls ingredients out one at a time to show me. “You will not believe this aged cheese I just discovered, and I got this honey the last time I was visiting my family in Idaho. I’ve been saving it for you to try.”
“You’re so good to me.” At some point, I decided acharcuterie board was my favorite meal, and no one has been more supportive of that than Sadie. “Tonight’s cocktail special has Sadie written all over it. I’m making lavender gin sours.” Coffee is my job, but there’s a special place in my heart for a craft cocktail, too. “Even made lavender syrup from scratch.”
“That sounds incredible. I truly…” Sadie’s voice trails off as Luke’s impressive frame casts a shadow through the glass front door. He props it open and a moment later walks in with a full-sized ladder under his arm. He doesn’t say anything or make eye contact with either of us. Sadie gives me a confused look, and I wave a hand to say, “I’ll tell you later.”
Unfolding the ladder, he sets it right where the problematic table was, perfectly lined up for me to hang the curtains. Sadie and I both blink at him, silently, as he walks past us again and back out the front door without saying a word.
Chapter 10
Luke
“If you quit running around, I’ll show you how this works.”-Grandad Ernie, to five-year-old Luke, while he was tightening the chain on his BMW R69
“Wow, looks incredible in here,” Brian says as he walks in the front door ofVoyeur Motors. He tucks his hands into the front pockets of his neatly pressed chinos and tilts his chin up, taking in the space’s exposed brick walls, functional wooden furniture, buzzing neon sign, and the latest addition—a fern in a matte black pot on the front desk that my friends, Kiara and Rick, sent as a congratulations gift.
I thank him, rounding the Triumph I’ve been working on all morning. “It’s good to have you in here.”
“Can barely remember what the gift shop looked like.” He walks up to the Triumph and leans down to inspect it. “Looks like you’re already busy with work, too.”
I wipe the grease from my hands with a shop rag. “People were more ready for a motorcycle shop than I anticipated. I’vegot a queue of work lined up that’ll last me all month.”
“Glad to hear it. We want you to do well.”
He must mean him and Hector, because Allie sure does not wish me well. She was livid with me the other night when she fell off that damn hazard of a table, and I haven’t seen her since. The next morning, the curtains were hung, and one of her baristas dropped the ladder back off to me. The curtains have been drawn ever since, leaving me isolated insideVoyeur Motors. Brian’s visit is a welcome surprise.
He takes a step back, continuing to check out the shop. “We mentioned my dad’s motorcycle to you the other day,” he pauses briefly, glancing over his shoulder towardTurbine, probably deliberating Allie’s parting statement from that conversation. It’s pretty clear now that she was referring to these fucking curtains. “I was hoping you’d have time to talk about it now.”
“I’d love to hear about it.” I keep my mouth shut about the salty brunette next door.
“My dad had a motorcycle when I was a kid,” Brian starts, adjusting his black-framed glasses where they sit on his nose. “He bought it brand new in 1959.” My eyes grow wider at that. “I remember my brother and I would always sit in the front room before dinner so we could hear it coming down the street. It only had one seat, no room for someone to sit behind.”
“A lot of the old bikes are like that,” I chuckle.
