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“Are you casing out the place?” Shelly asked as she stepped up beside me with her hoodie covering her head and her hands tucked in her pockets.
“No,” I said and laughed at the same time making me look even more suspicious. “I wanted to check it out before Randy did. I think it would be a great idea for him to have a storefront. He’s not so sure.”
“Wouldn’t it be easier than having your house full of cookies at all times?”
“Yeah, but Randy isn’t excited about dealing with people face to face. He loves delivering them to businesses but he’s not the type to own a restaurant. I was hoping we could use this space for storage and to bake everything. Plus, then he’d actually have time off when he’s not working.”
“Gee, Eli, what would you do with all that free time?” Shelly asked and fluttered her eyelashes while clutching her hands together and throwing her foot out to the side.
“Well, first—”
“Lalalalala, please no details,” she said, sticking her fingers in her ears.
“I’ll save it for Randy,” I said, making us both laugh. She took my arm, and we walked toward the gift shop. “Why are you here so early anyway?” Shelly worked at her dad’s sandwich shop, The Wedge, which was right next door to Aunt Carol’s gift shop.
“We’re getting a big order so Dad asked if I could come in early to help put it all away before the lunch rush.”
“It should be a busy week now that it’s not snowing,” I said, pulling my coat a little closer.
“Yeah, but it’s still so cold. Hopefully the weekend is nice.”
“Randy and I are making plans to go to Tahoe for Valentine’s Day. I think I’ll book us a really nice room and arrange for a couples massage there. Then later we can go to a nice dinner.”
“That sounds really relaxing, can I go too?” she asked with a big grin.
“Of course you can,” I said making her laugh.
“Are you kidding? I might learn more than I already know about the two of you. Rick and I are doing something too, we’re not sure what though. We might just end up ordering a pizza and spending the night watching a movie.” She tried to act like their relationship was casual, but I’d been around them both enough to know how much they meant to each other.
“Well, no matter what you do, have a great night. You two seem happy together.”
“We are. I mean we’re not picking out our kid’s names or anything, but I really care about him a lot.”
“Sounds like we both got our man,” I said as I stopped in front of the gift shop.
“Sounds like,” she said as she continued along before spinning around to walk backwards away from me. “Meet me for lunch?”
“Of course,” I said with anare you kidding melook. Because we had lunch together on most days and nothing was going to change that.
Eight
Randy
Iwoke up and immediately reached across the bed for Eli. Not feeling him there I cracked an eye open before I realized today was Monday and he’d be at work. He’d mentioned he needed to go in early, but I didn’t remember him waking me up before he left.
Checking the time, my eyes widened as I realized how late it was. “Fuck, I need to get moving.” Today I had a meeting I hadn’t told Eli about, and I shared everything with him. But this was something I needed to do on my own. Hurrying to shower and get dressed, I was ready to go and out the door within thirty minutes. I’d have to get coffee downtown this morning, and it would be after this meeting.
Normally, I just walked when I went downtown since it was close to my house, but winter was still in the air, and I didn’thave time to spare so I drove. Taking the street at the opposite end to where I knew Eli was working, I pulled into an empty space and waited. Glancing toward Carol’s Gifts I hoped for a glimpse of Eli, but I knew at this time he’d be busy unpacking new inventory and deciding on displays.
A knock on my window startled me, and Emily Jones, the president of the downtown business association, smiled at me. “Sorry, Randy, I didn’t mean to startle you,” she said through the window.
Opening the door, I walked around to where she stood. “No problem. I was lost in thought.”
She looked in the direction of the gift shop and smiled. “I bet. Come on, I can’t wait to show you this space. I think it could be perfect for your business. As you know it’s been closed just a short time, and they never used most of the available area.” She led me to the front door and unlocked it. “I know it’s not on the main shopping area, but I also know you don’t want to sell out of a storefront.”
“That’s right. I mostly want to move my baking out of my house and into its own area. Plus, more storage space would really come in handy.” I walked around the seating area before walking back toward the kitchen. It was set up with a grill and cold counter but not much else. “Is this it?”
“Not quite. The business that was here before the restaurant was a bakery, so they had this set up off the back of the kitchen.” I followed her down a hall that passed a cold storage room and a dry goods room. There, in the back, was an industrial oven along with two smaller ovens and a large mixer. “Think you can put this to use?” she asked with a knowing look.
