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Twenty-Seven
“I hopeyou don’t mind all this extra work.”
It was late afternoon, and Ally’s light blue eyes offered a coy apology from across Emilia’s kitchen table.
“Honestly, it’s fine.” She pressed her right foot to the old sewing machine pedal, a machine borrowed from Ally’s mother. “I’m glad you came over, actually. I’ve never made costumes before, and this is fun.”
“What the heck?” Ally jerked her head back, her voice muffled under the machine’s rapid-fire sound, one hand clutched around a long piece of forest green material, the other around a pair of shiny red fabric scissors. “First, you dabble in gardening, and now sewing is your idea of ‘fun’? You’re like Aggie McKey in the body of a vibrant twenty-eight-year-old.”
Emilia laughed, preferring to be compared to an eighty-three-year-old over having Ally and the whole town of Harlow clued in on just how exciting her life actually was. On-the-run socialite with a missing ex-husband, non-responsive dad, and sex with Blaine Callaghan…
Yep, she’d definitely take sewing and gardening over engaging in any strained confessions with people she still barely knew.
“I don’t know. Aggie’s dropped enough clues that she’s a wild one at heart.” She nodded at Ally to stay on task and keep cutting. “Besides, you won’t be so skeptical of this sewing business when we have the best costumes at the soiree. Who knows, maybe Wayne will sit up and notice too.”
Ally rolled her eyes and scoffed. “Ya. Sure. Except, I give up on him. The man’s clueless and chasing him is way too much effort. Besides, there are always new faces at the soiree each year, so my best bet is to maybe meet someone there.”
Emilia gave a shrug of agreement, only for a loud knock at the back door to break her easy mood. She lifted her foot off the machine’s pedal, her eyes pulling wide as Ally gaped back at her.
She decided to be brave and make her way toward her visitor, her rattled nerves settling the moment she glimpsed Blaine’s unmistakable silhouette through the mesh screen door.
“I wasn’t expecting you.” She pulled the door open, his mutual smile sending a tantalizing shiver down her body.
“I tried knocking on the front door for a change, but it seems you two were too absorbed in whatever plan you’re hatching back here.” He nodded over to the piles of fabric on her kitchen table, a small cardboard box tucked under his arm.
His gaze landed on her next and did a slow glide down her body, a sly grin pulling at his lips. As if by instinct, she dipped her chin, sending him an equally wicked stare from under her lashes. Something she would never have dared even just two days ago. Even more unbelievable, she, Emilia Bonacci, was finally having fun!
“I think you should keep letting yourself in. It’s been good luck for me so far.” She jutted her chin toward the box in his arms. “What do you have there?”
“Aggie stopped by the workshop this morning and insisted I be the one to deliver this to you.” He handed her the box. “I have no idea what it is.” His gaze flicked to Ally seated just a few yards away. “Last night you mentioned wanting those cabinets installed, I thought I’d come by and do just that.”
She backed up and took the box to the table, allowing him room to enter her kitchen. Meanwhile, Ally sat taller, eyeballing Emilia, who’d been eyeballing Blaine. Just great.
“Last night, hey?” Ally’s mouth stretched into a slow smirk. “Emilia? That must have been one heck of an apology.”
Emilia dug her fingers into the box’s sides, and her face heated. She shook her head at her friend, a silent plea that her questions go no further.
Blaine lowered his toolbox onto a counter, his attention still on Emilia, as though he put in a deliberate effort to ignore Ally. “There’ll be a lot of noise while I work.”
She opened her mouth to reply, but Ally shot from her chair, wooden legs scraping loud against the floor. “Oh, dontcha worry. We’re just finishing, aren’t we, Emilia?”
She extended her arms out and began sweeping large piles of fabric across the table and into a woven basket at her feet, her glinting stare not leaving Emilia as she did so.
She knew. Ally knew!
Emilia distracted herself with ripping the tape on Aggie’s impromptu gift, anything not to look at her friend. Her heart picked up speed. She had nothing to hide when it came to her feelings for Blaine, but things were so new, and other aspects of her life still so confusing. She didn’t want to add being the center of town gossip to her troubles.
She flipped the box’s lid open, and a hysterical squeak escaped her at what lay inside. Six knives. In various sizes. A bright yellow post-it note attached to the largest, machete-looking thing.
Hide these around your house, dear. In case your husband comes by.
A quick gasp assaulted her lungs, and she slammed the box closed. Blaine turned to her while Ally gave a scrunched, quizzical sort of look. “What’s the surprise?”
Emilia shook her head, jamming the tape back over the open seam on the box. “Nothing. Just Aggie being Aggie.”
If Aggie was a deranged serial killer. What on Earth was she thinking sending Blaine over with knives?
She leaned over and stuffed the box under her chair, then crossed her arms with elbows resting on the table in a casual nothing-to-see-here sort of gesture.
