AllFreeNovel
Share Us
2
Gretchen Bellows wanted New Year’s Eve to be over. She took a couple of steps toward Will and forced the disinfectant wipes into his hand. “Sorry.” She wasn’t sure what she was apologizing for, but the grumpy cowboy sure wasn’t saying anything.
She retreated back between the two vehicles and then got herself moving across the aisle to the van. Her vehicle was refrigerated, and she picked up the tray she’d gotten out when she’d first heard Will’s frustrated voice.
The man spoke in a timbre that she seemed attuned to, and she’d known it was him instantly. She’d gone to see if she could help, only to hear him curse her and find more caramel dripping from his clothes.
She pressed her eyes closed in a long blink and then drew in a breath. “Two more hours,” she mumbled to herself. She could do anything for two hours. Not only that, but business was very good tonight. So good that Gretchen was considering bringing the truck down to the beach every single evening.
People loved treats at the beach, and caramel apples were portable, as well as easily cut and shared.
She returned to the truck, climbing up the few steps to the narrow, galley kitchen. “More apples,” she said, sliding the tray onto the countertop. Jonathan, her assistant for events, turned a harried eye in her direction.
“Thank goodness,” he drawled in his Kentucky accent. “A mob of teenagers just came up, and I wasn’t sure if I’d get away with my life.” He held up a fistful of papers. “So I just took their orders and prayed.”
He grinned then, and Gretchen returned the smile. Her aching back could wait. She’d swallowed some pills at the van, and she’d be fine. This was all good for business.
So much of what Gretchen had been doing for the past six months had that mantra attached to it. She could handle handing out samples in the mall, because it was good for business. She could show up at the sweet shop before dawn, because it was good for business. She could design and run polls, stop by other shops and stores to see what their bestsellers were, and spend evenings in her test kitchen at home, because it was all good for business.
Gretchen wanted someone to take her by the shoulders and shake her. Tell her that she needed to start taking care of herself, whether that was good for business or not.
At the same time, she didn’t want to let down Aunt Patty. She wouldn’t. Her aunt had owned Sweet Water Taffy before Gretchen had taken it over, and in a perfect storm of events, which included Aunt Patty falling and breaking her hip, and Gretchen’s father’s chronic lung disease worsening, she’d returned to Sweet Water Falls.
Rather, she’d come to town. She hadn’t grown up here, but in an even smaller Southern Texas town called Short Tail. The town sat inland a bit, and Gretchen maintained a country cottage about halfway between Short Tail and Sweet Water Falls. Then she could get to the candy shop and her father’s in about the same amount of time.
Aunt Patty had been making a good recovery, and she’d started talking about coming back to work. But she didn’t want complete control of the shop. Gretchen was fine running it, though she’d changed several things in the six months since she’d been at the helm of Sweet Water Taffy.
She needed another truck like this one, and this one needed an upgraded generator and the steps on the front of it replaced. With the increase in business she’d been drumming up over the months, she could probably afford both.
She had hired more people as the business had grown too, and that included Jon, who she’d brought on after the very busy event at Sweetspot. William Cooper had helped her set up then, but Gretchen’s face still warmed with embarrassment every time she thought about him doing so.
She was a professional. She shouldn’t have relied on a bystander to help her with her business. Thus, Jon’s position had been created in Gretchen’s mind, and he ran all of their out-of-shop events now. When she showed up with the van loaded with the copper caramel pot and plenty of truffles, it was Jon who helped her set everything up.
Not only that, but the man could charm anything alive and probably all rocks, and having him as the public face at their events and in the truck had increased their sales yet again.
Gretchen set to work fulfilling the orders Jon had taken while she’d been gone to get the apples, leaving her mind free to roam. It moved along paths labeledSweet Water Falls FarmandWill Cooper, though she didn’t really appreciate being blamed for his placement of the caramel apple.
The orders actually started to slow, and Gretchen glanced at the digital clock she’d velcro’ed to the wall. “Holy cow,” she said. “It’s after eleven-thirty.”
“Some of the other trucks are closing up,” Jon said.
“Let’s do that while we can,” Gretchen said. Jon would drive the truck back to the shop, while Gretchen would take the van home. She’d deemed tomorrow a vacation day, and she was looking forward to sleeping in and then making a late brunch for her dad and Aunt Patty at her childhood home.
She’d spend the day there, and while she’d like to promise herself she wouldn’t work, she knew she would. Daddy had a bit of yard work to do, and Gretchen loved puttering around in a flowerbed. She’d also go over this week’s and next week’s schedule, send work text reminders, and go over her events calendar for the next couple of months. She tried not to do a lot on her days off, but she hadn’t mastered truly stepping away from the business yet.
A flash of sadness hit her as Jon shut the big doors on the front of the truck that meant they were closed. She couldn’t help thinking of Malcolm and all she’d lost when she’d left the praline shop behind in New Orleans.
She pushed her ex-boyfriend, her ex-candy-shop, and her ex-life out of her mind. Candy-making was a messy business, and she set an alarm on her phone so she wouldn’t miss the ringing in of the New Year, and then she got busy cleaning up the stoves and countertops in the mobile candy truck.
* * *
The next day,Gretchen sang along with the radio in her car, Aunt Patty strapped into the passenger seat, and plenty of brunch items riding in the back. They’d arrive in Short Tail in a matter of minutes, and Gretchen had achieved one of her goals for the day.
She hadn’t gotten out of bed until nine o’clock, and for someone who usually keyed their way into the candy shop by dawn, that was a huge accomplishment.
She made a right turn, and then a left. Daddy’s house came into view, and Gretchen found herself sighing.
“Here we are,” Aunt Patty said. She was Daddy’s sister, and neither of them had moved too far from their childhood home. Gretchen’s grandmother had died last year, and she currently rested in a town due west of here named Sugar Hill.
