Not So New in Town (3 page)

Brogan chuckled as he cruised back toward Main Street. Lucy Doolan could pretend all she wanted not to be flustered. But standing close to her, fingering her soft hair, he’d caught a whiff of citrus that smelled a whole lot like desire. “Little” Lucy was no longer shy or unassuming. Lucy Doolan knew how to leave her mark. Man, did she ever.

He smiled, thinking about the drama that Lucy had caused the night of the homecoming parade. Hacking off half Julia’s hair had caused quite the scandal.

Brogan eased his car into the owner parking space located in the alley behind BetterBites. He wished the entire back alley were filled with food trucks, unloading new merchandise due to stock flying off shelves, but that was not the case. Not even close.

He pushed his way through the metal service door in the back and stopped. Margo Ray was standing next to the supply shelf, wearing a green BetterBites apron tied around her waist, blue bandana around her short, spiky gray hair, and whole wheat flour on her face, glaring at the shelves as if they’d been having an argument.

“What’s going on?” he asked.

“Where’s the damn granola? I know I put it here just the other day. I need to make another batch of those banana nut muffins.”

“Really? You mean we sold out?” Brogan couldn’t keep the excitement from his voice.

“No. Had to throw the old ones out. Passed their expiration. But you got a customer in front of the house asking for muffins.” Margo pushed aside containers of oats and spices as she hunted. Brogan crossed the doorway and entered the kitchen. Margo had been busy baking bread from the looks of the loaves cooling on the racks and the smell of warm yeast filling the kitchen.

“Found it.” Margo bustled past him and plopped the sealed container of granola on the stainless steel mobile island. “You better get to work. After this batch of muffins, I’m gonna be low on granola.”

“Sure. I’ll be thrilled to make more. Just wish we’d sell more.” Brogan’s recipe for healthy, tasty granola was not necessarily a corporate secret, like the original Coke recipe, but he’d made a living off that granola and took pride in the natural ingredients and the making of it. Each of his stores had one person who knew the recipe, but since Harmony was his newest location, he hadn’t handed off that particular baton yet.

Margo stopped measuring cups of granola and gave him a steady stare. “I do too. What’s going on that everyone in Pleasantville gives you such a wide berth?”

Brogan shook a handful of granola into his palm, avoiding her penetrating gaze. Margo continued to talk. “I can’t figure it out. Aren’t you the Golden Boy around here? Most straight women would have heatstroke over someone who looks like you. All buffed with more product gunking up your hair than Vidal Sassoon.”

“Thanks, I think,” he said dryly. No product gunked up his hair except shampoo and conditioner. But Margo’s spikes didn’t stand on their own without the aid of some gel. He’d hired Margo away from Whole Foods in Raleigh, the next largest city, about twenty minutes east of Harmony, so she didn’t know the history or the mysterious workings of this small town. Where everyone knew everybody, and old stories never died. In fact, they only got embellished…and not in a flattering way. He may have been the Golden Boy in the past, but today he was the subject of some erroneous gossip.

“So, what is it? You post creepy pictures on Facebook?”

“No.”

“Worked for the IRS and audited everyone in town?”

“Nope.”

“Sell Ronco vacuum cleaners door-to-door?”

“Nah.”

If only. Any of those scenarios would be easier to explain and even rectify than the one he presently dealt with.

“Who’s out front?” he said, changing the subject as he entered the front of the store.

He immediately spied the guy Margo had referred to, because he was the only customer in the store and because he did indeed know him.

He smiled. “Javier, glad you’re here.”

“Bro!” Javier pulled Brogan in for a man hug, pounding him on the back. “This is awesome.”

Brogan shook his hand and watched as Javier Coloma, his business partner, sized up the new location for the first time.

“So, this is the latest?” He took in the shelves lined with packaged organic products, baked goods piled on round tabletops, and bins filled with dried beans and grains.

Javier nodded with approval. “I like it. Much smaller, but has a nice homey feel. How are the numbers?”

Not good, but Brogan would catch Javier up to speed later, poring over the books. “Plenty of time for that later.” Brogan opened one of the coolers on the far wall and grabbed two organic beers. And the last of the freshly made oatmeal-and-raisin cookies from the bamboo mobile display rack. Javier followed him to a cozy seating area near the front picture window. “Sit.” Brogan twisted the caps off the beers. “Help yourself to some cookies.”

They folded themselves into comfortable, armless lounge chairs covered in teal blue chenille, and Brogan slid the container of cookies to the center of the glass coffee table.

“Business is slow. Haven’t met my projections yet, but we’ll get there. We’ve only been open for six weeks. There’s still time.” Brogan tilted the beer bottle toward his mouth, hoping he didn’t choke from the lies spilling from his lips. Half lies. True, he’d only been open six weeks and hadn’t met his projections. Ten weeks remained in this quarter, but business still sucked, despite all the money he’d poured into this location and the quality product he sold.

“You need to wake this sleepy town up. Don’t they know that greatness has returned to live among them?” Javier was referring to Brogan’s football glory days in Harmony and at Georgetown. Even though Brogan had loved playing football in high school and college, he’d never entertained thoughts of going pro.

“That would be Keith Morgan, the famous tennis player. Not me,” Brogan grunted.

“I remember reading about that. Didn’t the Prince move here a few years ago to raise his daughter? Gave up his wild party days in Miami,” Javier said, shaking his head as if he couldn’t comprehend such strange behavior from a fellow man.

“Got married, too. Some local
chiquita
, right?” Javier added.

Brogan leaned back and crossed his ankle over his knee, fiddling with the beer bottle in his hand. Keith Morgan’s first wife had died and left him with a baby girl at the height of his tennis career. He retired from the professional tour and moved to Harmony to raise his daughter. And after meeting Bertie, the interior designer who renovated and decorated his old Victorian house, he’d finally found love and a place he could call home.

“He married Bertie Anderson, and she’s gorgeous, with a heart of gold. They don’t come much sweeter. And they were married
before
she got pregnant,” Brogan explained, smiling.

Javier’s brown Gucci loafer nudged Brogan’s foot. “Any more choice gals left in town, or did Keith snag the last one?”

Lucy Doolan’s silky straight hair popped into his head, along with her clingy tank top that molded to her curves. And her gray eyes, with their exotic tilt at the corners, snapping as she slung her barbs. He doubted she’d be categorized as blazing, but only because Javier didn’t know her like he did. All right, maybe knowing her was a stretch. He remembered her, but didn’t really know her now. He planned to change that. Sooner rather than later.

The bell over the glass front door tinkled, and Brogan glanced up to see a metal walker push through the entrance with Ethel Cornwaddle shuffling behind it. He jumped up to assist her before the heavy glass door knocked her down.

“Hey, Miz Cornwaddle. How you doing?” he asked as he gripped a bony elbow beneath her lavender cotton housecoat covered in yellow daisies.

“I’m breathing. That makes it a banner day!” His sixth-grade teacher smiled, revealing loose dentures.

“You’re looking mighty pretty all covered in daisies and”—his gaze traveled down to orthopedic knee-highs and beat-up combat boots—“and those…comfortable boots.”

“Don’t waste those sweet words on this old geezer. You always were a charmer.” She stared at him through watery blue eyes. “How come you’re not married? A good-looking boy like you. Is it true you came home to do right by Julia? I never did understand why y’all couldn’t iron out your differences.” Ethel’s frizzy gray hair moved like dandelions in the wind as she shook her head. She shuffled toward the stainless steel racks holding organic chips. “You got any pork rinds? I’ve been to the Piggly Wiggly and Toot-N-Tell, and they’re all out.”

Pork rinds? Brogan’s stomach lurched as he almost stumbled over the yellow tennis balls covering the front feet of her walker. Growing up, he remembered how that had been a favorite snack among the older locals, but he and his mom had never developed a taste for them. Even Lucy had turned up her nose at pork rinds in the lunchroom vending machine. A smile curled his lips as interesting ways of reforming Lucy crossed his mind. And they didn’t all include food.

“No, ma’am. They’re not exactly organic…uh, why don’t you try these popped chips? They come in lots of different flavors.” He reached for a smoky-bacon-flavored bag.

“Hmmm, I don’t know. I don’t like to buy something I’ve never tried before. What if I don’t like them? Can I bring them back?”

Brogan repressed a groan. “Absolutely. You give them a try, and if you don’t like them as much as pork rinds, you can bring them back, and I’ll give you”—he wanted to say store credit, until he felt that teacher’s eagle-eyed stare leveled at him—“a refund. Will that be okay?”

“That’d be fine.”

Brogan helped her to the register where his part-time high school clerk stood texting on her iPhone. “Bailey, please ring Miz Cornwaddle up.”

Pop
went her pink bubble gum. “Sure,” Bailey said as she scanned the bar code.

“And what about that boy?” Ethel asked. “I know he’s not yours, because I can count. I didn’t teach sixth-grade math for forty years for nothing.”

Ethel was referring to Julia’s fifteen-year-old son, Parker. At least Ethel could add and knew the kid wasn’t his. Julia had gotten pregnant eight months
after
he’d already left town.

“Your mama, God rest her soul, was so heartbroken when you skipped town.” Skipped town? Hardly. He’d left for college like any normal high school graduate. Ethel stuffed her coins inside her orange plastic change purse and snapped it shut. “Poor Charlotte. She never got over your leaving. She missed you something fierce.”

Brogan’s jaw locked. He missed his mom, too. But she hadn’t died of a broken heart like everyone yammered on about. She’d had a major stroke and hadn’t lingered very long. Charlotte Reese had been a strong woman, always encouraging Brogan to expand his horizons, and he’d done that by attending and working his way through Georgetown before he’d started his own business.

“And I miss her, but my mom encouraged me to leave, and I appreciated her advice,” he said, trying to keep the irritation from his voice. Truth be told, he couldn’t wait to leave. He’d had no intentions of settling in Harmony, and even though he never spoke the words, his mother had known.

Ethel nodded. “You were always a good boy when it came to your mama.”

Brogan wanted to bang his head against the brick column. She’d just told him he’d broken his mother’s heart. He couldn’t win this battle.

She patted his arm with her gnarled hand. “Not sure about all the shenanigans going on with the young ladies in town, but I know you loved your mama,” she said, thin lips forming a smile. “I’ll let you know about these popped things”—she jiggled the bag of chips—“but I’d sure like to find some pork rinds. You let me know if you get any in, ya hear.”

“Will do. Good to see you.” Brogan held the door as she shuffled out with her walker.

Javier had finished his beer and was loading up on cheese, crackers, and specialty olives as he browsed the aisles. But Brogan knew Javier had heard every last word, and he needed to prepare for the next inquisition.

Before the door had fully closed, it swung back open, and Dottie Duncan barreled in along with another blast of hot July air.

“Hey, Miz Duncan. What can I do for you?”

Dottie crossed her arms beneath her massive chest and cocked one hip as she tapped her red, white, and blue cowboy boot on his repurposed wood floor. “You selling ciggies?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Chew tobaccie?”

“Nope.”

“RC Colas and MoonPies?”

“No.”

“Cheerwine and four-cornered Nabs?”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Good. Then I don’t see any problems.” She lowered her arms and straightened the form-fitting red top with sequined blue stars that matched the blue eye shadow from the bottom of her penciled-in eyebrows to the end of her eyelids. Not to be outdone by the black eyeliner and ruby-red lipstick. But for all of Dottie’s wacky taste in fashion, she was probably the richest woman in town. She owned sixteen Toot-N-Tells across the state. Drive-through convenience stores, selling all kinds of garbage, including Lucy’s favorite, Cheetos, by the truckloads.

“No, ma’am. We shouldn’t have a problem. I sell mostly organic items not sold anywhere nearby. The closest competitor is Whole Foods in Raleigh.”

Dottie reached with bedazzling long red nails for a cellophane bag of his special granola. “People actually eat this…stuff?” She held it between two fingers, away from her body, as if she were holding a bag of fresh dog shit.

“Yes. I’ve managed to open four stores based on that granola alone,” Brogan said, not bothering to rein in his pride.

“Umph. Looks suspicious. Any funny stuff in there?”

“Funny stuff?”

“You know, like pot?” Laughter erupted down aisle five. Javier would have a field day with this. “Mind-altering things. You’re not making this stuff”—she gave the granola a vicious shake—“with any of those druggy herbs, are you?”

“Miz Duncan—”

“Call me Dottie. Miz Duncan reminds me of my mother-in-law, that meddling, cantankerous hag.”

“Er, Dottie, there’s nothing but healthy caramelized oats, nuts, and dried fruit in my granola. Tastes great. Try some.”