“Trust me.” Nellie slid her arm from mine. “I asked her to stop by while you’re at your meeting. She should be here when you get back.”
“Nellie—”
“Just meet the woman. She has experience.”
I glanced at my watch. My meeting started in less than five minutes, and I still had to get to town hall. I didn’t have time to argue with Nellie. It never did any good, anyway. “Fine. I’ll meet her. But it’s not going to work out.”
“We’ll see.” She nodded at the door. “Have a good meeting. We’ll have warm cookies waiting for you after.”
With a final look at Lane, I pushed through the door.
My meeting went well over the one-hour scheduled time slot. If it hadn’t been for the senior center needing the room for chair yoga, I’d probably still be sitting around the damn table trying to justify the need for replacing some outdated firefighting equipment. I loved working on the crew, but it pissed me off when funds earmarked for new equipment had to be redistributed to other projects.
By the time I got back to the cafe to pick up Lane, my mood resembled the dark clouds rolling in over the mountains. Not even the promise of warm snickerdoodles fresh from the oven could chase it away. The lunch crowd was in full swing, exactly what I’d been trying to avoid. I walked in, and the smell of something burning in the kitchen assaulted my nose. Not wasting any time, I raced behind the counter and through the kitchen doors.
The long-time cook, Angus, stood in front of the grill. Nellie was next to him, her hair sticking out of her bun, her purple and white apron covered in black smudges. Both of them looked a little shellshocked, but nothing seemed to be damaged.
My heart rate spiked as I looked around for Lane. “Everything okay? Where’s Lane?”
“Everything’s fine.” Nellie fanned the smoke hanging in the air with a dish towel. “Angus looked away for a second, and some drippings caught fire. Lane’s in the back office. We got done making cookies, and he wanted to watch one of his shows.”
Even with Nellie’s reassurance, I wouldn’t be at peace until I saw him for myself. I passed through the kitchen to the small office at the back of the building. Lane sat behind the desk, his headphones over his ears, oblivious to the chaos going on in the other room.
He looked up when I came in and paused his show before he tugged the headphones off. “Hey, Dad. Miss Nellie let me scoop the cookies out and put them on the cookie sheets. Want to try one?”
“Sure, bud.” I took the cookie he handed me while giving him a quick look over to make sure he was truly okay.
“She said we can take the whole box home. Can I have one after lunch?”
“How many have you had already?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. A couple.”
A couple probably meant at least a dozen. “Why don’t we save them for after dinner?”
“Okay.” He huffed out a quick breath as his shoulders sagged.
“Come on, get your stuff. Nellie’s got a lot going on, and we ought to get home for some lunch.” I turned off the tablet and slid it into the backpack. Lane handed me the headphones, then reached for the box of cookies.
“You can’t leave.” Nellie blocked the door. “Calla’s not here yet, and you promised you’d stick around to meet her.”
“You said she’d be here when I got back. She’s not, and I need to get Lane home for lunch before we have to head over to the fire tower to take care of some things this afternoon.” Slinging the strap of Lane’s dino backpack over one shoulder, I waited for Nellie to get out of the way, but she didn’t budge.
“I’m sure she’ll be here any minute. Go grab a booth, and lunch is on me while you wait.” She knew she had me there. Lane would never pass up an opportunity for the hand-breaded chicken tenders Nellie served at the cafe.
“She’s got until we’re done with lunch,” I grumbled. “And you’d better not stall. I know exactly how long it should take to get a kid’s chicken tender meal and one of your elk burgers out to our table.”
Nellie put a hand on one hip. “It might take a little longer since I have to clean up the kitchen.”
“Fine. You’ve got ten extra minutes,” I said. We stared at each other for a long beat. Then she stepped to the side and let us pass. I could have easily picked her up and set her down somewhere else, but I knew better than to mess with Nellie. She was the heart and soul of Hard Timber. That was another reason I didn’t want to meet the damn babysitter she’d decided to bring in. Ninety-nine percent of the time things went Nellie’s way. I wouldn’t give in on this though. No matter what happened.
Lane and I settled into his favorite booth at the back of the restaurant. It was the one that had a photo of an old dinosaur dig hanging on the wall. He was way into dinosaurs. Actually, it was kind of an obsession. I kept expecting him to outgrow it, but until then, our lives revolved around facts about creatures that roamed the planet hundreds of thousands of years ago.
Nellie stopped by with two glasses of water. “Want anything else to drink?”
“Can I have chocolate milk?” Lane asked.
I shook my head. “We’ll stick with water.”
