“I’m excellent. I’m alive and have my wits about me. Life is good.” Her smile is wide. “I brought some tiramisu with me, but I suspect you might want to see me at work.”
She slides the plate of tiramisu toward me, and I have to admit, it looks impressive. When I taste it, I’m blown away. The flavors, the consistency…it’s perfect.
“This is the best tiramisu I’ve ever had.”
She beams, pleased. “Thank you. My husband thinks so too. I love to make cakes and macarons, tortes, pies, you name it.”
She reminds me of my grandmothers, and I like her instantly. I’d been tempted to call in Grandma Nancy until I could find the right person, but I wasn’t sure she’d be able to handle not being the one in charge. And I was almost desperate enough to call on Grandma Donna, but she’s been busy with the Friendship Bench. She’s booked every day from one to six. Any time we have a thirty-degree day, she’s out there on the bench with a blanket and the outdoor heaters going full blast. On the cold tundra days, she takes the session into the glass pavilion. I had no idea people in a small town would need to talk so much, but Grandma Donna is a hot commodity. She knits while she listens, so I’m seeing her scarves and hats and gloves all over town. It’s just as well that she couldn’t work in the kitchen—she would’ve tried to pull out her Lutheran Jell-O salad, and that’s a hard pass.
Virginia gets right to work preparing an apple rose tart that is as beautiful as it is delicious, and a lemon cake with lavender glaze that I didn’t even know I’d been missing. She knows how to do amazing things with chocolate and comes to life in the kitchen without being in the way. I’ve found the right person.
“How soon can you start?” I ask.
She wipes her hand on her apron and shakes my hand. “Right now, if you’d like. Arthur will be glad that I’m out of the house for a while. We’re driving each other crazy.” She laughs.
“Yes, please.” I show her around the rest of the restaurant, and when we return to the kitchen, she gets to work.
It’s a weight off my mind.
The following day, I have to go to a restaurant supply store in the Twin Cities. I haven’t missed living near the city like I thought I would, but driving into St. Paul, I get nostalgic. My dad still owns the house on Summit Avenue, but he’s spent less and less time there since buying the land next to the lake house and working on the resort. I meet Tully for lunch and then head to the restaurant supply place near his condo.
The supply warehouse has more people in one room than I’ve seen in a long time. I think the last time was at a Colorado Mustangs game. Carts are everywhere, boxes are stacked like leaning Jenga towers, and people are rushing through like they’re on one of those supermarket sweep reality shows. I want to march back out to my car and get back to the solitude of Windy Harbor, but we need another industrial mixer at the restaurant. Britney managed to strip the gears on ours right before I fired her.
I’m halfway down the stainless steel section when someone whips around the corner at full speed with a dolly.
I collide into the stacked crates of produce, sending the boxes careening across the floor, and I bend over, rubbing my hip where the corner of the dolly nailed me. I grit my teeth, holding back every curse word I’ve ever heard because dammit, that hurt.
Somewhere in there, I hear a gasp.
“Oh my goodness,” a woman says. “I’m so sorry!”
It registers who it is before she pulls a large strip of kale from my head.
“Camden?”
“Yep, it’s me.”
Juju reaches out and plucks a leaf from my shirt, but my stomach dips like she’s touching my nipple or something. “What are you doing here?” she asks.
“Same reason as you, I suspect. We own restaurants. This is where we get our toys.” I nod at her dolly. “Kale shopping spree? Not exactly my idea of a good time.”
Her mouth twitches like she’s fighting a smile, and I feel a sense of accomplishment like I did in fifth grade when I won a blue ribbon in a relay race.
“You don’t get your produce here?” she asks.
“No, you know we’re growing a lot in the greenhouse, right? Tomatoes, herbs, and lettuces…we’ve even had some luck with vegetables.”
“That’s great.”
“You should come by and get what you need there. Can’t get any more local than that. It’s practically your backyard.”
There’s that almost-smile again. Damn. Whatever is happening today needs to stick.
“It does feel that close sometimes, doesn’t it? Small-town living is an adjustment.”
I nod. “Like living in a fishbowl.”
Now she does smile, and it warms my chest.
