Chapter 1
Captain Kendra’s Log: Thursday. Salty Dogs are life
It’s notevery day your childhood best friend kicks you in the lady balls.
No matter how often I swore I wouldn’t look at the news, my fingers again reached for my phone—pulling up the gut-wrenching article that made my heart ache.
The Early Riser Bakery Welcomes CIA-Trained Baker.
I lifted my empty glass and found it devoid of any remnants of the crushed ice it once held. The dimly lit bar enveloped me as I tore my gaze away from the screen. A chalkboard at the end of the weathered bar announced that today’s special was “Chili, fast as your shift.” It was next to a hot cop calendar that was two months behind. I squinted my eyes. Scratch that. It was twoyearsand two months behind.
I pounded my fist on the smooth bar in frustration. “Hit me again.”
The bartender, a stout man with gray hair and a faded T-shirt that read, "Home is where the vodka is," sidled up and fixed me with a stern stare as he stubbornly crossed his remarkablymuscular arms. “Haven’t you had enough?” he scolded. I could almost feel the disapproval pressing against my skin.
For crying out loud. I wanted to drink my troubles away, not be criticized for my poor choices. If I wished to haveJudgy McJudgefaceas a bar companion, I would have gone to my brother’s watering hole on Pleasure Point.
I raised an eyebrow and pointed toward the bartender’s shirt. “Maybe I haven’t made this place home yet.”
“If you’re living at The Squad Room, you got bigger problems than vodka.” The man turned away to mix me another Salty Dog.
I felt my phone screen judging me, too, waiting for me to give it more attention. My hand itched to caress the screen and swipe thePleasure Point Newsapp open. It called to the edge of my mind.Look at me! You can obsess over the bad news again!
Nope. Nope. Nope.
Not today.
Today, I would drink my drink and ignore the article.
Today, I would not think about the proverbial kick to the lady ‘nads that turned my world upside down.
Today…
Fuck it.
Today, my heart was broken into a million pieces, and I needed more vodka.
“Here you go,” The bartender grumbled. “Add it to the tab?”
I nodded absentmindedly, and the bartender slid the drink my way. I took a leisurely sip through the plastic straw, letting the familiar taste wash over me. It was an outlaw move, having plastic straws in a bar by the Florida Gulf Coast. They were dangerous to sea turtles. The straws, not the bar. Although come to think of it, the bar was probably dangerous to sea turtles, too—all the drunken idiots in here.
Myself included.
Don’t look. Don’t look.
My eyes refused to pay attention to my brain. The siren call of my phone screen drew them like moths to a flame.
Selene Strickland announced the hiring of Truette Heffernan at The Early Riser Bakery. Heffernan studied at the Culinary Institute of America (CIA) and recently ran a bakery in Jackson, Mississippi.
Heffernan said the move brings her back to Florida and closer to her family, which will be critical for her upcoming wedding.
Heffernan is engaged to Pleasure Point native Jesse Barbot.
A wedding date has not been set.
Heffernan. Sounded like aheifer.
That made me snort-laugh, but since I had recently taken a sip of my Salty Dog, this snort-laugh caused me to spit vodka and grapefruit juice all over the man sitting next to me.
