“You only get one shot to hook a prospective purchaser, Macy, and isn't summer your busy season?”
“Always busy here, TJ.”
“You stick to perfecting your pizza sauce,” Brad said to Newman.
“You just need to roll with it. The more you protest, the more they dig their heels in,” Macy told him.
“Roll with what?”
“The locals giving you a nickname.”
“It's a weird kind of parallel universe here, I swear.” He picked up a handful of scarves. “The world as I know it exists beyond the borders of Lake Howling, but once you’re here....”
“Couldn't have worded it better,” Newman said. “I leave often, and step back into that real world.” He was leaning on a shelving unit now, looking relaxed as only Newman could. The man, Macy thought, could look relaxed on a bed of nails. “But then I step back into this life and it's like I'm still thirteen.”
“You being sixty and all, Newman,” Macy joked.
“The point I'm trying to make here, is that we do tend to stand still here.”
“Not over the last few years.”
He nodded at her words. “True, we've had a few intrusions from the outside world.”
“What's happened over the last few years?”
“It would take a week to explain,” Macy said, following him to a set of racks.
“This needs to be better organized, Macy.”
“Okay smartass, what would you do?”
He straightened, and Macy dug her toes into her sandals to stop from taking a step backward. He was close now, and she saw the flare of heat in his eyes as he looked at her.
“You give me some time, and if you don't like it, I'll help you put it back the way it is now.”
Macy shrugged. If he was here, she could look at him, even if it was only for a few more minutes. Sad, pathetic woman that she was, she'd take that time.
He pulled down clothes and threw them on chairs, then moved racks and displays. He enlisted Newman to haul furniture, and then the counter was dragged closer to the door.
“What the hell is he doing?”
Macy, who had stationed herself by the door to intercept customers, smiled at Ethan as he appeared.
“TJ is rearranging my shop with help from Newman. Supposedly, it's not aesthetically pleasing.”
“TJ?”
“Tex junior. Jake came up with it, and Buster is pissed because supposedly he is the nickname supremo.”
“Original.” Ethan grunted, his eyes following his brother. “How the hell would Brad know what was aesthetically pleasing? I didn't even know he knew that word.”
“Damned if I know, and I'll let you know if he has a clue when it's done.”
But Macy could see what Brad was about now, and she had to agree he'd opened her shop up and made it more welcoming. The flow would appeal to a customer stepping in for the first time.
“How do you know what's aesthetically pleasing?”
Brad looked up as Ethan yelled the words at him. She saw the flash of something in the blue eyes before he lowered them and shrugged. His body had tensed with the arrival of his brother.
