Although, at the speed the dog was devouring them, the floor wouldn’t be messy for long.
“At least the dog likes the cookies,” I joked weakly, giving a one-shoulder shrug.
The man didn’t even crack a smile. He just continued to stare at me, arms crossed over his chest. “Look, miss, you’re trespassing, and I’ve asked you to leave. Seems to me I’d be in the right to call the police at this point.”
Thewho? He was kidding, right? I giggled nervously. Wouldn’t he be surprised to find out we only had one official cop in Jingle Junction—our police chief, Chief Greer. The problem was that I knew Greer wouldn’t answer his call. Instead, it would be Eve, my stepsister, who came running. She fancied herself an amateur sleuth and loved to answer the calls the chief couldn’t orwouldn’tanswer. She’d been manning the police station for years. If the stranger called Eve, I’d just bribe her with my award-winning German chocolate cake for a month. So, basically, his threat was almost laughable.
My family was eminently bribable with food.
But he didn’t know that. Or, it seemed, that they were my family at all.
“I don’t think I’m trespassing,” I said, trying to sound confident. This was all such a silly misunderstanding. I just needed to tell him who I was, and everything would smooth over, I was sure of it. Why then was I unable to actually get the words out?
He chuckled darkly. “Oh, you don’t? Well, I think otherwise.”
I meantechnicallyI suppose I was trespassing, but since my family owned most of the real estate in Jingle Junction, I wouldn’t say I was exactly trespassing. More like poking my nose in where it wasn’t wanted.
Oh, dear.
“Maybe you shouldn’t leave your front door open then if you don’t want visitors,” I suggested.
It wasn’t my best line.
I’d come in ready to offer friendship and now was giving him attitude—totally not like me at all. At this point, though, I seemed to have lost all control of myself as I thought about Dad and this candy store and not knowing what was going on, while struggling with that weird connection I still felt to this stranger. It was like it was all piled up like a tottering tower of pastries that simply couldn’t stick together any longer.
“Trust me, in a small town like this, you’re just inviting drop-ins,” I prattled on. “We’re a friendly bunch here in Jingle Junction.”
The handsome Scot snorted. “So I noticed. Plenty of gawkers here today. I felt like an animal in the zoo.”
“We’re just curious is all. This used to be a pizza place, so I was surprised—I mean, I’m suremanywere surprised—when the sign went up saying this was a sweet shop. I was wondering, are you—”
He didn’t want to chat, it turned out. I yelped again when large, strong hands reached out and grabbed my shoulders with surprising gentleness, then spun me around toward the door. “Go on now, before you get hurt, sue me, and I lose the store before I even open it.” And with that, he gave me a slight nudge toward the door, clearly done with my attempt at welcoming him to the street. “I got a mess to clean up here, thanks to you.”
My cheeks on fire, and my best laid plans shattered like the cookies the dog was finishing off, I hitched my breath before nodding. “Okay. Fine. I’m leaving.”
Humiliated, I all but sprinted out the door. What had I been thinking? The man was obviously lacking in manners. He’d practically thrown me out of his store! And for what reason? I was only trying to say hello and make him feel like he was part of the neighborhood.
I stopped in my tracks halfway across the street and groaned. “I wish I’d have thought to grab the basket.” I glanced back before resigning myself to the loss and finished my retreat across the street.
I went inside my bakery to get my purse, some leftover pastries, and a loaf of Italian bread, then locked the store’s front door behind me and sighed. Thinking back over tonight’s disaster made me wince. What I really wanted to do was go home and soak in my large tub and think about all the ways I could get back at the handsome candy maker. Maybe my mom would make me a doll that looked like the big Scotsman, and I could poke long pins in it. Giggling at that silly thought, feeling my stress release somewhat, I got behind the wheel of my car and headed for my dad and stepmom’s place.
6
As soon as I stepped inside Bell House, the overwhelming aroma of baking lasagna, cheesy and delicious, enveloped me like a welcoming hug.
“Hey, big sis,” my stepbrother, Nick, joked as he greeted me at the door. “I was worried I’d have to leave before you got here.” He snatched the box of pastries out of my hands with a broad grin. “Let me get that for you.”
I laughed. “That better make it to the kitchen, Nicholas Silver.”
My stepbrother was the youngest of our blended family. He was handsome, talented, and energetic, but much to my stepmom’s disappointment, Nick wasn’t interested in a nice nine-to-five job. As a musician and a budding songwriter, he slept most days and was awake at night, playing and singing in local bars.
I thought Nick was truly talented, and any day now I expected him to finally catch his big break. But his mom, Fran, worried about his lifestyle and his future, and so it sometimes made for strained family dinner nights. More than once, I’dducked down over my dinner plate, pretending to be deaf while some loving but unwelcome advice was sent Nick’s way.
“Do you have to leave before we eat?” I asked as I followed him through the dining room and into the large kitchen.
“Yep, I’m not going to make dinner,” Nick said over his shoulder. “Tonight’s gig is in a neighboring town, so I gotta leave a little earlier than if I were just playing down at someplace local.”
The interior of my childhood home, Bell House, was as familiar and welcoming as ever. A massive Victorian that had been built by the town’s original founder, I knew every nook and cranny, from its basement to its peaked-roof attic. I’d been playing hide-and-seek with my friends, the Silvers, ever since I could remember. Now that we were all blended together into one family, my friends had become my stepsisters and stepbrother, and they got to be part of Bell House, too. Even after Fran moved in, my father’s tradition of maintaining Christmas decorations in parts of the house carried on, and Fran seemed to love it as much as I did.
