Hunter opened his mouth to argue.
Mace grabbed Hunter. "Stop it." Hunter clamped his mouth shut and glared at my sister.
"Sorry," Mace told Susie. "They didn't know."
"We have a new food stand legislation where you don't need to go through as stringent of a process as if you were opening a restaurant," she offered. "The health department just comes and takes a look around your house to make sure you're not cooking in your bathroom."
"It's not a problem," Mace assured her.
Hunter shrugged him off. "This is outrageous. We're suing."
"Now who's being unreasonable?" Meghan shot back.
I helped Archer shoo his little brothers back into the old green school bus.
"As much as I like the fact that it drives Mace insane," Archer said as Remy drove off, "I really wish they'd do something with that bus. It's an eyesore."
Hunter and Meghan were still arguing about some obscure legal terms.
"I was going to have a meeting with him," Archer said, "but from the looks of things, he's going to be occupied the rest of the afternoon."
"I half wish they would just sleep together and end the sexual tension," I said as Hunter strode across the street to the courthouse, threatening to file a lawsuit. Meghan ran after him.
"Lawyers," Archer said, shaking his head.
28
Archer
"Speaking of sexual tension," I said softly in Hazel's ear, "are we going to finish what we started?"
She shivered. "I have to go to the café and get ready for lunch," she said.
"Well if you're craving big thick—"
"Big thick what?" Ida asked. Crap, I forgot she was still here.
"Pancakes," Hazel said firmly.
"You make pancakes?" Ida replied.
"She makes soft fluffy pancakes that I want to bury my face in."
Hazel shoved me.
"Oh, I see." Ida tapped the side of her head knowingly.
"I'll see you later," Hazel said. Before she could leave, I swept her into my arms and kissed her long and slow.
Ida whooped and hollered.
"I'm off to my conference center," I told her.
I was already thinking of it as mine. I knew the city had to approve the sale, and then Mike and Greg needed to be convinced that it would actually make money. But I was confident the conference center would happen. Mike was slowly getting on board. I needed to find a spot to build more hotels.
On the other side of the future conference center was an old strip mall site. I figured the city owned it, but no one could confirm. Hopefully Hunter hadn't aggravated Meg too much. Maybe I would have to organize a romantic dinner for them to grease the wheels. Hunter could be charming if he was motivated enough.
I parked my car and explored the strip mall site. It was flat, and I climbed up on a roof to look around. I could see the factory building rising up above the tree line behind the abandoned buildings. Another point in the strip mall site's favor was that it was far enough away that the tall hotel buildings wouldn't clash with the historic factory site or overwhelm the town of Harrogate.
