She glances toward Renley’s house and asks, “Does she know you’re here?”
“Not really. I tried texting her but she hasn’t responded. Please tell me she hasn’t completely forgotten me and moved on already.”
“I think we should go inside.” She nods toward my house, her answer not calming the fear that has been eating away at my stomach the entire trip here.
I open the door and let her in before Rupert and I drag our luggage in as well. When I close the door, I turn to her and ask, “What’s going on?”
“Yesterday Renley and I were cleaning out the apartment that’s above the shop because she feels she needs separation from Kitty, and when we were there, Marjorie stopped by.”
“Is she the bitch with all the watermelons and champagne who was mean to Renley?”
“That’s her. She told Renley that the business society made an executive decision and she now only has until next week to open the candy store, or else they’re going to confiscate the space and sell it to the chain store that has offered them a great deal of money for it. They’re going to sell.”
“What the actual fuck?” Outrage billows and swirls around me. “They can’t do that. They gave her the keys to the store.”
“They can. She signed a paper that was part of the contract that stated the business society could take over the store if she doesn’t fulfill their requirements. So giving her a week is basically setting her up for failure.”
I push my hand through my hair as my mind races. No wonder she hasn’t been messaging me back; she’s been completely and utterly devastated.
“Where is she now?”
“At my place. She’s been staying there ever since you guys left. She was fixing up the apartment above the shop to move into so she didn’t have to stay with me long, but I told her she could stay as long as she needed to.”
“Is she trying to open in a few days?”
Tilly shakes her head. “She’s given up. She’s not talking to Kitty right now, she really only has me, and she said she’s not going to put that kind of pressure on me to help. So she’s just lying in my guest bed…crying.”
Fuck. That…that makes me feel sick.
“What does she have to do to open?”
“Finish the bathroom, get her permit to open, and then obviously stock everything, but she won’t have all the stock in for a while. So it just seems, as she put it, impossible. I told her I was willing to try though.”
I scratch my cheek, trying to see a way around this.
“Where do you get a permit?”
“I actually know someone who could help us out with that. I think the bigger thing is setting up the shop, filling it with product, entering everything into the register, and marketing.” She shrugs. “It’s a huge undertaking and Renley is already tired and?—”
“We can do it,” I say.
“What?” Tilly asks.
“We can do it. We can open this shop. The biggest roadblock in my opinion is the permit, but if you know someone, everything else we can do.”
“How?”
“Rupert, remember when we were in Boston, we were talking to that one bearded guy about how he had to go to some surplus place to get meat for his food truck?”
“Yes, Jared was his name.”
“Sure, but there have to be other stores where we can buy a surplus of product. There has to be a candy store, someplace where we can load up a truck and at least have something for people to buy until we get stock in. She has the scoops and the storage for the candy. She just needs the candy.”
Rupert pulls his phone from his pocket and does a quick search. His eyes light up before he turns the phone toward me. “There’s a wholesale candy store in Boston.”
“Really?” Tilly asks, looking at the phone as well. “Oh my God, there is.”
“I can go to the store and purchase all of the candy. I know what she wants because she’s talked to me about it so much.”
