She really didn’t have time for distractions, but her gaze shifted back to the car. Despite her best efforts at biting her smile into submission, it slipped wide beneath her teeth.
But shedidhave thirty minutes.
“Hey, Daph, do you want me to set the scones out on the counter or the serving tab—”
Daphne turned to find her friend and employee, Rosemary Knight, paused in the kitchen doorway, wearing a somewhat confused expression as Daphne was poised with one foot out the front door and one in. Very ladylike.
“Oh no you don’t!” Rosemary raised a finger from beneath the tray of scones, one dark brown eyebrow lifting to add extra warning. “There’s no way you’re leaving me to work this fundraiser alone.”
“I... I wasn’t planning toleave!” Daphne pushed up a bright smile, scrambling for an excuse that didn’t sound completely ridiculous. “I was just admiring... the weather. It looks like a beautiful day for the event, don’t you think?”
Rosemary’s golden, marble-hued eyes narrowed to slits. Without breaking eye contact, she set the scones on the nearest table and crossed the room, her brows knitting tighter with every step. “What’s going on?”
Daphne’s shoulders collapsed and she looked back out the door. “Do you see that?”
Rosemary followed Daphne’s gaze, scanning the quaint and quiet Main Street, before turning back to Daphne. “The fine day?”
“No, the Cabriolet.”
Rosemary blinked, ending another visual sweep of Main Street with a slow shake of her head, causing her tight curls to bounce a little. “Is that a new restaurant in town?”
“No!” Daphne took Rosemary by the shoulders and steered her in the direction of the car. How could she not know what a Cabriolet was? “It’s... that car. A Cabriolet.”
Rosemary turned in the direction, finally landing her focus on the coveted prize. And then it was Rosemary’s turn to release a sigh the size of Texas. “Oh,the car.”
“Yes,the car,” Daphne said, practically bouncing on her toes. Everyone close to her knew of her fascination. Daphne lovingly blamed it on her mother. God rest her soul.
And Granny.
God rest her soul too.
“It’s perfect, Rose. Exactly as Granny described. And it looks like the one Mom pointed out when I was a little girl. Same color.” Daphne teetered back toward the threshold, gesturing with her index fingers toward the doorway as her shoulders rose in a silent plea. “It would be a shame for me not to get a selfie with it while I can.”
With another glance from the car to Daphne, Rosemary’s demeanor broke and she released a soft chuckle. “You’re ridiculous.” Then she shrugged, rolled her eyes with enough exaggeration to ensure Daphne didn’t miss it, and turned back toward the kitchen. “But you’d better get that selfie before your car disappears in a cloud of English mist.”
As if Daphne needed more encouragement.
But it proved the perfect catalyst against her weakness.
With a slight shift in the direction of her pink stilettos, she stepped away from her shop and into the midmorning sunlight, moving forward in a vintage-English-induced trance. She’d daydreamed about this particular car since she was a thirteen-year-old girl sitting at her mother’s sickbed listening to a nostalgic conversation between her mom and Granny about Granny’s romantic history.
“Your grandfather bought me one a long time ago. Couldn’t bring it to America with me, but oh...”She pressed her palm to her chest.“You’d have loved it, Daphne dear. It was cute and stylish, like you.”
Cute and stylish. Even at thirteen Daphne had taken those words as gospel. Her grandmother, who breathed elegance like the fictional Lady Cora Crawley, Countess of Grantham, had already sealed her fate as a hopeless Anglophile.
Maybe the Cabriolet-craze had been the combination of her granny’s sentiment and the memory of her mama along with Daphne’s near obsession with England, but a deep and abiding fascination with the tiny car had stuck with Daphne ever since.
Electric blue came as a bonus.
She neared the street, expecting the car to disappear as Rosemary had predicted, but its glossy exterior only glinted in the sunshine like a beacon. Thank goodness her brother wasn’t around to witness this moment. He’d ruin it by laughing... at her.
But he wasn’t a Cabriolet kind of guy, so there was that.
Sidestepping a passing bicycle, she smoothed her palm over the sleek hood, her pink nails the perfect shade to complement the car’s hue. A giggle bubbled out as she examined every inch of the adorable automobile. It was real! Perfect, all the way down to the leather interior.
How many times had she fantasized about driving through the English countryside in a little beauty like this? Exploring her grandmother’s hometown and meeting family members over tea and scones. Her entire body sighed against the car.
“May I help you?”
