“Great,” Wren muttered.
“He doesn’t like people any more than you do, so I’m afraid it’ll fall to you to do most of the talking. Grayson will be expecting that, even if he grumbles about me—I mean you—being too loud or talking too much.”
Those were two complaints Wren had never gotten in her life.
“So now I get to spend the weekend pretending to be you enough that I annoy your boss, but not so much that I get you fired?”
Lark giggled. “Jesus. Sounds terrible when you put it that way.”
“And yet I’m still doing this, right?”
Lark hit Wren with her cutest, most pleading Puss-in-Boots wide-eyed expression. “Please?”
“I’m going to regret this.”
Lark shook her head. “Nope. You’re going to have fun because for once, you’ll be getting out of this dusty old library, drinking in a bunch of fresh air, and soaking up some seriously needed vitamin D. Honest to God, Wrennie, you live like a vampire.”
Wren blew out a long, slow breath, but there was no real annoyance behind it. Just a sinking feeling that she’d agreed to something far more complicated than she realized.
Wren made a mental note to make sure her volunteers were okay to man the library on their own this Saturday and Sunday. Because Gracemont was such a small town, she was the only full-time employee in the library. She worked nine to seven, four days a week, then several local volunteers manned the front desk on the weekend half days—Saturday mornings and Sunday afternoons. However, it wasn’t uncommon for Wren to make an appearance both of those days, just to make sure things were okay. The only day the library closed was Wednesdays, which was a kickback to when Ms. Pauley was the librarian. Apparently, Wednesdays had been the day she got her hair done.
Wren rose from her chair and quickly finished running through her routine for closing. Then she and Lark left together. Wren rented an apartment from Edith Millholland just off Main Street. Edith had renovated an old house so that it now contained four apartments—two downstairs, two upstairs. Wren rented one of the apartments on the top floor. It was a small one-bedroom place with a little kitchen, living room, and bathroom, but it suited her just fine. Less apartment meant less to clean.
The best part about her place was that it was walking distance to the library, so while she owned a car, she never drove the thing.
“Hop in my car and we’ll swing by Philly’s for a pizza before we go back to your apartment,” Lark offered.
Wren hated missing her evening walk home, but Lark was a woman on a mission, now that she’d secured Wren’s agreement to pose as her.
An hour later, they were sitting side by side on Wren’s tatty Goodwill couch, chowing down on pepperoni pizza, while Lark opened the third bottle of wine. Wren had taken copious notes about the first and second wines they’d tried, feeling overwhelmed and, to be honest, downright impressed with her sister’s knowledge about the grapes, the harvest, and the process behind making the wine.
“I can’t believe how much you’ve learned since you’ve started working at the winery,” Wren said. “I also don’t know how the hell I’m going to remember all of this. Can I look at my notes, or will that be a giveaway to Grayson?”
Lark crinkled her nose regretfully. “I never use notes.”
Wren rubbed her temple. “Of course, you don’t.”
“I also break up the tasting with funny little anecdotes about living in a small town.”
That was unsurprising, though problematic. Lark was an entertaining storyteller. Meanwhile, Wren preferred to be the one on the receiving end of a good story. Hence her love of reading.
While Lark rose to wash their glasses, Wren popped the corks back into the first two bottles. “What the hell are we going to do with all these open bottles of wine?”
She knew the moment Lark came back into the living room, her brows raised as if to say “Really?” that it was a stupid question. Lark, the last of the original party girls, would have no problem polishing off a few bottles of wine with girlfriends over the course of the next week or two. Meanwhile, Wren still had an unopened bottle of red from the holidays sitting on her kitchen counter.
Wren raised her hand. “Forget it. I lost my head for a moment.”
“You live like a monk,” Lark said, looking around her apartment.
“I live like an adult.”
Lark rolled her eyes. “Not a single dish in the kitchen sink. And this living room… Where’s all the stuff?”
“What stuff?” Wren asked.
“Like the shoes you kick off by the door, or the bra you strip out of the second you get home? Where are the empty glasses and plates, the random stray sock or hair ties, balled-up blankets and shit like that?”
“That’s how you live. Not me.” And the main reason why Wren had refused to consider getting an apartment with her sister when she’d moved back after college, even with Lark flashing the Puss-in-Boots eyes at her.
