Page 8 of When in Rome
“Same temperature as yesterday, Phil,” I say, before taking a sip of my coffee. I don’t stop walking.
Phil blinks a hundred times and looks around for some conversational genius to strike him that will snag my attention. He can’tcome up with anything so Todd tries his hand. “Maybe the heat will bring in some new customers for you? Some out-of-towners, perhaps?”
“Heat usually make you crave pie, Todd? Might want to see the doc about that. Seems odd to me.” I keep walking and raise a hand over my shoulder after I’ve passed them in lieu of a parting greeting. They’re lucky I didn’t throw up the bird instead.
Now, obstacle number two: Harriet’s Market. I pull my hat a little lower over my eyes because if there’s anyone I really don’t want to see today, it’s Harriet. That woman is ruthless. I pass under her blue-and-white-striped awning and think I’m in the clear until her shop door chimes. I wince and consider speed walking away, but it’s too late. I’m caught.
She cuts right to the chase. “Noah Walker, don’t think I didn’t hear you had a woman staying over last night.” I have no choice but to take a fortifying breath and turn around to face Harriet. Her hands are perched on her slender hips, a severe glare on her face, adding new frown lines to the ones already present. The cheery yellow sundress she’s wearing doesn’t match her personality. Harriet keeps her salt-and-pepper hair tied back into a tight bun. It’s not that Harriet is grumpy because she doesn’t like people—it’s that she’s nearly 100 percent certain she’s better than most people. Who knows, maybe sheis.
“In my day, young men and women weren’t so intimate before they were married. It left a little something to the imagination. Something to be desired.” She tilts her head down so she can purse her lips and raise her brows. “Now who is this woman you spent the night with and do you plan on marrying her?”
That escalated quickly.
“Uh—no, ma’am. And I didn’t spend the nightwithher. Her car broke down in my yard, so I offered up my guest bedroom to her.”Not that it’s any of your businessis what I’d tell her if I wasn’tchickenshit and scared to death of this woman. I like to spar with Mabel, but I hide from Harriet.
She wags her finger in my direction. “Then you keep your hands to yourself. If you don’t intend to walk her down the aisle, then don’t go dipping your toes in her pond.”
I grimace. Not entirely sure if that’s supposed to be an innuendo or not but grossed-out all the same.
“Don’t worry. I’m not interested in her…pond.”
Yep. That felt as disgusting to say as I thought it would. Wonderful. Now I need to find a way to boil my brain today. This is also why I have to go outside the city limits if I want to spend any time with a woman. Which, let’s be honest, I haven’t done in a long time. I’m not really the one-night-stand sort of guy, because, like Rae Rose pointed out last night, one-nighters are always sort of awkward. I find the whole situation around them uncomfortable. I like to have an emotional connection with a woman before I sleep with her and it’s damn inconvenient.
All that to say, I don’t take any women back to my place because someone’s always out with binoculars prowling for gossip in this town. Harriet will find out and send the Nazarene preacher over to knock on my door and remind me that lust is one of the seven deadly sins. Except Pastor Barton loves pie and will eat no less than three pieces while sermonizing. It’ll take a whole afternoon.
Harriet nods, her scowl still deeply marring the space between her brows. “Well, good. Keep it that way.”
Great, glad that’s over.
“I’ll have your peach pie ready at closing for you.” It’s Wednesday so I know she’ll be by to pick it up on her way to her knitting group. I lift my coffee in silent cheers and then keep walking.
I pick up my pace and miraculously do not encounter anyone else as I pass the diner, and then the flower shop (which is run by my youngest sister, who I’m sure would be bursting out and demanding answers if she wasn’t out of town currently with my othertwo sisters), and finally make it to the front door of The Pie Shop. I shove my key in the lock even though I could probably leave the thing wide open at night and no one would even consider vandalizing or stealing anything. In fact, Phil would probably come in and fix the wobbly barstool and then lock the place up for me on his way out.
Stepping inside the shop feels like a hug. It might not look like much to anyone else, but to me, it’s home. This pie shop has been in my family for decades. Very little about it has changed over the years, which I’m grateful for. The same blue-and-white-checkered curtains hang above the double windows. The same scratched-up wooden countertop sits beside the pie case. I had to replace the high-top table that sits in front of the large storefront window because it was definitely the worse for wear, but I managed to find one that was nearly an exact replica.
I take ten steps into the shop, lift the folding countertop, walk through, and then latch it closed behind me. It, as well as the domed-glass pie case, separates the front half of the store from the back half. And back there behind me is a tiny kitchen where my mom, and my grandma, and her mom before her, and her mom before her baked our Walker family pies with their secret recipes. But that’s basically it. It’s small, or quaint, or whatever you want to call it, but it’s all I need.
I spend the next few minutes getting the shop ready to open—turning on the giant oven, brewing a fresh pot of coffee for customers, wiping down surfaces. I’m just popping a tray of pies from the freezer into the oven when the back door opens and James steps in with a crate full of apples. Like me, he grew up in this town and took over his family’s farm. We went to school together from preschool all the way through community college where we both majored in business.
“How’s it going, Noah?”
“Good. How are—”
“So who’s the woman?” he says, setting down the crate and crossing his arms.
I pour myself a fresh cup of coffee because I get the feeling today could be a several-cupper. “Damn. How doyouknow about her? It’s only eight in the morning.”
He shrugs a shoulder. “Mabel called asking if I could see anything from my porch.”
James is technically my neighbor. Except our houses are separated by several acres.
I raise my coffee to my lips and take a sip. “Could you?”
“Nah—too far off.”
“Couldn’t find your binoculars?”
“I think I lent them to someone.” James helps himself to a Styrofoam to-go cup and fills it with coffee before leaning back against the counter like he doesn’t have a damn thing to do all day. He crosses one booted foot over the other.