“I overheard your conversation. It’s me, Mabel. I’m the Castle King.”
She blinked once, then twice. Okay, scratch that. Maybe she was dreaming, or perhaps the mushrooms she’d sampled when she’d arrived were the magical kind.
Was this really happening? It couldn’t be him!
In an instant, the hum of the farmers’ market disappeared.
“Dad, what are you doing here?”
Dressed in a pair of worn jeans and his Muldowney Farms cap, Elias Muldowney looked as if aliens had beamed him up from the farm, then beamed him back, smack dab in the middle of New York City.
“I was having a conversation with Chelsea. She’s the one who told me you were here. You’re doing something that’s called trending. That’s when your name comes up a lot on the internet with a hashtag,” he answered straight-faced as if his being in New York City wasn’t completely insane—and sounding internet savvy to boot!
The aliens that beamed him here must have scrambled his mind.
“It’s good to see you, Mabel,” a woman—no, not just any woman—Chelsea Blaine said.
Her gaze ping-ponged between them. “How do you two know each other?”
“We just met,” Chelsea explained. “I got to your hotel a little early and noticed your father’s hat. And, of course, I recognized him from social media.”
Mabel’s jaw almost hit the pavement. “You know about Eat Elverna, too?”
Chelsea chuckled. “I do. But that’s not the only reason I wanted to meet with you.”
Here it was. Chelsea was here with an offer for Bella Mae.
Mabel caught Lily out of the corner of her eye. “I’m sorry for wasting your time, Chelsea, but I’m done pretending. I can’t be Bella Mae anymore.”
“I see,” the agent replied, raising an eyebrow.
Mabel smiled to herself as she observed Lily place a dried bunch of lavender in a reusable bag.
She held Chelsea’s gaze. “I’m sorry to have wasted your time.”
Chelsea leaned in. “What if I told you that I didn’t want Bella Mae?”
What else could she want? Mabel Muldowney?
“What do you mean?” she asked as people gathered around them and held up their phones.
Chelsea glanced at the crowd. “Everyone loves a comeback, Mabel. The internet saw your fall. But it’s what you did after that garnered so much attention. You went home, and you helped your rural community—and you did it in Prada heels. You’ve caught the eye of some of my clients. It’s the type of transformation sponsors want.”
It seemed too good to be true.
“What clients?” Mabel pressed.
“The Organic Farm Research Association, the US Department of Agriculture, and the Organic Farming Association, to name a few,” the woman replied, counting the groups off on her fingers. “And that doesn’t count the eco-friendly clothing designers who have expressed an interest.”
“Seriously?” she asked.
“You’re shabby chic, the farm edition, and people are paying attention to Eat Elverna and Farm to Mabel.”
It sounded like a dream come true, but she wasn’t ready to believe it yet.
“Why didn’t you tell me this in your letter? And why did you want me to come to New York?” she asked.
Chelsea nodded. “That’s a valid question. I’ve had Lucce monitor the Eat Elverna social media sites for the last couple of weeks, but I wanted to see you for myself,” Chelsea answered.
Mabel’s stomach twisted into a knot at the mention of Mr. two C’s and one stupid E.
“What exactly did you want to see?” she questioned.
Chelsea gestured to the people crowding around, then removed her phone from her bag. “Farm to Mabel is the real thing,” she said. “Eat Elverna has quadrupled its number of followers in the hour that you’ve been wandering around the New York City Farmers’ Market.”
Mabel stared at the screen. It was true! “That’s incredible!”
Chelsea watched her closely. “What do you say?”
Mabel glanced at her father, who, in Elias Muldowney fashion, simply shrugged.
This was it.
No one knows when that make-or-break moment is going to arrive. There were no guarantees in this world—especially the online world. She’d dreamed of being an influencer. She’d imagined people all over the globe knowing who she was. She glanced around at the crowd. That make-or-break moment was now, and it wasn’t for Bella Mae. No, it was for a little organic farming town called Elverna and the girl who wore designer shoes to feed a goat.
She thought back to her first day home when she’d told Sally that she wore many hats. Right now, she needed to don the businesswoman’s hat, which happened to be the one she had on—her sculpted wide brim dramatic floppy hat. Or, as Cal called it, the giant floppy sombrero. Oh, how she missed him, but she couldn’t let her mind go there. She schooled her features. She wasn’t negotiating for herself—she was representing her community.
“I have one condition,” she began.
The corners of Chelsea’s mouth tilted into the hint of a grin. “And what would that be?”
Mabel glanced at her father. “My first priority is the Eat Elverna Co-op. It will always come first.”
“I wouldn’t want it any other way,” the woman answered with a knowing glint in her eyes. “I’ll leave you to enjoy the market with your father. I’ll be in touch,” Chelsea finished, then squeezed her hand. “You’re going to do a lot of good in this world, Mabel Muldowney.”
“I’d like that,” she replied, then looked on as Chelsea shook her father’s hand before disappearing into the crowd.
“That’s a fine tomato you’ve got there,” the man commented.
She stared at him. That’s what he had to say after learning that Eat Elverna was about to become the poster farm for organic agriculture, and his daughter was going to be its spokesperson!
Not only that!
She had a bone to pick with him.
“Dad! Forget the tomato! How can you be the Castle King? I saw it on Cal’s laptop,” she tossed back, needing some damn answers.
Confusion marred her father’s features. “Of course, you saw it on Cal’s laptop. It’s the Muldowney Farms laptop. Me, Cal, Kenny, and Abe use it. Hell! The cats like to walk all over it.”
Some things never change. Her father was still infuriating.
“Where did you learn to make a social media account?” she pressed.
“The library! They had a whole class on helping old-timers like me understand the internet. The Young sisters signed me up. That’s where I met Claudine,” he finished with the sweetest look on his face, and she couldn’t stay mad at him.
Her expression softened. “But why Castle King? It doesn’t mean anything to me.”
Her father sighed. “It was supposed to be Casserole King, but there’s this thing called autocorrect, and I didn’t notice that it had switched casserole to castle.”
She chuckled. The man knew about autocorrect. “Old dog, new tricks,” she teased.
“Something like that,” he replied when another question popped into her head.