“You didn’t have to do that.” She dismissed me with a wave of her hand and my exhaustion and anger boiled over.
“I was trying to avoid a riot!” I stood, my anger over the stupid prank spilling out of me now. I hadn’t really had time all day to process how pointless and mean-spirited it really was. “Someone broke into my store and set this up. And I don’t know why I’m a target. I’ve never once done anything to any of you!”
“Any of us? Like we’re some other breed of human?”
“You know what I mean. Tanners.”
Addie rolled her eyes again. “Right.”
“What does that mean?” I was vibrating with anger, and while I knew Addie didn’t really deserve any of it, I couldn’t help myself. This feud was ridiculous, and today it had hurt business. I didn’t have a lot of spare money lying around.
“As if the Tuckers are so much better than us, like we started this whole thing.”
“I have no idea who started it,” I fumed. “And I don’t care! What I do care about is that today I lost thousands of dollars from a business I don’t have any interest in running in the first place! Is it too much to ask that I at least don’t go bankrupt because of someone else’s stupidity? I can fail perfectly well all on my own.”
Addie’s eyes widened as I spat these words at her, and she stood up from the table, her expression less imperious than it had been a second before. “Look, Michael, I’m really sorry for what happened. But—“
“I don’t really want to talk about it anymore,” I said. I’d told her far more than I intended and now I wished I could just reel the words back in. I felt my face flush, with embarrassment and anger—at the prank, but also at the state of my life and the fact I’d just given a beautiful, successful women a bird’s eye view of my pointless existence.
“Okay,” she said, her shoulders slumping slightly. “Well, I think I’m just going to walk down to the square and get some dinner at the Shack.”
I stood there, feeling stupid for a beat too long, and Addie turned to pick up her purse from the hook by the back door. I watched her pull her coat on, letting the anger dissipate from the atmosphere around me. Just as she put her hand on the knob, I managed to find my voice again. “I’ll walk you.”
“I’m fine,” she said, the dark eyes finding me as she turned her head over her shoulder. “You don’t have to.”
“Do you mind the company? I’m hungry.”
She turned to face me, her smile tentative and those wide eyes questioning. “As long as we don’t talk about the feud.”
“Deal,” I said. I’d had more than enough of it anyway, and I knew it was Shelly’s night off, but I also knew she’d have words for me about eating at her place of work with a woman. At that moment, I didn’t care. “Let’s go.”
We stepped out the back door and walked around to the front gates, leaving the old house standing in shadow for the ghosts to claim for the evening.
14
Old Bay Strikes Again
Addison
If you’d told me a month ago that I’d be sitting at The Shack in Singletree with Michael Tucker, eating fried clams out of a bucket today, I wouldn’t have believed you. Partly because my life was all planned out already, and there was no room in it for my tiny hometown, and certainly not for anyone named Tucker, no matter how handsome he looked with his dark red hair glinting under the glowing lights of the bar. But the other reason I would have said this was impossible was because I was in the middle of an eight-year-long delusion that involved my long-time boyfriend finally sacking up and proposing. It involved kids and a bigger apartment and some form of happily ever after.
But now, I was here. In a place where food was served in a bucket.
“I didn’t miss the Old Bay,” I confided, holding yet another fried clam before my lips.
“Doesn’t seem to be putting you off these too much,” Michael observed, watching me devour another.
“I can handle it,” I told him. “Just wouldn’t be my first choice of spice blend, that’s all.”
“Do you have a first choice in spice blends?”
I had to think about that. “I mean . . . what are the choices, really? There’s Allspice, right?”
“Not great on clams probably.”
“Maybe not. There’s Italian.” I shrugged, knowing this one was a stretch.
“That’s a culture, not a spice blend.”
“You can buy a little bottle in the store that says ‘Italian Spice.’” When he just stared at me, I added, “I see that you are absorbing this new information.”
“No, I’m just sad.”
I dropped my latest clam onto my plate. “Sad? About Italian Spice?”
He shook his head, and though his face was a mask of disappointment, there was a little glint in those dark blue eyes that both told me he was kidding with me, and sent a little pulse of giddiness through my stomach. “I’m sad that you think that’s a valid spice blend.”
“Fine, what’s your favorite?” I asked him.
“I’m partial to Garam Masala,” he said, and I kicked myself, wishing I’d thought of that one. “But my all-time favorite? Cinnamon sugar.” He smiled as if he’d won some kind of contest.
“That’s not a blend. That’s just two spices that you’re naming.”
“And they are delicious together. Which makes them a blend.”
“Not.”
“I bet Lottie would agree with me.” He raised his eyebrows and gave me a smug smile before taking another sip of the Half Cat Whiskey he’d ordered.
“Do not bring my mother into this.” I took a sip of my beer and sat back into my chair. Despite the company and the weird train of conversation, I found myself relaxing in his company, enjoying it even.
“But you and your mom are close, right?”
“Like she’d give me any other choice.”
He cocked his head to the side and narrowed his eyes at me, and I had the oddest sensation as he did it. Michael Tucker was listening to me. Really listening. A warm wave of emotion passed over me. I liked it.
“Tell me about it,” he said. “About life with your mom and sisters.”
I considered giving him a flip response, turning off this line of questioning before it could really get rolling. But hadn’t I spent the last many years wishing Luke would really listen to me? Not that I was comparing Michael and Luke, not at all. Luke was my boyfriend—my lover. And Michael was . . . so handsome as he sat and waited patiently for me to respond. His squared jaw was stubbled with fine golden hairs and his forearm, where it rested on the tabletop next to his glass, was tanned and muscular. He didn’t have the same fine hands that Luke had—a musician’s hands—but Michael’s looked strong and capable. My mind began to picture those hands at work, and maybe in the shower. Without meaning to, I imagined what that big firm hand might look like wrapped around my breast, or his cock—
I nearly spit out the sip of beer I’d just taken as I realized where my mind had gone. I felt heat rise in my cheeks, and still, Michael just watched me with those penetrating eyes.