No Vacancy (The Aveline Series Book 2)

Chapter 30

DARCY

It was Friday afternoon,and I’d called Peyton to hash out details for my plan. “I only have a week to scare him off. How do I do this?”

Peyton took a bite of something and spoke, her mouth full. “Okay, grab a pen and a piece of paper.”

I walked to my bedroom, took my notebook from the end table, and sat back on the couch. “Okay, done.”

“Let’s make a list, and then you can just start checking them off. One by one, you can make him wish he was never born!” Peyton’s voice grew oddly aggressive.

I put the phone on speaker and set it on the coffee table. “Simmer down, Tiger. I want him out of Aveline, not dead. Is this about Adam? Because I told you, he doesn’t deserve you.”

Adam Landry and Peyton had dated for six months before she caught him tongue deep in his office assistant two weeks ago. She had been angrier than ever at the entire male species since then.

Peyton sighed. “Maybe. But forget about Adam. Let’s focus on Operation AA.”

“Okay.” I pulled the pen cap off with my mouth and wrote at the top of the page.

OPERATION ANDIE ANDERSON

“I still think we need a better name,” I said as I stared at the title. I doodled a little flower next to it.

I could hear Peyton chewing through the phone. “No...mm, it’s not important.”

I shrugged as we tried to come up with the best ways to drive Penn away.

“Are there any concerts coming up? Like in the movie, she takes him to see Celine Dion. Maybe you could take him to like Disney on Ice or something.”

I chuckled, coming up with a brilliant yet mortifying suggestion. “Or what if I perform a concert for him?”

“Oh my God! That’s brilliant. Put on an epic Taylor Swift concert for him. Then make him watch the entire Twilight series.”

I was scratching down all of our ideas at an alarmingly fast rate. Once we began, the ideas just seemed to flood out, and by the end of the night, we had compiled the most epic list of all time. I looked over it again.

Force him to sit on the couch while I perform a Taylor Swift concert

Make him watch the entire Twilight series

Take him to Rosie’s to pick out wedding bouquets

Accuse him of cheating

Suggest starting a family immediately

Talk incessantly about ex-boyfriend

I read over the list a couple more times and then capped my pen. “I kind of feel like a bad person. Am I a bad person?”

“Yeah, maybe,” Peyton replied.

“Peyton!” I yelled, and she laughed.

“I’m kidding. Listen, it’s not that big of a deal. You are just trying to keep a random person from buying your dad’s store. It’s not like you’re making him fall in love with you and then messing with him. That would just be mean. You’re messing with him right away.”

“Right. Yes. That makes a difference, I think.” I scratched my head with my pen.

“Of course. Plus, I mean, Aveline has a way of chasing people off anyway. You may not even have to do anything at all.”

She was right. Aveline had always been a place to pass through. To be honest, most people ran away from the congested lifestyle where everyone knew everything about everyone. Some people wanted more adventure or privacy, and most of the time, people were in a hurry to leave. There were a select few of us that stayed behind, like me, and a few that ventured in and never left, like Lettie. But for people like Penn Murphy, it wasn’t a place that screamed home.

“I think Rosie seeing us that night might have just made this entire process easier for me. Penn will see how invasive the town is and that I’ll never agree to the restaurant in the hardware store, and in a week, he’ll be merrily on his way.”

“It sounds like a great plan. Plus, you know, you could just be yourself. That will probably scare him off just fine,” Peyton teased.

I laughed. “Oh yeah, like you’re such a gem,” I replied.

There was a knock on the door, and I jumped, not expecting it. “I gotta go,” I whispered. I shoved the notebook into the cushion of the couch before I stood up and opened the door.

“Penn?” I was surprised to see him standing in my doorway, wearing a blue shirt that matched his eyes. Did he know that wearing that shirt made his skin look like it was glowing? It wasn’t even summer; how was his skin a perfect bronze?

He was slightly out of breath. “I was being questioned. I didn’t know what to do.”

“Did you run here?”

He scoffed. “No.” He gulped, and I surveyed the bead of sweat on his forehead.

“No? You are just always a little sweaty and out of breath?”

“You did tell me I was sweaty, don’t you remember?” Penn ran his hands through his hair.

I laughed and opened the door wider, letting him in. “I do remember. Come in.”