CHAPTER TWO #2
“He’s just so mean,” she said after a few sips.
“I’ve never done anything to him. And he’s just so, so mean.
And not just to me. But it feels like he enjoys being mean to me.
” She shook her head and glanced up at the cloudless sky.
Bright green leaves, barely unfurled for the spring, rustled gently in the trees overhead as the wind zipped through them.
Blinking a few times, she sniffed and swallowed hard, doing her best to steel her emotions since we were in public.
I rested my hand on her thigh as we sat side by side. “You know he’s not doing this bullshit because he likes you, right?”
She glanced over at me. “What do you mean?”
“Don’t let anybody tell you that Clyde is being mean to you because he has a crush on you. That’s what they used to tell us, and it’s total crap. He’s being mean because he is a soulless demon and needs to be sent back to the depths of Hell whence he came.”
She snorted, and a ghost of a smile graced my beautiful daughter’s face. “I still can’t believe I just started screaming at him.”
My lips twitched to hide my smile. “I bet he nearly crapped his pants in fear. He probably thought you’d totally lost your mind and were going to beat the daylights out of him.” I kind of wish she had.
“I don’t even remember doing it. My brain kind of … went into outer space or something.”
I simply nodded. “It happens. It’s a protection mechanism our brains do sometimes.”
Leaning into her until our foreheads rested against each other, I wrapped my arm around her shoulders.
“For our own peace of mind, let’s pretend that Clyde actually did crap his pants, and he’s going through the rest of the day smelling like a dirty diaper and there is absolutely nothing he can do about it. ”
Her giggle lightened the heaviness of my heart.
While she felt better now, a chat and a kombucha were far from a solution. At the moment, they were no more than a Band-Aid on a bullet wound. And Clyde Whalley seemed like a bullet dipped in poison. Poison, I was determined to find the antidote to. Even if it killed me.
At ten minutes to eight, the parking lot of the San Camanez Island Community Center was full of vehicles.
Raina rode with Jagger since she and Marco were staying at his house.
So Gabrielle, Naomi, and I drove together.
The other four McEvoy brothers rode together in one truck, and the distillery dads came together in two separate trucks.
That left the women who owned the cidery, who showed up in one big minivan. Four out of the five of them piled out of the vehicle.
“Hey, Danica,” Ivy Ledger said, sidling up beside me as we all filed in to go hear the verdict about Bonn Remmen’s land.
I gave her a small smile. “Hey, Ivy. How are you?”
She let out a deep sigh. “Nervous. Glad this will finally be over, one way or another.”
Nodding, I shyly thanked Clint McEvoy for holding open the door. “Yeah, us too.”
“Myla is at home with all the kids. So hopefully this doesn’t take too long. She’s the only one of us without kids, and while she loves all her nieces and nephews, she’s significantly outnumbered, six to one.”
I blanched. “Oh jeez. Hopefully, she can use some of that police officer authority to keep them in line.”
Ivy barked out a laugh. “Her police authority carries no weight with those kids, I’m afraid.”
I snickered and smiled again as I followed Gabrielle and my other cousins off to one side.
The McEvoys stood beside us, Jagger and Raina holding hands as they literally bridged the gap between our two families. Then the four distillery dads, beside them the cider sisters, and … where was the mysterious fifth party?
It seemed we were all wondering the same thing. Heads swiveled and eyes darted around the conference room as we stood there in front of the two empty tables with chairs behind them.
Bennett McEvoy glanced at his watch. “For old hippies who dance naked under the full moon, they’re certainly drumming up the suspense.”
I checked my phone. It was now eight fifty-five.
The door behind the tables opened, and one by one, eight Island Elders filtered out—slowly—and took a seat on one side of the table.
Hattie Granger, with her flowy multicolored skirts and long, gray hair in twin braids, sat in the center with the gavel in front of her.
Abe Jefferies sat on her right with Keturah Katz on her left.
Sunflower Patrick pulled a manila envelope out of her patchwork shoulder bag and handed it to Hattie. None of them said anything.
However, as my gaze flitted across each of their faces, my pulse picked up tempo and my palms grew sweaty.
Each of them—except for one—wore a blank, unreadable mask.
I zeroed in on Jolene Dandy, also known as The Island Mouth, as her coppery-brown eyes glittered with excitement.
Under the table, her leg bounced, and when she caught me looking at her, her smile widened.
Did that mean something?
Cameron Arendelle at the end of the distillery dad group caught my attention and offered me a friendly wave. I gave one back, which earned me a gentle elbow to the ribs from Naomi.
“What’s that about?” she whispered out of the side of her mouth.
“Nothing,” I replied the same way. “We’re just friends.”
“Sure.”
I elbowed her back and made a point of not looking in Cameron’s direction again.
“We’ll give the last party another minute to arrive,” Hattie said, her voice scratchy as her bony hands trembled a little when they reached into the manila envelope and pulled out a stack of papers.
The sound of the front door of the community center banging closed echoed down the hallway toward all of us, and every single head turned halfway around, facing the open conference room door.
Footsteps down the corridor preceded the latest arrival.
The mysterious fifth interested party in Bonn Remmen’s land, and quite possibly, the winner of it.
My heart crawled up my throat until my entire pulse felt like it was trapped in my neck.
“Ah, Mr. Barone,” Hattie said just as the most handsome silver fox came cruising around the corner. Now my pulse thrummed, hot and heavy for a different reason.
“That’s the guy who performed CPR on that kid last summer at the school funfair,” Naomi murmured. “Who is he?”
Tommaso Barone.
I forgot to Google him when I got home from Sam’s appointment with the nurse practitioner, and now I wished I hadn’t. That was the man who owned the animal rescue center? Mr. Moneybags Superstar Soccer Player Ultimate Recluse?
My mouth grew dry, and that’s when I realized my jaw had gone slack and hung open as Tommaso came forward and quietly shook the hands of each of The Island Elders. Then he nodded at a surprised-looking Cameron, then stopped and stood next to the cider sisters.
“Who is that?” Raina asked.
But nobody had time to answer her before Hattie banged the gavel and commanded all of our attention.
She cleared her throat before she started speaking.
“Right then. We would like to thank all of you for your patience with this. Bonn Remmen, as you all know, was a pillar of this community, and as the remaining council, we didn’t feel it right to just hand over the gift of his land to just anybody without doing our due diligence.
There were a lot of interested parties, but you five had proposals that we liked the most. Each of them unique and wonderful in their own way.
We also took into great consideration what we think Bonn would have wanted. ”
The rest of the Elders down the tables all nodded in agreement.
“Bonn was a simple man, but he liked a good gathering. He liked people. He liked community and, while he didn’t have any himself, he liked family. We were his family.” Her eyes grew a little misty, and her thin bottom lip wobbled as she took a moment to compose herself.
Abe Jefferies reached out and grabbed her hand, giving it a little squeeze. She glanced at him and smiled.
Clearing her throat once more, Hattie continued to speak. “It warmed our hearts to see the feud between Jagger and Raina finally end, resulting in a romance that we’re all certain will last.”
My cousin and the youngest, beardiest McEvoy brother glanced at each other and smiled.
“And the fact that their families’ proposals were so similar just speaks to how aligned they already were.”
Out of the corner of my eye, the cider sisters and distillery dads all shifted awkwardly on their feet.
“So, while we wish we could give the land to everyone, and have all of your visions come true, we have decided to award the gift of Bonn Remmen’s land to the McEvoys and Westhaven Winery.” Hattie banged the gavel again, and Naomi grabbed me and yanked me firmly into a hug.
The McEvoys were hugging, then they hugged my cousins and me. It was just a lot of hugging. I thought about Gabrielle, who wasn’t a hugger or a touchy-feely person in general. She probably hated this.
Out of the corner of my eye, as Jagger had my feet nearly dangling, his guns-for-arms wrapped around me, I spotted Cameron shaking hands with Tommaso and the two of them talking softly.
Tommaso glanced over Cameron’s shoulder at me, only for a second before focusing his light-brown eyes back on the man he was speaking to.
Jagger set me down and moved on to hug Naomi just as Cameron—without Tommaso—came over and offered me a handshake.
“Congratulations,” he said, the loss in his eyes unmistakable.
My smile was crooked and small. “It feels bittersweet, honestly. Like, I’m happy for us, but sad for the rest of you.”
“And to wish for more land to come available basically means wishing for one of those old buggers up there to croak,” he said, his chuckle soft. “I get it. We all had a twenty-five percent chance. And obviously, your guys’ proposal was the one they thought Bonn would have wanted the most.”
“What are you guys going to do now?” I asked.