Chapter 8
Damon
Granville’s best breakfast place—the only breakfast place if you wanted something other than doughnuts—was The Diner.
Personally, I could have gone for a Glazed Hole right about now.
Although, I desperately needed coffee. I’d forgotten when I was waiting up for Maverick to get his ass home from that date last night that I had this early breakfast with Wendy to plan our parents’ anniversary party.
And if there was one universal truth in life, it was that you never drank coffee from Glazed Holes. Not if you wanted a stomach lining, anyway.
The parking lot was so full I had to park behind the building and enter through the back. There was a joke in there somewhere, but I was too tired to appreciate it. It was a sad day when a guy was too groggy for sex jokes.
I slipped down the hallway that ran past two bathrooms and the kitchen entrance. Dishes clanked as the staff scrambled to keep up with the breakfast rush. The short-order cook, Gladys, was barking orders at her assistant.
“Where’s my toast? Get my side of toa—No, not that kind. I’ll just get it myself. Start the next rash of bacon, and don’t you dare touch my eggs!”
I hurried past. Breakfast always tasted better when you didn’t see how it was made.
The dining room was full, the vinyl-and-chrome tables filled with older residents. They loved to congregate for morning coffee—and gossip. Both flowed freely.
Paula and Dirk Goodman sat bickering about something.
That was par for the course with those two.
Ever since Dirk kissed another woman and Paula whacked him over the head with a skillet, their relationship had been as tumultuous as any teen love affair.
Paula starting her own sex toy business on the side hadn’t made Dirk very happy, but he didn’t have much of a leg to stand on after getting caught trying to mess around with her cousin.
Elmer Boyd, owner of Elmer’s Family Jewels, sat with Ray Carr, former owner of the best auto shop in town.
He’d passed it on to his top mechanic, Darren Rafferty.
Dude was a little nuts. I’d played Truth or Dare with him once or twice, but I’d called it quits after Heath Warrington broke his ankle by jumping off a bridge.
I scanned the room for my sister, grimacing when I saw she’d chosen a booth right next to a group of the nosiest, most meddlesome women in town.
Iola Fletcher led the bunch, and she’d only gotten worse since launching her Matchmaking Mamas business…
which I’d supported by setting up that profile for Maverick. Oops.
Her best friends Lula Miller and Marilyn Lattimer sat with her, all of them gabbing and gesturing wildly as if their lives depended on gossip. I rounded a table on my right so I could approach my sister from the other direction.
I slid into the booth, feeling as if I’d just run a gauntlet, and grabbed my sister’s mug. “Coffee, thank fuck.”
“Hey!” she protested. “I just got that fixed the way I wanted it.”
Bitter coffee with just a dash of cream coated my tongue. I reached for the sweetener. “Needs more sugar.”
The harried waitress, a redhead named Sally who’d gone through two husbands before calling it quits and raising her kids on her own, stopped at our table. She sat a cup in front of Wendy and clucked her tongue at me.
“I ought to kick you out of here,” she said. “You know better than to steal a woman’s caffeine.”
“Sorry,” I mumbled before taking a big gulp of coffee just in case Sally decided to confiscate my contraband. Luckily, she poured Wendy a fresh coffee and let the matter go. “All right, what do you want for breakfast?”
Wendy skimmed over the menu. “I’ll take the veggie omelet.”
Sally nodded and glanced toward me. “And you?”
“Sausage, eggs over easy, hash browns, toast… Oh, can I get a stack of chocolate chip pancakes on the side? Oh, and bring some of that delicious molasses y’all have to pour all over them. That stuff is addictive.”
Sally finally cracked a smile. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“Thanks.” I took another swallow of coffee.
Sally stepped away from the table, then paused and turned back to top off my cup with more coffee. “Behave.”
“I always do,” I said with my widest smile.
She shook her head with a little laugh and moved on. Wendy kicked my foot. “You’d get away with murder, I swear.”
“It was just a little coffee, and I’m tired as fuck. I was up until almost two in the morning.”
Later than that if you counted the time I spent lying in bed wondering if Jory didn’t walk Maverick to his door because he’d already kissed him in that truck. Then wondering why I even cared. Maverick was my annoying neighbor. Who he dated really wasn’t my concern.
But then I had been the one to set up the matchmaking profile. Maybe I felt a little responsible for what came of that.
“Why were you up so late?” Wendy wiggled her eyebrows. “Did you have a hot date?”
“Not like some people,” I grumbled.
“What?”
“Rudy invited himself over, ate my food, and drank all my beer,” I said. “A great time was had by…well, just him.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know how you put up with that guy. He’s just so…”
“Rudy?”
She laughed. “Yeah.”
Sally arrived with plates full of hot food and I dove in. My plate was nearly clear before Wendy had made it through even half of that boring omelet. Why did women eat so slow anyway? Oh, right, because they talked all the damn time.
“…Mom and Dad’s anniversary party,” Wendy was saying. “Can you get the flowers?”
“Huh? What?”
“Flowers. For the party.” At my blank look, she leaned forward and flicked my forehead. “You do remember why we met for breakfast, right? It wasn’t so you could inhale sugar like there’s about to be a worldwide shortage.”
“I remember,” I said. “But why would you ask me to get flowers? I don’t know anything about that crap.”
She smirked, suddenly looking devious. “But your neighbor does. He’s a florist. You should totally take advantage.”
My stomach flip-flopped. “You know we don’t get along.”
“Yeah, but that’s just superficial stuff. Flowers are his business. He won’t dick you around.”
“Why can’t you do it?”
“Because I like to see you squirm.”
“Wendy…”
“Grow up, Damon. Neil is getting the venue, and I’m making the cake. You can suck it up and play nice with Maverick for your parents’ thirty-fifth wedding anniversary.”
I slumped. “Fine. Whatever.”
“Thank you. Now, I’m going to the little girl’s room. Don’t eat my food.”
I wrinkled my nose. “Not even if it was drowned in molasses.”
She shook her head. “You’re gonna kill yourself with that crap. You’re almost thirty. You need to stop eating like a trash panda.”
I shrugged and patted my flat stomach. “I burn it off.”
“You can’t burn off a clogged artery.”
She walked off before I could reply. It was just like Wendy to always need the last word. I worked my way through the rest of my pancakes. Clogging my arteries sure tasted great.
The voices at the table behind me—the Matchmaking Mamas table—got louder.
“…don’t understand why Jory would say that!” Lula exclaimed.
“It’s sure disappointing for our poor Maverick,” Iola said. “He deserved better than Jory.”
Damn right, I thought. But wait. What was all this about? I strained to make out what they were saying as their voices lowered a fraction.
“…needs a guy who will take it seriously.”
“I’m looking through our profiles.”
I frowned. Surely, Maverick wasn’t going to agree to another date if the first one had gone so badly?
“We need someone who loves Granville,” Iola said imperiously. “I vote for Gordon Mathis.”
I choked on a swallow of coffee. Maverick and Gordon? No way. Gordon was a total tomcat. He was the worst candidate for serious there was.
“I’m not sure they’re a good match,” Lula said. “Gordon is very…sure of himself. Maverick needs someone a little sweeter.”
“Well, what about Bryan Meadows?” Agatha suggested. “He’s awful sweet.”
Sweet, maybe, but that dude was about forty years too old for Maverick.
I damn near turned around to tell the ladies they were barking up the wrong tree, but they moved on.
“Fine, let’s set it up, but no more allowing these men to plan their own dates.” Iola snorted indelicately. “A nightclub in Riverton? No. The whole point of matchmaking is to get to know someone.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Lula said. “Clearly, these boys need a little guidance when it comes to matters of the heart.”
“You should send them to The Stag Pub,” Marilyn said.
“I don’t know,” Lula mused. “It’s not very romantic.”
No kidding. It was what I’d written as Maverick’s dream date, but even I knew The Stag was not a good choice. For picking someone up? Sure. But for an actual date? No. The Dinner Bell was the romantic hotspot. Of course, if you went there, you were basically announcing you were in a relationship.
“Maverick wants to get to know his date though,” Agatha said. “He needs a place they can talk.”
“That’s true,” Iola mused. “And if they go to the pub, we could pop in and make sure the date is going well.”
“Not to spy,” Lula said, sounding delighted.
“No, of course we would never,” Iola said. “We’d simply be enjoying a pitcher of Granny Tea with good friends…at the same time as the date.”
The ladies all laughed with a sort of evil glee that made me shiver with foreboding. You couldn’t pay me enough to put my love life in their hands.
I hadn’t expected Maverick to agree to a single matchmaking, much less go on multiple blind dates and tell the Mamas he wanted something serious.
He must really want a boyfriend.
Suddenly, my pancakes didn’t sit too well. Maybe Wendy was onto something about my eating habits.
I pushed my plate away, no longer hungry.