Chapter 6
six
DANIEL HAD SOLD exactly zero pies in his life. It was an easy stat to remember. But he had aced more than a few retail courses. One of his professors had been keen to remind them that all the supply in the world meant nothing if you couldn’t deliver it fast enough.
At least three women huddled at the back of the line winding out of Whitney’s booth, their shoulders hunched against the wind and their gazes darting toward other stalls.
Whitney was tied up with a customer who wanted to sample every flavor. She was going to lose those sales.
Not on his watch.
“Who’s next?” he called, raising a gloved finger to get their attention.
A middle-aged woman stepped toward him, then looked closely at his hat before snorting loudly. “Well, that’s one way to stuff a bird, I suppose.”
He shrugged, and the corner of his mouth tipped up briefly before his almost-smile disappeared. But the bubble in his chest didn’t vanish quite so quickly. In fact, it had been there since he’d made Whitney laugh. Since he’d realized that had been his subconscious goal from the minute he saw the preposterous hat.
Her laughter started in her eyes, an undeniable glow. Then her whole face crinkled as though she was fighting to hold it in. The surprised note when it refused to be denied is what got him. It was sweet and rich and better than a sample of her pie because it echoed in his mind.
He could listen to her laughter for decades.
“Can I help you?” he asked the customer.
Whitney sidled up to his side, three frozen pies in her hands. “What are you doing?” she whispered through a smile.
“Don’t worry. I’m a quick study.” To his customer, he simply raised his eyebrows in question.
“An apple crumb and a boysenberry. Frozen.”
He nodded, opened the cooler lids, and pulled out the pies. Each pink box was labeled with bold black letters in the lower right corner. Whitney’s inventory system was impeccable. Better than Aretha’s. Not that he was going to tell his aunt that. Besides, Aretha had a hundred times the products and a much larger variety.
Still, Whitney was doing well to manage the small business and bake all the supply on her own.
Perhaps she could use a hand in the kitchen.
He would have laughed at his own absurdity if he’d remembered how. There was no way he could be helpful in the kitchen. Shoot, he’d given up cooking for just himself and settled on takeout and frozen meals for... Had it really been three years?
No wonder he’d nearly stuffed a whole pancake in his mouth that morning. And the omelet yesterday. And the peach crepe the day before.
He’d had to force himself to carefully divide them into equal portions before devouring them. That was not a problem he had with limp broccoli and spongy beefsteak from the freezer section.
He frowned at Whitney’s back, her voluminous curls bouncing over her shoulders as she moved from table to table, providing samples and filling orders. She glanced in his general direction, her dimple for the customers—he was an unintended beneficiary. Her smile still hit like a perfectly balanced ledger.
It had to be her cooking that made him feel like that.
Forcing his mind back to the woman waiting for the boxes in his hand, he pocketed her cash, passed along the pies, and waved to the next person.
With both of them taking sales, the line quickly disappeared, and finally Whitney leaned against a table with a sigh. “Thank you. I was going to lose a few of those if things didn’t start moving.”
“I figured.”
“Well, thanks again.”
“You’re welcome.”
Those two words were all it took to draw another smile—another chuckle—from her. “You’ve really saved me today, but I feel bad that the only shopping you’ve gotten to do is for that”—she waved a hand in the general direction of his face—“well, I can hardly call that a hat.”
“Why not? It’s covering my head and keeping my ears warm. Isn’t that, by definition, a hat?”
Pressing her knitted gray mitten to her lips, she giggled. Her light brown eyes and bouncing shoulders telegraphed the merriment her hand had tried to muffle. “I’m serious.”
“So am I,” he said, leaning his hip against the table next to her. “It meets every criteria. This definitely qualifies as a hat.”
“No.” She pushed his shoulder playfully.
Even through the layers of stuffing, he could feel the warmth, the inherent familiarity of the contact. It stalled his mind for an instant.
“I meant, you should go see some of the other booths. Maybe there’s someone selling outdoor wear.”
“There is.” The corner of his lips twitched.
Her eyebrows rose in a question.
“The guy who sold me this.”
She burst out laughing, and he had to raise his voice to make himself heard. “And if you don’t think I’m going to take this back to Toronto to show the All Terrain buyers, you’re sorely mistaken. I know a thing or two about business.”
The smile that showed off her slightly crooked teeth dimmed, then fully disappeared. “Ruby stopped by earlier.”
“Hmm.” He couldn’t muster any more of a response.
“She was cold, so she said to tell you she’s at the café at the end of the street. She said you should meet up with her and talk about the store.”
He pursed his lips to the side and rubbed his hands together, the thought of spending the rest of the day with Ruby not particularly inviting. They would rehash the deal memo, and she’d remind him that Aretha hadn’t been clear about the details. And then Ruby would talk some more. And she’d keep talking.
There’d be no laughter or crinkles around warm eyes. He wouldn’t get to sneak another sample from beneath the glass dome or feel Whitney’s warmth when he stood beside her.
“You can go,” Whitney said. “I’ll be fine here. And thanks to you, I only have a few dozen pies left to sell.”
He looked in the direction of the parking lot and spotted the yellow and black coffee sign hanging from the corner of the brick building. He’d walked by it on his way back from the car and had seen Ruby walking in. He’d also strategically turned his back toward her and hoped his turkey hat made him unrecognizable.
“I doubt they’d let me in with this on.”
Her chuckle was dry and empty of actual humor. “I bet it comes off.”
Finally, he shook his head. “I know what she wants to talk about, and I’m not particularly eager to have that conversation.”
“Is it ... does it have something to do with what you were talking about this morning at breakfast?”
He watched her closely, trying to figure out how she could pick up on such details. He hadn’t even known she’d heard them at the inn.
“Aretha changed the subject pretty quick. It just seemed important.”
“It is. Could be a deal-breaker.”
“Oh.” There was a sadness in the hushed sound. “Really?”
He nodded slowly.
“Do you want to—I mean, can you talk about it?”
“I imagine Aretha’s told most of her friends by now.” The negotiations should be confidential even though the agreements didn’t explicitly state that, but he knew the island worked on a different system. If Aretha was right, handshakes and verbal contracts weren’t unusual among townsfolk.
But Ruby wasn’t a local. And she certainly didn’t work for an island company.
Maybe he could get Whitney’s input without actually revealing any of the details. And he wanted her input. As a small business owner. As an islander. As a friend to many of the women of North Rustico. He wanted to know where her thoughts went, what she’d do if put in a similar position.
Wading in slowly, he said, “Between you and me?”
She nodded.
“This is entirely hypothetical.”
“All right.”
“Say you were working with a storefront that agreed to sell your pies for a certain price and give you a portion of the profit.”
“You mean like what Aretha does with quilts and things? My mom bought one from her last year. Margie Giffins made it to look like the island’s intersecting red roads. It’s beautiful.”
He rolled his eyes as the hypothetical went right out the window. Everyone knew everyone’s business on the North Shore.
“Sorry.” She ducked her head. “Go on.”
“How would you feel if the store owner sold their shop—and your consignment agreement with it?”
“Would I still get paid?”
“Some.”
Squinting at him, she crossed her arms and tilted her chin up. “Not what I had agreed to?”
“Probably not.”
She pushed herself off the edge of the table and pressed her fists to her hips, her gaze turning to fire—amber flames replacing the warm brown depths. “You can’t cheat those women out of what they’re owed. They spend dozens of hours on those quilts, hundreds of dollars.”
“Whoa. Whoa. Whoa.” He stepped closer to Whitney, forcing her to tilt her head all the way back to maintain eye contact.
She didn’t back down, though. In fact, she shuffled toward him, closing the gap and staring him down.
“I’m not cheating anyone out of anything. And neither is Aretha. You know her better than that.”
“Right. Well, don’t.” Her voice dropped in pitch. “It’s not right. Especially at this time of year.”
Like July would make the situation any more palatable.
“Can’t you just give them back their quilts?”
“Hypothetically”—he nodded with each syllable—“yes. That’s what I’d like to do. But R & R wants those to remain in inventory.”
Her eyes narrowed, exactly as his had the first time he’d heard the proposition. But her question was different. “R & R?”
“Rogen & Reynolds. The conglomerate that Ruby works for.”
“Okay. So, why don’t they just buy them from the makers?”
He shook his head. “They want all of the inventory to stay with the store.” Ducking his chin, he conceded, “And Aretha may have forgotten to remove those from the initial documents she sent over.”
“But they have to understand...” Her voice trailed off as she stared in the direction of her car, though the view was dominated by the big gray theater and colorful shops on the shore.
The rub was, the numbers made sense—even without the quilts. The store was profitable and had been for years. Aretha’s agreement with the quilters was a gift to the community. Not a moneymaker for her.
“Ruby said she’d go back to her boss about it, but the whole thing could fall apart.”
“And then she’d leave...” Whitney’s rounded eyebrows flattened as they pinched together, forming three little lines above her nose, wrinkling her otherwise pristine skin.
“I guess.” He would too. Though she probably didn’t care about that.
“You should go talk with her. Get it worked out.”
“I will. But not today. Not until I figure out how to convince her.”
“Oh, but that’s the easy part.” Whitney promptly turned her back on him and straightened several pies on display.
He stared at the back of her shoulders for several long seconds, finally clearing his throat.
She turned around with raised eyebrows.
“The easy part? Care to expound?”
She chuckled. “I thought it was obvious,” she said just as four young women approached the booth, their cheeks rosy from the weather and their arms laden with shopping bags. Instead of answering his question, Whitney introduced herself to the shoppers, who were full of questions about her homemade pies. How long did it take to make them? Did she have a secret recipe? Would their moms realize they hadn’t made the pies themselves?
The last question made Whitney throw back her head and laugh, all of her abundant curls dancing with delight, her eyes lit from within.
If a picture was worth a thousand words, the sight of Whitney laughing could fill a dictionary. She was joy personified. Warmth in motion.
She cupped the elbow of the closest shopper and leaned in with a conspiratorial whisper. “I promise it’ll be our little secret. Your mom will never guess.”
The girls cackled, handed over their cash, and walked away with stacks of pink boxes. And very broad smiles.
When they were on their own again, Daniel crossed his arms and tried to analyze what made Whitney so magical.
She caught him looking and playfully swatted his arm. “What are you staring at?”
“Just wondering...” He bit his tongue, not wanting to admit exactly what he’d been thinking. “Just wondering if you’re going to tell me the obvious solution to the hypothetical situation with Aretha’s store.”
“Sure. I mean, it’s just a suggestion, but—here’s the thing. Everyone wants the store to succeed. Aretha, the new buyers, the community. Everyone. But if the new buyers don’t give Aretha or the quilters—”
“Hypothetically.”
She laughed. “Yes, whoever the craftswomen are. If the buyers don’t treat everyone fairly, the store will suffer. This community won’t stand for it.”
“But most of the business comes during tourist season. Those customers won’t know what R & R did or didn’t do.”
Whitney sniffed, her lips twitching to the side. “And who do you think points customers to the antiques store? Every other tourist shop in town.”
That made sense. It made a lot of sense.
Whitney put her hands on her hips. It probably didn’t have the effect she was going for—what with her puffy jacket making her twice as round as usual. But he still got the point that he was supposed to pay attention.
“Store owners support local craftspeople. And each other. If they get even a whiff that the new owners of Aretha’s store didn’t treat one of their own fairly, you better believe they’ll see it shut down. They’d rather not have an antiques store in town than have one that takes advantage of people.” Whitney crossed her arms over her chest. “So you’ll talk with Ruby?”
He nodded. He’d always planned to. But now, maybe he had something she’d hear.
“Soon?”
Before he could agree, they were swamped by another rush, this one mostly men looking for the pie samples they’d heard about. And then claiming their wives didn’t want to have to bake Christmas treats this year. Daniel wasn’t quite sure he believed them, but he couldn’t argue with the colorful bills they shoved in his direction.
Whitney had only three pies left as the temperatures dipped and the crowds that had filled the street all afternoon turned thin. Sitting down on the cooler lid, Daniel pulled his coat closed beneath his chin and breathed into his hands. Like an idiot.
His warm breath didn’t have a chance of reaching his freezing fingers. Not through his gloves anyway.
Whitney offered him a pitying smile. Sliding onto the seat beside him, she pulled a blanket from the wagon and flopped it over their laps, her hands nimble—clearly not suffering from the same frostbite his were.
“We don’t have to stay much longer.”
He nodded, the turkey legs bouncing over his ears.
Whitney’s gaze darted to his hat, and her whole face crinkled as she seemed to hold in her laughter. Just remembering her reaction the first time she’d seen it was enough to almost elicit a smile of his own. Almost.
They sat in companionable silence for ten minutes or so—interrupted only by Whitney’s occasional greetings to passersby. One minute the sun wrapped its last rays of warmth around them. The next it disappeared beneath the horizon, and the street went almost black. For the shortest moment.
Like in a movie, Christmas lights split the darkness. Some twinkled gently like stars. Others zipped around tent poles, chasing an unseen goal. Rows upon rows of open Edison bulbs strung between the buildings over the center aisle woke up slowly, glowing first orange and then finally popping to bright white.
Within seconds the scene that had been loud fell silent, every eye looking up, every face luminous with wonder.
Beside him, Whitney held her breath, as though simply inhaling might disturb the magic. When she finally sighed, she lifted her face toward the sky and shut her eyes. “Don’t you love it when you close your eyes but can still see the light?”
For the first time all day, he frowned in earnest. Not because he disagreed with her but because he wasn’t sure he’d ever once had that thought. He knew the feeling, of course. He’d spent far too many summers in Aretha’s backyard under the island’s brilliant sun not to.
But had he ever appreciated it?
Unlike Ruby’s questions, he thought Whitney’s deserved an answer. He just wasn’t sure what it was.
“I guess so.”
“You guess so?” She shook her head hard and peeked at him out of the corner of her eye. “Look at the lights.”
He didn’t. He was too busy staring at the glow beside him.
“Loo-ook,” she said again, imitating Julia Mae’s emphatic direction.
He complied, picking one antique bulb at the end of a string, its light illuminating the orange bricks behind it.
“Now close your eyes.” She released a little whispered sigh. “I love that moment where the bulb disappears but the filament burns even brighter. It’s like what’s real, what’s most true, remains.”
Strange. She was much the same. Even when she was gone, her warmth remained. Even when her smile disappeared, her light shone around her.
He’d never met anyone like her. And he wanted to know all the parts of her.
He had no business entertaining such thoughts about a woman he’d met only a week before—one he’d never see again after Christmas.
But there they were, and he couldn’t seem to let them go.