Chapter 2
Zoe had clocked Sophie’s dad the last time he’d come into The Latest Scoop about a week ago, but all she’d remembered was his slumped shoulders and defeated expression. She’d been so focused on—and annoyed by—his daughter’s serious snark she hadn’t given the guy a good look.
Now, with a jolt, she realized just how good-looking he was.
Her kind of good-looking, with rumpled dark brown hair, a little gray at the temples, smoke-colored eyes, and a lean, muscular body, showcased by a t-shirt sporting the tour dates of a rock band she’d heard of and liked, but hadn’t thought many people had, and certainly not middle-aged dads.
A millisecond after acknowledging his unexpected good looks, she realized how furious he seemed… and how his daughter was milking it.
“Daddy,” she practically howled, and ran toward her father, wrapping her arms around his waist. The dad looked a little startled before he put his arms around his daughter in a protective gesture, giving Zoe a steely, inquiring look over her head.
“Care to tell me what’s going on?” he asked in a voice of what she feared was deceptive mildness.
“Your daughter stole a magnet,” Zach jumped in before Zoe could, “and she refused to give it back. And then, when Zoe asked for it, she threw it at her, and it shattered.”
“Zach…” Zoe began, because as much as she appreciated her friend coming to her defense, she could tell it wasn’t particularly helpful.
Sophie’s father’s eyes narrowed as he glanced between the two of them, clearly not appreciating Zach’s decidedly aggressive tone.
Maybe the sanctimonious mom eating the Moose Tracks was right, Zoe thought on a sigh.
Maybe she’d handled this all wrong, but what else could she have done?
It wasn’t fair to Sophie to simply let her get away with it, never mind the loss to herself.
The man glanced down at his daughter, his forehead furrowed, his eyes creased.
He had, Zoe noticed, deep crows’ feet by both eyes, and laugh lines running from nose to mouth, giving him a careworn expression to his face that was not unattractive.
She guessed him to be about forty or so, a good ten or twelve years older than her.
“Sophie?” he asked, his tone gentling. “Can you tell me what’s going on?”
Sophie gave another theatrical sniff. “I was just looking at a magnet and I dropped it by accident,” she explained in the woebegone tones of a sad six-year-old.
Once again, Zoe had to actively keep from rolling her eyes.
“And then they accused me of stealing…” Her voice trembled as she gazed up at her father, blinking back tears.
The man looked up from his daughter’s tearful face to give Zoe a level stare. “Is that what happened?” he asked her. She couldn’t tell from his tone if he believed his daughter or not, but in any case he didn’t sound particularly friendly.
“Well, what I saw was…” she began, only to falter to a stop as a couple of other local teens came into the ice cream parlor on a wave of noisy chatter. They shot Sophie a few curious glances before heading for the counter.
“Yes?” the man asked, his tone now touched with impatience.
Inwardly, Zoe sighed. The teens who’d come in included Ben, Maggie’s son and Zach’s protégé, as well as Bella, the daughter of Lizzy and Michael Harper, who ran the bakery The Rolling Pin.
And these would be Sophie’s peers and potential friends in what was a very small town.
Grassing on her and causing a scene could very well tank her social options in Starr’s Fall before she’d started school.
She couldn’t do that to her, no matter how tempted she felt. Taking a deep breath, she forced a small, conciliatory smile. “That’s what happened,” she told the man. “It was a case of misunderstanding. I’m sorry the situation seemed to get out of hand.”
Next to her, Zach made a strangled noise of protest while Sophie’s eyes widened in shock before she quickly masked her expression. The man stared at her hard, like he was trying to figure her out, and Zoe gave him as bland as a look back as she could.
“We’ll pay for the magnet, of course,” he finally said. “I don’t think we’ve met.” He stuck out a hand for her to shake. “Dan Bryson.”
“Zoe Wilkinson.” She took his hand, trying not to react to the way his long, lean fingers closed firmly over hers. The last thing she needed right now was to develop some kind of thing for a man whose life already seemed way too complicated. And her life was complicated enough.
“You’re the manager here?” he asked as he released her hand.
Zoe tried not to bristle at the assumption that that was all she was. “Manager, owner, ice cream server and maker,” she replied breezily. “As well as marketing specialist, public relations expert, and, of course, janitor.”
To her surprise, his mouth quirked up at the corner in a way that was undeniably sexy. “Nice,” he told her. “I run my own business, as well.”
“You do?” Somehow she hadn’t expected this to evolve into a chat.
“Graphic designer.” His smile deepened, revealing a dimple in his lean left cheek, also sexy. “Designer, administrator, publicity coordinator, marketing specialist, office manager and general gofer.”
A laugh unexpectedly escaped her. “A jack of all trades.”
“Only by necessity.” He rested one hand on Sophie’s shoulder, like an anchor. “I’m sorry about the magnet breaking. How much was it?”
“Five dollars.” Zoe couldn’t keep the note of apology out of her voice. Somehow, in the course of this conversation, she’d lost hold of reality and started to believe Sophie’s deceitful narrative, all because of her father’s sexy smile.
“Okay.” He reached for his wallet while Sophie smirked and Zach silently fumed, clearly confused as to why she’d switched tactics so suddenly.
“Thank you,” Zoe told Dan Bryson as she took a wrinkled five-dollar bill from him. She glanced at Sophie, trying not to seem too pointed. “Hopefully next time you’ll be a little more careful.”
“I’m sure she will be,” Dan replied, and with his hand still on his daughter’s shoulder, he steered her out of the store.
“What was that all about?” Zach asked once they’d gone. Zoe stuffed the five-dollar bill into her back pocket as she hurried back to the counter to serve Ben, Bella, and their friends.
“What was what about?” she replied with an attempt at nonchalance. She washed her hands and then turned to Bella with a brisk smile. “What would you like?”
“Zoe…” Zach shook his head slowly. “You know what I’m talking about.”
“Let me deal with this first,” Zoe told him as she grabbed a carton of strawberries for Bella’s red berry blast smoothie.
She felt hassled and anxious by the whole episode, but also strangely energized in a way that alarmed her more than the rest of the events had.
Dan Bryson was not someone she needed to develop an unfortunate and futile crush on. No way.
Five minutes later, she’d served the teens, and they’d retreated to a corner booth, while the mom with the toddler and baby left the store. Zach was still waiting by the ice cream counter, his arms folded.
“Well?” he asked.
“Do you still want your milkshake?” Zoe asked. She hadn’t finished making it when Sophie had started to leave the store, and now the ice cream was mostly melted.
“Sure,” Zach said on a sigh. “But why did you sell me down the river? I came out swinging to defend you and then you just backed off.”
“It was because of those guys,” Zoe told him in a low voice, with a nod toward the group in the corner. “Sophie just moved here with her dad, and I didn’t want to ruin her chances of making friends.” She shrugged as she reached for the jar of peanut butter. “What can I say? I’m a softie.”
“They moved here?” Zach sounded surprised, and Zoe couldn’t blame him.
Generally speaking, not many people moved to Starr’s Fall, but in the last few years they’d had something of an influx.
Maybe it was post-Covid, or the rising cost of living in cities, or just something in the water, but Zoe liked to think her hometown was having something of a renaissance.
“Well,” Zach acknowledged somewhat grudgingly, “that was nice of you, but now she thinks she got away with it.”
“I know, and I hate that, but what else could I do?” Zoe tossed a sliced banana into the blender before putting on the lid.
The grinding sound of the appliance prohibited conversation for several seconds before she switched it off and poured Zach’s milkshake into a stainless-steel container, garnishing it with a dollop of peanut butter, a slice of banana, and a straw.
“It felt like the lesser of two evils,” she told him as she handed him his shake.
“I guess.” He took a sip of his shake, frowning in thought. “I just hope you haven’t made things worse for yourself.”
Zoe shrugged. “She knows I’m onto her now. I doubt she’ll try anything again.”
“The other stores in Starr’s Fall might need a heads up, though.”
“That feels a little unfair,” Zoe replied with a frown. She didn’t want Sophie to be known as the resident shoplifter after one unfortunate incident.
“The next time she tries something, another store owner might not be as forgiving as you,” Zach replied with a wry grin. “Imagine Wendy at The Starr Light letting it go.”
Zoe let out a reluctant guffaw at the thought. Wendy was a peroxide-blonde tornado, and truly a force of nature. If Sophie tried to steal anything from the town’s diner, she would have the full wrath of Wendy come down on her like a hammer.
“Hopefully she’s learned her lesson,” she told Zach. “Anyway, there are more important things to think about. Like when is your wedding?”
Zach had gotten engaged to Maggie, who ran the boardgame café in town, a few weeks ago, much to everyone’s delight.
“We’re still working on that,” Zach told her. “It can’t come soon enough for me, but Maggie has a bunch of family to consider.”
“But you’re having it here in Starr’s Fall?”
Zach nodded. “Up at the church, and the reception on the town green. Hog roast and fruit pies, and everyone’s invited. Hopefully before the end of the summer.”
Zoe laughed. “I love it,” she said. “You know I’ll be there.”
“I’m counting on it,” Zach replied with a grin. He finished the last of his milkshake before handing her back the container and sauntering out of the store. Zoe watched him go, grateful for the friendship that had sprung up unexpectedly between them.
Back in high school, Zach had been a show-off sports star, and as for Zoe… well, she’d been the classic geeky girl hiding behind a rebellious attitude. She hadn’t had many friends, and she’d derided guys like Zach. Good thing they’d both moved on from all that.
Well, he had, anyway. Sometimes Zoe still felt stuck in the painful rut of her youth—living with her parents, clinging to her little acts of rebellion as ways to prove she still had spirit.
And she still didn’t have many friends, not close ones, anyway.
She got along with everyone, making sure to amuse with her quick comebacks and breezily confident attitude, but there was no one in Starr’s Fall who was her true confidant.
No one who knew just how much she struggled.
And no one, Zoe determined, ever would. She glanced at the old-fashioned wrought-iron clock on the wall as Ben, Bella, and their friends, chatting and laughing, left the store.
The Latest Scoop was her pride and joy, the culmination of five years of backbreaking work to get it up and running, but she loved everything about it.
Running it was more than a fulltime job, which was another reason she didn’t have much of a social life. She simply didn’t have the time.
The main reason was her parents, and as Zoe glanced at the clock again she realized she needed to get back. It would take her twenty minutes to close up shop, another fifteen to walk home, which would get her back by six-thirty. That was a little later than she liked, but it would have to do.
With a sigh, Zoe considered the evening ahead of her, and then, resolute, she turned back to the ice cream counter and started tidying up.
As she moved around the store, spraying and wiping, her mind drifted back to Sophie—and her dad, Dan.
Why had they moved to Starr’s Fall? And where was Sophie’s mother, because already Zoe got the definite sense that she wasn’t in the picture.
It was all intriguing, maybe too intriguing, because Zoe knew she didn’t need to get involved with Sophie or her dad. And yet it sort of felt like she already was… at least in her own mind.
Doing her best to stop thinking about either of them, Zoe reached for her bag as she flipped the light switch, plunging the store into shadowy darkness.
She loved everything about the place—the old-fashioned wooden tables with wrought-iron stools, all reclaimed from a junkyard, the vintage newspapers she’d repurposed as wallpaper, the mugs and magnets and framed artwork she’d done herself.
Every aspect of the store had been a labor of love, and she was both fiercely proud and protective of it all. She certainly didn’t need any more distractions from making her store the success she knew it could and wanted it to be. And nothing, and no one, was going to get in the way of that.
With one last look, Zoe closed the door on The Latest Scoop and headed for home.