Chapter Fourteen
Reminder: Any parking signs reading Reserved For Locals Only are neither sanctioned by the town nor enforceable. Any person caught installing one of these signs in any manner will be subject to fines and/or arrest.
—Callie Devens, Town Manager
It’s not worth the risk because tourists ignore them, anyway. —Harold Rollins, Chief of Police
—Wayward Harbor Online Community Group
The next day, Nick got home a half hour after Lucy expected him and told her to put her shoes on. While she had no idea what was going on, she was always up for going somewhere.
“Where are we going?”
“Errands,” he said. “You can help me carry stuff.”
Not exactly the most fun activity to celebrate turning thirty, but Lucy was pretty sure Nick had forgotten.
That was fine, since she was putting off cake until Gran got home, and when you reached a certain age, cake was really the only thing worth celebrating.
Gran had sent her a text message early that morning, wishing her a happy birthday, and she’d gotten a funny video from Sydney, singing the song to her with the Miami skyline in the background.
She hadn’t heard from Iris, but she rarely did on her birthdays.
Lucy was confused when he drove by the hardware store, and then the market.
She wondered briefly if he was going to surprise her with the boat trip she’d put on their shenanigans list, but she trusted he would have warned her to dress warmer and to secure her hair a little better.
It was always windy on the water, according to Billy.
“No, really, where are we going?” she asked when she couldn’t stand it anymore. “It’s not outside, like yesterday, is it?”
“You’re the one who wanted to play football on the beach.”
She sighed. “I really thought that would be more fun.”
“It can be more fun, if you have actual teams and play actual football, with hitting each other and everything. What we played was a glorified game of catch until you tripped and threw my football in the water and wouldn’t go get it.”
“You still crossed it off the list,” she pointed out. “And I thought the waves would wash the ball back to shore.”
“Eventually, but you’ve got a pretty good arm on you when you’re in the process of falling on your face.”
Lucy laughed. “You had a good time and you know it.”
He smiled, and she knew he was thinking about that kiss. “I did.”
“So did I, but where are we going now?”
“We just have to run by the scone shop really quick.”
“It’s more fun if you call it the Scuttlebutt. Also, Willow closes at two, Nick.”
“Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “She hid a check under the mat for me. A deposit for some work she needs done.”
“She could have given it to me when I was here earlier today.” It made no sense to her that it hadn’t even come up in conversation, considering Willow knew she lived with the man. “And leaving a check under a mat is weird.”
“Small towns are like that,” Nick muttered. “We can grab it easy enough.”
“We? It’s going to take both of us to get a check from under a mat?”
“It’s a nice night. Actually, I’m just going to park here and we can walk. It’s easier.”
Lucy wasn’t sure why it was easier to park down and across the street and walk rather than parking right across from the building, but she didn’t care enough to push.
And then, when she was climbing down out of the truck, she almost fell on her face when Nick accidentally laid on the horn with his elbow while getting out his side.
“Are you okay?” she asked when she reached him at the curb. “You’re acting odd tonight.”
“Sure.”
“Sure you’re okay or sure you’re acting odd?”
He shrugged. “Two things can be true at the same time.”
They were almost to the Scuttlebutt when the inside of the bakery lit up and she saw Willow and Mattie grinning in the window, holding up a sign that said Lucy’s the Big 3-0! Happy Birthday! in huge letters.
Lucy laughed and shoved at Nick’s arm. “What did you do?”
“I’m just an accomplice whose only job was to get you here without giving away the surprise. If they’d known how bad I am at lying, though, they might have fired me.”
“Or at least given you a script,” she teased. “A check under the mat?”
“Hey, I got you here,” he reminded her as he pushed open the door.
Immediately, Lucy was pulled into a round of hugs. Willow first, and then Mattie. And then Willow again.
“Aren’t you supposed to be at work?” she asked Mattie.
Mattie shrugged. “It’s Wednesday night. Billy said he’d cover me for an hour and to tell you happy birthday even though you didn’t tell anybody. And Sasha is bummed she couldn’t be here, but Billy can’t cook worth a damn. She said we’ll have ice cream after close the next time you’re in.”
“Okay, Nick. You’re up again,” Willow said, gesturing toward a mound of fabric on one of the tables.
Lucy watched Nick lift the cute valances down from their brackets so the windows were bare.
And then he replaced each one with long drapes pre-hung on different curtain rods.
They blocked out the daylight, and the bakery’s soft lighting and the fairy lights hung around the crown molding gave the place a festive air.
Lucy looked at Willow, confused. “I’m almost afraid to ask what we’ll be doing that we don’t want anybody to be able to see.”
In answer, Willow turned to the door to the kitchen. “All clear!”
The door opened and Taylor burst through, a huge grin lighting up her face. “Surprise!”
Carson was with her, and Lucy got a little weepy as Taylor pulled her in for a hug. She’d had friends who were up for going out for drinks with her on her birthday, but she couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a proper birthday party. With actual friends.
And her sister.
“I’m going to get the cake,” Willow said. “I hope everybody’s ready to sing.”
“Oh no,” Carson whispered, and everybody laughed.
“Back when we were in school, Carson was always just asked to mouth the words when we’d sing for the Christmas program,” Taylor explained.
Carson’s face was a vivid red, but he was grinning. “I did karaoke once at the Keel because I lost a bet, and Billy had to comp everybody a drink to keep them from walking out.”
“You can sing as loud as you want because it’s my party,” Lucy said. “I have to ask, though, what song did you sing at karaoke?”
“That Titanic song by Celine Dion,” he said. “‘My Heart Will Go On.’”
“Ouch. Really?”
“Again, I lost a bet.”
“I guess it’s better than having to shave your head.”
Carson and Taylor shook their heads in unison, making her laugh. Then Carson asked Nick how business was and they started a side conversation while Taylor moved closer to Lucy.
“I know covering the windows was silly, but I hope it’s okay,” Taylor said. “We could have had the party on the deck at the Keel, but…you know. I know I’m a grown woman and it’s ridiculous, but she is my mom, and rubbing a celebration of your birth in her face seemed like a step too far.”
“I get it, and I’m just glad you’re here. Plus, if we were at the Keel, Lavinia couldn’t come and I’d be down three guests.”
Maybe the thumping noise was Nick shifting the chairs so Willow would be able to set down the cake, but that wouldn’t explain why they all looked down at the floor.
“Sorry, Jacob,” Lucy yelled toward her feet, just in case. “Down four guests.”
“Okay, everybody,” Willow said as she pushed through the door with the cake in her hand. In the center was a single candle that looked like a chunky thirty, and the flame flickered as she started to sing.
They all sang, even Carson, who was a truly awful singer. But he sang with enthusiasm and Lucy loved it. Nick, she noticed, had a rather nice voice. He might not have made it as a professional, but she’d bet he’d be a hit at karaoke.
She wondered what song he’d sing.
“Okay, make a wish and blow out your candle,” Willow told her when the singing was over.
Lucy’s birthday wish was easy—and thankfully a secret because it involved her and Nick and zero clothes. She leaned close to the cake and inhaled deeply.
But before she could blow, the candle went out.
“Must be a draft,” Mattie said as she took a lighter from Willow and relit it.
Lucy made her wish and was drawing in another breath when the candle went out again. She laughed and looked at Willow. “Does this seem more like Lavinia or Jacob to you?”
“Definitely Lavinia. Jacob likes to stomp up and down the stairs and clink glass bottles in the cellar, but he doesn’t really come upstairs. Lavinia, though? She likes to be a part of things.”
“So do you think she doesn’t like my wish?” Lucy asked. “Does she want to be part of the fun or does she not like open flames?”
“Or there’s a draft,” Nick muttered.
Lucy waved a hand at him. “Don’t be grumpy.”
He snorted. “At this point, I’m not even sure what you think grumpy means.”
“Well, I tried to look it up in the dictionary, but it was just a picture of you,” she shot back, and everybody groaned. Possibly even Lavinia and Jacob. “Okay, that was bad. Old and bad. I deserved that.”
“Okay, one more time,” Mattie said, relighting the candle. “Maybe wish for something else this time.”
In that moment, Lucy’s only wish was that she could have friends like these in her life forever. And this time, the candle didn’t go out.
* * *
It was tight quarters in the tiny scone shop, and it was getting warm. But Nick was the reason they were here in the first place, so he wasn’t about to complain.
They should have hosted the party at his house. It was far enough from the center of town so Taylor and Carson wouldn’t have had to sneak in like burglars trying to avoid cameras. There was plenty of space, and they wouldn’t have had to come up with a ridiculous plan for how to cover the windows.
But if they’d had it at his house, his brothers would have been there. There was almost no chance they’d get through the entire party without one of them revealing Nick’s bedroom had been sitting empty for a few days.