Chapter 41 Willow
forty-one
Willow
“Did you book your spa day?” Noah asks me that evening from behind, wrapping his arms around me and kissing my neck.
His stubble tickles the sensitive part of my neck and I giggle. “I don’t need a spa day,” I say, tilting my head to give him better access.
He tightens his hold on me. “We’ve been through this,” he grunts.
According to Noah, I work too much and need a rest day. Supposedly, the store is doing so well since I started “working my magic” that we’re having a hard time keeping up with inventory. He says I need to step back and recharge.
I settle my hands on his arms, relishing his touch. “But I took the whole day off to go shopping!”
“I know,” he grunts. “With Lane and Ms. Angela and your mom. That sounds even more exhausting than the store. You need some pampering.”
“You pamper me plenty,” I say, sliding a hand up his cheek. I wiggle inside his hold and turn to face him. “I don’t need some fancy, expensive treatments. I have everything I need right here.” I run my nails along his back the way that drives him over the edge.
He takes my hands in his, stopping my game. “What if I like the idea of you spending an afternoon at A Touch Of Grace to rest and relax? I don’t know why you make such a fuss about it. If you won’t do it for you, do it for me.”
“I’ll do it for you,” Lane says as she barges into the kitchen, flashing a fake smile at her brother.
“Back me up, Laney,” Noah growls. “Willow needs some time away from the store.”
Lane nibbles on a grape and narrows her eyes on us. “I saw Cruella lurking around the store the other day. You might want to stay away for now and hide at Grace’s. Who knows what she’s capable of.”
Noah tenses. “Gail was here again?! Are you sure?”
Lane nods. “The whole street stank of her perfume.”
An uneasy feeling creeps in—the memory of the pungent fragrance floating at the store, the day Mom mentioned not being introduced to my “mother-in-law.”
Noah steps away from me. Hands in his pockets, he stares out the window. “Beck said he saw her earlier this summer.”
My mouth dries up. I can rationalize Gail snooping around town right after our wedding. But now that our marriage couldn’t be more real, what is she up to?
I hate keeping secrets, but we can’t talk about this in front of Lane. Any talk of Gail gets us dangerously close to discussing the estate—and our marriage.
Too much is at stake.
With a shrug, Noah paces to the fridge and pulls out some squash patties. “Babe, get us some plates?” he asks me. “Lane, why don’t you pour us all a little wine, yeah?” he says as he coats a pan in olive oil. “I want to hear all about Burlington.”
Lane’s cheeks tint slightly as she pours some white wine for Noah and me, and apple cider for herself.
Noah’s eyes narrow on his sister. “Early interview tomorrow morning?” he asks, making a false assumption about her choice of drink.
“Yup!” she squeals. “Not holding my breath, though. This one’s for an online gossip magazine.
” Right then her phone alarm sets off with a meow, saving her from inventing more lies.
“M&Ms! It’s potty time!” she says cheerfully.
Lane has appointed herself official potty-training schedule keeper.
“They react to the sound of the alarm,” she remarks with a chuckle.
“Look at them!” Calla seems to be laughing at us while Muffin, Maple, and Myrtle trot to the kitchen door.
“I don’t get why she has a cat sound for the dog alarm,” Noah remarks as Lane goes out with the dogs.
“It’s so they like cats!” Lane cries from outside.
Noah shrugs. “A’right then.”
When the food is ready and Lane and the pups are back inside, Noah sits next to me at the island. “So? The spa? It’s settled, right? You’ll go?”
Not this again! “Care to explain your obsession with the spa?”
“No! No, I don’t care to explain,” he answers, bordering on exasperated. “I want my wife to go get some me time at the spa,” he says, pulling his phone out.
I stay silent.
“Unless there’s a good reason not to go.”
Plenty of reasons. It feels too much. I’ve never been. It’s superfluous. “Pretty sure Grace is closing in a couple of days because of her wedding.”
“It’s settled, then. Tomorrow.” He pockets his phone, then gives me his slow smile, the one that goes straight from my heart to between my legs, always leaving me all sorts of confused. “You’re all booked. Bring a swimsuit.”
Grace’s salon is a short walk from Lilyvale, on the other side of The Green.
It’s located in a Georgian mansion that she entirely decorated to turn into a beauty and wellness haven.
There’s even a hair salon in one room, and a nail specialist in another.
She has two rooms for facials now, and a cute three-season deck to sip cucumber water after a treatment.
She recently expanded her second floor to add more massage and meditation rooms. Cinnamon- and orange-scented candles create a warm and energizing atmosphere, and I recognize a Noah Kahan tune softly drifting from the speakers.
My friend greets me with a hug and walks me upstairs.
“You’re booked for the whole Touch of Grace experience,” she says as she hands me a plush robe and slippers with her salon’s logo, then takes me to my own dressing room, that comes with a key on a velour rope.
Inside the room I find a thick paper with my name on it.
Willow C.’S personalized menu of treatments.
Infrared sauna
Massage
Private meditation session
Wax (areas TBD)
Hair treatment with Fabrizio
Nails with Cheyenne
This is Grace’s business. Grace is my friend. Surely there’s nothing over-the-top about this. This is what people do. Right?
The swimsuit comes in handy for the sauna, which already deeply relaxes me. After a refreshing shower, I fall asleep under the expert touch of her new massage therapist. “Take your time,” she whispers, startling me softly awake. “I’ll take you next door for your meditation when you’re ready.”
I’m super mellow and feeling fantastic when I go downstairs, wrapped in the black and gold robe I’m to use for the whole afternoon. It says “VIP” on the front and back and I truly feel like one, especially when Grace pours me a pumpkin spice cocktail. “Created specially for us by Haley,” she says.
Fabrizio brings me to the wash station, giving me the scalp massage to end all scalp massages. “You have such gorgeous hair,” he fusses. “I’m thinking just a trim to give it umph, maybe a tiny bit of layering, and a glaze. I’m really working with gold here, just making it shine.”
“And here I was thinking my hair was mousy.”
“Whaaat? Sweetheart, don’t ever say that. We’re beautiful and we own it.”
“If you say so.”
He waves his comb at me. “Repeat after me. I’m beautiful and I own it.”
I can’t help but giggle at his enthusiasm. “I’m beautiful and I own it!”
He rolls his eyes. “Darling, say it like you mean it!”
“I’m beautiful!”
He leans toward me. “And I own it!”
“And I own it!” Whatever that means.
Their nail specialist, Cheyenne, starts on my manicure while Fabrizio works his magic. They must be used to working together like that, because they don’t seem to get in each other’s way.
Fabrizio leans into me, getting all conspiratorial. “We had the other Mrs. Callaway stop by this morning to make an appointment.”
So it’s true, then. My nape tingles.
Fabrizio continues. “Never heard so much venom come out of one’s person mouth. I don’t even know why she comes here, if she hates Emerald Creek so much.”
Venom? “What do you mean?”
Fabrizio doesn’t need more encouragement to get started.
“Let’s see. The store is flailing but it will be sold to a chain and we’ll all be better for it.
We’ll have more people move into town once Lilyvale is turned into an apartment complex, and that will help the school.
” He keeps fussing with my hair while he continues talking.
“Same music, different lyrics. This time things are going to happen that will be wonderful for the town.”
“I don’t know about before, but the store sure isn’t flailing anymore,” Cheyenne volunteers. “I saw the line of people on the sidewalk the other day.”
I roll my eyes at the memory. “We’ve had to tell tour busses that it’s only fifteen people at a time.
And you saw our posting on ECHoes, right?
During foliage season, locals should use the back entrance and go straight to Noah’s office for check out if there are lines at the registers.
” The windows, lighting, and overall layout changes I’ve implemented were huge drivers of our new success.
We’re basically still selling the same local products and everyday necessities (with a few additions), but we’ve become the place to visit and shop—a town landmark.
If only Noah could pick a name for it, it would make marketing so much easier.
My hair done in lush, shiny waves, I move to the pedicure room. Once Cheyenne is almost done, Fabrizio comes in, followed by Grace nursing a tea in one of the mugs Ethan keeps giving her. This one has cat shapes on a pink backdrop.
“Back to the other Mrs. Callaway,” Fabrizio says, “I never understood what Mac saw in her. It’s so sad, the way she took him away from here.” He crosses his arms, clearly upset by all that’s happened.
“His kids missed him, for sure,” Cheyenne says as she applies nail polish to my toes. “Noah is a rock. Always placed his family first.” She shakes her head and her eyebrows narrow.
“That’s why you were a perfect match for him,” she says with genuine sweetness. “You always put your family first. You understand him. You understand each other. It’s really that simple.”
I think about Mom, and Lane, and even the pups—the M&Ms, like Lane likes to call them. And Beck and Griff in their own way. We do worry and care about them. Cheyenne is right. They are central to our lives.
“Any idea why Gail is here?” I ask, eager for more information.
“Someone said they saw her with developers, driving around.”