Chapter 7 #2
“Everyone’s business is our business here,” Skylar said cheerfully, as if it were perfectly normal for a total stranger to know everything about Rachel.
No wonder Kell had loved living in the city so much. There was zero privacy here.
Turning the inquiry on its head, she looked Skylar in the eye, gave her a tight smile, and said, “If you don’t know why I’m here, then maybe the resident I’m here to see has kept it private for their own reasons.”
Skylar nodded slowly. “Never thought of it that way.”
A woman in her fifties walked in, her dark hair framing a red-cheeked face under a thick wool cap. She stamped her boots hard on the textured black mat at the door, and called out, “Hi, Skylar!”
“Hi, Deanna!”
Deanna? Deanna Luview?
Friendly eyes the color of Kell’s met hers. “Hello, there!”
“Um, hi.”
“Enjoying the coffee?”
“This is the lady who was attached to Kell at the ER yesterday!” Skylar called out, ruining any hopes Rachel had of escape.
“Oh, my gosh! You’re Rachel!” Deanna gasped, coming in for a huge hug that shocked Rachel to the core. The woman’s embrace was so motherly, she even smelled like freshly baked bread, mixed with a cologne Rachel’s mother had done ads for in the late 1980s. Who knew Elizabeth Arden was still a thing?
“Hi,” Rachel peeped, trying to come up with something to say, her mind suddenly blank.
“How’s your hand? Poor thing. Kell told me all about what happened.”
“He did?” Skylar was scandalized. “Wow, Deanna! Kell sure shares a lot with you! I’d never talk about my sex life with my mom!”
“Sex life? Skylar, what in the world are you talking about?”
“Nadine said Jeffy Stewart was volunteering in the baby wing at the hospital and saw Luke bring Kell and Rachel in, with his police jacket covering their hands, and they were handcuffed! Everyone assumed it was a sex thing.”
“You mean Jeffy decided in her petty little mind to start a rumor that it was a sex thing,” Deanna reframed for her.
“Right. That’s what I just said.”
“No. That’s not what you said, honey. Jeffy made it up. The truth is, Kell and Rachel touched superglue at the same time on a radiator hose and their hands got stuck to it.”
Skylar’s face fell. “That’s way less interesting.”
“Sorry to disappoint,” Rachel said in an acid tone, arching her eyebrows. “How’s my coffee coming along?”
“Oh! Hold on. Just need to pour the shots.”
“It’s so good to see you, Friend Rachel,” Deanna said, removing her hat and fluffing her hair.
Ouch. A memory from five years ago flashed through her, the FaceTime call Kell had with his mom when she was dressed up as a pair of lips for a town festival, all sequins and red, reminiscent of the Rocky Horror Picture Show lips.
At the time, Rachel and Kell had stressed that they were just friends, and Deanna had jokingly called her Friend Rachel.
All these years, and she remembered?
Deanna was warm and motherly, the type to keep tabs on everyone’s emotional state to make sure they were okay.
“Great to see you, too, Deanna. Nice to meet in person.”
“It is! How’s your mom?” Deanna asked.
“You probably talk to her more than I do,” Rachel said with a genuine smile.
“Oh, honey. We email or text maybe once a week. I’m sure that can’t be true.”
A quick mental calculation revealed that Rachel was right. She hadn’t talked to her mom in nearly three weeks.
Deanna’s smile deepened. “I hear you’re in town to convince Lucinda and Boyce to sell the chocolate company to Markstone's.”
Skylar dropped a small metal pitcher on the ground and made a squeak of surprise, looking at Rachel with huge eyes.
“They’re selling?”
So much for being discreet.
“For the record, I didn’t say a word,” Rachel pointed out.
Deanna reached across the counter and came to her caffeine aid, plucking her finished latte from next to the espresso machine and putting it in her grateful hands. The first sip was heaven.
Pure heaven.
Bright notes, but not too citrusy, caressed her tongue like she’d been transported to her favorite cozy spot in front of a roaring fire, curled up on a couch. The caffeine lifted her as the coffee’s warmth spread through her, an infusion of comfort.
Coffee this good should be everywhere.
“Mmmm,” she said as Skylar beamed. “This is amazing. What kind is this?”
“A special blend we call Love You Awake. Light roast, but with hints of cherry and butterscotch, darkened a bit by an undercurrent of oak.”
“It’s extraordinary. And you really know how to speak coffee!”
“Come back and enjoy it all you want.”
“Do you have other stores?”
“No. Just this one. But you can have our coffee shipped anywhere.” Skylar pointed to a business card holder. Rachel took one and slipped it in her bag.
“You have a new fan. Is everything made in Love You so good? Because the chocolate company makes the best chocolate I’ve ever had, too.”
“The chocolate factory’s been in the Armistead family since the 1950s,” Skylar mused, wiping the espresso machine with a white bar towel. “What would a big company like Markstone's do to it?”
“Make it better,” Rachel said with confidence. She knew that while Lucinda and Boyce were the decision makers, getting townsfolk on board mattered, too. “Add jobs. Turn the factory into a tourist destination.”
“It already is! Lucinda uses water from the hot springs. You know their motto: A little taste of love in every bite!”
“None of that has to change. Selling to Markstone's will help her family realize the value of all their hard work, and it’ll bring new jobs to Luview.”
Skylar perked up. “New jobs?”
“Yes.” Rachel knew she shouldn’t talk about it, but couldn’t help herself. “Thirty to forty full-time jobs with benefits, and maybe more if it all works out.”
Deanna’s phone buzzed.
“Excuse me.” Deanna held up a finger. “I have to get this, but Skylar, can you make my regular order?”
“Already working on it.”
“And Rachel–hold on.”
Rachel felt a twinge of worry worming its way in. Was she tipping her hand too much? Reasonably confident the family would, in fact, sell to Markstone’s, she’d come prepared with the offer, and knew it was a good one.
The Armisteads had a strong local brand and a solid online order system, but they’d faltered in the kind of widespread market penetration they could have had with better coordinated branding and marketing.
That’s where Markstone's came in. If the Armisteads sold out, their products would still be called Love You Chocolate, but the family would lose control to the new owners, who intended to find a new angle for a stale niche brand.
Their own.
That’s the part Rachel didn’t mention: why Markstone's, of all companies, wanted to buy a dinky little chocolate company in rural Maine. Part of the challenge when you were the world’s best-known luxury candy company was finding new ways to stay fresh in the consumer’s mind.
Love You Chocolate was unique, and Markstone's wanted unique.
If this pilot project went well, Rachel knew it could lead to many other acquisitions of small artisanal chocolate and confectionery companies.
The factories would remain individual distribution centers for now, but eventually, the companies would be rebranded as Markstone's, creating a massive chain network of small shops.
For now, though, this was about one small deal in one small town, with big implications for Rachel.
Because this wasn’t her first small-town candy shop rodeo.
Blow this and she’d be fired. It would severely affect her career. Closing the deal would save and possibly launch it. And she wanted to be launched before her brother launched, literally, into space.
For once, she wanted to be the one their father bragged about. The one her mother turned to for media connections and opportunities.
The one who got the spotlight, even for a short time.
No one would lose in this situation if the deal went through. The Armisteads would have more money than they’d ever imagined, the town would gain jobs, and Rachel would leave Kell Luview far, far behind, with a secure job and a new project.
All that was left was signatures on a contract.
Deanna looked up from her texting, shaking her head. “Poor Dean.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Another lovesick guy doing a practice run for Valentine’s Day.”
“Valentine’s Day?”
Skylar and Deanna barked out laughter. “You say that like you’re surprised. It’s the biggest day of the year here.”
“What does that have to do with your husband?”
“We run a tree service. Every year, we get skydivers who try to make a grand gesture, but the wind doesn’t cooperate, or they’re too green to know how to handle the steering, and they end up stuck in trees.”
“And you have to cut them down.”
“Yup. Dean and Kell are on it. Finishing up now.”
Rachel’s heart fluttered at the mention of Kell’s name.
“I didn’t know tree service workers did that. Isn’t that more the fire department’s job?”
“We’ve got better equipment for it, especially if they get caught too high up.”
“Wow. So this is a thing?”
“It is, indeed, a thing.”
“This town is full of surprises.”
Deanna squeezed her arm. “Always, dear. Always. That’s what makes it such a wonderful place to live.”
An alarm went off on Rachel’s phone.
Ten minutes to go.
“Oh, goodness. You must need to get ready for your meeting.”
“I do.” Rachel pulled a ten out of her wallet and handed it to Skylar, who gave her back a five, two ones, and a quarter. Cheap coffee compared to L.A.
Rachel gave her back the singles and asked, “Could I get four quarters for one of those? The other’s for you.”
Skylar nodded, handed her the quarters, and tucked the other dollar in the tip jar.
“Parking?” Deanna said with a knowing look.
“Yes. Why doesn’t the town use a parking app?”
“Good question. Probably because no one’s in charge of anything like that right now.”
“What do you mean? Your business development director doesn’t handle that?”
“We don’t have one right now.”