Page 5 of Found Objects

Hopefully Evie was wrong and they were just looking, and no money had changed hands. From where we stood staring at them, they all appeared to be young guys, so either they’d gotten royally screwed—Bill had never been forthcoming about the limitations of his land—or they were simply looking. I hoped, for their sake, that they hadn’t been duped.

And really, even aside from that, building in Coille was unrealistic. We were situated halfway between White Sulphur Springs and Tuckahoe, and there was nothing out here but miles and miles of nature. Perhaps they were opening a retreat, not a resort. Two years ago a very nice lady from New York—Victoria something; I couldn’t for the life of me recall her last name—had wanted to buy Bill Rader’s land to do just that. She had loved the vibe of The Bower and been thrilled to discover that I only employed women, and wanted to see if I would be interested in stocking her candles, lotions, and jewelry, which she would also sell at her spa, The Goddess.

When I’d told Idunn Shelby, who made all the beeswax candles for The Bower, as well as selling them online, she was not pleased. She didn’t want any candles but hers in my restaurant. As I’d only used her creations for years, I had to tell Victoria…something Italian maybe, that it wouldn’t work out. She’d insisted on speaking to Idunn, and that was the last I’d heard of her. Idunn was just a tad territorial and liked me quite a bit.

“Oh my God, why’re you yawning right now?” Evie asked me, dragging me back from my wandering thoughts.

“Need coffee,” I whimpered.

She muttered something about me being annoying under her breath but left, I was hoping, to procure me some caffeine.

“Mornin’, Mere,” Brandon Hubbell called over to me from his regular stool at the counter, sipping coffee I desperately needed.

“Good morning,” I greeted him and his crew, lifting a hand to them all.

Brandon was a landscaper, and he and his guys always stopped in for breakfast before hitting the road for Lewisburg. Not many people worked in Coille; there just wasn’t enough to do. So if the men standing in the courtyard wanted to try and bring some jobs here, it was probably a good thing. Besides The Bower, there weren’t many places to work.

Hard to account for it, but as usual, every stool at the counter was filled with regulars, the tables in the courtyard too. We had some empties inside, near the enormous hearth, but even though it was crisp outside, between low sixties and mid-fifties, people wanted to soak up the sun while they could still get it. It wasn’t time to fire up the hearth yet, though right before Samhain, or Halloween, I would get it going.

Even in our tiny town, on any given morning, we were packed. We stayed steady all day, with two peaks, one at nine in the morning and the other at seven at night.

As I made my way to the kitchen, since Evie hadn’t yet reappeared with a mug for me, I waved at all my first-shift people and got multiple calls of “Hey, Mere” back. It was Merritt, but everyone had been shortening it forever.

Paris Croft, my day manager, saw me and strode across the main area to slip her arm through mine, as was her habit.

“What?” I barked at her. I did it with everyone, so she wasn’t fazed.

“Don’t growl,” she warned me, steering me toward the redbrick courtyard. “Did Evie tell you about the guys waiting for you?”

“Yes.”

“Then why aren’t you speaking to them?”

“No coffee.”

“Yes, I’m aware. And because Evie made it sound like you were needing more than your regular, Lupe is making you that spicy concoction of hers with the chilis because she said your something chakra needs it because it’s out of alignment with Uranus.”

“All of what you just said is wrong,” I assured her.

“Anyway, I’ll bring it to you when she’s done, but you do need to go chat with them. New people bringing new business is good for the town.”

I squinted at her.

“It is. There’s nothing on this road but us for three miles in either direction. And the town needs more than a veterinary clinic, a women’s shelter, a gas station, a pub, and the equipment rental shop.”

“You forgot your own husband’s tour guide business.” I shook my head at her. “That’s terrible.”

She scowled back. “Is it really a business if he carries our daughter on his back everywhere he goes? How serious does the man look feeding her Goldfish crackers?”

I scoffed. “People with kids love him. He showed me his Yelp reviews.”

“Did he? All twelve?”

“You’re being really snide right now and not at all supportive,” I told her. The eye-rolling was just making it worse. “Don’t be mean to him, when he finishes his book on the Early Jurassic period, you’ll be rolling in money.”

“Will I? Rolling?”

“You are crapping all over that man’s dream right now.”