Better Than Chocolate (13 page)

“Sounds like fun,” Heidi said agreeably, but from the way she’d
been smiling at her husband, Samantha could tell she wouldn’t trade her former
single life for the one she had now.

A little ping of jealousy hit Samantha—but she brushed it off.
Yes, it would be nice to settle down someday, if she could have the kind of
happy ending Heidi had found. But there were no guarantees. She could as easily
end up with a loser like Charley had.

Blake Preston, with his big shoulders and his small heart, came
to mind, giving her a ping of a very different kind. Oh, no. Men like Blake
Preston were why she was single. She was happy with her life just as it was.
Well, just as it was going to be once she got everything back on an even
keel.

“Are you here for the festival?” Heidi asked Cecily.

“I am.”

“That’s so cool that you can take time off to come up.”

Cecily nodded, offering no other information. Samantha couldn’t
say that she blamed her sister. She wouldn’t be announcing it all over town if
she’d closed up shop. That thought led to more sobering ones, which she quickly
shoved aside.

“Well, enjoy your meal, guys,” she said again, and turned to
leave. That was when she discovered that while they’d been visiting, Charley had
seated some new customers at a table they’d have to pass en route to the bar.
Crud. There had to be a way to skirt around that table. More fake blindness
required. They should’ve stayed at Mom’s and watched a movie.

“Samantha,” Ed York called, smiling and waving at her.

She could have pretended blindness, maybe even deafness, too,
but with her sister standing right next to her, smiling in Ed’s direction, that
would have been pushing it. She swore under her breath, pasted on a smile and
waved back at Ed, who was seated a few tables over with her nemesis, Blake
Preston.

“Charm,” Cecily said under her breath, and led the way to their
table.

“Samantha, this is becoming our second home, isn’t it?” Ed
greeted her. “And, Cecily. What brings you back to town so soon?”

“I’m here to help with the festival,” she said.

“We’ll take all the help we can get, won’t we?” Ed stood and
pulled out a chair. “Join us for a drink ladies. We can talk.”

That was what Samantha wanted to do, all right, sit down for a
chummy little drink with Blake Preston, business killer.

“Maybe they have dates,” Blake said. He probably didn’t want to
get cozy any more than she did. Or was he insinuating she couldn’t get a
date?

“If not, you could join us for dinner,” Ed offered.

“Oh, no. We’ve already eaten,” Samantha said.

“Well, a glass of wine, then.”

“A glass of wine sounds wonderful,” Cecily said, making the
decision for them and instilling in her sister a desire to throttle her. Blake
stood to pull out another chair and she held out her hand for him to shake. “I’m
Cecily Sterling. I was a few years behind you in school but—”

“I know who you are. Everyone knows the beautiful Sterling
sisters,” Blake said gallantly.

Blech. This man was wasted in banking. He should’ve been a
salesman. On a used-car lot. Or at a fair, selling overpriced kitchen
gadgets.

“So I think we’re making real progress, don’t you?” Ed said
heartily.

“Absolutely,” Samantha agreed. “Everyone’s on board with this,”
she added, practically daring Blake to even hint otherwise.

At that moment, Charley walked by with Samantha’s downstairs
neighbor, Lila Ward, and another older woman in tow. Lila was a retired teacher,
skinny as a pencil, with short gray hair and thin lips. She told everyone she
was widowed. Samantha didn’t believe it. She suspected the former Mr. Ward had
run away.

Tonight Lila wore gray slacks and a heavy fisherman knit
sweater—a scarecrow bundled up for winter. At the sight of them seated all
together, her lips pursed and Samantha braced herself for an unpleasant
encounter.

Sure enough. Lila stopped at the table, leaving her friend and
Charley to move on without her. “I hear you’re planning some kind of festival,
Ed,” she said, ignoring his tablemates. Lila obviously hadn’t taught
manners.

“As a matter of fact, we are,” he said jovially. “If all goes
according to plan we should have a town full of people next month.”

“And there goes our peace and quiet,” Lila snapped. “I didn’t
retire up here to see the place overrun with yuppies and hoodlums. I don’t know
what you’re thinking.”

“We’re thinking it’ll give our town’s economy a boost,”
Samantha put in, unable to resist entering the fray.

“You’re a smart woman, Lila.” Ed spoke in a soothing voice.
“You understand economics. No business, no town. And then where will you buy
your groceries?”

“We don’t need crowds and crowds of people to stay in
business,” Lila said.

Ed sobered. “You didn’t notice? We haven’t
had
any crowds this winter.”

“Of course I noticed. And we’re all still here, aren’t we?”

“Not all of us,” Ed said, his smile completely gone.

“This won’t help. It’s foolish and silly.” Lila shot a
disapproving look at Samantha. “Chocolate festival, indeed.” And with that
parting shot she took her skinny self off.

“Well, almost everyone’s on board,” Ed murmured.

Just then Maria arrived to take their orders, ending the
conversation.

“I’d love a glass of pinot grigio,” Cecily told her.

While Samantha had been busy being a stellar overachiever, her
sister had been learning the art of sophisticated social drinking.

“How about you, Samantha?” Maria asked.

“ChocoVine.”

“You’ll have to go to a party at Charley’s for that,
amiga,
” Maria said. “Why don’t you try the huckleberry
martini? It’s a little sweet. You’ll like it.”

“Okay, I’ll try it.”

“We should get Hank to make up a signature chocolate drink for
the festival,” Cecily said, giving a lock of hair a thoughtful twirl as Maria
left to fill their drink orders. “A chocolate kiss. Doesn’t that sound good?”
she asked the table in general.

“A kiss sounds good to me,” agreed Blake.

Samantha ignored him.

She continued to ignore him as they sipped their drinks, and Ed
and Cecily tossed plans back and forth. The men ordered dinner and Ed insisted
the sisters have another drink on him. He didn’t have to force Samantha. She
decided she liked huckleberry martinis.

But she still didn’t like Blake Preston. He was a snake.

“Lila Ward is definitely in the minority when it comes to the
festival,” Ed was saying.

“Few ideas get one hundred percent support,” Blake said. “I
hope this flies for you, though.”

Samantha cocked an eyebrow. “Do you?”

“Of course I do,” he said earnestly.

She took a giant-sized sip from her martini. “Well, of course.
Silly of me to doubt you. The bank has already been
so
supportive.”

“We should probably get going,” her sister said.

Excellent idea.

There was no enjoying herself after that. (Not that Samantha
had planned on enjoying herself, anyway. Stress and fun didn’t mix.) Running
into Blake the Snake had been enough to curdle her entire weekend.

She tried putting him out of her mind by going for an
early-morning run on Saturday, but with every slushy footfall she could hear his
voice.
Hope this flies, hope this flies.
Did he?
Really?

Attending Cass’s weekly chick-flick night on Sunday evening
didn’t improve Samantha’s mood. It had been Charley’s turn to pick and she
brought
You’ve Got Mail.
Samantha found herself
squirming as she watched Meg Ryan’s character fall for the man who’d ruined her
business.

Well, unlike Meg, she wasn’t going to give in to
temptation.

Chapter Eleven

Every day brings something new. But if you don’t open your arms
to receive it, it will pass you by.

—Muriel Sterling,
Knowing Who You Are:
One Woman’s Journey

S
amantha had work to do before the festival
committee meeting. She didn’t have time to hand-deliver the chocolates she’d
promised to Todd Black. So Cecily, being a good sister, volunteered for gofer
duty.

“That’s the only reason, right?” Samantha asked, regarding her
suspiciously. “I mean, I’ll admit he’s a hunk and a half, but I’d be willing to
bet that man has a trail of broken hearts stretching from here to Tahiti.”

“Don’t worry, Mother,” Cecily said, tucking the pink box tied
with gold ribbon under her arm. “I’ve been vaccinated.”

“I’m not sure the vaccine for that one has been invented.”

“I’m just going to drop it and run,” Cecily assured her.

“Okay. If you’re not back here in twenty minutes I’m sending
out a search party.”

Cecily smiled and shook her head. Really, sometimes Samantha
could be so overprotective. But there was no need. Cecily had weathered two
crappy relationships. She wasn’t about to strike out a third time. And she was
only running this errand to be helpful. That was why she was here, to help.

Anyway, he probably wouldn’t even be there. It was morning.
Taverns never closed until the wee hours and he was probably home, wherever that
was, in bed.

Bed. Todd Black in bed. What did he wear to bed?

What did she care? She was so going to drop this candy and
run.

She got to the tavern to find the neon beer sign in the window
turned off and the potholed parking lot deserted except for one lone car—a
mud-spattered Jeep. One caveman left in the Man Cave. It wasn’t hard to guess
who it belonged to.

She didn’t see any lights on inside, though. Maybe Todd Black
had been too drunk to drive home after work. Maybe he was passed out on the
floor somewhere.

Cecily got out of her car and picked her way across the parking
lot. As she got closer she could see through the window into Todd Black’s
kingdom. Chairs were upended on top of tables, waiting for someone to sweep the
floor. In the dingy light she spied a dartboard hanging on a wall and a vintage
pinball machine in a far corner. The requisite TV hung over the bar, which held
upended bar stools that looked like they’d been imported from some old movie
set. Places like this always seemed so seedy and forlorn in the daytime.

She’d heard this one really hopped at night, attracting a rowdy
crowd, mostly men. No surprise there. What woman in her right mind would come in
here when she could be drinking wine or huckleberry martinis at Zelda’s? Maybe a
woman who liked to play pinball, she thought with a smile, and then added,
But not you.

She knocked tentatively on the door. No one came.

Just as well, she told herself. She didn’t want to see Todd
Black.

She knocked again, a little louder. She was here, after all,
and she hated to leave the candy outside to get ruined by the weather or eaten
by a passing dog. Chocolate was poisonous to dogs. She owed it to the canine
population to make sure this candy got to Todd. She knocked one last time—and
was rewarded by the sight of a shadow moving across the room toward the door. A
moment later it opened and there stood Todd Black in jeans and a black sweater,
unshaved and scruffy and tempting.

He leaned one hand on the door frame and treated himself to a
lazy perusal of her from head to toe. “Well, if it isn’t the California
girl.”

When a hot guy was single after a certain age there was usually
a reason. Now she knew why this one was on his own. He had a real gift for
irritating a woman.

She decided not to respond in kind. Instead, she simply smiled
and handed over the box of candy. “I’m dropping off a thank-you from my sister
for changing her tire.”

He grinned. “Pink, just my color.”

“I thought so.”

He swung the door open wider. In the distance the vintage
pinball machine beckoned. “Want to come in and help me eat these?”

Step into my parlor, said the spider to
the fly.
“I’m sure you can handle that all by yourself.”

“Yeah, but it won’t be as much fun. Anyway, I could use a
break. Couldn’t you?”

She’d come up here to get a break. From men. “I really need to
go,” she said, and took a step back.

“I bet girls like you don’t go in places like this,” he
taunted.

“What kind of girl am I?”

“Stuck-up?”

All because she’d turned down his invitation to enter his seedy
domain—talk about conceit. “Nope, just busy,” she said, and turned to go back to
her car. “Lucky for you because I’m a wizard with a pinball machine.” And that
was something stuck-up girls didn’t play. So there.

“Anytime you want to come by and show me what you’ve got…” he
called after her.

She picked up her pace. The sooner she was in her car and away
from here, the better. Todd Black was obviously an expert at getting women to
show him what they had.

* * *

“We’re almost at full occupancy for the weekend of the
festival,” Olivia announced to the rest of the committee as they met over
breakfast at Dot’s Breakfast Haus.

“I’m a little over half full now,” Annemarie said. She smiled
at Samantha. “This was a great idea.”

“And the Mr. Dreamy contest was positively inspired,” Olivia
said. “I’m going to enter both my sons.”

Samantha could feel Cecily’s superior smirk without even
looking at her. The elbow in the ribs was quite unnecessary.

“We don’t have permits yet,” Samantha told them.

“Maybe you should see what the holdup is,” Olivia
suggested.

As if she hadn’t been trying. On the issue of those permits,
Samantha felt like a salmon trying to spawn in quicksand. No one at city hall
seemed to know anything and they kept referring her to Pissy, which was a joke
since every time Samantha called, Pissy always managed to be out of the office
or on the phone or just plain unavailable.

When she’d finally cornered her archrival, Pissy had gotten,
well, pissy about the whole thing. “Do you think we’re incompetent around here?”
she’d demanded.

“No, of course not,” Samantha had said, getting in touch with
her inner Cecily.
Just spiteful.

But even Pissy wouldn’t be so small as to sabotage this merely
to one-up Samantha. At least, Samantha hoped not. Unless she didn’t get that it
was good for the whole town.

“Especially when this is going to benefit so many businesses,”
Samantha had added, just to make sure Pissy was seeing the whole picture.

“Yours especially,” Pissy had said. “Now, if that’s all you
need I’ve got to go. I have an important meeting.”

“With your shrink?” Samantha had snapped.

But Pissy was long gone and the only reply she’d gotten was a
dial tone.

Obviously, it would help if someone besides Samantha bugged the
gang at city hall. “Maybe someone with a little more pull should try to get
things moving. Ed, would you mind giving Del a call?”

“I’m sure he’s on top of it,” Ed replied, “but I’ll talk to
him. It would be good to know where we are.” He rubbed his forehead.

“Are you feeling okay?” Olivia asked him, sounding like a
concerned wife. Samantha suspected she’d like to step into that role, but Ed
only had eyes for Pat Wilder, the statuesque widow who owned Mountain Escape
Books.

“Just got a touch of headache,” said Ed. “I’ll be fine. But I
think I’ll go home and take a rest. I’m feeling kind of tired.”

“I hope you’re not coming down with something,” Olivia
said.

Me, too,
thought Samantha.
If you are, don’t get sick until you talk to Del.

Selfish,
she scolded herself. “Feel
better soon,” she told Ed. “And let me know what Del says,” she added, a subtle
hint to call the mayor before he collapsed. Okay, so she wasn’t the most noble
girl in Icicle Falls, but damn it, she had a business to save and a town
depending on her.

Ed’s departure, along with the fact that the pancakes had been
consumed, signaled the end of the committee meeting, but Samantha decided she
needed a private meeting with her sister. “Walk with me to the office,” she said
as they left the restaurant.

“Is that an invitation or a command?”

“Uh, yes?”

Cecily frowned but obliged.

It was a lovely day for a walk, anyway, Samantha reasoned. The
sun was out, the sky was blue, the rugged beauty of the mountains was
breathtaking and the crisp mountain air invigorating. Talk about a jewel of a
setting for a town. This festival was bound to attract new visitors, and once
they saw how lovely Icicle Falls was, they’d return and bring family and
friends.

“Is there a problem?” Cecily asked, bringing her back to the
present.

These days it seemed like there was always a problem. Samantha
didn’t say that, though. Instead, she said, “I wish you’d held off a few more
days before running that piece about the contest in this morning’s
Sun
.”

“You can’t wait until the last minute with this sort of
thing.”

“I know.”

“You’re worried about the permits, aren’t you?”

Samantha nodded. “We’re doing things backward. That makes me
nervous.”

“If you wait until you have the permits in hand you won’t have
time to set up all your events,” Cecily said.

Of course her sister was right. They were racing against the
clock and that meant they couldn’t follow standard operating procedure. Still.
She liked to get her ducks in a row and these ducks were swimming in all
directions. Now she rubbed her forehead. Ed’s headache was catching.

“I know I’m obsessing,” she admitted, “but without the arts and
crafts and food booths the festival won’t really feel like a festival. People
will feel cheated.”

“We’ll have to manage the best we can,” Cecily said with a
shrug.

Her sister was right. Worrying wasn’t helping anything. At the
rate she was going she’d be prematurely gray by Valentine’s. Samantha forced
herself to stay on track. “So, what’s this I hear about a kickoff for the Mr.
Dreamy contest at Zelda’s bar?” She could only imagine how tacky that would turn
out to be. “Is it really necessary?”

“Yes, it is. It’ll be a fun evening and get people excited. And
it’s another way to remind everyone that they want to buy tickets for the
pageant, not to mention chocolate.”

“I suppose,” Samantha said grudgingly. “Who have you suckered
into judging that, by the way?”

“You, for one.”

“Me?” Oh, that was what she wanted more than anything in the
world, to be a judge in a male beauty contest.

“Do I detect a sneer in your voice, Miss Icicle Falls?”

Samantha pointed a warning finger at her sister. “That was for
college scholarship money. And we at least had a talent competition.”

“Well, this is for valuable prizes,” Cecily said. “And we’ll
have interview questions.”

“Like if they want world peace?” Samantha scoffed.

“Nothing so boring,” Cecily said with a grin.

“I don’t know about this,” Samantha muttered. Although it
didn’t make any difference. Her sisters had turned into event bulldozers,
plowing over her objections and concerns. Not that she had many when it came to
the classier events. It was only this stupid Mr. Dreamy contest she wasn’t wild
about.

“It’ll be great,” Cecily assured her. “Guys will have to tell
us their favorite Sweet Dreams candy, so of course they’ll buy lots to do
research, and that’s good for sales. Anyway, everyone’s on board and this train
is already down the track.”

“Well, you can let it go down the track without me,” Samantha
said.

“I’m afraid we can’t. Sweet Dreams is sponsoring this and
you’re the face of Sweet Dreams. By the way, Nia Walters wants to interview you
for the paper. So you’re not only getting sales out of the contest, you’re
getting free publicity.”

It was hard to argue with free publicity. Still, Samantha would
rather have jumped naked into the icy Wenatchee River than judge this stupid
contest. “Who else is judging?” she asked grumpily.

“Mom and me.”

“Sounds like you have plenty of faces. You don’t need mine. And
what’s Bailey doing?”

“Mistress of Ceremony, since she loves the spotlight. And yes,
we do need you.”

“So is that it? I mean, shouldn’t we have someone else?”

“I thought maybe Cass. She’d be unbiased.”

“Have you asked her?” Somehow, Samantha couldn’t picture Cass
going along with such silliness.

“I hoped you would,” Cecily said, careful not to meet
Samantha’s gaze.

“You little chicken.”

“Cluck, cluck,” replied her sister. “Look at it this way. I’ve
given you a chance to micromanage.”

They were at Sweet Dreams now, and before Samantha could come
up with a comeback her sister had breezed into the gift shop to see if any men
had stopped by for an entry form.

“We’ve already had six guys,” Heidi said.

“I knew this was going to be popular,” Cecily crowed.

Samantha decided to say nothing other than, “I’ve got to get to
work,” and escaped to her office.

“Don’t forget to talk to Cass,” her sister called after
her.

“Why me?” she grumbled.

The answer to that was easy. She was the oldest. She got to do
the dirty work.

Later she found Cass and her daughter, Danielle, busy draping a
necklace holder with necklaces and bracelets made of chocolate cookie hearts
with pink icing.

“They’re for the festival,” Cass said. “What do you think?”

“I think they’re adorable,” Samantha gushed. “Who’s the
designer?” She didn’t really need to ask. Danielle was beaming and Cass was
looking like a proud mama.

“It was Dani’s idea,” Cass said. “Is she good or what?”