Come On Closer (4 page)

“Y
ou're in a mood.”

Larkin mustered a noncommittal grunt as she slouched at Gina Valeri's kitchen table, her nose precariously close to the top of her wineglass. Gina turned from where she was stirring sauce on the stove to eye her.

“Well, at least you're not bothering to deny it. What happened? Customer complaint? Jo get snippy with you? Cramps?”

She laughed despite herself, and Gina's sharp-featured, handsome face relaxed into a smile that warmed her coffee brown eyes. “No,” Larkin said. “No cramps. But thanks for the concern, Mom.”

“Well, somebody has to keep track of you,” Gina replied. “Might as well be me.”

She did a good job of it, too, Larkin thought. Much better than the woman who should have stepped up to the plate years ago. “Being my keeper is a pretty
boring job these days,” she said with a smile. “Lucky I didn't come over to borrow eggs about ten years ago. You'd be pulling your hair out.”

“I still would have taken the job. I don't usually open my door to find such a big smile. You looked too young to have bought the house across the street.” Gina's eyes warmed at the memory. It was a good one for Larkin, too, she thought, recalling how nervous she'd been about introducing herself. She'd put it off, afraid that the famously no-nonsense “Cake Lady” would give her the cold shoulder over some perception that she was moving in on her territory. Then she'd run out of eggs in the middle of a recipe, and necessity had made her brave.

Not only had Gina given her the eggs, she'd invited her in, handed her a glass of wine, and fed her a heaping plateful of spaghetti. Soon after, Larkin hadn't been able to shake the sense that they'd been looking for each other without really knowing it. Maybe that was moving into woo-woo territory, but it felt true. They'd just . . .
clicked
. And she'd come to depend on their weekly dinners together as much as she'd ever let herself depend on anything.

She'd gotten by for most of her life without a functional mother. Maybe she didn't even need one anymore. But as it turned out, it was still awfully nice to have a stand-in.

Gina hesitated briefly, and Larkin knew what question was coming before it was uttered. It was one she tended to deflect if possible, but she didn't think Gina would buy any of her usual lines. They were too close for that anymore. “Do you keep in touch with any of . . . you know . . .” Her hands moved in midair, as
though she were grasping for the right words. Larkin spared her the efffort.

“Any of my family? No. I'm pretty sure they were as glad to see me go as I was to leave. I wasn't a fun teenager.”
Climbing out the window to meet boys with fast cars and sweet promises, looking for everything I thought I wanted and couldn't seem to find . . . yeah, glad those days are over.

Gina tilted her head, studying her. “So your mother is . . .”

“Totally out of the picture,” Larkin replied. It was a triumph every time she could say those words without feeling anything. The years away from the decrepit little house at the edge of a dying town had lessened the pain of the way she'd grown up, and the absence of the woman who'd chosen her own needs over those of her kids every time there had been a choice. She'd had a speech memorized for years, just in case Journey O'Neill ever decided she wanted back in her elder daughter's life. At this point, though, it didn't look like she would ever need it. And that was fine.

As fine as it was going to get, anyway.

A soft smile, and Gina returned to stirring her sauce. “Well. Some people weren't made to be parents. And none of us were perfect teenagers. You probably weren't any worse than my Rocco.”

“Bet I was.”

It was Gina's turn to give a noncommittal grunt, and it made Larkin smile. In this particular kitchen, speaking the unvarnished truth didn't bother her so much. That was no doubt a function of the woman who presided over it. Gina might be barely five feet tall, but she was a force to be reckoned with, a wiry little dynamo with
short ebony hair threaded through with silver. She did things the way she liked them, no apologies, and didn't truck with bullshit. It was an unspoken rule that the BS was left at the door to the Valeri house, and Larkin had quickly learned to abide by it.

It was refreshing not to feel like she had to keep up appearances here. She'd overcome a lot to become a genuinely happy person, but she was still human, and she had days when smiling was a struggle. That wasn't okay in front of her customers . . . but it was just fine at Gina's kitchen table.

“So what got your panties in a twist today, then?” Gina asked. “A good day at work usually makes you all sparkly.”

“On Saturdays, it's looking forward to your cooking that makes me all sparkly.” Saturday dinners were one of the things that kept her world spinning just right.
Unlike Shane, who's more like a rapidly approaching Death Star.

“There's that face again,” Gina said, whacking the spoon on the edge of the pot to clean it off. “You want me to keep guessing, or are you going to fess up?”

“It was nothing, really,” Larkin said, and noted the quick-fire arch of one of Gina's brows. So she amended the “nothing” just a little. “I had to let a guy down easy, and I don't think I did a very good job of it.”

“Oh,” the older woman replied with a chuckle. “Well, that explains it. I'm surprised you aren't used to doing that by now. You don't exactly fade into the woodwork around here.”

“I just don't like hurting people's feelings.”

“And I wouldn't like you if you did,” Gina replied. She wiped her hands on her apron, turned down the
heat on the stove, and came to sit next to Larkin at the table. “So who was it? Not a stranger, or you wouldn't be so unhappy.”

“Mmm.” Larkin frowned into her wine, then took a sip. The rich, earthy flavor of the Sangiovese was a pleasant distraction from her brooding. She wasn't good at brooding. She was more of a fixer—she liked being an active participant in her life, and lying around feeling helpless when she might do something productive instead was against her nature. This, though . . . “fixing” this might just make it a billion times worse.

Things would be so much easier if Shane had just blown it off like she'd half expected him to. Instead, he'd acted like she'd wounded him. Maybe it was just having his ego pricked.

Or . . . maybe it wasn't. And that was what was driving her nuts.

Gina sighed heavily, drawing Larkin back into the moment. She watched as Gina poured herself a glass of wine.

“You're killing me here.”

“Oh, all right,” Larkin relented, tired of keeping it to herself. “It's Shane Sullivan.”

This time, both eyebrows shot up.
“Oh.”

“‘Oh'? That's it? You're not going to tell me what a nice guy he is?” She couldn't help teasing her. Gina took a lot of pleasure in casually listing off the names of eligible bachelors around town when she got the chance, just in case Larkin might be interested. Apparently, Shane wasn't on that list. Not a surprise.

“He's definitely not
nice
,” Gina said. “Handsome as hell, but . . . well, now I know why you're in a mood. I'm not even sure I could say no to that one.”

Larkin burst out laughing. “Gina!”

“Hey, I'm not dead, you know.” Gina took a long sip of her wine, then got up to drain the penne pasta she'd had boiling. She stirred it into the vodka sauce she'd been fussing with, then dished some onto two plates and returned to the table. Larkin dug in with gusto, figuring that the longer her mouth stayed full, the less she'd have to talk about her issues with Shane. Plus, the food was amazing.

When Gina started to fill the silence with her own speculation, though, Larkin gave in to the inevitable. She was going to be mothered. It was a sensation she was still getting used to.

“So what happened? Did he walk into the shop and start flirting while he ordered cupcakes? I
have
heard he spends a lot of time in there. I mean, it's not a surprise he'd fall madly in love with you—”

Larkin's eyes widened. Whatever Shane felt toward her, love was definitely not it. “Um, Gina . . . ,” she tried to interject through a mouthful of penne alla vodka. She was soundly ignored.

“You're exactly his type. Well, if you can say he has a type. He was crazy about that Ferris girl way back when. Cici. There was a group of them that was very tight for years—Jake Smith, Shane, that little Henry FitzRoy, the Weston boy, Max Holden, Thea Hanover, Kallie Monroe . . . and Cici, the little queen bee. She led Shane around by the nose all the way through school, but nothing ever came of it, and just as well. It was always Jake for her, not that they were good for each other. She's still bad news. Tried to mess up Jake and Sam Smith's relationship, you know, back before they were married, but he told her to get lost. She's
living here again, back from wherever. Maybe you've seen her.”

Larkin listened to her friend casually tick off the names, eyes wide. The depth of Gina's knowledge about everyone and everything in Harvest Cove never ceased to amaze her. “Mmm” was the only response she could manage with her mouth full. She swallowed the bite of food and tried to conjure an image of Cici Ferris. She saw most of the town on a semi-regular basis, and she had a vague idea this person was tall and pretty and usually surrounded by a small posse of the kind of people Larkin generally steered clear of. The bit about Sam and Jake was an interesting little slice of town gossip, she guessed, and reinforced that her impression of Cici had been correct.

The little queen bee . . . Yep, that's about what I figured.

What any of this had to do with her own situation with Shane she had no idea. Once Gina got rolling, though, she was hard to stop.

“Yeah, you've seen her,” Gina continued, waving her hand as she answered her own question. “Doesn't matter anyway; I think he's over that one. But after her there was the Jamison girl. And the Thayer girl. And the Delgado girl. And the Nightingale girl. And the Bloom twins—
that
one was a mess; those girls didn't speak to each other for months. Then they made up and egged his car.” She smiled at the memory. Larkin had no idea what to say.

“Oh. Wow.” It was one thing to know a guy had a reputation. It was another to have it laid out for you in list form. She ought to feel more secure in her decision to send him away. Unfortunately the memory of
his lips on hers kept getting in the way. The man could
kiss
, and they'd barely gotten started. An ugly little voice piped up in her mind:
Sure he can kiss. He's obviously had a lot of practice.

“There were others. I mean, not long relationships, but he always had someone new, driving them around in his sports cars or his Jeeps when he was home from college. It seemed to calm down once he finished law school and came back for good, but that's probably because he ran out of locals to chase.” She paused, popped a bite of food in her mouth, and chewed, looking contemplative. “I was surprised he came back, actually. His father's a piece of work, and Shane didn't seem like he was looking to follow in his footsteps. People thought he'd hit college and be gone. Maybe turn up in movies or something. His parents had some high expectations, though. I guess that ended up being more important.”

“Movies?” Larkin stared, confused. “Why would he—”

“Oh, you should have seen him!” Gina laughed, her hands moving energetically as she talked. “He was in every play during high school, and summer stock. . . . He could act—that's for sure. And sing. You wouldn't think it, but he can. He usually played villains. He made a great Orin Scrivello in
Little Shop of Horrors
.”

Larkin was left momentarily speechless, a forkful of food hanging in midair between the plate and her mouth. Shane had been a theater rat? All she ever heard was that he'd been a jock, which didn't surprise her. Why had she never heard about this? Her mind conjured an image of him in stage makeup . . . and she thought she might need to go soak her head after dinner.

“I had no idea” was all she managed to say. She hadn't dated a guy who wore guyliner since the hot musician back in . . . well, more years than she wanted to think about. Jaxon of the leather pants. And the great butt. And the criminal record. Larkin cleared her throat.

“No, you wouldn't know all that, not being from here,” Gina said, oblivious to the memories Larkin was trying to rebury as quickly as possible. “It was a long time ago, and his father didn't approve. I think he had a lot of pressure put on him,” she continued with a shrug. “Not that it excuses him. He was still kind of a little shit.”

Larkin couldn't help but laugh at the matter-of-fact way Gina said it. “He still is, in his own special way.”

“Of course he is. A handsome, charming little shit. And now you've got the scoop in case you change your mind about him.”

Larkin shook her head, though she was able to smile now without forcing it. “I don't think that would be a great idea.”

Gina chuckled. “Of course it's not a great idea. That's why you want to go out with him anyway.”

“Exactly! I mean, no! Of course I don't!” She cringed, realizing that Gina had pinpointed the source of her current misery with her usual frightening accuracy, and decided that denying it was useless. Especially because Gina was looking very smug. “Did you do this to Rocco when he was growing up?”

“What, amaze him by knowing everything? All the time.” She forked up more penne and popped it in her mouth. Larkin watched her and tried to imagine what her son, pictures of whom were scattered about the house, might be like. She knew Gina had raised him
on her own after her husband had walked out on her and the baby. “A bum” was all Gina would say about her ex, and Larkin supposed that was really all there was to say. It had to have been hard. There'd been a silver lining, though—his abandonment had led directly to her cake-decorating business, the Cake Lady, helped along by family and friends while she'd also worked full-time in the elementary school cafeteria to support herself. She'd been dealt a bad hand, flourished in spite of it, and built a good life.