Flipped! (Spinning Hills Romance 1) (4 page)

“You’ve lived here about five years and I’ve been here a little longer than you. You’d think we’d have met Dan Amador before Friday night’s disaster,” Emily said as she handed her a perfume bottle.

“Well, Johnny says he’s a lawyer with clients all over the country. Travels too much and doesn’t have time for a visit.” Holly glanced up. “And now that I’ve met him, I can totally see him being too busy bullying whoever’s on his opposing side to stop by.”

Emily smiled and shook her head. “So what did he do when you told him who you were?”

Holly ducked behind the counter and got back to work. “Nothing . . . because I didn’t tell him.”

“Did he figure it out when you told him to stuff his request?”

Holly kept busy and didn’t answer.

Emily heaved out an exaggerated sigh. “What did you do?”

“You don’t have to sound so exasperated. I have a plan.” Holly looked up. “I handed over my research, but I didn’t tell him who I was because if I show him I can be valuable, he might let me have some influence over the house.”

“You’re charming the snake. I like it. And it just so happens to tie into
my
plan.”

Holly raised an eyebrow, and Emily sat on her heels next to the stool. “I’ve been running numbers and I figure if we sign two more retail outfits like Burk and Crane as clients, you can afford to buy the house from him. He can’t tack on more than eighty K if he wants to sell it quickly. You’d need to forget about individual clients for a while so we can double the cold calls I’m making. We could send out a new mailing, too, if you handle some of the initial sales meetings. I can start training you on cold-calling strategies today if you carve out some time. And if he accepts your offer to help him out, you can get the house to look like you want it to.”

Holly hated saying no to her. Emily wasn’t just Uncommon Scent’s sales and marketing executive, she was Leo’s wife and her best friend. “It’s a great plan, Em. You know I’m all for growing our retail market, but I’m looking forward to reinvesting the new revenue in equipment and hiring—not on personal expenses. Plus I love working with individual clients, it’s my favorite part. I’d rather hire a talented salesperson to work on a generous commission, like you do, than blow off potential clients with my horrible sales skills. I’ve been smart about how I’ve grown my business, and I can’t throw it away over one house. I love your plan and you know how much I appreciate your support, but there will be other houses.”

Emily didn’t look upset, but she didn’t take her eyes off Holly’s face when she asked, “Then why are you hoping to help him with the house?”

“Because I’m a sucker for certain things and I don’t want to change that about me. It’s a flaw I like.”

 

Holly had a hard time concentrating on anything after Emily left. One of her employees came in to relieve her just as the clock hit twelve and the orange plastic bird cuckooed. Holly headed out the door and up the street, toward the oldest part of town.

Grandma Ruby and her two best friends, Sherry and Rosa, owned the Gypsy Fortune Café and Bakery on the corner of Main and Hillside, and Holly suspected she was in the mood for their lively energy as much as she was in the mood for coffee and dessert.

She whisked past the professional offices that made up most of Lower Hillside. Earthy autumn scents filled her nostrils, grounding her, and she slowed her pace. The downtown area was made up of eight streets, and six of them crossed Lower Hillside, east to west. Upper Hillside was too hilly for more than two streets. When Spinning Hills boomed in the twenties and thirties, its wealthier citizens built their houses on either side of Upper Hillside, looking out onto the park and downtown area, and on Manor Row, looking out onto the Great Miami River.

A breeze lifted a whirl of colorful leaves off the sidewalk, and they rolled up the street and sidewalk with her. People sitting on restaurant patios covered their plates. Out of habit, Holly rubbed the horse’s head on the old hitching post in front of the café and bakery. Her grandmother insisted it brought people good luck.

The bakery was one of the three original downtown buildings, and it had once been a horse feed store. At the turn of the century, people had come into town to buy horseflesh the first Saturday of each month. The stables and market were held in the area now known as Star Springs Park, and the horse feed store had been built next to it.

A hardware store and the first school were the other two original buildings. The school now housed the city’s offices, and the hardware store was still the hardware store. The police station had been built next to it, and Chief Davis waved to her just before she entered the bakery and she waved back, suddenly thankful Dan hadn’t called the police on Friday night.

Rosa was wiping a table down when Holly walked in. The elderly woman kissed Holly’s cheek, hugged her tight, and led her to a table. “Leo told us everything. Here, sit down. What can I get you? Your favorite, crabapple pie, yes?”

Sherry was working one of the coffee machines, her back to the door. “I saw you walking up and you looked like you could use a latte with a shot of Kahlúa in it,” she called.

“The latte sounds good, but I’m still trying to decide on a dessert.” Holly squeezed Rosa’s hand and sat down. Classic pop rock played over the speakers, and Holly sat back and relaxed. It was hard to worry about today when you were visiting yesteryears.

The women had decked the café out in “eclectic retro,” a term that meant they hadn’t been able to agree on a decade to style it after. The result was a charming mix of eras past. Comfy, old-style chairs, sofas, and swiveling stools upholstered in soda-shop pink and green, gilded mirrors, an over-the-top wedding cake chandelier, and exposed brick walls and rustic ceiling joists made for a unique and welcoming atmosphere.

“Have you settled on a dessert?” Sherry slid the latte across the table and sat down in front of her. Her blond pixie cut made her look almost cherubic, which was laughable. Holly took a grateful sip before replying, “I don’t know. I feel like eating a big piece of something really rich and sugary.” She took another sip of her latte. “It’ll help if it has a shot of liquor in it, too.”

“How does Irish cream pie sound?” Grandma Ruby called from the kitchen.

“And they say you aren’t a real fortune-teller,” Holly called back.

Her grandmother appeared at the kitchen door, serving spoon in hand. Her long silver hair was pulled back, and her bright blue eyes were blazing. “Who says that?”

“We do.” Sherry grinned.

Her grandmother was among the few people in the entire region who could trace her roots directly to the gypsies, and it had been Rosa’s idea to turn those gypsy ties into a marketing ploy.

“Here’s your pie.” Grandma Ruby placed the plate in front of Holly and glowered at Sherry before joining them.

Holly took a bite and sighed. It was exactly what she needed. “So, what’s the purpose of Irish cream pie?” she asked her grandmother.

“To sweeten the water of life and help it flow once again.”

Holly started to laugh and snorted her coffee instead. “You just made that up.”

“I did not. The pie has whiskey, and whiskey means ‘water of life’ in Gaelic. And it’s very rich, so I decided its purpose is to sweeten that water.” Grandma Ruby took a sip of her own coffee. “When water becomes stagnant, it tastes like crap. Your water was stagnant today and so you were craving sugar, cream, and whiskey to make it taste good again.”

Holly shook her head and smiled.

“See, your stagnant water is flowing already.” Sherry winked.

Rosa tapped her long, perfectly manicured orange fingernails on the table and Holly looked over at her. The woman was seventy-something and looked eternally
fabulous
. Today she had on a form-fitting, cream-colored pantsuit with a leopard print belt, matching heels, and burnt-orange scarf for color and pizzazz. With her long, thick brown hair, golden skin, and big dark eyes, she looked too exotic and cosmopolitan to be part owner of a small-town bakery.

“You know, this whole ‘pies have meaning’ thing started off as something fun to set us apart, but I think we hit on something. Your body craves what it needs. You just need to figure out what you need and why you need it so you can have a little bit of it and set yourself to rights again. Now, tell me if you’d like me to talk to Dan about selling the house back to you. Latinas can be very persuasive, you know.” Rosa had a melodious accent, talked too fast, and switched gears too quickly. It always took Holly a few beats to catch up to her.

“I was planning on paying him a little visit myself.” Sherry’s eyes gleamed. “We should go together. He can’t say no to two little old ladies he’s known his whole life.” She turned to Ruby. “Three little old ladies would be even better.”

“Yes . . . especially if one of them is the victim’s brokenhearted grandmother!” Rosa looked at Ruby, too.

Holly sat up, alarmed. “Um, please don’t. I’m no victim, and no offense, but you don’t exactly come across as
little old ladies
. If he’s known you his whole life, he won’t be moved.”

“Maybe he was only being stubborn with you because of the way everything went down,” Rosa said. “I think he’d listen to us.”

Holly sighed. Grand-smothering and meddling were among the only things the three women had in common.

“He never did like theatrics.” Grandma Ruby sent Holly a meaningful look.

Her grandmother was lecturing
her
on theatrics? “Would you say you know Dan Amador well, then?” she asked them in her most innocent and interested voice, hoping to veer the topic away from the house.

“Honey, after forty-one years on the corner of Hillside and Main, we’d say we know more about everyone than we have the right to know,” Sherry answered. “And Ruby’s been here her whole life. If there’s something we don’t know, she fills in the blanks.”

The older women grew quiet and Holly watched them, wondering what it felt like to be in one place for so long, listening to local news, troubles, and gossip every day.

The three women had met through Wright-Patterson Air Force Base over forty years before. Sherry’s husband, Holly’s late grandfather, and Rosa had all worked in Area B. There were rumors that they’d actually worked together in the infamous Hangar 18 of Roswell fame. The people of Spinning Hills loved themselves an outrageous tale, and one of the quirkiest around was that experimenting on aliens had been too much for Rosa, a devout Catholic who didn’t want to put her mad administrative skills to use on managing the dissecting of aliens.

How the three women had ever stopped respectfully disagreeing long enough to decide to go into business together was a mystery to everyone. The one thing they seemed to agree on was that great coffee, sweets, and plenty of unsolicited advice could make any situation better.

“Your mother babysat him until he was five, you know.” Grandma Ruby looked at her a moment later. “She used to bring him in for fruitcake. It was his favorite.”

Holly tried to imagine her late mother working as a babysitter and Dan Amador as a little boy. Both were difficult to imagine. “Is he as . . .
hard
as he looks?” Holly asked.

“Sweetie, we’re too old to know him
that
well.” Sherry laughed.

“That’s not what I meant!” Holly’s cheeks flamed. The three women laughed harder.

“Now, back to the house . . .” her grandmother began.

The urge to bang her head on the table told Holly it was time to leave.

That evening, she missed running into Dan by less than a minute. His front door slammed shut just as she and Ella were entering their apartment.

Ella hadn’t taken the news of losing the house well, and it was no wonder. They had gone window-shopping for furniture for the house the week before. Ella had picked out new, big-kid furniture for her room and paint colors for her walls. She’d told her mother, through tears and a quivering bottom lip, that it was okay. That had hurt Holly most of all.

Why had she thought it would be a fun activity to spend hours dreaming about the house next door with her daughter?
Ways to mess with your daughter’s heart. Parenting 101, by Holly Bell.

Ella climbed onto the sofa to look out the window and see the new owner of the house next door. Stanley stood on his hind legs next to her, his paws on the window. At the moment, he looked more like a monkey than a dog. “Mommy, is that the man who bought our house?”

“That’s him.” Holly stood behind Ella and Stanley and looked out the window, too. Dan Amador was standing in front of the house next door. His nephew, Jake, was in his arms.

“He looks nice, like . . . Prince Eric in
The Little Mermaid
,” Ella observed, her little finger pressed on the window, right on Dan’s face. “We can have a tea party with him.”

Nice? Like Prince Eric? Beast was more like it. Holly closed her eyes. How she hated fairy tales. And pastel colors. And poufy dresses. She and Ella were so different. “Um, I don’t think he likes tea.”

“I’ll open the window and ask him.”

Holly covered the window latch with her hand. “That’s not a good idea.” Stanley barked.

“Why not? Uncle Johnny likes tea, and you said he’s Uncle Johnny’s brother.”

“The thing is—he isn’t like Johnny. Grandma Ruby said that he has a good soul, but a hard heart.”

“Like Beast?”

Holly had to bite her lip to keep from laughing. “Uh, yeah, like Beast.” She kissed the top of Ella’s curly blond head and carried her down from the sofa. How could she keep Ella from trying to reform “Beast” if they ran into him on the street? “We only have people we’re sure are nice over for tea, and Dan Amador can be a little mean.”

“How mean?” Ella folded her arms across her chest.

He’d manhandled her and called her a lunatic numerous times, he’d been callous about her predicament Friday night, he’d mocked her when she’d told him she was a nose, and she’d seen the way he was looking around her studio. “Remember that blister you got on your ankle after ice-skating?”