The Damaged Hearts Bargain (Tetherington Hearts #2)

Chapter Eleven

“S o, um, I suppose I’ll be going then.” Lucy shuffled her feet, feeling more awkward than she could remember feeling for a long time.

“Yes, probably. It’s getting late.” Cal wasn’t doing much better, not looking her in the eye, pretending to be busy sealing a box closed.

“I could, um, I could come back tomorrow?” said Lucy. “I’ve got an early shift at the newsagents, but I could come by when I’m done?”

For an instant Cal did look up and she grinned. “Yeah, I mean, if you feel like it.”

Lucy sniffed. “Right, I’ll see you then.”

There was an agonizing twenty seconds of silence until both of them said goodbye at exactly the same time and Cal lifted up a box that obscured her face and then Lucy finally, mercifully, fled. When the front door closed behind her, she seriously thought about banging her head into it a few times, just to knock some sense into herself.

What had all that been about? She’d behaved like a fifteen year old on a first date. All that um-ing and ah-ing. Offering to drop by like they didn’t already have an arrangement.

It was embarrassing, all the more so because they’d actually spent a rather pleasant afternoon together. Well, once you got over the fact that Cal was grieving and they were cleaning out her mother’s house.

Cal got it somehow. That difficult family thing. The thing that no one else around her got because they’d all grown up in relatively normal circumstances. She got what it felt like to be on the outside looking in, that weird ache you got every time mother’s day came along.

It was nice to share things. But there was more than that.

Whatever her online dating profiles might say, she found Cal attractive. Very attractive. She’d spent an afternoon in her company and she was absolutely sure of it now. She was also pretty sure that Cal found her attractive.

Which left her with a little smile on her lips as she strolled down the high street. A smile that kept broadening into a grin when she let it, until she was walking down the road looking like some sort of mental case or a deranged clown.

“There you are,” Pen said as Lucy pushed through the door into the bakery.

“Jesus, it’s hotter than seven hells in here,” Lucy said. “And I’m not late. We don’t need to leave for another fifteen minutes.”

“Hot is what happens when it’s thirty degrees outside and you have two industrial ovens on,” Pen said.

“And the crochet circle waits for no man,” added Ash, who was sitting at one of the small tables with George going over some bookshop paperwork.

“Where’ve you been, anyway?” George asked.

“Nowhere,” Lucy said automatically.

“Liar, liar, pants on fire,” said George. “You’ve been with your shoplifter, haven’t you?”

“She’s not a shoplifter,” protested Lucy.

“You attacked her like she was, and Pen probably dated her, so you ask her all about… what was her name again?”

Lucy sighed. “Cal,” she said. She turned to Ash. “Doesn’t it bother you that George seems to think your fiancée has dated every woman in town?”

Ash shrugged. “What Pen did before she met me is her own business. Just as long as she doesn’t plan on dating every new woman in town, that’s fine by me.”

“You’re stuck with me,” Pen said, dropping a kiss on Ash’s head. “There’s no grumpy face I’d rather wake up next to than yours.”

“I’m not grumpy,” Ash said.

George pulled a face. “You’re like a cross between a dragon and the Aga Khan first thing in the morning.”

“I don’t think you mean the Aga Khan,” Lucy said. “He’s a religious leader.”

“Oh? Who do I mean then?” George asked, looking puzzled.

“Possibly Genghis Khan?” said Pen. “She does have a bit of a war lord look about her when she wakes up, doesn’t she?”

“I am right here,” Ash said. “If you don’t mind. And I don’t look like any Khans, thank you very much.”

“Whatever you say, my love,” said Pen. “And Lucy and I had better be going.”

“Enjoy,” said Ash. “And don’t forget, this is your last crochet circle before the wedding. So make sure everyone’s coming to the reception, and this time next week you’ll be in South America.”

“For mysterious purposes,” put in Lucy.

George rolled his eyes. “Get out of here you two.”

“Have fun tying complicated knots with sticks,” Ash added.

Pen looped her arm through Lucy’s and they went out into the evening sunshine. “Honestly, those two get worse the more time they spend together.”

Lucy snorted. “I don’t think George needs much encouragement, to be honest.”

“You’ll need to keep an eye on him while we’re away,” Pen said. “Fabio too.”

“Fabio will eat all the mice in both bakery and bookshop, and George will look after everything perfectly,” said Lucy. “You’ve got nothing to worry about. Everything will be fine here.”

“I know, I know. It’s just… it’s the first time I’ve left the bakery and I’m a bit worried is all.”

“I’m sure you’ve got bigger things to worry about,” said Lucy, thinking about the fact that coming home with a baby had to be at least a little bit nerve-wracking.

“Like what?” asked Pen.

Lucy cleared her throat. Maybe Pen and Ash didn’t want to talk about it just in case things didn’t work out with the adoption. These things could be tricky. “Oh, I don’t know, flying across a major ocean, that sort of thing. Malaria? Do they have malaria in South America?”

“Probably,” Pen said. “But not where we’re going.”

“Hmmm.”

They walked arm-in-arm along the street, turning when they got to the corner to walk along the promenade.

“So,” said Pen after a few moments of silence. “Cal?”

Lucy groaned. “Please don’t tell me she’s a terrible person or a cat-hater or… or a vegan or something.”

“The only Cal I know is Callan Roberts,” Pen said. She sighed. “I’d heard she was back in town. Her mother, Pam, passed a few months back.”

“I remember,” Lucy said. She sort of did. The town had been sad, there’d been a funeral, but she hadn’t been. “I thought it was a bit… odd at the time that I didn’t really know who she was.”

“Pam?” Penny breathed in warm sea air. “Poor thing had dementia. There were carers in and out, and the rest of town did what we could. But in the end it was probably a mercy. Didn’t remember a thing at the end.”

Lucy felt sorry about that, sorry that anyone met their end in such a way. But she had more pressing personal issues to deal with. “So, um, Cal then?”

Pen laughed. “You don’t need to worry. Cal’s a decade younger than me, you won’t be treading in my footsteps there or anything.”

Lucy shrugged. “You have good taste, I wouldn’t mind if you’d dated.”

“Well, we didn’t,” Pen said. She sucked air in over her teeth. “But, well, Cal’s relationship with town is… shall we say fraught?”

“Yeah, I’d sort of figured that,” said Lucy, grateful that Pen had brought it up so she didn’t have to directly ask. “People don’t like her much.”

Pen stopped walking. “Come on, we’ve got a few minutes before we’re really running late. Have a sit down on this bench and look at the sun on the sea. Maybe it’ll inspire you to paint something magical and get that residency you want.”

“What does fraught mean exactly?” Lucy said, as Pen steered her to a bench and they both sat down.

“It means exactly that, fraught,” said Pen. “And before you start giving me the third degree, this really isn’t my story to tell.”

Lucy sighed. “Somehow I knew you were going to say that. Not especially helpful.”

“You hate gossip,” Pen pointed out gently.

“I know, I do. But… but she’s so close-mouthed about herself, so shut off, and I can’t help but wonder what went on.”

“Then ask her. If she wants to tell you, she will.”

“It’d be easier if you told me,” Lucy said.

“You want me to woo her and sleep with her for you too?”

Lucy rolled her eyes. “No, obviously… just…”

“It’s not my story to tell,” Pen said again. “You two should talk if it’s important to you.”

“Do you hate her as much as everyone else?” This was important. What Pen thought about people was important. She trusted Pen’s judgment.

Pen sighed and shook her head. “I always thought she was a decent girl. A bit of a tear-away, but not a bad person. I don’t think she had anything to do with what happened, but then, I can’t see any other explanation either, and I’m not infallible. Maybe I misjudged her.”

“So you don’t hate her?”

“I don’t hate anyone,” Pen said. “Let alone someone who practically got chased out of town. And even if she did do what everyone says she did, she still deserves a second chance. We all do, we all make mistakes.”

Lucy looked at the light dancing on the waves. “And that’s as much of an explanation as I’m likely to get, isn’t it? ”

Pen nodded. “I’m an open book about myself. But I’m not sharing other people’s business.”

“Fair enough.” Lucy cleared her throat. “But if I, uh, brought her around sometime, that’d be alright?”

Pen paused for a second, then smiled. “That’d be just fine.”

Lucy took her hand and squeezed it. “Thanks, Pen.” She imagined bringing Cal to the bakery would be a bit like bringing your girlfriend home to meet your parents for the first time. Having Pen on side made things easier.

“So, um, you don’t need those online dating profiles we set up then?” Pen said.

“Dunno,” said Lucy. She looked down at her hands. “I mean, I like her. I know it’s fast and we haven’t spent much time together, but there’s definitely something there, a spark or whatever.”

“But?” asked Pen.

“I don’t know. It’s early days.” Lucy looked over at Pen and couldn’t help grinning. “I really like her though. She could be the one.”

Pen patted her hand. “I hope she is, Luce. But don’t get too carried away. And we’d better be going, we don’t want to be late.”

Lucy wondered, as they left, if Cal could crochet. Probably not, she thought, she didn’t seem the type. But maybe she’d like to learn.