Молли Харпер - Nice Girls Dont' Live Forever

Andrea rolled her eyes. “Well, I figured if I’m going to survive working at the shop, I would have to. And you only hinted that a person of any intelligence was required to read at least one Jane Austen book, like a thousand times.”

I tapped a finger to my chin. “That doesn’t sound anything like me …”

It was two days from the reopening. The cash-register drawer was stuck. We were missing a rather large shipment of what I considered our cornerstone product,The Guide for the Newly Undead.And I was beginning to suspect that Andrea was slipping extra espresso into her magical mystery coffee potions because “caffeinated Jane” amused her.

The only thing we had going for us was a local dairy that was willing to deliver to an account as small as ours and to a location as bad as ours at night. In fact, it was a delight to come downstairs from Mr. Wainwright’s old apartment to find a tall man in an indecently tight blue Half-Moon Dairy uniform stocking our little coffee-bar fridge with half-and-half and heavy cream.

“Wow, is that our dairy guy?” I whispered. Andrea didn’t bother removing her eyes from the sight of Dairy Guy’s delicious blue-clad bottom swaying as he loaded the fridge.

“Yep,” Andrea answered absently.

“He’s going to be coming here regularly, right?”

We simultaneously tilted our heads as Dairy Guy’s hips changed angles. Andrea sighed, “Yep.”

“Maybe we should arrange for Dick to be elsewhere on delivery nights,” I whispered. “Because you’re drooling. And I don’t blame you because milk does a body goooo— Oh, my God.” My jaw dropped as Dairy Guy turned, and I recognized him as little Jamie Lanier, whom I used to babysit every summer.

Jamie loomed four inches over my tall frame. His warm green eyes twinkled at me from under a faded blue ball cap he’d slapped over his wavy dark blond hair. (Curse my weakness for allAmerican boys!) Every inch of him was toned and tan, and he smelled like Irish Spring soap. I bit back a sigh.

This was the danger of living in the small town where you grew up. Local hotties have to start off somewhere, and generally, it’s as the annoying towheaded Little Leaguer who would only eatsmiley-face pancakes from ages five to seven.

“Miss Jane! Hi!” He flashed those devastating dimples. “It’s great to see you!”

“Jamie. How’s your mom?” I asked, flinching at his use of “Miss,” a sure sign that he thought of me as a senior citizen. “Still teaching?”

“Yep. But she says she’s going to retire now that I’m graduating and she and dad are going to have the house to themselves.”

“You’re graduating from college?” I said, an insane note of desperation in my voice as I tried to do the age math in my head.

“Actually, I’m still a senior at Half-Moon Hollow High. I’m just working at night to save for tuition.”

Forgive me, Lord, I’m the biggest pervert in the world.

“Say hi to your mom for me,” I said as he packed up his hand truck and headed out the door. He waved at us from the delivery van as he pulled away. I stared at the ceiling, then told Andrea, “You may laugh now.”

She guffawed, collapsing against the bar as she held her side. “I’m sorry. It’s just, the look on your face when he said he was graduating fromhigh school!”

I rubbed my hands over my face. “My eyes, they burn.”

“I can’t believe I get to relive this humiliation with every delivery,” Andrea said, rubbing her hands together in anticipatory glee. “This is already my favorite job ever!”

“I think you forget sometimes, I am fully capable of hurting you—” We turned to the front door as a woman in a smart peach raincoat came into the shop, clutching her purse close to her side with one arm and carrying an enormous beribboned basket with the other. Courtney Barrows, Nice Courtney, eyed her surroundings suspiciously, apparently afraid to touch anything.

“Courtney?” I said.

“Jane!” She sighed, relieved to see me.

“And it isn’t even my birthday!” Andrea was clearly thrilled that one of the chamber members had showed up for my brainwashing initiation so soon. She whispered, “Which one?”

I cleared my throat. “Courtney Barrows, this is my associate, Andrea Byrne. Andrea, Courtney Barrows. Courtney owns the Unique Boutique, the sterling-silver shop over on Dogwood.”

“Nice to meet you,” they chorused. I half expected Courtney to curtsy.

“It’s not that I’m not happy to see you again, but what are you doing here?” I asked.

Courtney let out a breathy laugh. “I know! I don’t normally come into this part of town, especially at night. But your store hours are just so odd, I wanted to make sure I caught you,” she said, hauling the giant gift basket onto the counter. “The chamber sent you this, and I volunteered to bring it by. It’s a welcome muffin basket. There’s an orientation folder, a directory, the memory book, and a suggested list of places where you should go begging for game prizes.”

Well, that capped it. If I’d learned anything from Missy the psycho real-estate agent, it was never to trust people bearing gift baskets.

“Memory book?” Andrea asked.

“It’s a little scrapbook for our special events, fund-raisers, that sort of thing.”

“Like a yearbook!” Andrea exclaimed cheerily, then scowled when I pushed the basket at her with more force than was probably necessary. She stifled a giggle and took it to my office. “I’m taking these muffins, by the way! They’re of no use to you!”

Courtney shot me a questioning look. I smiled. “I’m on a no-carb, no-sugar, no-gluten diet. But Andrea will love them. It was really nice of you to bring it by. You didn’t have to come all the way down here.”

“Well, I just liked talking to you so much at the meeting, I thought I’d come by for a visit. I just— I joined the chamber to make some friends. And the ladies at the chamber … I didn’t know what I was getting into when I joined. They’re sort of …”

“Scary?” I suggested.

“And blond?” Andrea shouted from the back of the shop.

I shot Courtney an apologetic smile, but she didn’t seem offended in the least that I’d been talking about the chamber members behind their backs. “Yes. But you were so nice. You know, you’re the first person I’ve met at one of those meetings that hasn’t made fun of the fact that my husband runs a construction company. As if my money is dirty or something, just because my husband’s not a doctor or a lawyer.”

“I was raised by a teacher and a meddlesome homemaker. I mock no one,” I told her, then amended, “unless they deserve it.”

“You’ve lived in the Hollow your whole life. You don’t know what it’s like to try to meet people here when you don’t know anybody.”

“I think you’ve been hanging around the wrong Half-Moon Hollow residents. See, I would imagine your husband probably outearns ninety-five percent of the people in this town. Frankly, I admire anyone who can operate heavy machinery without hurting innocent bystanders.”

She giggled. “See? I told you! You’re a hoot.”

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“That you did. Pull up a seat.”

Courtney gave an exaggerated look around, her face open and pleasant as she climbed up onto the bar stool. “Your shop is, um, really interesting.”

“Thanks. Coffee?” I asked. I pushed a bunch of buttons and hoped a cappuccino would come out. Andrea came running at the rumble of the cappuccino machine, like a mama bear protecting her young. She shooed me away and finished making Courtney’s drink herself.