Eliza had always been a whizz with her sewing machine, whereas Libby could barely manage to sew on a button. Stick her in the kitchen, though, and that was another story. She’d learned to bake at her mother’s hip and the café was a way of honouring those precious moments and keeping them fresh in her mind. Beth was the organised one, who would help her sort out the business side of things. Libby had experience helping her dad keep the books for the chip shop, but it would still take a lot of work to adapt to a more extensive menu. Work that would be much easier with Beth to guide her through it.
Eliza removed the apron she’d been wearing over a mint green shirt and matching capri pants and hung it on one of the pegs. ‘So, what does your dad think about your plans?’ Libby screwed up her face but didn’t say anything. Her dad would be 65 next year and the years of hard work were starting to show. He’d dropped a few hints about retiring after his birthday, and that was one of the reasons she was hoping their accountant might be raising the topic at today’s meeting.
She hadn’t mentioned it herself, because she didn’t want her dad to feel like she was pushing him out the door. When he was ready to take that step, she’d sit him down and go through her ideas. ‘You’re going to have to tell him some time.’ Eliza laughed. ‘Listen to me, Little Miss Assertive telling you what to do, when I’m just as bad.’
Libby slung an arm around her friend’s shoulder and leaned close until their heads were touching. ‘We’re hopeless. Remember when we were kids how we couldn’t wait to be all grown-up and be in control of our lives?’ She sighed.
Humming sympathetically, Eliza nodded. ‘We thought it would be so exciting, only no one told us how difficult it would be. I can’t for the life of me remember why we were in such a hurry.’
‘Because we wanted to have all that great sex we kept reading about in those copies of Cosmopolitan we used to steal from Beth’s mum.’
‘Ha! We should sue them for false advertising because we’re still bloody waiting.’ Eliza pulled back to regard her. ‘Well, I am, at least, although you’ve been very quiet in that regard. Any scorching hot love affairs you want to tell me about?’
As it had far too frequently in the past weeks, the image of Owen Coburn sprang to mind, all cocky smile and hard-bodied perfection. The fluttering that followed dissolved into a deep stab of humiliation. He’d stood out—a bright flame among the usual Saturday night crowd in The Siren, and she’d floated across the bar like a mesmerised moth driven by a fatal combination of bone-deep loneliness and a haze of hormones. And damn, had he burned her with that incredulous look in his eyes.
Men who looked like him probably had women throwing themselves at him all the time. He’d have his pick of gorgeous women with pretty hair and curves in all the right places, so she couldn’t really blame him for dismissing her unconventional looks and a figure that barely rippled from shoulder to hip.
And if the way he’d stared at her like she’d escaped from the local freak show hadn’t been bad enough, his sneering dismissal of her beloved bay had killed her attraction to him stone dead. Well, apart from when she closed her eyes at night and her treacherous brain wove alternative versions of their disastrous meeting that left her blushing in the dark and aching for something she shouldn’t want, and could never be.
Catching a curious glance from Eliza, she realised she’d been quiet for too long. In an effort to distract her, Libby pasted on a grin and waggled her eyebrows. ‘Only in my dreams. I keep trying to persuade Beth to dish the dirt on Sam so at least I’d have something to fuel my fantasies, but she just gives me that “cat that got the cream” look and refuses.’
As she’d hoped, one mention of Sam was enough to turn Eliza off the scent. Scrunching up her delicate nose, Eliza grimaced. ‘Ugh, and ew, that’s my brother you’re talking about.’ Her expression turned from disgust to something more encouraging. ‘Once the summer gets underway there’ll be lots of guys around desperate to snap you up. You’re just having a dry spell, that’s all.’
‘More than a spell, parts of my anatomy have been officially declared a desert zone.’ As they laughed together, Libby considered what Eliza had said. The influx of visitors over the summer might well increase her chances of finding someone she half-liked the look of. If she could only get a certain arrogant smile out of her head for five minutes. Owen Coburn wasn’t her type, and he’d made it crystal clear that she most certainly wasn’t his, so why couldn’t she forget about him and move on?
Not that there was anything to move on from. Those few cross words they’d exchanged had been the closest she’d come to intimacy with a man for nearly a year, which was embarrassing to the point of being pathetic. There’d been guys in her life before—even one a few years ago who’d got serious enough to start hinting at something more permanent, but he’d been hell bent on leaving the bay and couldn’t understand her desire to stay so they’d gone their separate ways—and there’d be guys again. She needed to snap out of it, and Eliza was right. Someone nice was bound to show up at some point over the summer, and Libby intended to be ready to catch him when he did. From this moment onwards, Owen bloody Coburn no longer existed.
‘I can’t believe he’s back in town. What the hell is he doing here?’ Libby muttered as she sank down on the toilet seat in Beth’s little bathroom where her friend was putting the final touches to her make-up for the evening. She’d managed little more than a quick shower and a change of clothes after helping her dad with the early evening rush. There wasn’t any point in dressing up, it wasn’t like she would be seeing anyone worth making an effort for. ‘Liar,’ whispered the traitorous voice in her head.
Beth ran a pale-pink lipstick over her lips and pursed them together before she met Libby’s eyes in the mirror. ‘I don’t know why he’s here, but it sounds like he might be interested in what Sam’s doing with the restaurant, so it looks like we’ll be stuck with his company.’ Turning her gaze back to her own reflection, Beth ran a brush through her glossy mane of chestnut hair. ‘I don’t get what the big deal is, Libs. I know he’s a bit up himself, but you’re acting like we’re supping with the devil.’
Libby pulled a face, knowing she was overreacting to the whole business. When she’d walked away from Owen after that first meeting, she’d fully intended to forget him. He might have been the most gorgeous man ever to set foot in the county, but he’d made her feel like a bug under the microscope and been rude about her beloved Lavender Bay to boot! Unfortunately, her subconscious had other ideas and Owen kept popping up in her dreams, the details of which were lurid enough to make a sailor blush. With no prospect of Owen returning, it had seemed harmless enough to distract herself with a daydream or two.
And then Eliza had casually dropped his name into conversation during their recent girls’ night and butterflies had been somersaulting in her middle ever since. Not only was the object of several embarrassing fantasies back in the bay and staying at The Siren, he and Sam were somehow considering going into business together! In the hopes of getting him onside, Sam had asked Beth—and by association, Libby— to join them for a drink that evening.
How the hell she would be able to look him in the eye and not burst into flames from sheer embarrassment, she had no idea. ‘I don’t like him.’ It wasn’t exactly a lie… Hiding her discomfort behind a scowl, she folded her arms. ‘If I remember rightly, you’re not exactly his biggest fan, either.’
Beth turned on the stool, and it was all Libby could do not to wilt under the sweet concern in her eyes. ‘What’s got into you? The main reason for tonight is to meet Jack, and give Eliza a bit of