Wynn Sheehan unlocked the back door and stepped inside the dark storage room. In less than an hour, the quiet would be overwhelmed by clanging pots, sizzling bacon, coffeepots hissing and the murmur of simultaneous conversation. For now, though, she had the Hilltop Café all to herself.
She tucked her long blond hair into a knot and started the morning checklist. Open the blinds, turn on the lights, start the first pot of coffee and the first batch of cinnamon rolls, scramble the eggs, make the batter. She’d watched her mother go through these same motions, and there was something comforting about it. No matter where she had gone, or what she had done, things here, at least, stayed the same.
Measuring flour, shortening and buttermilk, she made the biscuits from a recipe she would’ve sworn she’d long ago banished from her memory. She’d had plans, a sackful of dreams to leave this little town and make her mark on history. She was going to change the world. She’d been passionate and driven.
And naive. So unbelievably naive.
Never would she have thought she would be back at the Hilltop, or back in Red Hill Springs, for that matter, but the Wynn who left for college with stars in her eyes, never planning to come back, was gone.
She’d found herself with no choices and worse, no friends. She didn’t even know when it had happened, how she’d gotten so isolated. Well, looking back, she did know how. She’d been so focused on her job and her boss, the charismatic congressman from Virginia, that she hadn’t had time for anyone else.
She hadn’t even seen anyone else.
The timer dinged and she pulled the cinnamon rolls out of the oven, then slid the first pan of biscuits into place. Next up, the frosting for the cinnamon rolls.
By the time she got to the task of unlocking the doors, it had been an hour and a half. Six a.m. straight on the dot. And Mr. Haney and Mr. Donovan were waiting outside the door, just like they always were.
Mickey, the cook, let himself in the back door and made his way into the kitchen, lifting his apron off the hook and dropping it around his neck.
“Cutting it close, aren’t you, Uncle Mickey?”
His bushy gray eyebrows lowered even farther over his eyes. “Where’s your mother?”
“She’s out at the farm helping Claire get the kids ready for school. Joe had an emergency callout in the middle of the night. Don’t worry, I didn’t mess anything up.”
He slid his hand into a pot holder and pulled out the biscuits before sending her a sideways glance. “Never said you did, girlie. Now get out there and see what the customers want. Lanna doesn’t come in until seven today.”
Armed with a pot of coffee, Wynn rounded the counter with a smile for Mr. Haney and Mr. Donovan. “Hello there, gentlemen.”
Mr. Haney looked up from squinting at the menu, his reading glasses tucked into the front pocket of his overalls, as usual. “Well, hello, darlin’. I’m going to be back here tomorrow if I get to look at that pretty face.”
“You’re here every day, Mr. Haney.” Wynn sent him a wink, filled his mug and dropped a handful of creamers onto the table for her favorite farmer.
Mr. Donovan nodded to her as she poured his coffee. “I’ll have the blueberry pancakes.”
“Cinnamon roll and bacon on the side for me, Wynn.” Mr. Haney slid his menu back into the holder. “I don’t know why I look at the menu. I get the same thing every day.”
“I’ll keep the coffee coming.” She turned back toward the counter and discovered that when she’d been in the kitchen with Mickey a couple more men had settled in a booth toward the front.
The practiced smile firmly in place, she started toward them, her feet stumbling to a stop as she realized one of them was her brother’s friend Latham Grant. He’d practically grown up in the room next door to hers, and when they were teenagers she’d had the most miserable crush on him, one which left her stuttering over her words and tripping over nonexistent things.
They’d been friends, too, until they weren’t. She closed her eyes for a brief second. There were so many things she needed to do here, so many relationships to repair. Nothing like returning home to give you some clarity about all the people you’d hurt along the way.
She hadn’t seen him around in the month or so she’d been back. Maybe it was wishful thinking to have hoped it would stay that way. He was just as ruggedly good-looking as he always had been, with muscles from actual work and not the gym, and that lock of dark hair that curled onto his forehead as he studied the menu.