‘Who picks you up from Mrs Benedict’s? Daddy?’
‘Yes, at five o’clock on the dot at Mrs Benedict’s front gate,’ Melly recited.
Jaz glanced at her watch. ‘That’s nearly an hour away. You know what, Melly? In celebration of making my very first new friend in Clara Falls, I’m going to close the shop early today and walk with you to Mrs Benedict’s.’
Melly’s eyes grew round. ‘I’m your friend?’
‘You bet.’
Then Melly beamed at her, really smiled, and the ache pressed so hard against the walls of Jaz’s chest that she thought it’d split her open then and there.
Jaz found Connor leaning against the shop front when she arrived at eight-fifteen on Tuesday morning. He held out the key she’d given him yesterday. ‘I had a spare one cut. Sorry I didn’t get it back to you yesterday.’
She reached out, closed her fingers around it. It still held warmth from his hand. ‘Thank you.’
He looked exactly as the radio weatherman had described the weather that morning—cold and clear with a chill in the air, blue skies hinting at the warmth to come later in the day. She didn’t know about the warmth to come.
‘You closed the shop early yesterday.’
No judgement, just an observation. He looked tired. Something inside her softened to the consistency of water or air…marshmallow.
Not marshmallow! She didn’t do marshmallow any more.
But that weariness…it caught at her.
He and Faye had only lasted two years.
Had Connor married Faye on the rebound?
The thought had never occurred to her before. But that marriage… It had happened so fast…
Her knees locked. No! She would not get involved in this man’s life again. She would not give him the power to destroy her a second time.
But that weariness…
She hadn’t noticed it yesterday or on Saturday. All she’d noticed then was his goldenness. The goldenness might’ve dimmed, but that didn’t make him any less appealing. With his hair damp from a recent shower, the scent of his shampoo enhanced rather than masked the scent of autumn that clung to him.
She tried to pinpoint the individual elements that brought that scent to life, hoping to rob it of its power. A hint of eucalyptus, recently tilled earth… and fresh-cut pumpkin. Those things together shouldn’t be alluring. It didn’t stop Jaz from wanting to press her face against his neck and gulp in great, greedy breaths.
Good Lord. Stop it!
‘I closed fifteen minutes early. I had things to do.’
She wondered if she should tell him about Melanie.
She recalled the way Melly’s face had lit up when Jaz had declared them friends and knew she couldn’t. Not yet. If Melly hadn’t confided in Connor by the end of the week, though, she would have to.
‘Have you found new staff yet?’ Connor all but growled the words.
Jaz unlocked the door, proud that her hand didn’t shake, not even a little. ‘I’m working on it.’
‘Will someone be in to help today?’
‘Perhaps.’
He followed her into the bookshop. ‘Perhaps! Do you think that’s good enough?’
‘I don’t think it’s any of your concern.’
He followed her all the way through to the kitchenette.
‘Coffee?’
Idiot. Mentally she kicked herself. Coffee was way too chummy.
Relief didn’t flood her, though, when he shook his head. Work boots thumped overhead and an electric saw rent the air. ‘Sorry. I hope we’re not disturbing you too much.’
‘Not at all.’ That didn’t bother her in the slightest. Seeing Connor every day…now that was tougher.
Don’t go there.
‘What time do you start work?’ she asked, because it suddenly seemed wise to say something, and fast.
‘Seven-thirty.’
She swung around from making coffee. ‘Yet you didn’t knock off yesterday till just before five?’
One corner of his mouth kinked up as if he’d read the word slave-driver in big letters across her forehead. ‘My apprentices knocked off at three-thirty.’
But he’d hung around at least an hour longer?
‘Look, Connor, you don’t need to bust a gut getting the work done in double-quick time, you know. If it takes an extra week or two…’ She trailed off with a shrug, hoping she looked as nonchalant as she sounded. He really should be at home spending time with Melly.
His jaw tightened. ‘I said it would be completed asap and I meant it. I at least have employees to help me.’
He planted his legs, hands on hips, and Jaz’s saliva glands suddenly remembered how to work. Heavens, Connor Reed was still seriously drool-worthy.
‘What do you mean to do about it?’ he demanded.
She stepped back. Stared. Then she shook herself. He meant her staffing problem.
Of course that was what he meant.
‘Get straight to work. That’s what I mean to do. I have oodles to get through today.’ She wanted to spend between now and nine o’clock trying to coax the secrets out of that ancient computer, particularly the ones that would point her in the direction of her suppliers.
After she’d walked Melly to Mrs Benedict’s front gate this afternoon, she’d return and see what else she could coax from it.
Just for a moment, gold sparked from the brown depths of Connor’s eyes. ‘Have you settled in at Gwen’s? Are you comfortable there?’
‘Very comfortable, thank you.’
Not true. Oh, her room and en-suite bathroom, the feather bed, were all remarkably comfortable. Gwen’s reception, though, hadn’t been all Jaz had hoped for.
She made herself smile, saluted Connor with her mug of coffee. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.’ Then she fled to the stockroom before those autumn-tinted eyes saw the lies in her own.
The computer did not divulge her suppliers’ identities. It didn’t divulge much of anything at all. Who on earth was she supposed to phone, fax or email to order in new books? She started clicking indiscriminately on word documents but none of them seemed to hold a clue. Before she had a chance to start rifling through the filing cabinet, it was time to open the shop.
Business wasn’t as brisk as it had been the previous day, but she still had a steady stream of customers—all tourists. As she’d had to do the previous day, whenever she went to the bathroom she hung a ‘Back in five minutes’ sign on the door.
She breathed a sigh when it was time to close the shop and walk Melly the five blocks to Mrs Benedict’s front gate.
‘Melly, why don’t you want to tell your dad that you’re unhappy at Mrs Benedict’s?’
Melly stopped skipping to survey Jaz soberly. ‘Because Daddy has lots of worries and Mrs Benedict is his last hope.’ She leaned in close to confide, ‘I know because I heard him say so to Grandma. There’s no one else who can look after me and I’m too little to stay at home alone.’
‘I think your happiness is more important than anything