AllFreeNovel
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“What are you doing here?”
Summer greets me with a kiss on the cheek, smudging me with paint.
“I just came by to see if you needed any help,” I say.
My sisters, Summer and Harmony, are busy putting the finishing touches on the yogurt shop, Little Spoon, and have repeatedly refused my help.
But on my late afternoon stroll with Graham after my shift at the feed store, I couldn’t resist stopping by and checking out the place.
Harmony waves to Graham and me from her perch on the stepladder, holding a pink-covered roller brush. The replica pressed-tin ceiling is three-fourths finished in a bright, peppermint pink color. Graham waves up at his aunt from where he sits in the stroller, eating puffed veggie snacks.
“I think we’ve got it covered,” Summer says, her blue coveralls speckled with white and pink. “But thanks.”
Everyone in our family has always been fiercely independent about everything. They didn’t want my advice or help on this venture, insisting I was too busy. And they were right. I’m proud of how far they’ve come, but I can never resist giving them a little bit of shit.
“That color makes me crave peppermint ice cream. Good choice,” I say.
Summer glares at me. “It’s a frozen yogurt shop,” she says. “Not ice cream.”
“Oh,” I say, feigning disappointment. “Are you sure you can’t keep a Ben and Jerry’s pint in the freezer for me?”
Summer rolls her eyes. “No, Owen. I can’t. If you want an ice cream shop, then you open an ice cream shop.”
The thought of doing anything more than what I currently do makes me queasy.
“No thanks,” I say.
“Then keep your business opinions to yourself,” she says with a grin, waving a pink-smeared brush at me.
She doesn’t know I have my own business ventures to worry about. The corporate franchise that owns the feed store will likely go out of business within the next few years. I’ve been thinking of dipping into my savings, buying the property, and expanding the place into a garden center. Not only that, but my bigger dream is to make the location a learning hub for anyone who wants to learn how to start their own farms. I’ve already spoken to the state university extension office about teaching classes like beekeeping and animal husbandry. But I haven’t told my sisters any of that. I’ve always been the type of guy who says very little about his plans, until his plans are already underway. I just have to keep saving my pennies, and hopefully, the timing will be right.
“I’ll try to remember that,” I say, with a wink for my sister.
Someone wearing a delivery uniform knocks on the currently doorless doorframe just then. “I’m supposed to deliver a commercial freezer?”
Summer shrieks with joy. “Yes, that’s me! Bring it around to the back, and I’ll show you where to put it!”
Harmony does a little dance on the top of the stepladder. “Yay! The freezers are here!”
“Careful, sis!” I call up to her.
She dances even more vigorously because that’s what my younger sisters always do. They love to tease me for being bossy and overprotective. Graham giggles and tries to reach for his aunt. Time to get him away from the job site.
“Let me know if you need any help with anything. I mean it,” I call up to Harmony.
She gives a little salute, and I wheel Graham outside.
The delivery truck partially blocks the sidewalk, and I have to wheel the stroller around the ramp.
I pause and put the brakes on the stroller, away from the action.
“Hey, guys?” I say to the delivery men in the truck’s cargo area, loading the commercial freezer onto a dolly. “The girls said to use the alleyway, not the street entrance. There’s drop cloths and equipment everywhere in there, and it’s gonna cause an accident.”
One of them grunts, “We’re here now. And we’re behind schedule. We know what we’re doing.”
I’m about to tell them they’re not allowed to block the sidewalk without setting up cones, but several things happen all at once that steal the words from my mouth: A woman with a strangely familiar shape and long blonde hair is walking backward toward me, holding a phone in the air, taking photos of the courthouse.
I have to tear my eyes away from her shapely ass when I realize that she’s about to trip over the metal ramp. At the same time, the horrible sound of twisting metal echoes from the back of the delivery truck. Someone shouts a curse. A stainless steel box careens down the ramp.
