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She’d finally had him over to her place on the Fourth of July and set out a picnic for them on her balcony—sub sandwiches, fried chicken, potato salad and bottled iced tea. She told him she’d fallen in love with him the first time she heard him try to croak out “Silent Night,” so he could stop with all the crazy stuff. And when was she going to get a ring?
She got one the next day.
Now here was a new woman who’d obviously been interested, and he’d missed his opportunity.
Except, tomorrow she might need a midmorning coffee break.
Maybe he would, too.
Stef had just sent off the needed document when the text from Frankie came in.Call me when you’re done having coffee.
Of course, Frankie would be all excited and hopeful, sure that Stef’s coffee shop encounter was a matter of serendipity. Serendipity had sure fizzled.
Done, she replied.Camille texted and I had to go and he gave up.
He sure gave up easy.
That could happen when your phone was dinging and ringing like crazy. Oh well.
Maybe he’ll be back looking for coffee tomorrow, Frankie suggested.
Maybe he would. Maybe Stef would want to get some coffee at the same time tomorrow.Good idea.
I’m full of good ideas.
That she was, and some of them not so good. It would probably be best if Stef did her own matchmaking without any help from her sister. She’d try the coffee shop again the next day. If the mystery man was there, then she’d know they were meant to meet.
It looked like Stef wasn’t meant to be with her coffee shop surprise. She woke up the morning after their brief encounter feeling like an eighteen-wheeler had run over her head, and she was starting to see sparklers go off to the sides of her eyes. Migraine City. There would be no trip to the coffee shop that morning.
She staggered her way to the bathroom, took a pill and called in sick. Then she lay down on her spinning bed, pulled the blankets over her face and hosted her own little pity party.
Griff just happened into The Coffee Stop at ten thirty. An older couple was seated at one of the wooden tables. In front of him, two women stood in line, one of them holding a baby. The other had a toddler hanging on her arm. It didn’t look promising.
He ordered an Americano and took a seat at one of the high tables by the windows, thumbing through emails on his phone and keeping an eye on the door. An older guy he always saw when he went into the hardware store came in, along with a nice-looking woman, younger than him. The hair color was different, and she wasn’t the same age, but she reminded him of the woman he’d seen the day before. Too bad she wasn’t that woman.
This had been a lame idea. He took his coffee and went back to work.
And tried not to think of the pretty woman with the friendly smile and generous spirit.
12
Barbara opened the final Santa Walk committee meeting by predicting that this year’s Santa Walk would be the best one yet. Of course it would because Barbara was in charge. It was all Frankie could do not to stick her finger in her mouth and pretend to gag.
“I think all we need to do now is finalize our Mrs. Claus pageant,” Barbara continued.
“What’s left to finalize?” Frankie asked. “We’ve got ballot boxes everywhere, and we’re set to use the VFW hall for the pageant.”
“Frankie, sometimes you overlook the details. We still haven’t got judges for the pageant.”
“Do we really need judges? Why can’t we just tally the votes?” asked Frankie.
“It would hardly be a pageant if that’s all we did. Thanks to the suggestion of the gingerbread houses,” Barbara said, her tone of voice showing exactly what she thought of that addition to the pageant, “we now have to have judges.”
“People can vote for their favorite gingerbread house at the event,” Frankie said. “Then we’ll add those to the other votes, which we’ll already have tallied. Simple.”
“I think we should have judges for those,” Barbara insisted. “You can’t have a pageant without judges.”
“Who are we going to get to judge at this late date?” asked Hazel, frowning. “The Santa Walk is right around the corner.”
