Chapter 3

“Do you think I could learn to do that?” Robert asked with a chin thrust to the layered cake I was putting the final touches on for the weekend’s wedding.

He’d made it to Friday without any mishaps, problems, or one single complaint. I don’t know who was more impressed: his father, me, or Robert himself. He’d been upbeat every day when Lucas dropped him off, worked at whatever job I assigned him, which was mostly bussing tables from breakfast, serving and then bussing at lunch, and cleaning and sweeping up after both meals, and not much more. The days had gone swiftly by, and before I could take a few minutes to give him some cooking instructions, his father showed back up to bring him home.

The awkward moment in the kitchen wasn’t mentioned by either Lucas or me, although I would have given anything to know what he’d been thinking that day.

“Of course you can.” I piped the final flourish on the third and top tier and said, “Help me get this into the walk-in fridge. I’ve got some free time until I need to start cooking for the rehearsal dinner, so I can show you a few things.”

“Cool.”

Back in my kitchen, I pulled out a tray of cupcakes I’d made the night before when I couldn’t sleep. Baking always helped me wind down, and somewhere after the third batch was cooling on a wire rack, I’d been able to put my head back down on the pillow and catch a few hours of rest.

My piping bags were still full, so I figured we could use them.

“I need you to do something for me, first, though,” I told him while he washed his hands.

“ ’Kay.”

“Since this kitchen is used for commercial food prep, there’s a laundry list of rules I need to abide by from the state to keep my license to serve valid. One of them concerns hair.”

Robert cocked his head at me, swishing his fringe out of the way when he did.

“You probably noticed Sarah, all the girls who work here, and I keep our hair pulled back in ponytails, or if it’s short, like Jill’s, back from their faces with a headband.”

“Yeah. So?”

I reached into one of my counter drawers and pulled out a hairnet and an elastic band. I showed them to him and said, “You’ve got three options, one of which we can’t deal with today. You’ll either need to cut your hair short enough so it doesn’t keep falling in your face, wear a hairnet over it when we’re dealing with food, or pull it up in a bun. Up to you, but the easiest option is to cut it.”

He stared at me for a few beats. In all truth, from the way his mouth fell open and then slammed shut, to the way he started blinking like he was delivering some kind of Morse code, I figured he was going to tell me to forget the whole thing. Teenaged boys are as vain about their hair as girls are. I knew he wasn’t about to cut it, the thought of wearing a hairnet to keep it contained probably made him nauseous, and let’s be honest, not every guy can rock a man-bun.

It was hard to hide my surprise when he tilted his head, then said, “Okay. I’ll get Dad to take me to get it cut. For now”—he reached out a hand and took the elastic band I held—“I’ll pull it all back. Okay?”

“Fine.” I turned away so he couldn’t see how he’d shocked me.

I washed my hands as he’d done and then pulled out a baking sheet and put a piece of parchment paper on it.

Handing him one of the bags, I said, “I’ll teach you some simple basics first, on this. When you feel comfortable with the maneuvers, you can try them on a cupcake.”

“Don’t you need those for an event or something?”

I grinned at him. “Nope. These are totally for my own pleasure.”

His eyes widened when they drifted over the three dozen I’d pulled from the fridge.

For the next hour, I taught him the basics: how to hold the pastry bag and the right amount of pressure to exert to get the piping perfect. He graduated from straight lines to curlicues in less than ten minutes.

“This is cool,” he said at one point when he was practicing making stars. “But it’s nowhere as easy as you make it look.”

“She makes everything look easy,” Lucas said from the doorway before I could respond.

He was leaning against the jamb, his arms crossed over his chest, one shoulder settled against the woodwork.

“How long have you been standing there?” I asked.

“Long enough for my mouth to water.”

I had the wild hope he meant it as a compliment to me and not my cupcakes.

“Please tell me this is one of those times the kid gets to bring home something to work on?” he asked, coming next to us. “And by work on, I mean eat.”

I couldn’t have pulled back the laugh if I’d tried. Like a five-year-old standing in front of a sweets counter who’d just been told he could have one piece of everything in the candy store, his face broke out into huge, expectant grin.

“God, Dad. Lame, much?”

Lucas faced his son. His facial muscles went slack, and he tilted his head a bit to the side. “Is that a—” He circled a hand in the air. “—whatchamacallit? Ponytail?”

Robert’s cheeks went ruby red in a heartbeat. He dropped his chin to his chest, and his shoulders folded in on themselves. I’m fairly astute at reading body language, a left-over side effect of being the quiet, observant one living with a gregarious, headstrong twin. Right now, I’d have bet a million dollars Robert was trying to make himself smaller, maybe even invisible, by the way he was folding in on himself.

Lucas hadn’t meant to sound so judgmental, but unfortunately that’s how his teenage son had taken his words and the tone slicing through them.

“The technical term is man-bun, and I think Robert’s rocking it,” I said in a voice which left no doubt of it. The boy’s head shot back up to face me, his father doing the same. “Not many guys can pull their longish hair back like he has”—I pointed to Robert—“and still manage to look masculine.”

I explained the need for Robert’s hair to be contained while in my kitchen doing food prep work. “Since he couldn’t get a haircut before we started, it was the best option. He knows if he wants to keep working in the kitchen, though, he’s either gonna have to get it cut or wear it tied back like this every day.”

“You wanna get it cut?” Lucas asked his son, who told him he did.

“We’ll go right now.”

I put the cupcakes Robert had been practicing on in a sample box.

“Please tell me we’re taking those home,” Lucas said.

The sound of his stomach rumbling pulled a laugh from his son and a frown from me.

“Did you have lunch?”

“Nope. Got called to a traffic accident out on Glory Road. I just finished up about ten minutes ago and figured it was easier to pick Robert up now. I’ll grab something while he’s at the barber’s.”

“Sit down.” I pointed to a chair. “Robert, you go get washed up. We can continue with this next week.”

“You don’t have to make anything, Maureen,” Lucas said after his son left the room. “I can scarf down a couple of the cupcakes on the way home.”

Before I could say I had plenty of food left over from lunch, Sarah came in to the kitchen, escorting a visitor.

“Mr. Boyd is here to see you, Maureen.”

Crap. I’d forgotten I’d scheduled a meeting today.

Donovan Boyd stuck out his hand. When I slipped my own into it, his cornflower blue eyes widened and his broad smile beamed.

“Well, it’s lovely to finally put a face to a voice.” Ireland wrapped around his words, and it was impossible not to smile back at him. His lilting tone mimicked my grandmother’s.

“Mr. Boyd, thank you so much for coming out here today. It’s difficult for me to get away during the workday for meetings. I really appreciate it.”

“No problem. I like gettin’ outta the office when I can. And call me Van, darlin’. Mr. Boyd’s me father.”

I laughed. “And I’m Maureen.”

“Maureen O’Dowd.” He shook his head, his handsome smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. “You’ve a name and beautiful face telling me there’s Irish blood running in your veins. Are ya sure you’re not a transplant, like me?”

“Sorry. Born and bred right here in Heaven.”

“Ah, well.”

I glanced down to discover he still held my hand.

When a not-too-subtle throat clearing sprang from next to me, I pulled my hand back and turned. Lucas’s face was filled with curiosity. Eyes pulled a little tighter in the corners, chin dropped a notch, head tilted a few degrees to one side. It was an expression I’d seen him toss my grandmother any number of times when he’d arrested her for some bit of public malfeasance.

“Lucas,” I said, “This is Donovan Boyd. He’s an architect with Ascension Architects. Van, Heaven’s police chief, Lucas Alexander.”

“Nice to meetcha, Chief.” Boyd extended his hand to Lucas, his open smile still in place.

It took him a moment, but Lucas shook it. He didn’t return the smile. “I’d heard Kevin Anderson had someone new working for him.”

“Aye, that’d be me. Arrived about a month ago. They’re keepin’ me busy, for sure.”

Lucas nodded slowly, another sign he was evaluating the man in front of him.

To be honest, Donovan Boyd was a bit of a surprise. I don’t know why, but when we’d spoken on the phone to set up the appointment, I’d gotten the impression he was older, maybe forties, or even early fifties. I was wrong. He was a few years older than me, but not by much. Tall and lean, he had wide shoulders that filled out the sports jacket he wore nicely. Those clear eyes occupied a pale, angular face, sharp with high cheekbones I was a little jealous of. A thick thatch of midnight hair sprinkled with thin threads of gray at the temples was a stark contrast to the light blue in his eyes.

Nanny’s voice shot into my head. He’s Black Irish, Number Four. A striking combination and easy on the eyes, to be sure.

She wasn’t wrong.

“You all settled in, then?” Lucas asked.

“Aye. Got a little place over on Rapture Road.” He chuckled. “Funny name for a street, eh? I keep expectin’ to see angels come ’round every corner.”

“All the streets have some kind of biblical tag.” I grinned. “The town charter dictates it. All the businesses, too, have to abide by the rule. Hence”—I lifted a hand and swiped it around the room—“Inn Heaven and Ascension Architects.”

“It’s charmin’ and quaint, to be sure.”

“I’m curious,” Lucas said, interrupting us. “What brought you to our town? Ireland’s a ways from here. You have family in the area?”

“Unfortunately, no. It’s just me.” His gaze slid back to me for a second. “For now.”

Both men continued to stare at one another. I got the feeling there was some kind of hidden male telepathy-agenda going on between them, but for the life of me I couldn’t figure out what it was.

Men were such a mystery. Growing up in an estrogen cloud with three sisters, Nanny, and my mother, I’d never learned the ins and outs of the male mind. My father tended to shut himself up in his office more times than not to avoid all the female drama occupying the daily lives of his girls.

The looks passing between these two were…interesting, to say the least.

“Kevin’s an old friend of my former employer,” Van told him. “They went to college together. When the position opened up, Liam—that’s me old boss—thought it might be something of interest to me, seeing as I’d been lookin’ for a change.” He focused on me again. “He wasn’t wrong.”

“Still. You’re a long way from home.”

“I am, it’s true. But this is a delightful town you have here. I’m finding it, and the people, most welcoming.”

“Dad?” Robert came back into the kitchen, his hair back down. “I’m ready to go.

Lucas glanced at his son, then back to Boyd. “My son, Robert,” he said.

With a smile and a nod for the boy, Boyd turned to me and lifted a cylindrical tube. “I brought a few preliminary sketches with me for ya to go over, based on our brief conversation last week.”

“Great. We can use my office.” I handed the box of cupcakes to Robert. “Don’t let your father eat all of these,” I told him. “You enjoy them, too, since you decorated them.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Sketches?” Lucas asked me. “Of what?”

“Nosy, much?” I fisted my hands on my hips. “Don’t you have stuff to do? Barbers to visit? Criminals to apprehend?”

His brows pulled into kissing distance. “I’ve got a minute.”

I rolled my eyes and shook my head before I opened the refrigerator. While I pulled out leftovers from lunch service, I said, “If you have to know, I’m expanding the inn. With a full house almost every weekend, I’ve had to turn people away more than I’d like.”

Now those brows rose almost to his hairline. “I didn’t know you were thinking of adding on.”

“Why would you?”

He shrugged.

“I’ve been mulling around the idea for a while.” I took a shopping bag out from the pantry closet. “Eileen had a dream to build individual guest houses out in the back of the property for families when we first bought the inn. Unfortunately, the idea got pushed to the back burner when, well…when everything happened.”

I didn’t need to explain the reason it had to Lucas.

He nodded.

“Now seemed like a good idea to start exploring my options. Here.” I handed him the shopping bag filled with the wrapped tin-foiled leftovers. “This should be enough for the three of you for dinner.”

Lucas stared down at the bag, then back to me. With his tongue pressed against the inside of his cheek and his head titled at an angle again, he looked a little confused. About what, I hadn’t a clue.

“Dad? Are we going, or what?”

He pulled out of his musings and, with a deep breath, nodded. “Thanks for this.”

I swiped my hand in the air. “Don’t forget Nanny’s party starts at twelve. Sharp,” I told them. “And she hates—”

“When anyone’s late,” Lucas finished. “Yeah, I know. I’m always on time, so don’t worry.”

“Your dad’s invited, too. Nanny specifically asked for you to bring him.”

“Easier said than done,” he mumbled.

Robert groaned. When he realized he’d been heard, a deep flush drenched his face and neck.

“I can only promise to try,” Lucas said. “If he’s in a mood, well…”

“Let him have one of those”—I pointed to the box of cupcakes—“tonight, and tell him I’m baking more for the party. It might persuade him to come.”

His grin shot out so fast I wasn’t prepared for its power over me, so I didn’t have time to brace myself. Instead, my breath hissed in audibly and my neck grew hot.

“I know it would convince me to,” he said, oblivious to my reaction.

With one last glance at Boyd, he tossed me a nod. “Catch you later. And thanks again.” He lifted the bag of food.

Once my kitchen was empty of the Alexander men, I took a calming breath and smiled at my guest. “Okay. I need to start cooking soon, but I’m all yours for the next thirty minutes.”

The charming grin on his face widened when he said, “Now there’s a proposal a man would have to be daft to refuse.”

The half hour flew by as Boyd showed me the ideas he’d drawn up.

I was impressed. By both the time and effort he’d put into the drawings and layouts, and with the man himself.

The subtle mirth in his smile and the concentrated way his eyes held my own for a beat longer than was required showed me he was a bit of a flirt, not unlike my grandmother. The two of them could have been cut from the same bolt of flirt fabric, in fact. While I was used to the way my grandmother acted around any human with an X and Y chromosome, it was an unfamiliar sensation having that kind of attention focused on me.

Before he left, we made another appointment for the following week to give him enough time to draft the changes we’d discussed. Once again he agreed to come to the inn.

“I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it,” I said as I held the front door open for him. “Running this place takes up most of my time and leaving even for a few hours during the day can be hard at times, so thanks again.”

While he shook my hand and continued to hold on to it, a tiny line sprouted between his brows. “You’re busy during the day.” He nodded. “But do you never take a night off, then? Just to relax and maybe pop down to the pub for a bit?”

I laughed before I could think not to.

“And that’s amusin’, why now?”

I shook my head. “Not amusing, sorry. This is a twenty-four-hour-a-day business. There’s not a lot of room to pop out anywhere for a drink, a quick meal, or much of anything else.”

“You’ve got assistants, though, haven’tcha? The lovely woman who let me in, Sarah, it is? Sure, she could spot ya a time or two?”

“I couldn’t run this place without her, that’s the truth. But she’s got her own family to go home to every night. I live here, and truthfully the last thing I want to do after being on my feet all day is to go out, especially when I have to be up at an early hour each day to get breakfast for my guests.”

He tilted his head and leaned a shoulder against the door jam, his concentration centered on me. “So if I suggested we meet at, what’s it called now? The Love Shack, aye?”

I nodded.

“If I asked ya to come and join me for a pint one evening when you’ve an hour to spare, would you?”

I shouldn’t have been surprised by the invitation. He had been, after all, giving me signals he was interested in more than just the plans while we’d gone over them. It had been years, though, since I’d been involved with a man. In any capacity, be it meeting for a quick drink, or dating. Not since I’d walked out on my last boyfriend when he’d selfishly ordered me to choose between him or my sister.

“Ah, I can see you’re debating the pros and cons, as such,” Van said, laughter in his voice. “You’re a dying breed, Maureen, darlin’,” he added, his mouth twisting into a grin.

“A dying breed?”

“Aye. A dedicated business owner who puts the needs of others ahead of her own. ’Tis charmin’ and a wee bit daunting for a man.”

As far as compliments go, it was a lovely one. Why, then, didn’t it fill me with pleasure?

“Well, I’ll be heading out, now.” He lifted the cylinder. “I’ll work on these and incorporate the things you want included for next time.”

He stopped and turned before he was through the threshold. With a glint in his eyes, he cocked his head as he regarded me. “Let me know if you decide there’s more pros than cons to my idea of sharing a pint or two of an evening.”

He bent and kissed my cheek, then walked to his car, whistling as he did.

When I closed the door behind him, I leaned my head against it and dragged in a breath.

Eileen, my deceased twin, had been the sister the male population had been drawn to as naturally as hummingbirds are to nectar. Vivacious, mercurial, and an apprentice at my grandmother’s knee in the coquette department, Eileen was the sister who’d never gone dateless one weekend in high school or college. She’d been Prom Queen, voted Best Liked by our graduating class, and elected Class President during our senior year. College had been no different.

My entire life I’d watched from the sidelines as she’d brought sunshine and warmth into the life of every boy she’d dated. Her breakups were never dramatic or torturous, and she was able to remain friends with all her exes.

I was labeled the quiet twin. Shy and unobtrusive. A thinker and a loner.

The descriptions were spot on. I was happy to stay in the background while Eileen shone in the foreground. Her death hadn’t changed the dynamics of my personality one whit. I was still the private, silent one who spent a lot of time in her head and alone with her thoughts.

So, to have a man like Donovan Boyd show his interest in more than a professional way toward me—well, it was a little strange, a little baffling, and a whole lot of flattering.

And I had no idea how to deal with those strange emotions.

Now, if only a certain chief of police could show the same kind of interest.

Ah, well.

With a sigh, I got back to work.