by Debbie Mason
Abby subscribed to the Go big or go home way of thinking when it came to business. She just hoped her lack of sleep didn’t mess with her head, because the mayor had suggested they hold the meeting at Three Wise Women Bookstore.
She parked the tour bus on Main Street. Other than the hardware store, the grocery store, Penelope’s Pet Emporium, and the Village Green, she hadn’t seen much of the pretty mountain town. The street was lined with leafy trees and old-fashioned black lampposts from which baskets of cascading orange and fuchsia flowers hung. Wooden and wrought-iron benches for weary shoppers and people watchers dotted the sidewalk.
The street was warm and welcoming, just like the shop windows proudly displaying their wares from beneath colorful awnings. Brick storefronts were interspersed with wooden storefronts and Victorian homes with gingerbread trim. Three Wise Women Bookstore was housed in a stately white Victorian house with violet trim.
In her great-aunt’s second journal, which Abby was currently reading, the bookstore had been just a pipe dream. But Liz had mapped everything out to the smallest detail. Abby saw similarities between herself and her aunt as she read. They were both driven and determined, and Liz believed in Go big or go home as much as Abby did. Her aunt hadn’t had much money either, and yet she’d made her dreams come true. With a little help from her friends, Abby thought, looking up at the bookstore from where she stood on the sidewalk.
A white car with a blue Highland Falls logo pulled up behind the tour bus. Chief Campbell.
She briefly closed her eyes on a sigh and then turned to Sadie, who’d joined her on the sidewalk. They were both wearing their tour bus uniforms: white shirts, kilts, wool socks, and kick-butt black boots. “You know, Sadie, I think you should present our vision to the town. After all, they’re your friends and neighbors.”
“I can’t. You have to do it. You’re way more enthusiastic and convincing than me. Besides”—she lowered her voice—“I’m afraid I’ll slip up about the you-know-what.”
The last thing Abby wanted was for Elsa and members of the Sisterhood to get word of their plans for the standing stones. Even Sadie had no idea how elaborate Abby’s plans had become. As she’d tossed in her sleep the night before, the ideas had kept coming, each one bigger than the last. And, she was positive, more lucrative.
“It’s okay. I’ll do it.” Abby glanced to her right as the chief approached with his thumbs hooked into his gun belt.
“So what’s this I hear about you cooking up a new get-rich scheme, Fancy Pants? It better not have anything to do with the farm or the barn, or this time I won’t allow the Mackenzie family to sway me. I’ll put you in jail and throw away the key.”
Abby opened her mouth to tell him what she thought about his threat and to remind him the farmhouse was hers to do with as she pleased. Then she closed it. Like Elsa, Owen had featured heavily in her aunt’s journals. He’d been Liz’s biggest cheerleader and champion, sticking with her through thick and thin.
So while Abby had yet to see the characteristics that made her aunt love the man, she gave him a smile and the respect Liz would’ve expected her to give. “You’ll hear all about it in a few minutes, Chief. And just so you know, I’ve cleared it with Hunter.” Cleared it as in she’d been completely aboveboard with her plans, not that he’d given them a thumbs-up. Still, the chief didn’t need to know that.
That got her a harrumph from Owen. But as he held open the door for her and Sadie, he asked, “How’s he doing? I heard about what happened at Summer Solstice with Sloane and her mother. I was tempted to set the two of them straight, but he’d probably never speak to me again if I did.”
And there it was, a hint of why her aunt loved this man. She gave the chief’s arm a reassuring pat. “He’s okay. And if he actually lets what I told him sink in, he’ll be better than okay.”
He frowned. “What did you tell him?”
Abby hesitated as several women, including Elsa and the mayor, looked over from where they stood in front of a sweeping staircase of polished honey-colored wood. The rooms on either side of the staircase had been opened up to reveal shelves upon shelves stuffed full of books. Small groupings of brown leather chairs sat on an oriental rug in the space to her left. At the back of the room on the right, an ornate wooden bar served as a checkout counter. A gilt-framed mirror with gold veining leaned against the red-painted wall behind it, creating a dramatic backdrop. As did the gold chandeliers.
Abby smiled at the women before lowering her voice to tell the chief what she’d told Hunter about Sloane not blaming him before he shut Abby up with a kiss that blew her mind. She didn’t tell the chief that part, but she might as well have, considering his look of shock. At least it wasn’t tinged with horror. And she knew that because he rewarded her with a half smile, waving Elsa over to share what Abby had just told him.
Hunter’s aunt nodded as she listened to Owen, then she surprised Abby by saying, “Perhaps my best friend knew what she was doing after all. Thank you for being there for our boy.”
“It was—” Abby began before a panicked-looking Sadie waved her over. She was standing with her grandmother, the owner of Bites of Bliss, and another woman.
“Ina and my grandmother are pumping me for information about our new tour, Abby. So maybe you should get on with the presentation? I don’t want to spoil anything.”
“I’ll grab myself a coffee before the meeting begins,” Owen said as he walked away.
As Elsa headed in Granny MacLeod’s direction, she moved three woman along, and Abby caught a glimpse of a round display. There, prominently featured among the stacks of books, were several copies of Outlander.
Abby picked one up, hoping to gauge just how much the bookstore owner knew about the series. “My friends back in LA are rabid fans of this show.”
Elsa walked back to the table. “The television series was adapted from Diana Gabaldon’s books. They were wildly popular before the show and are even more so now. I prefer the books myself.”
“I’ll have to give them a try,” Abby said as she mentally edited all references to Outlander from her upcoming sales pitch. She’d focus not only on the busloads of tourists they’d bring to town but also on the free, national advertising they’d get from being featured on her YouTube channel.
“Let me know if you do, and I’ll order them for you in audio.” At what must’ve looked like her blank stare, Elsa said, “You mentioned your difficulties reading so I thought perhaps you’d prefer listening to the books instead.”
Abby looked around at the rows upon rows of books in either room. It was as if Elsa had opened up a whole new world for her. “Thank you. I never would’ve thought to ask. Until I moved here, I did whatever I could to avoid reading. But the way my aunt talks about books in her journal made me feel like I was missing out.”
“Not anymore you won’t. I’m making it my mission to guide you on your journey from book hater to book lover.” She smiled and reached for Abby’s hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Lizzie would be so happy to know her words inspired you to give reading another chance.”
“She loved you and Owen very much, you know.” Abby smiled as she glanced around the bookstore again. “This is exactly how she’d imagined it. She must’ve loved it here.”
“She did, and I hope you come to love it too. Now, let’s hear about this new tour you and Sadie are introducing.”
* * *
Two hours later, as they walked back to the tour bus, Sadie said, “Can you believe how well that went? I’m still in shock. I mean, don’t get me wrong, you made an even bigger believer out of me today. But I didn’t expect Elsa and Owen to get onboard so easily. They actually seemed excited about it.”
Even better to Abby’s way of thinking, they seemed to have changed their minds about her. She didn’t realize until today how much she’d wanted Owen and Elsa to like her. Maybe because they’d meant so much to her aunt, a woman Abby had grown to love through reading her journals. And now that she seeme
d to be growing on her aunt’s best friends, Abby didn’t want to do anything to upset them.
“So,” she said as they got back on the tour bus and she slid into the driver’s seat, “I think we’re going to pare back some of the events at the standing stones. We won’t have Hunter build any permanent structures there.”
He probably wouldn’t have agreed to anyway. She’d been thinking of having him build a replica of Jamie and Claire’s cabin on Fraser’s Ridge and also life-size stand-ins of the couple for people to stick their faces in and pose for pictures. She’d planned on stand-ins for Brianna and Roger too.
“Um, I didn’t know about the permanent structures. But I’m onboard with doing away with them and paring down the events,” Sadie said.
“Sorry, I forgot I hadn’t mentioned them to you yet. We’ll just do the one event at the standing stones and keep it low-key and respectful.”
An hour later, sitting with Sadie at the farmhouse’s dining room table on a Skype call with Mallory Maitland, discussing her expectations for the bachelorette party tour, Abby’s earlier optimism began to fade. She was getting a funky vibe off the gorgeous blonde whose husband had reportedly left her a gazillionaire widow. Funky, as in it was beginning to feel like Abby’s and Sadie’s hope that the bachelorette weekend would put them in the black was going up in smoke.
“Just so we’re clear, instead of three nights, you’re doing two, and you want to cancel the suites at Three Wild Women Winery on the Fourth and go with the sleeping-under-the-stars idea instead?” It’s what Abby had suggested when it looked like they were going to lose the tour completely. “And you want to go with regular rooms at the winery on the Friday after the Outlander event?”
Keeping a smile plastered on her face and her eyes on Mallory’s, Abby wrote She’s broke on a piece of paper and slid it in front of Sadie.
“Are you kidding me?” Sadie said, and then got a deer-caught-in-the-headlights look on her face.
Geesh, and Abby thought she had a problem keeping her feelings to herself. She patted Sadie’s hand. “I’m so sorry,” Abby said, then looked under the table. “Naughty girl, Bella. No more humping Sadie. Sorry about that, Mallory. Little dogs. Now let’s get—”
“You know, sleeping under the stars sounds fun and adventurous. Maybe we should just do it both nights? What do you think?” Mallory asked, looking desperate.
Don’t do it, Abby. Don’t do it, she told herself, but of course she did it anyway. “Please don’t be offended, Mallory, but has something happened since you made the initial booking with Daisy at Three Wild Women Winery?”
Beside her, Sadie groaned, obviously seeing their future go up in flames. But the thing was, if Abby was right, she had a fairly good idea what Mallory was going through and felt sorry for her.
“Is it that obvious?” There was a sigh in Mallory’s voice as if she was mad at herself for not doing a better job of hiding her distress. She looked tired and a little sad. “Harry died last fall, and his first wife contested his will. We tried to handle it through mediation, but now it’s going to court.”
“I’m so sorry. That must be really hard.” With her eyes locked on Mallory, Abby wrote Google on a piece of paper and then Don’t react before passing it to Sadie.
“It’s horrible. Honestly, if I hadn’t promised Harry on his deathbed that I’d give his niece the wedding he wanted her to have, I would’ve canceled. But Blair would never forgive me, and neither would Harry. He adored her.”
“Um, do you adore Blair?” Abby asked.
She made a face. “Harry adored her enough for everyone.”
Sadie nudged Abby’s knee and turned the iPad screen. Mallory wasn’t wife number two; she was wife number three. And from the photo in the gossip section of the Atlanta Star, she was a dead ringer for Mrs. Maitland the First, only thirty years younger. The headline above the article about the upcoming court battle said it all: TRUE LOVE ALWAYS WINS, and it wasn’t Mallory’s picture beneath the heading; it was Mrs. Maitland the First’s.
Abby and Sadie shared a commiserating glance. They had to help this poor woman. “Don’t worry, Mallory. We’ll take care of everything for you. I’ll send you the itinerary by end of day, and you can let us know if it works for you.”
Sadie, who’d just taken a sip of her coffee, sprayed the screen. So maybe she wasn’t as sympathetic to Mallory’s plight as Abby.
“Darn that Bella.” She patted Sadie’s back while waving goodbye to Mallory. Abby disconnected before Sadie blurted out her feelings for the other woman to hear.
“Abby! We can’t take care of everything. We’ll go broke.” Sadie held up the itinerary they’d come up with for gazillionaire Mallory Maitland.
“We’re already broke.” Abby took the itinerary, thinking while money-wise she was broke, she didn’t feel broke. Not like she had in LA. She and Bella were no longer living in a car. They had a roof over their heads (albeit one that needed to be replaced), food, a new friend, a job, a really good plan to get back on her feet (even if they had hit a snag), and a dangerously sexy man who’d kissed her senseless last night. And who was no doubt having morning-after regrets.
But she couldn’t think about that now and smoothed the paper Sadie had crumpled. “We just have to tweak the itinerary a little and think of some really fun, free things to do. We’ve got the biggest event covered, and it’s going to be awesome. We’ll just stick with the Outlander theme and go from there.”
“I’m still a little worried about the night at the standing stones. I know you say no one will find out about us being there, but I’m with Hunter on this. People talk. And now that we won’t be paying actors to play the roles of Jamie and Claire and hunky highlanders, we can’t get them to sign an NDA.”
“We can. We just have to give them another incentive. For some people, appearing on YouTube might be enough. So we have to get rolling on the videos.” Thanks to Sadie, everything was in place. They’d also started working on a trailer to spur interest before the channel went live. “You’re from here—you must know some hot guys.”
“I left for college and only came back a couple times a year to see my grandmother. Or to bail out my brother. Most of my friends left town like me. So my connections are with business owners and the chief of police.”
“Your connections with the business community are more important than ever now. We’re going to need donations for food and camping gear and a whole bunch of other stuff. But if we spread out the requests, we should be okay.
“And while Mallory’s basically broke, the other women in the party aren’t. I checked out the list of names, and every one of them is connected to major money. We’ll head to Main Street when they arrive, show them around and take in the Fourth of July celebrations that evening. Friday will be all things Outlander, and maybe we can organize a fun, free outdoor activity, and a picnic before they leave on Saturday. They can do the Unicorn Hunt in the garden maze, and your grandmother can tell her stories.” Abby smiled, feeling better already. They could totally pull this off.
“Minnie and Myrtle, the horse and the goat, aren’t available. But you won’t be able to keep Granny away.”
“Perfect.” Abby scratched out Friday’s spa treatments at the winery and replaced it with all things Outlander and a fun, free outdoor activity. She swapped Saturday’s trail riding and white-water rafting with a picnic at the Village Green. She chewed on the end of her pen. “I think I can take care of the unicorn. Wolf would totally work.”
“His owner would also work as the hunkiest of highlanders, but I don’t see either happening.”
“He would, wouldn’t he?” she said, thinking of Hunter last night as he stepped out of the shower. She released a dreamy sigh and then grimaced at the intrigued expression that came over Sadie’s face.
“Okay, what happened? And please don’t hold back. I want every last detail. No. I need every last detail. It’s been years since I’ve had sex. I mean, I’ve had sex, just not very good sex.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Now that I think about it, I don’t know why I even bothered. That’s not true. I wanted a baby, and I was willing to put up with mediocre sex, and a mediocre boyfriend, so I could have one.” She gave Abby a half smile. “I’ve always wanted to be a mom, and it’s beginning to look like that’s not going to happen for me.”
“You’ve got lots of time. We’re around the same age, aren’t we?” Abby had never had a burning desire to have children so she couldn’t really relate to what obviously was very important to Sadie.
“I’m twenty-seven. So, yeah, I do have time. But I’ve decided as much as I want a baby, I don’t want the daddy to come with it. They’re too much work.”
Abby thought Sadie’s brother might have soured her on men but kept her opinion to herself. “You can adopt.”
“I’ve already started looking into adoption and in vitro. But right now, financially, neither is an option.”
“Then we better get back to work so that it is.”
“Absolutely, but first you’re going to tell me about you and Hunter.”
“There’s really not much to tell. We didn’t have sex. Except his kiss really made me wish that we did.” She shook her head. “It’s better that we didn’t.”
“Because of Sloane?”
Oh, crap—how could she have forgotten about Sloane? “Actually, I meant because I’ll be leaving by the end of the summer.” She made a face at the sharpness in her tone.
Obviously she was way more into Hunter than she thought if being reminded that there was another woman in his life, one he actually loved, made her cranky. She was rarely cranky. She reminded herself that Hunter was, and it was a trait she didn’t appreciate. Although he hadn’t been cranky lately. He really needed to be cranky again.
“Sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”
Sadie gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “You’re falling for him, aren’t you?”