On the Corner of Love and Hate
Page 32
She sighed into the phone. “Get an Uber, Charlotte. Or better, call your dad.” She punctuated each word with a short pause. It was an argument we’d had for the past few days. I didn’t want to let him, or anyone else in Hope Lake, know that I was coming.
“Obviously, you’re going to have to see him, and explain things, eventually. You know, like when you show up on his doorstep and say, ‘Oh hey, Dad, I’m home.’ ”
I interrupted. “Here.”
“What?”
“I’m here, not home. Home is where you are. Here is not home. This is a bump in the road. A sad little pit stop in my life. Nothing more, and certainly not home.”
She huffed. “One thing is for certain.”
“What?”
“You’re not going to be writing the Hope Lake tourist advertisements,” she barked, laughing as she repeated, “Sad little pit stop.”
“I’m serious. I can’t let this . . . whatever . . . distract me and make me lose focus of the end goal. Getting back to New York . . .” I paused, feeling a sense of unease wash over me. “To civilization,” I finished.
“Whatever it is—a pit stop, a roadblock, or the start of something new—you can’t just sit on the side of a highway alone in the middle of the night. It’s like a Stephen King novel. Or better yet, an M. Night Shyamalan movie. He’s from Pennsylvania, right? I’d be worried sick.”
“You’re enjoying my imminent demise a little too much, thanks,” I lamented. “Wait a minute, the start of something new? You’re either living in a Hallmark Channel movie or High School Musical, Parks.”
She sighed, no doubt dreaming about Zac Efron. “Whatever, send me your exact location so if you go missing, I can have a lead to give to the hot country detective who’ll want to question me about your disappearance.”
“This isn’t the country, exactly,” I corrected. “It’s just not the city.” I put the phone on speaker so I could share my location with her via iMessage.
“Brilliant explanation, Sherlock. You know that anything outside of New York is the country to me. Okay, I’m sending you an Uber now. You’re limited out there in the sticks on what type of vehicle will come pick you up, so hopefully whatever comes fits all your crap.”
I sighed. “You don’t have to do that, Parker. That’s not why I called you.”
There was a long pause. I could hear pots and pans clinking and clanking in her tiny kitchen. “I know it’s not.” I hated the thought of my recently not-so-broke friend sending her super-broke friend a charity Uber.
Then, something howled. It was coming from the thick wooded area next to me. Were those eyes in the darkness?
Okay, maybe I didn’t hate the charity Uber that much. I wasn’t going to last five minutes out here. This didn’t exactly bode well for me being stuck in Hope Lake for the foreseeable future.
“I’ll pay you back,” I insisted, knowing that it would be a bit before I could. Things were tight. It helped that I was saving on not having to rent a place when I got there.
Parker grumbled. “Unnecessary. This is me helping you after you helped me manage everything after the coverage from the Food Network. Now, if you just took the job I offered you, you would still be here with me, in New York, instead of leaving me here all alone.” She sighed longingly. “I have to let my idiot brother’s idiot friend move in.”
Even with all the press, she had thankfully stayed the same witty, generous best friend that I had had for the past fifteen years. Even if it meant offering her untalented-in-the-kitchen best friend a job.
“I’m sorry about that, but we both know me working as your assistant would have been disastrous. I burned water and destroyed your favorite caramel pot. With my luck, my first day on the job would be me burning down the entire place instead of a small stove fire. No, thanks.”
Parker laughed just as a car drove past. Not the Uber. “I didn’t think it was possible to be that bad at boiling, but, surprise, it was. I’m sure the fire department is still telling that story.”
I pinched my face up, not that she could see me. “In my defense, I forgot about the stove because my phone rang and I got tied up.”
“Fair enough, I know that was the last phone call you were hoping to get,” she said kindly, having been there to witness my pathetic mood after I got the bad news.
The caller was the head of HR at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. After almost three months of trying to find something new, it was the last job prospect I’d had before I officially gave up the search in New York. Sure, I could have gotten a job almost anywhere else, but I wanted a job in my field. Wasn’t that why I was still paying off my student loans? The position at the BBG wasn’t exactly what I had hoped for, but it was close enough and I would have been happy. Plus, there was the hope that the change of scenery would have been a good move for me. Getting out of the flower shop and into more of a business role with more responsibilities and a chance to move up would have been worth it.
It was just after they courtesy-called to say they went with another candidate with more community engagement experience that I decided to head back to Hope Lake with my tail between my legs. There were options, of course.
Sure, I could have found a way to stay—cater-waitering, something soul-sucking in Times Square, tour guide on the Grey Line tourist buses—but how long would that have lasted before the boredom crept in? I was in debt, desperate, and after a Come to Jesus conversation with Parker about my options, Hope Lake seemed like the best, well, hope to get my life back on track.
Plus, I figured that if I ducked out of the city for a couple months, the gossip that my former boss Gabrielle had started about me would die down and I wouldn’t be shunned in the floral world any longer.
“Hey, not to beat a dead horse, but has there been any more Gabby gossip floating around?”
Parker sucked in a breath. “Do you want me to be honest?”
My stomach dropped. I thought it would get better if I left. “No, but yes,” I responded, nibbling away at my thumbnail.
“She said you were trying to steal clients from her, and that some of the accounting was off. Which we know is a lie, but it’s made people not want to hire you because they think you’re shady. I’m really sorry, Charlotte. It’s my fault that she’s going after you.”
The worry latched onto my heart and squeezed. If this kept up, August wouldn’t be enough time for the damage to fade away.
“No, it’s not. She was always looking for a reason to give me the boot. The cupcake incident just added to it.”
“Still, I’m sorry. I should have done my due diligence with that order. I knew they were for her, but it was just so busy that day I let the assistants handle that one and never checked what the message was.”
Parker’s bakery had made a cupcake delivery to Gabby that was . . . poorly timed and not well received thanks to the order her husband—ex-husband—placed and had Parker’s shop deliver.
“It’s not your fault that her husband was cheating.”
“With her sister.”
“Still, where he dips his nib isn’t your fault. Or mine, for that matter.”
“No, it’s not, but if it wasn’t for his message on my signature banana foster cupcakes, she wouldn’t have taken it out on you.”
I snorted. “Maybe not, but it is what it is. I can’t keep losing sleep over it. Besides, I’m here now, and maybe she’ll find someone new to torture.”
“You’re so positive! This trip is working already.”
I tried to focus on that sentiment. “It’ll be good for me to help my dad with Gigi. She’s getting older, and although he won’t admit it, I know he could use the help. And let’s be honest, I’ve been a pretty lousy granddaughter when it comes to visiting her.”
As in not coming back to visit in—checks watch—twenty-one years . . .
“Yeah, but they loved coming to visit you in between all of your dad’s incredible service trips. It’s not like you haven’t seen them often,” she
insisted, knowing how much I loved having both my dad and Gigi come to visit me in New York. “Remember how much fun Gigi has here?”
I nodded into the darkness. The rumble of an engine drew my attention. “I think the Uber is here.”
Sure enough, a large diesel-engine truck pulled into the lot, headlights streaming across the cracked pavement. The driver was shrouded in the darkness of the vehicle. He didn’t look like he was going to come out and help me with my bags. What a gentleman.
“Don’t hang up. Keep me in your pocket until you’re delivered to your dad’s doorstep!” Parker insisted.
“It’s like I’m a pizza,” I said, laughing. I stood, slipping the phone into my shorts pocket.
Pulling the first suitcase up, I tipped my chin toward the truck bed. “Can I put everything back there?” I shouted through the partially open window.
As I asked, he picked up his cell phone. The brightness of the screen highlighted his face. Thankfully, he didn’t look like a serial killer.
Neither did Ted Bundy.
Waving me back, he started yelling into his cell.
“Great, this will be a fine addition to the trip from hell,” I mumbled. Then the first raindrop plopped onto my forehead.
I hurried as best I could with flip-flops on, running back and forth to lug the suitcases, considering some didn’t have working wheels. The truck bed was thankfully empty, and had one of those covers over the top in case of rain.
Just my luck, by the time I slid the last suitcase inside, the skies opened up. At least my things didn’t get soaked.
Continue Reading…
Meet Me on Love Lane
Nina Bocci
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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Nina Bocci is a USA Today bestselling novelist who loves reading and writing about swoony, relatable heroes and smart, witty heroines. If the book’s set in a small town, even better. You can always find her chatting on social media about her massive, crazy Italian family and her favorite person in the world, her son.
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2019 by Nina Bocci
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First Gallery Books trade paperback edition August 2019
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Interior design by Michelle Marchese
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Bocci, Nina, author.
Title: On the corner of love and hate / Nina Bocci.
Description: First Gallery Books trade paperback edition. | New York : Gallery Books, 2019. | Series: The hopless romantics series ; 1 Identifiers: LCCN 2018034238| ISBN 9781982102036 (trade pbk.) | ISBN 9781982102050 (ebook)
Subjects: | GSAFD: Love stories.
Classification: LCC PS3603.L396 O5 2019 | DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018034238
ISBN 978-1-9821-0203-6
ISBN 978-1-9821-0205-0 (ebook)