“Yeah, heaven forbid people come in because the place looks nice,” Ava said. She turned a full circle. “Well, we’re going to have to do…something.”
“We can easily paint, get some new furniture, put in a photo booth,” Cori said, also turning a circle and taking it all in. When she’d turned all the way around she stopped. And realized that they were all looking at her. “What?”
“A photo booth?” Ava asked.
“Sure. That would be fun,” Cori said. She looked at Evan. “Is there already a photo booth in town?”
He shook his head slowly. “No.”
“Then it would be something unique,” she told them. She frowned as they continued to just stare at her, looking confused. “A photo booth,” she repeated. “One of those things where you get in with a bunch of friends or a date and it snaps a strip of photos and you pose differently for each of them.”
“Yeah, we know what a photo booth is,” Ava said. “What does it have to do with the pie shop?”
“It would be something that could pull kids in,” Cori said. “And people on dates. We could call it something about Sweetie Pie. Oh!” she said as another idea occurred. “We could do pies shaped like hearts and serve one with two forks. This could become the new it spot for date night. And we could have a photo wall. If people want to hang their photos up here, it would show all the fun people have when they come in.” She turned to Evan again. “Is there a jukebox anywhere in town. At the diner or anything?”
He shook his head. “No. Definitely not at the diner. But no.”
“A jukebox would be fun too,” she said, scanning the room and mentally putting the photo booth into the corner by the glass case. “We might have to take part of the case out though. But that thing is huge. We don’t need that much display space.”
“We could…” Ava trailed off. “I don’t even know where to start with all of that.”
“Well, and obviously we wouldn’t just focus on sweetie pie stuff,” Cori said. “There’s a lot of other types of customers too, but that just came to mind.”
While her sisters were looking at her like they had no idea what language she was speaking, Evan was looking at her with a mix of amusement and wonder. She kind of liked that mixture.
“You walk into this shop and immediately things like photo booths and sweetie pie specials come to mind?” he asked.
She shrugged. “I guess so.”
“It’s a basic, boring shop,” Ava said. “Of course, she immediately starts thinking up ways to make it more fun and…unique.” Ava gave her a smile. “It’s how she’s wired. She can’t help it.”
Cori decided to take that as a compliment. “It’s okay if you use the word crazy instead of unique,” she told her sister.
Ava laughed. “Well, I think we have a ways to go before we can start adding photo booths and things, but yes, we need to do something here.”
“But shaped pies would be cool,” Cori said. “And that’s gotta be easy. I mean, all the pie stuff stays the same, we just need different pans.”
“Do they make different shaped pie pans?” Ava asked.
“If they don’t, they should,” Cori said. “We’ll commission something. It could be a side business.”
“Oh, I could talk to Brent Gerwin. He’s into restaurant supplies, I think,” Ava said.
“Great. Email him tonight.”
“Wow.”
They both stopped talking and looked over at Evan. He was standing next to Brynn and they were watching Ava and Cori with wide eyes.
“You haven’t even seen the pie pans that you already have,” Evan said.
Cori crossed her arms. “Are there heart-shaped ones?”
“Definitely not.”
“Well, then.”
Brynn looked at Ava. “You’ve never even made a round pie. You sure you’re ready to get into different shapes?”
Ava looked pained. “I’m not ready to even go into the kitchen.”
“Right. Maybe one step at a time,” Brynn said.
Okay, she had a point. But Ava was right. Cori couldn’t help that her mind started spinning with new ideas that seemed like fun. It was a problem, actually. Her ideas were often a little wild, and she loved to just jump in. Doing this with Ava and Brynn was a good thing. They could keep her craziness reined in and tell her when her ideas were too much. Which was probably about eighty percent of the time.
“Okay,” Cori agreed. “We’ll just start with paint and some new tables and chairs.” She looked the current furniture over. Honestly, it looked like Rudy had picked up the various pieces from different yard sales or something. But that made her wonder… “Evan, do you know where Rudy got this stuff?” she asked.
He looked the room over. “Around town. Yard sales and stuff,” he said.
So she’d nailed that.
“Like I said, he didn’t want this to be fancy,” Evan said. “Just the basics. Just a place where people could come and sit and chat. Like a friend’s house.”
The tables and chairs were mismatched and clearly not new, but there was something nice about them being from people in town. “Maybe we could just give them a makeover,” she said to Brynn. “Paint them or refinish them, add some cushions to the chairs, some tablecloths, little centerpieces.” She pulled her phone out and quickly did a search. Then she held her phone up to Brynn. “We could do something with little tartlet pans like these for centerpieces so it’s sort of pie themed.”
Evan stepped forward and wrapped a big hand around her wrist, lowering her hand and phone. “The front of the shop is Brynn’s. The pies, of all shapes, are Ava’s. Come here.” He started behind the counter, pulling her along with him.
Cori wasn’t sure she’d ever felt tingles from a guy holding onto her wrist, but she did with Evan Stone. That was how complicated this was, of course, going to be.
He took her through the swinging door into the kitchen at the back of the shop. It was…a kitchen. Which she’d guessed. But this looked like the kitchen in a house, not a restaurant. There was a stove and oven—one, basic, white stove and oven—a refrigerator, which was yellow, a sink, and countertop that was a gray granite, and some oak-colored cupboards. Nothing matched in here either. And there was no stainless steel, no restaurant quality appliances, no enormous center island, no racks hanging overhead displaying copper pots and pans. Yes, she’d imagined copper pots and pans. She wasn’t sure why. But she realized as Ava came through the door behind her that she’d actually envisioned the kitchen in the pie shop. And it was nothing like this.
“Let me guess, the appliances and stuff came from yard sales too?” she asked.
“He bought the stove from a woman who was remodeling and was getting new stuff. He bought the fridge from a guy whose mother had passed away and was cleaning out her house. He got the countertop from a guy who does remodels and had extra. And he took the cabinets and cupboards out of a house they were tearing down.”
“Wow,” was all Ava said to that.
Evan chuckled. “The pie shop was more like a clubhouse for him and his friends and he set it up with odds and ends. He made pie and coffee and hoped people would come by and sit for a while and talk. It wasn’t about looks, but about function,” he said. “This is why no one had any idea how much money he had. Everything was really basic with him. He didn’t mind secondhand and he lived pretty simply.” Evan shrugged. “I can’t explain it better than that. This pie shop totally fit your dad.”
Cori felt that getting-familiar stab of sadness. She shook her head. “Not the guy we knew.”
Evan’s expression softened and the fingers around her wrist tightened briefly. Those tingles zipped up her arm, effectively distracting her from thoughts of how she would have really liked to get to know the Rudy Carmichael who collected stray furniture and rescued unwanted appliances so that he could make pie for his friends in his version of a clubhouse. She supposed if little boys had the ability to put ovens into their tree houses, they’d do it. F
or the frozen pizzas, if nothing else. And she supposed that her father hadn’t had a clubhouse or a tree house growing up. And maybe he hadn’t had that many friends either. Cori hadn’t known her grandparents on her father’s side, but Rudy had been raised with money and had grown up in a Manhattan penthouse and had gone to private schools.
Just like Cori, Ava, and Brynn had.
Hell, they hadn’t had clubhouses or tree houses either. And suddenly she felt like she’d missed out. And like maybe this pie shop could be something similar for them too.
“You okay?”
She focused on Evan, finding him watching her with a look of concern. He was also stroking his thumb across her wrist, over her pulse point. And it had a strange combination effect of increasing the tingles, but also making her feel calmer. She nodded. “Yeah. Probably.” Especially if you keep touching me.
He looked like he wanted to say more, but Ava pushed past them and further into the kitchen.
“This is not what I expected,” she said. Then she sighed. “I wonder when I’m going to quit saying that in regards to this whole thing.” She started opening cupboards and drawers. Then she turned toward Evan. “There’s nothing here.”
“Well, there are measuring cups and stuff,” he said.
Ava held up some plastic measuring spoons. “There are these.” She held up a wooden spoon. “Two spoons.” And she stepped out of the way of the cupboard she’d opened. “And one set of bowls. I don’t even see measuring cups.”
Evan shrugged. “Simple. Basic.”
Ava tossed the spoons back into the drawer and rubbed her forehead. “Not what I expected.”
Evan started across the kitchen, tugging Cori along with him again. He stopped in front of a door. “Ava’s in charge of the kitchen, Brynn has the front, and this—” He turned the knob and pushed it open, “—is your domain.”
He dropped his hold on her now, and Cori felt the instant loss of comforting tingles. If there was such a thing. Though it really seemed that there was.
Evan flipped on a light switch just inside the door and Cori peered around him, with admitted trepidation. Trepidation that was absolutely warranted as she took in the room. Or rather the closet. That had a card table, a folding chair, and a file cabinet in it.
“This is the office,” Evan said. His voice held a hint of humor.
“Wow. The whole room and everything in it is mine?” she asked.
“Yep.” Evan grinned at her. “But don’t get your hopes up for that file cabinet. The top drawer has about every fifth receipt and invoice in it that it should and maybe some pens, and the bottom drawer has a broken phone in it and a stapler.”
Cori lifted her hand to rub her forehead, but stopped just short of exactly mimicking Ava. “I probably need to make a trip to the bank.”
Evan nodded. “I have all of his account information and the paperwork you need to access it.”
“Great.” She glanced back at the closet. She stepped to the file cabinet and opened the top drawer. “Well, the stapler is in here.” She pulled it out, along with a box of paperclips and two folders. Yes, just two folders. She bent to open the bottom drawer. “You’re right about the phone. And—” She reached in and pulled out the only other thing in the drawer. “Measuring cups. No pens in here though.”
“I’ll check the oven for them,” Ava said dryly.
“I assume I can take this stuff home?” Cori asked Evan. “I can’t work in here.”
“Sure. As long as you’re the one taking care of it,” Evan said agreeably.
“Uh, guys?” Brynn came into the kitchen, holding a piece of paper. A plain white sheet of paper with words printed on it in black marker. In Rudy’s handwriting. Cori recognized that immediately.
“Is this the menu?” Brynn held it up to Evan.
He nodded without even looking at it. “Yep.”
Brynn lifted an eyebrow. “There are four things on it. And one is coffee.”
“Simple. Basic,” Evan said.
Cori gritted her teeth. He was hot and funny, but that was getting damned annoying.
Brynn turned the page to look at it and read, “Cherry pie. Apple pie. Peach pie, parentheses sometimes. Coffee.” She looked up again. “Seriously? This was all he served?”
Ava grabbed the page from Brynn. “Three kinds of pie?”
“Sometimes only two,” Evan said.
Ava looked at him. “How is this a pie shop?”
“He served pie,” Evan said with a shrug. “Look, I get it. It was—”
“I swear to God, if you say ‘simple’ or ‘basic’ again, I will smack you,” Cori told him.
He cleared his throat. “Rudy wasn’t in the pie business to make a lot of money. He liked pie and he felt that there were things about business that he wanted to learn up close and personal. He wanted to do things with his own two hands. He wanted a place that was all his own.” Evan looked at all three of them. “All of the things he wants you all to learn and experience now. So, he kept it…” Evan trailed off and glanced at Cori. “Easy,” he finally said. “Straightforward.”
She rolled her eyes at him to let him know that the synonyms weren’t much better. But then she focused on her sisters. “Well, I guess there’s less for you to learn to make this way,” she told Ava.
“It’s ridiculous to build a business on three products, one of which is only available sometimes,” Ava said. “I suppose that could create some kind of demand for the peach since it’s not available all the time. But having only two other kinds of pie? I don’t even like pie, and I can name off at least five others that are so commonly known that it should be assumed that a pie shop would have them.”
Cori almost laughed. Almost. But seeing Ava riled up about pies was funny. Her sister was officially in CEO mode one hundred percent of the time. Which meant that Cori was going to have to split her time between the books for Blissfully Baked and making sure Ava remembered how to not think in terms of profit margins and investment strategies twenty-four-seven. Which meant keeping Ava away from those books and in this kitchen.
Maybe Rudy had gotten this right. The thought occurred to her and it didn’t make her flinch. Maybe giving his girls a simple and basic business to work on together would teach them all something. Maybe it wasn’t about the business at all. Maybe it was about letting go of their ideas about how they wanted their world to work. Ava was used to running everything and making money. Now she would be making pies. And that’s all she’d be doing. Brynn was used to being able to hole herself up and not interact with anyone for days at a time. Now she had to make sure that the shop was inviting to the public. And Cori didn’t like to be tied down, not by a job or a relationship or even a lease. Now she co-owned a business and had to stay in this town for a year. Yeah, this had to be about more than the actual business of pies. Besides, the trust said simply that the business had to be profitable after the year. That meant, as long as they had one dollar in the bank after expenses, they’d made it.
Piece of cake. Or pie, as the case may be.
“Are there recipes in here somewhere?” Brynn asked, looking around the kitchen.
“There’s hardly anything in here,” Ava groused. “I need to get on the computer and start ordering supplies.”
“How do you know what to order without a recipe?” Brynn wanted to know.
Ava frowned at her, as if bringing up that point was irritating. “Well, I’m guessing I need flour. And sugar. And…”
Now Cori did laugh. “Good guesses,” she said, as Ava trailed off. “I can help you come up with a list. And we can look around the house too. Maybe some of the stuff, like recipes, is there.”
“I don’t think he had recipes,” Evan said. “He was trying to make pies that tasted like the pie his grandmother made when he was a kid. He was never able to track down a recipe and he tried over and over to replicate it. I think he threw all recipes out after they disappointed him.”
“There has to be a starting point
at least,” Ava said. “And how am I going to know if they taste like his grandmother’s pies?”
“You won’t,” Evan agreed. “You’ll have to make them your own. Customize your recipes for Blissfully Baked.”
Ava tipped her head back and groaned. “I have no idea how to do that.” She looked at Evan again. “And can we change the shop name? Does it say in the trust that it has to stay the same?”
“It doesn’t,” Evan said. “But I wouldn’t do that.”
“No?”
“At least not right away,” he said. “Everyone in town is happy to have you here, but also…hesitant.”
“Hesitant?” Ava repeated.
“You’re new. You’re from New York. In the five years your father lived here, you never came to visit. People are just not sure how you’ll fit in and how this will all go. I wouldn’t come in and start changing a lot of things up, if I were you,” Evan said with a shrug. “It is your shop now, but you’ll be dependent on these people to support you and come spend money here.”
Ava nodded. “Okay, fair enough.”
“And you shouldn’t order the groceries. Go to the store here and spend your money in town.”
Ava sighed, but she didn’t argue that. She did tip her head to the side, regarding Evan. “Though I am dating one of the town’s favorite sons. That has to help me some.”
He flashed her a grin, and Cori felt her gut clench at the sight.
“You are, at that,” he said. “And it will help them give you the benefit of the doubt, bring them in the door at first. But if they don’t like the pie, you might be in trouble. And I’ll hear all about it. So, you probably need to learn more about pie than the fact that it requires flour.”
Ugh. That wasn’t even flirtatious and yet, hearing Evan and Ava talk about dating—even pretend dating—and seeing them grinning at each other was officially Cori’s least favorite part of this day. She should have brought the bottle of champagne in with her.
And then it got worse because Ava laughed lightly and said, “Well, I know there’s sugar involved too.”
That actually was a little flirtatious. For Ava, anyway.
Diamonds and Dirt Roads Page 9