“No problem,” he said cheerily, tucking his phone away. “I’ll take this back and have the manager call and get this all sorted out.” He closed the back door of the truck with a decisive snap. “By the way,” he said, as he cleared his throat nervously. “Would you...would you want to get dinner sometime?”
“Oh, I wish I could but I’m—” Allie stopped midsentence. She’d been about to say engaged. But she wasn’t. Not anymore. She looked down at her bare ring finger, which still bore the slightest hint of a tan line where Jason’s two-carat diamond ring once sat. “I...can’t. Sorry.”
Dave’s face fell, but then he rallied. “Hey, can’t blame a guy for trying.”
Allie sent him a weak smile, feeling a twinge of guilt as he hopped back into the truck and turned the ignition. He wasn’t her type, so she probably wouldn’t have said yes anyway. But she knew she needed to get out of the habit of thinking she was taken.
No sooner than the white delivery truck drove out of sight, Dallas’s black pickup turned in, kicking up dark dust behind its oversize wheels. He headed straight to her front porch, so she didn’t have time to duck inside her house for a cover-up.
“Was that the roaster?” he asked gruffly as he took in her outfit. He frowned as he looked at the curve of her bare hip and the plunging neckline of the bikini top. He wore wet board shorts and a sleeveless T-shirt, his bulging tanned biceps on display.
“Yes,” she said, tapping one flip-flop on the gravel driveway.
“Where is it?” He glanced around as if expecting it to appear out of thin air.
“I sent it back.” Allie lifted her chin in defiance. Dallas’s face registered shock and then anger. He pushed up his mirror sunglasses into his tousled blond hair.
“You what?”
“I sent it back.” She crossed her arms and frowned.
“Oh, no. No more crap about your side of the line! I thought we discussed this!”
“I own half this farm, Dallas. You can’t make large purchases without talking to me first. The lawyer said...”
“We need that roaster for the harvest.”
“You should’ve told me about the purchase, Dallas.”
Dallas let out a frustrated breath of air. “I tried. You didn’t want to talk about the harvest!”
She ignored the little flick of guilt she felt. He had tried to talk about the harvest, she knew, and she’d shut him down.
“Well, now I do, but first you’re going to tell me why you used Grandma Misu’s credit card.” Allie was beginning to think the worst: that Dallas might have just been playing Grandma Misu. She’d been an old woman, and Dallas was a charming guy. He wasn’t a relation, and yet he ended up with half her estate? Maybe the reasons weren’t good.
“I didn’t use her card!” Dallas threw his arms wide in exasperation.
“Her name and number were on the invoice.” Allie crossed her arms again and glared. Jason had always given the orders in their relationship. She wasn’t about to get pushed around by Dallas.
Dallas heaved a sigh. “It might have been her name, but it was my credit card number,” he said, rubbing his forehead. “It was my account, I just let her use it. She made purchases for the farm, and when I called, that must’ve been the number that they had on file.”
“What do you mean it was your credit card?” Allie didn’t understand.
“Three years ago, your grandmother was nearly broke,” he said. “I stepped in. I helped her out with a loan, paid for the new roasting barn and put her on one of my credit cards so she could still get things for the estate.”
“You...did?” Allie had never heard of this. Not that she was close with her grandmother, but her mother and Grandma Misu talked all the time. Her mother would have mentioned financial troubles. Allie felt guilt like a sharp piece of shrapnel in her chest. It had never occurred to her Grandma Misu was having problems. Could it be that all these years Allie had thought her grandmother was choosing not to help them, but the truth was she couldn’t?
Allie’s anger drained away. Dallas had saved the estate. At least, he said he had. She’d check it out, but why would he lie about something like that? The lawyer would know. There’d be financial records. It’d be easy to prove.
“Wow, I didn’t know.” Allie glanced up at Dallas’s face and saw the frustration fade away a little. His blue eyes studied her.
“Misu was a proud woman. It’s not something she’d broadcast,” he said, glancing back over the coffee tree line. “Up until the day she died, she swore she’d pay me back with interest.”
Understanding finally dawned. “So she did. With half the estate,” Allie said, feeling again like a complete moron. Why’d she have to go and assume Dallas was a con man? He’d done Misu a solid favor, and she’d paid him back, plain and simple. Allie sank into a porch chair. “I’m really sorry. I had no idea.”
Dallas watched her for a beat, his blue eyes wary. “It’s okay. I’ll need to call the delivery company. See if they can turn that delivery around. We still have time to work out all the kinks before the competition.”
“The Kona Coffee Festival?”
“You know it?” Dallas asked, looking bright and hopeful.
“Uh...yeah, I’ve heard of it.” She elected not to tell him about Kaimana’s condition to sign the paper she needed.
“Well, if we’re going to have any chance of winning, we need that new roaster,” Dallas said.
Allie groaned and let her head fall into her hands. Could this get any worse? “Okay, okay! I get it.”
He glanced down at her string-bikini top. “I can’t really blame the fella for listening to a pretty woman in a bikini.” She’d forgotten she was on the porch half-naked. She tugged up her sarong, suddenly feeling exposed.
He walked off her porch as he dialed the number, heading down the path to his house as he chatted.
Allie watched him go, feeling glum. What else am I going to muck up?
Her phone rang then, and she jumped a little, startled to see an unfamiliar local number flash across her screen. She thought about letting it go to voice mail, but picked it up instead, wondering if it might be Kaimana, ready to sign the papers.
“Allie?” came a voice that was definitely not Kaimana’s. “Hi, it’s Teri. At the Tiki Teri salon. We met at Kai’s barbecue?”
“Of course I remember. Hi, Teri.”
“I hope you don’t mind. I got your number from Kai. It’s kind of an emergency. Can you come down to the salon this afternoon?” Teri did sound a little unsettled, and Allie could hear commotion in the background, which sounded like shouting of some sort.
“Oh, sure,” Allie said, sitting up a little straighter in her seat. “When?”
“How about now?”
Allie hung up and felt a weight pressing down on her shoulders. She might as well help out at the salon since she was stuck here for a while. She had no idea how she was going to manage to pay for anything past next week and now it looked as if she’d have to find a way to survive until the coffee competition in November.
CHAPTER EIGHT
FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER, Allie was standing outside Tiki Teri’s wearing a sundress she’d hastily thrown on over her swimsuit. She paused at the window. It was nothing like Michel’s, where she’d worked as a makeup artist and brow tech in Chicago. Michel’s was a full-service spa downtown, offering hot rock massages, fluffy white robes and the sound of running water in every room. Tiki Teri’s was brightly lit, with antique aluminum and shiny aquamarine patent leather salon chairs, a black-and-white-tiled floor and multicolored plastic flip-flop-shaped lights strung up by the wall-to-wall mirrors. Bob Marley music played softly in the background, but the atmosphere was anything but calm.
Teri, her platinum-blond, chin-length hair perfectly styled, wore Bermuda shorts and a bright coral top. She was trying to console a client who was red-faced and crying.
“Teri, this is a disaster!” the brunette shouted, as she hid her face in her hands.
<
br /> Teri saw Allie and nearly melted with relief. “Allie! Oh, thank God.” Teri waved her over. “Ella, this is the girl I was telling you about. If anyone can fix you, she can!” The crying client lifted her head ever so slightly, and that was when Allie saw the problem.
“I tried to wax my own eyebrows, but...well...see?” Ella pointed to her forehead. She was missing most of her right eyebrow from the far side in. Allie tried not to gasp. She put on her best poker face.
“Anyhow, I know you hadn’t made up your mind about the job, but any way you could help her now?” Teri asked. Allie was surprised Teri had reached out, given that she’d only met her once. That kind of thing never happened in Chicago, but maybe islanders were different. Or maybe she’s just trying to be nice. Ella gave her a pleading look.
“I can help,” Allie said, feeling confident. She’d seen worse.
“You can?” Ella dabbed at the tears on her cheeks. “I’ve got a date with Todd tonight and I just...I just can’t go like this!”
“Todd is like a living legend around here,” Teri said. “Flies helicopters into the volcano.”
“Gives tours. It’s nothing quite so dangerous as all that.” Ella laughed a little. “And it’s just our second date.” Ella grabbed her phone and proudly showed Allie a picture of Todd. He had jet-black hair and bright blue eyes and a killer smile. He was sitting in the cockpit of a massive black helicopter, giving a thumbs-up sign.
“Really?” Teri sounded skeptical. “Because people die doing that.”
“He’s the best pilot on the island,” Ella declared. “But he won’t want to be seen with me like this!” Ella’s bottom lip quivered, and tears threatened to spill.
“Whoa, now, it’ll be okay.” Allie held her hands up as if Ella was a skittish horse. “Come on over here,” she added, easing Ella into one of the salon chairs. “Let’s get a better look at you.”
* * *
A LITTLE WHILE LATER, Allie had worked a miracle with an eyebrow pencil. Ella’s eyebrows arched perfectly. Allie had gone ahead and done the woman’s makeup, too.
“You weren’t kidding about your skills, honey,” Teri said, nodding her head in admiration. “I’m going to have to call you the brow whisperer.”
Ella’s brow looked surprisingly natural, her makeup flawless. She looked ready for her date.
“I love you,” Ella gushed, admiring her reflection. “How much do I owe...?”
“Uh...” Allie glanced uncertainly at Teri.
“Oh, screw it. Here’s what I have! Keep it.” Ella pressed eighty dollars into Allie’s hand.
Allie had her hand open with the cash in it as she offered it to Teri.
“Keep it,” Teri said, closing her hand over the bills. “You earned it.”
“But...” Allie didn’t quite feel right as she watched Ella bounce out of the salon. She thought she should refuse it, but part of her knew she was looking at a week’s worth of groceries. And since it didn’t look as if she was selling the land anytime soon, she’d need all the cash she could get. She took it and folded it into her pocket.
“You’re a lifesaver, honey. So glad you could come by. Given any thought to that job? How about you set your own hours? Part-time, whatever works for you.”
Allie felt the cash in her pocket. She needed it, especially if she wanted to eat sometime past next week. “Sure,” Allie said, thinking that she could see herself happily spending time at Tiki Teri’s. She eyed a bowl of mango candy—her favorite—on the counter near the door.
“Take as many as you want,” Teri called to her. “You’ve earned them, honey.”
Allie scooped up a grateful handful and unwrapped one for eating and left the rest in her pocket for later.
She left the salon feeling happy about her good deed of the day. She walked into Hula Coffee next door, wanting to say hi to Kai and Jesse, and also craving a little iced mocha something as a reward.
She found Jesse sans Kai working like a well-oiled machine, ringing up orders and making them. When Jesse saw Allie, she bustled out from behind the counter to give her a big hug.
“Hi, Allie!” She grinned, her freckles on her nose just adding to her warm cheer. “What brings you into town?”
Allie told her about Tiki Teri’s and the eyebrow job, and she beamed. “You’re going to be working right next door? That’s great,” Jesse said. “Leaving Dallas, then, to do all the heavy lifting on the estate?”
“Uh...yeah, I guess so.” Allie glanced around at the full house of customers enjoying her grandmother’s coffee. Did she really want to tell them she planned to sell her share as soon as Kaimana signed that paper?
“He’s a good man, you know,” Jesse told Allie.
“Who?”
“Dallas.”
“That’s not what I heard,” Allie said, thinking about what Teri had said about his not being a one-woman man. She didn’t even know why she said it just then. Hadn’t Dallas saved her grandmother’s farm? But did that really matter if he was a cheater and a womanizer? Then again, who cared if he was? Allie had no intention of dating him.
Jesse let out a disgruntled sigh. “Don’t you dare be swayed by island gossip,” she scolded as she gave Allie back her change for the iced coffee. “Most of it isn’t true, and the other part is completely fabricated.”
This made Allie laugh.
“Seriously, though, Dallas... I mean, Hula Coffee would not be here without him.” Jesse handed Allie her iced latte. She took a big sip. “Kai and I, we wanted to start this shop, you know? Always have wanted to, but try telling a bank officer that a surfer and former whale-watching guide are good business investments.”
“They wouldn’t loan you money?”
“We were considered high risk. We had no collateral, since that was before Kai got his big endorsement deal, before the surfing really took off. He wasn’t making much then.” Jesse wiped down the counter. “Dallas loaned us the money, and we’re not the only ones.”
“I know,” Allie said, thinking about her grandmother. “How was he able to...”
“Give away free money?” Jesse shrugged. “He did inherit some from the sale of his family ranch, but by the way he gives it away, I can’t imagine he’s sitting on all that much anymore.”
“Why does he do it? Do you share profits?” Allie was still looking for the angle.
“We’re paying him back, but he won’t take interest. He’s just a part of the community. He cares,” Jesse said. “Locals look after one another. And all that stuff about him being a player... I just don’t think it’s true, honestly.”
Allie suddenly had a sneaking suspicious Jesse really cared for Dallas. Maybe more than she let on. “Do you...and Dallas...?”
Jesse barked a loud laugh. “Us? God, no!” she exclaimed, as if Allie had just asked Jesse if she had a crush on her own brother. “There are many reasons for that.”
“Oh.” Now Allie just felt puzzled. “Do you...”
“I like girls, Allie,” Jesse said, matter-of-factly.
And then it all made sense to Allie. No, she definitely wouldn’t be into Dallas. He was the furthest thing from a girl there was.
“Oh,” Allie blurted, and then laughed. “And here I thought...”
“That I was secretly in love with Dallas McCormick.” Jesse shook her head. “Not my type. Too many Y chromosomes.”
Allie laughed, strangely feeling relieved. “So why all the rumors about Dallas?” Allie just felt like where there was so much smoke, there had to be a fire. “That he cheated on his fiancée? Left her and her little girl?”
“I don’t believe it,” Jesse said flatly.
“What happened, then?”
She hesitated. “I don’t know. He won’t tell me, and I don’t want to pry. It’s none of my business.”
“But the tourists...” Allie knew she should stop digging up dirt about Dallas, but part of her just couldn’t help it.
“He only started that after Jennifer,” Jesse said. “If you
want my opinion, he’s just rebounding—hard. He doesn’t know how to stop. But make no mistake—he’s one of the good ones.”
Allie left the coffee shop feeling strangely unsettled. Maybe she’d been wrong about Dallas. Maybe she’d jumped to too many conclusions about him like she had about pretty much everyone on this island. Even Grandma Misu, assuming she’d spent all these years withholding support, when she couldn’t give any. Maybe rushing to judgment was her fatal flaw.
Except for Jason. He sure got past all your defenses.
She didn’t want to think about Jason. She didn’t want to think about Dallas, either, although his stark blue eyes seemed to hover in her mind no matter how hard she tried to think about something else. No doubt he was handsome, beyond handsome. And if she were honest, he’d been nothing but nice since she’d stepped foot back on her grandmother’s property. She’d been the rude one. Like accusing him of stealing from her grandmother—case in point.
The bright, warm Hawaiian sun beamed down on her, and the cool trade winds blew off the ocean, ruffling her dark hair as she strode back down the main street. She got into her car and decided, on a whim, to follow the signs to Magic Sands Beach.
Why not spend some time on the beach? She still had on her bikini beneath her sundress. She might even take a swim. The bright white sandy beach was dotted with big black lava rocks. She remembered those from her childhood, and they could be found on most beaches, a not-so-distant reminder that these beaches were still new and growing, with Kīlauea, the active volcano not too far away, pouring hot lava into the ocean.
The wind blew stronger here, and the surf was a little rougher than she expected: boogie-boarding kids were having a grand time catching waves that pulled them to shore. Some boys even got dumped upside down, laughing as they popped back up out of the crystal-blue water, shaking their blond heads and sending salt water in all directions. She walked by the big red sign that said in bold, intimidating letters: No Lifeguard. Swim at Your Own Risk. Danger: Strong Currents, but figured that if the kids could do it, so could she. She kicked off her flip-flops and pulled off her sundress. A college kid walked by, his eyes lingering a little longer than they should on her yellow bikini. She had to admit, it felt good. Down the beach she saw a couple lounging on folding chairs beneath a big, colorful umbrella.
Her Hawaiian Homecoming (Mills & Boon Superromance) Page 10