Devi’s brown eyes light up. “Ooh, right, he came from California, didn’t he?”
“That’s what I hear.”
Both women eye me.
Laney with are you seriously pretending you’re still off gossip?, Devi with is that all you’ve heard?
“How’s your leg?” I ask Laney, even though I want to ask her how Emma’s doing, which I won’t do unless we’re completely alone.
I’ve been smiling through all of the questions I’ve gotten about her the past week and a half too. Runaway-mooning has turned into my standard answer.
Laney pulls a face. “Annoying. Don’t tell Theo I said that though, or he’ll make it his new mission to make me more comfortable.”
“And that’s a bad thing?” Devi asks.
Laney shakes her head. “It’s a good thing. But I think he’s itching to go snowboarding or to do anything other than sit still in his house for one more day, and he won’t if he thinks I can’t survive eight hours without him.”
“He’s surviving this party without you.”
“I asked him to fix me lasagna for lunch tomorrow, and he took off for the market over in Elk’s Knee since he says they have the freshest ingredients for the homemade sauce it needs, and he needs to start it before they open tomorrow.”
Laney hates lasagna.
Which means Theo’s probably actually doing something with or for Emma.
My heart squeezes. I want to be helping too, but for the first time in my life, I don’t know how.
“You two are so cute.” Devi turns to me. “Almost as cute as a petite redhead being caught in the arms of her devastatingly handsome and stupidly tall new boss in her café’s kitchen.”
“I’m off gossip,” I tell Devi. “If you want the scoop, you’ll have to go back to whoever told you that.”
Devi laughs.
Laney sighs.
Jitter rolls his eyes.
Okay, he doesn’t. He puts his head in Laney’s lap and gives her puppy dog eyes like he can’t stand it when anyone is less than happy, and her sigh says she’s less than happy, and he wants to know what he can do to make it better.
“Is this no-gossip thing because of the wedding?” Devi asks me.
“Yep,” Laney replies for me. “I’m against this plan, for the record. Especially since Bean & Nugget’s new owner—”
“Is planning to convert it into a kombucha brewery?” Devi finishes for her. “I heard he’s calling it a kombrewchery, which is a dumb word. So I agree. Sabrina needs to use all of everything she has to make sure Bean & Nugget stays Bean & Nugget.”
“Who told you?” I ask.
“Frannie. Her mailman’s niece’s boyfriend is one of the three local contractors that were asked for quotes.”
I almost groan.
“Is that wrong?” Devi asks.
“No, that’s correct.” I will not howl in frustration. I will not howl in frustration. “It’s just—” I cut myself off and shake my head. “I feel a little out of my league to do whatever I need to do to change his mind,” I finally say.
“You are never out of your league,” Devi says.
“I am now.”
Laney eyes me.
I give her a slight shrug and hope she interprets it as if he were the same guy he’d been in Hawaii, I’d have a chance.
There are moments when I feel like he’s the same, quietly watching me and taking me all in. And then the next minute, he’s closed off and guarded.
No heart-stopping, crinkly blue-eyed smiles. No pushing to know more about me. No insisting he’s a truly terrible person at heart while he pauses to pick up a piece of trash or tell someone he loves her shirt.
“You ever talk to Chandler?” I ask Devi.
Her brown eyes sparkle in amusement. “So you’re not totally off gossip.”
“I haven’t seen him since the wedding. I haven’t even heard anyone’s seen him since the wedding, and I’m frankly pretty happy about that. Just wondering if—when I should brace myself for a confrontation. Since the Bean & Nugget situation is his fault.”
“I’m on gossip,” Laney says to Devi. “You can tell me everything. Have you talked to him? I want to know how he set up this sale so quietly and how he knows this—ah!”
Jitter clamors to his feet under the table and bumps her leg.
“Jitter,” I say softly. “Down, boy.”
He ignores me and strains on his leash.