Sweet as Honey (Aster Valley 2)

“It’s fine. A friend of Tiller and Mikey’s got into some trouble with his motorcycle, that’s all.”

She opened her mouth to question me, but Pim appeared with a pot of coffee and cut her off. “Tell me everything. I heard you were stung by a rabid swarm of bees and had to be taken to the hospital by a miscreant on a motorcycle.”

He winked at me, and I rolled my eyes. This town was crazy.

“It was nothing, I promise. Just a misunderstanding.”

Pim set the coffeepot down and pulled out his order pad. “I heard it involved that hunk from Houston. What was his name? Simba? Sylvester?”

“Sam,” I said. “And I’m pretty sure you knew that since you’ve met him before.”

Pim’s hand fluttered against his chest. “Those muscles. That ass. That brooding scowl…”

His husband Bill’s voice came from the kitchen. “You think I can’t hear you, but I can.”

Chaya laughed. “Okay, I’ve got to see a woman about a horse, so will you please ask Bill to make me a breakfast combo with scrambled eggs, bacon, and hash browns?”

Pim jotted it on his pad. “And you, Mr. Sweet?”

“I’ll take some dry toast. Thanks.”

Both Pim and Chaya stared at me for a minute before Pim wrote something down and muttered under his breath. “Dry toast and a peanut butter, banana, and chocolate protein smoothie.”

I opened my mouth to tell him I wasn’t hungry enough for my favorite smoothie today, but he’d already bolted through the kitchen door.

“What’s wrong?” Chaya asked. “And don’t bullshit me this time.”

“It was Patrick Stanner. He crushed Sam’s motorcycle on purpose because Sam stopped to defend me against his harassment.”

Her eyes narrowed. “That fucker. This has gone too far, Tru. We need to contact the State Police. Sheriff Stanner is never going to prosecute those sons of bitches for their bullshit harassment. Something worse is going to happen, and we both know it.”

“I don’t want to get anyone into trouble.” It was something I’d already told her a million times, but the sentence was starting to sound ridiculous.

Chaya sat back and folded her arms in front of her. “Well, maybe this Sam will finally get Patrick into trouble. Someone from out of state is hardly going to accept them not bringing charges against him.”

When I didn’t say anything, she pressed me. “Surely, this friend of Mikey and Tiller is pressing charges.”

I shrugged. “I mean… it sounded like he was. But when he mentioned it, the sheriff took Sam in instead. I found out later they didn’t charge him with anything, but I think it was their way of trying to intimidate him out of accusing Patrick of the property destruction.”

Just then Pim showed up with my smoothie and gave me a stern look. “Drink it. And if you want to know what Sam is going to do, simply ask the man.” He looked over my shoulder with a tilt of his chin before returning to the kitchen. I turned around to see Sam sitting with Mikey and Tiller at the counter. He was busy scribbling notes with a pencil on a yellow legal pad.

I turned back around to face Chaya and tried not to look as flustered as I felt.

“Your cheeks are like little red apples,” Chaya said with a shit-eating grin. “Funny, you don’t get apple-cheeked about Mr. Balderson.”

“His name is Barney.”

“Babe, I grew up here. He’s been our librarian for a thousand years. We always called him Mr. Balderson. No amount of nookie with my bestie is going to change that.”

I shuddered. “No nookie, and you know that.”

“That’s not what Big Daddy told his model trains club,” she singsonged.

“What?” I cried, unaware of how loud it came out. “What the heck are you talking about?” If Barney had told his model train friends lies about me…

“Gordon Iverson told me Barney had asked the group for a bed-and-breakfast recommendation. He said he wanted someplace special to take his beau for an intimate weekend alone.”

I groaned. “I just want to be friends with the man. He’s been so good to me, especially after everything that happened in December with the Stanners confronting me and then with Mikey and Pim’s accident in front of the shop. How do I convince him I just want to be friends?”

I didn’t have many friends as it was, and I didn’t want to lose one of the few who cared about me.

Before she could answer, Chaya’s eyes widened before a shadow appeared over my shoulder.

“You okay, Truman?” a familiar and delicious deep voice asked from behind me.

I looked up into Sam’s handsome face. His blond hair was scattered about like he’d driven down the mountain in a convertible with its top down, and his eyes bore their usual intensity. I felt my stomach take a dive.

“Your eyes look like rosemary,” I blurted.

No one said anything, so I scrambled to fill the awkward silence. “Ha, but not… not like… I only mean the rosemary plant has the same sort of dusty green color, you know? Rosemary? The herb? Do you know it? Salvia rosmarinus? Never mind.”