Clouds rolled in over Hartwell that morning. Fortunately, they didn’t look heavy with rain. Overcast days were the norm in February, but as long as it stayed dry, we’d have no meltdowns from Kell.
Carrying my sewing kit in one hand, the cloak for Maleficent (I’d had last-minute sewing to do on the hem) in my other, plus my purse, car keys, and a bottle of water, I clattered down the stairwell of my apartment building already feeling flustered. Winter Carnival was a big day for me. The parade moved through town first before the festival kicked off, so I was on call as one of the seamstresses and walked behind the floats. That meant I also had to be in costume, so I dressed as Snow White. After the parade, I had to hurry to the top of Main Street, which we closed to set up a market. My stall was in that market. Thankfully, Bailey was helping me out this year, so she’d set up the stall for me while I was parade-bound.
I wondered if I’d see Michael today.
Nope.
Don’t think about him!
Space, he’d said. He was giving me space.
Well, he certainly had done that. The only time I’d seen him in the last two weeks was the previous Friday at Cooper’s. He’d been off duty and no surprise he and Cooper got along like a house on fire. Bailey, Jess, and Emery weren’t much better. Once Michael decided to be charming, he was goddamn hard to resist. I’d never seen Emery stutter and stammer so much in my life.
And other than a few flirty comments my way, he’d left the bar around eleven o’clock. He’d said good night to everyone but stopped by my side. He’d looked at me a few seconds and then brushed his finger gently across my cheek before he said softly, “Good night, dahlin.”
Unfair!
He might as well have kissed me for the way my body reacted to that simple touch.
Oh, and the girls swooned all over that.
Bailey was dying to interrogate me, I could tell. She wanted to know what was stopping me and I couldn’t bring myself to explain.
I hadn’t seen Michael since that night, but Cooper reminded me that working for the sheriff’s department meant Michael wasn’t only a cop in Hartwell. He was a cop in the whole county, and although the sheriff’s department was based in Hartwell, there were much bigger towns on the west side of the county. Jeff had sent Michael to assist the police department in Georgetown in an investigation over a suspicious suicide.
I guessed that it was keeping him busy while he was giving me space.
The whole giving-me-space thing was making me jumpy. I didn’t know when he was going to decide to stop giving me space.
Ugh.
Hurrying down the last flight to the first floor, I almost skidded to a stop at the sight of Ivy Green standing in the doorway of the apartment below mine. She grimaced when she saw me, and I would hav
e been insulted if it wasn’t for the fact that it seemed to be her reaction to everyone these days.
“I said I’d bring it in.” Ira pushed through the door with a box in his hand.
“We need it before we need the box you’ve got,” Iris said behind him.
And then they were both walking down the hall, bickering.
Iris saw me first and her face melted into a huge smile. I smiled in return.
The owners of Antonio’s were the funniest, warmest couple I’d ever met. Iris and Ira bickered about everything, but everyone knew they adored each other.
I also knew from my brief chats with Iris that they were extremely worried about Ivy.
“Hey,” I said, struggling to keep hold of all the items in my hands. I put my sewing kit box down. “What are you guys doing here?”
“We’re moving Ivy in,” Ira answered.
“Oh, we’re neighbors?” I turned to Ivy. “That’s great.”
She gave me a listless nod.
I frowned, studying her.
Iris and Ira adopted Ivy when she was a baby. All they knew about her birth parents was that her mother was Filipino and her father was Caucasian. If they hadn’t known it, it still would have been evident in their daughter. Ivy was stunning with large dark eyes that tilted slightly upwards and narrowed toward the outer corner. She had perfect, light-bronze skin tone, high cheekbones, and a small but lush, full-lipped mouth. Anytime I’d met Ivy in the past, her poker-straight, jet-black hair was styled to perfection. Her nails were manicured and her light makeup professional in its application.