Once a Charmer Read online

  “I have this signed—” Landon began again.

  “I don’t care what you have,” I said. “It’s not happening.”

  “Allie, please,” Nick said in a low voice. “Let’s take this in the back.”

  Nick was right. He was being the cool-headed logical one. Acting like management, taking charge of the situation. He was being me. And I was having a mental breakdown next to the coffeepot.

  I own fifty-one percent…

  Oh my God.

  What did you do, Dad?

  Walking to my office felt like the walk of doom, as the cold chill of things shifting washed over me. It wasn’t my office if this guy owned—

  The hell it wasn’t. It was my mom and dad’s before me and fuck if some man-pursed asshole was going to take it from me.

  I spun around.

  “Mr. Lange, my father has put a lot of things on the line over the years,” I said, focusing on the tone of every word as it left my mouth. He couldn’t have really done such a thing. I had to believe that. I had to hold on to that hope. “I’ve seen too many things lost, including my home, and he made a promise to me after that. The Blue Banana would never be jeopardized.”

  “Well, I’m sorry,” he said, walking in, setting the paper on my desk without hesitation. “It is what it is. Signed and legal. He can verify it.”

  It is what it is.

  Hope left the room. It peeled itself from every surface and floated away. My father did it. He lost it. He lost our everything.

  I couldn’t breathe.

  “He—” I cleared my throat. “My dad can’t verify anything. He’s got dementia. Some days he isn’t sure of his own name.”

  “Sorry to hear that,” Landon said. “He was a nice guy.”

  “He’s still a nice guy,” I snapped.

  Landon held his palms forward and then picked up the paper, holding it in front of me. “Can you just look at the signature?”

  My feet felt rooted to the floor. I shut my eyes, feeling the tightly wound control I valued so much begin to slip away. I didn’t have to look. I didn’t want to. I’d know my father’s writing in a heartbeat, and I knew with just as much conviction that it would be on that paper. Still, my eyes needed the proof. The stinging slap to the face. I felt Lanie’s arm link through mine and Nick’s hand on the back of my neck, while my eyes fluttered open to a watery image of a yellow form. A deed transfer. Of majority percentage of the Blue Banana Grille to Landon Lange. Signed and dated in a hard right-slanted hand by Oliver Greene, Owner.

  I didn’t even have a tenth of a percent to my name. I ran it as my own because it was our baby. My mother gave birth to it, my father raised it, and I took it on. Now this stranger that had never set foot in here before today had controlling ownership. Had been in control for a while, and I never knew it.

  “This was signed last year,” I said, my voice not much more than an exhausted whisper. “Over a year ago, actually. Why are you here now?”

  He never changed expression, just set the paper down on my desk when I didn’t take it from him.

  “Honestly, I liked your father, Miss Greene,” he said. “He’s straightforward and truthful. I don’t see much of that in my line of work.”

  “I’ll bet,” I said.

  “What exactly is your line of work?” Nick asked from behind me.

  “He’s a bookie,” I said.

  “I’m a private loan officer,” Landon amended.

  “He’s a bookie,” I repeated.

  “So,” Landon continued. “I didn’t want to capitalize on his bad luck. Thought I’d give him a while to straighten his affairs out, but he never contacted me again.”

  “His affairs are about sitting at home watching war movies and sports and taking walks from one end of the trailer park to the other,” I said, cutting off the tears that wanted into my words. “Most likely, he doesn’t remember any of it.”

  “That’s unfortunate,” Landon said, then shrugging. “Or fortunate, perhaps. Spares him the drama.”

  “What do you want?” I asked, swiping a rogue tear as it fell, letting that one little piece of weakness be my staff. I took a step forward. “You don’t strike me as the diner type, Mr. Lange. I don’t see you having any interest in a small town like Charmed or any of its establishments.”

  His lips tugged into an almost-smile. “On the contrary, Miss Greene,” he said. “I see a lot of opportunity here. I’ve recently made a couple of lucrative investments here in Charmed—I figured why not since I own the majority of the most popular eating establishment.” He smiled, and my skin prickled. “Give back, is what I always say.”

  The image of this man sitting across from Bash, shaking his hand, crossed my thoughts.

  “What do you want?” I repeated, crossing my arms over my chest.

  His smile grew curious. “Are you suggesting that I’m open to a payoff?”

  “I’m suggesting that anyone able to so glibly take a man’s livelihood with a piece of paper is probably just soulless enough to throw something else out there,” I said, refusing to blink.

  Landon clapped his palms together, rubbing them in a fast motion. “Oooh, an insult and a challenge all in one sentence,” he said. “You do make it interesting, Miss Greene.”

  “How much?” I asked.

  “Oliver was in to me for fifty grand,” Landon said finally, setting my skin on fire with his oily words. “Not all at one time, mind you. I let him skate by a time or two. But things add up after a while and Oliver—well, he couldn’t seem to get on the right side of it.”

  Fifty grand.

  Sweet Jesus.

  “But that was before I checked on it,” he said. “The Blue Banana appraises for just over a hundred-seventy-five thousand.”

  I stared at him, not really seeing him anymore. One-seventy-five. Even split in perfect halves, that was over eighty-seven thousand dollars. We were done. I was done. I couldn’t get that kind of money if I wanted to. I basically worked for him now.

  “You—want Allie to cough up that kind of money to buy her own diner back?” Lanie asked.

  Landon shrugged. “Makes no difference to me one way or the other.” He turned to go. “But I have to ask—The Blue Banana?” He screwed up his face in dislike. “What’s with that?”

  My chest squeezed around my heart and I briefly wondered if cardiac arrest might be in my near future.

  “It’s personal,” I pushed out.

  He shook his head as if pondering it. “I’ll give it some thought. We can do better than that.”

  And he was gone.

  Nick and Lanie were talking to me. I felt hands and hugs, but all I could see were the eyes of another man that took something from me. The sound of his words telling me that my life’s plan had just flipped on a dime. The feeling of what had always been solid ground under my feet being wiggled away one tug at a time.

  “What are you going to do?” I heard Lanie ask.

  “Counters need wiping,” I said breathily, forcing myself to walk. “If Dave’s back, go do what you have to do, Nick. We’ll take care of it.”

  “Allie.”

  “Go,” I said, looking back but not really focusing. “Business as normal.”

  Normal.

  Whatever that was.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The next two hours were an out-of-body experience. I saw people talking, I heard the buzz; I even interacted and smiled, nodded and shook hands, and generally breathed in and out as if a universe-sized bomb hadn’t been dropped on my head.

  What was I going to do? What could I do? Go interrogate and rip my dad a new ass for breaking his promise, throwing our lives away again? The bitter anger that raged under the surface of my skin wanted to. With every turn, every pour of a coffee cup, every plate set in front of a customer, I had to grit my teeth together and s
wallow it back. Because I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t go off on an old man that did most of his living inside his own head now. Whose biggest joy was when his Dallas Cowboy T-shirt got washed so he could wear it again. He wouldn’t remember doing this, and it would be selfish and cruel of me to beat him up with it.

  I had to deal with it. I had to find a way to figure this out in what was now a foggy maze with no instructions or directions. Everything that had always been A was now Z. Up was down, green was the new blue, and for the first time in thirty-three years, I wondered what I was going to do with my life. It had never been a question for me. The most college interest I’d ever had was business courses at a nearby community campus, and that was so I could be a better restaurateur.

  Now, I had no footholds. Everything was slippery. Everything hung on a sleazeball named Landon Lange. And Bash knew him.

  There was another fiery poker.

  Bash of the incredibly hot, embarrassing, carnal delight visiting my dreams each night. Bash, of the forever friend category, the man I could normally tell anything. Bash, the honorary uncle to my daughter, the child he delivered in a storeroom during a particularly stressful night when we were seventeen. My closest, dearest friend. Who I had kissed three months ago.

  Because—crap.

  I’d kissed Bash. And I was pretty sure he’d kissed me back. Everything had been flipped on its awkward ass ever since.

  And now I’d seen him sitting buddy-buddy, shaking hands with the asshole out to ruin me. Good times.

  My phone buzzed from my pocket. I shook my head free of the crazy and pulled it out. Angel’s school. Awesome.

  “Mrs. Greene?” a female voice replied to my answer.

  “Miss,” I said, accustomed to the assumption.

  “Oh, sorry,” said the young woman, a hint of fluster in her voice, as though she’d practiced a spiel and I’d knocked her off her game.

  “Not a problem, can I help you?” I asked. “Is Angel okay?”

  “Yes ma’am,” she said. “Except she isn’t feeling well.”

  I rubbed my eyes. Today wasn’t the day.

  “Is that so?” I asked. “Does she have fever?”

  “No ma’am,” she said. “But Angel said she has a bad stomachache, and there is a bug going around, so—”

  “Well, this morning it was a bad headache and her throat hurt,” I said. “But her throat was as pretty as can be. Have you asked her about fourth period-itis?”

  The woman didn’t find me amusing, probably because I questioned her ability to be a school nurse and not spot a fake a mile away. Fifteen minutes later, Angel was in the car, looking appropriately miserable for about thirty seconds before the first question kicked in.

  “Can we stop at the Quik-Serve?” she asked, pointing at the convenience store up ahead.

  “For?”

  “I need to get some random magazines for a project for sociology,” she said.

  And there it was.

  “Uh-huh, and when is this due?” I asked.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” she said, shrugging. “Next week sometime. But I’ll probably do it today since I’m home.”

  “Right,” I said. “Should I run in and pick them up since you’re so ill?”

  “Nah, I’m—I’ll be okay,” she said, placing a hand to her belly. “I’ll only be a minute.”

  I pulled in, handing her a twenty. “Don’t move too fast, don’t want you puking in there.”

  Stomachache, my ass. That girl needed to realize who she was talking to, and the level of faking talent she needed to perfect before surpassing me. In my senior year of high school, I was six months pregnant before anyone suspected it. Not my dad, not anyone at school. And that included a month and a half of puking every time I smelled chalk. The only one I told was Bash, and he kept my secret.

  I narrowed my eyes, studying her as she returned to the Jeep and got in with a plastic bag full of magazines.

  “Are you pregnant?” I asked.

  She looked at me like I’d sprouted warts.

  “Are you high?”

  I turned the key. “Just checking.”

  “I’d have to have sex first, Mom,” she said. “I’m pretty special, but I’m not quite holy enough to pull that off.”

  And I’m not you.

  That’s what she had the tact not to say, but I knew ticked across her brain.

  I’d never hidden the truth from Angel, she knew how she came to be and what the story was with the boy that knocked me up and bailed. I never wanted her to have the young struggles that I had. The stigmas and social barriers that I had to overcome. I wanted her to enjoy the fun perks in life and be loved and liked for the awesome person she was. I raised her to hold her ground and be her own girl, and not let herself be controlled by someone who got his kicks out of yanking her chains.

  When she was younger, I thought I’d succeeded. Now, she was turning into such a teenager. Fortunately for her, she wasn’t anything like I was. Unfortunately for me, I sometimes had no idea how to decode such a creature.

  “Good to know,” I said, pulling out. “Have everything you need? What is the project about?”

  Angel shrugged and clicked into her seatbelt.

  “No idea.”

  I blew out a breath. I wouldn’t be a hypocrite. I was by no means a great student in school, and becoming a single mom at seventeen was certainly no prime example of what to do with your life, but this girl was smart. Like crazy smart. Straight A’s without ever cracking a book until the teen years rolled around and she realized that being the class whiz wasn’t cool anymore. It punched me in the gut every time I saw her waste her brain.

  “Angel, you’re better than that,” I said, feeling her tune me out without ever looking her way. “I’d be willing to bet you know exactly what the project is, what’s required, and five different ideas on how to do it better.”

  “Think so?” she said in a bored tone, her dark-eyed gaze focused on the small-town streets of Charmed passing outside her window.

  “I know so,” I said, yawning.

  It wasn’t even ten o’clock yet, and I felt like I’d lived a week outdoors being stomped by a horse.

  “So what’s with you not sleeping lately?” Angel asked.

  If only that were something I could discuss with a fifteen-year-old. I shook my head.

  “Just too much on my mind, I guess,” I said.

  “Bad dreams?”

  I gripped the steering wheel a little tighter. Lord have mercy. “Something like that, too.”

  “About Uncle Bash?”

  If I could have yanked my dashboard off and fanned myself with it, I would have. Oh God, what if I’d said something in my sleep and she heard?

  “Why?”

  “Because you cursed him in the shower this morning,” she said. “You were too cranky to ask at the time.”

  I took a deep breath and let it go. I was cursing him before I even knew I had a legitimate reason. That had to say something.

  “Don’t say anything to Pop about me having bad dreams,” I said. “He worries about stuff like that.”

  My dad being coherent enough to worry was really a fifty-fifty shot, but when it came to the subject of dreams in our family, he was likely to pull right out of his foggy little world and grill me for hours. He took that crap seriously. Protecting our livelihood—now evidently not so much.

  Stop. It would do no good.

  “Can we stop for donuts, too?” Angel asked, twisting a strand of dark wavy hair around a finger as we stopped at a red light and a new bakery sat all pretty at the edge of the Lucky Charm.

  I stared at her for what I hoped was an uncomfortably long moment.

  “For your severe stomach problems?”

  She gave me an innocent hurt look. “It’s comfort food.”

&nbs
p; “You are so full of it,” I said. “I have to get back to work.” Because…why, exactly?

  “You own the place, Mom,” she said.

  Oh, just shoot me and throw me in the pond. The stab to my middle was so strong, I had to work for my next breath.

  “Pop owns the place,” I managed, shoving the words out. I couldn’t tell her. Not yet. “I just—”

  “Do everything?”

  I cut Angel a sideways glance as we started moving. “Run the place,” I said. “But yeah, that too.” Since my dad’s illness kicked in, and before that some back problems that had him down, the list never seemed to end. I’d actually missed the days of coming in to work for someone else who had all the responsibility. The irony of that was brutal and cruel. “Who is going to take care of the diner in my absence?”

  “Nick?”

  “And if I’m AWOL, what does that tell my employees to do?”

  “Take a break because the big bad boss isn’t there?” Angel said, tilting her head with a snarky grin.

  “You’re a piece of work,” I said, shaking my head. “There are no breaks in the service industry, baby girl. People never stop eating, boss or not.”

  She just blinked at me. “So—comfort food?”

  A simple little donut would rock my world, considering the morning I’d had. I tapped my blinker. “The things I do for you.”

  “Speaking of people doing things for me,” she said, raising an eyebrow my way. “Uncle Bash is supposed to start driving lessons with me tonight, has he called you?”

  My tongue stalled as the familiar anxiety washed over my skin. Has he called you? No, Bash hadn’t called me. Not in the wide awake world of reality. He hadn’t come by in his normal drop-by-to-see-my-Angel-girl way or swung by the lunch counter at the Blue Banana to swipe a handful of peanuts from the bowl I had out. He even started having couriers drop off the cases of honey I sold from his apiary instead of delivering them himself. He’d been there as a customer off and on, but always with someone and always engaged in a conversation that didn’t look interruptible. Not that I would have, since I was avoiding him like a virus, myself.

  “You could call him,” I said, clearing my throat and my mind as I pointed at her phone. “Text him, message him, Facebook, or Insta-something him. You’re the one wanting him to teach you, Angel, and that thing that never leaves your hand has to have some kind of purpose.”