Snowflake Bay (29 page)

Keep reading for a preview of

by Donna Kauffman,
coming next May.

She didn't mind being known as the single sibling, the last remaining unmarried McCrae. She didn't. Kerry McCrae's life was too big, too bold, to settle herself down in one place, with one person.
Let 'em eat wedding cake.

“Refills in the back!” came a shout from the pool table area in the rear of the Rusty Puffin, her great uncle Fergus's pub, which was tucked away in the tiny harbor town of Blueberry Cove, Maine.

The same pub she'd been helping him run now for a little over a year, putting her big and bold life on hold. She'd come back for her older brother Logan's wedding the previous summer, then stayed on for her oldest sister Hannah's Christmas wedding. And now the middle McCrae sister, Fiona, was driving them all bonkers planning her fall wedding to Snowflake Bay Christmas tree farmer, Ben Campbell. None of those were excuses for Kerry not heading out on her next grand adventure.

If she was looking for an excuse—and she wasn't—it was the stroke that Fergus had suffered just a few weeks prior to Hannah's holiday wedding that had kept her hanging around. Technically, he was her late grandfather's cousin, but he was Uncle Gus to her, and to her siblings. He was her port in a storm, the one McCrae who truly understood her, who recognized that glint in her eye, because it matched the one in his own. He knew she couldn't contain her spirit in a small seaside town, no matter how dear the Cove was to her. And her hometown was dear, as were each and every one of her family members. It was their strength, stability, and support, after all, that had given her the confidence, the assurance, the daring, to leave home at the tender age of eighteen and go forth to conquer the world as she pleased. And she'd pleased herself a great deal, gypsying around the globe for more than a decade now.

Except, she thought, for this last year when she'd been home again. For the weddings. And to help Uncle Gus. If it also kept her from thinking about the last adventure she'd been on before she'd returned home, then all the better, really.

“Keep your pants on, Hardy,” Kerry called out, without even looking up from the bottles she was uncapping and sliding down the bar to two of the other thirsty bar patrons crowding the small establishment. Her musings continued as she pulled four more drafts and set them on a tray. Gus's stroke had absolutely been the reason she'd stayed past Hannah's wedding. He'd always been there for her, so of course, she'd be there for him.

She carried the tray to the back, trying to ignore her little voice as it whispered
, he's fine, or fine enough, he doesn't need you to stay . . . so how long are you going to cling to that reason before you find yet another? Fiona's wedding, perhaps? Then what?

Kerry ignored her little voice—she'd gotten good at that—and set the tray on the round café table closest to the pool table that Hardy and his three fellow lobster fishermen coworkers were using. “Who's losing?” she asked, then grinned as all four men paused in chalking or lining up their cues to look her way. “I only ask so I know whose tab to put this round on.”

“Might as well add it to Perry's,” Hardy replied as the other two men who weren't Perry chuckled in agreement. “He couldn't sink a shot if he nudged it all the way to the pocket with his nose,” Hardy added with a laugh.

Hardy was a tall, well-muscled, good looking guy, a few years older than Kerry's thirty-one. He wasn't a native of the Cove, but had moved there from Boston after marrying Caroline Welsh, the third-grade teacher at the local elementary school. So Kerry didn't know him well, or at all, really. What she did know was that he was a natural flirt and cocky enough to think it was perfectly fine to exhibit that talent wherever and whenever he saw fit. She also knew it had surprised no one except him, apparently, when, after three years of marriage, Caroline had filed for and gotten a divorce almost before he'd known what had hit him. That had happened right after Kerry's return to Blueberry.

He'd stayed on in the Cove, continued working for Blue's, the local fishing company in Half Moon Harbor. The locals had opined he'd hung around to woo his ex-wife back, but he'd tried to coax Kerry out on a date more than once, so if that was his plan, then the divorce had taught him nothing about women. He'd been good-natured enough about accepting Kerry's continued rejections, but she knew, given the twinkle in his dark brown eyes, that he'd try again. She wasn't worried about that. She'd handled far worse than Hardy on her globetrotting travels.

Perry was a half dozen years older than Hardy, also a Blue's employee, and had been since he was sixteen, helping to keep his family's farm going by dropping out of school and working full time as soon as he was able. He was as good-natured as he was hardworking, married to Bonnie, the town's one and only EMT, and proud of his wife's accomplishments. They had two little ones and another on the way.

He looked up at Kerry with a sheepish grin, then straightened so he could take a sip of the beer she'd carried to him. “I wish I could say different, but he's right. I'm blaming it on lack of sleep. Bonnie's pulling night shift work as long as she can—pays better—so I've been pulling double duty with the kids. Her ma's got them tonight so I can get out for a bit.”

Kerry just nodded as he handed the mug back to her and bent back over the table to line up his shot.

Across the table, Hardy took a sip of his beer, folding his arms around his pool cue as he leaned back against the wall, watching Perry try to line up a shot that would sink both the seven and the three if it worked. The other two men followed Hardy's example, which was privately why Kerry thought Hardy had really stayed in the Cove. Big-man-in-a-small-pond complex, at least in his immediate circle. The three men took turns sipping and taking side bets on how many rounds Perry was going to owe for by the end of the night.

Kerry had set Perry's mug on the table and picked up the now empty tray, but set it back down again and walked around to where Perry was still lining up his shot. She leaned down next to him. “Tap the side of the table,” she told him, her voice low.

He paused, shifting slightly to look at her. “What?” “Tap the table,” she said again, enunciating the words this time. She'd just delivered their second round of ale, so she knew he wasn't buzzed.

Perry straightened, then caught her wink, and tapped the edge of the pool table with his palm.

Kerry followed suit and tapped hers twice, then took his cue and nudged him out of the way.

“Hold on, hold on,” Hardy said, smile fading, beer suddenly forgotten. “Wait—you can't just—”

“He tapped out. I tapped in,” Kerry said. “I'm taking his turn for him.”

“This isn't a wrestling match,” Hardy protested. “You can't just tap out and tap in.”

Kerry lined up her shot, going after the same two balls, but taking a slightly different approach. “My bar, my rules.” She hit the cue ball, then stood, grinning, as first the three went in, then the seven. She moved around the table. “Excuse me,” she said, as she slipped between Hardy and the pool table to get to her next shot. “Still Perry's turn, I believe.” She then proceeded to run the rest of the table. She'd been playing pool since she could see over the edge of these very tables, a skill that had stood her in very good stead on her worldly adventures. She'd been surprised by just how many countries there were with bars and pubs containing a pool table or two. And how men in every last one of them would underestimate a woman with a pool cue.

A goodly number of folks were watching now as she sank the final ball, and a cheer went up as the black number eight fell in the side pocket. Perry was flushed, but laughing, as were both of the other fishermen playing his table. Hardy looked like he was going to complain, but Kerry just held her hand out, palm up, in front of him. “Man's got two toddlers and another on the way. He needs that money for diapers and college funds.” She rubbed her fingers, her smile and stare never wavering. “Now, be a nice single guy with no kids and pay up.”

“I have a dog,” Hardy grumbled, as he reached for his wallet, to the hoots of the other two men, and the assembled crowd. He got a cheerful thanks from a smiling Perry. “A big dog,” Hardy added, as he slapped the bills on her palm while Perry collected from the rest of the bettors.

Kerry took one of the fives and handed it back to him. “I've seen your big dog, Hardy. Ten pounds of terror, that one. Get little Fritzie some kibble. On me.”

“He's my ex's dog,” Hardy replied and, to his credit, ignored her offer and picked up his beer again. He grinned as he lifted the mug to his lips. “At least he doesn't steal the covers.”

Everybody laughed, including Kerry. It was just past suppertime as the sun began to set on another breezy June Friday, and the Puffin was full up with the hard working folks of the Cove looking to burn off a little workweek steam and a few dollars from their freshly cashed paychecks while they were at it. They worked hard and played hard, but for a few exceptions, mostly kept themselves in check.

Though Gus's stroke had left him a bit less blustery than his usual ornery, Irish self, the folks of the town respected him and knew he ran a tight ship. The Rusty Puffin was the only pub in town, and as he was often fond of saying, “I want it to stay standin', so keep yer balls on the table and your hands to yourself, or I'll cuff one to the other and let you sort out how to get yerself free.” That his great-nephew— Kerry's older brother, Logan—was the Cove's chief of police didn't hurt any either.

She handed the cue back to Perry, but not before tapping the end of it on his shoulder. “Seeing as Bonnie's also pulling double duty, working and growing you an adorable new baby at the same time, maybe you should spend some of your grandma capital taking her out for dinner and a movie while she can still sit long enough to enjoy them.”

Perry didn't flush or look embarrassed. He grinned and leaned closer over the laughs and guffaws. “Our tenth is coming up. She thinks she's got shift duty and I'll be out running traps, but her ma and I have set up a little surprise. Getting away for a whole weekend, just the two of us.”

Pleased, Kerry gave him a fist bump to the shoulder. “Well, good on ya, mate, good on ya.” Then she leaned in and bussed him on the cheek for good measure. “The world needs more men like you,” she added, plenty loud enough for those close by to hear over the sounds of a pub in full swing.

Grinning at the hoots and hollers that got, she scooped up the tray and skirted the table, taking an order from the three men at the next table as she ducked by. Hardy eased forward just enough to crowd her pathway back to the bar. “Sounds like someone from your little Down Under adventure gave you a bad impression of men. Mate,” he added, pointedly, copying the bit of Aussie accent that crept into her voice now and again, usually when she was cheering or swearing. So, fairly often. “You should let me fix that for you.”

Kerry smiled sweetly up into his handsome, preternaturally tanned and weathered face. “I'm thinking I'll wait until your track record improves.”

Hardy clutched his chest and stumbled back a step in mock pain, as one of the other players called out, “She shoots, she scores!” causing another ripple of laughter amongst the slowly dissembling crowd. Hardy grinned and laughed with them, but not before Kerry saw a bit of a hard glint come into his eyes. She'd have wondered how he knew where she'd been prior to her return to the Cove, but in a town as small as Blueberry, the fact that everybody knew everyone else's business was a given.

Within moments, she was once again swallowed up in the rush of running a small pub on a crowded Friday night. She dismissed any concerns about Hardy. He might be an inveterate flirt who hadn't had the good sense to expend at least some of that natural charm on his own wife, but he wasn't an overly aggressive guy. He'd keep up the pressure, to be sure, but she'd handle it, handle him.

She ducked under the bar in time to bump hips with Fergus as he came in from the tiny kitchen in the back. “Natives are restless,” he said. “And hungry. Eatin' us out of house and home, they are. We're down to pretzels and nuts. We need to order more of those cracked corn nuts you put on the menu, too.”

He was balancing a tray filled with little wooden bowls in his good hand. She smoothly shifted the tray from his hand to hers, leaning in to kiss his ruddy cheek as she did. “Will do,” she said, and carried it to the waiting bar patrons without giving him a chance to protest. He was touchy about the limitations his stroke had left him to grapple with, and she'd learned the best way to deal with that was to do what needed doing while charming her way through his moods.

The stroke had left parts of the left side of his body less than fully functional. He had a very slight droop to the corner of his left eye and the corner of his mouth on that side, but his speech patterns had mostly returned to normal with only minimal slurring. He still had random gaps in his memory, both of current events and ones from his past, and at times he would lose his train of thought, or struggle a moment to find the word he wanted, but otherwise, for a man pushing eighty, he was still sharp as ever.

More troublesome was that the stroke had rendered his left shoulder, arm, and hand incapable of the normal lifting and carrying required to run a pub, though fortunately he was right handed, and still had all his fine motor skills there, where they were most needed. According to his doctors and physical therapist, he should be using a walker, as his left hip and knee weren't at full mobility, but Fergus wasn't having any of that. He'd found a way to move his short, stout-framed self around well enough using a thick, hand-carved oak cane that Eula, the local antique store owner and restoration expert, had given him. Still, Kerry worried about him, and was glad she could stick nearby to keep an eye on him.