The Ivy House - By Drea Stein Page 0,24

them, the woman’s mouth slightly open, the man sending Chase a knowing look.

“It looks amazing,” the woman added.

Chase recovered first. “From The Golden Pear, one block up. Make a left onto High Street.”

“Best I’ve ever had,” Phoebe said and then wished she had kept her mouth shut.

The couple left, and she and Chase were alone again. He had taken a step back and was no longer leaning, and his sunglasses had slipped down from his head and she could no longer see his eyes. It was hard to read him, and then his mouth quirked up in its typical smile.

“I guess I’ll be seeing you,” he said.

“I guess so,” Phoebe agreed, though she didn’t know why. Unless he needed more pillows. Still, she wasn’t in the right frame of mind to disagree with him.

He backed away a few paces before he turned and walked in the direction of the harbor. Phoebe stood there, the remains of the cookie still in her hand, unabashedly enjoying Chase’s rear view.

Head turning, he caught her looking at him and flashed her a grin. She was almost certain that he threw her a wink behind his sunglasses. And then he turned and was on his way.

Phoebe leaned against the cool brick of the building. It was a shady and ideal place for her to just stand still. Her brain was a puddle of mud. And her stomach was flip-flopping again, probably from the giant cookie she had eaten. Right, that was it. It had nothing to do with the way Chase Sanders kept showing up when she least expected it. And doing her favors. Phoebe shook her head, trying not to get too worked up. In Los Angeles, nobody did favors for nothing. Chase’s help had to come with a price.

Chase did his best to keep his cool as he made his way back down towards the marina and his office. He’d only meant to give Phoebe a helping hand with the pillows. He stopped, almost started back, and then thought better of it. Joan still had his credit card and his pillows, but he knew they’d be safe. He’d go by later and pick them up when he was sure that Phoebe would no longer be anywhere in the vicinity.

One glance of her eating that cookie had been enough. The cookies were famous enough around Queensbay. Heck, even Noah swore by them when he needed to get out of the doghouse, but Chase wasn’t sure he’d ever seen someone, well, a woman, get so much pleasure out of a cookie. It was like…no, he wouldn’t—couldn’t—go there. Already he was having too much trouble concentrating without any more thoughts of Phoebe Ryan breaking into his head.

Chapter 12

Phoebe retreated to Ivy House. She had discarded the rest of the cookie and was now eating an apple while she doodled. The internet had been set up in the house, and Lynn had let her borrow a couple of sawhorses and a large piece of plywood from her father’s garage. It was serving as a temporary desk and that was just what Phoebe needed.

Joan Altieri had called just after lunch, while Phoebe was busy scrubbing kitchen cabinets. A customer had seen the pillows Chase had bought and wanted some just like it. Did she have more?

Phoebe took a deep breath, lied, and said yes. There was no way she was going to say no to another sale. As soon as she got off the phone with Joan, she called up her workshop in California.

Angela, the manager there, was nice, but always fretting, and Phoebe had to stop herself from screaming with frustration. That would only make Angela fret more and delay the process of her getting any more pillows. Finally, Angela admitted that they did have some stock in the warehouse space that Phoebe rented from them, and that she could send out some pillows by tomorrow morning.

Triumphant, Phoebe fist-pumped and got off the phone before Angela could change her mind. Walking over to her computer, she tapped on the keyboard until her website came up. She sighed. It was a piece of crap. Well, not exactly. It looked good, with beautiful pictures of her designs and even a pretty good headshot of her on it, one that she had bartered for. A duvet cover captured her in a slightly sexy, somewhat just-woke-up kind of look. Phoebe’s only quibble was that her resemblance to Savannah was too evident. Dean had suggested that she mention her relationship to Savannah