Sandcastle Beach (Matchmaker Bay #3) - Jenny Holiday Page 0,24
ended in May, and with it their détente. And the next season didn’t start until August. So he had no idea what she was doing now. He studied her. On the surface of things, she looked the same as ever. Well, it was Monday—no theater on Mondays—so she didn’t look like an overdressed murder victim circa 1985, but her hair was piled on top of her head like it always was when she wasn’t playing a character. She was wearing a green T-shirt with Shakespeare’s face on it that said “Will Power.” She was probably wearing her green Converse high-tops to match. He leaned forward to peek over the bar. Yep.
Everything was normal, was the point.
Except maybe her eyes were a little less bright than usual. Her eyes were usually glinting with…something. Her latest entrepreneurial impulse, general mischief, bloody revenge, whatever.
Today, though, they seemed less sparkly.
He hadn’t responded to her inquiry about a truce. He nodded and pulled out her bottle of wine. He had no idea what they would watch. He didn’t even know if the app archived matches once the season was over.
But a person didn’t question a truce. That was the whole point of a truce. You suspended hostilities and truced.
She put her hand out to stop him from pouring her wine. “I can’t. I have to be somewhere.” She slid off her stool. “You closing tonight?”
She was asking what time the truce would commence. “Nope,” he lied. Since she didn’t have a show tonight, she didn’t have to be up late, and it was usually two thirty before he made it upstairs after he closed. This would be some more practice for Carter.
And for him. He had to get used to letting other people take more responsibility at the bar.
“Off at nine,” he said.
Maya should have had the wine at the bar. As she trudged up the path to her parents’ house, she could have used the liquid courage.
But as much as she enjoyed sipping wine at Lawson’s Lager House, alcohol wasn’t going to solve her problems.
Money was going to solve her problems. She had talked to her friends some more, and they’d come up with a plan and a budget to tackle all the repairs needed at the theater. And given that, she’d let herself be talked into going after a loan.
She just wasn’t going to get it from TD Bank. Or RBC. Or Scotiabank. All three—RBC just today—had turned her down for a small-business loan. Not that that was much of a surprise. On paper, the extremely not-for-profit Moonflower Bay Theater Company probably wasn’t the greatest bet. But if they would come see a play, understand the potential. Experience it.
Which she’d asked the bank officers—fine, young, tie-wearing men all—to do.
“That’s not really how we parse loan applications,” the TD guy had said. And from Mr. Scotiabank: “I’m more of a TV person. Did you watch Game of Thrones? Epic. Epic.” RBC had merely said no thanks. She’d been like, Really? That’s it? Just “no”?
The aroma of charcoal suggested her dad was out back grilling, so she let herself in the side gate and plastered a smile on her face. “Hi! What are you grilling? I thought we were doing takeout?” Not that she cared. She’d be happy with anything. Her own budget-constrained diet of late had been heavy on packaged ramen noodles, which Jenna had had on sale for fifty cents apiece recently. And since Maya’s car was currently dead behind her building, making runs to a proper grocery store impossible, she’d stocked up.
“Hi,” her dad said. “Your mom is bringing some takeout home, but I bought some fish from Jake Ramsey today. We thought we’d do a bit of a smorgasbord—eat the fish while it’s fresh.”
Jake, who was all but retired as a commercial fisherman, still went out occasionally and sold to the townspeople directly from the pier at the little beach. “You want to thread those onto skewers for me?” Her dad nodded toward a Ziploc in which chunks of fish were marinating in a mixture of yogurt and spices.
Her mother came through the gate, dressed in her work clothes. She was a nuclear engineer. Everyone’s stereotype of a nuclear engineer was a dude in a hard hat and a hazmat suit, but her mom wore standard Hillary Clinton–style pantsuits to work. “Hi! Happy Monday!” Maya usually had dinner with her parents on Mondays. Even if she was in the middle of a run of shows, Mondays were always free.