Page 12 of Snowflakes Over Starr's Fall
“I just wanted to apologize properly,” she told him frankly, her tone friendly but also resolute, like this was something on her to-do list she needed to get out of the way so she could move on with the better things in life. “For our… interaction… back in June. I was a little snippy then and I’m sorry for it.”
“Apology accepted,” Jack replied stiffly. He could feel all the eyes in the room on them, avidly. “I, ah, wasn’t the friendliest person myself, in that situation.”
“Well, I guess you really wanted smoked salmon,” she replied with a wry smile, and he forced a smile in return, although in truth everything about that interaction—and the frustration he’d felt since for this new, unwelcome life of his—still chafed. He’d felt it particularly that morning back in June, when he’d read the news right before heading into her store and seen just how much Wall Street had moved on without him. Adam Lassiter, the new CEO of Wexler Capital, had been hailed as a hero, and the name of the firm changed to Legend Investments, which was so stupid and basic and completely erased him from the firm he’d founded. It had smarted, a lot, and he’d let that anger and hurt carry him into the store and his stupid spat about smoked salmon.
He wasn’t about to explain any of that to this woman, though. Let her think he was just a jerk who’d wanted a particular product. Who cared?
“Something like that,” he agreed neutrally.
“Did you ever find any in Litchfield?” she asked, and Jack wondered why on earth they werestilltalking about smoked salmon.
“No.” He paused and then admitted with deep reluctance, “The truth is, I’ve been out of action for most of the summer.” He gave her a tight smile and in answer to her obvious confusion, explained, “I ended up needing surgery for a bleeding ulcer. Trying to avoid going down that route again, so I’m being very careful.” He looked away, embarrassed that he’d mentioned it,again. Good grief, he was sounding so very tedious. He needed to get some hobbies. Somemorehobbies, since playing Scrabble had become one, mainly by default, because it felt like there was so little he could do these days. That needed to change.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Jenna replied, sounding genuinely contrite. “That sounds painful.”
It had been excruciating, but as he really didn’t want to talk about it, he just shrugged. “Water under the bridge, anyway, in regard to that episode?” he asked. “I’d love it if the residents of Starr’s Fall could conveniently forget all about it, but I have the sense that isn’t going to happen, at least not anytime soon. They all seem to possess the memory of an elephant.”
Jenna chuckled, and Jack found he liked the sound of her laughter, rich and throaty. “You’re right there,” she agreed. “This town doesn’t forgetanything.” A small sigh escaped her as she looked around. “I love everyone here to pieces and they all have hearts of gold, but sometimes it can feel a little… suffocating.”
Curious, Jack shifted his stance to move a little closer to her. “You lived here your whole life?”
Jenna nodded. “Bar three years in the city—first San Francisco, then New York. I worked in marketing.” She made a face. “Not that you’d know it.”
He cocked his head. “Why wouldn’t I?”
She shrugged, the collar of her sweater sliding over one freckled shoulder. She was wearing as colorful an ensemble as she had the first time he’d met her—a rainbow patchwork skirt that swept the floor paired with chunky hiking boots with bright red laces and an oversized cable-knit sweater that looked as if it had belonged to a fisherman about fifty years ago. A very large fisherman.
“Just that if I had a better head for it, Miller’s Mercantile might be doing better than it is.”
Jack wasn’t surprised the store was struggling, considering what a dump it had looked like when he’d walked in there, but he was surprised that Jenna had admitted it. She seemed like the prickly, proud, and yes, a little shrewish type… At least shehad. He didn’t know what to think of her anymore.
“Anyway,” she said quickly, and he could tell she wanted to move past that admission, which he suspected she hadn’t meant to make. “What brought you to Starr’s Fall?”
“Retirement,” he replied succinctly, and her eyes widened in surprise, because hopefully he didn’t lookthatold. “Health reasons forced my hand, unfortunately.” Here he was, talking about his health problems again. Someone shut him up,please.
She nodded her semi-sympathetic understanding, her eyes still bright with curiosity and something that almost looked like confusion. “And you picked Starr’s Fall because…?” she prompted, with a lilt of incredulity in her voice that annoyed him. Was it so strange that he’d come to this place? Was hethatmuch of a city slicker?
He thought of his mother, whom he’d seen that morning. She’d been sitting by the window, a blanket over her bony knees, her hair, once so perfectly styled, in flyaway wisps about her wrinkled face. She’d called him Frank. He wasn’t about to go into any of that with this woman. “It was convenient.”
Jenna let out a laugh, the sound even more disbelieving. “I don’t know anyone who thinks Starr’s Fall is convenient. Not anyone who’s lived here, anyway.” She eyed him consideringly, as if she suspected he was lying, and Jack felt his body tense, his hands begin to curl into fists. With effort, he kept them flat and loose.
“Well, it’s convenient to me,” he replied shortly, and then cursed himself for yet again sounding like a jerk. Jenna was just being friendly, and maybe a little bit nosy, but he knew he was overreacting. Even so, he was not about to explain why he’d moved here to Jenna Miller, with all the emotion that entailed. They might have made up, but they weren’tfriends. Not even close, especially the way she was acting now, all snottily superior, because she was a Starr’s Fall old-timer and he wasn’t. At least, that was what it felt like.
“Surprisingly so, I think,” she replied with a new coolness to her voice. “For such a city slicker like yourself.” There was the faintest hint of a sneer to her voice, and mentally Jack shook his head. Had he actually been starting to think this woman was nice? For a little while there, it had almost seemed as if they could get along, which meant it was time for a reality check.
“So what are you going to do about your store?” he asked, sounding, he knew, a little aggressive, and Jenna jerked back.
“Excuse me?”
Jack shrugged. She’d touched too many raw nerves in the last few minutes, and when that happened he went on the attack. It felt good, in a way, almost the way he used to feel when he was closing a deal—that surge of adrenaline, the thrill of satisfaction. He was in control again. “You said it yourself,” he reminded her. “That it wasn’t doing great.”
“I said it could be doing better than it is,” Jenna corrected quickly, an edge entering her voice. “As just about any business could, I might point out.”
Jack let out a scoffing laugh that put her back right up, he could tell, and perversely he was glad. “Come on. That place? Smoked salmon aside, it looked like it was on its last gasp. When’s the last time you turned a profit—2005?”
All right, that might have been alittleharsh, even if it seemed like it was pretty much true.
Jenna’s eyes narrowed to golden-green slits. “And here I was, thinking you might be an okay kind of guy, since you took down that review?—”
