Page 37 of Brewbies
“A 1952 Schwinn Starlet.”
Roy’s eyes narrowed. “Twenty-four or twenty-eight-inch frame?”
“Twenty-six-inch frame,” Darby said, returning his shrewd look with one of her own. “Schwinn didn’t make a twenty-eight-inch Starlet. You’d need a Spitfire for that height.”
Silvery brows shot up toward Roy’s surprisingly abundant pewter gray hair.
Suck it, secondhand snob.
“I got a set in the back,” he said begrudgingly.
“Splendid.” Moving robotically, Darby stooped to pick up the cigar box and shoved it toward Roy’s pearl-snap-clad chest. “Here,” she said. “These are for you.”
Roy’s gaze fixed on the box like it might contain a bomb instead of a dozen hand-rolled Cuban cigars that had probably set Fawkes back a pretty penny.
“What for?”
Over the course of her illustrious career as St. Vincent Academy’s resident bad girl and the blue-blooded Dunwell family’s black sheep, Darby couldn’t even begin to figure how many lies she might have told. Ranging from your harmless little fibs to your absolute save-me-a-seat-in-the-back-row-of-hell whoppers.
Why, then, the completely unvarnished truth should come spilling out of her lips in such a completely inopportune moment was an utter mystery.
“They’re a bribe.”
Roy’s watery blue eyes blinked at her from behind the smudged lenses of his gold wire-framed glasses.
“A bribe?”
“Yes, sir. Cady Bloomquist’s fiancé said they were your favorite and that I should bring them to you so I can try to find out why the entire town dances around you, even though you don’t seem to get along with anyone, because it might help me get the petition against Brewbies overturned.”
Shit, shit,shit.
One bushy silver brow lifted. “That all?”
“Also, he thought it was strange that you agreed to help Caryn try to get control of Nevermore Bookstore when you didn’t have a single thing to gain from it.”
“I see.” A current of smoky-sweet tobacco leaves drifted over to her as an ancient window AC unit cranked to life.
“Personally, I think it’s kind of bullshit that she and Mayor Stewart have avoided you like the plague since you basically took all the blame during the city council meeting,” Darby added when Roy didn’t say anything else. “According to what I’ve heard.”
The silence that stretched out between them lasted approximately a millennium.
“You’re wasting your time.” Roy herded her back into the shop with an outstretched arm.
“Because you won’t change your mind about the petition?” Darby asked, praying she didn’t end up going ass-first into one of the piles.
“Because I didn’t sign it.”
EIGHT
Bitter
Ethan crossedWater Street to Dobson’s side, so intent on where Darby had disappeared into the secondhand shop that he nearly knocked over his own mother. Immediately, he broke his vow not to allow his first words (post-scandal) to Caryn Townsend be an apology.
Steadying her, he couldn’t help but notice how thin her shoulders had become beneath her silk blouse and tailored blazer.
“Ethan.” She regarded him as if she’d sent him off to war and never expected to see him again.
“Are you okay, Mom? Did I hurt you?”
