Page 20 of The Affair
I raised a suspicious eyebrow.Was Sawyer Gallagher stalking me?
He shrugged. “It’s a small town, and for as long as I can remember, it was always your mom and dad running that place—well, except for the summers when they’d bring in you and your brother to help out. I figured, with your mom gone, that you’d need the help but wouldn’t necessarily be able to afford it.”
I leaned back against the sofa cushion, my arms folded against my chest. “Oh, you did, did you?”
“Yeah, I mean, the store isn’t exactly busy all the time, so you’ve got to figure, you aren’t exactly rolling in the cash. The income you’re getting from those few rental spots have to help, but—”
He finally noticed the way I was looking at him.
It was a murderous sort of stare, and he quickly cleared his thought and moved on, “So, anyway, when I noticed your Help Wanted sign had disappeared after you outright refused me, I came up with a way to help us both.”
“Go on.”
“What if I helped out—free of charge, of course—and in exchange, you gave me a spot in your shop to try out my furniture?”
“I already told you—”
“I know; I know. You already told me that you only sell antiques, and I get that. I know you are a stickler for tradition and doing things the way your parents did them, but at the end of the day, you’ve got to realize you are the owner now, Elle. You. Not anyone else. And it’s you who’s got to keep the doors open.”
“And you think I’m going to do that by selling your furniture? And how are you supposed to support yourself with no income?”
That sly grin returned. “Well, it couldn’t hurt to try. Change isn’t always bad, and I have cash saved up; don’t worry.”
“And if it doesn’t? Work, that is—this change.”
“Well, you see, that’s where we negotiate. Let’s give it a time frame to test it out. Maybe six months?”
“Make it three,” I said, just to see how desperate he was.
“Fine,” he agreed. “Three months, and I promise you, this is going to change your life.”
I didn’t know why, but just at that moment, a chill ran up my spine, and I wasn’t sure if it was a good sign or a seriously bad one.
Had I just made a deal with the devil?
Chapter Four
Along with the insatiable need to control everything around me, I had this undeniable hatred for anything even remotely spontaneous. Even as a child, I had been a hard-core planner. So, when I woke up the morning after agreeing to Sawyer’s crazy-ass plan to throw chaos into my perfectly adequate antique store, I immediately regretted it.
“What was I thinking?” I asked myself.
Unfortunately, the steamy reflection staring back at me in the bathroom mirror had no answers. With my towel wrapped tightly around me, I hurried out of there and made myself ready to face another day.
By the time I got downstairs, with just enough time to grab a fast breakfast, I luckily had the whole Sawyer debacle all figured out.
“I’ll just tell him it’s not going to work out,” I explained to my toaster.
Talking to myself out loud had become a normal thing since my mom moved out. It was either that or I found myself turning on the TV late at night just to hear the sound of another human being.
I wasn’t kidding about thatsaddest human being on the planetthing.
Maybe I should look into getting a cat.
Something to think about later. Right now, I needed to grab my bagel and get in the car, so that on my way to work, I could conjure up the perfect way to let down Sawyer. I knew he meant well. The store did, in fact, need a boost in income, but I would find a different way to do it.
Without compromising the integrity of its tradition and including my ex-brother-in-law.
Feeling better about my decision as I drove to work, I almost didn’t notice him as I pulled up to the store.
