I laughed, then tried to muzzle it under a cough. There was already wine on the table. I had one more slice of cheese and garlic pizza. If I met my maker tonight I’d want to have a full stomach. We had a lot to talk about.

* * *

The bookstore was busy the next day. Tourists streamed in. Part of the reason was that I had an employee standing outside giving away samples of apple cider caramel cake. It was the treats that drove them in. I don’t blame them. I believe a treat a day keeps the doctor away. I also had my tea specials up on a board at the door: Honey Lavender and Cinnamon Chai.

But who couldn’t love a shop called Evie’s Books, Cake, and Tea? The finest things in life, right? They loved sitting in the café area and looking out over the bay. They loved the deck. They loved the bouquets I sold for my mother and aunts today labeled “Men Are Dense, Like Cheese. Buy Your Own Bouquets” and “A Woman’s Place Is Wherever She Damn Well Wants It to Be” and “Laugh More, Laugh Loud, Drink Beer.”

They loved my aunt Camellia’s lotions and potions, called A Lady’s Secret and Carnal Coconut and Soothing Seduction.

And they loved my aunt Iris’s puzzling/somewhat suggestive /now and then a little creepy flower photographs that made you stop and think and tilt your head as you tried to “get it.” One of her purple flowers definitely resembled a penis, and two other exotic red flowers together definitely resembled breasts. She had turned many of her photographs into cards, and they flew out the door.

I met with customers and tried to get them to buy piles of books they would love. I am not bragging, but I know my books. I can find any book for anybody. And I can usually figure out what they might like to read that they had never thought to read. Books are my business. I am their book gal.

But in between customers and loading up shelves with new books and rearranging displays, when I had a minute, I thought of Marco. I knew I loved him. But there could never be a future because of what I knew, what I had seen, would happen between us.

I could not let that happen.

And that made the inside of me feel lonely and cold.

I touched a yellow rose petal in the bouquet on my office desk. I would eat a raspberry rose cupcake to warm me up, then I would have some honey lavender tea.

* * *

The Book Babes were back.

They were discussing a book in which a woman watered her cheating soon-to-be-ex-husband’s Corvette with a hose.

The discussion had morphed into what was appropriate in terms of revenge if a husband cheated. They decided . . .

* * *