“Hello, Julie!” he called.

She stopped to smile at him. “I love what you do with your table settings.”

“Thank you. I like what you do with your window displays. Even when shoppers aren’t hungry, they stop to look, and they usually end up going inside to grab coffee and a cinnamon roll.”

“I cheat by piping the aroma of fresh-baked goods into the concourse where everybody smells them. It gets their mouths to watering, and then they can’t resist.”

He laughed and winked at her. “Smart thinking. Maybe I’ll try that.”

“Oh, no. I patented the idea.”

Julie waved as she walked away. She and Tony got along well, but she was careful not to get too chummy. When it came to neighbors, whether residential or business, she believed in the old saying, “Familiarity breeds contempt.”

As she pushed out the double front doors to the sidewalk, she checked her watch and was pleased to see that it was only a few minutes after five, which gave her plenty of time to walk to Blackie’s Pawnshop, located just beyond the town center on West Main. She’d been wanting to drop in for ages, but she hadn’t wanted to practically run to get there before Blackie closed up for the day. This afternoon, everything had fallen into place for her to finally walk over at a leisurely pace. She knew Blackie called it a day at six o’clock sharp. He’d told her once that he kept his doors open an hour later than the bank for people who worked a nine-to-five. That gave them time to drop in and hock their rainy-day treasures or redeem something.

It was a lovely afternoon, still sunny and warm despite the breeze blowing along the street. Julie loved the smells that teased her nostrils. The aroma of freshly baked bread drifted across the street from the Jake ’n’ Bake. Tantalizing scents wafted from Chopstick Suey, a Chinese restaurant owned by Hunter Chase. She even caught a whiff of permanent wave solution from the Silver Beach Salon, operated by Crystal Malloy Richards. But mostly what captivated Julie were the myriad perfumes of flowers that grew in window boxes along each side of the thoroughfare. Now that May had a firm foothold and the weather was warmer, the display of color was also a pleasure point, the pinks of petunias vying for center stage against yellow daffodils, heather, and daisies. Seeing the blossoms made Julie yearn to hurry home to her own gardens.

But that wasn’t on her agenda for today. She needed to close a sad chapter of her life at Blackie’s Pawnshop. A foolish part of her hoped against hope that she would get a happy ending, but her pragmatic side scoffed at her for even entertaining the notion. It had been two years since she’d hocked her deceased grandmother’s engagement ring, and it was too beautiful a piece to have escaped the notice of bargain shoppers who drove from town to town to find great deals in pawnshops.