Page 9 of Windlass (Seal Cove #3)

Several days after her conversation with Stevie—and subsequent sprint around the house to find the leak—Angie worked up the courage to talk to one of the few other people in her life she trusted completely.

That was progress, right? A sign she was serious about making positive changes?

Proof she could cite that she was doing everything she could to prevent the catastrophic possibility of Stevie moving out?

The very thought of losing her was enough to cut off her air. Lana was nothing compared to that fear even if she had seemed like the solution to that very same terror the other day. Angie shut her car door, wishing she could shut her thoughts off as easily.

Stevie, the leaking roof, the other bills . . .

The blue awning overhanging Storm’s-a-Brewin’ fluttered in the breeze, ushering her into the familiar warmth of the cafe.

If a space could exude the same energy as a person, then Stormy’s cafe and brewery was a physical manifestation of Stormy’s energy.

It was impossible not to feel her spirits lift as the bell tinkled, announcing her arrival.

Stormy greeted Angie with a broad smile and patted the bar stool she was wiping down. Angie accepted the invitation and Stormy’s embrace. The smells that always emanated from Stormy’s clothes and hair—coffee grounds, Stormy’s floral shampoo, and baking bread—greeted her like the smell of home.

“Why do you always look so good, girl?” She checked Stormy out as she pulled away.

Stormy’s scoop neck T-shirt revealed her generous curves, which the apron with the café logo emphasized, and her jeans accentuated her hips.

Angie thought she was one of the most beautiful women she had ever seen, as well as one of the kindest.

“Flatterer,” said Stormy.

“Just speaking my truth.”

The coffee shop, which combined “rundown industrial coastal town” with hipster chic, featured exposed brick and tiny potted succulents, as well as a few air plants hanging in glass balls from the ceiling.

Stormy’s curling handwriting filled the chalkboard menu over the bar, and Angie scanned it as if considering a drink other than her usual.

“Dirty chai latte, soy milk, cinnamon sprinkled on top?” asked Stormy.

“You are an angel.” Angie slid onto the stool and hauled out her sketchbook while Stormy walked around the bar. She did not open it yet. She was not even sure she was going to draw, but she carried it with her like a talisman.

“I know what my girls like,” Stormy said and blew her a kiss.

What she liked, Angie did not say, was apparently an unhealthy dose of masochism and driving away the one person she could not afford to lose.

“So . . . about that. I fucked up.”

Stormy was one of two people she’d ever spoken openly with about her feelings for Stevie, and she wasn’t going to risk making Lilian feel badly about moving out, so in a hushed tone she knew sounded guilty, she filled Stormy in on the events of the past few days, from the weirdness on the couch to Lana to her recent conversation with Stevie. She left out the roof.

“Oh, girl.” Stormy set her beverage on the counter in a blue ceramic cup.

“I know. I’m a fucking idiot.”

“Be nice,” said Stormy. “You are misguided, not an idiot. I get why you did it.”

“Really? I don’t.”

“You’re pretending you’re protecting her in order to protect yourself from happiness, which you don’t believe you deserve.”

Stormy wiped down the nozzle of the milk frother with a suggestiveness that offset the brutal accuracy of her assessment. Had this been a comic, an imprint of a giant fist would have showed in the middle of Angie’s stomach.

“Ouch.”

“I do what I can.”

“Could you maybe . . . not?”

“My bad,” Stormy drawled, rinsing the rag and wringing it out. “I take it back. You are in no way self-sabotaging.”

“That was the least convincing thing you’ve ever said.”

“My monotone has earned me many standing ovations on Broadway.”

“And here I thought it was your monologues. How are you ?”

“Nice try.”

“Humor me?”

Stormy shrugged. “Briefly. We’re not done here. Keeping on keeping on. Plumbing issues and the usual. Any chance you have any plumbing skills?”

Here it was: a natural opening to share her own water-related stresses. The words would not come. Two confessions in one sitting were two too many.

“I could pick some up for you,” she said, taking a sip to hide her expression. “Use it as a distraction from Lana.”

“Barring the fact that Lana is the distraction , not the thing you need to be distracted from , please do. You’d be adorable in a pair of little coveralls with some wrenches.”

“You are thinking of that character from Atlantis , aren’t you? Audrey, or whatever her name is.”

“Am I?” Stormy paused, considering. “Overalls, wrenches, great hair . . . Okay yes, maybe I am. Doesn’t mean I’m wrong.”

“I’m pretending I didn’t hear the rest of what you said, by the way,” Angie said.

“Oh, I know. But you know I’m right, right?”

“What? Did you say something?”

“Pretending not to hear me only works if you haven’t already confessed to pretense, girl.” Stormy poured herself a cup of coffee and drank it black. “But I would love to see you learn some healthier coping mechanisms. Lana sucks.”

“That does seem to be the consensus.” Angie gripped her mug, feeling for chips in the ceramic. “I don’t need anyone to like her.”

“Especially since you’re done with her, yeah?”

“Yeah.”

It was true. She didn’t need her friends to like Lana.

If she could have had it her way, none of them ever would have met Lana, but living with her best friends had made that difficult.

Hearing how much they hated Lana, though, always hurt more than she let on.

It would be a relief not to deal with that.

“Have you told her that you’re done with her?” asked Stormy.

“It’s not like we talk. She’s got other girls. She probably won’t even notice.”

“Uh huh.” Stormy, thankfully, didn’t voice her disagreement, because Angie really wasn’t up for much more of this conversation.

“I’ll just get a better vibrator,” she said.

“That’s my girl. You know you can always call me, right?”

“For sex?”

Stormy laughed. “I don’t think I could handle you. No, for emotional support.”

“I know.” The mug was annoyingly smooth beneath her fingertips. An imperfection would have given her something else to focus on. Swallowing past a lump, she asked the question she’d come here to ask. “Is it fair to ask Stevie for help?”

Stormy leaned her elbows on the bar, holding Angie’s eyes. Angie looked away.

“Are you ready to talk about that?”

“No.”

“Okay. Then, I think you know the boundaries of what is fair to ask her, and what isn’t. They depend entirely on what you’re both willing to give.”

She did know that. But could she trust herself to act on that knowledge, or was she setting herself up for disaster?

“I just don’t know what the endgame is,” she said instead.

“Learning to lean on your friends instead of bottling all your shit up? Developing healthy coping mechanisms so that you can have healthy romantic relationships?”

“Okay yeah, but—”

“You just said you didn’t want to talk about the other thing.”

True.

“Do you really want my opinion?” Stormy asked.

Angie dared to glance back up at her friend, whose eyes held too much sympathy to bear.

“Maybe someday,” she said, her voice small and quiet.

The kid was there in the morning when Angie, shivering a little in the brief morning chill, headed toward the barn to check on her boarders.

Jaq had her hood pulled up and her hands buried in the sleeves of her sweatshirt, which was in a considerably sorrier state than Angie’s own.

She suppressed a smile. She remembered when it had been a point of pride to wear her sweatshirt until the hems were tattered and the band logo faded with wash after wash, though the laundry had never quite been able to cleanse the lingering stench of teenage angst. “Hi, I’m Angie. ”

Jaq looked up at her warily. Angie noted the soft doe lashes and deep brown eyes and the skin of the girl’s lip, which she clearly made a habit of chewing ragged. “Hi.”

“You’re here nice and early. Do you drink coffee? Wait, how old are you? Should I be offering you coffee?”

“Fourteen.” A pause. “I drink coffee.”

“Thank god. Want a cup? I want a cup. And I’ll show you where the bathroom you can use is, in case Stevie forgot.” She didn’t wait to see what Jaq said, remembering the agony of making any decision at that age, and walked into her boisterous, noisy world.

The area of the barn she’d turned into her lobby was built out of the lumber she’d had removed from the barn in renovations.

Warm reclaimed pine planks glowed in the lights she’d chosen specifically for that effect: homey, rustic, and reminiscent of the vague, idealized idea of “the farm” where dog owners wanted to send their dogs to play (not to be confused with “the farm” parents told children dead pets had been sent to).

Jenny, one of her employees, looked up from the front desk and smiled brightly.

Angie explained Jaq’s position and bathroom privileges to Jenny, showed Jaq where said facilities were located and with one more reassuring smile, let the kid go clean stalls or whatever it was she was doing for Stevie and Ivy.

“Cute kid,” Jenny said when Jaq had gone.

“Right? Apparently, she just showed up one day.”

“Are you keeping her? Doesn’t look like she eats much.”

“Very funny. Can you imagine?”