Page 46 of Worst Nanny Ever (Babes of Brewing #2)

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

HANNAH

It’s Wednesday morning— late morning , full disclosure—and I’m about to go meet Sophie and Briar for breakfast, but when I go to leave, a knock lands on my door.

I look through the peephole and frown. It’s Mick, the big guy from down the hall who goes to the same boxing gym as my brother.

He’s a total asshole half the time, so the joke is that he’s Mick half the time, Dick the other half.

But occasionally he and my brother grab a beer because they both enjoy punching people.

My heart starts thumping faster. Did something happen to Liam last night, and this guy figured I didn’t need to know until morning?

I whip the door open, but once I get a close-up view of him, I cock my head. Because Mick/Dick is covered in glitter, and he is not the glitter type. “New look for you?”

“It was meant for you,” he says gruffly, sounding pretty pissed off. He shoves a small cardboard box at me, and I start laughing hysterically when I realize what must have happened.

Travis tried to glitter-bomb me, but he accidentally glitter-bombed Mick/Dick instead .

“It’s not funny,” he insists. “It got me in the eye.”

“They can do that,” I say through laughter. “Why’d you open my package anyway?”

He scratches his head and unleashes a cloud of colorful sparkles. “Oh, c’mon, Hannah. I wasn’t trying to steal it. I just didn’t look at the label.”

“Well, thanks for taking one for the team.”

“Do you know who sent it?”

He clearly means to do the sender harm, and there’s no way I’m throwing my guy under the bus, so I shake my head, feigning ignorance. “Guess I must have pissed someone off.”

He grumbles and stomps off, leaving faint glitter footprints along the hall.

I’m laughing so hard I’m barely breathing now, but after a few seconds, I gather myself enough to close the door behind him. I carry the little box in with me and sift through the remaining glitter, finding a note.

All it says is:

Now, it’s even.

With love from your guys

If that doesn’t make my heart swell…

He’s sent me something every day this week so far. On Monday, it was a box of donuts that would have given me early-onset diabetes if I’d eaten them all, followed by another huge stuffed dog on Tuesday because my first dog might be lonely. And then the glitter bomb today.

Grinning, I get out my phone and text him.

Did you send me something?

I believe in plausible deniability.

So, it would mean nothing to you if I say that instead of exploding on me, the glitter bomb exploded all over my huge heavyweight boxing champion neighbor.

Now I really want some plausible deniability.

Do you have any more fantasies for us to work through later?

Always

Any more articles about [nautical emojis]?

Not today. Seems to be dying down a bit. [Fingers crossed emoji.]

There was an article about Travis in the local paper on Monday, but the story hasn’t gone national…not yet, at least. A few videos about the Ships crew have gone viral on social media, but no one has shown up on Travis’s doorstep, thankfully.

I lock up my apartment, which is delightfully clean of glitter but not all that clean in any other way, and head over to Tea of Fortune to meet my friends.

When I arrive, two minutes late, I spot Sophie and Briar in the back, but I pause to greet the Wise Elders Group, which is still in session at the front of the tea shop.

Eugene’s with them, and he actually gets up and hugs me!

Talk about presto change-o. I secretly think getting drunk with Dottie was the best thing that ever happened to him.

It’s like she magicked her laid-back philosophy into his head.

Of course, when I told her that, she clucked her tongue and said that “awakening” Eugene to his better nature has been a group effort and that it wouldn’t have worked at all unless he was ready for it.

She’s probably right. She’s right about most things, aside from her crystal fetish, which I’m willing to overlook .

“The hedgehog is ready,” I tell Eugene with a meaningful look. “Project Applebottom Jeans is on.”

I wanted to give Eugene and Mrs. Applebaum a celebrity couple name, but this is the best I could come up with, and as an upside, it makes Ollie laugh hysterically whenever he hears me say it. He has no idea what it’s in reference to, other than that it has something to do with his teacher.

The project kicks off today. After breakfast, I’m going to pick up the hedgehog pencil cup, and then I’ll give it to Mrs. Applebaum when I pick up Ollie after school later.

It’ll have a note inside. Not one of those middle school notes with checkboxes for DO YOU LIKE ME, YES OR NO, but an invitation to the brewery on Friday afternoon for a “tipple,” which is apparently her old-timey word for having a drink with a pal.

If she shows on Friday, Travis is going to serenade her—he even learned her favorite song on the guitar!—and Eugene’s going to tell her how he really feels.

If it all goes to hell in a handbasket, Dottie says she knows at least five potential relationship candidates for Eugene who could soothe the sting of Mrs. Applebaum’s rejection. I’m thinking we could set up some kind of geriatric Bachelor situation for him.

I explained the whole thing to Travis, and he said, “If you ever doubt my feelings for you, remember that I willingly had this conversation.”

Eugene sits forward in his chair, giving me the stoic nod of a man going into battle. “I’m ready.”

“Yeah, you are. I’m going to pick up the cup after breakfast. I already have the invite you prepared.”

“You handwrote it, didn’t you, Eugene?” asks Ann. “Handwriting is a very sensual act. She’ll appreciate that.”

Constance snorts. “You think everything is a sensual act. ”

“I’d be happy to make you a ginseng tea blend too, dear,” Dottie tells her.

I grin at Eugene, pat him on the back, and wave to the rest of the elders before heading to the back to join my friends.

“You’re here,” Sophie says, popping up from her chair to hug me. Briar hugs me too, and then I lower into the chair next to Sophie.

“You two were totally talking about me, weren’t you?”

“We want to know what’s going on with Travis,” Briar says, lifting her tea for a sip.

It’s not like they’re not in the know. I’ve been group texting them about the whole situation in a long stream-of-consciousness babble.

I grin at Briar. “For someone who’s so entirely done with love, you’re sure interested in it.

You should be begging me to stay away from Travis, because as soon as Dottie decides she’s done working her magic on me, she’s coming for you next.

She said we were all going to find our great loves. Nora too. It sounded like a threat.”

“So you’re admitting Travis is your great love?” Sophie says, her eyes sparkling.

“I don’t know,” I say, which makes her look like I just tore a puppy out of her hands, so I admit, “I’m happy, though.

Really happy. And last night we told Ollie we’re seeing each other, and he was happy.

But you and I aren’t having a double wedding no matter what happens.

I figure I should say that right now to get it out of the way. ”

“Who says I want a double wedding?” she asks, glancing at Briar with a mischievous look in her eyes. “I’ll settle for nothing less than a triple wedding.”

“Not a four-way?” I waggle my eyebrows. “Dottie insists that Nora is going to pop up when we least expect her.”

“I don’t blame her for not wanting to talk to us,” Briar says, setting her teacup down. “I wasn’t sure I wanted to be friends with you two in the beginning.”

Sophie gasps as if she just slapped her across the face.

“Don’t get me wrong. I’m happy I did,” Briar says quickly, setting her hand on top of Sophie’s. “But Jonah made me feel so dumb and blindsided, just like I did after my business partner took off with all our money. I didn’t want to keep my stupid mistakes. Maybe that’s how Nora feels.”

“Like hanging with us would mean reliving a horrible memory over and over again?” I ask.

“Yeah, but either way, I say we let her live her life while we live ours.” Briar sighs and fidgets in her chair. “I could really use some good news right now, though, so tell us more about Travis.”

I hesitate, not wanting to gush when she’s clearly dealing with something right now, but I know she believes in even exchanges, so I tell them about the last few days: Travis’s little gifts.

The way he’s been helping with Project Applebottom Jeans.

How he signed those printed photos of his face so I could send them to Alice and her friends even though he hated doing it.

(I made up for it by giving him head beneath the table, which goes without saying.) How he agreed to switch to tacos on Monday night even though it’s supposed to be spaghetti night.

(To be fair, the tacos were terrible, so we ended up making spaghetti anyway.)

“You’re glowing,” Briar says with a smile that doesn’t meet her eyes.

“What did your father do to you this time?” I ask suspiciously.

She cradles her head in her hands.

“Briar?” Sophie asks, reaching across the table to put a hand on her arm.

“My dad’s making me fire people,” she says.

I’d ask why she’s playing along with his games at all, but I know the answer.

She wants the brewery. To him, it’s a disposable project, one he never really liked that much in the first place.

But she’s been working there for the past couple of years with the dream of running it, spending each day visualizing how it will go.

It’s hard to let go of a dream like that.

Especially since her other dream is six feet under.

“Oh no,” Sophie says. “What did they do wrong?”

“Nothing,” Briar says flatly. “He thinks we have too many bartenders now that we scaled back the food menu to just appetizers. So he wants me to pick two people to fire by the end of November. Then he’s going to make me be the one to break the news. It’s part of Briar Boot Camp.”