Chapter 1
Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Truer words were never spoken, especially in small towns where big fish rule. I think a lot about power and influence during our monthly South Cove Business-to-Business meeting. To be completely honest, sometimes I think about the cheesecake sitting in the walk-in cooler in my office, but mostly I think about relationships and secrets and small-town politics. Like today.
Bill Sullivan, our chairman and a city council member, had invited the volunteer South Cove fire chief to open up the meeting since there had been a few changes in policy approved by the council for the upcoming season. Unfortunately, Barry thought he’d been invited to lecture the group on the history of fire prevention, rather than just give a quick update of his program.
I’m Jill Gardner, and as the business liaison to the council I was responsible for hosting and setting up the meetings. By my count, today’s group of business owners had gone through three rounds of coffee carafe refills and the cookie plates were totally empty. I shook my head when Sasha Smith, one of our baristas, asked me a nonverbal question about refills. We hadn’t gotten our supply order from Pies on the Fly yet, and if the meeting didn’t end soon, we’d be out of food to sell to actual paying customers.
“Safety is our number one priority.” Barry Gleason stood in front of the shop owners gathered for the June meeting and pounded the table with his fist. The volunteer fire chief paused, and when he knew he had the crowd’s attention, he ran a beefy hand with a garnet ring from his college football glory days through his wavy, too long salt-and-pepper hair.
Amy Newman, my BFF and the secretary for the meeting, leaned toward me and whispered, “Someone should tell him that hair style went away with the Bee Gees.”
I tried to keep my lips from twitching, but from the glare I got from Mayor Baylor, I guess I had failed. I glanced down at the agenda. Once the fire chief relinquished his stage, the only other thing was Darla and the finishing touches for the Fourth of July street festival. Since the actual holiday was on a Saturday this year, we had a long weekend planned for South Cove visitors and tourists. Everyone would be open longer hours and Coffee, Books, and More would be erecting a tent annex out at the end of town near the bandstand and Diamond Lille’s. Which the owner, Lille, had expressed her dismay about several times. Lille and I had an agreement mostly: she didn’t come north and I didn’t go south. Except for festival time when the needs of the tourists superseded our boundaries.
“I’ll be inspecting each and every business this week for fire code violations. If you’re not up to code, I’m going to close you down on June thirtieth until you are compliant.” Barry started handing out folders. “These are the new rules. You all might have gotten away with being lax on the fire code before, but now with the city council’s blessing, there’s a new sheriff in town, so to speak.”
“That’s less than a week away,” I said. I opened the folder and cringed when I found what looked like a twenty-five-page single-spaced list of must-do’s. “It will take me that long to read and understand these regulations.”
Barry shrugged. “Not my problem. You all didn’t seem to worry about fire safety when I didn’t have the power to make you change. Now you’re on my timeline.”
“I’ve always believed in following the rules,” Josh Thomas, owner of Antiques by Thomas, said, jumping into the discussion. “You can come inspect my shop at any time. I’m certain I’ll pass.”
“Thank you for your support.” Barry paused, looking for questions from the group who, like me, had their gaze on the enormous list of must-do’s. To fill the gap in the discussion, Mayor Baylor started to stand, but Bill Sullivan beat him to the front of the table.
“Thank you, Barry, for that insightful update on the history of fire prevention in South Cove. Now, let’s get this meeting going. I know you all have a lot to do before the holiday next week. Darla, would you come up and give us the final directions on the Fourth of July festival?” Bill moved in front of Barry, who still hadn’t sat down.
Barry glanced at the mayor, who waved him into the seat next to him. Apparently, Barry hadn’t been ready to relinquish the podium. He probably had planned on reading the entire list of regulations to us, one by one. Thank goodness for Bill. I don’t say that often, but today he’d saved the entire group from dozing off at the table. Even with the excess of caffeine from the coffee.
Amy pushed a sheet of paper toward me. I picked it up and tried to read her scribbles. Rumor is he has slept with all of his firefighter’s wives.
I picked up her pen and wrote in big block letters the only response I could muster: EWWWW.
Amy giggled and this time not only Mayor Baylor but Bill and Darla glared at me.
I squared my shoulders and mumbled, “I didn’t do anything.”
“If Jill will quiet down, I’ll run through the assignments. Our big event will be on Saturday, when Diamond Lille’s will host an old-fashioned summer picnic to go with our old-fashioned Fourth of July theme. We’ll set up tables in the street with red-checked table cloths. And we have a great lineup of bands coming in all day. Matt did a great job of setting up a diverse mix.” Darla blushed a bit as she threw kudos to her boyfriend-slash-winery manager. He’d arrived on the scene last winter and, like Sasha, hadn’t left. That had been one of the mayor’s great ideas that had actually worked out.
Well, except for the manager of the Welfare to Work program. But that’s another story. I pretended to take notes as Darla listed off the events starting at noon on Thursday. All I knew was my store needed to be open and staffed until nine each night. Which were normal hours anyway. We would be down a person since Toby would be full-time deputy for the duration of the festival, but Amy had volunteered to take on a few shifts in the evening.
“You realize that these people you bring in for festivals are mainly drunks and losers.” Barry was playing a game on his phone so he didn’t see Darla’s glare. But I did. She ignored his comment and went back to outlining the festival schedule.
As the meeting broke up, Barry Gleason barreled his way toward me.
“Since I had to stay for the entire meeting, I’ve already started the fire safety review for your shop. Do you mind if I check the back office? That way we’ll be done and I can move on to Mr. Thomas’s shop.” Barry Gleason grinned and I realized that maybe this wouldn’t be as bad as I’d imagined. He probably would take ten to fifteen minutes and I’d be done for the next year. “I’m sure you’re as busy as I am,” he said.
“That’s for certain.” I took his arm and led him toward the counter. “Sasha will assist you if you need access to anything or need information.”
Sasha smiled brightly. “I’d be glad to help.”
“Actually, I’d rather work with you, if you don’t mind.” Barry glanced at Sasha and even I could see the dismissal in his eyes. I didn’t know if it was her age or her skin color that made him uneasy, but Barry had gone down a few pegs in my estimation of him—which hadn’t been that high to begin with.
“That’s fine. Sasha’s busy with the counter anyway.” I sent Sasha a “what can you do” glance and got a shrug from her back. Either Barry didn’t like working with underlings or people younger than him, or, probably, he didn’t want to work with anyone he didn’t think was worth his precious time. Anyway, the faster I got him out of the shop, the better for all of us.
Ten minutes later, he ripped off a page that appeared to be a ticket. He’d been taking notes on the pad all through the tour, but I hadn’t realized it was an official document. “Here’s the list of infractions. Please call me when these are repaired and I’ll come back for a new inspection. Call early as it typically takes a week to get on my schedule.”
I glanced through the list. “For a lot of these things, I’ll need to call in an electrician. There’s no way I can get them done by June thirtieth. That’s next week.”
“Then you’ll be closed until you do get them done. And I won’t do any reinspections from July first to the seventh since it’s a holiday week. I’m planning on taking some time off.” He handed me a card. Then he winked. “Call me when you need a reinspection. Or if you think of a way we can work this out.”
I dropped the list and the card on the counter. I wasn’t quite sure what his idea of “working something out” was, but I didn’t want to broach the subject here. And it wouldn’t do to make a scene, but the mayor was going to get an earful as soon as I got him cornered. Glancing around the room, I realized I was too late to grab him after the meeting. The only people left were helping Sasha set the dining room back up. Which meant the mayor was long gone, since he didn’t do manual labor.
Sasha glanced at me as she walked back to the counter. “Uh-oh. You look steamed. Did our esteemed fire chief insult you too?”
I held up the paper. “Actually, he gave me a list that is impossible to complete by the end of the week. Which means I’ll have to be shut down over the fourth.”
“That’s not going to happen.” Darla snapped up the list and read through it. “Most of these things aren’t real violations. I think he made some of this up.”
“Well, look out, he’s on his way down the street and should hit the winery by midweek.” I wondered if Amy had the skinny on what power this guy really had. Amy ran most of city hall and served as the mayor’s go-to girl for whatever he needed. “I’m calling Amy to see if she’ll have lunch with me.”
“You could just call her and ask about the regulations,” Darla said as she put a stack of flyers on the counter. “Hand these out to your customers. We need to get the word out about this festival. I want it to be the biggest one ever. The council spent enough on the entertainment, including bands and fireworks. I need to be able to show some ROI for their generosity.”
When Darla left, Sasha picked up a flyer. “I know ROI is a business term, but what does it mean again?”
“Return on investment,” Aunt Jackie said, answering the question from the back office. “Basically, the money or value you get from spending money. Like our advertisements that bring in people for the book signing. We spend $100 on ads, we get at least $100 in sales from the event. More if we have a good ROI.”
My aunt was trying to teach someone the basics behind the business part of the store. She’d tried with me, but I really would rather be reading. Sasha was her next victim. One of these days I was going to feel sorry for my aunt and do something really stupid, like listen.
“I thought you’d be watching your shows.” My aunt worked the late shift, but you never knew when she would pop down from the second-floor apartment over the coffee shop.
“I wanted to check in and see how the meeting went. Anything I need to know about?” Aunt Jackie poured herself a coffee as Sasha looked at me wide-eyed.
“How did she know?” Sasha whispered.
“She has the place bugged.” I laughed as Sasha’s eyes went even wider. “I’m kidding.”
But there was a part of me that totally believed my aunt had a camera set up somewhere in the shop. I glanced upward toward the corners to see if I could see any flashing lights. When my gaze lowered, I realized my aunt was watching me.
“Okay, fine, there is a problem.” I pushed the list of infractions toward her. “We’re supposed to get all these done and have the place reinspected before June thirtieth. Or we’ll be shut down.”
“That’s the only option?” my aunt said as she studied the list.
“Well . . .”
Now she looked up at me, her eyes narrowing. “Jill, what else did he say?”
“He insinuated that I could make it go away by calling him.”
Aunt Jackie looked confused. “Why would calling him make these things go away? I’m not sure some of them are even possible to correct.”
“I think he meant . . .” I glanced at Sasha, who was grinning.
“He wants Jill to be his love muffin,” Sasha said, finishing my thought. “And can I say, EWWW!”
“That’s what I said.” I held my hand up for a high five.
My aunt watched us. When we were finished, she sipped her coffee. “This is a serious problem and I’d appreciate it if you treated it as such.”
“I am.” I sat next to her. “First thing, I’m reaching out to Amy to see what recourse we have on this whole thing. I can’t believe the council gave him carte blanche to harass South Cove businesses. And then, if she doesn’t know, I’m going to talk to Bill Sullivan. He should know what regulations the council put in place. And, if none of that fixes it, I have a few attorney contacts from my past career who would be happy to take on an overbearing fire department. We might even be able to get a cash settlement for pain and suffering.”
“Which will mean our tax rate will increase. No one gets anything for nothing.” My aunt shook her head. “Let me make a copy of this and I’ll call an electrician to see what’s really necessary and what’s just this guy’s opinion.”
“Sounds like a plan.” I waited for my aunt to disappear into the back office before I picked up my phone. “Hey, Amy, want to hit Diamond Lille’s in about ten minutes?”
I listened to her tell me how hungry she was when I knew she’d eaten three cookies at the business-to-business meeting and probably had a three-egg omelet for breakfast. I would kill for her metabolism.
I’d already tucked my phone away when my aunt returned to the front. I took the copy she handed me and folded it into my tote. “Don’t worry, we’ll get this handled. No one’s going to bully us.”
“Government entities can do what they want in the name of safety for all. I would have thought you would have picked up on that by now.” My aunt peered at Sasha. “Are you here by yourself this afternoon? Maybe I should come down and help.”
“Toby’s coming in at noon. There’s no reason Sasha can’t handle the shop by herself for thirty minutes,” I said, stepping into the discussion before my aunt got Sasha to believe she wasn’t trusted.
“Well, if you need me, I’m just watching television and working on an afghan. I like to get my Christmas gifts done early.”
Sasha waited for Aunt Jackie to leave and didn’t speak until we heard the door close at the top of the stairs. “Does she realize it’s June?”
“I guess early is early.” I grinned at my newest barista. “Be good or you’ll get a knitted hat for Christmas instead of a bonus.”
“I think a hat would be sweet.” Sasha wiped the counter with a damp rag. “My granny is always making things like that for Olivia and me.”
“You haven’t seen Aunt Jackie’s work yet.” I tucked a new advanced reader copy of a local mystery author into my tote and then headed out the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
By the time I power walked to Diamond Lille’s, the place was already busy. Tuesdays seemed to be when the locals hit the diner, mostly to avoid the weekends full of tourists. Of course, a lot of locals worked weekends so eating out early in the week was more convenient. Amy had already snagged our favorite booth.
“What did you want to gossip about? Did you see Darla blush when she mentioned Matt. I can’t believe she’s still so crazy about him.” Amy read over the menu as she talked, not looking at me at all.
Carrie dropped off our drinks. Iced tea with lemon. We’ve been going to Lille’s for lunch for a while, so she knows what we want. We put in our orders and then I turned to Amy. “Tell me about Barry Gleason. What kind of regulation power did the council give him over the businesses?”
“I’m not exactly sure. I can pull up the minutes and send them to you. I don’t really think they changed much last meeting. Maybe he’s just exercising the power he already had. Why, was he harsh with the store?” Amy sipped her tea, watching me.
“Harsh is an understatement. He gave us so many citations that we’ll never get them cleared in a week and he’s threatening to shut us down over the holiday.”
Amy’s eyes widened. “No way. I’m sure that’s not allowed.”
“The problem is that he thinks it is. Get me the fire regulations so I have something to show him. I’m going to fight this guy tooth and nail.” I sipped my tea and then groaned when Carrie dropped off my fish-and-chips basket. The smell of french fries makes me happy. I’m not proud of this fact, but it’s the truth. I needed the salt, carbs, and fat today. Stress eating is my specialty. “I can’t wait until he gives Josh his list of violations. I’m sure he’ll go ballistic on him. Darla said that a lot of what he wrote me up for doesn’t even make sense.”
“Maybe he’s got a brain tumor and doesn’t know what he’s doing.” Amy took a big bite of her cheeseburger and wiped grease off her chin.
“Whatever it is, he needs to be reined in before someone thinks he’s serious and does all this crap.” I thought about Harrold, the older man who owned The Train Station. This kind of report on his shop could cause him to have a heart attack on the spot. “He’s dangerous and needs to be stopped. I need to talk to the mayor.”
“Uh-oh, I know that look in your eye. You’re going to cause trouble.” Amy pointed a french fry at me. “Maybe you should calm down first.”
“Did I tell you what he said to me? How I could figure out some way to fix the issues if I met up with him? I don’t think he was implying I could bribe him with money.” I lowered my voice and glanced around the room. “It makes my skin crawl just thinking about him touching me.”
“Wait, he wanted you to pay him off with carnal acts?” Amy almost choked on the french fry she’d just ate. “Man, that guy is creepy. He told Mayor Baylor that I was hitting on him last week. Barry had started to corner me in the hallway outside my office. I told him that if he came one step closer, I was going to punch him.”
“What is it with some men? Does he think he’s so attractive to women that we’ll do whatever he wants?”
Amy took a sip of her tea. “I heard when his wife divorced him, she got alimony because she could prove he had been stepping out on her. I guess she had a good lawyer for the p. . .
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