Needle and Dread (2 page)

“Your
sewin'
?” Margaret Louise teased. “
What
sewin'?”

Leona's finger moved closer. “I swear, I'll—”

A quick but distinct jingle brought all four pairs of eyes toward the front of the shop and a clearly uncomfortable Debbie Calhoun.

“Did I interrupt something?” the bakery owner asked from around the stack of powder blue boxes in her hands.

Tori and Margaret Louise swarmed around the mother of two like bees to honey, lessening her load in record speed. “Nope. You didn't interrupt a thing.”

“Unless, of course, you count Leona's usual threats.” Margaret Louise carried the first pair of boxes over to the table and stopped. “Where do you want these, Twin?”

“I want the cookies taken out and put on the empty harvest plate. And I want the cupcakes arranged across the leaf-etched plate to its left.” Then, turning back to Debbie, Leona sagged against the counter. “I was starting to think you'd forgotten.”

“I didn't forget.” Debbie flicked her dark blonde ponytail over her shoulder, took a quick but unmistakable inventory of the room, and then nodded approvingly first at Rose, and then Leona. “Inviting . . . motivating . . . cozy . . . well done, ladies, well done.”

Rose lifted her finger into the air and then disappeared momentarily behind the counter. When she re-emerged, she had a whimsical holiday apron in her hand. “So what do you think?”

Tori put the last cupcake on the plate and handed the empty box to Margaret Louise. “Oh, Rose, I love it. It's fun and very timely!”

“It was between this and a door hanging, but I finally decided we should go with this.”

“Finally decided at eleven o'clock last night.” Leona plucked the empty boxes from Margaret Louise's hands and carried them back to the counter. “Nothing like waiting until the last minute.”

Rose swapped the apron for one of the empty boxes now fanned out across the counter. With slow, arthritic moves, the elderly woman broke each of the boxes down for easier disposal and then handed them back to Leona to put in the trash can in the back room.

Leona, in turn, handed them to Margaret Louise. “Here. Get rid of these, will you?”

“Do I look like your maid, Twin?”

“No. My maid is taller, thinner, and far less
bothersome.” Then, before the quiet gasps to her left and right could built to a crescendo, Leona brought her lips to within inches of her sister's ear and said, in full voice, “There's an extra pickled shrimp in the kitchenette. If you throw those boxes away, it's all yours.”

“Now you're talkin', Twin . . .”

In a flash, Margaret Louise was gone, and in her wake was a clock-peeking Leona. “The bus should be pulling up out front in less than fifteen minutes.” Moving her gaze from Tori to Debbie and finally onto Rose, she added, “Are we ready?”

“I've never been more ready for anything in my life, Leona.” Rose came out from around the counter with a rare burst of energy, powered, no doubt, by the breathtakingly beautiful smile spreading its way across the eightysomething's rapidly aging face. “Let's make their time here at SewTastic something they'll never,
ever
forget.”

Tori counted out the correct number of tags onto the counter and then gathered them into her hand, the mundane task bringing with it a much-needed chance to breathe. From the moment Miranda Greer had ushered the weekend crafters off the bus and into SewTastic, things had been nutty.

Sure, some of that nuttiness came with doing something new. But a big chunk came from the very real feeling that despite a ten-to-five ratio of helpers to crafters, they were grossly understaffed. To an outsider looking in, it made little to no sense. But to an insider who should have anticipated the driver's gender, and thus Leona's preoccupation with said driver, it made all the sense in the world.

Needless to say, Tori, along with Miranda, Rose, Debbie, Margaret Louise, the rest of the Sweet Briar
Ladies Society Sewing Circle members, and Charles, had spent the better part of the last hour on the move—answering the female crafters' endless questions, fetching all necessary supplies, troubleshooting any and all issues that arose, and keeping an eye on the store's regular customer traffic. Likewise, during that same hour, Leona hadn't budged from her spot beside Travis Beaker, the lone male in the visiting group.

If Travis had a question, Leona purred the answer into his ear. If Travis needed a refill of finger foods or dessert, Leona snapped her finger at whoever was standing around and then proudly set the plate—that was handed to her—at the man's spot. The fact that he wasn't one of the crafters who'd paid to be part of the event didn't seem to faze Leona.

“I don't get it,” Charles whispered in Tori's ear as he skidded to a stop just outside the project room. Running a hand through his bright red spiky hair, the twentysomething jerked his head in Leona's direction. “Travis doesn't meet Leona's criteria.”

“Leona's
criteria
?” Tori repeated.

“Yes.” He loosened the knot on his accessory scarf and inhaled dramatically. “Leona prefers men in the twenty-to-forty range. Travis is pushing fifty-two, easy.” Rocking back on his purple Keds, Charles peeked into the room, conducted a slow and thorough once-over of the man sitting beside Leona, and then turned back to Tori. “He also has a bit of a paunch—a major no-no in Leona's book.”

Tori looked from Charles to Travis and back again. “You're overlooking one major factor.”

Charles's perfectly arched left eyebrow shot upward. “What's that?”

“He's wearing a uniform.”

“But it's a
bus driver's
uniform,” Charles protested.

“It doesn't matter. A uniform is a uniform in Leona's book.”

Charles's mouth gaped. “But I thought she meant pilots, or doctors, or cops . . .”

“Well, she has a preferred hierarchy, of course, but if there's only one uniform-wearing male in a room, he'll do.” She swept her hand toward the object of Leona's current eyelash-batting affection and then dropped back against the wall. “Hence, the attention she is lavishing on one Mr. Travis Beaker. Though what I find most interesting is the fact that he seems unimpressed. Leona isn't used to that.”

“Young man? Young man?” A woman's voice, shrill and commanding, wafted out the open door, taking with it all semblance of color from Charles's already pasty complexion. “Where
are
you?”

A rush of silent hand flapping was quickly followed by the warmth of Charles's breath against Tori's ear. “I swear, I'm going to strangle that woman if I have to hear one more of her complaints.”

“I know she's a bit trying, but—”

“A
bit
trying?” Charles parroted. “Victoria, please. I realize you like to see the best in people whenever possible, but in this instance there's nothing to see. That woman is
impossible
—wait, no, she's
hell on wheels
—no . . . no, even better, she's a
menace
to the very image that is a southern woman!”

She nibbled back her laugh and, instead, made a face at her friend. “Now, Charles . . .”

“Don't
now Charles
me, sugar lips. Not one person
on that tour has even spoken with her since they got here. Not one word. Don't you think that says something? And if the lack of conversation with her fellow tour members isn't enough, have you seen the
looks
she's gotten from every single one of them except Saint Minnie?

“Not that I can blame them, of course,” Charles added. “Because I can't and I don't. If I was faced with spending an entire weekend with her, I'd probably work on honing the art of flesh-melting glares, as well.”

She felt her right eyebrow arch upward. “Flesh-melting glares?”

“Yes! Though, and I'm not sure why, I'd rather face those than have to deal with that raving lunatic one more time.”

“Charles, please. You're sounding more and more like Leona every day. All drama, all the time.”

He took a moment to preen at the perceived compliment and then leaned close to her ear once again. “If you take her this time, Tori, I promise I'll be on your doorstep tomorrow morning at the crack of dawn ready and willing to make you my famous chocolate chip pancakes.”

“Did you say chocolate chip pancakes?” she asked over the sudden and rather loud answering grumble of her stomach.

Charles snapped his fingers in his favorite triangle formation and followed it up with a lip pop. “I did, indeed. And, honey, no one makes chocolate chip pancakes quite like yours truly.”

“Young man!”

“Please, Tori. That woman scares me.”

Laughing, Tori pushed off the wall and sidestepped her way into the project room so she could maintain eye
contact with her overly dramatic friend. “I'll take my pancakes at nine o'clock.
Sharp
.”

“Nine o'clock. Got it,” Charles echoed as he made a showy reach for Tori's hand. “Good luck, Tori. Godspeed.”

Making a mental note to stop by Turner's on the way home for anything resembling an award she could present Charles for his stellar acting, Tori stopped, took a deep breath, and ventured in the direction of Opal Ann Goodwin, the single most negative person she'd ever met.

Granted, Dixie Dunn had held that distinction for the first twelve months Tori resided in Sweet Briar. But considering the woman had been ousted from her nearly lifelong job as head librarian of the Sweet Briar Public Library to make room for Tori, the daggered looks and woe-is-me attitude had made sense.

Opal, on the other hand, had gotten off the bus that morning wearing a maroon housecoat and the kind of scowl that had sent even the always-happy Margaret Louise scurrying off to help one of the other guests.

Looking back to the group's arrival, each of Tori's sewing circle sisters who were at the store that morning had seemed to instinctively latch on to the guest most like themselves.

Debbie had gravitated toward Lucinda Penning, no doubt because of the book-themed tote bag the woman carried. Sure enough, within a minute, maybe two, Debbie was sharing details of her husband Colby's best-selling novels and promising to give Lucinda a signed copy of his very first novel before the crafting weekend was over.

Georgina Hayes, Sweet Briar's long-standing mayor,
had teamed up with Dixie to look after Gracelyn Moses, a kindred spirit in everything from her age (probably somewhere between Georgina's early sixties and Dixie's mid-seventies) to her interest in current events. The trio had dissected modern-day society on so many levels already, it was hard to imagine there was anything left to say.

Margaret Louise and her daughter-in-law, Melissa, had sidled up to Samantha Williams in short order, as well. And while Samantha had a good twenty-five years on the energetic mother of eight, and didn't seem to share Margaret Louise's interest in cooking, they were unified on their love of detective shows. And when it was discovered that Samantha had once spent an entire year in England, Beatrice had temporarily broken away from Minnie Randolph, the sweetest crafter of them all, to share tidbits of her childhood and current work as a British nanny to a local family.

Rose and Miranda had flitted from guest to guest over the past hour, working tirelessly to make sure each and every guest was happy. But when Charles had found Rose poised and ready to wrap her arthritic hands around Opal's neck, he'd wisely sent her up front to tidy the food table and get a handle on her rapidly declining patience.

Opal Ann was, in a word, nasty. If there was something negative to say, she said it. And if there wasn't, she still said it. So far, the temperature in the store had been adjusted a half dozen times, her food plate emptied and refilled four times due to a “speck of dust” no one else could see, her thread spools swapped out twice although
no one knew why, and her disinterest in the project expressed more times than anyone could count.

Tori deposited the tags on the table and then rested her hand on Opal Ann's shoulder. “Yes, Opal? What can I do for you?”

“What are those?” Opal groused, pointing at the tags.

“Those are in case you'd like to add a label to the inside of your completed project.” Tori retrieved the example from the center of the table and turned it over to display Rose's personalized label. “Rose always embroiders her initials inside, but Dixie over there usually puts in her whole name. It's really up to you . . . if you even want to include a label at all.”

“My work speaks for itself.” Opal straightened in her chair, flicking her hand toward Rose's apron as she did. “Besides, if I was going to do a label, I wouldn't do something boring like a name. I'd do something distinctly my own.”

“Your name
is
your own,” Minnie said, glancing at Opal over her sewing machine.

Opal rolled her eyes at the elderly crafter with such disdain Tori, herself, gasped. “If you truly knew anything about sewing, you'd know what I'm talking about. A name is a name. I'm talking about an embroidered fingerprint that is uniquely your own.”

Minnie removed her foot from the machine's pedal and leaned forward. “I'm not sure I could embroider my fingerprint . . .”

“It's not an
actual
fingerprint,” Lucinda said, leaning around her own machine to address Minnie. “It's just—”

“Good heavens, you call yourself a seamstress?” Without giving Minnie a chance to answer, Opal snapped
her fingers at Miranda. “You—with the freckles! Short of handing this woman a free pass to my upcoming exhibit on the elusive Lily Belle, surely
you
of all people can explain the concept of a signature to her, can't you? I've had more than my fill of ineptness for the day. And
you
”—Opal's eyes widened on Tori—“I called for the young man. Where is he?”

“Charles is attending to other things at the moment, Ms. Goodwin, but I'm happy to help with whatever you need.”

“What things are more pressing than one's customers?” Opal spat. “I tell you, when I get back home, I will be writing a review of this awful little shop and its utterly useless staff!”

All chatter ceased as every eye in the room came to rest on Opal first and then, finally, Tori.

“If you'd just tell me what it is you need, Ms. Goodwin, I'll take care of it.” She heard the pathetically pleading tone to her voice and hated herself for it. But, as she'd reminded herself many times already that morning when dealing with this particular guest, today was about Rose and the realization of a lifelong dream Tori had only recently come to know.

“You'll take care of it?” Opal sniped. “Okay, fine. I want a full refund for everything. And I do mean
everything
—this pathetic project, the cost of my meals for the weekend, my gas to and from my home to the tour's departure point, my hotel for tonight, and anything I might choose to purchase while I'm in this godforsaken town.”

Tori felt herself draw back against the weight of the woman's unrealistic demands. But before she could
formulate a response, Leona vacated her spot beside Travis and made her way around the center workstation Milo had helped erect in preparation for the event. “Ms. Goodwin, is there a problem?”

“And
you
are?” Opal inquired, widening her death glare to include an impeccably dressed Leona.

“I believe the question, Ms. Goodwin, is
who are you
?”

The eyes that had fixed themselves on Tori only moments earlier now collectively moved to the doorway, with Tori's following suit . . .

Rose
.

With purpose to her shuffling feet, Rose flanked Leona, her bifocal-enlarged eyes dark with the kind of anger usually reserved for Leona, herself.

“Rose,” Tori whispered. “I think maybe you should let Leona handle—”

“I repeat my question, Ms. Goodwin,” Rose said through clenched teeth. “Who do you think you are?”

Clearly miffed by the sudden absence of the same kid gloves she'd been handled with all morning, Opal opened and closed her mouth a few times before pounding her fist atop the table. “Doesn't anyone know the meaning of customer service anymore? Why, in my day, the customer was always right and they were treated with dignity and the utmost respect—neither of which I have been shown by anyone connected to this—this
awful
little shop.”