Chapter 1
As Kate McGuire turned onto Coral Cay’s main drag, named—ironically—Main Street, she checked her watch for the third time in ten minutes. Her interview was in half an hour. And her creaky old Toyota was making some brand-new noises she didn’t like.
Never taking her eyes off the road, she groped for the bakery box on the passenger’s seat with her right hand and flipped it open.
A tiny, perfect sand dollar cookie. She’d bought a dozen before she left the hotel that morning. After two back-to-back job interviews—and no job—there was only one lone survivor left in the box. She popped it into her mouth.
She tasted butter, sugar, and cinnamon. Bliss.
As Kate slowed, the red SUV behind her hit the horn.
The next interview was a long shot. Prep cook. A trained pastry chef, the position was definitely not her first choice. But she’d been in town for over a week. Countless interviews, phone calls, and drop-in visits had yielded not so much as a nibble. So when a CIA classmate called back and told her about a fish place on the mainland looking for a prep chef, Kate booked an interview pronto.
Luckily, with island breezes and the windows cranked down she could give the engine a break and skip the AC.
Kate checked the rearview mirror. That’s when she saw it. Or what could have been it. Three cars back. The silver car.
She’d glimpsed it a couple of times over the last few days. Always with a lone guy driving. Sometimes he wore a ball cap, other times a Panama hat. Or a fishing hat. And sunglasses. Always sunglasses.
Don’t be an idiot, she chided herself. It’s probably not even the same guy. This is South Florida. Everyone wears hats and sunglasses. And odds are, some local rental place has a fleet of cookie-cutter cars.
Suddenly the Toyota gave an ugly shudder, shimmied, and lurched to a stop. Steam poured out from under the hood. Or was it smoke?
“No!” Kate groaned, popping the hood release and scrambling out of the car. She flicked the hood up with two fingers and jumped back. Steam and acrid black smoke poured out. Along with the stench of burning rubber.
Dead. Definitely dead. Just like her career prospects.
The SUV leaned on the horn again. Three long, loud blasts.
“Damn!” she swore under her breath. One slim chance at a paycheck, and it was gone. Along with her wheels. What was she thinking, coming here from New York without a job? Or even a lead on a job?
Kate knew she should move her car off the road. But there weren’t any empty parking spots nearby. And how exactly should she approach something that was spewing smoke like a volcano? What if it exploded?
Too bad her little nephew Billy wasn’t here. He lived for explosions.
“Wow, I haven’t seen one like this in a while.”
Kate looked up and saw a big, burly man in a yellow and orange Hawaiian shirt, tan board shorts, and gray suede work gloves ambling up to the car. A lime-green tow truck was double-parked behind her.
“It’s my latest creation—auto flambé,” Kate said grimly.
“Not flambé yet. More of a fumée, really.”
She gave the guy a second glance. She hadn’t met many auto mechanics well versed in French culinary speak. But then, after eight years in the city with no car, she hadn’t met many auto mechanics.
Hawaiian Shirt had already turned his attention to the engine.
“Hey, before you get started, I don’t have any cash to pay you just now,” Kate said, addressing the back of his close-cropped brown head as he sidestepped the smoke plume. “I’m out of work and low on funds. I was on my way to a job interview when this happened.”
“So you want to just leave her here?” the mountain said, turning to give her a half smile. She could see her own stressed face glaring back in the reflection of his wraparound sunglasses.
Seemingly out of nowhere, he produced a blue rag and used it to twist and turn a few things in the engine. The noxious cloud slowed to a stop. He stepped back and carefully dropped the hood.
The SUV laid on the horn. Joined by an off-key chorus of backed-up traffic.
Hawaiian Shirt stepped into the middle of the street, pushed his sunglasses onto the top of his forehead, and made eye contact with the SUV driver. “Around,” he said, flicking his wrist.
The cacophony stopped.
“Look, free diagnosis,” he said, walking over to Kate. “This car is suffering from an acute case of neglect. Not fatal, but it’s going to need some serious TLC before you can drive it again. It’s been in storage for a long time.”
“How did you know that?”
He stared at her.
“I live in Manhattan,” Kate offered. “I was storing it at my sister’s place in New Jersey. She promised that Deacon Dave was starting it at least once a week. And I was paying her for car washes and oil changes a couple of times a year.”
“Deacon Dave?”
“Her husband.”
“Far be it from me to impugn the word of a church elder, but no one’s touched this engine since the London Olympics. Aside from a couple cans of oil someone dumped in recently.”
“I took it to their garage before I hit the turnpike. The guy gassed it up and added some oil.”
Hawaiian Shirt shook his head sadly.
A line of cars slowly and carefully snaked around her hobbled sedan. But nary a beep or a honk. Kate was amazed.
As the silver car passed, the driver turned away. Kate noted his tan ball cap. And a sticker in the back window with a neon-orange palm tree—Sunshine Rental Car.
“So what’s the job interview?” the mountain asked, hands on hips.
“Chef. Prep chef. At a place called Fish-a-Palooza. On the mainland.”
“Yeah, I went there once,” he said.
“So you know it?”
“Enough to know that nobody ever goes there twice. They cater mainly to the tourists. Anybody else knows better. Frozen fish. You’re a chef?”
“Pastry chef. Trained at the CIA. Not the spy agency, the other one.”
“Yeah, Culinary Institute of America. Got it. So what’s a New York pastry chef doing down here trying to get a job with a second-rate seafood joint?”
“Long story,” Kate said, exhaling deeply. “The short version is the restaurant I worked for closed. My apartment building went condo. And I called off my wedding.”
“Perfect storm,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Pretty much. I’m Kate McGuire, by the way,” she said, extending her hand.
“Gabriel Louden—Gabe,” he said, shaking it cordially. “Why Coral Cay?”
“We were going to spend our honeymoon here. I figured I could get a job and start over. I sold pretty much everything I owned. Liquidated my savings and my retirement account, and … well, here I am.”
“Yeah, we get a lot of that. People want to get a fresh start, they either roll west or south. This is as far south as you can go without hitting water.”
“Well, that’s kind of reassuring. I’ll be in good company.”
“Between the heat and the mosquitos, most of ’em don’t make it through the first summer,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Turns out Dante was right.”
“About Coral Cay?”
“About hell. Dante claims the better zip codes in the netherworld are bathed in flaming heat. Which pretty accurately describes late summer. Locals contend it’s hotter than hell and twice as humid.”
“There’s the slogan for the next travel poster,” Kate said.
“Then there’s hurricane season. Officially it starts in June. But between you and me, August and September are the worst of it.”
“Did Hurricane Irma do much damage here?”
“Oh, we were lucky with that one. Barely a glancing blow. A few loose roofing tiles and some of us lost power for a day or two. But that was it. Really lucky. So what’s your backup?”
“My what?” she asked.
“Your backup plan. In case this doesn’t work out. Back to Manhattan? Miami? Disney World? Everybody’s got a Plan B.”
“After today? Plane ticket to New Jersey. To live with my sister, Deacon Dave, and the twins.”
“The twins?”
“One plays the violin twelve hours a day. Badly. The other likes to make things explode. And right now, he’s my favorite.”
He smiled. “So, no Plan B.”
“Ten days in a hotel, I’ve had a great vacation but no job offer. I’ve still got some savings. But without an income, I can’t get a place to live. And my stuff, what’s left of it, is stashed in a storage unit on the mainland, outside Hibiscus Springs. I even toyed with the idea of living there temporarily, but I’m pretty sure it doesn’t have plumbing. Besides, at this point, I’d have to hitchhike,” Kate said, nodding at her car.
“Well, in my humble opinion, you dodged a bullet with Fish-a-Palooza. And don’t let me scare you—Coral Cay really is a great place to settle. Hey, I know one job opening right here in town,” he said, suddenly snapping his fingers. “Should be right up your alley. A bakery. The pay’s probably crap. The boss is a cranky old goat. And a real tightwad. But he’s good at what he does—great breads. Oh man, his sourdough melts in your mouth. Upside is he spends a fair amount of time on the beach with a bottle of rum and a metal detector, so he probably won’t micro-manage. I think you’d be a shoo-in.”
“Because of my credentials?”
“Because you’re the only person I’ve met desperate enough to apply. But you never know. ‘The path to paradise begins in hell.’”
“Wow, you should write his help-wanted ad.”
“Dante truly understood life. Word is Sam Hepplewhite—that’s the baker—old Sam’s getting ready to sell the place. The Cookie House. And you didn’t hear that from me. So the job’s temporary, at best. But it would give you time to get something better. And anything beats Fish-a-Palooza. Besides, underneath it all, Sam really is a good guy. And he needs the help. If you can find a local room for rent, you’re good to go.”
“If I say yes, will you help me push this thing off a cliff? Preferably a really steep one?”
He lowered his sunglasses into place and patted the hood. “She’s not so bad. Just acting out after years of neglect. Go talk to Sam. The bakery’s just up the street. See what happens. In the meantime, I’ll tow Gwendolyn here to the shop. We can park her out back until you decide what you want to do. Sound fair?”
Kate shook her head. “I don’t have enough cash on me to pay for towing. Or for storage. And my credit card’s maxed out at the moment. I don’t suppose you’d take an out-of-state check?”
“Don’t worry about it now. Got a vacant lot behind the garage. Plenty of space.”
He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a wallet, which he peeled open to produce a business card. Embossed with “Gabe’s Garage,” plus a business address and phone number, it featured a smiling cartoon car.
“I’ll pay you back,” Kate vowed. “Every cent.”
“Never doubted it. Besides, ‘He who sees a need and waits to be asked for help is as unkind as if he had refused it.’”
“Dante?”
“Yup. And if a loaf or two of that sourdough dropped from the sky, I definitely wouldn’t refuse it.”
Copyright © 2019 by Eve Calder
