Free Shutter by Rhonda Laurel Page B

back room and brought out two bottles of chilled wine from the fridge.
    “I told you news of your genius was getting around,” Felix said affectionately.
    Lucy sank against the counter. “I wasn’t expecting all this.”
    “Sure you were,” Antonio said quietly.
    Lucy laughed. “And why do you think that?”
    “You put a Help Wanted sign in the window.”
    The food arrived and the guys made a makeshift table while Lucy wrangled some of the chairs for sale in the store. She had to admit it was nice sitting with friends, shooting the breeze and having a good time. She missed Felix, but she knew as long as Antonio was staying at his house she didn’t want to venture over there.
    Antonio seemed to be off his game tonight. He wasn’t sending her the usual enigmatic stares. In fact, he was barely looking at her at all. Sure, the conversation was polite enough and Felix was his usual charming self, but Antonio seemed to go mute. He was on his sixth dumpling and didn’t seem to be stopping anytime soon. Lucy wondered often how men could eat like that. Felix ate controlled portions; she was used to that. But Antonio ate like a quarterback beefing up for football season.
    She pushed around a piece of chicken on her plate, trying to decide if it was worth not being able to move after she took that last piece. Antonio leaned over and started eating some broccoli off her plate.
    “So Luce, back to this Help Wanted sign,” Felix quipped.
    “Yes?”
    “Get any candidates today?”
    “No.” She sighed. “I’d just put up the sign this morning.”
    “Well, I have a wonderful idea, my sweet. Antonio can help you in the store.”
    “I’ll be in town for a while. I could help out. Maybe set up that Web site for you,” Antonio said.
    “That’s a great idea, Ant. Then we could expand to a catalog and have a separate department for that.” Felix beamed.
    Lucy took a big, crude gulp of wine and swallowed. “I think you guys are getting ahead of yourselves.”
    “No, we have faith in you,” Antonio replied.
    There was that word again. Faith. Why was that the one word everyone seemed to use in a sentence when talking to her?
    “Why would you want to spend your free time being cooped up in my store?”
     
     
     
    There was a small voice inside Antonio that was daring him to admit that he wanted to be near her, to get to know her. And each time that little voice began to get louder, he would let out a little burp to muffle the sound. He was afraid that if he told her, if he sounded unsure for any reason, she would write him off again. And he didn’t want that. Working in her store was the equivalent of being in her head.
    “I have the time and I thought it would be nice to help a friend. That way you can take your time interviewing people for the permanent position.”
    “Well the pay won’t be much. Actually I hadn’t figured how much to offer.” She bit her lip.
    Antonio took a sip of his wine and smiled wickedly. “I’m sure we can figure something out.”
     

Chapter Eight
     
     
    Antonio was a good little soldier, getting up at six in the morning to get ready for another day at Accidental Wonderland with Lucy. Part of him did think he would be bored to tears, but little did he know how interesting it would be to see her in action. She was a head-in-the-clouds artist. She was also a practical businesswoman. She knew how to deal with her vendors, her customers, and found time to create in the process.
    He’d changed the lightbulbs in the storage room, began an inventory system that she could use to keep better track of her sales, and was able to take pictures of the passersby who walked up and down Main Street.
    Lucy was working on another mosaic; this time it was a frame for a family portrait. He found her creative process to be rather interesting, which usually began with a thirty-minute meditation. He asked her why she meditated, and she replied very nicely that it helped center her and she was trying to