A Man Of Influence

“Who came in?” Mildred asked, voice on the max volume setting. Apparently, she hadn’t put in her hearing aids this morning, and couldn’t see through her ice cube lenses.

Mr. Golden Glow chuckled as he approached the counter. He moved out of the sunlight and became...no more normal. Still gorgeous. He walked as if he owned the room, exuding a vibe Tracy had always admired—power, prestige, a winner of corporate boardroom games. Didn’t matter that he wore jeans and a polo shirt. That walk said suit and tie. His confident air said, “I know people who can get you a job.”

Tracy’s mouth went dry, because she needed a better job. Unfortunately, she could practically feel the full extent of her vocabulary knot at the back of her tongue, clogging her throat.

She tried to remember her latest speech therapist’s advice. Breathe. Relax. Turn your back on the person you’re talking to.

Okay, that last one was Tracy’s antidote. But it worked. Not that there were many opportunities to turn her back mid-conversation or in an argument without looking like a total jerk.

And how could she forget the advice of her speech teacher in college? Breathe. Relax. Imagine your audience is naked.

“What’s good here?” Mr. Tall, Perfect and Speech-Robbing stepped in front of her.

Tracy’s gaze dropped from his steel gray polo to the counter. Oh, for the days she dared imagine the opposite sex naked. “Coffee.” That was good. Normal sounding. If you didn’t count the frog-like timbre of her tone. She cleared her throat. “Scones.” She waved a hand over one of the pastry cases that her boss, Jessica, worked so hard to fill.

“Why do you suppose he’s here?” Rose, never shy, asked the room, shuffling her feet beneath the table. That woman never sat still.

“Maybe he’s lost,” Eunice piped up from the window seat.

“Not lost,” the stranger said cheerfully, smiling at Tracy as if they shared a private joke.

The joke was on him. This was Harmony Valley, where people had no respect for personal boundaries and could have taught the FBI a thing or two about interrogation.

“Visiting relatives?” Mildred squinted his way.

“Strike two.”

Tracy had never been a believer in eyes twinkling. But there you go. His did. Despite that power-player vibe. Or maybe because of it. Her body felt a jolt of electricity, as if it ran on twinkles, not caffeine.

Old Man Takata held up a chunk of chocolate croissant. “Health inspector?”

“Thank you all for playing.” The newcomer grinned, scanning the menu board above Tracy’s head while the room erupted with speculative conversation.

Tracy felt the urge to apologize for her hometown homies. “We don’t get many...” She searched for the word amidst the nerve-strumming intensity of his very brown eyes. “...strangers here.”

“No worries. I’m a travel writer.” His voice. So silky smooth. Like the ribbon of chocolate Jess put on the croissants. “I’m here for the Harvest Festival.”

If he thought that would bring the room back to normal, he was wrong. The bakery customers exchanged dumbfounded glances. This was what Harmony Valley had been waiting for—exposure. No one really believed it would ever come, because the town had been off the radar for a long time. More than a decade.

When Tracy was a teenager, the grain mill had exploded. To this day, Tracy couldn’t think about her mother and her mother’s co-workers being burned alive without a sickening churn in her stomach. Back then, Tracy had been devastated, too young to understand the ramifications beyond the heart-wrenching grief over losing Mom. Without jobs, the majority of the population had moved away. Those who’d remained were mostly retired. But now there was a new employer in town. A winery, started by Tracy’s brother and his friends. People were returning. New businesses were opening. What they needed were tourists and the dollars they’d bring. What they needed was this man and his readership—whatever that might be.

“Thought I’d come up early,” the travel writer added. “Find a room, and do a story on the town and its winery.”

Mildred gaped. Rose gasped. Phil covered a snort with a cough and received several dirty glances.

Tracy sighed. Yes, there was a story here. Probably too many. There just wasn’t a hotel within a thirty mile radius. Rumor had it the Lambridge twins were going to open a bed and breakfast—next spring. Mr. Travel Writer wouldn’t find a room this week unless he wanted to bunk with Mildred.

“A travel writer.” Mayor Larry stood in all his tie-dyed dignity, tossing his gray ponytail over his shoulder and approaching the counter. “Welcome, welcome. I’m the mayor.” Larry gave the town council the high sign—a repeated head tilt toward the door, as in: emergency meeting needed to find the travel writer a place to stay.

But Rose only had eyes for the newcomer, Mildred was legally blind and Agnes was digging in her purse.

Larry pumped the travel writer’s hand as if he drew water from a well. “Why don’t you sit down and let Tracy bring you some coffee and a scone?”

Tracy held her ground because Mr. Travel Writer didn’t seem like the black coffee type. If she had to guess, she’d go with a shot of espresso with a splash of half and half. Besides, the hunky travel writer hadn’t accepted Mayor Larry’s offer.

“The town council meeting will start in five minutes,” Agnes said, proving she’d received the mayor’s message after all. “Phil, you’re on the agenda today.”

Phil, the town barber and the Lambridge twins’ grandfather, glanced up from the checkerboard. He was the one person in the room who hadn’t been staring at their visitor, most likely because the guy had crisply cut hair and no need of a visit to Phil’s barber chair. “But my game—”

“Can wait.” Mayor Larry grabbed Phil’s spindly arm and helped him up.

Agnes, Mildred and Rose mobilized. The fire-drill search for a hotel was in full swing.

“It’s not even Tuesday,” Phil wailed, referring to the town council’s regular meeting day as he allowed Larry to lead him out the door.

And just like that, the morning rush was over.

From his playpen, Gregory gave one of his happy-to-be-alive shouts. Eunice leaned over and quacked at the baby, eliciting giggles from Jessica’s son.

Chocolate croissant eaten, Old Man Takata moved into Phil’s spot with a rattle of his walker.

Before Takata could settle in Phil’s seat, Felix executed a three-hop move and grinned. “King me.”

“Seriously?” Takata grimaced.

The bakery quieted enough that Tracy could hear the creak of the oven door as Jess worked in the kitchen. Her speech therapist would have encouraged her to start a conversation with the newcomer, who still stood across from her at the counter and who looked nothing like a travel writer, not that she’d ever met one before. But all Tracy could think about was how normal she looked at the moment and how that image would shatter if she opened her mouth, how the warmth in his eyes would turn pitying and how low her spirits would then sink.

She said nothing, but her head began to nod as if trying to fill the silence with movement.

“I swear, I showered this morning.” The travel writer tugged the placate of his polo as if airing out his shirt. “I’ve never emptied a room before.”

“It wasn’t you,” Tracy fibbed. Good. Very good. She could appear intelligent. If she could just get a handle on the nervous head nodding.

“That’s what my last girlfriend said.” He gave a self-deprecating laugh. “It’s not you. It’s me.”

Was he flirting with her?

Tracy used to love to flirt. She used to be the Queen of the One-Liners, the Princess of Comebacks, the Junior Miss of Verbal Jousting. Now she was just a head-nodding simpleton. “Latte? Sssss-cone?”

His smile softened like chocolate on a warm spring day. He probably thought he was so gorgeous he made her tongue-tied.

Little did he know, Tracy’s tongue was permanently in knots.

* * *

“YES TO BOTH latte and scone.” Chad introduced himself and smiled at the pretty, petite blond behind the counter. He’d spent the past month relearning the feel of lips curving upward over his teeth, the deep sound of his own laughter, the subtleties of a nuanced joke.

He’d slept in, eaten junk food and driven up the western coast from California to Canada and back again with a laptop, a small suitcase and the box he’d taken with him from the office in his trunk. He’d enjoyed the culture, sophistication and women the cities of Portland and Seattle had to offer. It wasn’t until he’d returned to an empty penthouse in San Francisco that he’d remembered the story lead sheet and thought about what was next for him.