Mail Order Bride Mishap (Into the West #3)

Chapter 21

The store hadn’t been this busy since its opening week, Fiona mused that morning as she cut another length of ribbon and rolled it around three fingers. As she handed it off to its buyer, a bright-eyed young mama who had yet to purchase a hat, Fiona looked around the busy hat shop and paused.

After having watched Edward Townsend sprint down her stairs and back to his house this morning, Fiona had stood at her open door for several minutes, longing for him to return but not knowing what to answer in regards to his question.

Did she want to marry him? Yes, yes, yes. Did she love him? Another trio of yeses. Would it be good for her to marry him? It was here that she hesitated. After all, the memory of Edward telling her he “couldn’t do this,” meaning marry her, was emblazoned on her brain like a brand. Those words had crushed her once. She didn’t know if she could risk her heart again.

 “Thank you for dropping by, Ma’am,” Fiona smiled at her customer now. “Christmas is just around the corner. I hope you’ll think of my shop when you need to buy that special gift.”

The woman’s eyes flicked over Fiona before she moved off, saying nothing but grabbing her daughter’s hand and pulling her out the front door.

“Curious,” Fiona muttered, shaking her head and turning to find herself face to face with one of the old bats from the mercantile yesterday. One of the ones Edward had likened to a witch, no doubt. She gulped, while that woman drew herself up straight, ample bosoms jutting toward Fiona like the prow of a ship.

The woman sniffed and said with asperity, “I don’t understand young men nowadays. I really don’t. What about you keeps him coming back, especially after I warned him?”

Fiona blinked at the woman. Couldn’t remember her name for the life of her, and disliked the tone of her comment. So she decided to ignore it.

“Do you have something in particular that you’re looking for, Ma’am?” She asked courteously instead. The woman sniffed, and looked her up and down. Fiona could feel the tickle of anger begin to lick at the edges of her mind. The woman shook her head.

“I was looking for a reason. A reason for why a man would throw away his reputation over you. And I’m sorry. I just don’t see it.”

That was it. Fiona realized what the old bat was talking about, but she would be damned if she’d let the woman slander her in her own place of business. She had no control over what people said elsewhere, but this was her domain, and she would not sit back and take insults.

Drawing herself up to her full height, which did tower over the malicious old cat, Fiona attempted to look down her nose and said with asperity, “Ma’am, this is a hat shop. My hat shop. If you don’t like my hats, please ask me to make you one to your specifications, and I’ll be more than happy to do so. But if you just came in here to gossip and spread your lies, then I have to ask you to leave. These people are my customers, and deserve to shop without being hassled by an old woman with too much time on her hands. There’s the front door,” and Fiona finished by gesturing to that portal as graciously as she could, when she really wanted to punch the woman right between the eyes.

She watched the woman’s face drain of color, eyes widen in shock at being spoken to thusly. And then the color came rushing back into her face as anger suffused her features. She opened her mouth and closed it several times, and Fiona took a moment’s pleasure in having made the woman speechless.

Before the woman found her voice, the connecting door between her shop and Cookie’s restaurant slammed open, allowing Muriel to barge in, turning all Fiona’s customers’ heads toward her. Fiona dropped her verbal assault to stare at the frantic Muriel.