The thing she loved about Hotcakes was that she had regular customers who came in every morning like clockwork. Mr. Dearen came for the hazelnut coffee. Esther with the ugly red cane came to get a bear claw even though she needed a salad more than a sweet treat. There were several people who always came in, and she knew exactly what they wanted. Assuming it was one of those people, she pulled herself up. Instead, she was face to face with a man who looked very much like Santa Claus. Should she press the panic button she had behind the counter? Or grab the mace from her purse?
“Can I help you?” she asked, her hand grasping a knife she kept behind the counter just in case a thief came in and tried to take her money. Although Seagrove was the safest city she’d lived in, she never liked to take chances as a woman alone.
“SuAnn?” The man stared at her, a slight smile on his face. He wasn’t bad looking, even if he did resemble the man who lived at the North Pole. He was fairly tall, thin and handsome, if she was being honest. Of course, if he was an ax murderer, none of that would matter.
“Yes. Who are you?”
“You don’t recognize me?”
“I don’t.”
He chuckled. “I suppose it has been a very long time, but I’d know your face anywhere.”
She was completely confused. Who was this guy? His voice sounded slightly familiar, low and gruff with an unmistakable southern accent. She trusted people with southern accents more than anyone else.
“Well, don’t keep me in suspense,” she said, getting more than a little irritated. If there was something SuAnn hated, it was being in the dark about anything.
He walked forward a couple of steps, and she tightened her hand around the knife handle. “Don’t worry. I’m not here to hurt you, SuAnn. Quite the opposite, in fact.”
Just as she was about to get her answer, Mr. Dearen walked through the door, the bell dinging so loudly that it surprised SuAnn and she dropped the knife onto the tile floor. It made a loud metal noise and startled Mr. Dearen.
“Mornin’, SuAnn!” He said the same thing every morning, his big smile - with several missing teeth - on full display. He wore a wool hat, a thick wool coat, and shuffled along with a walker.
“Good morning,” she said, pretending she wasn’t in the middle of a mystery. Even if she needed help, old Mr. Dearen wouldn’t be in any position to protect her. He could barely make it over to the counter himself.
“One large hazelnut coffee, please,” he said, sliding the exact change across the counter, as he always did.
She quickly poured his coffee and handed it to him. “Here ya go. See you tomorrow.” As much as she hated to hurry him away, she desperately wanted to know who this Santa Claus looking man was.
He nodded and held the cup up toward the mystery man. “This is good stuff. You should try it!”
“I may just do that,” the man said, as Mr. Dearen smiled and left the bakery. Now it was just the two of them again.
There was a long moment of tension in the air before SuAnn couldn’t stand it anymore. “Out with it!”
He laughed. “Just as impatient as ever, I see.”
“Look, I don’t know what kind of prank you’re trying to pull, but you’re way too old for jokes.”
The man smiled again. It was really starting to irritate her. “Susie, you always knew how to cut to the chase.”
“Susie? The only person who has ever called me Susie is…”
Her heart felt like it stopped in her chest. The way he said it, the sly smile on his face under that bushy white beard. It couldn’t possibly be…
“Is it all coming back to you now?”
“Nicholas?”
“In the flesh!” he said, holding his arms out.
“But, how…”
“You’re not an easy woman to find, Susie, but I never gave up. Been trying to find you for almost a year now. This time at least.”
“I haven’t seen you in… what… forty years?”
“That’s about right, I suppose. That was the last high school reunion I went to.”
“Same here.”
“You’re just as beautiful as you were way back then.”
What was she supposed to say to that? Nicholas, or Nicky as she often called him, had been the first great love of her life. They’d dated from ninth grade until after graduation, all the while planning to get married and start a family. But then life got in the way.
First, SuAnn’s father had unexpectedly died, leaving her to care for her inconsolable mother and little sister. Nicholas had gone into the Army right after high school and served in the Vietnam War. By the time he came home years later, SuAnn was married and pregnant with Janine. She’d heard he was home, but didn’t see him because she knew it would’ve been too hard.
Years later, at their high school reunion, she’d seen him with his wife, and her heart had broken a little. As much as she wanted him to be happy, he’d been her soulmate as far as she was concerned. After that reunion, she’d never gone to another one, not wanting to see him again. It was just too hard.
Even after her husband died, and she’d remarried, she’d thought about Nicky. Where was he? Was he still married? Could old sparks be rekindled?
“Nicholas, why are you here?” She was still standing on the other side of the counter, wanting to keep a safe distance between them.
“Because I never stopped thinking about you, SuAnn.”
She stared at him. “It’s been decades, for goodness’ sakes! And you’re married!”
He shook his head. “Darlin’, I was only married for six years. We never even had kids.”
“What?”
“But you were married. And then, when your husband died, I didn’t figure it was the time to ask you on a date.”
“How did you know my husband died?”
“I kept up through friends from school, as best I could anyway. I know Richard died when your girls were still teenagers.”
She softened a bit at the mention of her precious husband and father of her girls. Richard had been such a solid figure in all of their lives, and he’d allowed SuAnn to be who she was. After losing him when Julie was just a junior in high school, it had forced her to go to work and raise her girls on her own. Sure, they were older, but they’d needed her more than ever after their daddy had died.
“He was a wonderful husband and father.” She didn’t know why she suddenly felt the need to defend his honor.
“I’m sure he was.”
“There were quite a lot of years between my marriage to Richard and my marriage to Buddy. So, if you were so interested in finding me, why didn’t you do it then?”
He sighed. “I got married again. Tricia was her name. She passed away about three years ago.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Look, Susie, maybe too many years have passed, but I couldn’t keep going through life without checking in on you. And when I did an Internet search and saw you’d opened a bakery in this little town, I decided to take my last shot.”
She couldn’t help but feel flattered. But decades had passed between them. She wasn’t the same girl from high school, and she was sure he wasn’t the same boy either.