Money Shot by Susan Sey Page A

was level with Rush’s stiff shoulders and poked his elbow through his shell. “Dude. Aren’t you hot?” She squinted into the unexpectedly strong sun. “It’s got to be in the forties.”
    “Fifties.”
    “Nice,” she said. “Does it warm up like this a lot in December? Some weird lake-effect thing?”
    “Not usually.” He jerked his chin at her jacket. “You ready?”
    She sighed and fell in behind him, trotting in the prints of his snowshoes. “You’re angry.”
    “Yeah. I am.”
    “With me?”
    “With the situation.”
    She sighed again. She’d known he would take this hard and had hoped forcing him to take a night to think on the situation would cool him off. And it had. Boy, had it. The heat of his anger had cooled all the way down to the icy, purposeful drive now propelling him along the trail toward South Harbor at a near sprint.
    “Rush, I know this is your home and you feel betrayed, but it’s nothing personal. To this person—whoever it is—I guarantee you, it’s just about the money.”
    “It’s more than that.”
    “No, Rush, it isn’t. It’s—”
    “I’m going to show you something,” he said. “Something most mainlanders don’t know about. Something that’ll make you understand. This is about way more than money.”
    “What?” She jogged to catch up, grabbed his sleeve. “What are you going to show me?”
    He gave her a flat, silver glance. “You’ll see.”
    Ten minutes later, they were pushing through the shiny red door of Mother Lila’s Tea Shop.
    “The sign said closed,” Goose pointed out as sleigh bells announced their arrival. “Shouldn’t we at least knock?”
    “Doesn’t smell closed,” Rush said, and Goose had to admit he was right. Gingerbread and cinnamon hung in the moist, warm air as usual and bold sunshine spilled across the wooden floors.
    “Upstairs!” Lila’s voice drifted through the door behind the counter leading to the private spaces of the house.
    Goose followed Rush through the door and into the kitchen. It had obviously been retrofitted to meet commercial standards—stainless-steel countertops gleamed, a tiny industrial-strength dishwasher squatted in one corner and refrigerators and freezers with temperature gauges built into the doors sidled side by side like a pair of musclebound bouncers near the door.
    In spite of the high-tech makeover, though, it still felt like a kitchen Lila might live and work in. Potted plants marched across the sill, while a filmy set of honey-colored curtains made the most out of whatever sun found its way into north-facing windows. Terra-cotta tiles the color of freshly baked bread marched across the floor at a diagonal, the center taken up by a geometric mosaic. The jagged, inlaid pieces didn’t render a picture so much as suggest one. Goose had to squint hard before she decided it was a stag in front of a full moon.
    “Lila?” Rush called.
    “Up here.”
    Goose turned to find a pretty circular staircase in black wrought iron tucked into the corner. Rush waved at it. “After you,” he said.
    “What are we doing here?” she whispered, threading her way carefully up the tiny, wedge-shaped steps.
    “You’ll see.”
    They emerged a moment later into a sitting room that made Goose want to toe off her shoes and have a cup of tea. And she didn’t even like tea.
    The wooden floors shone like spilled maple syrup, the gleam broken up by the warm expanse of a blue-and-gold woolen rug. A fire snapped in the pretty hearth that took up most of the far wall, while two dormered windows framing breathtaking views of the lake occupied the adjoining wall. Built-in bookshelves ran above, beside and between the windows, while a thickly cushioned bench ran beneath. Plants hung from the ceiling in front of the glass, bushy with the kind of good health that Goose had only ever seen in magazines.
    “Hello, dear,” Lila said, rising from the window seat. She padded across the floor on bare feet and took Rush’s