Her muscles flexed under my hands. A flinch. Was she reminding herself I was paid to be here? “Sure. Let’s get some food.”
Fuck.
I loved my sisters, but I was also upset with them. They couldn’t have known it, but Summer and Autumn buying me for Scarlett was a harsh dent to her confidence, one I might not be able to smooth.
3
Scarlett
The staresfrom everyone were a million spiders crawling up my back and into my hair. The whole town knew this date was part of the auction.
I should’ve gone to his house. This was ridiculous. We were a spectacle.
The manager of Canyon Grill, Curly Binstock, bustled out of the kitchen when we arrived and seated us, gushing over the mountain view, as if I didn’t eat here regularly when even embroidery on Friday nights got to me. Summer, Autumn, and I would meet at Curly’s for our girls’ night, and the manager hadn’t made an appearance any of those times. Not even when Wynter or June were in town and would join us.
I pushed my lettuce around my plate. After the humiliating confession in my house, I had the constant urge to flee. Seeing him with my cat would make any ghosting after this date worse.
Lilith had liked Peter too—for the first year. Then, when she’d started getting “lost,” I should’ve realized that she would hide when he was around. Instead of sleeping on the bed, she’d be under it. When he walked into the kitchen, she’d sneak around the edges of the room, then dash under the bed.
Humiliation flamed my cheeks. The blush had almost died down, and then we’d walked into the restaurant and had become a show. Stares. Murmurs. We’d been seated for twenty minutes, and their gawking crawled over my skin.
How much of what Peter had said about me being a dud had gotten around town? Were people making bets over when Tate would run, not walk, away from this date?
Tate took a drink. He’d just gotten water. Not what I expected after Curly had gushed about the various lines of Copper Summit liquor they carried.
He carefully set his glass down, his gaze on me as I tried to admire the mountains and take my mind off the other patrons. “Do you want to leave?”
“No, it’s fine.”
It was foolish. No one knew what Peter had said when we’d broken up. Or did they? How much had Peter told others during the two years we were together? I had begun to question it all. Some of my kids’ parents knew I was into needlework, those who had also been customers of Peter’s at the implement dealer. I thought it’d been small talk. But had he complained about how boring and predictable I was too? How I was assigned the kids who were more of a handful because my sedate personality could put anyone to sleep?
“Scarlett.” He pushed away his empty soup bowl. He’d had an entire bowl of chicken tortilla soup and hadn’t spilled one drop on himself. The guy was unreal. Half the time, I wondered if my boobs were a special magnet for food.
“Tate, it’s fine.”
“It’s not. You don’t like being the center of attention, and we were literally put in the center for the attention.”
I grimaced and glanced around. Tables surrounded us. Booths lined the windows. The most private booth in the back corner by the bathrooms was empty. “Yes, we were.”
“Curly always likes it when the Baileys dine here.”
“‘Baileys’ being the critical part.”
His gaze sharpened. “What do you mean?”
Dammit. I didn’t want to spend the whole day complaining about the various attitudes in town. “Your sisters don’t impress him as much.”
The Baileys had taken in Summer, Autumn, and their other two sisters as fosters and then adopted them. The girls had kept their last name of Kerrigan. Darin and Mae Bailey had wanted them to feel like they would always have a part of their parents with them. Most folks in town lumped them in with “the Baileys.” But others, like Curly, thought it was like a partial rejection, a way to say,but these aren’t ours.
Displeasure rippled across Tate’s face.
I didn’t know Mae and Darin that well, but from what I’d heard, they were welcoming and supportive. They loved their three boys, they’d fostered several kids over the years, and they’d adopted the four little girls who’d lost their parents in a ravine when they’d been out camping.
Tate’s lips were in a flat line. “If only he knew the reason he gets a deal on Copper Summit products is because of Summer and how much she loves this damn town.”
“She does remind him periodically, don’t worry.”
He laughed, garnering more attention, but when his smile was aimed my way, I preened.
