“And what the fuck do you plan to do about it, chief?” Teddy squared up, nose to nose with Dan.
“Touch her again and find out…chief,” Dan gritted out through clenched teeth. The chatter in the hallway quieted. I knew I had to defuse this situation quickly, and the fastest way to do that was to get Teddy away from Dan and out of town. I stepped between them, pressing my palms into their chests to keep them apart. Dan’s heart was beating furiously against my fingertips.
“Stop this. Okay? Just stop it,” I whisper-shouted. “This isn’t the time or the place for this. As a matter of fact, there is no time or place for two grown men to be acting like children.”
“Did you think I was gonna let somebody—” Dan began. His eyes were pleading with mine, but I cut him off.
“I can take care of this. Let me handle this.”
“Yeah, mind your business. This doesn’t have shit to do with you,” Teddy shot back.
“Shut up,” I spat at him before turning back to Dan. “You have to let me handle this.” I grabbed Teddy by the wrist and tugged him away from my boyfriend and the curious onlookers, and out of the town hall. I could feel Dan’s eyes boring into me in anger, but I couldn’t look back at him.
I tugged Teddy down Main Street and didn’t stop until we were seated in a secluded booth in Erica’s diner. Melissa was seated at the counter, holding a pencil in front of a small pile of open schoolbooks. Her mother caught my eye and furrowed her brow, her expression asking me if I needed help. I answered with a quick shake of my head.
“Teddy, you need to leave.”
“I’m not leaving without you. Don’t you get that, Emma? I took time off from work. I drove all the way out to the middle of nowhere to get you back and bring you home.”
“I am home, Teddy. I need you to understand that. Our relationship is over. It’s been over for a while. Our routine was just too ingrained in us to understand before. But coming out here, reconnecting with my past—”
“Fucking another man,” he interjected. The rest of my sentence died on my lips as I looked at Teddy in horror. He quickly changed course. “Look, Em. I’mma cut to the chase. I didn’t just get into town this morning.” I tilted my head in confusion. “I’ve been here for a few days.” My stomach dropped because I knew exactly where this conversation was headed. “I don’t know if you think you all are being discreet, but it didn’t take me long to figure out what the hell is going on here.”
“I don’t know what you’re—” I began, feeling my voice shake.
“Cut the shit, Emma.” He shook his head while wearing a shit-eating, mirthless grin. “Your little farm is an illegal marijuana dispensary, and this whole fucking town is in on it. Four and Twenty Blackbirds? Greenie’s Diner?” He waved a hand dismissively around the restaurant while glaring at me.
“Seriously, Teddy?” I forced myself to laugh, though I had to wrap my hands around a water glass to keep them from shaking. “That’s circumstantial at best. Is this your evidence?”
“Not all of it, but you put together the names with the abundance of tourists that look suspiciously like patients, the brownies that cost twenty dollars each, the fact that the farm you live on doesn’t sell shit… no beef, no pork, no milk. It’s a glorified pettingzoo. Where’s the money coming from, huh?” He raised an eyebrow while I remained stoic.
“You’re right, Em. It’s not a lot of evidence, but maybe it’s enough to get a search warrant for the back half of that big-ass greenhouse tucked away on the farm. The part that’s behind the military-grade steel door?”
I felt the blood drain from my face. Teddy obviously noticed my change in expression because he smirked triumphantly. I opened my mouth to protest and then closed it again, still staring at him in disbelief. I can’t believe he snuck onto the farm, into the greenhouse.
Teddy continued. “I’m not planning to let the authorities know what’s going on in the town, if that’s what that look is about.” A tiny bit of relief flooded my chest, but it was short-lived. “It would reflect badly on you, as my future wife and mother of my children, if you were unmasked as a drug dealer. Not to mention my political future and the prospects of turning the farm and its town into even more of a tourist destination than it already is.”
“Teddy, you can’t,” I said in a defeated whisper. Yes, he could. Theodore Aloysius Baker the Third, the man I thought I was in love with for my entire adult life, wouldn’t let anything stand in the way of what he considered his birthright, his destiny—least of all me, the woman he claimed to love.
“It’s too late for that, Em. I’ve already talked to Preston Smith. We’ve set a plan in motion to make things right and put everything back on course. Of course, the success of this plan depends on you.” Yes, as usual, Teddy needed my help to fulfill his delusions of grandeur. This time would be different. I wasn’t the Emma he thoughthe knew. I was Emmaline Walters, and like my great-grandmother, it was my duty to protect this town and everyone in it.
“No, Teddy,” I replied. “I’m not going to let you destroy this town. You and Preston need to find another town to gentrify and exploit.”
“It’s not that simple, Emma. You seem to think you have a choice, and you don’t. If you don’t do whatever is in your power to make sure that everything goes my way, I’ll have no choice, as an officer of the court, but to report any crimes that I may come across.”
“Teddy—”
“ThisNarcos,Breaking Badshit you have going will have to end, but if you do what I say, no one has to go to jail over it. Plus, that shit you have going on with ol’ dude ends now. I’d be willing to forgive you and take you back. You were probably under too much stress and had a nervous breakdown or something. I’m not going to let three months ruin our lives. We’re better than that. We’re Teddy and Emma. Nothing can stop us. This way, everything gets put back the way it ought to have been. In my estimation, everyone wins.” He reached for my hand across the table and placed his warm palm over mine. The contact made me flinch. I never wanted to be touched by this man again. While Teddy waited for my response, I glanced over to the counter. Erica was still eyeing us with keen interest. Melissa was still fixated on her schoolwork. My heart was breaking. This town was perfect before I came here. The demons that haunted my life in Atlanta had followed me here and planned to destroy everything I’d grown not just to love, but to need. Erica’s husband was the sheriff. Mavis and Leonard were two kind, elderly people who loved to bake. Then my thoughts drifted to Dan. Wouldhe be sent to prison, or deported? Both prospects were too difficult to consider. Just as everything seemed so perfect, I’d managed to destroy everything.
“Emma?” Teddy leaned forward, still gripping my hand. I met his eyes, not believing the loathing I felt for the man I’d actually considered spending the rest of my life with. He was waiting patiently for the only answer I could give him, wearing a smug, triumphant grin.
I was Emmaline Walters, and like my great-grandmother, it was my duty to protect this town and everyone in it.
“Yes,” I whispered, and a tear slipped down my cheek. “I’ll do it.”
The rest of the day was spent meticulously going over every final detail of the festival. I needed it to go perfectly even more than I had before—as if somehow losing myself in the planning would make my conversation with Teddy vanish, and the giant steamroller of his plan speeding toward the town would magically disappear.
The day stretched into night, and I kept finding things to occupy my time in order to avoid going home, going back to the farm. My guilt felt like a heavy, wet blanket engulfing my entire body and threatening to suffocate me.
