“Something like that,” he muttered, though he knew it wasn’t only that. Urgency bubbled under his skin, demanding he move. Go, do, act.Something. Before his time ran out and he had to leave Havenbrook all over again.
“I thought I’d have more time with her,” he finally said. “To see…” He trailed off, not wanting to voice the hope he’d had but hadn’t even admitted to himself. To see if she’d say yes this time. If she’d be with him, even if he didn’t—couldn’t—call Havenbrook his home.
“Well, with everything that’s goin’ on, you’re never gonna get time with her while you’re hangin’ around here,” Lilah said. “Mac’s spread way too thin to even be thinkin’ about you. With everything she has to do to keep her daddy in line, she’s gotta be exhausted. I’m sure you can guess just how easy Richard is makin’ it on her.” Lilah rolled her eyes before turning back to the wall to smooth the tape down the diagonal line, following the path of the laser level.
Lilah was no stranger to the Haven household, same as Hudson. She’d graduated with Kenna’s younger sister, Natalie. And though they hadn’t been the best of friends, they’d hung out their fair share of times—that tended to happen when one’s entire class consisted of a whopping seventy-five people, give or take a few. Which meant Lilah knew exactly what Kenna was dealing with—an overbearing, condescending, irrational, spoiled man-child.
“He needs a keeper,” Hudson said, frustrated that it was Kenna who’d somehow been volunteered for it but knowing she’d never decline. She was too kind. Too generous. Too giving.
“Ohh! You know what you should do?” Lilah asked, her eyes lit up. “You need to take her somewhere the real world can’t encroach. Maybe sneak off campin’ like y’all used to do?”
That actually wasn’t a bad idea. When they’d been teenagers, they’d done their fair share of camping out in the woods surrounding the Havens’ property. But that wouldn’t suffice for this trip—not if the goal was to get herawayfrom her family so she could breathe a little.
“Maybe,” Hudson murmured, trying to figure out the details in his mind. A lot of the bulk work at the bakery had already been done, and they’d moved on to the finishing work. It’d been a small remodel, all things considered. Mostly cosmetic—just enough change to make the space feel more like Lilah’s since she was edging to take over more of the duties.
And the work needing to be done at the cabin… Hell, it had been going along fine for ten years while he’d been gone. What was another couple days?
Now the only thing he had to worry about was how he’d convince Kenna. It’d take a hell of a lot to get her to skip out on her duties. And though he hoped the only reason she’d pulled away this week had been because of her overworked status, he couldn’t help but worry it had something to do with the call he’d received.
And the reminder that he wasn’t there to stay.
Mac restedher head on her daddy’s—er, her—desk and closed her eyes. She could do that because she was acting mayor, and there wasn’t anyone around to tell her she couldn’t.Shewas acting mayor. Who thought this was a good idea?
Certainly not her daddy. Since she’d taken the seat at his desk on Monday, he’d done nothing but hover, stare over her shoulder, or elbow her out of the way when she wasn’t doing something “correctly.”
Basically, he was being his usual overbearing, pain-in-the-ass self while also not listening to his doctor’s orders to take time off. Her momma was havingnoneof it. She’d allowed it for all of two days, and then she’d swung the hammer hard, hiding Daddy’s car keys so he had no way to get to town hall and forbidding anyone from giving him a lift. God bless her, because the in-person pop-ups courtesy of Richard Haven had finally stopped.
Now all Mac had to contend with were the incessant phone calls. Every fifteen minutes, her daddy called about something or other—none of which were overly important. All of which could wait until the thirty-second of Never. It’d gotten so bad, she couldn’t hear a phone ringing without cringing.
As if that weren’t bad enough, she’d been continually knocked down at every meeting she’d tried to attend on the mayor’s behalf this week. On her daddy’s schedule had been meetings with the sheriff, the council members, and the school board. She’d dutifully gone to each, complete with an iPad Will had procured her for making notes, but she could’ve left the thing in the office for all the good it’d done her. Hell,shecould’ve just stayed in the office because the “meetings” were a giant waste of time.
This week alone, she’d been told more times than she could count that they didn’t feel comfortable discussing issues with her because she was too young, not to mention a lady. The first time, she’d laughed. Ha.Hilarious.
And then she’d realized they’d been serious. The first time it’d happened, she’d stared, gaping at Sheriff Halsey, her daddy’s best friend and a man who’d been in her life for almost three decades, unable to find her words.
She’d found a hell of a lot of them after she’d gotten home that evening and had washed the day off herself in the shower. Macexcelledin make-believe arguments in her shower, and if this week were any indication, she’d be a gold medalist in the shower-arguing Olympics when this was all said and done.
So, yeah, she was exhausted, trying to do a job she didn’t exactly know how to do, just out here floundering by herself. What she really needed was a nap. Maybe she could close her eyes for just a second… No one would—
A knock sounded at her door before it opened, and she snapped her head up, a piece of paper sticking to her forehead. She reached up and yanked it off her face, hoping whoever had walked in hadn’t seen that.
Hudson leaned against the doorjamb, arms crossed, amusement dancing in his eyes.
So much for the futile hope that he didn’t see anything.
“What’re you doin’ here?” she asked.
Hudson’s gaze ping-ponged all over her face, reading her, so she sat up a little straighter and hoped she didn’t look as defeated as she felt. “I have a proposition for you.”
“Do you?” She ignored the way her stomach flipped over all the possible propositions he could suggest…most of them dirty. She’d been ignoring a lot of dirty ideas lately. Too bad her dreams made up for it.
He nodded. “I do. I want you to come campin’ with me this weekend.”
Memories flashed through her mind of all the times they’d gone in the past. They’d spent a solid seventy percent of their childhood outdoors, between the lake cabin and her parents’ property, and they’d had so much damn fun fending for themselves out there in the wilderness.
She was horrified to realize a knot had formed in her throat over thoughts of how things used to be between them. God, she hadn’t thought it’d be this hard to have him home. She hadn’t thought having these memories resurface would feel like she was being cracked right down the middle. Like she was excavating her soul.
And now she had not only her memories of their past, but their present, too. Thoughts of what they’d done in the woods the other day had been on a near-constant loop in her mind, keeping her company at the most inopportune times. It was hard to force the council members to take her seriously when she spent the majority of their extremely unproductive meeting squirming in her seat.
