I shove my hands in my pockets and clear my throat. “Night off tomorrow.”
Will’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline.
“Rich is in town. Might see if he and Ethan wanna get some tacos.”
Will’s eyes flash in understanding, and he looks too sanctimonious for my taste. “This wouldn’t have anything to do with Brie Casey being back in town would it?”
I don’t take the bait. “I keep giving the guys the brushoff. It’s no way to be a friend.”
My brother folds his arms, waiting me out.
I keep my face neutral but ask, “How do you even know she’s back?”
Will levels me with a bored expression. “You have to ask that when Luce works at your front office, and her sister works at mine?”
“Good point.” Despite being her boss, hearing Señora Martinez referred to by her first name stillunsettles me.
“So?” he prompts.
“What?” I busy myself with putting away my tools.
“The girl you tormented is back” —I suppress a sneer at the accurate characterization— “and you’re suddenly interested in going out to a bar for the first time in years.” He leans against a wall stud. “Aren’t you supposed to be setting agoodexample, Principal Strong?”
“Alright, Mr. Mayor,” I drawl. “Rich doesn’t come back to Blue Ridge all that often these days, and it’s been too long.” This is actually true. Besides my buddy Jake, with whom I maintain a mostly text-based friendship, Rich is probably my best friend. “You wanna come out tomorrow or not?”
He pushes off the wall and walks across the room. “Nah, I’m too old for that shit. You shouldn’t either. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll leave that girl alone.” He opens the exterior door and stops to face me.
I brace myself for more.
“But if you do go, at leastlooklike the principal you are and shave. You look like a bear.”
CHAPTER 7
BRIE
“I’ll beout of your hair for dinner tomorrow,” I say as I load the dishwasher as my older sister, Gia, packs up the leftovers from dinner.
Mara and her new firefighter boyfriend, Tucker, are in the living room, playing a game with Lizzie.
Gia hums her acknowledgment. The thing about Gia is . . . I can’t read her. She’s my own sister, and I don’t know what she’s thinking, ever.
While I was working the school pick-up line this afternoon, she appeared out of nowhere, leaned up to kiss my cheek, and said, “A spare bedroom’s ready for you. We eat at 5:30.”
I was too stunned, toobaffled, to even respond before she was driving away with a gaggle of kids in her bubblegum pink car.
Not that I’m complaining. I had no plan when I drove down here, and I could do worse.Wayworse.
If someone told me that I’d one day be staying in a house in the neighborhood of Belmont, I’d assume it wasbecause I was a live-in maid,notbecause my sister lives in a six-bedroom home with her daughter here.
Gia does data entry for a living, and Mara’s pretty sure she doesn’t get child support from her ex. No matter how curious I am, I won’t ask her about it.
Dishes clink in the sink, and I bring myself back to the conversation. “We’re meeting at a place called Jolly Jalapeño,” I say.
“Is that how you pronounce it?” Gia asks, messy bun flopping to one side as she tilts her head. “I know it’s aJ, but in my head, I’ve been calling it Holly Jalapeño. You know, twoHsounds. Alliteration and all.”
Frowning, I say, “I have no idea. I only read it in a text.”
I reach for my phone in my back pocket to check the text Dev sent me. A deluge of notifications from the group chat I muted earlier greets me, and I scan them from where I left off.
