If I stay in Hell’s Bells after Junie leaves for college and there’s still something there with Flint in a few years, then there’s still something there.
But right now, I really don’t see that happening.
I told him he could trust me.
I told him we were friends.
I told him I wanted to be more than friends.
And then, just like everyone else in his life, I left him.
This one’s on me.
Chapter 35
Flint
I’m at Iron Moose when news breaks that Maisey has landed in Tampa to pick up her runaway daughter. No TVs in the place, but everyone’s checking their phones.
Takes about thirty seconds to get the scoop.
Dean’s mistress is pregnant. They’re engaged. And June threw a fit and ran away because she’s the same brand of selfish narcissist as Maisey.
Yeah, that one makes me come out of my seat.
“Sit down, Mr.Neanderthal,” Kory drawls. “You know the only people in here who believe that are the same people who think aliens are coming to kidnap us tomorrow.”
“I dare them to come here to Hell’s Bells and say that about our Junie and our Maisey,” Regina says.
“I’m getting bored. Might branch out into libel-and-slander law,” Charlotte adds.
Libby is growling like I haven’t heard her growl since the drama department was disbanded at the high school. “I’m starting a petition to block any site that says bad things about Junie from Hell’s Bells forever. First Hell’s Bells. Then all of Wyoming. And thenthe world. Maisey, too, for that matter. She brings good treats. But Junie—she’s such a good kid.”
“Send me the link,” Regina calls. “I’ll share it with my cousin up in Montana. He’s, like, TikTok viral for splitting logs or something. We’ll get the right side of this story out.”
“She dump you?” Kory asks as I lower myself back into my seat.
“It’s a temporary thing.”
“Temporary dumping or temporary fling?”
“Dumping.”
“How temporary?”
“June has another year and a half of high school.”
He snorts in his tea. Chokes on it, actually. “Oh, wait. You were serious.”
I don’t answer.
“You’re serious,” he repeats.
“I’m a sucky soccer coach, and I need to step aside and let someone else run the program.”
He drops his fork. “Excuse you?”
“A fuckingteenagerbrought those kids together in ways I never could’ve. A teenager who had every reason to hate all of us and not a whole hell of a lot to gain, but she did it anyway. And you know why? Becausethat’s what her mother taught her to do. And you know what’s sexy as hell?”
