And if I were being really honest, the part of me that could still put on a dinosaur costume and make a room full of people laugh wanted to see if he’d scowl again.
The smarter part of me, the part that still flinched when the phone rang at night, that kept changing my locks every few months even though no one asked me why, knew better. I’d already let one mistake carve too deeply, and I wasn’t sure I was going to give another man the opportunity to do the same. Maybe a quick roll in the hay, but he was Sage’s brother, and it would be poor form to do the deed with him and then kick him to the curb.
Maybe I was flattering myself. He probably didn’t want to do the deed with me.
4
Easton
The rain had thinned into a mist by the time I left Chapter & Crumb, the kind of damp that clung to your collar and worked its way down the back of your neck no matter how you shifted your jacket. The box of cinnamon rolls was warm in my hand, the ribbon already sticking from the drizzle. Maggie would be happy. She liked anything sweet, and I got the feeling they were a special treat.
Still, I couldn’t get Lila Merrick out of my head.
Not because she stood her ground when I grumbled about the cinnamon rolls, though that had surprised me. Most people folded when I scowled. She didn’t. She smiled. A bright, practiced smile that had steel under it. I’d seen that kind of thing before, in people who had to put on a show for everyone else.
What struck me most was her joy. The way she was willing to make a fool of herself for her small group of blue-haired ladies at book club went straight to a dusty corner of my soul. Part of me was a little confused about how a grown woman would be willing to jump around in an inflatable suit, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. But I hadn’t missed the customers in the shop who had been laughing so hard that they hiccupped, or the good-natured jokes afterward, or the happy smiles.
And damn if it hadn’t made me want to laugh, too.
I wasn’t supposed to notice how her eyes lit when she leaned into the moment, or how the whole room seemed to ease just because she wasn’t afraid to look stupid. I sure as hell wasn’t supposed to be turned on by how sexy she was. Geez, what was wrong with me? I was only in town for one thing … and that was family, not a hook up.
But there it was, chewing at me as I walked to the grocery store, the bell over the door jangling too loud in the quiet. My boots squeaked against the linoleum as I stepped inside, and just like that, I felt it. Eyes on me.
A pair of old men in the produce aisle stopped talking, one pretending to check the ripeness of an apple, the other just staring. A young mom with a cart glanced over her shoulder more than once, whispering something to her kid before giving me a side-eye. Even the cashier paused in bagging someone’s groceries when I stepped up, like I had grown horns.
I told myself I didn’t care.
I had told myself that a thousand times before.
But it grated. Every time.
They whispered when I was a kid, too. The foster boy at the Holt place, the one who had been in trouble even before he learned how to drive. I had been the first one they took in, so maybe there’d been some shock and awe. Later, after Levi died and I didn’t come back, they whispered even louder. I knew it even when I wasn’t here.
I grabbed another loaf of bread for sandwiches, a gallon of milk, and a bag of coffee for Maggie, throwing them into the basket harder than necessary. If Kipp were already running things at the farmhouse, he would have stocked the basics, but Maggie preferred her specific coffee, the kind ground fresh, which she swore made her mornings better. I wasn’t about to show up empty-handed with only cinnamon rolls.
A couple of housewives in the cereal aisle looked me over, then leaned close and murmured to each other. Their eyes flicked away when I stared back. I clenched my jaw and kept moving, trying not to get into my head too much.
I should have been used to it by now. Cities had given me freedom. In Boise or Portland, no one knew who I was. No one cared if I came home late, or if I worked until my hands blistered, or if I walked into a bar and walked out with someone who didn’t even ask my last name. That was the beauty of being a ghost. Here, I wasn’t allowed to be one.
The line at the register was short. Mrs. Seaver, the one with the little girl from Chapter & Crumb, was in front of me. She looked back, recognition flashing across her face, and gave a polite smile that didn’t reach her eyes.
“Hey there, Easton. Good to have you back in town.” She shifted her little girl to her other hip. “How have you been?”
“Good.”
Not bothering to offer anything else or invite conversation, I dropped the basket onto the counter. The cashier was a kid, probably still in high school, with pimples across his chin and nervous energy all over him. He scanned the bread and milk before looking up, then paused.
“You’re Easton Holt,” he said finally, voice low like he hadn’t meant to say it out loud.
I didn’t answer.
He bagged faster, stumbling over the barcodes. “Your picture is in the trophy case at the high school. My uncle said you could have made it big. Said you could hit a home run clean over the fence.”
I slid cash across the counter. “Your uncle talks too much.”
The kid laughed nervously and stuffed the change into my hand.
The rain had picked up again, steady enough that by the time I loaded the groceries into the truck, my jacket was damp. I sat behind the wheel for a second, fingers tapping against the steering wheel, staring out at Main Street.
