Her footsteps falter, and she pulls me to a stop. “You don’t mean that.”
I hadn’t meant to say it, but now that it’s out there, I don’t know how to take it back. “There are a lot of things you don’t know, Lucky. About me. About my family.”
She tilts her head slightly. “Does any of it change who you are?” Her hand rests directly over my heart. “In here?”
I want to say “no” so badly, but I just don’t know anymore.
Because it’s definitely changed me.
I offer a slight shrug and she leans in, feathering her lips across mine.
“I don’t believe it could.”
Her faith in me is completely unwarranted at this point, but I let it soak in, let it soothe some of my frayed edges as I lead her toward the fire pit.
Maybe one day I’ll tell her everything.
Maybe one day she’ll learn my deepest, darkest secrets.
But that day is definitely not today.
12
LUCKY
The constant clicking of Raven’s fingers against the keyboard mixes with the music playing from Willow’s phone to fill the space as we work. I glance over at Willow’s best friend, who has her head dipped toward her computer screen where she sits at the display case counter beside the register. She’s deeply engrossed in whatever she’s working on and doesn’t seem to be paying us any attention.
Neither is Giz, who has curled up on an old blanket Willow brought in for him from the truck when we came into the shop.
I lean in toward Willow so Raven doesn’t hear me. “Doesn’t that incessant clicking ever get on your nerves?”
Willow snorts and hands me another candle to slap a label on. “Yes. Which is why I don’t normally sit with her while she works. Most of the time, she’s at Claire’s.”
“The bakery?”
Nodding, she continues organizing the candles she pulls from the boxes brought down from the homestead. “She used to work here.” She spreads her hand out. “But Old Man Murray wanted to retire, and he shut down the paper. She lives above the bakery so she kind of took up residence at the corner table there.”
I glance again at Raven, whose brow is furrowed, blond hair falling over her shoulders as she leans into her computer, her lips pressed together in deep contemplation about something.
“Then why is she here now?”
Willow laughs. “That’s a good question.” She tips her head toward her friend. “Raven, why are you here since you’re not helping?”
Raven drags her gaze off the computer screen and scowls at her. “I will help. I’m just busy at the moment.”
“That’s what you’ve been saying all day.”
It’s true.
She has been.
In the few hours since we came down the mountain and started digging into the boxes of product Willow had readied for the store, Raven has barely moved from her spot at that counter, and certainly hasn’t helped with anything other than occasionally picking up the baby out of the playpen we moved out here while he was awake. Now that he’s napping in the office, she’s dived right back into her work as if we don’t even exist in the same space.
“And what is it you do, exactly, Raven? I know this place used to be a newspaper…”
Raven nods, blowing hair off her forehead. “I was a reporter. The only reporter who worked with Murray. But when he shut down the paper, I became a freelancer.”
“So, what does that mean?”
