“Liar.”
I scowled at her in a perfect demonstration of our family dynamic. My parents had started their family young—teenagers whenthey’d had me, which had meant our relationships weren’t like most of my mates and their parents. Even now, Fran was only forty-six, young at heart, and way cooler than me. And now that I was old enough to not need the mothering she’d often found so difficult, she was my friend. “Gus’s sister is in town. I saw her in the chip shop.”
“Gus’s sister? That’s what you’re calling her these days?”Fran brought me a mug of tea and set it in front of me. “And I’m pretty surprised you didn’t know already. That new florist shop is the talk of the town.”
“You knew?”
“Of course I did, and so would you have if you were a little more social.”
My mum, ladies and gents, the terminal social butterfly. My tearaway brother was just like her, in all the wrong ways, but I took after my dad.I liked my own company—when I wasn’t sulking over running into my ex—and didn’t understand the rest of the world’s need to be up in everyone’s business.
Apart from days like today.
Fran came back to the table with a glass of wine for herself and the local paper for me. “There.” She pointed at an article on the third page. “She’s taken over the old salon at the end of the high street. Opensin two weeks.”
If I’d been flummoxed by the idea of Mia merely visiting Gus, the prospect of her being permanently back in Rushmere pretty much gave me a fucking stroke. I stared at the newspaper, and white spots danced in front of my eyes. I’d come home because the Navy had sucked me dry, and Mia, to the best of my knowledge, had left Rushmere behind to start a new life after her mother died.If I’d known—If you’d known what? Her little brother still lives here. He works for you. There was every chance you’d cross paths with Mia again someday.
The devil on my shoulder was a righteous bastard. I pushed the paper away, drank my tea, and tried to come to terms with the fact that perhaps I’d wanted this all along.
