“You want me to live in your house.”
“I just want you to let me take care of you,” I told her. “I could buy you any property in Harrogate. Shoot, if you wanted to move back to Manhattan, I could arrange that too.”
She drew herself up. “I am a member of the government of Harrogate, and I will not be bribed by shady investors.”
I muttered a curse.
Meg mashed the elevator button. I ignored her when she yelled at me not to follow her inside the cab.
“How else are you going to bring all your thousands of baking items upstairs?” I countered, looking down at her. Her hair was frizzy with the exertion of the day. “Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever even seen you bake anything.”
“Now that I’m not taking care of Barry, I will start baking,” she said, chin set.
I grinned. Meg scowled at me.
“Are you going to invite me over to taste some of your baked goods or…” I chuckled. “Lick the frosting off of your cupcakes?”
“I’m not letting you anywhere near me.” She huffed as we walked down the short hallway to her apartment.
I stepped inside after she unlocked the door. Svensson Investment had bought this building over a decade ago. It had been abandoned when we had moved to Harrogate, and we had squatted in it, cooking over a propane campfire wrapped in blankets after escaping the polygamist cult.
I shook off the memories.
The window of the tiny studio looked at a brick wall.
“If you moved in with me,” I said casually, “you could have a view of the Harrogate Estate backyard, or I could buy us a very nice condo on Main Street.”
Meg shoved me out of the door.
“I don’t even get a ‘thank you for your help’?”
Meg narrowed her eyes at me. “You only did it because you wanted something.”
Yeah… Meg.
5
Meghan
Islumped against the door after Hunter had left. It had taken all my self-control not to take him up on his offer.
He’s just trying to use you. That’s how he is. He acts charming and loving to get what he wants.
But it was a temptation. Hunter had always promised me an easy life.
I nervously checked my banking app on my phone. Maybe I had made too hasty a decision. This apartment was a lot of money. I could have just moved in with Susie.
“I just need to hold on until I officially become the mayor,” I told myself, “then I will be paid four times my current amount, and I will actually hire a deputy mayor that’s more competent than Barry, and I won’t have such a heavy workload.”
As I showered, I continued to give myself a pep talk. “Just be optimistic,” I ordered myself as I put on a skirt, no-nonsense pumps, and a blazer that was my typical deputy mayor outfit. “Barry is healthy, I have somewhere to live for now, and I have free time. In fact, I am baking cupcakes tonight. Maybe…”
My phone was blowing up with emails from people wanting to schedule meetings, residents demanding that I fulfill promises Barry had made, Ida wanting to know why I had rejected her proposal for her friend’s nudist retreat…
“I cannot deal with this on an empty stomach.”
Hazel was at her restaurant making sandwiches behind the counter when I walked in.
“I have your favorite,” she said. “A prosciutto and buffalo mozzarella sandwich with pesto aioli, plus mozzarella sticks because I think we all deserve fried cheese in times like these.”
