Page 19 of The Do-Over Girl

I suck it up and head over, searching the crowd for Nash himself. Mrs. Pike stands behind the tables, overseeing her small army of volunteers and a mountain of baked goods. She wasn’t kidding when she said her bake sale would do all right. She’s selling the muffins for two dollars apiece and the cookies for a dollar each—and there’s a truckload of them. Too many to count or even guess.

Sliding behind the table, I take up an apron and jump in to help as promised.

“Have you seen Nash?” I whisper in her ear as I take some money from a student.

She shakes her head and pulls out another tray of cookies from under the table to replace an empty one. She’s been baking every day and night since we arrived at the inn, and now I see why.

“I wonder why he’s been missing from dinner every night. It’s been two weeks now.” I’m going for casual, but she gives me a look that tells me she knows I’m more than curious.

“There he is now,” Mrs. Pike says. “You can ask him why. I’d be interested to know myself.”

Nash walks up to the table, cutting through the crowd of kids who part for him automatically. I don’t miss the admiring stares of the girls and boys, but especially the girls. He hasn’t lost his female magnet quality, that’s for sure. He lands directly in front of me, grinning, one dimple, killer intense eyes sucking me in like I’m one of his minions. But I’m not. Squaring my shoulders, I smile back.

“I thought I smelled your delicious cookies, Mrs. Pike. Glad to know I’m not hallucinating.” He picks up a cookie and takes a big bite.

“What’s the matter? You hallucinating from starvation because you’ve missed dinner for two weeks?” Shit. Too direct. And way too snarky.

He darts me an amused look, and damn, I sounded like a whiny housewife whose husband keeps missing dinner, didn’t I?

“Not that I care. But Mrs. Pike—Charline—is a fabulous cook, so you’re missing out on some spectacular meals and—”

“I get the picture,” he says, his smile smug with his one devastating dimple deepening, and I wish I had somewhere else to be.

He takes a ten-dollar bill from his wallet while the kids are saying hello and good luck and generally giving him all their attention. He smiles and winks, acknowledging them, but returns his attention to me.

Handing me the money, he says in a quiet voice for my ears only. “You miss me, Kali?”

It sounds a hell of a lot like a serious question, and I respond to the emotional undercurrents in his words with my unvarnished emotions, automatically, maybe unwisely.

“Yes, I do.” My inner voice of reason and maturity screams at me to take back the words, to qualify them, to explain my answer away. But I don’t. I stand there frozen, and he stands frozen, staring back at me as my answer, my confession hangs between us.

“I—” He’s about to answer me when the cheerleading squad comes bounding towards the table led by Mia, heading straight for me. She pushes past Nash and starts a cheer for the team.

“Who’s going to beat us?” The answering shouts are immediate. “No one’s going to beat us.” The cheering intensifies when the players parade by, dressed in their jackets and ties, per Nash’s directive.

Nash grabs one more cookie and winks at me. “Wish me luck, Lollipop.”

Heat infuses me, but this time it’s not insult or anger or disrespect that I feel, it’s the kind of warmth that reminds me of back when we had something between us, though a mere shadow of that feeling. I smile at him and wink back.

He’ll be missing dinner again tonight, but this time, it’ll be because of the game, and pre-season or not, the excitement is inescapable. And almost as heady as Nash himself.

“Come on Miss Austin,” Mia says, waving her pom-pom in my direction.

“It’s time for one last practice before the game,” I tell Charline as I take off my apron and fold it.

“Go get him, girl,” she says with a straight face, and it sounds like she means him—Nash—not them, as in beating the other team. I nod either way and wonder about her.

Walking over to the arena, I glance up at the tarp, wondering not for the first time why the newly refurbished arena nameplate merits secrecy. However, my boisterous cheerleading squad awaits, bubbly and excited like a bunch of teenage girls ought to be.

I think coaching them is the most fun part of my return to Andrews Point so far.

“Let’s get inside ladies and run through the intro cheer and the first and second intermission routines one more time.”

Mia, who I chose for captain, leads the rest of the girls around to the practice rink doors, and we go inside to the tiny locker room where the girls keep their skates. They’re already dressed in their uniforms, which are tights with a skating skirt on the bottom and a school sweater with a turtleneck underneath on top in the school colors of blue and white.

They chatter about the guys on the team, and when Dylan’s name comes up, all eyes go to Mia.

“You’re so lucky. He’s so hot.”

“He’s devastating, Mia. What I wouldn’t give to have him kiss me just once.”

They giggle, and she blushes.

Another girl I don’t know well says, “I wouldn’t mind him doing a whole lot more—how is he—"

“All right, ladies,” I interrupt, “let’s get out on the ice. We don’t have a lot of time.” The way the girls talk about Dylan reminds me of the way they talked about Nash back in the day. I reacted a lot like Mia does now, slightly embarrassed and seriously grateful. Dylan is a good kid, way more than just a hunky guy, and Mia knows it.

The same way I knew that about Dylan.

Until things went all wrong.