Page 19 of The Hometown Heartbreaker

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Mom snapped, her voice sharp in that way that only mothers of four boys can manage. “You think I’m going to let you get into some stranger’s car when there’s a perfectly good Lockhart here to drive you?” She shot me a look, all but daring me to refuse. “Dawson can take you.”

I stood there, mouth slightly open, and tried to make my brain work. I wanted to say something—anything—but every possible word felt like a landmine. I couldn’t say, “I missed you,” or “Please don’t leave again,” or even just, “Good morning.” Instead, I nodded, and the motion felt like it belonged to someone else.

“Oh, and I’ll have your bags moved into cabin ten once the Hope Falls guests have checked out this afternoon.”

“You don’t have to⁠—”

My mom lifted her hand like she was one of The Supremes telling Sadie to stop in the name of love. “This is not up for discussion, mija.”

I could see a battle happening behind Sadie’s gorgeous baby blues. Ultimately, she did the right thing. She may have been MIA for a dozen years, but she remembered arguing with Selma Montez-Lockhart was an exercise in futility.

Instead, she said a simple, “Thank you,” shouldered her bag, and headed toward the door. I watched her slip past the kitchen island, the distance between us growing with each step. Her movements were so quick, they practically left afterimages.

Mom was having none of it. She blocked the exit with a skillet in one hand and a dish towel in the other, like a linebacker dressed for brunch. “Dawson will take you.”

I found myself obeying before I could think to resist. I caught up with Sadie at the mudroom, where she was shoving her arms into a faded green jacket. She still didn’t look at me. Her jaw was set, and there was a tightness in her posture I didn’t recognize, like she’d been training for years to avoid me with the least possible effort.

“Can I give you a ride?” I asked, finally finding my voice, but it sounded rusty and unused. I was smart enough to know that just because she acquiesced in front of my mom, did not mean she would comply away from her.

She looked up then, and for a split second, the armor fell away. There was curiosity behind her eyes, but also something much harder, something like fear, or maybe anger, or maybe just exhaustion. Then it was gone, and she was back to Sadie Version 2.0, the older, more guarded version.

“It’s fine,” she said. “You don’t have to play chauffeur. Really.”

“I want to,” I admitted, and immediately hated how desperate it sounded. But it was true. I wanted to be near her, to make up for every single thing I’d broken, even if it was just for the drive.

7

HANDS AT TEN AND TWO, EYES TO YOURSELF

Sadie

Some muscle memories never die, no matter how deep you bury them.

The moment Dawson fell into step beside me on the way to his truck, my traitorous brain served up the highlight reel, his hands at my waist, that ridiculous grin, the way he used to swing me around like I weighed nothing and make me laugh so hard I’d snort. I actually used to snort. God help me.

He opened the passenger door for me, and I stepped up. The second I put on my seatbelt, nerves began popping like kernels of corn in hot grease. I was going to be alone with Dawson, really, truly alone with him for the first time in twelve years. We went from spending every day together, basically from sunrise to hours after sunset, not leaving each other’s side, to cold turkey. No contact. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. It was jarring to say the least, mildly traumatic to say the worst.

The truck dipped to the left when he climbed into the driver’s side and shut the door.

“I was actually wondering⁠—”

“If we could go to Buddy’s place before the hospital,” Dawson finished, glancing at me sidelong, a practiced efficiency in the way he checked the mirrors and pulled out.

I stared at him, momentarily stunned that he still had the ability to do that, to read my mind. “Yes, please.”

The grin that spread on his face—rare, unguarded—made my chest feel like it was being rung like a bell. I took the opportunity of him staring straight, concentrating on the road, to study him. He was broader than he’d been twelve years earlier, his jaw square and unshaven, the tendons in his forearm standing out as he turned the wheel. In high school he had been uniformly gorgeous, but now he was sexier, older, built for heavier burdens. For a fleeting second, I hated him for it.

“I need to grab a few things for him,” I tried to clear my mind of all things Dawson. “His books, mainly. He’s convinced he needs to work while he’s in there.”

He moved his arm to the back of the bench, and his knuckles grazed my shoulder. I felt it—a jolt, involuntary, a muscle memory of teenage desire that I had spent the last decade waiting to happen with someone else, but it never did.

I turned to look out the passenger window, pressing my lips together, hyper-aware of the truck’s interior closing around me—old leather, earth, soap, and the faintest trace of his cologne, the same as always, all of it arranged with the same precise, maddening Lockhart efficiency. New truck. Same Dawson. Same everything.

Which meant I was in serious trouble, because the last time I’d sat in this exact passenger seat, I’d been stupid enough to think I was exactly where I was supposed to be and I’d be there forever.

And I feared, some part of me still held those beliefs to be true.

We drove in silence on backroads we’d driven hundreds of times before along the edge of Valentine Bay, the morning shrouded in a shifting mist that made the town look like a faded photograph. Memories came flooding back of times we’d shared downtown on the pier, at the drive-in theater where we snuck in after closing and nearly got mauled by a raccoon, on the beach watching shooting stars.