Page 43 of The Right Kind of Wrong

Along with her group classes, Amelia took private lessons with Holland, where they worked on technique as well as specific routines for the talent portion of the pageants that were more and more frequently crowding the little girl’s calendar.

Blake only hoped that Amelia actually liked competing more than she had and that, if she wanted to stop doing them at some point, Grace wouldn’t blow a gasket.

Holland gestured toward the yard, at the fifty-plus people filling the space. “I feel like they invited half the damn town. I never had a birthday party like this, I can tell you that much.”

Blake studied the crowd. The girls all seemed to be having fun, which was the most important thing. “Me either. We used to have Amelia’s birthday at my house, but, well . . .”

Holland gave her a sympathetic, but not pitying, look. Blake appreciated it immensely. “Times change. New leaves and all that. Carpe diem. Whatever the hell else they say,” she finished with a laugh.

Holland had the type of energy that people gravitated toward, so Blake tried not to cower when more than a few pairs of eyes looked in their direction at her boisterous laugh.

Blake had never liked being the center of attention. She was never the loudest person at the party, but it was hard to be friends with Holland without being okay with extra focus on them.

“How’s the new place, by the way?” Holland asked, toying with the long necklace she wore. Today, she was dressed in a pair of jean shorts, a flowy blouse, and cowboy boots. Blake would have gotten hell had she shown up in that outfit—on a church Sunday no less—but Holland didn’t play by the conventional rules.

And, somehow, she made it work.

How was the new place? Hm. Blake thought about Monroe—and Maisie—not for the first time today and smiled instinctively. Aside from being out of her parents’ house, her new neighbors had been the bright spot in her life these last couple of weeks.

She bit back a laugh when she remembered the way Monroe had tried to maneuver down the rock wall last week. They’d both laughed like their lives depended on it when Monroe had been forced to throw the wine bottle across the yard in order to save herself from falling over. “It’s honestly really great,” she replied to Holland’s question. “Thank you for letting me know about it.”

Holland turned fully toward Blake, then. “What’s that smile about?”

Blake shouldn’t have felt embarrassed about wanting to lean into someone who made her feel excited. Even before Noah had divorced her, she hadn’t felt this way. There had been no newness left in their relationship. No honesty. No earnestness.

Still, she felt ridiculous. Like a teenager hiding a secret from her parents. Maybe it was because of the knowing way Holland was looking at her.

But what Holland expected her to say, Blake honestly wasn’t sure.

And she still didn’t know how to categorize her nascent friendship with Monroe. Not by a long shot.

Blake’s life had been static for so long—stale, if she was being honest—and wanting to fall eagerly into how good she felt was making her feel a little bit out of control.

Still, it was hard for her not to talk about it. “Do you remember Monroe Lockhart? Probably not, since she was my age, but you met her at the festival a few weeks ago.”

“I’m not that old,” Holland batted back, doing a great job at pretending to be offended even as she laughed again.

Blake smirked, getting used to the eyes that stayed on them. “We all know that you could run circles around anyone in this town.”

Which was the truth. Holland was insanely athletic, and she seemed to genuinely love physical activity as a form of stress relief. Blake couldn’t say the same about herself, even if she did always feel better after working out.

Holland waved her hand at Blake, bringing her focus back from looking out over the yard. “Anyway . . . Monroe Lockhart.” Holland tapped her chin, thinking. “I went to school with Dean Lockhart. Siblings, I assume? If so, I really feel for her. That was tough. His case, I mean.”

Blake’s lips twitched. She’d resisted looking up the specifics, figuring that whatever Monroe wanted to share with her, she would. Vaguely, she remembered his sentencing from a few years ago, when someone had brought it up at a party.

At her core, Blake was embarrassed to admit that it hadn’t really stuck with her. At the time, Dean Lockhart had already been a nobody in the eyes of her social circle—in the whole town’s eyes, really.

When it had come up that he’d gone to prison, she couldn’t remember who, but one of the women sitting around her pool, sipping margaritas had said something like, “And water is wet.”

Everyone had laughed, and the conversation had moved on quickly.

It had been fodder for the day, but it absolutely picked at something inside of Blake now, the way she’d so casually dismissed the way this man’s life had gone.

Blake, under the protective wings of the Duvall family, had been insulated. She knew that.

That knowledge came with more self-recriminations now, as two sets of deep blue eyes flitted through her mind.

“Yes,” Blake finally responded, pushing her guilt away. “Monroe is his younger sister. Maisie, who just started dance class, is his daughter.”