by Kate Angell
His fucking dream come true. But Carol was a friend. And she seemed—a little too breakable. He just couldn’t do it. And she had kicked him out in sick mortification, avoiding him ever since.
“Of course,” Carol said, her hands fluttering to her waist, her throat, and then crossing over her chest. “Good to see you again,” she repeated before retreating into the salon.
“Shit,” Sawyer said, rubbing his tired, gritty eyes. He had to be the only man alive thinking that women chasing him down for sex was a problem.
The sex wasn’t the problem. Everything that came afterward was.
Putting his truck in Reverse, he started the trek home. Let all the crazies lose their senses tonight. Let Amelia Rose do her thing at the cottage. Sawyer had no need to hobnob with the Maine-iacs on Halloween. Or hand out copious amounts of candy to kids with snake hair. He and Duke, the old stray mutt that adopted him five years earlier, would be just fine lounging around fat and happy with their steaks.
Chapter 3
“What do you mean, you have no reservation?” Sidney asked, her hand stopping halfway into her bag. “You just mean it’s early, right? I know it’s way early for check-in, I was just hoping maybe you might by chance have the room ready so I could freshen up before—”
“Miss Jensen,” the clerk interrupted, pasting on a polite if not slightly nervous smile. “I’m sorry, but I’m afraid there’s actually no record of a reservation in your name.”
Sidney blinked. “What?”
“I looked twice,” the clerk said, pointing at her monitor as if that would prove it.
“That’s impossible,” Sidney said. “Monica made—wait, maybe it’s still in my boss’s name. Orchid Blossom?”
The clerk’s eyes darted to meet hers, and Sidney nodded at the question in them.
“I know. Yes, that’s a real name.”
Fingers paused a second on the keyboard, second-guessing, and probably third-guessing because of Sidney’s accent. Somehow, in the North, a Southern drawl sometimes equaled a lower IQ. Finally, she typed in the name. “Sorry,” the clerk said. “Not in here, either.”
Sidney huffed out a breath as she set her bag on the counter. “Hang on, let me call—or can you just book me into one now?”
“We are completely full,” the clerk said.
“Full?” Sidney said, blinking fast. “What about after checkout?” She glanced at the sign. “At noon?”
“We are totally booked for the next three days,” she said. “A convention in town.”
“Jesus,” Sidney breathed. “One second.” She pulled her bag off the counter and walked over to an overstuffed chair in the lobby, digging for her phone as she went.
She didn’t have to get a hotel, theoretically. It was an hour and a half’s drive, meaning she could technically drive home and back again in the morning. Assuming she’d need to. Assuming she didn’t knock the deal out of the park today. But she couldn’t plan on that, and her car was essentially held together with string and duct tape and the gallon of water she kept in the backseat in case the radiator overheated again. She’d exhausted all of her prayers on the drive there.
“Monica!” she whispered urgently when the voice answered after four rings.
“Sidney?” she said. “It’s Saturday.”
Really? “I’m aware of that,” Sidney said. “I’m standing in the lobby of the Crescent Hotel, wondering why they don’t—”
“Oh shit,” Monica said.
Sidney’s shoulders slumped. She rubbed her forehead. “Well, I guess that answers that.”
“I’m so sorry, Sidney,” Monica said. “I got so busy with Orchid yesterday and forgot.”
“Well, it probably wouldn’t have mattered,” Sidney said. “They’re booked solid. Where was Orchid staying?”
“She wasn’t,” Monica said. “She was hitting up her uncle’s issue in Moonbright on her way upstate. She wasn’t staying there.”
Of course she wasn’t. Because she was friggin’ Superwoman.
“Hold on,” Monica said, the sound of shuffling reaching Sidney’s ear. “Let me look up what else is around there. Maybe there’s something in Moonbright proper.”
“It’s supposed to be tiny,” Sidney said, already shaking her head. “Outside of town would be bett—”
“They have a B&B!” Monica exclaimed.
Sidney closed her eyes. “Great.”
“Well, I mean, I can look in Portland, but that’s farther north,” Monica said. “Do you want me to call this place? It’s called the Rose Cottage.”
Just shoot me.
“Then, if it takes you some time, you’re right there,” she said.
Because I’m not Orchid.
“Fine,” Sidney said wearily, watching a couple get room keys and pull their happy little luggage to the elevators. “Give it a shot. I’ll sit here till I hear back.”
“I’ll call you right back,” Monica said, clicking off.
“Okay then,” Sidney said to no one.
She leaned over, elbows on her knees. It could be worse. She could be fired. She could be spending the weekend poring the Internet looking for openings for law associates. Or Walmart greeters. So spending it in Podunk Hell was candy in comparison. And it probably wasn’t that bad, anyway. Not like Derby, South Carolina, the hick town she’d left behind after high school. After her nana died and the bake shop closed. After everything that made that place bearable was gone.
Including him.
Her phone ringing startled her so badly, she nearly dropped it. Lord, where had that come from?
“Hello?”
“They have an opening,” Monica gushed. “They had a big Halloween party last night, but everyone is leaving today,” she said.
“Oh God, it really is Podunk,” Sidney moaned.
“It’ll be fine,” Monica said. “Okay, so the Rose Cottage. Put it in your GPS. I’ll text you the address, too, but it’s on the corner of Pumpkin and Vine.”
Sidney’s eyebrows shot up. She felt them. “I’m sorry, what?”
“I know,” Monica said. “I did the same thing. But I double-checked and Googled it twice. It’s at 816 Vine, Moonbright, Maine.”
Walmart wasn’t sounding half-bad.
“I—I—”
“Owner’s name to ask for is Amelia Rose. And get this—she’s a fortune-teller.” The sound of a baby’s cry echoed in the background. “Crap, my son’s up. I gotta go, Sidney. Good luck!”
“Uh-huh,” Sidney managed, but the line was already dead.
* * *
Turning off I-95 toward the coast was an adventure in itself. Lots of winding, lots of nothing but trees, and more than one prominent billboard advertising the world’s largest pumpkin patch. In Moonbright. Because the rest of it wasn’t unbelievable enough.
It was like going home to Derby. On holiday steroids. Except that she’d never done that. Gone home. There was nothing for her there. No friends, no family—her nana long gone and her parents gone even longer before that, taken in a car crash when she was eight. And the only person she could ever somewhat call a friend—even as weird as it was—had disappeared.
Caleb James. God, he’d been so beautiful, so hot, so every girl’s secret fantasy. The rebel son of the high school principal who skipped more classes than he attended and wore jeans and a leather jacket better than anyone she’d ever seen. And stole her breath, her words, and her heart every time he was near. Which was a lot.
James and Jensen had put them together since grade school, and lockered her under him all through high school. Her kneeling down, looking up at him every day as he grinned and walked away. Till senior year. When a hand appeared in her face, and she followed the arm all the way up to Caleb James. Holding out a hand to help her up.
* * *
“I have a question for you,” he’d said.
Nothing had come out of her mouth but air, so he continued.
“I need tutoring if I’m gonna graduate,” he said, that hon
eyed voice drawling the words. “My dad told me to find someone or he will.” His eyes faded a bit. “You’re smart. Will you help me?”
“I’m—I’m—I don’t think—I mean, I’m not that smart,” she stuttered out like a five-year-old.
“Please,” he said, one side of his mouth crooking up in a grin that nearly buckled her back to her knees. “You’re smart, Sidney. You’re squeaky clean, you should be class president or something.”
“That requires actually talking to people,” Sidney said, amazed that the words found their way out. And that he knew her name.
He laughed. And not at her, but like she’d said something funny. Huh.
“So, will you help me, Squeak?” he said, his eyes sparkling.
* * *
“Jesus,” Sidney exclaimed, squeezing the steering wheel as she shook her head. “What the hell?”
She hadn’t thought about Caleb in years.
He’d used her for her help, but she hadn’t cared at the time. It put her in his world. Every other day. Actually talking. Laughing. Learning about the guy no one really knew. Finding out that he wasn’t so different from her after all. She’d look into those impossibly dark eyes and get lost. Watch his lips as he talked and dream of kissing them. And every now and then, as she waxed on about government or literature, she’d look up and stop breathing as she caught him watching her.
And she hadn’t thought about any of it, about her old life, about much of anything outside of memories of her nana, in so long. Now, because she was headed to some small town, she was stumbling down memory lane? No thanks. It wasn’t that great the first time around. Except for—well, except for that. That had been pretty great. That had been monumental. Until it wasn’t.
She did not need to go there. She didn’t need to think about men, period, past, present, or future. Not that there was a present . . . or much potential for the future. But none of that mattered. She needed to think about her case. The lease agreement. Finding Orchid’s uncle. Finding the dick who was giving him grief. Focus, focus, focus. Yet, every curve, every turn, brought her memory after memory of that night.
There it was, finally. A giant sign advertising Moonbright, Maine. Proud home of the world’s largest pumpkin patch.
And not even that hideous monstrosity could keep her mind from straying. From tumbling backward ridiculously to graduation night. Twelve years ago.
* * *
“. . . these, our last precious moments of our high school careers . . .”
“God, if she says ‘precious’ or ‘behoove’ one more time,” Caleb said under his breath. “I swear I’m standing up on my chair and playing air guitar.”
Sidney giggled. “I dare you.”
Caleb turned and gave her one of those piercing looks that always made her breath catch.
“You should know better than to dare me, Squeak,” he said, his voice going low and curling her toes in spite of the nickname she hated.
“. . . if only we could look into a crystal ball and see what extraordinary futures we have yet to behold . . .”
“If only she’d wrap up this shit so we could get out of here,” he groaned, letting his head fall back.
Sidney didn’t care that the valedictorian’s speech was ludicrous and long and flowery and full of dumb metaphors. Let her ramble on incessantly forever. Stretch out this night. This year. This moment of sitting next to Caleb James, his knee touching hers. His laugh warming her on an already steamy night. Before it was all over and he didn’t need her anymore. And before there were no scheduled reasons to see each other every day.
That ended tonight.
She was all too aware of that.
“. . . take the hand of the person next to you . . .”
Say what? Hold his hand? Did she hear that right? Her deodorant was failing by the second.
“. . . in some way, that person has shaped your life. They have been present in your world every day for twelve years . . .”
Thomas King was on Sidney’s right, and he’d brought her a candy bar in the sixth grade. So, that was something, right? His hand was sweaty and sticky as he grabbed hers, but Caleb’s was warm and dry and impossibly perfect as he took hers. And laced his fingers through her fingers.
Laced. His. Fingers.
Jesus. God.
The world could end right there because it wasn’t getting better than that. And then again maybe it was because there was that look again. Draining all the blood from her head.
“Couldn’t have done this year without you, Squeak,” he said.
She wanted to say something. Something profound. Something perfect. So she blinked.
“I mean, I literally wouldn’t even be on this field if it weren’t for you,” he said.
“Your dad would have found someone else to tutor you if it wasn’t me,” she said finally, staring at their hands. Trying to memorize it.
“I wouldn’t have listened to anyone else,” he said, his voice going distant. “I probably would have skipped town like my mom.”
His thumb started moving along hers, and things shot off to places she didn’t dare talk about.
“No, you wouldn’t have,” she whispered, watching his thumb move back and forth. She wanted to do what she always did when he got angry talking about his mother leaving him, and tell him he was better than that. That it was her weakness, not his. But Sidney couldn’t think in full sentences at the moment.
“Ever wish you could just disappear?” he asked, pulling her out of her stupor. “Just vanish, be invisible, start over somewhere new where no one knows you?”
Sidney turned to look at his profile. He was staring, unseeing, at the back of Kristin Callihan’s head.
“I’m always invisible,” she said. “But yeah, starting over would be good.”
“What would your starting-over name be?” he asked, his voice soft.
“Jane Eyre?” Sidney said. Caleb gave her a look. “I don’t know,” she said, chuckling. “You asked! Cinderella?”
“Cinderella?”
“What would yours be, then?” Sidney asked, daring to move her own thumb along his finger. She held her breath to see if he’d notice, and watched his eyes drop.
“If you’re Cinderella, then I’d be Tom Sawyer,” he said, his words slower.
Breathe. “Well, of course,” she said.
“Or Huckleberry Finn.”
“Be creative,” Sidney said. “Mix it up and be Sawyer Finn.”
Chapter 4
“Smells good in here,” Sawyer said, coming in the back door to grab a bottle of water from the stash that Amelia Rose kept in the fridge.
“Wipe your feet.”
“On it,” he said, scrubbing the bottoms of his work boots on the wiry doormat. “Cooking lunch so soon?”
“We have a guest coming this morning,” Amelia Rose said, her small frame looking dwarfed by the large, old-fashioned stove she stood in front of, stirring a large pot of something. Her long, flowing clothes made her look even smaller.
“Already?” Sawyer asked. “Damn, we barely got rid of last night’s heathens.”
“Sawyer Finn,” she said, turning with a hand on her hip. “Those heathens fund your paycheck.”
“I know,” he said, rubbing at his eyes. “I’m just cranky. All these damn pumpkins.”
“They’re adorable!” Amelia Rose said, her smile taking over her face as she turned back to her pot. “I’ve never seen such amazing carvings. And the Cinderella carriage!”
Cinderella. Something about that just pissed him off.
“You see amazing carvings all over the lawn,” he said. “I see rotting pumpkin carnage that I have to haul off at a hundred pounds per load.”
“Bah humbug,” she said.
“Don’t even get me started,” he said. “So, how soon is this guest coming? How soon do I have to get all this mess cleaned up?”
“Don’t sweat it,” she said. “It’s a lawyer from Boston. She’s coming early, so I’m sure she
’ll understand that we have a little cleanup to do from last night. I just want to have some lunch ready.”
“From Boston,” Sawyer said, snatching a piece of corn bread from a plate. “Fancy.”
“I don’t know about that,” she said. “But I know we were not her first choice.” She threw a smirk over her shoulder. “I want to change her mind.”
“Fancy and snooty,” he said around a mouthful of corn bread. “How was the party?”
“Wonderful as always,” she said.
“Anyone find out they’re going to die?”
She turned with a frown. “What?”
“Your fortune-telling,” he said. “Everyone always gets good news. I have a hard time believing that.” She cut him a glance that always gave him a little bit of the willies. “I love you,” he said. “I just, you know . . .”
“I tell the truth,” she said. “I always tell the truth, but if I see something particularly bad—I’m not going to tell someone that. No one should know certain things about their own future.” She shook her head. “It changes how you live if you know too much.”
“So you lie?”
“So I refund their money and tell them I couldn’t see anything,” she responded quietly. She sighed then and blinked quickly as if clearing her mind of the subject. “You should clean up a little.”
Sawyer chuckled. “For what? I’m in the yard all day today with sour pumpkin guts and a giant muddy spider.”
“For our guest.”
“Since when?”
Amelia Rose sighed. “Because I feel like you should,” she said. “Can’t that be reason enough?”
“No,” he said, laughing. “I promise, I’ll stay out of the way.”
“You know, you could do with making an impression or two,” she said. “Maybe a bit of polishing.”
Sawyer chuckled. “For what?”
“For the female population,” she said.
“Please,” he said. “I do just fine with the female population.” He reached in the fridge for the water he’d forgotten about.
“Is that so?”