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“How old are you again?” Aimee shoved a plated sandwich in front of her. “No, he hasn’t. When we run into each other, it’s smiles and small talk. You remember how he was, like nothing could ever faze him. He’s like a walking good mood.”
A little piece of Jen’s heart crumbled off and knocked around inside her chest. She’d managed to faze him all right, the night before she’d left Glea
“So he doesn’t know I’m here?”
Aimee shook her head. “No one does except the mayor and me. What if you’d said no, Jen? We didn’t want to get our hopes up and then be denied.” A pregnant pause. “I’ve had enough disappointment.”
I, not we. Jen knew Aimee wasn’t talking about today as much as her and Ainsley’s disastrous visit to New York three years ago. It had coincided with the same week the fashion house had called, and Jen had had to drop everything to secure the prestigious new client, including entertaining her sister and niece. Without their reason for visiting, Aimee and Ainsley had left the city.
Aimee took a bite of sandwich and talked with her mouth full. “When’s your meeting with the mayor?”
Jen flicked on her phone to check the time. “About ten minutes.”
Which, if she remembered correctly, gave her about six minutes to eat, since it took four minutes to walk to Town Hall. They ate in silence, Aimee’s past disappointment hovering around them. Then Jen fixed her hair and makeup, grabbed her purse with her trusty laptop, and headed for the front door.
A hard wave of memory slammed into her. This moment felt like all those other summers, leaving for job after job after job, her college-fund bank account growing with every hour worked. It was as though ten years hadn’t passed. Even the feel of the front door’s oblong brass knob brought back memories. She’d drown in them if she wasn’t careful, and she’d only been in Glea
She opened the door, the scent of thyme and rosemary wafting in. The herb garden, surrounding little metal breakfast tables, was new. She couldn’t, for the life of her, picture Aimee having planted that, but apparently she had.
“Jen.”
She turned around to find Aimee standing in the hallway, at the foot of the narrow, creaking staircase leading up to the guest rooms, her eyes filled with emotion.
“I want you to know that I feel bad asking, for taking you away from the city.”
“Don’t. It’s no biggie. Came at the perfect time.” Jen’s eyes swept over the foyer and she smiled. “Anything for this place. Anything for you.”
She hadn’t told Aimee about the impending partnership or the risk she’d taken coming here at this particular time in the year. There was no point. She’d been taking care of Aimee her whole life. Back when they were growing up, it had been a responsibility Jen had assumed with drive and determination. Now she accepted it with bittersweetness, but still with love.
Aimee blurted out, “I’m older. I should’ve been taking care of you, instead of the other way around. And here you are again.”
The first time Aimee had said anything of the sort, and it struck Jen like a bell. She covered it with a smile, as reassuring as she could make it. “It’s okay. I’m going to do what I can,” she said, and then headed downtown.
Glea
Now, however, the place was practically deserted. She remembered buckets of bright flowers spilling from window boxes and street lamps, and the shop that had once sold gra
The ice cream parlor where she’d scooped out orders one summer had long since closed, but she could see that at the building’s last use, it had been a scrapbooking store. The Picture This sign still hung over the door. A faded poster was taped inside the window, one corner curling back, proclaiming: Glea
Looking around town, she realized it was the only mention of the games anywhere, and the thing was supposed to happen in two weeks. It matched what Aimee had told her over the phone, that the games had faded into an a
Then she looked closer at the poster.
Leith. His brown hair longer than when she’d last seen him, wet and clinging to his forehead and cheek. His rugged face contorted in exertion, his body even bigger and more muscular than she remembered. He clutched a hammer in his great fists, thick arms sweeping the thing high around his head. The hammer wasn’t an actual hammer at all, but a large metal ball on the end of a long handle. The thrower twisted it around his body several times, then released it backward over one shoulder.
In the picture, Leith looked powerful and focused. Badass. And he wore a kilt.
Good God, a kilt.
She’d seen him wear his family’s tartan before, back in high school when the whole town had turned out for the a
None of the men in New York were that kind of gorgeous.
The pseudoshrine out on Route 6 declared he’d last won the heavy athletics competition five years ago, the same date on the poster, which would age him in that photo at twenty-three. What did Leith look like now? Seeing how much he’d improved from age eighteen to twenty-three, the curve for hotness progression over time indicated he should be approaching godhood right about now, at twenty-eight.
Her phone blared a warning heralding the time, and at first she didn’t recognize the sound. She was never late. Ever. She hurried down the street, past the half-filled Kafe, to the small brick house that served as Town Hall. Ringing the doorbell to the locked front door, she couldn’t help but feel like an underappreciated teenager all over again—as though she’d accomplished nothing in the past decade and had nothing to show for herself. It was an odd feeling and one she a
That expression Jen remembered with painful clarity.
“Hi, Mrs. McCurdy.” Jen pasted on a smile.
Mrs. McCurdy, Jen’s old manager at the ice cream parlor and also a former steady dog-walking client, looked Jen over with awkward appraisal. The mayor stepped back and opened the door wider, her fleshy arm jiggling. “Here. Let me show you the mess you’ve inherited.”
Jen took a deep breath. “Um, great. Thank you, Mrs. McCurdy. It’s great to see you, too.”