Page 100 of Lucky Haven

But I can’t tell him that it was a sixteen-year-old girl who ignited this whole mess. Not yet. I think she’s reachable, and he’ll be furious.

I know that his over-protective instincts are how he expresses his love, but it’s not what I want from him.

Hot tears prick at my eyelids as I melt into the shadows. Just another summer night I wish I got to experience very differently, one of many over the last twenty-nine years.

I take the long route to the parking lot so he doesn’t see me, so nobody knows where I am. After years of resenting how invisible I felt, I’m oddly glad for my ability to disappear tonight.

The part of the parking lot right behind the line of information booths is full of vehicles from those tables. Trucks and vans that arrived early to set up, and won’t leave until the fair is over. Nobody is coming and going.

I look around, waiting for Kaitlyn, hoping she’ll show up. I think about being sixteen and frightened and full of questions I was taught to be ashamed of, and about what I would have needed someone to say to me.

A vehicle door slams open, making me jump.

I twist around, catching movement in the shadows.

But it isn’t Kaitlyn.

It’s Jeb.

He’s smiling, but it makes me take a step back anyway. I bump into a picnic table, and he holds up his hands. “It’s good to see you here. You don’t need to be scared.”

The air leaves my lungs all at once.

It’s not Cash that Kaitlyn is enamored with. It’s not because I kissed Cash that she is mad at me for being a slut.

I would bet anything that before I returned to Dragonfly Creek, Jeb was always making Kaitlyn feel special. Singular.

And then I came back, and that probably changed in an instant.

Hearing her parents talk about my return wouldn’t have helped.

“You,” I stammer.

“Me?” His smile grows. “What does that mean?”

“Did Kaitlyn talk to you?”

“Kaitlyn Pelley?” He manages to look confused, but there’s a brightness in his eyes, giving him away. “She’s a good girl. Faithful.”

“She’s less than half your age,” I bite out.

“What are you suggesting?”

“You know exactly what I’m saying.”

“I don’t.”

I forgot how patient he could be. “Will you ask her to marry you?”

He sighs. “You have strayed so far. It’s his terrible influence, isn’t it?”

“Don’t talk about Cash.” The words lash out of me. I don’t mean to sound that defensive, but it has an accidental effect of getting under Jeb’s skin.

Good.

I grab the corner of the picnic table, ready to launch myself off it and push past him as soon as I say my piece here. “He’s ten times the man you will ever be.”

“He’s a criminal.”