Page 71 of Sundown Somewhere

“He wasn’t even in my class. He was in Jace’s.” I gesture toward brother number five, who’s sitting back in the chair like nothing is wrong.

“Ewan’s,” he corrects me.

Even better. If he’s Ewan’s age, he’s three years younger than I am. Our paths really didn’t cross back in the day. He’s never worked directly for me. I’m sure as the local plumber they’ve contracted for Hayes Industries at some point, but even then, that’s probably rare, since we have a full-time maintenance staff.

What the hell could I have done to this guy?

“He’s got to have some motive,” Anton surmises. “And we need to figure out what.”

“No, no, we do not,” Gus warns.

Popping up from his chair, Anton rubs his hands together, a devilish look appearing in his eye.

“Now, Gus, are you really going to sit back and let this happen?”

“Didn’t say that.”

“Then we need a plan.”

“A good one,” Jace adds.

“And here I thought we’d start with a bad one,” I quip, unable to help myself.

Jace shrugs, still leaned back in the chair, letting my sarcasm roll off him like water off a duck’s back. Must be nice to be so unaffected.

“Look, all I want is to get this approved. To build the playground for Dolly, so that…”

I trail off, not able to finish that sentence. Or maybe just not wanting to finish it out loud.

So that I can show her I might be good enough…

“Stupid question, but it has to be a playground? We can’t help upgrade the diner?” Anton asks.

“Has to be a playground.” I nod solemnly. Although if she wants to upgrade the diner, we’ll do that too. Fuck, I’ll build her a whole new one. And another one on top of it. That doesn’t change that the playground is nonnegotiable though. “We met on the playground.”

So you’re my Wendy…

“Fuck, dude,” Jace mocks throwing something at the ground, shaking his head. “You sure you’re not sneaking peeks at my books?”

“No, he’s just making it fucking impossible for the rest of us to live up to him,” Anton mutters.

I shrug, not giving a damn what they think. I have something to prove.

And I’m still probably going to come up short.

19

DOLLY

“Hold on. Wait,” Rose says, the pep in her voice knocking down a few notches. I pause, the running water hitting the last few dirty dishes in the industrial sink at Dolly’s barely audible through my earbuds. “So we’re all supposed to go to Drafts and Dig In tomorrow and just pretend like this is any other Thursday night? Like this isn’t actually happening. Like y’all aren’t finally a couple and everything we’ve secretly hoped for isn’t coming true?”

Everything they’ve secretly hoped for? That seems like a bit of a stretch. While it’s no secret that many—many—years ago this town was all in on the Hux and Dolly forever train, that was a long time ago. That train has been clearly marked out of service. Since then, they’ve been respectful of the pact that we made and our commitment to remaining friends.

Something that may be a little more in limbo now, but that is irrelevant.

No one in this town has been secretly hoping that Hux and I would end up together. Look no further than the fact that they all showed up to my failed wedding to watch and support me marrying someone else.

Unless they were hoping for some epic objection when Reverend Terry asked if anyone has a reason why these two should not be wed.