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“Careful, we’re not marrying our first cousins,” she laughed. “We’re just…interested.”
“Interested? Is that the polite word for gossip?”
“It is, I think. It sounds much nicer. And this town runs on being interested.”
“And everyone is talking about the wedding tomorrow.”
He didn’t state it as a question. She was sure he already knew the answer.
“Yes,” she replied honestly. “This has brought up…a lot for the town.”
They were quiet for a moment, neither of them speaking.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Zack finally said. “It doesn’t seem to help or change anything.”
“I’m not the type to push.”
Zack finished the last of his beer, placing the glass back down on the bar.
“Are you the type for dancing, Lucy Gilbert?”
“I’ve got two left feet but what I lack in talent I make up for in enthusiasm.”
He laughed at her joke, real and true. He wasn’t just humoring her. This guy totally got her strange sense of humor.
“Sounds like my perfect dance partner,” he joked. “Save a dance for me, okay? I want to see a friendly face at the wedding.”
“You don’t think anyone else will be friendly?”
“I can’t count on it. You never know when it comes to my family.”
Winslow angst. It was something she didn’t quite understand but she knew it existed.
If she was Zack, she’d go to that wedding and then get the hell out of town. But she knew from experience it was easier said than done.
Somehow Winslow Heights always dragged a person back.
* * *
“You didn’t have to leave me and Lucy alone,” Zack said when Cooper came back to the bar.
“I didn’t do it for you, although maybe I should have. Lucy is attractive, and you’re a grouchy old bachelor.”
“Then what are you?”
“Handsome and mysterious.”
“You are so full of shit.”
“That’s your problem,” Cooper said, grinning widely. “You don’t know how to relax. Just live life. Have a few laughs, and don’t take yourself so seriously.”
“That’s not my problem.”
It might be, though. Zack hadn’t relaxed and had a few laughs in a long time. Life had become stressful and serious.
“You have one more problem, too.”
“Which is?”
