He looks at me, then at Jillie, then back to his phone.
“I’m not sure.”
My own phone starts buzzing on the table behind the booth.
Then Mrs. Bellamy from the gift shop hurries toward me, cheeks flushed and eyes huge.
“Sadie,” she says, waving her phone like it might explode. “Honey, you need to see this.”
Cold moves through me.
I pick up my phone. There we are.
Colby carrying Jillie on his shoulders.
Me smiling up at them.
The lights glowing behind us.
The three of us looking painfully, impossibly, heartbreakingly like a family.
The caption beneath it reads:
COLBY REID’S SECRET SMALL-TOWN FAMILY?
My pulse stumbles.
Another notification appears.
Then another.
Then another.
Celebrity blogs. Hockey fan accounts. Local pages. Comments multiplying too fast to read.
Who is she?
He has a daughter?
This is the happiest Colby has looked all year.
Secret family in Briar Cove?
Jillie tugs my sleeve. “Mommy? Why is your face funny?”
I lock the phone and force myself to breathe.
Colby steps closer, his expression is grim now. “I’m sorry,” he says quietly.
I should blame him.
I should panic.
I should run inside the bakery, pull the blinds, and keep my daughter away from every camera in town.
Instead, I look past him. Darren is staring at the phone in his hand. Vanessa is too.
For the first time all night, neither of them looks smug.
