“Uh. Morning?” I offered.
“Morning, Mr. Williams,” a woman I recognized from the town hall permit office said… which was funny since I’d seen her at the store the other day and she’d walked right past me. “I meant to thank you for the book you sent home with Jasmine the other day. She loves it.”
“Oh. Hey.” I raised a tentative hand. “That’s… great to hear.”
“Luke, my brother!” A guy I recognized from the bar the night before stood, grabbed my hand, and pulled me into the kind of dude-bro handshakey-back-thumping-hug ritual I’d seen other guys perform my whole life but had never actually participated in. “Habs gonna beat the Pens tomorrow night or what?”
“Wow, okay, that’s my lung. Yeah, we… we sure are,” I agreed. I wasn’t sure exactly what I was agreeing to, but the guy seemed to approve, judging by the way he set his hands on my shoulders and shook me like a maraca.
“Fuck yeah. See you at the Bugle tonight for the football?” he demanded. “Rusty Spikes on me!”
“Oh. Ha. Maybe not quite so soon? Gotta forget the last round first.” I pressed a hand to my head, which was ready to explode like a shaken soda can from all the unexpected jostling.
“That’s the damn truth! But you’re a Hollowan, Williams,” he said inexplicably. “You’ll learn to love ’em.” He lovingly thumped me twice more before I managed to extricate myself.
I was a Hollowan?Was that actually what people here called themselves?And was it the drinking that made me a citizen? Or the hockey?
This town was so weird.
By the time I caught up to Katey, she was already standing beside Webb’s booth, twirling a lock of her blonde hair as she batted her eyelashes at him. Webb nodded and smiled along.
See that? He’s perfectly friendly. This is gonna be fine, I chastised myself.Get a grip, Luke.
Except then Webb caught sight of me over Katey’s shoulder as I sidled up to the table, and his green eyes darkened with some emotion I couldn’t quite identify. Not anger, not at all, but for sure not let’s-blow-a-bugle friendship either.
Awesome.
It was too late to turn back, though, so I put on a big smile and moved forward, because that was what I did.
“Hey,” I greeted softly, directing the word to the condiment caddy in the center of the table.
I hated sounding so unsure. I hatedbeingso unsure. I straightened my spine. “Is it okay if I sit here?”
“Luke!” Drew’s genuine smile made his face crease beneath his tie-dyed headband. “What a treat.”
“Of course you should come sit,” Emma invited, pushing down around the horseshoe so I could take a spot on the end of the booth across from Webb. “You look like you need some coffee.”
“You look like you might keel over,” Marco corrected with a kind of waspish fondness. “Much like this one did a little while ago.” He elbowed Webb, who grunted.
Webb lifted his eyes to mine. He looked… cautious, I decided. But that was fine. That wasgreat. I could work with cautious. I was feeling pretty cautious myself.
Katey snagged an empty coffee mug from a nearby table and thumped it down in front of me. “Pot’s there.” She pointed toward the carafe in the middle of the table.
“Okay. Thank?—”
“Everyone else already ordered. What can I getcha?”
“Well, I—” I darted a glance at my menu, which was still tucked under her arm.
“Pancakes?” She tapped her pen against her order pad like she was writing a period. “Figures.”
“I… I guess it’ll be pancakes, then,” I called after her. “Great! Thanks!”
Emma pushed the coffeepot toward me with a grin. “Don’t mind her. Katey likes flirting with Webb,” she explained. “She doesn’t like that Webb doesn’t flirt back.”
“Em,” Webb warned. “Leave it.”
Emma grinned back, unrepentant. “Just sayin’. You could throw the woman a bone every now and then, for the sake of?—”
