Page 36 of The Worst Possible Plan

A good story. Logical. Professional. The kind of story I could live with. It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that every time another problem landed in her lap, she straightened her shoulders, took a breath, and tried again instead of walking away. Or the fact that she’d stopped pretending in front of me before she’d stopped pretending in front of everyone else. Trust wasn’t something people handed out by accident. Especially not people who’d spent the last day trying so hard to convince the world they were fine.

I’d been married to someone who quit the moment things got difficult. Different situation. Different woman. I wasn’t making comparisons. I didn’t want to. Comparisons had a way of leading places I had no interest in going. I’d spent enough years convincing myself that if I just worked harder, fixed one more problem, compromised one more time, everything would eventually fall back into place. Sometimes it didn’t. Sometimes people simply left.

I’d already made enough mistakes where women were concerned—one marriage, one divorce, more lawyers than I cared to remember, and enough disappointment to last a lifetime. I’d promised myself there wouldn’t be another relationship complicated enough to require attorneys billing by the hour. Peace and quiet suddenly had a lot of appeal after that.

Life was quieter now. Exactly the way I liked it. My house. My job. My routines. Nobody arguing over where I spent my evenings. Nobody questioning why my phone rang after midnight. Nobody expecting me to leave being sheriff at the office when that had never been possible.

Then Hartwell showed up carrying a giant binder and somehow managed to inherit every problem in town.

It was temporary. The festival would end. She’d move on to whatever came next. Someone like Hartwell wasn’t built to stay in one place forever. She wasn’t built to stay in one place. She had too many ideas and never seemed to sit still.

I’d go back to normal.

That was the plan.

I preferred plans. They were reliable. Predictable.

Unfortunately, I’d already seen the look in Hartwell’s eyes.

And that usually meant trouble.

9

SOPHIE

By the time the last vendor had stopped asking questions, the sun had slipped low over Maplewood Falls, turning the ocean beyond the harbor into a sheet of molten gold. The afternoon crowd had long since disappeared, replaced by volunteers wandering around with staple guns, ladders, extension cords, and varying levels of confidence. Somebody had found an old portable speaker, and soft country music drifted lazily across the square, mixing with the cries of gulls and the steady rhythm of waves rolling against the docks.

The whole place looked… hopeful. Which was strange. Yesterday it had looked like the opening scene of a documentary called How Festivals Die.

Now people were laughing, working, and hammering signs into place. Someone had already strung flowers around the gazebo. Somehow we’d gone from complete disaster to organized panic.

I wasn’t naïve enough to think we were out of the woods. We were probably still standing in the middle of them, surrounded by angry bears. But at least everyone had stopped screaming. Nobody was threatening legal action. Nobody was chasing livestock. Almost like the universe was taking a coffee break before deciding what fresh horror to throw at me next.

I looked around the square and tightened my grip on the ladder. “You can do this.”

Yes, I was talking to myself. And no, I didn’t care who heard me.

“I had to do this.”

This wasn’t just about the Summer Festival anymore. It wasn’t even about Helen. Or the paycheck.

This was my chance.

My one chance to prove—to Helen… to Sarah… to Margo… and maybe most of all to myself—that I wasn’t the woman who always quit. The one who bounced from job to job collecting awkward exit stories like loyalty cards.

I’d spent years telling myself I’d eventually figure life out. Eventually had started feeling alarmingly overdue.

But I wasn’t walking away. Not this time. Even if tomorrow brought escaped llamas. Actually… scratch that. If tomorrow brought llamas, I might cry first.

Then I would deal with the llamas.

See? This was growth.

I balanced on the second rung of a ladder, stretching on my tiptoes to hook another strand of white café lights between two wooden poles. Whoever invented decorative lighting had clearly never been five-foot-five with average upper-body strength. The lights refused to cooperate, tangling around my wrist like creepy glowing snakes.

“Come on,” I hissed. “We’re literally on the same team.”

One end slipped free, and then the entire strand slithered off the ladder and landed in a heap around my feet.