Page 126 of Pumpkin Spice Promises

“You were different, so beautiful and confident.”

I blushed at her comment. No one had ever said that to me before.

“You also traveled outside of this town.”

“Only for rodeos, I didn’t get to see much unfortunately.” This was the part of friendship I had forgotten. Nobody needed to understand the worst thing that had happened to me. Sometimes another woman could simply stand across from you with flour on her face and tell you she used to think you were cool.

I lowered the folder. “What did you do while I was on the circuit?”

Clover brightened. “Everything boring.”

“What does that mean?”

“Cheerleading for two years. I absolutely hated it, then I worked here every summer. Dated a guy named Travis for eight months because I thought being seventeen meant relationships were a must.”

“Was he bad?” I attempted to hide my wince behind my hand. She caught it anyway and shrugged.

“He cried in my driveway because I wouldn’t let him read my texts.”

“Oh, that’s interesting.”

“Very.” She agreed, giggling under her breath.

I laughed. Clover had always seemed like a person whose stories escaped before she decided whether anyone wanted them. She told me about changing majors twice before realizing she hated college, coming home, working full-time at Sugar and Pine, and deciding that baking felt more honest than earning a degree simply because everyone told her she should.

The story of how she met Hunter unfolded as she continued spewing her life story. She had noticed him years earlier, because he always came into the grocery store at the least crowded times. He bought almost the same things every time and avoided making conversation with anyone who tried. Clover, apparently incapable of respecting the natural social order of introverts, kept speaking to him.

“He hated me,” she smiled softly as though reliving the moments.

“You say that fondly,” I note, finally lifting my hand to wipe the flour off her cheek.

“Oh, he totally did. He would change checkout lines once he saw me.”

“That’s brutal.”

“In his defense, I followed him.”

I stared at her, jaw slack at the admission. Clover lifted one shoulder.

“I was twenty-two.”

“That doesn’t make it any better!”

“He needed to know I wasn’t afraid of him.” The humor left her voice so gently I almost missed it. I looked toward her as she rearranged the cookies on the tray. “He thought everyone was.”

“Because of his scars?” I thought about the man who hid behind hoodies and baggy pants with the deep scars on his face. I would have wanted to hide too.

“And everything else.” Her answer came without hesitation and a wave of her hand. “He’d been back in Willow Creek a while by then, but people didn’t know what to do with him. Some stared. Some tried really hard not to stare…which can be worse.”

My stomach tightened as she continued.

Clover picked up a cookie and broke it in half. “He just wanted to buy groceries. So I started bringing him cookies because he bought the worst store-bought ones I’d ever seen.”

“That was your reason?”

“At first.”

I pushed. “And later?”