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What if Hailey doesn’t remember me?
What if she does, and she once again politely refuses my interest?
I’m not sure which one would be worse as I stalk the barn’s boundaries ten minutes later.
“Looking for someone?” My buddy Archer sidles up to me by the open bar. He's newly back in town after opening a tattoo parlor with his friend, Finn. He’s been in Guardian Valley for the past few years, but with his uncle sick, Archer decided to move home to help out where he could.
“What makes you think that?”
“The way you're prowling like a caged jungle cat. Don't tell me you're still hung up on Hailey Jones.”
My head whips his way. “What are you talking about?”
Archer rolls his eyes, then takes a sip of whiskey from the tumbler in his hand. “Everyone knows you were gone for her in high school. I heard she's catering this reception, and now, here you are looking like you're about to burst into flames any second if you don't find her.”
Well, shit, I didn’t think I’d been that obvious.
Instead of denying him, I ask, “Have you seen her?”
He chuckles and runs a hand through his shoulder-length hair. I haven’t seen it this long since college where we both had football scholarships. “She's probably in the kitchen at the main house. You know, doing her job, which you should let her do hassle-free.”
He may have a point, but fuck it, I want to see Hailey.
Except the moment I step into the kitchen, somebody is exiting with a tray of champagne glasses that spill all over me. My shirt, jacket, and pants are soaked, seeping through the fabric to coat my skin in the sticky substance.
“Oh my god!” The waiter gasps and hurriedly drops to their knees to pick at the broken glass. Before I can stop them from possibly cutting themselves—they seem accident-prone, after all—a familiar voice cuts through the tension.
“Connor?” Sheer horror infuses a tone I'll never forget.
My eyes snap upward to zone in on the curvy woman hovering near the kitchen island, a trembling hand covering her pouty mouth.
“Hailey Jones, fancy meeting you here.” I wink and stride forward with purpose.
Forget about dripping in alcohol.
I finally found my girl after nearly two decades.
CHAPTER THREE
HAILEY
Life is funny sometimes.
Not ha-ha funny.
And not now, with Connor Madsen looking sexy as hell in his black Stetson and soaking wet button-down shirt, but everyone knows life has a sense of humor.
Too bad it leans into the humiliation track when it comes to me.
“I’m so sorry!” Snapping into action, I direct the waiter to grab another full tray of champagne flutes and sealed bottles and set them on the covered cart to haul into the barn, rather than whatever the hell he was doing carrying filled glasses out of the kitchen. “We’re still working out our flow. Here, let me help…”
My hand hovers over Connor’s broad chest. A clean towel hangs limply from my fingers as I pause to stare. Goodness, he’s gotten bigger since I last saw him, and Connor Madsen wasn’t exactly tiny in high school.
The star quarterback was lithe, buff in model-perfect ways—not too knotty around the shoulders with no neck. Every guy in school wanted to be him while every girl just wanted him. Me included.
You might have had him if you’d been braver.
If I’d defied my parents like I learned to do a mere three years later.
