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The words feel like acid, burning my mouth on the way out.
“Do you usually run away fromno big deals?” Callie smirks at me.
God, why did that kiss have to feel so right? We’ve been friends for six years. He’s held my hair back while I puked after one too many candy corn martinis. I’ve pukedonhim after one too many candy corn martinis. I’ve seen him eat almost an entire cow in one sitting and then get the meat sweats, and I’ve listened to him play Candy Crush on his phone when he’s in the bathroom. It should have been nervous and awkward, but it was nothing like that.
It wasn’t just a kiss, dammit. It was electrifying. Earth-shattering. Time-stopping, life-altering, spellbinding—
For shit’s sake, I’m waxing poetic again!
Something big happened last night. Something more than just crossing that friendship line, and it scared the hell out of me. Ford’s face suddenly flashes before my eyes, that moment right before I turned away from him and ran down off the porch. Regret makes my stomach roll with nausea, but I cover it up with a smile.
“Maybe I felt like a jog at midnight. You don’t know my life. It was nothing, and I’m fine.”
“Right.” Callie nods, totally not buying what I’m trying to sell.
“Right.” I nod back.
“You’re not scared, are you?” a giant, animated witch standing on the sidewalk next to the salon cackles at me, not buying it either.
“Good morning, ladies!” Stacy Sullivan greets us, stepping out from the doorway of the salon to grab the box of succulents from Callie’s hands.
“Hey, Stacy, thanks for—”
“How did Ford like the pumpkin muffins I made for him?” she interrupts me, pulling an envelope out of the pocket of her apron and handing it to me.
“He shit his pants for three days straight, so I’d say not at all, Stacy!” I laugh a little too loudly as I yank the envelope out of her fingers.
“Oh dear,” she mutters with a frown, while I mentally call myself all kinds of names for being so ridiculous. “He must be allergic to pumpkin.”
Callie snorts next to me, and I shoot her a quick glare before looking back at Stacy.
“You know what, it was probably just that stomach bug going around. You should call him.”
“Really?”
“Really!” I cheer, going so far as clapping my hands a few times before Callie and I quickly walk away.
“See? No big deal.”
Oh God! What have I done?
“Right. Can you give me the rest of those kiss details before you need to excuse yourself to go somewhere private and scream at the top of your lungs for doing something so stupid? I’d like to have this knowledge before you become catatonic.”
“Shut up. I’m fine. Ford can talk to whoever he wants while he’s in town. I’m not discussing this anymore with you. It happened, it’s no big thing, and it’s not going to happen again.”
Talking about this is just going to make me think a repeat performance would be a splendid idea. No matter how much I want it, that can’t happen.
“So, you’re just going to pretend you don’t want to screw his brains out and have all his babies?” Callie laughs while I absolutely do not think of adorable little dark-haired babies dressed in flannel with scowls on their faces. “All of this denial is making you grumpy.”
“I’m not grumpy.” I prove it by smiling at her as we stop at the crosswalk.
Callie looks back over her shoulder while we wait for theWalksign to flash.
“Just so you know, Stacy is already on her phone, absolutely talking to Ford if we’re going by the big, horny look on her face.”
Confirming what she’s saying with my own glance over my shoulder, watching Stacy throw her head back and laugh a little too loudly with her phone pressed against her ear, I don’t even bother waiting to find somewhere private. I scream at the top of my lungs right in the middle of Main Street.
“It’s fine!” Callie reassures frightened tourists as she starts dragging me across the street. “It’s all a part of the Harvest Grove charm!”
