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“He is, and he hasn't even been easy on me, which I appreciate. But between running that, figuring out what I'm going to serve at this festival and the plans for the orchard as a whole, it's all a little stressful. I’m sure I'll figure it out.” She waved it off, clearly not wanting to bring down the night with her stress. But the truth was Iwantedto listen, to hear how she was doing. It had to be a big change for her to move out here and take everything on and she had my respect for that.
She took another drink, catching my eye as she hummed happily. “I'm not sure whether to be impressed that you're drinking beer, or not surprised because it's pumpkin.”
She nearly choked on the beer at that, a cute little sputter before she recovered quickly. “Well my nameisAutumn, gotta live up to the reputation, right?”
A carefree laugh spilled from my lips at her fire, and I felt some of the tension from the week melt away.
“So… how is it being a sheriff in a town like this? I can't imagine there's much crime.”
I leaned back and took another drink, the smug smile on my lips still in place as we continued our banter.
“It's a hard job but someone's gotta do it.” She rolled her eyes and I continued, a bit more serious this time. “It's really not too bad. We have more crime during tourist season than we do any other time, but it's usually things like petty theft or small car accidents because people are in too big of a hurry to handle the small town life.”
She nodded with a small smile on her face. “I can imagine, city traffic is the worst. I haven't missed it one bit since coming here.”
“Well it seems the tourists can't leave it behind,'' I countered. “We have at least two a season. But other than that I just deal with a few things like rowdy teenagers throwing a party, or neighbor disputes. It's always little things and it always gets resolved pretty quickly. There's a whole lot of old ladies in this town who want to keep Holiday Hollow peaceful. You’ll be safe here, omega.”
She nodded knowingly but I didn’t miss the relief my words gave her. She quickly defaulted to humor though. “A few Karen's here and there?”
I shrugged. “Yeah, but they always have the best of intentions. Those intentions just end up being a pain in my ass.”
“At least it's not like those videos you see going viral,” she joked.
Before we could continue, Lindsay was back. “Kitchen’s gonna be closing in about thirty minutes. You guys want me to put anything in for you?” As if on cue, Autumn’s stomach rumbled loudly.
Shaking my head, I reached for the menus. “Yeah, I think we will. Can you give us just a sec, Lindsay?” She nodded and walked away to help someone else.
I slid one menu towards Autumn before opening the other, both of us quiet as we decided. They had an assortment of bar food and I was tempted to order it all to satisfy that growl I’d heard. It irked me that Autumn was hungry, plus you couldn't really go wrong with things like pizza, wings, and mozzarella sticks.
When Lindsay came back, she pulled out an order pad and looked at us expectantly. “What will it be?”
“I think we'll take one of your pepperoni pizzas and some mozzarella sticks. Plus, whatever Autumn wants to add on,” I said, giving her an encouraging smile.
“I’m thinking the buffalo wings with a side of ranch, and some chips and queso,” she said, her teeth catching her bottom lip.
“Can't go wrong with cheese,” Lindsay joked.
“Make the wings a large one please, Linds, and put it on one bill,” I said before she could walk away. She nodded and I turned back to Autumn to find her curious eyes on me. “As an apology for the near arrest.”
“You didn't have to do that, but thanks,” she said with a small smile and I had a feeling that I had caught her a bit off guard. Apparently I liked surprising her and oddly enough… that thought didn’t scare me.Much.
When our food was brought out, we ate, sharing between us and just chatting about little stuff like our childhoods, what summers were like here for me, what they were like for her. I felt myself relaxing around her and talking to her like an old friend which was something that I definitely didn’t do, but I was enjoying our conversation too much to think too deeply about it.
When all our food was finished and Lindsay cleared it away, I turned to her and took the last drink of my beer, our third of the night. We both had a pleasant buzz, and I had a feeling we were both done drinking for the evening, but I didn’t want our time together to end just yet.
“Care for a dance?” I asked her.
Surprised, she glanced at the dance floor only to realize it had definitely filled up now.
“You want to dance?” she questioned, her eyes trailing down me.
I scoffed. “I wouldn’t have asked you if I didn’t, darling.”
“Hell yeah,” she said, getting up excitedly.
“Here, I’ll tuck your purse back here,” Lindsay offered her.
“Thanks,” Autumn said, passing it over before Lindsay shot me a look that saidbehave.
