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“Christ, you could’ve mentioned that before we got up here.”
“I know, I know. I’m sorry. I kept thinking lightning would strike me or I’d fall to my death before we got to this point. What are we going to do?” he asked.
Maddie sighed and started unpacking their painting supplies. “Well, you’ve made it all the way up here and you’re required to stay, or else you’re in contempt. I’d say the only thing to do is to paint the damn water tower.”
“Madelyn, I can’t even move.”
“Yeah, you can. Let yourself slide down until you’re sitting. You’ll feel more stable if you’re sitting.”
He inched down slowly until his butt met the metal grating. That did feel better, he noted with surprise.
“Now, the graffiti is pretty large. I think you can paint over the, um, testicles from a seated position and I can paint over the rest.”
Emmett turned to look at the giant spray-painted penis they were there to cover up. That plan seemed like it would work, except for the highest part of the graffiti. He might not like it, but he might be the only one able to cover that up. “Will you be able to reach the . . . overly enthusiastic ejaculate?”
Maddie sighed and shook her head. “I’ll worry about that last. Let’s just get to painting before we lose daylight.”
She seemed fairly disgusted by the whole situation and he wasn’t surprised. She didn’t strike him as the kind of baker who would make sexy novelty treats for bachelor and bachelorette parties. That had to break some kind of debutante code, he was pretty sure.
Emmett wasn’t too happy about it himself, although the six-foot penis was the least of his worries. He rolled onto his knees and pried open the paint can. He poured the paint into a plastic disposable tray while Maddie loaded foam rollers onto the paint wands.
They got started, but it didn’t take long to realize the water tower was going to need more than one coat. The tower was white with swirling red letters and a rose on one side. The penis was dark purple. It took about a half hour to paint over the whole thing.
“I think we need to take a break and let it dry,” Emmett noted as they finished. “If I paint over a wet spot, it just pulls the paint off instead of layering on more.”
“Fair enough.” Maddie set the roller down and picked up her tote bag. “Good thing I packed some reinforcements.”
Emmett had rolled back onto his rear end with his shoulder blades pressed into the water tower. “Reinforcements?”
Maddie flopped down beside him and reached into her bag. She pulled out two bottles and a small box from her bakery. “Sun Drop and my homemade take on MoonPies. It’s the only appropriate snack to have at the top of a water tower.”
Emmett’s brow went up and she opened the pastry box to reveal a treat too decadent-looking to be called a MoonPie. “You made MoonPies?”
“Yep, it’s my Wednesday special. I make homemade marshmallows and sandwich them between my special ginger cookies. Then I dip the whole thing in dark chocolate ganache.”
“Wow.” Emmett accepted the treat she offered. “I’ve never actually eaten a MoonPie before, but this has to be way better than the skinny little things they sell in the packs at the gas station.”
“You’ve never eaten a MoonPie? Where are you from?”
“Florida,” Emmett answered before taking a large gooey bite and groaning aloud. “That just wasn’t something we ate, I guess, although if they were all this good, I’d be twenty pounds heavier.”
“Ah, well, it’s a little bit country, but sometimes it’s just what you do. When I was working for Estelle, someone came in and asked if we could custom-make an order of a hundred of them for a redneck-themed wedding by the lake. They were doing camo bridesmaids dresses, the whole thing. We made enough MoonPies for them to stack them like a tiered wedding cake. The wedding was ridiculous, but everyone loved the MoonPies. People started coming into the shop asking for them, so I started making them as a specialty item when I opened Madelyn’s. Before I left to come over here, I grabbed a couple of treats just in case. When I realized we’d be climbing the water tower, I picked up the soda so we could have the ultimate southern experience.”
Climbing this tower was an experience Emmett could’ve skipped, but he had to admit the snacks helped to take his mind off things. “So tell me, how many times did a fine upstanding girl like yourself make it up to this water tower?”
“A couple of times my senior year,” she admitted. “All the teenagers know it’s the best spot to sneak off to during a football game. From here you can see the field and would know how much time you had left to make out before you had to crawl back down.”
Emmett chuckled and opened his bottle of Sun Drop. “Are you telling me you climbed up here to make out with boys? That’s scandalous.”
“Actually, no. I wasn’t the kind of girl who climbed up here on a regular basis. I came up here a couple of times with one special guy in particular. He was a friend of Blake’s from Auburn and he would come home with him every now and then. I was head over heels for him. It was his idea to climb up here the first time and we made the pilgrimage every time he came to visit.”
“Did he ever declare his love for you on the water tower?” Up close, Emmett could see the faint ghosts of previous graffiti that was painted over, including some good and bad. One stated that someone loved Donna, one accused Nancy of being a slut, and another announced “Rick and Tina Forever.” Apparently you could keep up with the latest Rosewood relationships by looking at the water tower—at least back in the day. He hadn’t noticed anything like that lately until the big penis showed up.
The faint smile faded from Maddie’s face and she shook her head. “No, he didn’t. No one has ever climbed up here to announce that they loved me by vandalizing public property.”
Emmett wasn’t surprised. That didn’t seem like the kind of thing that would impress her. “I suppose your fancier guys had better methods for doing that. What did they do? Bring you flowers? Write romantic love poems?”
“Not really
