LITMIR.BIZ

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gazing down Main Street, which was unusually quiet for this time of day. In an hour the lunch crowd would hit, and then...then Emily didn’t know what to expect. She had visions of people pushing through a crammed door, eager to take a peek inside Maple Woods’s newest establishment.

      Still smiling at the thought, she whipped around to the sound of an engine revving in the near distance. A bright red sports car was sitting at the intersection of Main Street and Maple Avenue, the noise a dramatic contrast to the peaceful and simple life of Maple Woods.

      Emily watched as the car took a sharp left when the light turned, wincing as the vehicle rumbled offensively and took speed in her direction. She squinted into the sunlight as it quickly closed the distance, but as it zipped past her, her eyes shot open.

      It couldn’t be...not him. After all these years, there was no way. Why now?

      Emily peered at the sidewalk as she tried to logically process what she had just seen. Her stomach tightened with each ragged breath. Scott Collins hadn’t shown his face in this town in nearly twelve years. Would he really come back now, after all this time?

      She pursed her lips. It had taken months of heartache and waiting to learn the answer to that question. It was about time she accepted it, too.

      She swallowed the knot of disappointment that was quickly forming a lump in her throat, replacing her sudden shock. She hadn’t thought of her high school sweetheart in years, and look at her: all it took was one drive-by, one trigger to open wounds she thought had finally healed. One double take to have her thinking of those blue eyes and that lopsided grin all over again.

      She shook her head and pulled open the door to the bakery. The car had been too fast. Her mind had been playing tricks on her. Besides, Lucy would have surely announced if her own brother was paying a visit.

      “I just got a call from George,” Lucy announced breathlessly as soon as the door closed behind Emily. She finished untying the strings to her apron and hung it on a hook on the back of the kitchen door. “He needs me at the diner for a bit to help prep for the lunch crowd, seeing that we don’t have any customers here yet.” The last words of her statement were laced with disappointment.

      Emily studied Lucy’s face thoughtfully, wondering if she should even mention her possible sighting, but her friend’s expression showed nothing that would indicate Scott’s arrival any more than her words did.

      “Hurry back if you can,” Emily said as Lucy gathered her things to hurry to the diner that she owned with her husband. “I have a feeling that by tonight, we’ll be so busy, we’ll be wishing everyone would just go home.” She paused to stare out the window, idly searching for the mysterious red car. Suspicion engulfed her all over again. No one in Maple Woods drove a car like that. She turned back to Lucy. “Were you expecting anyone special for today’s grand opening?”

      She knew from Lucy that her father wasn’t well...but no. Scott hadn’t so much as bothered to come back for a holiday in all these years. Surely he wasn’t suddenly sweeping into town looking to make up for lost time. Unless...

      “Just the usual group of friends and family showing their support.” Lucy shrugged. She surveyed the empty room once more, her lips thinning. “I’m off, then. Call if you need me. I’ll just be across the street.”

      “Will do,” Emily said, sighing. Silly girl, she thought with a shake of her head. Of course it hadn’t been Scott. He was gone, never coming back.

      Besides, she was better off without him.

      * * *

      What the hell was he doing here?

      Scott leaned on the hood of the red Porsche, his eyes narrowing as his gaze swept down Main Street and over to the town square. The charming little gazebo bordered with hydrangea bushes. The bronze statue of the town’s founder standing tall and proud under the umbrella of a magnolia tree. His stare lingered on Lucy’s Place, his gut knotting at the familiar sight. In all his life, he never expected to see that diner again, or any place in Maple Woods, really. There was no circumstance that could bring him back, he’d thought, and yet here he was.

      He shook his head in disgust, angry at himself for giving in. He shouldn’t have come back. He should have stayed away. Twelve years was a long time. Longer than the innocence of some childhoods. Longer than most marriages. But twelve years wasn’t enough time to put distance between him and Maple Woods. Or the secret the town held. The one he had sworn he would take to his grave.

      Scott turned and regarded his rental car, grimacing with regret. He’d rented the exact model he owned in Seattle, out of habit, but with its flashy red paint and six-figure price tag, that car didn’t belong in Maple Woods any more than he did. It would only garner more unwanted attention and speculation, and God knew this town was full of enough gossip. Sleepy little towns like this enjoyed a good scandal, or in his case, a good secret. It kept things interesting, and gave an otherwise dormant community something to talk about other than marriages and births. Deaths.

      Scott scowled as his stomach began to burn again. It had been happening a lot lately—ever since Lucy had called and begged him to come back to Maple Woods, pleading with him to take over the rebuilding of the town library, which her son had damaged in a fire he had accidentally started. “Kids,” Scott had told her over the phone, when she’d tearfully explained his nephew’s involvement, but something about it touched a nerve, evoking memories that were better kept buried. Lucy wanted to set things right: Bobby was doing community service, he was working hard to get into a good college on a football scholarship, and the plans for the new library were moving along nicely...until their father got sick.

      He didn’t know why he gave in to her request in the end. Maybe it was because she’d let him stay away as long as she had, maybe it was because he respected her need to set things right for the wrongdoings of her son, or maybe it was because she didn’t ask him directly to come back and be there for the family in their hour of need that he felt he couldn’t say no to her. Whatever the reason, he was here.

      You’re gonna pay me back for this one, Lucy.

      His breath hitched on a rueful laugh. Who was he kidding? He could never stay mad at her for long. How could he? With their seven-year age difference, they’d never had the kind of banter or rivalry one expects with siblings. Lucy had always doted on him, right up until the time she married George Miller and moved across town to start a family of her own.

      She would probably be in the diner right now, filling coffee mugs with that no-nonsense grin and a twinkle in her eye. In a matter of minutes he could see her again. He had to admit the idea of it was appealing, despite the circumstances.

      Scott pushed back from the car and straightened his shoulders. Hands thrust into his pockets, he began wandering down the sidewalk, taking his time in surveying the shops that lined the quaint street. He was struck with wonder as his eyes roamed over the storefronts. Absolutely nothing had changed. It was all the same. The pizza place. The flower shop. The bookstore. The fashions in the window of the clothing boutique sure had changed, though. He paused to study the dress on the mannequin with furrowed interest before his gaze slid to a wide-eyed face staring back at him through the glass. He flushed as the woman mouthed what he was nearly sure was “Oh, my God, it’s Scott Collins!” and another slack-jawed face quickly appeared on the other side of the mannequin, eyes gleaming in the ray of sunlight that poured through the shop window.

      Scott frowned before turning on his heel and quickening his pace toward the diner. He remembered those girls, all right. Women now. They were both in his math class senior year. They’d been some of the prettiest girls on the cheerleading squad. From the looks of it, they’d remembered him, too.

      He’d put a hundred bucks on the notion that the women in the clothing shop were calling around to every one of their old classmates right this moment and grimaced to think of the reaction he was going to elicit when he pushed through the doors of Lucy’s Place. After all, a man didn’t disappear from this town for twelve years without prompting a reaction when he returned.

      He didn’t think he could stomach it, honestly.

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