Chapter 2
Chapter Two
PATTY
By the end of the week, as it turned out, Patty hadn’t grown up quite as much as she had convinced herself she had. At least, not enough to be able to resist peer pressure any better than she had when she’d been the strange girl people laughed at more often than they laughed with in high school.
For all her adamance and well-reasoned copouts, all it had ultimately taken was the right person standing in front of her. When it was one of the only people who had been kind to her before she had learned how to be kind to herself to demand she participate in the name of town spirit, insisting it wasn’t all about romantic coupling, Patty had caved like a house of cards in a snowstorm. It was some comfort, at least, to remember she’d never met a soul with the nerve to deny Dot Simmons.
The woman wasn’t the mayor of Maplewood Grove, but Patty wasn’t certain Dot didn’t have more power than the stout, apple-cheeked sweetheart of an eccentric man who actually held the title. She believed in Dot’s dominion—which wasn’t political or authoritarian in nature—and she wasn’t the only one. No one could deny it: if there was something to know in town, Dot Simmons was the first one to know it. She wore the title of the town’s unofficial historian with pride. Patty also happens to consider her the implicitly official Absolem of their little Wonderland on top of it, though Dot isn’t nearly as amused by that comparison as Patty remains.
“That’s okay,” Patty consoles serenely, motioning her on. “Just tell me who my random partner is, and let’s get this show on the road.”
Dot swirls her hand through what Patty can only describe as a gigantic fishbowl. From it, she plucks a white heart-shaped card that she opens. When she holds it up, it’s Dot who looks amused and Patty who wears dismay. In sturdy, block lettering is written the name COLTON P. RHODES . The man put an initial down for his middle name. That ’s how serious a person he was. The red heart-shaped card with her own name on it featured only her first name in a cursive, sprawling font. There are stars whimsically doodled around it.
“Oh, the Sheriff ,” Dot says, sounding impressed in a way that sounds… a touch too theatrical for the woman Patty understands her to be. Then she adds, “That’ll definitely give you a leg up in the scavenger hunt, that’s for sure.” Rational, no-muss-no-fuss thinking. That is more the Dot she knows. Of course, there isn’t too much time to appreciate it before Dot is announcing to the crowd of townsfolk all over the Sip ‘n Saw bar they’d all gathered at, already paired off, or are waiting to be: “ Sheriff Rhodes! Sheriff Colton P. Rhodes! You’re with Patty Sullivan! ”
Patty gapes at the other woman. Or rather, is left gaping in general. She can’t comprehend it. Any of this.
Not that someone who was arguably the most sensible person Patty knew had talked her into this spectacle in the name of community advocacy. Not that she had just announced a man Patty spent most of the time feeling immensely wishy-washy in front of, was with her, resulting in titters and poorly concealed whispers spreading through the masses.
And not— especially not—that Colton Rhodes, Mr. Big Serious Cop from the Big Apple, would sign his name onto a heart-shaped card… subsequently signing his entire day away just to traipse between historic and scenic locations all around the fairweather town that was all they had in common. Not that he steps out of the crowd, in his uniform the way he always is, and holds his arm out to Patty, as if she is a princess about to descend the last step of a grand staircase and needs an escort for it.
She doesn’t mean to laugh. It’s an involuntary spurt that leaves her, mostly as air through her nose. Patty can see the tips of Colton’s ears turn red.
“You’re super gentlemanly, man,” Patty is quick to say. She throws up a spontaneous peace sign he doesn’t know what to do with. For some reason, it gets under her skin, the notion that he might twist her laughter into something meanspirited. Too many men, Patty had long since learned, let their pride get in the way of a swell time. Given everything she had tucked away to show up to Sip ‘n Saw today, she wasn’t about to let him make a hard day harder. When her arm hooks through his, it’s with gravitas. He hasn’t said a word. “I dig it,” she assures, taking charge since the man has been rendered mute. “Shall we?” There is a lilt to the words. Theatrics are more her vibe than Dot’s anyway.
Her heart may be bruised, but Patty Sullivan’s je ne sais quoi remains an indefatigable force. All the more so when she suspects they’re going to need it to power them through this hunt.
COLTON
In retrospect, Colton thinks ruefully, he should have known when Betty Lou Hopkins had walked up to his usual table at Loretta’s Diner a few days ago and plopped down in the seat opposite him that something was amiss. It should have set off an alarm bell or two in his head when she hadn’t had any tips to give him, none of the intel she typically served him with plenty of sauce on the side. Maybe, he had to consider, irked, he’d grown desensitized to his own detriment.
It had been too late when he hadn’t thought anything of the vaguely impish glee shone in the young woman’s eyes as she had prompted, apropos of nothing, “So, Sheriff, how come we never see you with a lady on your arm?” Colton had stared at her blankly. Befuddled. Non-reactive. It hadn’t been as if it was the first time one the townsfolk had pried. What wouldn’t fly in the city he’d come of age on the gritty streets of, was the norm in Maplewood. He’d grown accustomed to it.
He’d forked another bite of his pancakes into his mouth, and listened to her go on about how he was getting on in his years. With the salt and pepper streaking at his temples, Colton knew she was right. He felt nothing over it. Besides, he already knew nothing could have dissuaded the post office clerk from gabbing on. Unlike diners back in New York, there was no TV at Loretta’s. This did the same job, in a way.
Yet he should have known better than to be lulled into submission due to the sheer familiarity of it. By the time knowing better had come around, he may as well have been waving a white flag in the air, signaling to racing cars revving to tear away from the starting line. By then, Betty Lou had already corralled over the two elderly twins, Agnes and Mabel Carlton, to join her makeshift brigade. Colton had long since stopped taking at the face value of their creaky knees and learned to recognize the menaces they were; the sight of them, and the concerning knowing gleam in their eerily bright eyes, had been what had finally raised his hackles. Too late.
Now, even days later, the sheriff felt swindled. Colton wasn’t sure how he hadn’t remained immune to it. The only way to get them to quit probing, it had felt, was to agree to be a part of some scavenger hunt Betty Lou had insisted the entire town was set to partake in. He could have left, of course, but that common sense hadn’t chimed in at the moment of disaster.
It helped, at least, that this once, the town gossip’s word was good as gold. The entire town jammed itself into Cliff Barnett’s Sip ‘n Saw bar – which he typically lent to the town for impromptu town meetings anyway, and wouldn’t think of denying his other half, Dot Simmons, for the Love Quest.
Colton’s attention zeroed in on the sea of townsfolk. It was his job to look after them, and he had shown up to do it—yet he can’t shake the uncanny feeling that it’s them watching him . Watching him tactlessly, and intensely, while he stands amidst them, as much of a sore thumb sticking out as ever. He almost misses his name being called. Dazed, Colton has no honorable choice but to step up to the plate for none other than Patty Sullivan herself.
His nostrils flare. There is something fishy at work here. The suspicion doesn’t prickle just because, as a rule of thumb, Colton Rhodes is not a man who puts any stock in the notion of coincidence. He wasn’t a charlatan who dismissed them in favor of devotion to newfangled, woo-woo explanations. He just understands the existence of a bigger picture.
All one had to do was zoom out. He tries…
Until Patty loops her arm through his. Colton had gotten used to the unnerved manner in which townsfolk tended to simultaneously seek him out and avoid his gaze. Now, they watch . Like they are waiting, with bated breath. It’s far from the first time he’s seen them all this way. He’s always been an observer; not the main character in their tomfoolery.
He doesn’t have to eye Patty for long to know she’s as, if not more, in the dark as he is.
Colton breaks more than one of his rules when he only half-listens to Dot speaking, albeit it is while she elaborates on the details surrounding a scavenger hunt of all things. He typically prides himself on paying attention in ways most take for granted. Only, right then, Patty holds his focus hostage, standing beside him, growing stiffer and stiffer the longer they stand there.
Colton keeps his distance, not because he wants to, but because he doesn’t know how to bridge the gap. Every now and then, as they walk, he catches himself watching the way Patty’s hair danced in the wind or how her lips curved into a small smile when she thinks he isn’t looking. It’s small moments like these, the ones she never noticed, that make him feel the pull. But he doesn’t let himself act on it—not yet. Instead, he lets the tension simmer, lets it build slowly, like a storm gathering on the horizon, content to wait for the right moment, whenever that might be.
“Everybody, be sure to grab a bag of Sweethearts !” Betty Lou chirps from the bar she’s been parked behind since the unofficial town meeting had kicked into gear. It was where the Love Quest would begin; their starting line of sorts. “Get your Sweethearts, then grab your sweetheart’s hand and go forth!” Colton can’t help but cringe at the words, his body viscerally rejecting the cloying sentiment.
Ironically, it is the sight of Patty’s palm meeting her forehead in an exasperated thwack that curbs the secondhand embarrassment.
“You all right?” He nudges Patty’s side gently.
She freezes. He can see, plainly, the effort it takes her to nod her head, and tersely say, “I’ll just go grab our candies, partner. Hang… Hang, uh, tight, huh?” Patty doffs an imaginary cowboy hat in his direction and weaves through the crowd before he can say another word.
Just as well , Colton thinks. He didn’t have anything clever to say back either way.