Chapter 38
“So you think she’s pretty? Like Elizabeth Bennet pretty?” Ginny swings her legs back and forth impatiently as we sit at the bar with Blake and wait for Logan and Gigi to show up.
I don’t say anything, but George pipes in as he hands me an iced tea. “I bet she’s not as pretty as you two.”
I reach over and cuff his cowboy hat. “Thanks, George.”
Ginny giggles. “Why, how very sweet of you, George. If only I wasn’t pregnant and about to marry my elementary school sweetheart.”
“I can’t believe I haven’t seen her yet,” Blake mutters.
Dye calls out from his table. “I saw the back of her head yesterday by the old train station.”
“Really?” Ginny leans toward him. “What’d you think?”
Rusty growls, which I take to mean he didn’t think much of the new girl from New York City.
“Nothing special.” Dye shrugs. “Tall girl, that’s for sure. And she’s blond.”
“Because we don’t have enough blond girls in our town already.” I bite down on my lip in frustration.
“No kidding,” says Ginny. “Why do you think I’ve always dyed my hair? I hope it won’t grow out before it’s safe for me to go to the hair salon again.”
I nod at her. I’m one of the few naturally dark-haired girls in Darcy, a trait I thought Logan always appreciated.
“Logan doesn’t usually like blondes.” I reach over the bar to grab a dishrag and then start vigorously wiping the counter.
“True,” Blake says.
“Seems he likes just about everything about this girl,” George says.
I take a huge gulp of my iced tea and clutch my trusty dishrag in my other hand. I don’t think this bar’s ever been as clean as it has in the past twenty-four hours.
George gently tries to extract the dishrag from my grip, but I hang on too tightly. He gives up and reaches under the counter for another cloth for himself.
“Your daddy’s coming by later with a reporter to give him a Cowherd tour,” George says. “Hopefully your visit with Logan and his fiancée will be over by then or you might attract quite a crowd.”
I purse my lips. “I told my father he could only bring reporters by when the bar’s not open. He’s ignoring me because he thinks the patrons will get excited if they see a camera.”
“Well, he’s right,” George says. “Why won’t you let him come by at night?”
I search for an answer other than the truth— that it makes me feel safer. Daddy’s always been a follower, and if there are fewer people in the bar, the less chance he’ll break and take a drink.
Instead, I gesture toward the Where’s Your Mr. Darcy Mama carefully painted in white letters across the back of the bar.
“My parents want that question answered so badly.”
George looks where I’m pointing. “No one knows anything until that cell door swings open though, right?”
“I just can’t believe Logan Wild is Mr. Darcy,” Ginny says.
Blake rolls his eyes. “He’s not. Macey’s parents have started a crazy rumor.”
George laughs. “I saw Logan by the fishing hole earlier, and there were actually two cameramen following him. It’s like he’s an overnight celebrity.”
“With an overnight fiancée.” Ginny smiles. “Weird.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Especially since he’s the last person in this town who would ever want to be part of a famous couple like that, fictional or no.”
“He’s a damn cowboy, not a romance hero,” Blake says. “Y’all agree—Logan’s sarcastic, the opposite of a romantic…”
I don’t agree with the last part, but I don’t say anything. Logan Wild can be very romantic in private. And my chest aches at the idea of him being that way with a woman other than me.
“He’s negative,” George points out.
“He likes to relax and fish,” Ginny adds. “Mr. Darcy was a very hard worker.”
“He’s also fifteen minutes late,” Blake says. “He’s never late.”
“Surprise, surprise,” I mutter. Lots of things seem to be different about Logan nowadays. “He’s probably been slowed by the paparazzi.”
I glance around The Cowherd on the off chance Logan snuck in somehow. A bunch of cowboy hats line the bar, but no one under the age of fifty is in sight.
“Got the ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ crowd back again.” George pulls back his long white hair with hands gnarled from playing too much rock guitar.
Other than a few decades playing half-empty honky-tonks, this is the only job he’s ever had.
“They’ve had that song on replay for about twenty minutes.
I highly suggest you take over the music selection. ”
I drop my empty iced tea glass on the counter. “I love that song, though. Okay, George, make me one dirty martini, and I’m good.”
George does a slow turn toward me. Blake and Ginny twist around on their barstools to look at me.
“It’s not like I never drink hard alcohol,” I say to the three sets of raised eyebrows. “I just pick my spots. Trust me, this is a spot for a dirty martini.”
George shrugs and grabs the bottle of gin.
Ginny puts her hand carefully over my shaking one. “Macey, are you all right? You seem so nervous about meeting you know who.”
I don’t know why she’d say that. I’ve only wiped the counter to the point that the damp rag has made the fingers on my left hand all wrinkly like I just got out of a bath.
I manage a weak smile in her direction. George hands me my martini and I quickly down a third of it.
My intestines are jumping around so much I may need to make a bathroom run, but just as I force myself to take a deep breath, the bell dings, and the air changes like it always does when Logan walks in.
But something’s completely different this time. This time, he’s taken. And I’m about to meet the woman who took him.