Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“ Y ou’ve really stepped in it this time.”
“I know that.”
“I mean big, big doo-doo.”
“Yes, Maxine.”
Maxine hopped over a crack in the sidewalk as we walked to a closed Micky’s Diner that night for the committee meeting. “I’m saying you need man-sized waders to walk through this level of—“
“I get it.” My teeth hurt from clenching them so hard. “But who invited Ian here in the first place?”
“And your parents thought I’d be the problem child while they were gone, but—”
I held open the door of the restaurant. “Yes, you’re a virtuous saint.”
“What you did was impulsive, reckless, and just a tiny bit scandalous.” Maxine winked as she walked past me. “I love it.”
“No, do not even start that. This will be over before it begins.” I followed her toward the back of the dining area where the others sat at a large table.
“Georgie and Michael had an arranged marriage on General Hospital , and it turned out just fine. Well, except for when that mob boss gunned them down. But they showed up alive again a year later, so it all worked out.”
“A truly inspiring story.”
“Gosh.” She pulled out her chair and sat down. “Being fake-engaged makes you grumpy.”
I settled into a seat beside her and said hello to the group of fifteen or so townsfolk who were there because their business was on the chopping block or they just wanted to be involved.
The chatter swirled around us and hovered like a cloud, but no matter who was talking, it was the same conversation.
Thrifty Co. was a bully, there were lives on the line, and they weren’t going to let the corporation win.
Maxine put a thumb and finger to her lips and produced an ear-splitting whistle. “Let’s get this meeting started. My granddaughter needs to go shop for honeymoon lingerie.”
All heads turned toward me.
“Yes, we hear congratulations are in order!”
“When’s the big day?”
“I’ll do your wedding cake!”
“The Lonestar Motel has a bed that vibrates for a quarter.”
“Um, thank you. For all that.” I took another look to make sure it was just us in the diner then lowered my voice. “There is no wedding. It’s a long story, but for reasons I don’t want to get into, I’m kind of faking this whole thing.”
“Honey”—Mrs. Gleason gave her husband the side-eye—“I’ve been faking it for forty years.”
“I need everyone to just kind of go with it,” I said. “And if any of you outs me to Ian, not only do I walk away from this project, but I make sure someone spits in your coffee at Micky’s for the rest of your lives. Any questions?”
A gray-headed woman raised her hand.
“Yes, Mrs. Higgins?”
“Are you in some kind of legal trouble?”
“No.”
“Are we going to be interrogated by some immigration agent?”
“I was born right here in Texas.”
Maxine took a sip of water. “You look pretty alien to me. ”
“If you needed someone to marry you, I would’ve volunteered.”
“Mr. Henry, you’re fifty years older than I am.”
“I have my own chicken house empire.” He waggled his white brows. “You could’ve been my first lady.”
Maxine patted his veiny hand. “If she and Charlie don’t work out, you are definitely her runner-up.”
“Let’s get started, shall we?” Good Lord, whoever said you couldn’t go home had clearly not been from In Between. Nothing had changed. “As I mentioned in my email to you all—“
“I prefer text.”
“I don’t do the computer.”
“More of an Instagram man myself.”
“As I said in my email, we need data. We need to show them the numbers. How many workers will lose their jobs? How much income will be lost? How much in taxes to the city does your business contribute?”
“Let’s have everyone’s information to Katie by Wednesday,” Loretta said.
“We also need to collect testimonials.”
“FiberLax is really effective stuff.” Mr. Delmott removed his Dekalb ball cap. “Keeps things moving and grooving, if you know what I mean.”
No wonder Thrify Co. had easily bought their way into town. “I meant a testimonial of how your business has affected someone in In Between.”
“Oh. Still,”—He nudged the guy next to him—“good stuff.”
“That lawyer we hired didn’t ask for any of this. Are you sure he’s worth a hill of beans, Don?” Loretta asked.
“He’s my grandson from Houston. Mary’s kid. Of course he’s good.”
“Why isn’t he here?” Loretta asked.
“He’ll be at the town hall,” Mr. Henry said. “He told me to take notes.” The man clicked the end of his pen and returned it to the napkin he’d been writing on. “Did Katie say this was a shotgun wedding or one of those arranged situations?”
Loretta’s eye roll was as dramatic as it was disgusted. “I’ll give you a testimonial,” she said. “Last year when John Thomas’s house burned down, Foster’s hardware store donated all the lumber to rebuild it.”
“And Miss Loretta takes leftover food to the shelter every Thursday,” said Mr. Gleason.
“That’s exactly the sort of thing I’m looking for. We want to appeal to logic and emotion.”
“Are you sure you don’t want me to make your wedding cake?”
“There is no wedding, Mrs. Holcomb.”
“But we will need some samples,” Maxine told the woman. “For authenticity’s sake.”
“Well, whatever it takes to help you, Katie dear,” said Mrs. Holcomb. “You’re our leader, and we want to help you like you’re helping us.”
“We’re gonna make this fake engagement look real authentic,” said Mrs. Gleason. “Just you wait and see. It’s the least we can do.”
“All I need you guys to do is just keep the secret, okay? That will be more than enough.”
“We won’t let you down, Katie.” Mrs. Holcomb pretended to lock her lips and throw away the key. “You just leave it to us.”
The In Between meeting hall was really just a big converted barn.
The town used the red, rustic facility for dances, dinners, meetings, events, voting, and even the occasional wedding.
Last summer Mr. And Mrs. Harris even rented it out for their Happy Divorce party.
But tonight hundreds of In Betweenites sat shoulder to shoulder, occupying rows of gray metal folding chairs.
These were the people I had grown up with.
I knew their children, their stories. The Valiant was everything to me, but just as it held my heart, so many folks here had just as much, if not more, at stake.
I followed Maxine and the committee to the center section, front row.
The group wanted to be eye to eye with the mayor and representatives from Thrifty Co.
when they took the wooden stage and spoke to the town.
I scanned the area, smiling at familiar faces, but searching for one face in particular—Charlie’s.
Since his home was now in Chicago maybe In Between losing some landmarks wasn’t that important to him.
“This seat taken?”
My stomach sank as Ian slid into the chair beside me.
“Actually I’m saving it.”
“For your fiancé?”
“Yes.” Geez, the lies. They multiplied like weeds.
Ian crossed his arms over his chest, his body leaning a little too close to mine.
“Want to tell me how you could be engaged mere weeks after breaking up with me?”
My brain shifted and stuttered. “It’s. . .it’s like you said—we’d been over for a long time. Charlie and I reconnected, and it was just. . .magical.” Micky’s Diner didn’t serve syrup any sweeter than this. “Charlie was my first love.”
“I’m not really buying this.”
“Your feelings on this don’t matter to me either way.”
“You’re not impulsive.” Ian gave an infuriating chuckle. “You don’t jump into anything. It took you three weeks in London before you braved the Tube—armed with your spreadsheet you’d made of the stops. Six months of planning before you ventured to Paris. You waited—“
“Okay, I get it. But when it’s right, it’s right.
” Now I was quoting Frances. “If you must know, when Charlie and I had our near-death experience, it just opened my eyes to what really mattered. When that plane went down, all I could think about was. . .him. The only face I saw was his.” I cleared my throat, a little uncomfortable with how right that felt to say.
That kiss replayed in my mind, falling to the earth with Charlie’s lips on mine. It had felt...right.
“Nearly dying put things into perspective for me,” I said. “I realized life is short, and it’s certainly not guaranteed. I got a second chance, and I don’t want to waste it.”
“On me.”
“On people who don’t appreciate me. Respect me.”
“And this Charlie does that I assume?”
Ian’s tone was so condescending, I wanted to leap out of this cold folding chair and bang him over the head with it. “Charlie is honest, loving, and kind. He’s a man of integrity. And I can trust him to remain faithful for a long time. You know, like the fifteen minutes of an intermission.”
Ian’s smooth smile slowly disappeared. “People make mistakes.”
He was not sucking me in with this. Ian might’ve been a director, but he could act with the best of them.
“I don’t want to talk about us anymore. We’re over.
It’s in the past. I don’t know why you’re really here, but if you were hoping to find me languishing without you, you can see I’m far from it. I’ve never been happier.”
For long, painful seconds Ian said nothing, then finally he straightened and focused on the mayor taking the podium on stage. “There are four TV news reporters in the back,” Ian said grimly. “At least three newspaper outlets. I’ll do what I can to help you, but I need you to help me as well.”
“In Between doesn’t need you.”
“Do you really want to test that theory? Because if you’re wrong, and you throw away my assistance, my connections, then you will have made an error that cannot be rectified—all for your pride. Because once this store gets the property, it’s over.”
“We have an attorney.”
“Where is he?”
I had wondered the same thing.