13. Sophie #2
Lola cocked a brow. “Oh, darling, I don’t think so. Why is it all wrinkled?” She looked at me. “What have you been doing with it?” The smile spreading across her face suggested she’d already imagined at least twelve inappropriate answers.
“Don’t be gross.” I snatched it back. “A goat might have nibbled it a bit.” I pointed the card at her. “That sentence sounded completely normal yesterday.”
Lola’s eyes widened with theatrical delight. Her entire face lit up the way normal people reacted to winning vacations or finding twenty dollars in an old coat pocket.
“A goat?” She pressed one hand dramatically against her chest. “That’s somehow even sexier.”
“No, it’s not.” What the hell was wrong with her?
“It is,” said Lola. “Nothing says forbidden romance like a sheriff’s business card that’s survived an attack by livestock.”
My insides did a little flip. “There is no romance.”
Lola sighed dreamily. “Broad shoulders. Nice smile. Calm voice.” She fanned herself with a paper napkin. “The sort of man who could tell you to renew your driver’s license and somehow make it sound indecent.” She closed her eyes briefly. “I’d probably renew it twice. More like three times.”
I nearly inhaled my coffee. “Why is this happening to me?” I coughed into my mug.
“What?” Lola looked innocent. “I’m appreciating public service. There’s no harm in that.”
“He is single, you know,” added Dottie, her eyes on me.
I set down my mug. “How do you know that?” I hated how interested my voice sounded.
Dottie shrugged. “It’s Maplewood Falls.”
That explained everything. Which was both reassuring and deeply unsettling.
Lola nodded solemnly. “We know who’s sleeping with the pool boy and who’s sleeping with the gardener in this town.” She beamed. “And it’s not me.”
“And who’s been borrowing flowers from the town planters,” added Dottie.
I looked from one woman to the other. “That’s actually a little creepy.”
“It’s community,” Dottie said with complete conviction, like she’d just settled a constitutional debate instead of defending what sounded suspiciously like organized neighborhood espionage.
I pointed my fork between them. “You two need hobbies.”
“We have hobbies,” said Lola. “We’re discussing yours.” She raised her brows suggestively. “The sheriff.”
I groaned. “He’s not my hobby.” The fact that I’d thought about him approximately seventy-three times since yesterday was completely beside the point. Seventy-four if you counted right now. Which I refused to do.
Lola rested both elbows on the table. “So… when did he give you his number?”
I shook my head. “He didn’t give me his number.”
She looked pointedly at the card. “You understand how evidence works. Yes?” She tapped the table beside it. “Because Exhibit A is sitting right there looking slightly damp.”
“It’s his business card.”
“With his direct line.”
“Because he’s the sheriff.”
“And?”
“And…” I searched desperately for a logical explanation that didn’t somehow make me sound guilty. “Sheriffs have business cards.”
Lola smiled patiently. “So do dentists. I don’t carry my dentist’s card around.” She tilted her head. “And if a goat chewed on it, I’d throw it away instead of carefully preserving it.”
She had a point. I looked down at the slightly chewed card still sitting beside my coffee. I could have thrown it away. Instead, I’d kept it.
What did that say about me?
Dottie chuckled. “So why do you still have it?” She wasn’t teasing anymore. She sounded genuinely curious, like she’d already guessed the answer and simply wanted to hear me say it out loud.
“Because he told me to call if I needed help with road closures or permits or safety questions.” I shrugged. “It’s practical.” I slipped the card carefully back inside Helen’s binder before they asked me more questions. “He’s just being nice.”
Dottie nodded. “He is nice.”
“Exactly,” I said, giving her a short smile.
“And handsome,” she continued.
I gave her a look, though I felt warmth pool in my middle. “He came around to help out a few times. That’s what sheriffs do. They help people.”
Lola poured herself some coffee. “He didn’t have to.”
“No, he didn’t,” I answered. “He was just making sure the festival didn’t become a public safety hazard.” And maybe making sure I didn’t accidentally become one too. The line between those two possibilities had gotten a little blurry.
Lola grinned. “Sure he was.” She smiled slowly, like she’d just spotted the final missing puzzle piece sliding into place.
Heat crept up my neck. “He was.” And then I got tangled and fell into his arms like an idiot.
But it had felt nice. Really nice.
The sort of nice that kept replaying in my head at two thirty in the morning while I should’ve been worrying about generators instead of wondering whether he’d noticed how fast my heart had been beating.
Lola leaned back with the satisfied smile of a woman who’d spotted blood in the water. Sharks had nothing on her. At least sharks finished the job quickly. “Oh, sweetheart.”
“What?”
Her smile widened. “You’ve already started defending him.”
“I am not defending him.” I stabbed my pancake.
It had done absolutely nothing to deserve it, but at this point, breakfast was becoming collateral damage.
“He’s not interested in me like that.” I waved my fork vaguely in the air.
“Besides, have you looked at him? Men like Sheriff Walker don’t notice women like me.
They notice women who have their lives together.
Women who don’t accidentally shut down Main Road with a miniature donkey. Me? I’m a walking tragedy.”
Lola gave me a look. “Honey. A tragedy is when you sit down and your thighs are twice as large.”
Good point.
But right now, I had bigger problems than the size of my thighs.
The festival started in less than thirty minutes. I had vendors to check. Volunteers to organize. Hundreds of visitors arriving. A million things that deserved my attention.
Which would’ve been great…
If my brain had kindly stopped wondering whether Captain Competent was already there.