doing back here now. “And you’re back here visiting?” I was hopeful that was the case.
She shook her head. “No. I went to school in East Lansing and then returned home. I worked in the feed and seed with my parents for a year or two before meeting my husband.”
And that’s when my hope fled. “You married Danny Bollinger?” That was disappointing. He’d been hot when I was in middle school, quarterback of the football team. All the girls threw themselves at him. Shadow Hills was basically one stereotype heaped on top of another stereotype, and Danny hadn’t escaped the curse. Now, fifteen years after his graduation, he was fifty pounds overweight, about a pound of hair lighter, and he spent all his time sitting at the front coffee counter talking about his glory days with the other men who lived and worked in town. He’d been parked in what I assumed was his regular spot when I showed up for my first shift.
She nodded and smiled. “Yes, he’s the love of my life,” Sarah said blandly, her tone telling me she would happily pack up and run should the chance arise. Danny was apparently nobody’s happily ever after, which was probably to be expected. “I still don’t know who you are.”
The time I’d been dreading had finally come and I wanted to find a hole and crawl inside to hide. I’d made a promise to myself, though. I wasn’t going to run from this. It was only a temporary solution after all. I wasn’t back in Shadow Hills forever.
Except you are, a weak voice whispered in the back of my mind. You know that as well as anybody. You took your shot, made it for five seconds, and now you’re back. There’s no escaping this town.
I brutally shoved the voice out of my mind and pasted what I hoped could pass for a friendly smile onto my face. “Stormy Morgan.”
Realization dawned on Sarah and I didn’t miss the hint of triumph that managed to push through even as she wrestled to hide her glee. “Right. I should’ve recognized you. I saw you on television when you were doing the rounds on all the news shows years ago for that book you wrote. What was it again?”
“Death of a Small Town,” I gritted out. She darned well knew the title. Heck, everybody knew the title. It was set in Shadow Hills, for crying out loud. The book put the town on the map for a full year — before everyone forgot about it and I faded into obscurity.
“Yeah, that was a big hit, right?” Sarah’s expression was encouraging, but I knew better. She wanted to hear the sad tale of my fall from grace. She wanted to hear how I got one book contract and sold hundreds of thousands of copies and then flopped with my second book and the publisher dropped the option on my third. That was the reason I was back in Shadow Hills. Everybody was going to want to hear that story.
“It did okay,” I replied evasively, shifting the tray. “I really need to deliver this order. I’ll be back to see if you need anything else.”
Sarah beamed at me. “Maybe when you come back we can catch up. I’d love to hear about the time you spent in New York.”
I had no doubt that was true. “I really spent only a few months in New York. I was in North Carolina after that ... and Savannah ... and New Orleans.” Basically anywhere I thought I could find inspiration for my second book, I silently added. “I have to get back to work. It was good to see you.”
I was grateful that the women on the other side of the cafe, the dinner side that boasted salad and soup bars, were older and didn’t appear even mildly curious about who I was, or why I was delivering their cheeseburgers and fries. They were in their sixties and deep in conversation, talking about some incident that occurred at the senior center the previous day.
“I’m telling you she’s a cheat,” the woman with the platinum blond curls hissed, barely sparing a smile for me as I delivered her food. “She has hand signals she shares with Marla. That’s how they always win the weekly euchre tournament.”
The other woman gasped in surprise, which quickly turned to outrage. “That makes so much sense.”
I checked to make sure their beverages were full and then disappeared back into the kitchen to claim