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Everything was falling into place, if Emma ignored that Eli-shaped cloud looming in the peripheral corners of her mind, threatening to ruin her calm.
Yesterday’s uncomfortable epiphany had changed the mood between them. She had tried to act like nothing had happened, like the word mistake hadn’t triggered a come-to-Jesus moment in her soul. But Emma had never been very good at faking anything, and she could tell she hadn’t succeeded yesterday, either. A few times she had caught him watching her with a question in his eyes. But he had never asked, letting her keep the pretense.
So she would keep the pretense. Eli was a problem that would work itself out when the election was over. He would be her ex-best friend who had betrayed her and ruined her dad’s life. And she would be his favorite mistake.
Her heart still burned a little at the thought.
But it would all be fine. Everything would go back to normal.
Except...except it wouldn’t, could it? Because normal, until a month ago, meant she hated Eli, and she didn’t entirely feel that way about him now. It had been so easy then. So easy to hate him from up there on her high horse, judging him for his human frailties. Hate was a lot harder to pull off now, realizing just how her own frailties had brought them both down in the muck.
And if she didn’t hate him, where did that leave her? Where did that leave them?
Was she supposed to just exist in the same damn town as him, never being able to talk to him, to touch him, without all that steely hate driving her on? She didn’t know if she could do that.
But she would have to.
And despite her flaws, Emma was pretty good at doing what she had to do.
Right now, doing what she had to do meant pushing thoughts of Eli aside and getting her job done.
“What’s with that look on your face, Emma?” Suzie asked next to her. “Are you okay?”
“What look?” As if she didn’t know.
It was a gorgeous summer day, the kind that gave Emma a bone-deep sense of peace and gratitude. The sky was nothing but blue as far as the eye could see. Hart’s Mountain was a deep emerald green, and beyond that were layers of blue ridges that lived up to their name. The Blue Ridge Mountains. She was lucky to live here.
It was the perfect day for canvassing, as Suzie called it. Emma preferred to think of it as listening. The idea of going door-to-door, telling her neighbors that had known her since she was in diapers a list of reasons why she was better than Eli made her squirm. But she could listen to what they had to say. She could learn about their problems, and help come up with solutions.
“It’s a complicated look,” Suzie said. “A little sad. A little annoyed. Kind of horny.”
Emma and Kate stopped in their tracks and turned slowly to stare at her.
“Not going to lie, I’m a little disturbed by the implication that you know what Emma looks like when she’s horny,” Kate said.
“Fine. I don’t know if Emma is horny. It’s me, okay? I’m horny. And it’s not fair,” Suzie groused. “I spent the first three months spewing up everything I swallowed. I spent the next three months—the second trimester, where everything is supposed to feel great, mind you—I spent it with sciatica that hurt so bad I could barely go up stairs. And now that I’m finally feeling good, I’m horny as hell.”
“So, um, go have sex with that hot husband of yours?” Emma suggested. “Isn’t that the point of marriage? It makes sex convenient?”
Suzie glared. “Convenient? Do you know how hard it is to find time for sex with two kids under the age of five, one of whom has suddenly realized he won’t be the baby anymore and is extra clingy?” she hissed. “Do you?”
No, Emma did not. She sent a panicked look to Kate, who nodded.
“Hey, there. It’s all going to be okay.” Kate rubbed a soothing circle on Suzie’s back. “Why don’t you send the kids to me Friday night for a sleepover? Jessica and I would love that. Well,” she reconsidered, “I would love that. But I’ll pay Jessica thirty bucks, and she’ll love the money.”
Suzie’s eyes widened. “Are you serious?” she whispered.
“Of course.”
“Zack is still in diapers. I mean, you’d have to change them.”
“I am familiar with the concept,” Kate said drily. “I might have done that once or twice with Jessica, you know.”
“Kate!” Suzie shrieked joyously. She grabbed her in a side hug, the only kind of hug she could manage with her expanding belly. “You’re such a sweetheart.”
Emma didn’t think she was imagining the look of supreme annoyance that crossed Kate’s face.
“Don’t call me sweetheart,” Kate muttered, proving her right. She gave Suzie a quick hug before disentangling herself. “You know I don’t like it.”
“I’m sorry. It’s a hard habit to break. Everyone calls you that.”
“You’re going to hate hearing this, but it’s because you are a sweetheart,” Emma said. “You’re the absolute best, Kate. Everyone loves you.”
“Everyone loved George,” Kate corrected. “George was the best. I’m just the girlfriend who got knocked up her senior year. People are only willing to overlook that because Jessica is all that’s left of him.”
“Having sex in high school is not a character flaw,” Emma said. “Lots of people did it, including George, obviously. You’re not even the only one who got pregnant.”
“Right. And remind me how those girls were treated?”
Emma bit her lip. Kate had a point there. She wouldn’t say that they were shunned, exactly, but they weren’t embraced with open arms like Kate. And that had nothing to do with Kate being more deserving, and everything to do with George. Hart’s Ridge, like small towns all over the country, had sent many of its young adults to the military. George was the only one who hadn’t come home again. That made him a hero, in addition to being a good guy.
“It’s just hard, dealing with all those expectations,” Kate said softly. “Everyone wants me to be perfect for George, but I’m not perfect. And sometimes...sometimes I want to scream my head off.”
Emma’s heart ached for her friend. “Kate...”
“It doesn’t matter.” Kate shook her head and smiled brightly, signaling that she was done talking about it. “Let’s go get some votes.”
Emma exchanged a worried look with Suzie, who lifted her shoulders in an I know, but what can we do? gesture. They fell into step.
“So, where next?” Emma asked, because Suzie was the mastermind here. Emma was only tagging along because, well, she had to.
Her phone buzzed before Suzie could answer the question. She retrieved it from her purse, noted the unfamiliar number, and answered it anyway. “Hello?”
“Ms. Andrews? This is Maria Lipscomb from the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office. I received your email regarding the lamp posts of Hart’s Ridge, and we have a problem.”
Emma frowned. That wasn’t what she wanted to hear at all. “Just a moment.” She hit mute and looked at her friends. “I have to take this. I’m going to get a coffee at Wired. You guys want anything?”
They shook their heads. Emma unmuted the phone and darted across the street. “Sorry about that. What can I do for you?”
Ms. Lipscomb sighed heavily. “It’s not about what you can do, unfortunately. It’s about what you’ve already done.”
That didn’t sound good at all. Emma’s heart sank into her shoes. “What did I do?”
“The lamp posts on Main Street are registered on the National Register of Historic Places, which means that all repairs must be approved by the State Historic Preservation Office. You did not receive approval before commencing work.” Ms. Lipscomb sighed again. “All of which is to say that you violated Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act.”
Emma’s heart exited her shoes and sank beneath the sidewalk pavement. “I broke a law?” she squeaked.
“Yes. Yes, you did.”
“Oh my God.”
Emma sat down on the bench outside Wired and rubbed her forehead. Her first act as mayor broke the law. All she had wanted was to make her dad proud. To be like her mom and leave things better than she found them. That’s it. A little thing, she had told herself. And she had failed spectacularly. Why had she ever thought she could do this?
“Okay,” she said. “Okay. What should I do? How do I fix this?”
“I don’t know that it can be fixed, unfortunately. If the historic nature of the lamp posts has been destroyed, there will be fines. I’ll need you to send me, in writing, everything you did to the lamp posts. The method you used for cleaning and painting. The brand and type of paint. All of that. Let’s hope you did not damage anything beyond repair.”
“I’ll do that today.”
The moment she hung up, she started typing. Five minutes later she hit send. Now all she could do was wait.
She stood up, rubbing her aching neck, and looked up from her phone, searching for her friends. Instead of Suzie and Kate, she found herself eye-to-eye with Eli’s new campaign poster. There was a picture of him in his police uniform, grinning his good-guy grin...and next to that was her dad’s mug shot.
Emma froze, stunned. He could have walked up to her in the middle of Main Street and punched her in the face and it would have hurt less. Would have made her feel less exposed than she felt right now, staring at the photographic evidence of the second worst moment of her dad’s life.
Things were not falling into place. Not at all. Things were falling apart.
***
Eli was having a pretty good day until Mrs. Gaither, who was somewhere between the age of eighty-three and Methuselah, socked him on his shoulder with her purse.
“Hey, now!” He rubbed the spot where her bag had made contact. What the hell did she have in there, rocks? “What was that for?”
“Don’t you play dumb with me, young man. I won’t have it. Those posters are all over town. You should be ashamed of yourself.” She smacked him again, on his other shoulder this time. “I’m disappointed in you, Eli.”
That stung more than the clobbering. Mrs. Gaither had always liked him.
“What posters?” he asked. The only posters he knew of were the ones that said he was running for mayor. She couldn’t be pissed about that, could she? It didn’t make any sense. “Honestly, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m just here to get my coffee and maybe a donut. That’s it.”
Shrunken though she was, Mrs. Gaither still managed to grab hold of his ear and haul his face to where she wanted it. “Those posters. Now, what do you have to say for yourself?”
Eli blinked, trying to get his eyes to focus on the image a mere two inches from his nose. There he was...and there was Mr. Andrews.
Oh, shit.
He pulled back, despite her grip on his ear, so that he could see the whole thing. The choice is yours. Do you want the man who puts criminals behind bars, or the criminal’s daughter? Vote for Eli Carter. Vote for law and order.
Double shit.
“What did that poor girl ever do to you to deserve this?” Mrs. Gaither demanded. She released his ear so she could hit him again. “Hasn’t she had enough sorrow in her life? No matter what her dad did or didn’t do, she’s done right her whole life. This isn’t Washington, D.C. This is Hart’s Ridge, and we don’t tolerate this sort of nastiness here.”
“I don’t...I didn’t...” He flailed for words. How had this happened? Who had done this? Because it wasn’t him.
Jacob Bronson. It had to be Jacob Bronson. Goddammit.
“There’s Emma now. Maybe you can explain it to her.”
He turned so fast he nearly gave himself whiplash. Their gazes clashed and held. And the look in hers. Oh, God. It damn near broke him. Wounded. Like a lover had stabbed her in the back. Which, fair enough. Only he hadn’t, but she didn’t know that.
She spun on her toes, hair whipping behind her, and broke into a run. She was literally running away from him. There was a time when he would have allowed it. Would have allowed her to leave him over a stupid misunderstanding, because oh well, she was bound to leave him sooner or later anyway. No point in making someone stay when they were determined to go.
But he had only just gotten her back. She couldn’t go away so soon. Not like this.
Not this time, honey.
She had a head start, but that didn’t matter. Emma wasn’t a runner, whereas Eli put in three miles most days of the week. He caught up with her in a block, wrapped his arms around her like a lasso, and hauled her back against his chest.
She struggled against him. “Let go of me!”
“Just listen. Listen first, and if you still want to walk away after, fine. Just listen. Please.”
She stopped struggling. Her shoulders vibrated, but he knew her well enough to know it was anger, not tears. She was pissed. That was fine. He could handle her anger. It was her other moods he didn’t know what to do with—like how she had gone all withdrawn while they were painting. Something had been eating at her, but she hadn’t seemed interested in sharing.
But her anger, yeah. She was more than happy to share that.
And he was more than happy to handle it.
He didn’t know why that was, why all her fury only made him feel softer. She was a wave crashing on the shore, and he was the sand, soothing the wave into placidity before it returned to the ocean. That was about the sappiest damn thought he had ever had, but so what? He was softer with her, and in that softness was more strength than he ever knew he possessed.
“Emma-bear.” He leaned in, surrounding her with his body, and lowered his head to press his cheek against hers. “You know I had nothing to do with this. You know that, because you know me. Even the worst thing I ever did to you, it wasn’t from spite. It wasn’t like this.”
She swallowed hard. “Everyone is staring.”
“I don’t fucking care.”
He knew she didn’t either, not really. She was used to people staring at her. At first with pity, because of her mom. And then with morbid fascination, like rubbernecking a car wreck, because of her dad. That hadn’t lasted very long, because people had learned pretty quick that if they stared at Emma, then Emma might stare back, and no sane person wanted to be on the receiving end of a death glare from Emma. She had a way of making a person feel like they needed to get right with Jesus in a hurry.
“I hate that picture of my dad. Is that what everyone thinks of him? He gets out in less than six months. I know what he did was wrong, I get it. But he’s not going to do that again, because it’s not like my mom can resurrect herself and die of cancer all over again, you know? I want people to remember who he was before, all the good he did. He deserves a second chance.”
“I know, honey. I’ll take care of it. I have a pretty good idea who put them up, and I’ll see to it that they’re taken down.”
“I’m trying to set up a life for him here, in Hart’s Ridge. With me. The food truck, he wouldn’t have been very good at that. It’s a small space, just enough work for two. He wouldn’t have fit. So the bed and breakfast...I don’t believe in fate, but it felt like that. Like it was meant to be. He would love telling people all about the history of the house and the town over breakfast. Seriously, he would love that. Everything was finally falling together, and now this? On top of...”
He heard the catch in her voice. “On top of what?”
“I—” She made a gulping noise that sounded suspiciously like swallowing a sob. “I made a mistake. The lamp posts...I knew they were on the historic register, but I didn’t know I needed approval to fix the chipped paint. My first official act as mayor was to break the law. I screwed up, Eli. Like, really, really screwed up.”
The pain in her voice. He ached for her, for what she was feeling. “How were you supposed to know something like that? You couldn’t have known.”
“I should have known. There are laws for everything. It should have occurred to me that there was a law for this, too. My mom would have known. And my dad...well, at least when he broke the law he did it on purpose. If I had paid more attention in school, if I had learned what I was supposed to learn, this wouldn’t have happened.”
“Come on, Emma. You know that’s not true. Not everything is learned in school. So you’re not perfect. No one is. You’re something even better than perfect.”
“Oh, yeah? What’s that?”
“There’s not a word for it, because there’s never been anyone like you. You have an incredible ability to make things better, not just for yourself, but for everyone around you. You’re going to make this better, too. You’re going to fix it. I don’t even have to ask, because I know you’re already on it. So stop putting the bar at perfect. You’re never going to touch it, but that doesn’t matter. You don’t have to.”
Her shoulders had stopped vibrating and she leaned into him, just a little. “Okay,” she said finally. “You can let go of me now.”
He was disinclined to do that.
“What if I don’t want to?” Not now, not ever. But he wasn’t going to say that part out loud, because he already knew the answer. She wasn’t going to keep him. When the election was over, they would be, too.
“I don’t think you have a choice. You’re in uniform, which means you have to work. You can’t stand here on Main Street, holding me hostage all day. Unless you plan to arrest me. That’s what you do, isn’t it? Arrest otherwise upstanding citizens for their very first infraction?”
And there it was. He knew her nerves were frayed to their breaking point, finding out she broke the law while also seeing those damn posters. But she meant it just the same. She still hadn’t forgiven him, not that he had ever asked her to. And dammit, he was tired of it. Never mind that, as far as first infractions went, making crystal fucking meth was not exactly jaywalking. He wasn’t going to take this crap from her. She was sleeping with him, dammit. He had been inside of her. She needed to know what he stood for.
He released her and spun her around by the shoulders to face him. “Emma Louise Andrews, don’t you ever say that to me again. I’ve made mistakes. I know I have. But I’ve worked damn hard to rectify those mistakes. There was a time, when I put on this uniform, I couldn’t look myself in the face. I was too ashamed. But serve and protect—I learned what that meant. I learned how to do it, not just pay lip service. I wear this uniform with pride now. Don’t you dare say otherwise.”
She stared at him with wide gray eyes. He had surprised her. She hadn’t expected him to push back, probably because pushing back wasn’t something he usually did. Not when it came to her.
“Okay,” she said, but he could tell she didn’t understand. And he wanted her to. Wanted her to understand how he felt about his job. Wanted her to understand him.
“Come with me,” he said impulsively.
Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Come with you where?”
“On patrol. Come with me.”
“I was afraid that’s what you meant. No, thank you.”
“Riding along with a police officer, seeing that interaction with Hart’s Ridge citizens, that seems like something a good mayor would be interested in doing.”
She gave his chest a slight push. “That’s a low blow, Officer Carter.”
He noticed that she had left her hand there, resting on his heart. He looked down at it, then at her, eyebrows raised.
“Yes,” she snapped. “I like touching you. What of it?”
“Come with me, and you can keep doing that. Maybe I’ll even let you hold my hand.”
She rolled her eyes. “I’m not that kind of girl.” She huffed a long-suffering sigh. “Fine, I’ll come. But only because I want to be a good mayor.”
He grinned. “Sure, that’s why.”
As he led her to his car, he grabbed her hand, lacing their fingers together. Because he knew exactly what kind of girl she was.