The café bustled with employees getting ready for the day. Thatcher grabbed mugs and helped himself. He loaded mine with sugar and cream, just the way I liked it.
“I thought you’d be more enthusiastic today.”
“Hmmph.” I took a sip of the hot coffee and hissed as it burned my mouth.
“Easy.” He watched me over the rim of his mug. “You do know your favorite author is due in the store in less than an hour.”
We walked into the main floor of the shop where the first customers of the day perused the aisles. A line had already formed around Miranda Lockhart’s table. A flare of anger shot through me as I realized everyone in line thought they were meeting the author today.
“Why can’t everyone just be themselves?” I muttered.
“What?” Thatcher turned to look at me, eyebrows raised.
I shook my head. “Never mind.” My feelings were irrational. Lots of writers had pen names. I wasn’t mad at Perry Griffin, was I? Then again, Perry Griffin wasn’t a glamorous brunette with perfect hair who’d known Beckett since college.
It made me feel marginally better to know that Sally would not be the first to read Beckett’s latest work. This novel was his best yet. Even though it wasn’t romance, true Miranda fans wouldn’t be surprised to know the same person who’d writtenHeaven on Earthhad penned it. Beckett had a way with prose that made even the mundane seem spectacular. His settings pulsed with life. His characters sauntered into your life like an old friend. And the sex scenes? Panty melting.
I realized I was already composing the five-star review in my head, and I hadn’t even read the ending. Was Perry Griffin going to get the credit for Beckett’s new novel, or would he create a new name?
It was a genre of its own, and it was going to be a groundbreaking hit.
“Help me get some more books from the storeroom.” Thatcher eyed the crowd forming around Miranda’s books. “This is going to be great for business.”
I glared at the cardboard cutout of Sally and the handsome man covered in red kiss marks. If looks could kill, the cardboard would have spontaneously combusted.
“I could hardly believe it when Miranda’s agent reached out to arrange a book tour,” Thatcher said. “Is something wrong with your eye? It’s twitching.”
“I didn’t get much sleep the past few nights.”
“Join the club. Painting isn’t as easy as it looks.” He opened the door to the storeroom. “It took four cans of paint to do the living room. I think I got three on the floor and one on the walls. I spent half the night cleaning up.”
“Hmm.”
“Okay, what the hell is wrong with you? You were jumping out of your skin a month ago when I told you Miranda was coming, and now that she’s due any minute, you look like you’re plotting a murder.”
I sat on a box of books and peered into my coffee mug as if it had all the answers. “I’m thinking about something else.”
Thatcher chuckled. “More like someone else. If Beckett can get your mind off Miranda Lockhart, you must have it bad.”
Even before I’d known Beckett’s secret identity, he’d distracted me. Now, he was all I could think about. “I’ve tried to tell him I don’t want a relationship, but he refuses to listen.”
Thatcher sipped his coffee. “Why are you so sure you don’t want a relationship?”
I scoffed. “I don’t do relationships. You know that.”
“That was the past,” he said. “Things change. You’re not the same person you were when you started working here a year ago. First of all, you’re still here.”
I stood and paced across the room. I remembered warning Thatcher that I wanted to work at Hyperbole’s temporarily. I’d told him I never stayed put for long.
Was Thatcher right? Had I changed? I blamed Mossy Oak. The fine weather, the clear Carolina sky, the ease of small-town life where everyone had a greeting and a kind word for a neighbor—all of them combined to make me want to stay in Mossy Oak forever.
I’d never wanted forever before. I had a perpetual wanderlust that only relocating could satisfy.
But I’d never been anywhere like Mossy Oak before. The town seemed to collect people like me—outsiders who didn’t really fit in anywhere—and bring them together.
Mossy Oak had everything I wanted—the best bookshop in the world, the closest friends I’d ever made, weather that hardly ever kept me from doing what I wanted, and Beckett Vinroot.
My heart beat faster just thinking about his green-brown eyes twinkling at me.
