Page 31 of Beehives and Broken Heroes

“‘Just a game’ my pasty behind!” Pete said. “Now it’s all about beating this burro!”

Brandon grinned and shrugged. “Won’t be you, at least not this year.”

Pete feigned horror. “Low blow.”

“You staying the night?” Brandon asked.

Pete nodded, then topped that off with a huge yawn. “But I gotta leave first thing in the morning. Mi vieja isn’t happy I drove down here.”

“Are you from North Carolina, too?” Allie asked.

Pete nodded. “All this was so much easier before you moved here.”

Brandon slid out of the booth and offered a hand to Allie to help her out. “Even if I’d stayed, you still would’ve lost.”

Pete stood and threw his arms up. “Was that called for?”

“I’m going to take Allie back to her party.” Brandon dropped a twenty on the table. “Meet you at the parking lot in five.”

They split up outside, Pete heading down the street as Brandon and Allie crossed back to the club. They stopped outside the front door.

“Brandon,” Allie finally started, pointing toward the club with her thumb. “What you did in there . . .”

“It was my pleasure,” he said.

The silence became awkward, and then Allie started to remove his flannel.

He put up a hand. “Keep it. I can get it back later.”

“Thank you,” she said. Then, before he could walk away, she threw her arms around his middle and squeezed tight. “You’re a good friend, Brandon. The best.”

There was that word again. Friend. He was categorically starting to hate that word.

He pulled back, then reached up and tugged a lock of her hair. She leaned into his hand. “Happy birthday, Allie.”

Chapter 10

“Be mindful of how you treat people. Be mindful of how you handle things. Be mindful of your intentions. Be. Mindful.”

- Alex Elle

Aweek had passed since Allie and Jo’s party. After Brandon left, Allie’d gone back to the dance floor for another hour of wishing he’d stayed. Although apparently, after she’d left, Cash and Danny Cabrera—who hadn’t been a deputy yet for a lot of the Tony fiasco but knew all about it—had told Tony in not so many words to get lost. He had, not surprisingly. The man had never had much of a backbone. They’d also warned Jenn off him. Allie just hoped the woman would take the warning.

What had she ever seen in Tony to begin with? Ugh.

But Brandon . . .

An ice storm had blown through town a couple nights ago, knocking out the power to half the shops on Main. Unfortunately, Sticky and Sweet had been one of them. She and Jo had ended up at their aunt’s house for a couple of nights, as the heat was out in their apartment. Not that they’d minded. The twins loved spending time with Jessie and Caroline, and Allie had been glad to have her pooch, Honey, near for the night. She needed to figure out a better situation for her beloved pet.

The power had come back on halfway through the day after the storm, but Jo and Allie decided not to open and to take a day off since Jo had so many things to do before the wedding. It’d been Allie’s idea. She’d taken the day to go over some details. The next day, they’d stayed closed again so they could drive around and check the crops in the locations where they planned to put their hives to make sure the frost hadn’t killed the buds. It hadn’t. They’d been really lucky.

Now, they sat on the floor in their cousins’ room, where they planned to stay one more night, with Jo’s wedding plans spread all over the floor. Jessie and Caroline were down chatting with their mom, the younger cousins were giggling from the adjoining room. And try as she might, Allie couldn’t get Brandon out of her head.

She didn’t want to think of him or the way he’d wrapped his arms around her while they’d danced. She didn’t want to think of his delicious smell or how hot she’d found him when he’d laid his friend flat in the parking lot. That had been the epitome of studliness. Sigh.

She didn’t want to think about how he’d called her Allie at the end of the night instead of sunshine or about how disappointing she’d found that—surprisingly. And she especially didn’t want to think about how she hadn’t seen him for over a week.

Not at work. Not in town. Not at her aunt’s for Sunday dinner.

---